The Blue Ape's blood splattered all over Gaston, coating his neck and the lower half of his face in it's thick red blood.
Gaston did not seem to notice however, or if he did, he didn't seem to mind.
Swiftly pulling his halberd out of the Blue Ape's corpse without much resistance, he was going to turn and help Ruben deal with his target.
What he seemed to have underestimated however, was that just because something came easy to him, didn't mean it would come easy to others as well.
Unlike Gaston's target, which died before it could even resist, Ruben's target had much greater luck.
Perhaps it was due to the fact that Ruben's weapon of choice was a short sword, or perhaps it was due to Ruben's own mistakes, Gaston did not know.
What he did know however, was that Ruben had failed to kill his target, and not only that, but as he turned to help him, he saw the Blue Ape's spear being thrust towards his head!
Gaston's eyes widened at the sight, surprised by the sudden turn of events.
Nevertheless, as a man that has spent the majority of the last 30 years of his life moving from one battlefield to another, he remained cool-headed in the face of death.
As if he had rehearsed this scene countless times, Gaston let go of his halberd without hesitation, and ducked under the Blue Ape's spear, shooting in for a takedown!
'Wow! What a beautifully timed takedown attempt that was by me!
'It's nice to see that my past self has kept some things in my combat style from Earth.'
Gaston inwardly admired his past self's technique, but he did question the intelligence behind such a move.
After all, this was a magical Ape nearly 7 feet tall, it hardly seemed like he would be a match for it physically.
Killing one of these things with a weapon was one thing, but engaging in unarmed combat with them was another.
One of these options seemed far more dangerous to Gaston than the other.
Before he could continue along this train of thought however, he saw himself successfully reach the Blue Ape's legs!
Unlike what he thought would happen however, it seemed that past Gaston had never intended to go for a takedown!
As soon as he reached it's legs, he successfully pivoted to the side and reached it's back, his hands successfully wrapping around the Blue Ape and locking together on it's stomach.
This technique, executed on a human, would result in him having a firm control over his opponent and establishing control over his opponent's back.
A pity however, that his opponent was not human.
Seeing the human go behind it and then press his chest against it's back, with it's hands wrapping around it, the Blue Ape let out a smirk.
Letting go of it's spear, the Blue Ape pulled his arms back and was about to rip apart Gaston's body-lock with pure strength alone.
When the disparity in strength between two parties was too large, technique was no longer as important.
Gaston had no doubt that if the Ape grabbed ahold of his arms, it could break out of this position with ease.
In fact, it would be him that would be in trouble by then!
Thankfully for Gaston, his past self did not test his strength against that of his opponents, but took the initiative to let go of the body-lock himself.
While his hands let go of the Blue Ape's body however, he didn't distance himself from his opponent.
Instead, quickly retracting his hands and whilst his right arm grabbed onto the right shoulder of the Blue Ape, his left hand reached over to the inside of his chest, where he hid a punch dagger for special use in times of emergency like this!
For Gaston, the punch dagger was an easily concealable last-resort weapon for close quarters combat back when he was on Earth.
Always hidden on the inside of his chest, he could easily pull it out in a scramble and save his life.
As it turned out, this habit of his he carried over to this world as well.
Gaston pulled out his black-in-color punch dagger, with a blade of only 3 inches in length, and seamlessly enchanted by his magic technique, he started rapidly stabbing it into the Blue Ape's neck!
"Punchi, punchi, punchi!"
With piston-like motions, his left arm quickly and successfully penetrated the Blue Ape's neck three times!
Before he could continue however, the Blue Ape desperately threw an elbow towards it's back which landed squarely on Gaston's ribs, sending him flying 3 meters away!
"Crack!"
Seeing this sight and hearing the noise produced by the strike, Gaston's first thought was that the Blue Ape had cracked his ribs.
Upon a closer look however, he saw that the area that the elbow landed on was emitting a dark-brown glow.
The loud crack turned out to be from his temporarily created small magical shield shattering into pieces, not his ribs!
The blow no doubt left it's mark on Gaston however, even through his magical shield and his protective white coat.
Even with such protection, he could still feel the left side of his ribs ache, fully demonstrating just how strong the Blue Ape was.
Contrary to his own slightly disheveled state however, the magical Blue Ape was in far worse condition!
Because it was an abnormally large magical Ape, three 3-inch deep wounds to the neck were not enough to take it's life, but it wouldn't require too much more.
Blood kept gushing out of it's three closely positioned "shallow" wounds, even as it kept its left arm held over them.
Perhaps if it had more time, with the help of some Blue Ape doctors or whatever their civilization called them, it would be able to preserve it's life.
Unfortunately for it, that was not the case.
As Gaston was rising back to his feet from the blow, now three meters away from the Blue Ape, that was itself looking at him with a manic look in it's eyes, something interrupted their silent confrontation that would no doubt escalate into a life-and-death battle in the next second.