The metal slime oozed its way over to the fallen hero and appeared as a 7ft tall MILF with large shiny titties. It shook its hips back and forth, tantalizing behind the fallen heroes back. A smile appeared on the formerly stoic being's face, and it winked at me.

 

“Did you know the one who enslaved Medy before was the hero of this town? Like me, he betrayed the angels, but unlike me, he saw monsters as nothing more than tools.” Medy rolled her eyes behind the fallen hero’s back. “Save me the trouble; if you plan to be like him and enslave the monsters after you betray the angels, then you’re my enemy.” The man said.

 

The fallen hero was dressed in leather armor, enchanted out of the ass, and radiated a metallic feel. I could smell rust wafting off him. He wasn’t overly tall, nor was he short. As far as heroes went, this guy was every man’s average everyman.

 

I checked my current PL and my energy levels. While I was topped off, that didn’t mean I was in the best state imaginable. Every 10PL of enhancement increased my physical strength by two of me. At a PL of around 120, I was roughly 12 times stronger than the average guy. That was until I took a strength and speed pill. They fundamentally changed how I tallied my enhancement. Roughly, the materials I worked with had a qualitative increase. It was like before I was 1, and not I’m 1.2, meaning before, with enhancement, I was a solid 12; now I’m 14.4. While that didn’t seem like much, it was a little over a sixth stronger. It was the difference between having twelve people to potentially pick up a car and having fourteen.

 

There were other statues in the clearing, a few that had gone untouched in the metal slime’s feeding rampage. I raised my fist and punched one of the statues of a girl holding out her palm to block a sword. The statue crumbled and melted into a pool of slag.

 

It felt good to use my strength.

 

“So you’ve bought the fire spell book and put all your points into strength pills, big deal. If you were smart, you would spec into magic like a Giga Chad Wizard. Look at me; I have a metal slime to take the hard blows and deal with close-range enemies. What are you going to do against an enemy with range, you angel boot-licking fuck.” The fallen hero said.

 

That seemed a little uncalled for. I was only flexing my muscles to get a feel for my new level of strength. My plan for this place had nothing to do with this guy. I wanted to see about gathering a herd for food while I trained. Really, I only investigated this guy because I was curious why the people were hiding in their homes.

 

“What’s your name, oh giga Chad Wizard?” I asked.

 

This guy was completely hostile, and I loved every minute of it. Get him talking, and I was sure the guy would run his mouth. It’s what I needed most of all: some free information from a guy too angry to censor or lie.

 

Just in case, I gave a few commands through my cube and prepared my home to ram them just in case.

 

“Walter Franklin, remember it. I’m going to be the strongest hero in the world. You, on the other hand, aren’t going anywhere. You’ve shown your hand, and there aren’t enough points to go around. Little known fact: kill a hero, and all the points they have and spent go to you.” Walter said.

 

The metal slime lurched forward, its body aimed for my mouth; I could practically see the strategy in my mind’s eye. She was going to enter through my mouth and burst me from the inside out. Whether I could burn her up in time or she destroyed me would be a mystery. I dodged her attack with a sidestep and aimed my pointer finger at the fallen hero.

 

A laser fired. 

 

It was deflected by a mirror shield of polished steel. The smell of iron coming from Walter meant that he had metal magic. I should have known, but I hoped my attack would have ended the battle immediately.

 

“Do you think this is our first encounter with another hero? We wait in places like this for the so-called special heroes to appear. Not one has survived long enough to challenge the necromancer queen. She and Diablos will continue rewarding us while failures like you die.” Walter said.

 

It seemed Walter had a bit of an inferiority complex. Well, in his defense, he was a mage. The fact I used the words Giga Chad and Wizard together felt more wrong than this setup.

 

It should have been obvious the town knew something fights between heroes must happen frequently enough for them to be in their homes. Did I miss a scout on the way, or did the inhabitants have the means to detect me?

“Sword Of Damocles,” a silver sword wreathed in darkness, slashed at me with blinding speed. Medy’s body fired piercing metal tentacles that hardened right before impact, only slowed but not stopped by my barrier. Blood-spewing craters opened across my chest as the blade wreathed in darkness and slashed at me under the moonlight.

 

I raised my fists and felt the weapon cut down to the bone. My barrier wasn’t enough; I wasn’t at the level needed to block spells like Sword Of Damocles bare-handed. The sword sliced, cutting a line through my bones; before I could adjust, more metal tentacles punctured my body, as I spilled blood on the ground.

 

The lion’s share of my energy pool was then given to regenerating from the damage to my arms.

 

My footwork was slowed from blood loss, and no matter how I maneuvered, Medy stayed in front of me. I kicked her in the gut, and despite the force and heat behind my attacks, she remained unfazed. Her stomach rippled from my blows but showed little damage.

 

Then my house flew upside down and ran the slime over. Her body was scattered but slowly started coming back together. On the other hand, my hands were attached by strips of muscle and little bone. 

 

My house rounded for another strike, only for Walter to raise his hand and turn the trajectory of my home. It appeared metal magic was overpowered as hell. At the moment, winning seemed practically impossible. If my arms were 100%, I would have risked it, but after the fight, I didn’t feel confident in bringing the fight into close range. Another swipe from the Sword Of Damocles spell might cut me in half with my current energy reserves.

 

When my home came around again, I knew I had to retreat.

 

“What are you going to do without your meat shield? You said it yourself: you’re not a long-range fighter.” I said.

 

“Oh, I like my chances, and Medy isn’t as out of it as she appears. This is around the time she prepares for her second phase. Trust me, it’s something to behold.” Walter said.

 

I jumped back and fell on the floor of my home when it came back around. We zoomed away out of danger.

 

“A shame I don’t think we’ll meet again,” Walter said.

 

…

 

Out of town, on the far end of the pastures, I found a good-sized herd and parked my house. By my count, there were a good 280 heads of cattle, perfect for the next stage of my plan.

 

Under unfamiliar stars and a yellow moon with unfamiliar craters, I let my emotions out. For the briefest second, I lost control over my aura, and the air vibrated with heat. I was ready to burn the world down for that terrible loss. My arms were still healing; there was some kind of murky darkness in the wound. I got it then the darkness covering the blade was a curse or lasting effect.

 

Magnetism was something I should add to the resist list for future projects, especially the metal kind. I lost to a magic user; I lost to a self-proclaimed Giga Chad Wizard. That hurt more than the wounds currently leaking black necrotic puss.

 

I bought a health pill and swallowed it down. Using the system was a must; if I didn’t do that much, then how could I expect to get better.

 

My eyes glared at the holographic image of the four elemental spell books. I felt like if I purchased one, I would be betraying everything my culture stood for. Even if I knew I couldn’t suffer from cascading cell death from learning something new. It felt morally wrong to use magic. On the other hand, I lost. 

 

If I hadn’t used my house as a weapon, Walter would have killed me. What angered me more was the fact Walter hadn’t shown me everything he could do, not by a long shot. I lost to a bastard mage fallen hero who held back. I needed comfort food.

 

One of the cows approached close enough, and I punched it, driving my fist into its head. The animal’s legs kicked out from under it, and I went to work processing the animal. Blood could be used for permanent seals that didn’t require enough energy to use constructs. I needed to fence in the area and prevent other people from entering it.

 

…

 

Within the throne of Seraphs, Helel and the other angels watched a monitor depicting Atom’s progress or, in this case, setbacks.

 

“Awe, he lost, but he’s taking more pills; that’s a good thing,” Uriel said.

 

“Walter Franklin is a piece of shit; we gave concessions, and he joined up with Diablos for slime girl titties,” Satanos said.

 

Helel was focused on what he was building with cow blood. Fencing was going up while his arms healed and spewed black puss on the ground. Normally, the land would become cursed and produce monsters from those injuries. Darkness loved to mutate, invade, and eventually corrupt. With those wounds, it was only a matter of time before Atom joined Diablos. They should prepare for their next experiment, maybe a hero with less talent and more insanity. At this point, they were throwing darts at a wall.

 

“What’s he doing?” Helel peered closer at Uriel’s question.

 

The seals, when crafted with blood, produced a small amount of energy of their own. The fence altered by Atom kept the coventrated energy in the fence. While some grass died, some adapted and rapidly took the place of the wilted grass. Seals were used to alter the landscape completely, unlike the farm she had seen in the other world. Atom was experimenting in ways she had not foreseen. He stored parts of the cow in a wooden box covered in seals before building a water collector over a freshly dug pit.

 

Atom’s enhanced strength transformed the land rapidly while the energy infusing it changed the flora and soon the fauna that lived there.

 

“I don’t think this is over yet,” Uriel said.

 

“You say that, but no one beats the corruption of darkness,” Satanos said.

 

…

My home hovered above the doll hill; it was time to get back to it. A red moon hung overhead, drowning the entire hill in a serial killer tint. I felt like killing and fucking the bastard Walter Franklin might be there, and if so, good. Our next fight wouldn’t be the same. A week was enough to get my strength to a higher level.

 

I was feeling fouler than normal and needed a good fight to get back into feeling like myself.

 

PL 295

 

I popped a strength, speed, and health pill, bringing my totals up to 5 each. While my wounds have healed, black veins have crept up from my forearms. No amount of bloodletting seems to do the trick, and I can’t move forward unless I do some research. With my limited supplies, I had to lean further onto seals to satisfy my needs.

 

Liquid energy was a thing, and a pit I dug was currently filling with it one heavily condensed and concentrated drop at a time. While magic and energy weren’t anathema to each other, energy baths couldn’t hurt. They would help soothe my sore muscles.

 

The second my arms were better, black veins or not, I began training while taking the pills. My body could only handle one of each per day, but the results were astounding. Health pills made me healthier and allowed me to train far past my normal limits. While I wasn’t looking at growing thousands of PL at a time, I didn’t have the resources to feed that I was well on my way to the upper 200s. After my first week, I ran out of pills and haven’t had a chance to go back to the doll hill to restock on points. Still, from what I could tell, I was roughly 60 times stronger than a normal human.

 

I leaped out of my door and plummeted headfirst for the doll mountain. My landing smashed old broken dolls apart and earned me a couple points from the impact. There had to be a few spirits possessing the dolls, or maybe they were some kind of mechanical monster. But looking up at the castle above the hill, dumping out dolls like it was going out of style, I had a hunch the necromancer queen had something to do with it.

 

Dolls rose up on the hill, and I moved, breaking them apart with my fists and melting them down to slag. I cleared out whole groups in moments as I climbed higher up the hill. More dolls made their way to me but met the same fate. My points ticked up as I traveled until the dolls started reacting faster to my blows, and some managed to score some hits.

 

That caught my attention. Halfway up the hill, the dolls were getting stronger. It seemed there was a point to all of this after all. The Necromancer queen had a plan or a plot in motion, and this pile of dolls was her failure in an epically long research plan to create powerful artificial monsters. Or perhaps this was something more personal. She may have wanted a spare body for herself and didn’t want to go with the whole grossness of lichdom.

 

As I thought about it, I heard the cutting of a familiar spell and an unfamiliar voice. If I heard his name, I would go insane.

 

“Walter,” a melodious voice called out. “We need to retreat; the dolls are getting too strong the points aren’t worth it,” Medy said.

 

“Come on, just a little more. I need to get to the third tier. That bastard must have saved up all his points to rise up the tiers; how else did he manage to get a flying ride like that.” Walter said.

 

I moved without thinking and punched my hand through a doll sneaking up behind the bastard. As the doll burned to slag under my fist, Walter slowly turned his head and our eyes me. My blow flashed faster than ever before, striking him in a metallic shield that fractured and cracked as the heat melted its surface, running the steel like a wax candle in a fire. I crouched low and threw myself forward, placed my hands on a pair of breasts, and kicked Walter with both feet, shattering the shield and sending the fallen hero into a pile of silicon.

 

“Sword of Damocles,” Walter shouted, and I moved, leaving behind afterimages as I smashed him in the chest with my fist. His body crumbled into a mass of metal slime, and for a moment, I was stunned before I turned to see Medy with Walter encased in her body. “Medy second stage.”

 

Blades wreathed in darkness, spears covered in winding flames, and arrows dripping with foul-smelling liquids slashed, pierced, and fired in my direction. A wall of liquid metal finely controlled by a metal mage lashed out, shifting and homing whenever I dodged an attack. My body moved faster as the attacks grew faster and more accurate. The heat of my aura didn’t stop the liquid metal magically kept cool by Walter.

 

I hadn’t learned any magic, and one of the blades bypassed my barrier. First blood went to them again. There was so much magic in the attacks that my barrier was bypassed almost instantly. The slightest glancing blow from the swords and spears cut me to ribbons; when they struck flesh, they burst, dealing as much damage as possible.

 

This was the power of synergy between a monster and a human with the same elements. What should I get a dragon or some kind of phoenix to counter them?

 

I refused even as blood-soaked a shirt I stole from the laundry lines of the villagers. While I had grown stronger, it seemed they had been holding back before. I still didn’t know how much. There was only one way to find out. At a PL of 295 and 5 health pills, my regeneration was much stronger. Even the explosive strikes from the blades healed quickly.

 

Heat rose around me as I let my aura loose. I turned up the heat higher than I dared, uncaring of who would sense it. The air shimmered as my wrath finally peaked, and the metal that had resisted me before melted. My lungs hurt, and suddenly, I realized I was screaming. Streams of bubbling silicon and metal covered the ground, and the mage lifted his hand.

 

“We’re ready now to show you the second phase.” Metal from all around the stuff I melted myself flowed into the Medy. She grew larger and larger until a red orb appeared; it was her core rotating around Walter. “Behold our true power.”

 

A fist lashed out faster than I expected and smashed me into the ground. I crawled back to my feet, simmering in a pool of rising metal; it was rising to fill out Medy more. Blood leaked down my chin and filled my lungs, throwing me into a coughing fit.

 

I watched the giantess continue to grow. After all, the current giantess hardly had the tits to match the real Medy.

 

Magic used mana to manipulate. It could be used to gather heat for a fireball and burned as fuel for it, but magic didn’t really create. The same rules applied to the giantess Medy. She couldn’t pull it out anywhere, and controlling so much metal and keeping it liquid must be exhausting. I doubted they could keep up their second phase indefinitely. That wouldn’t matter if they smashed me to bits. The giantess raised her hand and produced the largest Sword of Damocles yet. It was easily 50 feet long and wreathed in enough darkness to drink the light from the moon.

 

Chains of various metals rose from the pools of liquid metal around me, shooting out to bind or distract me. The Doll Hill might have been the worst possible place to fight Walter. Melting so much metal for him to use was also a mistake. I didn’t think ramming my house into Giantess Medy was going to cut it this time.