Cheat Awakening

"F*ck, it's so hot!" Myne panted heavily, wiping sweat from his forehead.

"Don't those bastards have any better venue to choose than throwing me inside a volcano?" He fanned himself with his hand, his gaze sweeping across the fiery landscape. Thanks to his high endurance, his body somehow withstood the searing heat emanating from the magma, but it was only a temporary reprieve. Myne was confident that if he stayed here for more than ten minutes, he would definitely become roasted chicken.

"System, what's going on with those statues? Why are they here?"

[ Monarchs are observing this battle. Because of the host's past performance, the Insect Mother is showing some interest in you and wants to see what you can do with an environmental disadvantage and limited space. Can you still defeat your opponent with your 'funny tricks'? ]

"What do you mean, 'funny tricks'? I fought for my life back there, alright..."

[ You are matched with an opponent who has won two battles. ]

Just like last time, an ancient voice echoed in the sky, and the system also provided a brief description of his opponent, foreshadowing the beginning of the duel.

"Looks like the battle has started, but where is that bastard?"

Myne, who was sweating profusely from the intense heat, even his leather shoes showing signs of damage, looked around vigilantly. But even though this time their battleground was limited with no obstacles to hide behind, he still couldn't find his opponent. Only gods knew where it was hiding, giving Myne no chance to end the battle as soon as possible while he was still in his peak condition.

This time, Myne's opponent seemed to have a completely different fighting style. It didn't show itself directly; it seemed to want to defeat Myne by simply relying on the home-field advantage instead of confronting him directly.

From a rational point of view, this was a good strategy. After all, not everyone could jump into magma, pull it out forcefully, and beat the hell out of it.

Two minutes later, just when Myne started panting crazily, drinking water as if there were no tomorrow, and even throwing it on his body to cool down, while silently patting himself for collecting enough water in his inventory, his eagle-like eyes suddenly spotted two small hands slowly emerging from the magma at the edge of the small stone on which he was standing.

Before he could guess his opponent's intention, he saw the other party sink its claw-like, sharp fingers hard into the stone's edge and press the entire stone into the magma, directly flipping it 360 degrees, scaring Myne to death.

Thankfully, Myne had already moved to the other end of the stone when he saw his opponent's hand. When the other party pushed one side of the stone into the magma, and the other side lifted up, he relied on the stone's momentum and, with its support, jumped onto another nearby stone.

"Hot, hot, hot, hot..."

The other stone was much hotter than the previous one, and as soon as Myne stepped on it, he realised he couldn't stand on it for too long. So, he quickly threw a large amount of water onto the stone's surface to reduce its temperature while avoiding the hot steam. Only after its surface temperature became bearable did he look around, wanting to find that bastard who was playing shameless tricks like a coward instead of coming out and fighting like a man.

"Get the hell out of here, you coward! This is cheating! You can't hide in the magma and overturn the stones!"

Myne tried to provoke his opponent so it would at least come out. Even a second would be enough — then he could paste its body to the stone and show it who the real boss was. But sadly, his tricks didn't work, and the other party remained hidden and turned a deaf ear.

"I hate these types of shameless bastards the most," Myne cursed, but sadly, there was nothing he could do in the current situation except wait for an opportunity.

"But thankfully, it seemed that in its initial state, those opponents didn't have any skills and could only rely on their physical characteristics to fight. Otherwise, if this guy could control magma even a little bit, it would be nigh impossible to defeat... "

"Aha! Here you are!"

Just as Myne was looking around vigilantly, he saw two small hands emerging from the magma again, grabbing the edge of his stone once more. But this time, he didn't give the other party a chance and directly pasted both its hands.

The next moment, Myne's opponent, who was hiding under the stone inside the magma, found that it couldn't close its fingers or move its hands no matter what it did, as if they were stuck to the stone. This gave it a very bad feeling, which came true when it felt a very sharp blade touching the back of its hands, as if warning it to stick its head out or forget its hands.

Myne, who had backed away after giving his opponent the warning while holding the butcher knife in his hand so the opponent couldn't do anything funny like spitting magma at him, waited for it to come out and show its face.

The next moment, a small goblinoid about 1.3 meters tall, with a red, magma-like scaly body, smoldering yellow eyes with a sly, calculating gaze, a jagged, toothy grin, along with a bald head, pointy ears, and a sharp nose, poked its head out from the magma and stared at Myne coldly. If eyes could kill, Myne would surely be dead a dozen times over by now.

"A red goblin?" Seeing his opponent's face, Myne was taken aback. He hadn't expected to see a familiar figure even on a cosmos-level platform. "Those little bastards are really no less popular than humans."

[ Name: Magmascorch, the Cunning

Level: 4

Race: Ember Ghûl ]

"Well, it seemed different from usual goblins; at least its race name had nothing to do with them."

Myne, having seen the other party's status, didn't waste any more time, quickly and shamelessly, he used the Paste skill on his opponent's mouth to avoid a sneak attack and swiftly rushed at him with the butcher knife.

Magmascorch, seeing Myne rushing at him with the knife, quickly hid his head in the magma. Sadly, his hands were still glued to the edge of the rock and couldn't release them, giving Myne the chance to catch him. With a few hits, Myne cut off one of its hands, injuring him badly.

Red blood, hot like magma, burst out from the severed hand, searing Myne. He hadn't expected that the other party's blood would be so deadly. Not only that, but even his knife took considerable damage as it wasn't durable enough to handle the high-temperature liquid like magma. It was good that it didn't melt like a candle after coming into contact with Magmascorch's blood.

Several bubbles rose above the magma, indicating that Magmascorch was screaming in pain; he seemed to have forcefully broken open his mouth.

However, while Myne thought that Magmascorch would jump out of the magma after getting injured and fight him to the death like his previous opponent, the insect warrior, the other party didn't even show its face until Myne slowly cut off his other hand as well, making him unable to fight, automatically winning the battle.

"That guy is indeed a coward. I was overestimating him for nothing. If it weren't for the fact that the venue has a huge advantage for him, he would have nothing to fear. I would have dealt with him with ease," Myne muttered with a sneer. But when he looked at his knife, which was damaged in multiple places, he didn't feel happy about winning the battle at all.

While Myne was troubled, wondering where he could repair his knife, suddenly the huge worm statue twisted its body a few times, making the entire volcano shake as if it had been hit by a high-magnitude earthquake, and then disappeared.

Following this, the blood-spraying fountain sprayed blood one after another, as if cursing someone's entire family, and then also disappeared, leaving only the statue of the Lord of Hell, whose already cocky smile became even more disgusting, enough to make people's blood boil and have the urge to beat him to death.

"Doesn't this bastard have anything better to do than create trouble? What did he do this time that made the other two guys flee with such momentum?"

Myne, who was almost thrown into the magma pool, muttered angrily, watching the two colossal statues disappear. Then, the next moment, the scenery around him also began to break and return to the ancient arena.

The statues of the five monarchs still stood quietly in front of him.

Only this time, the five monarchs all lit up with a faint glow, which was completely different from the coldness when he first came.

Three balls of blue light rushed out from the Lord of Hell statue and merged into Myne's body, and the system prompt sounded in his ears.

[ Congratulations to the host for clearing the second round of the battle.

You have received 5 free attribute points, 1000 coins, a random rare quality equipment or prop scroll, and 3 Cosmic Coins. ]

"Wait, why are the attribute points so few this time?" Myne didn't care about the other rewards, but when he saw that his next battle-winning ticket, on which he was putting all his hope, was taken away, he immediately complained.

[ The reward is gained based on the host's performance, and because the host's opponent this time was many times weaker than him, you won't get extra attribute points for nothing. ]

"But that's cheating! What about the venue? I was almost thrown into the magma!" Myne didn't give up and continued talking nonsense, but the system obviously lost its patience and restarted its favourite game of playing dead.

"Fine, you won't give. At least tell me about the other rewards. What is this scroll and Cosmic Coin thing? How do I use them?" Myne realised that he wasn't going to get anything free from the system, rolled his eyes in annoyance, and asked about the other rewards.

[ The random scroll can be used to randomly select a rare quality of equipment or prop from the treasure house of the cosmic arena. As for the Cosmic Coins, it is the universal currency in this Cosmic arena, which can be used to trade or directly exchange equipment, props, bloodlines, blessings, skills, abilities, etc.—anything you think can be bought with those coins. ]

[ But these things can only be used after the host becomes a formal gladiator. So keep working hard. ]