Chapter 479: An Onslaught of Tanks and Mages

Joshua stared at his opponent this time around and he wasn't disappointed and annoyed because of the person in particular. The reason Joshua was pissed off was because his earlier guess of the system trying to slow him down and drag out the matches was right on the mark. Standing across from Joshua was yet another tank that was decked out in even more armor than the last one he had faced. This time it was a guy that stood a little over six feet tall that held a massive shield that was clearly designed for blocking attacks from giant beast along with a two handed sword that he held in one hand with his higher strength gained from all of his levels.

This time around his opponent was actually a little higher leveled at level sixty-five, but he was still nearly twenty levels lower than Joshua which was a large gap to try to bridge. What annoyed Joshua most about this opponent was the fact that they wore armor that was covered in spikes on several parts of the body that would often be targeted by both beast and human opponents. His shoulders had large spikes on it that would make it hard to grab hold of and that seemed to be the theme to his armor as just about any location that you would usually grab ahold of had some form of spikes on it.

With this ridiculous fight set up by the system Joshua knew for sure that the system was either trying slow him down or force him to actually use some of his abilities, but Joshua wasn't going to do either. With an annoyed snort Joshua dashed across the field the moment that the match started. His opponent followed the usual strategy of a knight putting up a barrier with his shield, but Joshua ignored that completely. He acted as if he was going to try to punch through the barrier like he had done in the last match, but since the barrier was formed with a more curved shield and the man had already bent his legs the force of the blow would most likely only send his opponent skidding away with a fractured barrier.

Instead Joshua stopped directly in front of his opponents shield surprising him and stomped his foot into ground hard enough to cause the arena to crack and cave in a bit. Joshua had noticed before the match had started that his opponents shield had pointed edges on the top and the sides along with some rough scales on the front to make whatever hit it take some damage in return. The only portion of the shield that wasn't a threat to hit was the bottom of it since that needed to be straight so that it could be planted into the ground easily when being used as a barrier to protect the user's entire body.

With Joshua foot planted into the ground he was able to cave it in enough to open a gap between the bottom of the shield and the arena floor which was all he was looking for. Joshua kicked up with his other foot while his opponent was still bracing himself from the after effects of Joshua's previous move. With a swift kick Joshua hit the bottom of the shield with such force that it knocked the man's entire arm upwards along with the shield nearly lifting him off the ground. The sudden motion would put quite the strain on the arm, but Joshua didn't stop there. In the man's current position his chest was exposed while he was off balance. At first look it seemed as if he wasn't panicking thanks to his armor, but Joshua was going to change that really quickly. He twisted his body with his leg planted in the ground so that he could deliver a devastating blow with his elbow directly into the center of the man's chest.

Joshua still had his bracers on protecting his arms all the way up to his elbow, and the material they were made out of was far stronger than whatever metal the man's armor was made from. The spinning force of Joshua's blow immediately cratered the chest plate of his opponent and lifted him into the air before sending him soaring off the arena without any way to stop himself. He ended up crashing into the walls underneath the crowd and slumped down to the floor unconscious as his body vanished. The crowd once again cheered at Joshua's quick Victory with only the explorers in the crowd realizing how tough it was to take down a tank so quickly when they were turtling up from the start of the battle.

Soon enough Joshua was brought back to his waiting room and he quickly took a seat in the one chair in the room as he thought about how annoying the rest of the matches were going to be. He went from fighting a turtle that didn't get the chance to hide in her shell without it being broken to fighting a turtle that hid in its shell and made sure that its shell had spikes on it to spite Joshua from the get go. Joshua didn't even know how that man planned on winning any fights with most of his gear being geared towards defending in a one on one tournament. There was no way he was going to be able to hit anyone with a giant slow moving sword.

From what Joshua could see of the match that was being broadcasted on his television at the moment it was clear to see that the system wasn't only trying to drag out his matches, but was also trying to do the same for other participants that had won all of their matches up to this point at a fast rate. It was giving them all bad matches without making them go against other extremely high level contenders. Either that or it would throw a mage with an annoying combat style at them which was even more annoying than the turtle like knights that Joshua had to deal with up to this point. The moment Joshua had started thinking along those lines he knew that he was fated to go against some of those types of mages next up.

Laying back in his chair as he looked up towards the ceiling instead of watching the fight that was on the screen in front of him, Joshua closed his eyes and waited for the next annoying match that he was going to have to push through and when it was finally his time to go to the arena he stood up as he was teleported away. He once again arrived in front of a cheering crowd as he stood across from a man in red robes that made it obvious exactly what his plans were for the upcoming match.

Joshua casually stood there and watched as his opponent who was a level sixty-two mage started setting up all sorts of traps around the arena. Unlike the previous mage who only made one layer of traps and backed away, this guy was laying it on thick. Layer after layer of different traps were set up all around him as he smiled tauntingly thinking he had put himself into a position where he had control over the battlefield. That would be the case for most opponents, but Joshua just looked at everything that was laid out before him and clicked his tongue in annoyance. If he tried to force himself through with just pure speed the traps ahead of him would be set off before hand from the ones that he would already be passing by. That would slow him down and allow the mage to keep moving away from him while laying more traps.

If Joshua wasn't worried about showing off his skills he would just allow his aura to surround him and blast through all of the traps without a care, but since he was trying to be low key in that regard he would have to figure something else out. As the countdown got closer to finishing Joshua figured out what he was going to do. He was set to take something out of his inventory the moment the battle started that would help him end the fight quickly without showing off any of his real fighting capabilities.

When the countdown stopped the mage started channeling mana so that he could set up a few more large scale traps that would help him escape from Joshua if necessary, but since he was focusing on that he didn't notice Joshua pull out a gun from his inventory that he pointed in the direction of the mage. Joshua used his rail shot skill to charge up a stronger blast that shot across the arena at high speed going straight through the stomach of Joshua's opponents. The man stopped his chanting and looked down in disbelief at the giant hole in his body before vanishing from the arena.

The crowd seemed to be stunned silent for a moment as they looked towards Joshua as he held up the gun and mocked blowing it to cool it off and spinning it around before placing it back in his inventory. By the time the crowd reacted with cheers Joshua was already being teleported back to his waiting room. In the end Joshua decided to use a skill to end the obviously set up match quickly, but he used a skill that had nothing to do with his actual fighting style. The only reason he had gotten the rail shot skill in the past was to attack enemies from a distance when he didn't really have any skills that allowed him to do so.

Things turned out the way Joshua was hoping for. He was able to take out his opponent without showing any of the actual skills that he usually uses and he ended the match as quickly as all of his other matches. Going into the next match Joshua was expecting to run into something similar again, but this time around his opponent would probably be expecting that. After all the news station and battle arena networks were showing off his matches all the time along with the other high level contenders.

The hour until the next match flew by extremely quickly and Joshua took out his gun this time since he knew his opponent wasn't going to be taken by surprise. When Joshua was teleported to the arena for the fourth match of the day he gave the crowd a wave as he held his gun at the ready and looked over to his next opponent. This time around he was up against another mage that had brown robes this time around. He was already panicking the moment he saw Joshua and started laying out several traps, but he didn't stop there. He built up a large earthen wall in front of him that was too thick for Joshua to just shoot through and take him out in one shot. Joshua just watched in amusement as he tapped his foot on the ground already figuring out how he was going to handle the situation.