Mmmm


    Though Ares didn''t catch the sound of Mako''s mumbling from where he currently was, he did spy the elf''s body wriggling around a bit and that was more than enough to understand that his time, unimpeded bullying the clone, was close to being up. He needed to deal with this damn clone now and haul some serious ass to kill the elf before he could wake up and start being a problem again. One more. One more debilitating strike on the clone and Dominus ought to be able to come in like a wrecking ball, bulldozing through his opposition and clearing a path. As soon as this clone died Ares'' win was assured in his mind so he focused up and stared down the clone and its disintegration coated scythe. "Black Blossom." Ares copied the clone and activated the same art so as not to fall behind in head on collisions. There was zero reason to not do this unless he wanted to handicap himself for some training but the time for that was long over and Ares was in full ''win this encounter'' mode right now.


    Ares threw aside petty tricks and ran straight to the clone without taking any detours or setting up any plan B''s, his sole goal was to force direct confrontation and win off the back of his vastly superior skill and his ''healthier'', if it could even really be called that, bodily state. Ares let the clone take the first swing so he could get a feel for what kind of level it was at when given a chance to actually strike at him but Ares wasn''t much impressed by the weak poke that came his way using the blunt end of the scythe. It was safe but could convert into an actual swing if the clone wanted by flipping the weapon down, or up, and around. Simple and boring so Ares responded in a way that was sure to get the fight heated up by kicking the underneath of the scythe and sending the butt of it sky high. This action brought the bladed end of the scythe down to the ground, enabling the clone to launch a vertical strike with relative ease but Ares actually wanted it to. If the clone did nothing then Ares was going to punish and if it attacked from this position, launching the attack would be slow and cumbersome as the clone would need to change its grip and swing with little momentum so, despite the attack originating from a closer position to its target, it wasn''t a great attack to be forced to make. Both options were terrible and Ares was looking to exploit this situation. Ares had left himself a little open doing this, with such a brazen kick, but the clone hadn''t expected it and Ares still had a few means to cover for himself if it was necessary. Thankfully it wasn''t, as the clone was slow to retaliate, so Ares'' risky kick paid off in the end and he was able to put the clone in this position without any pushback.


    In the end, the clone gave in and lashed out with the scythe just like Ares wanted it to. It didn''t exactly have many options so it took the simplest one available to it that was the least likely to backfire. It was a losing strategy, as many of the options available to it tended to be as of late, but it would be safe and so that was a manageable outcome from which to plan a new way out of this mess. Plus the Black Blossom would help keep it safe somewhat afterwards anyway. Without the art the clone would have retreated but it was particularly good in situations like this so the clone could be a bit more aggressive here... Or so it thought. It was about to have that assumptive notion dispelled rather quickly. The strike from the clone came flying up from near the ground and, though Ares could dodge it to either side, he knew he needed to intercept it. If he dodged the scythe then the Black Blossom detonation after would still hit him. It wasn''t amazing against Ares but it was more powerful than the pseudo annihilation magic the clone could put out so that made it scary enough to warrant avoiding.


    It wouldn''t be an issue if Ares clashed his own disintegration magic against it, however, because his was just flat out superior. The essence of the clone''s magic was similar to Ares'' but was technically just a really high quality knock off. The clone didn''t have his affiliations for the pillar so using actual, one to one, destruction magic wasn''t a possibility. Still, the fact that creation could almost flawlessly copy the magic''s structure from the ground up and replicate it with astonishing accuracy was to be praised. The ''Ersatz'' title was incredibly apt because it wasn''t the real deal, no, but it was shockingly close and could trick anyone who wasn''t intimately familiar with the magic to begin with. This clone could fool basically anyone who didn''t live in Ares'' house 100% of the time... Although it not speaking much was a dead giveaway. Ares rarely if ever shut his trap! This fight was some of the longest he''d ever spent with his claptrap shut and even then he''d still let out a few curses here and there. Ares had taken the phrase ''silence is golden'' and flipped it on its head. In fact, when he spoke, there was often plenty of gold that followed. The clone needed to work on that, Ares propensity for speech, otherwise it couldn''t even really be called a revenant at that point! Although it was just a clone... But maybe it could transform into Garmr? When its cultivation was at the appropriate stage, and after Mako had seen Ares do transform for real, not just off the back of a Canis Stimulant, it might be able to do it to some extent? There actually might not be too much point though because the reason Garmr was so powerful was because it was an amalgamation of things that Mako couldn''t copy, not right now anyway. Bloodlines, actual destruction magic, draconic heritage, etc... It would still be strong though so maybe it was worth Mako''s time upgrading the clone''s functionality at a later date?


    It seemed like Mako would be highly reliant on his Genesis and Ersatz to be his heavy hitters going forward so he would likely dedicate his training, development, and experimentation in those two directions. The base of his creation magic was flexible enough as is and training with it was somewhat redundant. It could do almost anything anyway and the only real limiting factor was his cultivation. Ironically, the hard worker of the fundamental champions had gotten the pillar that required the least overall effort... Still, in a way, that was a pretty good thing as his overabundance of work ethic could all be piled onto a few things that were worth investing time on rather than being spread thing on pointless issues. His Genesis was going to be freakishly strong once Mako was done kitting it out and it didn''t seem like the kind of thing he was ever really going to be 100% satisfied with. The elf was just going to keep improving it until the heat death of the universe at this point because he had little else to do with his spare time and energy. In that sense, Mako was also a better option than Eagerton because the pompous writer would dedicate his time to his craft which, in a roundabout way, did affect the pillar, just not as much as directly working on the pillar via means like Genesis or Ersatz would. Eagerton would make no effort to improve either of the two aforementioned magnum opus-es of the creation pillar as they didn''t gel well with his approach to life and he was too selfish to change. Though only really partially sentient, the creation pillar did still know what it was doing when picking a suitable candidate!


    Anyway, Mako wasn''t awake yet so Ares kept his attention directed at the clone and swung his scythe overhead to oppose the clone''s attack. The two disintegration laden scythes screeched as they clashed but Ares'' magic was savagely encroaching upon the clone''s disintegration like unchecked ivy and swallowing it up at a rapid pace. Ares'' disintegration rolled over the clone''s scythe and hunted down the remnants of the fake copy that disgusted it before exploding and scattering petals everywhere with a ROAR. The deep bass of the explosion shook the ground and the clone could practically feel the noise in its soul so it instinctually backed away from the danger in front of it and accepted its loss. It couldn''t overpower Ares and his magic lost handily too. It was rough going and only going to get rougher because Ares came bursting through the black tear and petal swarm with single minded motivation to cut the clone in half. The clone struggled to raise the scythe which had been flung into the floor as a result of the earlier collision. Every time he fell behind he would only be able to muster weaker and weaker swings, so it was imperative the clone was as quick as it could be in responding to Ares'' actions, but there were limits to what it was capable of and the clone was beginning to crack.


    Ares sought to wear the clone down even further via an unrelenting assault so he took multiple swings in a row without much caring for underhanded sleights of hand. His strikes and slashes were all expertly woven together with finesse and the talent he''d accrued since he first wielded the scythe way back when so it was hard to deal with. His movements were graceful but packed a daunting threat with every step he took towards the clone as the scythe danced in accordance with his will. The ever flowing scythe and the fluidity of Ares'' approach was hard to muster a worthwhile defence against and the clone could only barely manage to bat away attempt after attempt, failing here and there to completely shun every attack which lead to small scrapes and cuts appearing on its flesh. With every passing slash the clone''s wounds were getting progressively worse and what was once a small cut not even a second ago was now a considerably deeper wound from which blood flew without much impediment. The blood didn''t last long in the fresh air though as disintegration petals, or Ares'' scythe itself, swept through the area and claimed the space as its own shortly after it cropped up.


    Ares rolled the scythe around his palm, hand, and arm to flip it in his grip and then convert the momentum into a swing from angles that were downright despicable. Low and in the corner, high and curved, and slashes that started with a bait in one place but somehow finished in another after a wavy course led it to the clone''s blind spots like a wriggling snake. Ares was on point and each strike was poetry in motion. Every clash the clone managed to force embodied the spirit of a caesura, resetting Ares'' flow but never quite ending it entirely. He piggybacked off the parries and deflects rather than allowing the clone to, managing to exploit them more than the clone could by dragging his body along for the ride and following the weapon to accommodate its deviated course. When his strike was parried he leant after the scythe so that he could then throw his body back around and generate speed and power in his next attack via rotational force. It was a seemingly never ending hail of deathly scythe moves that were tinged with the disintegration''s darkness. He advanced upon the clone and gave it no room to breathe as his attacks became swifter and harder to ward off, almost as if he was descending into a berserk rampage with nothing on his mind over than swinging the scythe to and fro. Ares'' talent with this weapon was soaring as the repeated attacks allowed him to learn with every slash, improving with every movement, even the tiniest, of his wrist.


    Though it seemed improbable, Ares'' footwork had been able to merge with his scythe wielding to a degree that even his sword wielding hadn''t despite being less experienced with this weapon overall. The scythe just felt completely natural in his hands, like it should have been there all along. This feeling was probably a result of the Reaper''s mark and his Timeline Splice experience but it all just kind of clicked together the longer he stuck with the weapon. It even reached a point where the start of one attack and the end of another was indecipherable to the eyes of any non-expert and, even then, the more experienced cultivators had to really stare intently at the weapon to piece together the puzzle of its free-flowing form. The clone wanted to cry at how unfair this all was because it felt like he was being attacked a machine, the kind that learned and adapted over time until it reached perfection and then just kept going for no other reason that because it could. Sparks flew with every effort the clone made to pause Ares'' momentum as it feebly raised the scythe to block but Ares looked truly unstoppable at this point and only the clone''s death would satiate Ares, halting him in his tracks. He genuinely looked like he could do this for days on end... And, yet, despite everything... It almost looked incomplete? Like there was a layer to his scythe proficiency that wasn''t present right now. The form Ares had copied off his future self was missing... Something. Put simply, there was wasted energy. Not in terms of Ares being inefficient, the opposite actually, it seemed like there was a well of untapped brain power and spare time in his swings that he just wasn''t using for some reason. This was not Ares'' final scythe form, not even close, and whatever he learnt to do with that weapon was going to be a nightmare to deal with if what the clone was currently dealing with was still only in its infancy. If this unceasing, unapproachable blade storm of inevitability was still just stage 1 then, quite frankly, the clone didn''t want to see the other stages. It didn''t want to be Ares anymore! How much effort would it take to copy this bastard when he really got going?! Mako was seriously going to have to work overtime on this clone to make him even half as decent as the real deal because there was no way in hell it was managing this task of copying Ares by itself.


    Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    The clone was stumbling backwards and almost trying to scramble away at this point but something truly disastrous happened when it turned to run... It hit a wall! Ares had pushed the clone all the way to one side of the arena and cornered it like a rat where it was going to have fight like its life depended on it... Actually, there was no ''like'' about it, the clone''s life was hanging in the balance right now. Ares, fuelled by the sight of the clone having nowhere left to run, redoubled his efforts and his vim and vigour was on full display as he put his back into every single swing, even letting out a small grunt here and there with some of the mightier attacks that took a significant amount of effort to perform. The clone sunk under the weight of Ares'' scythe but also did as such to keep a lower profile and try to avoid the disintegration petals surrounding him. Not even five seconds of this onslaught later and the wall behind the clone was scratched as though a pack of feral wolves had gone to town on it but the clone in the middle was comparatively still unharmed. The clone''s defences had remained decently strong and the clone''s will power, which strongly resembled Ares'', was hanging on by a thread right now.


    Indignation and unwillingness to lose drove the clone to bravely launch an attack in something that honestly couldn''t even really be called a ''gap'' in Ares'' sequence of slashes. The clone had mustered a large chunk of Ares'' innate talent in order to time this attack perfectly and it had done an alright job, the only problem was that Ares was currently doing a fantastic job and merely brushed the diagonal slash aside with his hand! Ares had let go of the scythe and slapped the side of the blade away from him before continuing to attack the clone as if he''d stopped to swat a bothersome fly and nothing more. It''s not just that Ares'' mastery of the scythe enabled him to wield it, but he could now also see the mistakes and holes in other people when they attempted to. For the clone, who was stuck in close proximity to Ares with this weapon, this was a death sentence and its brain was failing to come up with any kind of escape plan. The best it could do was just keep blaring a siren and telling the clone to Shift even though that was problematic in its own right. The clone''s best option was to randomly teleport to a position of Ares'' choosing and be jumped as soon as he exited the nothingness tunnel instead of staying here, that was how bad it had gotten. Its options were effectively die now or die later so it made the choice to try and preserve its life for even a few seconds longer and Shifted, buying itself a momentary reprieve in the nothingness tunnel wherein it could put the weapon away and regain some clarity. There was no time to pull out another weapon, as the clone had already been thrown out of the nothingness tunnel, but at this point it was safer to go with his fists than a scythe because Ares'' understanding of it was just that many leagues above its own. Fighting with his fists, against a weapon that had as much range and potential for area denial as a scythe, was asking for trouble and yet the clone had added up the details of the current situation and still believed it was worth doing. The clone''s decision wasn''t even wrong, that was just how menacing Ares was right now with the scythe in his hands.


    The clone looked around and realised, thanks to divine sense, that Ares was directly behind him and taking a swing. Although the clone could control its divine sense and move its body at the same time, much like Ares, it wasn''t amazing at doing this so it had one of two choices. Keep the divine sense up and running to see what Ares was going to do and try dodging it with subpar movement or give up on the divine sense, regain full bodily control, but have no idea what Ares was going to do behind his back. In other words, two terrible choices, both as risky as each other in one way or another. If Ares opted for a quicker attack, with less thought put into it, then abandoning the divine sense and dodging was the only way to avoid it in time as the clone would be too slow otherwise. If Ares was more methodical, and took a slower approach but winded up the attack more to be devastating if successful, then keeping the divine sense up to reposition itself as far as possible from Ares'' shenanigans was what should be done. As there was zero way of predicting this without going to deep into mind game territory, which had resulted in failure and nearly even full on demise last time, the clone prayed to Terros, wherever the poor rock was right now, and gambled its life away.


    Whether the clone would get to keep its life after this risky business remained to be seen as it gave up on the divine sense and committed to a combat roll forward... And felt nothing behind it. Had Ares gone for a quick strike it would have blown right past where the clone had been and generated an air current the clone could feel tickling its back. As that wasn''t the case, put in layman''s terms, the clone had fucked up. Ares had not gone for a lighter swing and was brewing up something fierce. The clone''s roll had done it absolutely zero favours and now Ares could aim his heavier attack in peace knowing the clone''s options to dodge were incredibly limited as it wouldn''t be able to roll again in time. The most the clone could do here was hurl its body in the opposite direction of Ares to the best of its abilities and let fate take the wheel. This was the first instance, during this bout, in which one combatant was destined to take a heavy hit and couldn''t retaliate no matter what they did. There was no magic, no technique, no weapon, no strategy, no nothing that was getting the clone out of this jam and so it gritted its teeth and braced for the inevitable.


    Ares, who was surprised the clone took the riskier option of the two, thanked his luck, as this really was just a fifty fifty for the clone, and trudged forward with steady hops as he leant backwards with his scythe dragging behind him. He was prepping for a horrifyingly powerful overhead cleave and there was a decently high chance the clone was just going to die from this strike. It all depended on how high up the slash landed on the clone''s body based on how much of it could escape from Ares after the clone lunged away from him. At bare minimum, based on Ares Omniscience estimates, the clone was guaranteed to lose both ankles by the time this attack was all said and done... And that was the worst possible outcome which was extraordinarily unlikely. The more probable average outcome was that everything beneath the clone''s knees went bye bye and it became completely impossible for the clone do anything other flop around like a fish. Granted it would still be a massive struggle anyway if it lost its feet, and the outcome was roughly similar, but the pain that wracked it varied and that might potentially mean its dying efforts were more paltry than they would be otherwise due to the agonising distraction. It was a small thing but it did matter! There was no point offing the clone if Ares died too and so he didn''t want to allow the clone to become some kind of sacrificial martyr that took Ares with him in its final moments. Every measure that could be taken to lessen the odds of such a thing was worth its weight in gold and so Ares did actually put elbow grease into this swing even though it wasn''t strictly ''necessary'' to do so. There was also a slim chance he just straight up sliced the clone in half at the waist, unlikely though it was. Ares could almost taste victory and he wasn''t going to get sloppy here just because he could afford to be a bit lazy, that was downright silly and he would regret it forever if something stupid happened as a result of his waning effort right when it mattered most. He brought the scythe down and the clone threw itself forward but Ares'' swing was looking like it was going to connect with the clone''s knees here, much as it was expected to, so the fight was presumably going to be over after this... And yet, a certain someone had just complicated matters by tossing a rocket into the mix. The damn elf had woken up and, although he was still groggy and yet another rocket was the best he could manage, it was about enough to stall Ares and force him to back off... But if he did then he would lose out big time here and be forced into a two vs one he wasn''t entirely convinced he could win... Ares saw no way to overcome this situation with the means he had at his disposal but, well, he didn''t need to. There was someone else here with myriad life experiences that had culminated in a bevy of arts and tricks, one of which could surely put this whole situation right. Ares had wanted to try and win without Dominus if possible, or at least put the guy in a winning situation so Ares could claim he did most of the work, but it was no longer time to be burdened by such unnecessary and prideful egoism. He''d done good enough and if Mako was allowed to summon an Ares clone then Ares was allowed to summon an ''Ares clone'' too! It was only fair! Besides, Ares still planned on ending this whole fight himself after anyway so calling on Dominus to finish up the clone was acceptable in Ares'' eyes.


    Speaking of Ares'' eyes, he''d just shut them as he handed over control of his body. He found it easier to swap with Dominus by doing this as his ability to visualise his bloodline was considerably better when he wasn''t distracted by the chaotic reality around him. If he needed to bring about Dominus it was always going to be for the sake of a fight and who knows what kind of garbage he would be seeing at the time? Arts flying everywhere, death and destruction... It was much easier if Ares just shut himself out and away from all the visual clutter. Not that it was a hard process to begin with but if he could smooth the transition then that would actually aid Dominus as he''d have a few extra milliseconds to spare and, though that meant little to someone like Ares, it was a monumental time save for somebody like Dominus. So many of Dominus'' fights had come down to millisecond timings and it wasn''t uncommon when two weapon masters were pitted against one another. In fact Dominus'' fight with the weapon pillar God had been decided by roughly one thousandth of a second even though he''d been winning for most of it. Last ditch efforts were to be feared and needed to be stifled accordingly with full force so Dominus was actually rather grateful Ares didn''t skimp on the transition process. Ares had bought Dominus enough time by doing this to maybe make a play here he wouldn''t have been able to otherwise. Dominus'' pried open his shut eyes with an evil smirk and immediately did what he''d been wanting to for quite some now...


    "Absolute Reversal!"


    ... Play with a toy... Art, that intrigued him to no end. Put simply, he was jealous of this art and wanted nothing more than to steal it so he was going to take advantage of this body and learn it much the same way Ares had benefitted from Timeline Splice. It was love at first sight and Dominus was going to abuse this art for all its worth, bringing forth its true potential in a way that only he could. The thousand weapon exemplar was here and ready to party!... Although how he was going to counter an entire rocket was anybody''s guess...