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Unfortunately, boxing himself in also meant giving up any helpful spatial information from the Scarf, but that was fine. He had a mental map of everything that he was materializing. All the boxes together. Even as they plummeted toward the ground.

And he didn't hesitate to begin moving through them. Dematerializing walls, then rematerializing them again. Up through the fortress, then diagonal, then up again, then to the right, on and on. He kept adding more boxes to the top of the fortress while annihilating the lower boxes before they could reach the ground.

He could've tried to use the hovering technique on all the boxes instead, but this would be more disorienting for his opponent. Plus, it basically was the hovering technique, just scaled up to a huge degree. Instead being held up by the hovering iron, they were inside it. And this way, Hector could add extra boxes as he pleased, too. Horizontally, diagonally, vertically. Every which way.

He wanted it to be a maze. A means of concealment. If he couldn't run away from Sermung, then maybe he could surprise. The only trouble was that all these soul-infused walls also concealed Sermung's position from Hector--or at least, he'd thought that would be a problem.

But it wasn't quite so. It was subtle, but Hector felt like he could actually still sense which box Sermung was in, somehow. It didn't make sense. Was it aura? Didn't feel like it. No, it felt like the iron itself was telling him. His iron.

There wasn't time to dwell on it, though, even with the benefit of a spare thought process. He needed all of those, right now, because he knew that an attack was coming. If his plan was not to win the fight but to just annoy Sermung, then he had to prepare for if the plan actually worked.

The Crystal Titan would not abide an obnoxious maze for long. Without a doubt, the man would be able to tear the whole moving fortress of cubes apart in an instant whenever he wanted.

So Hector used the concealment to help create that distance he'd wanted. Sermung wouldn't be able to destroy all of it if he didn't know how much there was. More cubes. More iron. Turn the fortress in a snaking line. Then add more lines. Tentacles. Sprawling. Diverting attention.

And fill some of them molten iron, too, while he was at it. Just to be extra irritating.

Next page on 26th

Thanks for reading, everybody.

Page 4131

Even as lava surged forth and coated the Titan entirely, blocking Hector's view of him, the young lord from Atreya was under no illusions that it was actually accomplishing anything.

Problem was, he didn't really know what the fuck to do.

'How exactly is this helping him?' Garovel was saying. He did sound a bit calmer, though.

'I gotta try and knock some sense into him.'

'That is NOT going to work, Hector.'

'Yeah, probably not, but this is the way it has to be. I have to get my ass beat.'

'Okay, but my ass is also here.'

Hector might've liked to respond, but even with multiple thought processes at work, all of his attention was stolen by the fact that he very abruptly sensed the Crystal Titan right behind him.

"Interesting technique," said Sermung.

Hector jolted away, flying and not stopping, hoping to create distance.

The Titan stuck to him like glue, though. Still not actually attacking or even touching him for that matter. Just keeping perfect pace with him. "That was more intense than I expected. What else do you have to show me?"

This fucking guy.

That aura was not so warm and friendly anymore. It was definitely confident, however. More than ever before. How could it be like that now when Hector had previously sensed so much self-loathing and bored angst? What sense did that make?

Perhaps it was just a mask, but it sure didn't feel like it. The guy felt smug as hell.

Which he certainly had a right to be, Hector knew. But there was just something about it that really pissed him off.

The Titan's aura was laughing beneath the fight. Wasn't this to remind me of something important? Seems more like you just wanted to fight because I got under your skin.

Maybe there was some truth there, Hector acknowledged. But I got under yours, too.

You flatter yourself. You're an amusement, not a bother.

Hmm. That actually gave Hector an idea.

If it was impossible to create distance, then perhaps barriers would do the trick. Walls. A full-blown maze. He'd done that before but not for quite a while. How much more elaborate could he make it now? He was keen to find out.

Soul-infused iron exploded into existence all around him, placing Sermung and himself into separate boxes, then adding more boxes around those. And more. And more. A fortress of cubes.