Shovels In Spades

The exact moment that Daz appeared on the stage, he sat down and closed his eyes to focus all of his attention on his headache.

Both Pheldorapod and Daz's opponent gave him curious looks. Less than a second had passed before the alien nodded his head knowingly.

Daz's opponent, however, had understood the pained look on Daz's face very differently from how Pheldorapod had.

In regards to Daz's opponent, were he to open his eyes, he'd see a handsome young man roughly his own age. This man had dark-brown skin and a cleanly-shaven head. Held in his hands was a very intricately designed battle axe.

'I wonder what's wrong with him? Anyway, this is perfect! I can easily beat that rock monster and the other Dazes. I was worried it'd be close, but if he can't fight himself, then this should be easy.' The young man was clearly very joyful upon seeing Daz's current state.

He wasn't evil and nor did he enjoy watching others suffer, but he also wasn't a saint. He wanted the Skill Cap Upgrade Token. Pheldorapod's speech on the item's potential had sold him, hook, line, and sinker.

Pheldorapod quickly summarised Daz's achievements once again and then stated that the challenger, Adetokunbo Abara, had no achievements of note, but he did state that the African man was amongst the most accomplished Earthian testees who had yet to become a ruler or fall under one.

With all of that explained, the squishy octopus began the fight without any further delays.

Daz instantly summoned Hamson and tossed it towards Clone Two - the one who had helped develop the Basic Martial Arts skill which was promptly assimilated into the Shovel Arts skill. "Clone One, Clone Two, Rimmy, end this as fast as possible. I wanna lie down for a bit."

"I'll do so, Original."

"Of course, Original."

"Rimmy!"

All three accepted their master's request.

Adetokunbo didn't appreciate Daz's confident attitude despite his seemingly miserable condition. "I only need to kill you to win!" he shouted as he threw his battle axe straight towards the actual Daz's head.

Clone two stood in the weapon's way and used Hamson's blade to deflect the battle axe, resulting in a loud noise ringing out from the two weapons.

Shockingly, the battle axe lost all of its momentum and then slammed into the ground. Looking at it, it was clear to see that it now had a massive chip in the head of the axe and its haft was heavily splintered. In fact, it was a God-given miracle that the weapon hadn't just shattered into a million pieces considering Hamson's Attack stat.

Before Adetokunbo could even respond to that, Rimmy used his Great Roll skill and pummeled the African man's body, shredding it limb from limb.

For good measure, Clone One activated his Archreaper's Aura just in case Daz's opponent had any skills similar to the one that Larry Billard had used to avoid death.

A smile wormed its way onto Clone One's face. "Found you." The Archreaper's Aura had felt some resistance coming from the far edge of the stage. "Laughing Skull," he and Clone Two both said as they looked at the area that they'd felt the resistance from.

With blood covering his body, Adetokunbo appeared out of thin air. His face was covered in a grimace as the necklace he was wearing cracked slightly. It would seem that the accessory had saved his life from the Laughing Skulls.

Raising his hand slightly, a defiant look entered the young man's eyes. "Heavenly Chop!"

His incredibly damaged battle axe rose into the air on its own and swung down in place with an unstoppable force, resulting in a massive astral axe appearing above Daz's head.

The reaper did nothing to avoid this monumental attack. His body moved on its own the second it was about to be split into two.

What was astounding was that not only did the astral axe not disappear after that initial chop, but it, in fact, pulled back for another chop.

Again, Daz did nothing. Again, the gargantuan axe missed the man and harmlessly bounced off of the indestructible stage.

Despair flashed across Adetokunbo's face. 'How many times can his halo save him like that?'

The young man would never learn the answer to his question. His bald head was roughly grabbed by Rimmy who then squished it like a watermelon.

"Ladies, gentlemen, the genderless, and everything else in between! Once again the testee Daz had graced my stage and shown us all a very marvellous victory! Congratulations, Daz!" Pheldorapod praised sincerely before he immediately returned Daz to his private suite.