Chapter 258 Sparring

Bzzzz

Ten lightning spears were floating around Reign as the latter had his eyes closed in the training area beneath the building. Suddenly he opens his eyes as all of the spears blitzes toward Shadow who was using his [ Shadow Swords ] skill. With breakneck speed, Shadow charges toward Reign while dodging the lightning spears that were aimed at him.

His [ Shadow Swords ] allowed for his daggers to have a much longer reach and he was able to even deflect some of the spears that were impossible to be dodged, of course, the brief contact with the lightning shocked him a bit, but with mana covering his body he was able to simply shrug it off.

He immediately appears in front of Reign and slashes at him with both of his daggers as the latter readies his two swords in order to meet the attack.

Swoosh

Right before the swords collide Shadow suddenly disappears. Using his teleportation skill he was able to immediately appear behind Reign, with his daggers still pointing downwards he stabs toward Reign with great speed.

Clang!

Suddenly two swords appeared in front of the daggers and blocked them, Reign didn't even turn around, he simply moved his arms back as he had already anticipated the attack from Shadow. The two had fought hundreds of times when they were younger and they had gone through tens of battles together since the beginning of the game and Reign knew Shadow's fighting style well.

Two swords and two daggers hit against one another repeatedly as Reign and Shadow darted through the training area. The trainees together with Wolf and the others were in a corner or the training area and were watching the spectacle intensely. Most of them couldn't even catch many of the movements that Reign and Shadow did as they were moving too fast for their eyes to follow them. They were surrounded by a powerful barrier that Reign and the others had installed so that they could fight without risking anyone getting injured by mistake.

Each time one was close to winning they would gasp as the attack would get dodged or blocked seemingly out of nowhere. The two had a very good understanding of the skill and patterns of the other and were able to accurately guess what the latter was going to do.

Shadows suddenly sprung up from behind Reign as they tried to catch him and immobilize him, only to be blasted away by a powerful discharge of black and white lightning. Before Shadow could properly adjust himself Reign had already appeared in front of him and aimed a punch at his stomach.

[ Shadow Body ]

Thanks to becoming a lot stronger than before Shadow was able to use his [ Shadow Body ] for a prolonged period of time, similar to how Reign could use his [ Lightning Charge ] and [ Lightning Body ]. The two skills were connected as the [ Lightning Body ] was simply an evolved form of the [ Lightning Charge ], still, when it came for an incredible burst of speed in one direction, the charge was undoubtedly the better skill but it offered no maneuverability.

The trainees were only able to see two lines moving throughout the area, a bolt of black and white lightning and a shadowy line were clashing constantly before backing away. After about 30 seconds of using the skills the two stopped and stared at each other while panting heavily. Reign had a larger mana reserve compared to Shadow but many of his skills drained more mana compared to the latter.

The two of course were not using the most powerful skills and attacks they had since they couldn't guarantee the safety of the other. Of course, that was not how it looked like to the trainees as they were on the edge of their seats with every exchange, none of them was pulling back punches and each hit looked like it would either seriously injure or kill.

Since the two had been fighting for 30 minutes now they decided to finally stop, fighting any longer would simply force them to use some of their most powerful attacks and that could end very badly.

The two enter the barrier and sit down, they had used a great deal of stamina and mana and needed to take some time to recuperate. Beast and Greenie enter the training area after them and start sparring. The fight between the two was very different as the first half of the fight was Greenie doing his best in order to dodge the multitude of arrows that Beast launched his way.

Sometimes he would be forced to hit an arrow with his hammer as it was impossible to dodge it, that would always come with risk as he never knew whether that arrow was an explosive one or not. Finally, after getting close to Beast he threw his hammer at him before lunging toward him. Beast was forced to quickly move in order to dodge the hammer and he was unable to draw any distance between himself and Greenie.

As the gray ogre descends upon Beast he smiles slightly before clenching his two hands in fists. Before he could attack Beast however he was surprised as the latter simply raised a hand and channeled a great deal of mana in it. Suddenly Beast pushes his hand forward as a powerful blast of wind hits Greenie and sends him flying backward.

[ Wind Blast ]

It was the skill that Beast had received as a reward from the trials, since the skill didn't really do a lot of damage and was mostly used in order to push enemies back he didn't really use it that often. When fighting solo however it was an amazing skill that could save the life of a long-range attacker, but when fighting with Reign and the others he simply had no use for it as it was a rare sight for him to be attacked by a monster at close range. Even if that happened his beasts were there to protect him and he could simply focus on attacking the enemies from afar.

Having the ability of a tamer and the [ Fusion ] skill together with [ Wind Blast ] effectively eliminated the biggest weakness that Beast had as a long-range combatant. If any opponent thought that they could win against him by closing the distance they would be shocked to find that not only could he send them flying back, but he could use one of his beasts and transform into a powerful melee combatant as well.

At the end of the sparring session, it was Greenie that lost, after being blasted away by Beast and not having his hammer it was almost impossible for him to close the distance again. Even if he could, Beast could simply use his [ Fusion ] and fight him at close range as well, the ogre was exhausted however as he had spent the first half of the fight running around and dodging the arrows before lunging towards Beast.

In his haste, he had completely forgotten about Beast's wind skills and simply expected Beast to fuse and fight him at close range. Even though Beast would get a boost in stats during his fused state, his close-range fighting capabilities were below Greenie's and the latter thought he could easily win this sparring match.

Tank and Laura were the last ones to spar, Wolf was simply observing them all today and had no plans of joining the sparring session, he focused mostly on explaining to the trainees what was happening during the different sparring sessions and giving them advice on what they could do in those kinds of situations.

Laura immediately started bombarding Tank from afar as the latter had already activated his dome skill. Her normal attacks wouldn't work against it as they were simply not powerful enough to break through the powerful dome that surrounded Tank who was walking towards her.

Quickly she took out her dark tome as Tank immediately constricted his eyes and started running as the dome was dispelled. The phantom of a red bull appeared around him as he charged at Laura who had already finished casting the black fireball, the party had used the last two weeks mostly for training and they rarely went out to hunt, they were able to use their skills a lot easier and with greater proficiency as well.

Laura for instance was now able to use the black fireball relatively easily and it only took her about 10 seconds to cast it compared to more than a minute that it took previously. The [ Spear of Annihilation ] was a different story as she was barely able to improve her casting time with it. She hurls the fireball at Tank and an intense explosion takes place, the phantom of the bull flickers a bit as it was damaged heavily and Tank was forced to slow down from the attack.

Laura quickly used a dagger to cut her hand and used her blood to draw a pentagram in front of her, the creepy sight of a pentagram that was made of blood floating in front of her made the trainees wince a bit as they intensely stared at what was to happen next.

The pentagram shines ominously as a concentrated blast of demonic energy was fired at Tank who quickly put his shield in front of him. The bull was destroyed by the attack but Tank was still standing as his shield that was strengthened by the [ Mana shield v2 ] was able to protect him from the leftover energy of the attack.

Suddenly he hurls his shield towards Laura who quickly jumps to the side in order to avoid it. The shield hits the ground a couple of meters behind her as an explosion takes place. As Laura turns towards Tank she was surprised to see him missing, only to widen her eyes in shock as a big shadow was suddenly on her.

Looking up she was able to see Tank falling down on her, quickly tries to dodge again, only to be hit by the shockwave of the attack. Tank immediately charges toward her and was surprised when the latter turned around and sent a kick his way. He quickly lifted his arm to block the attack only to be surprised by the pain he felt, Laura's leg was covered with a hard bone and the power behind it was able to hurt him.

Tank quickly remembered the Rank A Bone Belt that was given to Laura some time ago, that piece of equipment had an "enhance" option which would harden a part of the wielder's body and it seemed that Laura was now using it.

( Author: I just realized that I originally put enchant instead of enhance when I gave the description of the item, will fix that )

The battle continued for about 10 more minutes, Laura tried her best as she used her belt and demonic whip in order to damage Tank while trying to draw some distance and attack him with her demonic energy but it was futile. Tank's ability offered him great defense and in the end, she was defeated.