Chapter 108- Something From The Heavens
"You only have 2 minutes left, Rin," Emilia said as she looked at her bracelet casually.
"Hah… Hah, I still didn't give up." Rin said as he wiped some of the sweat that accumulated on his face with his shirt. The idea of giving up never crossed his mind at all, all he thought about was how to get to actually touch Emilia.
'Should I just use that?' He thought in his head.
'Wait, he still has more?'
Hearing his thoughts, Emilia's interest peaked as she gazed back at him with anticipation. She thought that she had seen everything he had to offer but for him to still have a trump card hidden, she really wanted to see it now.
'Maybe he's going to finally reveal his element to me?'
All this time, Emilia had never forgotten about Rin's element at all. It has been something that she speculated on many times but couldn't find a possible element that could fit him. Even when he tried to sense his mana and guess the element from his mana pattern, she couldn't find anything.
Most people's mana changes drastically when they awaken as they adapt to the person's powers. For example, a water element user will have very fluid mana, ice users will have a mana that feels slightly colder than normal and fire users will be the opposite of that. These small alterations affect the user in the longer term, the more they develop their powers, the more their mana becomes fused with their element.
Some extremely strong magicians can even make anyone feel as if they were inside a freezing blizzard storm or submerged in the deepest parts of hell just by pressuring them with their aura.
But, Rin had no such thing, his mana was so raw and pure that it almost made Emilia believe it was the world's mana just purely concentrated in his body. This made her ask many questions but couldn't find a single answer to them.
*Swish*
Hearing the sound of Rin closing up on her again, she shook those thoughts and focused on him.
'What is he going to do?'
The moment Rin was close enough he jumped in the air. But, he didn't attack and instead landed again and moved around Emilia. His speed coupled with the mana camouflage from the Formless Ghost Dagger technique made his movement very hard to follow.
In less than 3 seconds, he had turned around Emilia many times, closing up to her before backing away at the last second.
'He's trying to make me lose my stance and then attack me when I least expect it. Clever.' She complimented in her head.
A weird kind of blur appeared around Emilia's spot where she stood. Rin's body was basically everywhere and nowhere, his afterimage made any normal person incapable of determining where he was exactly. However, that was obviously not the case for Emilia at all.
*Swish*
Rin's blade suddenly appeared right in front of her face, barely one inch away from her eyes. However, Emilia simply tilted her head and the dagger passed her, barely touching a strand of her beautiful black hair.
'He threw the dagger?' Looking back, she saw that the dagger vanished. Rin had picked it up midway through the air.
*Swish* *Swish*
Rin's threw the dagger again at Emilia which she dodged again and again as if it was nothing. She didn't even need to look around her to be able to detect the dagger's exact place and trajectory before moving her body.
'How can she do that?' He asked himself.
'Ah, whatever!'
Then, Rin quickly opened his system and then his stats. He saw that he had exactly 8045 Action Points that he had never used.
'System, put 2000 Points into Agility and 2000 into strength!' He thought in his head.
[2000 Action Points have been put into Agility.]
[Agility has evolved from F- to E-.]
[2000 Action Points have been Put into Strength.]
[Strength has evolved from F to E.]
Even though there was some risk in this move that Emilia might get suspicious. But, Rin wasn't someone to back down from a fight without giving his best especially when it will definitely benefit him in the future. Besides, he will have to use some of these points at some point so he might as well do that now.
Instantly, Rin's body was pumped with an overwhelming amount of energy he didn't the source of. It was as if his body was reborn again after evolving. Such an intoxicating feeling of extreme power made him very delighted. He felt as if he was on top of the world at the moment.
'Let's do this!'
Emilia was completely oblivious to this so she didn't know that Rin had powered up greatly. He was now completely a different person.
*Swish*
'Hmm?' Her eyes widened a little bit when she felt that something was off.
The dagger that he threw at her this time was way faster than before. In fact, Emilia was sure that if she was completely relaxed, the dagger might've actually touched her hair. But, that didn't happen.
*Pang*
'His speed increased too?'
Emilia noticed that his blurry image became even hard to follow. She now had to actually look at him just to see him clearly.
*Swish* *Swish* *Swish*
Three daggers were thrown all at the same time from different directions. Emilia's eyebrows rose a little bit in surprise and quickly bent her body down. No, they weren't three daggers but one camouflaged dagger thrown at an extremely high speed.
'He's completely different.' She analyzed him in her head with a serious frown.
"You let your guard down, master."
She heard his voice near her ear and she quickly turned around before jumping back before he could touch her. Rin's hand moved in grabbing her.
"Tsk." Emilia clicked her tongue.
*Swish*
She suddenly vanished from her initial place startling Rin to his core. But, before he could even care about such a trivial thing, he found himself a few inches away from smashing to the ground.
But, Emilia grabbed him with her left hand. The two looked at each other for a good 3 seconds.
"..."
"Mmm, bonjour?" He said awkwardly.
"You… Sigh."
"Hey, master. You lost." He said as he pointed at her left arm and then at his bracelet which indicated that the 10 minutes were still not over.
Emilia froze for a second before she released her arm, making Rin fall to the ground.
"Forget about the reward. What did you just do a second ago?"
"Hmm?"
"Don't act like a fool. How did you suddenly become faster and stronger?"
"I don't know what you are talking about." He replied casually as he crossed his legs on the ground.
"You little rascal! Do you take me for an idiot? Hurry and spit it out before I make you spit it out."
"Would you promise to keep it a secret, master?"
"I already saw your talent and I could've leaked it out to anyone and got anything I want for it. But, I never did that. I won't tell you to trust my word. But, my actions speak louder than my words. Now, say it."
"Fine, fine. Well, the truth is, and please don't get shocked because of it."
"I won't get shocked."
"Ok. Other than the talent that I have now, I have another special power."
"Special power?"
"Yes, special power. It allows me to basically be able to kill monsters or do certain things and that will make me power-up, basically."
"Huh?"
"In a nutshell, with each monster I kill, I can get stronger on time." He said.
What Rin revealed was technically the truth about his system. He wasn't allowed to reveal anything about his system so this vague description was the most he could say which also doesn't affect him much. For him, Emilia was worthy of enough trust to tell her about this special power of his.
He was sure that no matter what happens, she will keep this a secret. It wasn't a matter of deep care for Rin but because of her extremely prideful personality. Emilia was never someone that licked to snitch just to gain more power or wealth. For her, that was the deepest humiliation possible.
Emilia's body froze in its place. Her mind short-circuited. She didn't know what to say at all.
"You can get stronger just by killing monsters? Just like that?"
"Just like that."
"Huh… Hehehe!" Her shocked face then gradually turned into low chuckles. She held her face with one hand and kept chuckling.
"Hahaha! What are you really, Rin?"
She didn't say 'who are you?' but 'what are you?' which meant that Emilia didn't believe Rin was a human at this point. There is simply no human that should have the ability to continuously evolve. That clashes with world laws.
"Master…" Rin called for her.
"You must be some kind of treasure from the heavens, Rin. This is not a coincidence. You contradict every worldly law and basically spit in the face of this world's greatest figures. Hahaha! This sounds like the most stupid joke I have ever heard. Maybe you are indeed some kind of god or a higher entity." She said.
Emilia didn't even know what she felt at that moment. Was it a thrill? Was it amazement at the thing that Rin keep on showing her that somehow topple down the one before? Or was it something else… Something that she didn't want to admit to… Was it fear?
Fear to witness someone that could potentially have the fate of this whole world in his hand in the near future. Emilia felt that she was indeed facing something far greater than anything she had and will ever witness in all of her life. It was impossible not to feel fear. But, her fear didn't stem from Rin but from the worst that could happen if Rin was turned into an enemy of this world. The mere thought of that happening made Emilia shudder slightly.
'If we turn him into an enemy... That's going to be our end. Until he becomes stronger, way stronger than anyone else, I must keep him safe.'
The two people's relationship was starting to get more and more complex by the day. One wants to get stronger and the other wants to protect him at all costs for his sake and the sake of the world's future.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thanks for reading. Any support you give me is always appreciated no matter how small it was. Let's all keep it up :)