Chapter 224 - Return To Ishar {2} Let The Dual Commence

"Now, let us go inside." Amell said with a smile, "Sebas, I will need a full report on the state of the world." Sebas nodded and everyone followed him inside. The group made their way through the halls of the castle. The endless sparkling coming off the floors and the walls made its beauty breathtaking.

"How is Acnologia doing?" Amell asked while navigating these massive halls. He remembered every path in the castle, and he seemed to know exactly where he was going as his pace increased, indicating that he was a little excited about this.

"He spends most of his time in the rocky area far off to the West. And he rarely leaves his cave. Over the years we have noted one important thing about him. He seems to be waiting for something, or someone, that we still don't know." Sebas reported it all in an orderly manner. He didn't seem nervous or flustered in the slightest, he was a true professional.

"Good. Does he know we have been watching him?"

"No, my lord. We have observed all targets with utmost caution. They never even suspected that they were being watched." Sebas didn't hesitate. He spoke only with absolute certainty.

Amell nodded in acknowledgement. And finally, they had arrived at the place Amell was looking for. And that place was the massive arena located in the courtyard of the castle. "Here we are. Alora, you and I will spar, I want to see how strong you have become." He said and gestured for her to walk to the arena.

"Yes, my lord, I can't wait!" She said and ran up to the ring with an excited smile. Sebas and the maids immediately combined their efforts to create an incredibly powerful barrier around the arena.

"Are you ready Alora?" Amell said while standing there with his hands behind his back. Amell was wearing his long martial robes, it was white with golden lining along the arm and shoulders.

"I'm ready, my lord!" She took a battle stance against him. Now they both just waited for Sebas to announce the start of the match. The butler looked at them both then said, "Ready?" and after getting a confident nod from Alora, and a casual nod from Amell, he yelled out, "Begin!"

The ground cracked under Alora's feet as she took off at supersonic speed. He raised his right hand and blocked her fist and the collision caused a shockwave that almost destroyed the barrier.

"Whoa, lady Alora is strong!" Lupus said as she stood off to the side twirling her red hair with her index finger. Yuri glanced at her in annoyance, "Of course she is. She was the first Overlord of this island and the first one to bow her head and accept lord Amell as God. She is the strongest dragon in the world."

"I know, I know, I have just never seen her fight before, so I was just a little shocked that our barrier could barely handle their initial clash." Lupus said with a sour expression.

"About that, Sir Sebas, we should strengthen the barrier further." Yuri turned to Sebas and said respectfully. And he quickly nodded.

"I'll take care of it." He said and walked forward. He put his hand on the barrier and released his magic power. [Thousand Layer Barrier] He said loudly and a thousand extremely thin but powerful barriers appeared on top of the already existing barrier.

Inside the barrier, Amell and Alora were trading blows with each other. Or to be more accurate with it, Alora was using both her hands and throwing thousands of punches and Amell was blocking them all with his right hand. She was getting a hands-on experience on the disparity between their strengths.

"Good power, and even better speed. You have grown splendidly, Alora," Amell said with a smile while casually blocking thousands of blows from her. Her expression went from determination to anger to annoyance, "Can you please not say that with a smile while still only using one hand, it's kind of hard to believe I've grown at all." Alora increased her speed as much as she could, but she still couldn't force Amell to use two hands.

"Think about who it is you're fighting. Trust me when I say that you have grown a lot during my absence." At Amell's words, her expression brightened up a little. And she went at it with even more ferocity, but Amell stopped her suddenly.

"Okay, let me experience your magic instead. I have already gotten a good overview of your physical strength"

"Okay! You asked for it!" Alora said and she quickly jumped back. Fire, wind, water, and earth magic power started to revolve around her. Everything started to shake as her magic took control of the four main elements inside the barrier. "I will make you use your other hand!" She slammed her hand down on the stage and roared, [Earth Golem] And twelve massive earth golems rose up from the ground. "Charge!" She yelled and the golems took charge.

"Powerful golems, but against me, you're gonna have to do better than that." Amell threw out a palm strike and a gigantic wind blast completely destroyed all twelve of them. Thousands of pieces of stones were sent flying against Alora. She stopped her own charge and slammed her palms together, [Converge] she yelled and every piece of stone, big or small merged together and transformed itself into a giant spear. Alora slammed her hands on the spear and yelled, [Combine Magic: Meteor Spear] flames spread from her hands and covered the entirety of the giant stone spear. Alora pointed at Amell and the spear took off at close to supersonic speeds.

Amell smiled and waved his index finger and his own shadow rose from the ground and transformed into a giant black hole that completely swallowed the spear. Alora stood wide-eyed at the sight, 'Shadow element! He mastered the advanced elements before me.' but she was immediately taken out of her stupor by Amell's next action.

He snapped his fingers and the black hole opened up behind Alora and her own flaming spear came flying out of it. She kicked down on the ground like an earth bender, [Wall Of Stone] She raised a fifteen-meter thick earth wall in front of her, and she wasn't done yet. She put her hand on the wall and said, [Absolute Hardening] and the earth wall was transformed and became a glowing bright blue-coloured wall of stone.

'She's incredibly skilled. Her ability to almost instantly adapt to any unknown situation in a fight is fantastic.' Amell showed a proud smile for a second. The spear and the wall clashed and caused an explosion that uprooted most of the stage around Alora. And after having dealt with that, she turned to Amell again with an ecstatic expression on her face. She took a long and deep breath and said [Ultimate Elemental Magic: Chaotic Hurricane]

Alora's entire magic power rushed out of her. Those thousand barriers Sebas sat up around them stood not one single second against her power. They all broke like a stone being thrown against a glass mirror. "Lady Alora has lost her mind, she will destroy masters entire castle at this rate. We need to stop her!" Yuri said while preparing to interfere in the fight, but Seba's hand gripped her shoulder and stopped her. "We shall do nothing at all." He said sternly.

Alora raised both her hands to the sky and the air around this mountain peak started to change. With her as the centre point, a hurricane started to form around her. Amell stood with his hands behind his back and smiled proudly. 'This is something she created herself. The destructive power should she be allowed to fully form the hurricane would easily be enough to eventually destroy the entire continent of Ishgar.'

"Very impressive, Alora. But I can't let you continue an attack like that since I still want a bed to sleep in tonight." Amell said and raised his right hand in front of his chest. He performed a sign with his hand Alora suddenly lost control of her body. Her hurricane started disappearing and her own body started moving according to someone else's command and not her own.

She stared horrified at Amell, "Lord Amell, what did you do? What is this magic?!" She was freaking out because she couldn't feel any foreign magic invade her body, but still, she had absolutely no control of her power or body.

"This is blood bending. I am controlling the blood inside your body," He said with a smile on his face. Alora's facial expression was more of the creepy kind. Creepy in the sense that blood bending creeped the hell out of her.

"EEEWW! Stop that! That's so CREEPY!!" Her screams stemmed from horror while Amell forcefully made her walk to him like a puppet. "STOP!!!" She screamed louder, but this time she was screaming at her legs that wouldn't stop moving.

"I control everything inside of you," Amell said with a jokingly sadistic expression on his face. When Alora had walked over to him, he cupped her chin and looked into her eyes. "I am very proud of you, Alora!" He stopped controlling her and kissed her on the forehead. And after that, he simply walked away, leaving all this destruction behind him. Alora stood frozen in place not sure what to think. "P-Proud of me? Lord Amell is proud of me!" She said to herself with a smile.

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