Chapter 500 - Fight of the strongest (Patreon)

##### Author's Note #####

By the System.... we reached 500. I can't even process this. Thank you all so so much for all the support, the opinions, the likes (seeing the number of hearts go up makes brain happy), the rolls on discord, the conversations, the criticism, the praises. Basically everything. 

The first chapter of maze went live on march of 2020 and I honestly had no idea how long it would be around for. Being close to two and a half years later and the story still going with people still reading it as soon as a new chapter comes out feels amazing and I wouldn't be writing for this long without you guys. 

Thanks for the amazing 500 chapters and here is to the next 500, be it on MAZE or in something else.
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Hera's Status

When Vond's body fell to the ground, Khagril was running close by. It was just by chance that the Previous chieftain candidate looked to the side and noticed his friend being killed by a human. He was one of the most vocal opposers of the idea that humans were a scourge. The centaur believed that the people who opened the wall couldn't have known about the suffering they caused since they themselves had no idea about the existence of any other rooms outside their home. It didn't matter what those people had told them. The stories about how humans had discovered the location of the centaur and sent the Wendigos to this place seemed too far-fetched, but the chieftain disagreed, so there was nothing he could do about it. However, his opinion on the matter changed as soon as the attack began. Even so, there was still a glimmer of hope in his heart. Some reason as to why the humans were attacking them like that. The centaurs never did anything to threaten or mess with them. This seemed like mindless rage and prejudice. He lost his father, his brother, and even his position in the tribe, and now, the humans were even taking out the few friends he still had. The father of his godson. Malva's husband. This had to stop. Humans had to be stopped, and he would kill all of them himself.

Khagril stepped towards Mirror Match, who was now on the ground by Vond's body, trying to rest for a moment. As fate would have it, someone else appeared in front of him before. The strongest human alive wielding his two-handed sword. Insomniac wasn't there because he wanted to fight against Khagril specifically, nor because he was trying to protect Mirror Match. In reality, the man was just trying to do his part during the fight. Sculptor was able to deal a lot of damage to the centaurs, and it felt wrong not to pull his own weight. To make things worse, he wasn't able to finish off any of the ones that came to face him, and it wasn't like he could just rush after them. One of his jobs was to keep Sculptor safe; to do that, he couldn't actually jump in the thick of it. His luck changed when Khagril appeared. The fighter felt like he could finally do something, and this centaur looked like trouble.

"Let's dance, sweet tooth," Insomniac smiled.

"Move away, vermin. I have no time to waste with you," Khagril took his sword out of his waist and slashed at the human, thinking that it was just another weak enemy trying to delay him. What he didn't expect was that the human was not just able to block his attack, but it felt like he was hitting a wall. As a follow-up, Insomniac made an upward slash, cutting the centaur's front leg. Khagril growled and started taking the fight seriously. He slashed down, aiming at the man's neck, but his sword was blocked by another blade. It was the first time anyone aside from Vond was able to defend against one of his strikes without having their stance broken.

Insomniac pushed the centaur's weapon away, took a step back, and smiled. It's been a while since he fought against a person with actual weapons. Most of his training was against monsters, but it seemed he wasn't as rusty as he imagined. Khagril did a flourish with his sword and got into a stabbing stance. Since they were in the middle of the forest, focusing on attacks that allowed him to maintain his footing was better. On the other hand, Insomniac didn't have to worry about mobility as much. He still had to be careful with wide swings, but unlike the centaur, he had a much easier time moving quickly to the sides. This wasn't something purely because of luck. When they arrived in the forest, the fighter made sure to look for places that didn't have a clear path for the centaurs to run through as a way to have some environmental advantage.

Khagril realized the human plan and smiled internally. He tried to stab the human to gauge his reaction, only for the man to step behind a tree and appear on the other side, slashing at his horse torso. The centaur made a point to seem like he was struggling with the movement and only blocked it at the last moment. With a smile, the human did the same thing again, moving behind a tree before appearing again on the other side. Khagril acted like he was getting scared and struggling with the attacks, which never worked when he was sparring with his people, but the human seemed to believe in his poor acting skills. The two continued like that for a few moments, the human using the trees as cover and the centaur pretending that he was blocking the attacks in the nick of time.

With each blow, Insomniac's strikes became heavier. As part of his fury skill, the longer a fight would take, the stronger he would get. Spinning around a tree, he did an upward slash, trying to open the horse's torso. A cruel part of him was curious about the centaur anatomy and wanted to know if Khagril's guts were where he expected them to be. The attack failed yet again, and for the first time, some suspicion appeared on his face. Maybe the centaur wasn't having as much trouble as it seemed.

Noticing that Khagril realized that he could no longer test his opponent. Not just because of the human's suspicion but also for the weight of his blows. But the damage was done, the centaur had already managed to get enough information out of his enemy, and he was ready to strike. When Insomniac vanished behind a tree again. Khagril jumped and kicked the tree, causing it to collapse to the side. As a follow-up, he kicked another tree and started jumping around. The human was caught off guard by the centaur's mobility and accidentally gave a few openings that Khagril was happy to take advantage of.

One slash cut Insomniac's shoulder, and while jumping around the trees like a gazelle, Khagril delivered three more blows to the fighter. To make matters worse, after the fight with the Wendigos, the centaurs stop being so precious with combat. They would still honor a fight when he was amongst them, but any method worked when facing an enemy after their lives. Khagril's weapon of choice was acid. He had his longsword enchanted so it would corrode and dissolve anything it cut. It would already be a problem for a monster, but having part of your muscles burned by acid was horrible for Insomniac. Not only did it hurt like hell, but he could feel his body not responding as it should anymore. Khagril noticed the effect and jumped on top of the human, ready to pierce his sword through him. However, just as he was about to strike, a large boulder appeared out of nowhere, aimed at his torso.

Sculptor was close by, watching the fight while trying to not attract attention to himself. Insomniac had told him not to interfere since he would be too weak to do anything here. However, after seeing the fighter get in danger, Sculptor just used his legacy to remove the boulder by his side and send it to the centaur. The attack also gave an opening to Insomniac, who made an upward slash while covering his two-handed sword with a sleep spell. After all, the centaur weren't the only ones who could play dirty.

Khagril felt like he hadn't slept in weeks, courtesy of Insomniac's spell that allowed him to share his tiredness. And since his current well-rested mode was a placebo, the effect of his attack was incredibly strong. Still, the centaur wasn't about to go down. He jumped again, trying to reach Sculptor, but Insomniac dashed to intercept, and the former smuggler used his hiding ability to vanish from sight. In the middle of such a tense battle, Khagril wasn't able to locate him before he was intercepted by his enemy. Two slashes came out of the human's blade, cutting the back ankles of the centaur, while a third one tried to hit the back of his neck. In a quick motion, Khagril kicked a tree to the side to push him away from the attack. He landed badly, hurting his back legs even more, and Insomniac was right on top of him to strike. Not having many other options, the centaur got ready to counter, but a bundle of branches filled with leaves appeared in front of his face, causing the human to be hidden from his sight.

Insomniac managed to sink his weapon into the centaur's body, pushing through the humanoid torso and cutting the spine of the horse half in two. As if to make sure he was done, the human grabbed Khagril by the throat and started squeezing as he felt blood fill his mouth.

"They were right about you humans," Khagril said with his dying breath, the sleep effect added to the sudden pain and bleeding was too much for him to fight back and his body went limp on the ground. The fight lasted 54 seconds, but the surrounding woods were completely destroyed with large cracks on the forest floor, showing the places where one of the warriors blocked an attack.

Sculptor rushed to Insomniac's side, he was the only one to witness the fight, but it was a sight that would be engraved in his mind forever. The speed in which the warriors moved was impossible and his interactions with the fight only happened because Insomniac told him where to aim his attacks. A few moments had passed after the fighter killed the centaur. It seemed like he was struggling to remove his sword from the corpse, "That was a great fight! Let's get you a healer. Here, I'll help you," as he reached out for the weapon, Sculptor noticed Insomniac's eyes leaking a purple goo, blood coming out of his mouth and a dagger letting out some black smoke embedded on the man's torso, "Insomniac!"

His screams were deafened by the madness that was around him. Dozens of centaurs and humans were fighting each other. But despite losing two of their strongest warriors, Halros still tipped the scales in their favor. He managed to kill three people every five arrows he shot, and his ammo was nowhere near running out. But there was one human he couldn't hit. One that was nothing but a blur as he moved. Yellow Flash also noticed that and occasionally slowed down to lure out an attack from Halros. Doing that allowed him to narrow down the archer's location, and now the human was heading there to get rid of the threat.

Halros noticed Yellow Flash coming at him and sent out a few arrows trying to stop the man, but nothing seemed to work. Even with the uneven ground filled with rocks where his village once stood that should slow anyone down, the human was still able to keep his speed. Arrows also weren't able to do anything against him. The man was too fast, and Halros knew he couldn't run away. Not seeing a way to survive that encounter, Halros made a decision. Instead of focusing on his incoming doom, he turned back to the forest and triggered all the skills he had to accelerate his attacks. In the span of 10 seconds, he sent out 50 arrows and was finally stopped by a streak of yellow energy that decapitated him in a swift motion. Now that Yellow Flash had sped up enough, he could do more than just harm his targets. Even so, he slowed down ever so slightly to look back at the centaur he had just killed. Halros was willing to sacrifice himself to help his people, and that was something he had to respect.

Most of the arrows shot by Halros before his death went to the humans near the forest killing almost forty people, but among the projectiles, there was one special arrow that he shot higher, making it seem like it was a mistake. Instead, it was a special projectile. One he could only use once every week, and it was aimed at a clearing by the barrier where three humans were currently fighting Malva.