CORE

Chapter 22 - Jester

"...Boring," The Jester mentioned, with an overexaggerated frown on their face, before they grew that wretched smile back instantly, their eyes extending upward as their limbs stretched to unnatural lengths, reaching 30 meters as his tentacle-like limbs attempted to rush and grab Hero simultaneously.

Immediately Hero sent forth an explosion of magic through his legs, swiftly careening through what limbs tried to grab him as he made his way to The Jester's main body while raising his hands in the air, and forming a large ice hammer about five times as large The Jester, as Hero then slammed it straight down onto their body, sending them flying to the void as their long limbs shiveled up and return to normal length.

"...Something's wrong," Hero thought, looking down as The Jester fell as his behemoth of an Ice Hammer faded away into magic.

The Jester suddenly sprung back to life, extending their long limbs with such efficiency and power they blasted themselves upwards back on equal ground with Hero, in which they increased their size, now not only being thrice as large but 20 times larger than Hero as he looked down on him with a wicked grin on his face.

"Have you never seen such an amazing magic trick?" The Jester commented as they raised one of their hands, swiftly and quickly as they tried to slash Hero down, but they were able to defend themselves with a swift rainbow kick, which released a mini-hailstorm, deflecting their hand away.

"His Inborn Magic, I get it now..." Hero said as he flew back on a floating icy path, like one on a rollerskates riding through wet concrete floor.

"The ability to change his size and length at will, and possibly his flexibility... How troublesome," Hero said as he raised both of his arms in the air, before sending out a heinous barrage of ice bullets as if it were a mini-gun.

Upon seeing this, The Jester cackled before shrinking into a smaller size, compact enough to the point he was far more miniature than the ice bullets themselves.

Due to this, Hero could no longer see The Jester, and unwilling to waste his magic, he stopped his barrage of ice bullets, putting his hands down as he looked left, right, up and down for The Jester, but it seemed like they had disappeared into thin air.

Almost instinctually, after realizing this, Hero froze his surroundings in an ice-like dome, which should have frozen The Jester, and if not, they would not be able to harm or much less, get close to Hero.

"His size is most likely at a molecular level at this point," Hero remarked, expressing his desperation as he cautiously looked over his surroundings within the ice dome.

"...Nothing-?" Hero questioned himself, but suddenly, he was thwacked in the head by The Jester, who snuck up on him and grabbed onto his back, growing back into full-size while they enlarged their fist, attacking Hero in that moment of desperation.

Hero stumbled back on his ice path, his ice dome thawing as immediately looked back to where The Jester was, quickly raising his hand as he attempted to fire a blast of magic, however, before he could, his entire body was struck by The Jester's large hand, sending him flying to The Carnival's rooftop.

Although this did not stop him just yet, he attempted to recover quickly, reforming the ice path he floated on as he took a sharp breath, and made a large ice sword which should be as big as The Jester himself.

But before he could even swing it, The Jester suddenly stretched over to Hero, swinging back both of their arms as they sent a flurry of rapid-fire fists towards Hero, who, seeing no other choice, used their blade and put it up front, blocking the attacks.

"Come on... There has to be one way or another," Hero said as he scoured for anything that could prove useful, but in this desperation, The Jester suddenly broke through their sword, catching Hero off-guard as they thought it could hold off for far longer.