Chapter 494: Expectations and Reality

"So, what will it be? Shall we continue or are you ready to concede?" Sara asked with an impish tone in her voice, grinning widely at the statuesque girl in front of her. 

A moment later, as if just reminding herself of the fact, she hit her forehead as she continued with a soft giggle.

"Oh, silly me, you what am I doing, you can't even respond! Sorry!" Then her purple glowing eyes flickered for a moment, releasing the mental hold and relieving control back to Crysta once again. 

"Is it better now? So what will it be?"

The girl stood still only for a second, before her face slowly changed, donning a sorrowful look. Though it was convincing, Aiden -and for that matter Sara also-, felt some strange, powerful emotions coming from the girl, not matching the act she was putting on.

"Well…" She began, slowly closing her eyes and displaying an expression as if she was about to acquiesce to her opponent's demands. However, in the next instant, suddenly with a wide grin, she suddenly stepped to the side and jumped up in the air doing a frontal flip. 

Her target was to somersault behind Sara, hopefully catching her by surprise, or at the very least not fully alarmed and getting herself back into the fight. 

Now, knowing that she could, under no circumstances let their gazes meet, felt that there was still some small sliver of a chance. Blind combat, although is not what she was best at, she could still get by, especially against a non-combatant like this mind witch.

Fighting without relying on one's sight is actually a pretty high-ranked training method, not just in the kingdom, but all across Eora. By depriving one of their most important visual senses, their other receptors will kick in.

Relying on steady breathing and once one becomes capable to feel and guide the flow of mana inside their bodies, they could use it to enhance their bodies and thus their smell, their hearing… their touch… and most importantly, their so-called [Battle Sense]. 

This ability, this skill that usually is learned through living through the gore and carnage that are the reality of battlefields is a sort of sixth sense for a warrior. You will be capable of sensing the very flow of mana inside others, and with time, be able to get a feel of their strength through it. 

The more this strange, mysterious substance could be seen in someone, the more fluid, the more vibrant, the more… 'energetic' it was, the higher in the power ladder that person was.

Crysta, though was already capable of using a basic, primitive version of the skill and thus could get a rough feel of others, but it was nowhere clear enough for her to rely on it instead of sight. For one, she couldn't differentiate between auras, the outgoing surges of energies, or the actual flow, the spiritual, nerve-like system inside a body. To her, it was all a single mass of light blue-ish colored puff of cloud in the vast void of darkness.

Adding to that, that they were surrounded by a relatively large group who all were powerful individuals, the scene that she was greeted with was as if she was thrown into a giant puddle of pond consisting of light blue paint exclusively.

She couldn't rely on it at all, and even with the slight enhancement to her other senses, her perception didn't clear up at all. Yet, there were still her instincts, her own experiences to rely on.

Crysta was sure that after the somersault, she should have landed behind the girl, at around one, or at most two steps away from her. She also knew that she only had around a breath's time to act, as with the surprisingly sharp reflexes of this purple-haired girl, she was probably mid-way to turning around already. 

She only had one chance, one strike, that was free. She had to make it count. Even if he couldn't steal it and secure the victory, at the very least she needed to even the chances a bit and assure her friends that they could at least match up to this party of monstrous youngsters.

With these thoughts flashing through her mind in the span of a second only, she didn't hesitate and struck towards the lower back area of Sara's head with her right fist. 

From knowledge and experience, she could sort of create an image of the girl inside her mind and was aiming somewhere between her nape and the back of her head, to a nerve cluster that with a sufficiently strong blunt force, could hopefully cause the girl to momentarily lose consciousness and fall face-first onto the ground.

Though there was a strange, uncomfortable tingling sensation coming from her right, she ignored it, focusing on completing the plan of her attack instead.

Unfortunately for her, though her effort was commendable, it ultimately bore no fruit. The fact was that she correctly guessed her landing spot, and her plan of attack and aim would have been impeccable, but sadly, she still underestimated Sara's reaction time.

The moment she saw her opponent sail over the air above her, Sara immediately stepped to the side and was standing ready to unleash a counter. Knowing that her opponent has willingly derived herself from her sight, it was almost child's play to counter the girl's movements.

So as Crysta was thinking of aiming at Sara's back of her head, she was actually unleashing her anger against the empty air. Meanwhile, Sara's hands were glowing with a faint milky white glow as the energy was slowly building up inside her. 

She muttered, some incomprehensible, nonsensical words to the others that when it reached its conclusion completed a simple, not-too flashy spell. Her fist struck forward, hitting seemingly nothing but the empty air.

Yet, before any of the onlookers could look at her with confusion, questioning stares, a ball of transparent light shot out from the end of her cute little clenched palm and like a cannonball shot from a cannon sailed through the air at frightening speed towards the right side of the still blinded Crysta.

Even though she could feel the incoming danger, and reacted almost immediately, her fate was already decided the moment she closed her eyes and decided on this last-ditch effort.

Before she could throw herself back and evade, the ball of energy crashed into her side, releasing all the surging energies inside it and releasing it at the same time in a blaring blast of the invisible explosion, throwing Crysta's listless body up in the air and flinging it violently towards the left. 

Just a few seconds later her body crashed onto the ground, tumbling and rolling helplessly for a couple of rounds before finally slowing to a halt. 

Even though she controlled her strike as much as she could, the sudden, unexpected impact still proved to be too much for the girl. As she crashed onto the ground she had already fainted. 

As the echoes of the powerful attack gradually died down, a heavy silence descended on the grassy training fields. Most of the eyes from the crowd were in shock, as they looked at the sprawled out, and unconscious teammate of theirs, before taking fleeting glances at the awkwardly smiling girl left standing alone at the center. 

Doubts started to appear in their minds after such a violent and unexpected result. They weren't so sure anymore that they wanted to face the rest of these little monsters…

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