The Primal Hunter

Caroline couldn’t even scream anymore as the metal spread from her heart until all that remained was a mannequin of iron. The low vitality and toughness of a healer became apparent, as she didn’t even have time to struggle before her death.

On the other hand, Richard was dumbfounded along with the still more than 30 elites around him. What the fuck was going on?

“Always the healer first,” William said, his voice cold, “And then you do the adds, followed by the big boss.”

With those words, metal slid up and covered his face, not even leaving any holes for air to seep through.

His spear was still stuck in Caroline’s corpse of metal as the two warriors closest to him made their move.

The first one swung down a massive heavy sword, aiming for the hand that held the spear. William didn’t even bother to dodge as the man hit his lower arm.

To the surprise of everyone but William, the arms didn’t even move. Instead, the warrior felt the impact reverberate up his arms, causing him to grunt in pain. The ground below William did sink in slightly, but otherwise, he didn’t really feel the blow very much.

Counteracting the force using metal manipulation on his armor was simplicity itself, while the enchantments Herrmann had placed on the armor nullified much of the impact. Along with that, William didn’t exactly rate the man very highly.

The other warrior simply stabbed towards William's back, his blade not finding any purchase either as it encountered the impenetrable armor.

“Boring,” a distorted voice sounded out from within the golem-like body.

Taking his spear out in a far faster motion than any of the warriors were capable of, he swung it to one side, slicing up the chest of the one with the heavy sword, while four blades seemed to emerge from the armor as they stabbed through another.

Instantly two warriors fell as Richard started to realize the gravity of the situation.

“FORMATION!” he yelled as they all shrugged off their groggy states and all retreated away from the metal caster.

The casters on Richard’s side began to condense spells, as the two archers that remained began to each channel a Powershot.

Not that William planned on letting them fire it, as more weapons emerged from his armor.

William didn’t have any spatial storage but instead used the Legacy of Herrmann Schmidt to summon his armory. It was akin to spatial storage in some ways, but in other ways, it wasn’t. The weapons didn’t physically exist but were constructed in real-time by the skill as he used them.

It allowed William to summon creations of the late smith. Swords, axes, spears, daggers, all sorts of weapons, and some pieces of armor. Though the young caster didn’t need that part of the ability, as he was more than fine when it came to his defenses.

It did cost him mana to create these weapons, but it was nothing compared to using his other metal-creation skill.

These weapons were now flying out one by one from his body as he focused his mind on controlling them. When he had first gotten the skill Metal Manipulation, he could manage only a few daggers. It rapidly progressed from three to four to five, and so on and so forth.

Now, more than twenty weapons that were far bigger than a dagger flew around him with erratic movements. Like a school of fish, they bombarded the poor warriors, who could only scream and run as the nearly two dozen weapons chased them down pointy-end first.

Seeing that this couldn’t go on, Richard charged towards William as he released a shockwave of force. While the young caster's armor gave him incredible defenses, it did have its limits as he was blasted backward, momentarily losing control of some of the flying weapons.

met Richard's glowing sword with it. A mighty clash of caster and warrior ended as one

a giant bell as the man hammered it with his sword. Without

the chest, making him nearly fall over from

decrepit and weak. He looked in an even worse shape after more than twenty swords pinned

Richard, who didn’t manage to raise his shield in time. The spear struck down again and again but was reflected every

Ferroras. It raised his physical stats significantly while wielding

living things, which meant that William had to penetrate flesh to activate it. Something Richard currently hadn’t allowed him

of them was agility-focused in any way, but their speed was nevertheless impressive even to most light-warriors only

to consider the entire situation. Richard did manage to face him in melee combat, but this was all while William simultaneously focused on the many flying weapons as he suppressed all the other elites around

also had to keep track of all the ranged attacks and the warriors who managed to approach him. While he could shrug

from the side as William dodged backward frantically. Another flood soon followed as a caster who seemed himself

spell not unlike what Herrmann had done to finish his armor. In return for consuming your life source, the

behind him, propelling towards William. With a fright, the metal manipulator tried to get away but was blocked by Richard,

bomb, with William only barely managing to summon his trusty Wall of Iron

towards physical attacks, it was far from good against elemental ones. The pain was unbearable as he felt his arms and chest heat up and blister as he

single trace of the caster remained, save for the vast area of burned forest in the shape of a crescent

deep breath. His stamina was

they slowly started turning to mana once more as they dispersed. The Spear of Ferroras was also nowhere to be found, as it too had been dispelled. A total of eight

single one of them unscathed, the wounds they had suffered after the fight with Desmond had only worsened. One of the warriors even missed an arm as William had managed to cut it off with

received which meant that the

was the first one to notice as he exclaimed: “Watch out! He is doing something with the

a single arm and a rapier flew past everyone as its tip found purchase in the man standing in the

groaned as he felt the thin blade penetrate him from behind, but he managed to twist his body and avoid getting hit in the heart. In

the moment William’s

“Vortex of Steel.”

of unprocessed metal started slowly rising up from the earth and gathered towards William.

meters. All of them with the equipment they had worn still on. Equipment that now lay unclaimed as their

weapons, arrows, everything. This was soon followed by other tools and articles of

their way towards him. An unlucky warrior also started getting sucked in as he was impacted by an object,

wide open as

sounded

It carved a path through the forest, cutting up and even felling a few

a nail in his eye, but before he could react, half a quiver worth of arrows smashed into his unprotected side. He only managed to get a single scream out before the torso of what had once been a heavy warrior collided with his head with the velocity of a speeding car, knocking him

but effective as it slowly died

beings remained within hundreds of meters of the vortex's epicenter: the one who had summoned it and Richard.

pile of battered armor and weapons as he breathed heavily. Both his arms and one of his legs were completely twisted, with his shield and sword nowhere to be found - a horrendous wound seeping out blood from where

the steel-looking armor slowly got up as the

severe burns. Not a single spec of hair remained, and vast parts of his skin and flesh seemed to have

stupid… too stupid. The dog was too mad