Chapter 508: The Result
Merasi laid down with her back to the ground, thinking back to what had just
happened. Despite her hard work, her muscles had been useless in her ght.
Ning had rushed towards her, with no weapon aside from his two ngers
straightened like he was holding a dagger.
He moved with normal speed and hit her with a little bit more force than a
normal human would.
But as soon as he did that, Merasi would lose control of part of her body. Ning
hit her on the elbows where the metal didn't t together, on the knee where
there was a gap in the armor, and nally on her neck, making her lose control
of everything below her as she slammed on the ground.
She looked with wide eyes as she realized that during the entire ght, she
hadn't managed to land a single hit on him.
"How?" she asked, unable to understand what had happened. At rst, she
thought he was using Aether, but even she couldn't do something like that with
aether.
Also, he was hitting each of her body parts before they went docile.
Ning walked in front of her and said, "you lose."
Merasi said nothing. She knew that she had lost. The winning condition was if
the other person surrendered or was incapacitated.
She couldn't think of a better example of incapacitation than what she was
going through.
"You can stand up, right?" Ning asked.
"Yes," Merasi said as Aether passed through her entire body. While she still had
no control of it directly, she used Aether to control it.
She slowly stood up and with a thought, destroyed all of the armors in her body,
revealing her muscled body to the masses once more.
"What did you do to me?" she asked Ning once more.
Ning picked up his sta from amidst the pile of broken metals as he said, "I hit
your nerves to stop them from working for a few minutes."
"You can do that?" Merasi asked with a bit of surprise. "How do you even know
where my nerves are?"
"I'm a doctor," Ning said. "These sort of things are second nature to me. I don't
use it as much since using Aether is easier, but it does come in handy from time
to time."
"You defeated me so easily," Merasi said. As much as she loved battle, it
seemed she didn't like being beaten so overwhelmingly.
"I would've defeated you a lot more easily if you had decided to go with a
weapon, instead of armors. I only hit your nerves because they were the only
parts exposed to me for now."
"There are a lot more places on your body that I could hit to end the match in a
single instant, but you got wise enough to put on armor. That helped it drag on
to 5 minutes," Ning said.
"So... you lost the bet."
Merasi looked at him with awe. She had thought that she would have a great
chance at winning in a battle, but... it seemed she was doomed to lose from the
start.
"Where did you learn to ght like that? That sta technique of yours was
amazing," Merasi said.
"Was it? It's one of my weaker techniques. The only reason I used it was
because I didn't want to cut you with a spear," Ning said. "As for where I
learned it... it was in another world."
Merasi didn't say anything. She assumed he was talking about a dierent place
at a dierent time.
Waxil still looked at Ning with a face full of shock. Even after the three of them
had entered the tower, he couldn't help but keep staring at Ning.
Ning saw that but chose to ignore it.
"So, about our bet. When do I leave?" Ning asked.
Merasi nally remembered the bet and said, "you wanted to join the Battle
force of the headquarters?"
"Yes," Ning said.
"Now that you have shown me your ability, I can't deny that you will be a great
help to us," Merasi said while nodding to herself.
"Alright, I will take you," Merasi said. Ning's smile widened to a grin.
"After 32 weeks."
Ning's smile faded. "After 32 weeks?" he asked. "Why do I have to wait for a
year and 12 weeks?"
"Well, that's how long there is until the next Battle Force recruitment," she
said.
"Recruitment? Wasn't I supposed to directly join?" Ning asked.
"Yes, but you still have to wait for the day of the recruitment to join with the
fresh recruits," Merasi said.
"It takes place every 2 years, so the last one already took place 8 weeks ago.
Now, you have to wait for it like everyone else," she said.
Somehow, despite winning, Ning felt like he had lost today. He couldn't believe
that he would have to spend another 32 weeks doing nothing.
"I will go and report what I have learned here today. I'm sure they will send
someone to you to further discuss how to use the Aether you made."
"Until then, sit tight and don't let anyone else learn about this," Merasi said as
she closed her eyes.
Her thoughts drifted to a distance and she latched onto it. Suddenly, Waxil and
Ning felt themselves being slightly tugged onto by the space in front of Merasi.
The space warped to open a hole in it, that looked no dierent from a drain
being opened under a pool of water.
"I hope to see you before I go sleep again in a few years. Goodbye," Merasi said
and stepped forward.
Then, she disappeared.
Merasi had left as she had come, by opening a portal through space and walking
into it.
It wasn't long before Ning could do it again.
He spent the rest of the day working like he normally would while occasionally
thinking about the work related to the Aether.
Finally, once he was done, he left the tower.
He was in his thoughts when he came across someone sitting on his front
porch.
Alexis was back.