Chapter 708: Two Students VS Two Mercenaries
I faced off against my opponent, fully prepared to start the fight.
Since I don’t see her drawing her weapon, I assume she was aiming for a fist fight so I had already dropped into my stance in preparation for that.
Before I could ask how she wanted to start this fight though, a shout from the side interrupted me.
“Waaaait!! Stop, stop!!”
I turned to see Odeta with her hands raised in a panic, “I wanna watch Sister Aster fight!! Let me beat him first so I can watch you, Sister Aster!!”
Err… Ok?
I relaxed my stance while the other guy huffed at her, “Hey, I might not be as physically strong as a normal Amrap, but I do have superior skills, ok? At least fight me seriously!”
Odeta didn’t even acknowledge his protests and simply shot me a grin, “Watch me, Sister Aster!”
I nodded at her to assure her that I would definitely be watching her before she focused her attention back on the opponent in front of her.
She cracked her knuckles and smirked at her opponent, “Alright! Let’s go then! I’ll finish this quickly!”
“Ha! I’ll make you regret that soon enough!”
Instructor Henry quickly shouted out from the side, “Hold yourself back, Odeta! I’m warning you!”
Oh geez, the Mercenary facing against Odeta definitely wasn’t liking the fact that even the instructor himself was not expecting him to win.
At least he seemed to take it in stride and said no more before drawing his weapons which consisted of a wooden shield and sword.
Odeta was, of course, unarmed, which did not bother her opponent even as she lowered herself into her combat stance.
Both of them circled around each other, watching the other’s movements as they sought for a gap in each other’s defence that they could exploit.
The male Mahun was the first to move as he lunged towards her with his sword thrusting at her chest.
Odeta slammed her foot on the ground to get a better footing and faced the Mercenary head on.
As the sword was about to reach her chest, she suddenly slammed her fist into the side of the blade, completely knocking the weapon out of the Mercenary’s hands.
To his credit, he did not panic and simply raised his shield in an attempt to slam it into her instead.
Odeta responded by slamming her own palm onto the shield, stopping his momentum completely and forcing him a step back.
Odeta grinned at him before raising her other hand and clenching it in a fist dramatically.
The Merc quickly raised his shield to block the incoming attack and Odeta punched forward, smashing her fist right in the centre of the shield.
I got to watch the wood of the shield cave in slow motion before the cracks expanded outwards from the epicentre of the punch.
The cracks slowly made their way towards the edge of the shield and all of a sudden the world went back into real time before I saw the Mercenary get flung away with the shield shattering into pieces.
He flipped in the air and managed to land on his feet, bending down to pick up the sword that was knocked out of his hand earlier as he slid past it.
Odeta was already rushing towards him while he was in the midst of straightening himself, the Mercenary raising his sword just in time to block a punch from the Amrap with the flat of his blade.
He realised he obviously did not have the physical strength to completely negate the punch and tilted his blade to allow her fist to be redirected to the side instead.
Odeta tried to grab him with her other hand but he took a leap back to avoid it, creating distance between himself and the Amrap.
I’ll have to give it to him though, he’s holding his own pretty well.
He had to raise his sword again as Odeta was already lunging at him once more, making sure that he did not have time to fully recover.
This time, she caught his wrist as he tried to slash at her, holding him in place as she swiped his legs out from under him.
The Mercenary let out a surprised gasp as he found himself falling to the ground, Odeta stopping him from actually hitting the ground by pulling on his wrist so he was jerked back up again.
He blinked and found that Odeta’s fist had stopped right in front of face, a clear sign that she had won her match.
“I… Give…” The Mercenary mumbled, acknowledging his loss.
Odeta laughed before releasing her grip on his wrist to turn to me, “How about that, Sister Aster?”
I clapped, “That was so cool, Odeta!”
I really meant it by the way, her moves were so smooth that I was really impressed by how she fought him, even if her stats were higher than his.
She laughed at my praise, “Wahahaha! Now it’s Sister Aster’s turn! I wanna watch!”
I turned to look at the female Mercenary who was my opponent, “Shall we?”
She gave me a determined nod and we assumed our positions once again.
“Are you not going to use a weapon?” I asked.
She looked at me in surprise, “Are you going to use one? I wanted to fight you on equal terms.”
“Oh, I only didn’t use one because I thought you weren’t using any. I will use a sword then.”
She nodded and quickly retrieved two wooden swords from a pile before returning to me.
I shook my head at the sword she offered, “I apologise, but I will also be testing out a spell of mine if you don’t mind.”
I focused myself and started to chant, “Forge of light, form the radiance and remake them as I require. Be it shield, sword or spear, the limit shall only be self-imposed. With my strength of will, the light shall bend, form and coalesce as my creation. The rays are my ingots, the light my hammer and anvil. [Light Forge].”
A sword made of light materialised in my hands and I gave it a few swings to test its weight, nodding when I was satisfied with it.
I wasn’t really worried about this one breaking since Lisa had told me that her light sword only broke because it was up against a sword made from Umbramancy which was specialised in destruction. Under normal circumstances, a sword made using Lumenmancy would be able to withstand hits from a steel sword without breaking, so a wooden sword was not a problem either.
“I did not know you were a mage too,” The Mercenary asked.
I nodded at her, “Is that a problem?”
She grinned, “Not at all. In fact, I’m very glad that you have chosen to have this match with me. Shall we?”
The Mercenary then lowered herself into her stance with her sword’s tip pointed at me.
I nodded and lowered myself as well, holding my sword parallel to my body.
She was the first one to move and charged with her sword swinging horizontally at me from my left.
I swung my sword in an arc, parrying her sword swing away to counter her with a sword strike of my own from overhead.
She took a step back instead of blocking my blow, bringing her sword back so that she could attempt a sword thrust at my throat.
I parried the thrust upwards before disengaging from the melee, giving me space to reset my stance.
The female Mahun seemed to take a page out of Odeta’s book as she was not allowing me to rest and trying to close the distance between us with another sword slash aimed at my foot.
Unfortunately for her, I was faster than Odeta’s opponent so I recovered fast enough to lift my foot and avoided the blow entirely.
I used the momentum to lift my sword above my head before bringing it down in an overhead strike as I placed my lifted foot back down at the same time.
She had her own sword raised so I was expecting my attack to be blocked which I would then respond by stepping into her guard to deliver an elbow strike to either her chest or her chin, whichever was easier for me to strike after she blocked my blow.
What I did not expect was for my sword to break her sword into two pieces and continue downwards to smack her in the face, knocking the poor girl onto the ground in a single blow.
I watched as the Mercenary girl crumpled onto the ground like a puppet with its strings cut, her eyes rolling to the back of her head as she lost consciousness even while she was still falling.
I just stood there in the same exact pose while I tried to comprehend what had happened, only for me to be woken out of my stupor by the sound of Odeta clapping from the side.
“That was awesome, Sister Aster!! Wahahaha!!”
… Ok… I was not expecting that at all… Is she ok?
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