"Alrighty then [Appraisal]"

The magic circle formed around one of my hands, the target was, of course, the moving statue of [The Peasant Knight] that is now eyeing me, he actually didn't twitch or showed any sign that it was disturbed by the skill.

"Okay let's see... 1 minute I guess?"

The runes were slowly forming around the magic circle, it would take a minute before it activated and it wasn't even sure if the magic circle would activate immediately like with the husk. Felix was thinking about this, he didn't really take his attention off the statue since [Calculation] made him able to guess the time properly.

The statue suddenly ran forwards and pulled its sword back, since the statue didn't have any muscles it was hard for Felix to guess what it was going to do but [Prediction] and some game knowledge filled the gaps and made him jump at the side.

*Swoosh*

The statue thrust its stone sword forward where Felix's stomach was a moment ago, then immediately went for a wide swing which was promptly blocked by the spear, its force was impressive but Felix's [Poise] skill made him resist the attack and deflect the sword, Felix decided to ignore the system messages at the moment but he was sure he got a level up on [Poise] from the impact.

In the opening, he made Felix swing the tip of the spear toward the statue's neck with the intent to kill it, and immediately got hit.

"Wha-!?"

' TOUGH '

The first thing that it was felt was the vibration of the spear, and the repelling force that almost made him drop it on the floor, then a scraping sound made it into his ears. Felix was confused and almost got himself slashed but he managed to roll back before the swing got him.

Felix looked at the statue, it didn't look perturbed or even more damaged, then he looked at his spear momentarily while taking a step to the left in a circling motion. and then his eyes widened at the realization.

"IT'S A FUCKING STATUE"

He yelled the obvious.

 

Felix wasn't an idiot who didn't realize this, the statue was made of stone no matter how you looked at it, but the fact didn't truly sink in because in the game, no matter the enemy, the attack NEVER got staggered or blocked because the enemy had armor.

"FUCK this is worse than I thought"

The statue was the tutorial boss, it is meant to crush anyone who simply hadn't learned the game controls yet, wide swing for the player to roll, telegraphed attacks for reflexes, and finally, a bit of damage to make the player understand that the game simply won't tell you shit from there on out.

But this was real life, a stone statue that moves is made of stone, not ' Flesh stone or something ' as his brain made him think, it was a simple statue of stone. He immediately got on even more guard and started sweating at the jump in difficulty that this problem posed, he did not have the confidence that the spear would be usable in this battle.

"Alright then STONE FUCK get over here"

He immediately turn the tip of the spear backward and held the blunt end towards the stone statue that was now taking quick steps towards him... or as quick as a stone statue could walk.

' If I use the tip it would get blunt in like 4 strikes or something that would be not good '

A thrust passes over his side nearly hitting him, he hit the hand that was holding the sword, but as expected the impact made him stun for a second from the recoil, the statue itself also seemed a bit more disturbed but it brushed it up quickly and started to dash towards him with its shield up.

' Oi, that's cheating '

The statue stopped in front of him and used the momentum to rotate its body to do a swing towards him, Felix immediately pulled his spear in the opposite direction with his two hands while lowering himself.

"BRING IT ON"

A clash of a stone sword and a metal spear was heard, the impact transferred from the spear made him grit his teeth from the pain he felt at the recoil, and his entire body began to slide a few centimeters along with the dirt.

After the clash, he jumped back to make distance with the statue and gazed upon it, it was becoming increasingly obvious that looking at its unchanging expression would not give him an advantage so he decided to simply look at its posture and the cracks that it had, new ones sometimes appeared once he looked closely.

It rolled towards him and immediately tried to stab him in the head, he diverted the blow with another swing of the spear and it barely missed his head, he was getting used to the recoil and decided to stab the face of the statue in retaliation. The statue used its while to block and thankfully it did not deflect the blow.

' Fuck!! the shield is not for show in here '

Then, a single text appeared in his peripheral vision.

〈 Living Statue 〉

' Descriptive '

That was his only tough as he tried to roll away from another swing, then the statue did a stab while he was distracted.

"Gafuh?!"

A stinging pain got in his left arm, a little above the elbow, he backed away from the statue as it tried to stab him again. He inspected his arm and found that a part of it was cut deeply, he felt the warm blood falling down his arm as well as saw the skin and part of the gauged flesh hanged from there.

The statue immediately tried to strike him down with a forceful downwards swing, he rolled to the side and almost fell but he immediately got his act together. The statue had its sword slightly buried in the ground so Felix tried to make it off balance by tackling it down.

He ran up to the statue and used his left side to bring it onto the ground, the sound of his body crashing against stone entered his ears as the statue fell, Felix groaned as he felt the consequences of tackling a fucking stone statue and backed away to check his HP.

He grabbed the flask of water and immediately gulped it down and checked his [Resources].

 

HP: 349/400 (0.33/min)  |   MP: 280/280 (0.33/min)  |   STA: 195/230 (3.8/min)

 

"Ah god fucking dammit!"

He was actually decently hurt even though it didn't feel like it, he grabbed the flask of water and immediately gulped it down completely, his wound starting to close slowly, it took a complete minute before he got his 400 HP completely up, he had to block a few sword strikes before he could do something.

A swing from the left came, a swing for the right and followed with a stab, Felix dodged, redirected, and rolled to evade the sword from the statue that was strangely swift. He retaliated by swinging his spear onto the sword two times and immediately backing off.

*thud*

Felix immediately felt how his back hit something, his movements completely stopped, a sweat dropped from his face as he immediate looked backward

"The wall huh?..."

Felix looked back at the statue, it was completely fixated on him and had its sword in the position to exert its all to stab him, he felt the shadow of death on his head, he steeled himself and tempered his resolve.

*Swoosh*

Like a train, the sword came forward with the complete force of the statue as it made the air almost chirp, Felix's gaze was on the sword and its trajectory while using [Prediction] and [Calculation] to their fullest extent. He almost was late in raising his spear and redirecting the spot where the sword was going.

By pushing his spear up, he made the sword go a little more up than intended, but it would surely be a sure hit on the left side of his chest if it still landed, Felix dropped down by crouching and the sword thankfully landed out of his body.

The statue wasn't impressed or so it look like to Felix, it tried to pull the sword out of the wall.

*...*

Silence, Felix was already standing up when the statue saw the wall, the sword miraculously was stuck between the bricks that made up the wall, it wasn't immovable but it was stuck there for at least a few seconds. Felix made damm sure to take the opportunity at hand and raised his legs upwards.

As lighting, his leg swung down to the sword in a beautiful Axe kick that had the complete weight of his body, The statue was actually surprised about how ready the kick seemed. But a simple kick would not bre-

*CRACK*

The sword immediately snapped, starting from the cracks that the constant clash of spear and sword that Felix was so adamantly keen on. The statue looked at the grinning Felix. he used the surprise from the statue to deliver a Yakuza kick at the statue that caused him pain, but it was strong enough to send the statue staggering backward.

"It worked better than expected, I must be a genius of some kind!"

He said while not believing himself at all.

Felix made his objective to break the sword once he knew that the statue of stone was actually made of stone, hitting the sword constantly and with force would inevitably make it crack since the sword was also made of stone, not springy metal. so it was not difficult to simply keep hitting the same spot over and over again.

Then he simply let the statue put the sword in a compromising position and broke it with brute force broke it, now the statue had something even worse than a short sword since it would keep breaking every time it strikes something. The sword itself was still dangerous if he got hit but the danger levels just got shot down immensely.

Felix spun his spear around himself and looked down onto the statue that was still somehow perplexed at his figure, the fluttering green cloak, the hair that fell down and hid one of his eyes, and the brown orb that gazed onto the statue with absolute superiority. Right there and then the statue looked relaxed as if to say ' I found the one '.

Felix simply swung his spear once again to end the statue.