Chapter 20 Cold Mirrors Surrounding The Rose

First of all, I wasn't going to fight her for real, even in this world filled with atrocities, I still had my morals, Nari was a girl.

And second, my goal wasn't to win but still to make her think that she had lost against me, that was to make her question her own abilities for a while and also make her feel vulnerable.

And third, it would come in handy for the future, getting used to fighting someone with real power and skills.

"Nari..." I looked into her cat-like dark night eyes, "You can try as many times as you want."

I then stretched out my hand towards her face. She didn't move or tried to avoid my hand at all though. I thought that was pretty brave of her considering what I could do with my mirror technique.

Although I still wasn't completely aware of how to properly use it, it could have been dangerous if the glass had actually touched her soft like silk skin, "Worry not about me, but yourself," the icy type of tone came from her glossy pink lips as her face got serious.

Without even a proper notice, the corner of my lips curved up and I could feel a large amount of jolting energy flow through my body. This very moment was exciting.

For once, I had something more than her.

Not only in terms of strength but also experience, maybe? The battle between us had now finally started.

The first thing she did after noticing that her blow missed was to press both of her hands on the ground, making it so that she wouldn't fall.

I was impressed, that was a smart move. Then again, I'm sure no one would ever think that I'd still let them get up after falling down unless they were an idiot.

Quickly stepping forward with my left leg, I kicked her hard in the stomach, making her come to her knees.

I wasn't proud of this, as I promised not to hit her at first, but Nari was ready to kill me if needed.

And at the same time, I pressed my right foot to the ground and slid onto her back.

Her head was now in front of mine and I was facing her directly down from above.

In other words, I was looking straight into her face, "You still have time to give up and join my side, dear." I whispered softly into her ears.

Nari opened her mouth wide and breathed out a large breath of air, pushing it out all at once.

It was like a giant gust of wind that blew away anything that was around her, 'So this was her power!'

"Ugh!" I gritted as my eyes widened when sharp shards of ice flew towards me hitting right on my chest and arms.

However, this was nothing when compared to the pain I felt earlier. This just hurts.

A lot.

My body started trembling violently as I pushed myself off her back, 'When did she even get there?' My eyes were glued to the place where I last saw her. But wait... How come she was able to push herself up? 'I've never seen her do such a thing before.' There was a series of confusion that came into my head.

She must have already recovered from the fall.

One thing I actually forgot, Nari was an assassin... Silent movements were just her expertise, she couldn't really show off her true potential until she was close enough to the target and nor would she think to.

Although it sounded impossible, I was kind of impressed by how fast she was, not simply in thinking, but also making it happen.

"Well then, I'll end this here," I spoke loudly on purpose to make her question her own abilities.

Even if I had to use dirty tricks to get her on my side, I would. I couldn't care about it being right or wrong.

I knew Nari's weakness, something that even she didn't know, all I needed was to make Nari get closer to me and then wrap things up.

She was about ten feet away from me, or maybe less, the distance we were apart wasn't much of a problem with the plan I had in my mind.

ραпdα nᴏνa| сom And as I thought, my plan worked perfectly. The reason why I wanted her to come closer was that I was planning to use my most powerful technique...

For a while, I was waiting for her to approach, but instead, she kept moving backwards, running zig zags across the battlefield, trying to evade my attacks. I could see that she was being careful of the range she was at.

"Can't you even hit a girl?" I rolled my eyes and shook my head, "TSK, how irritating!"

I wanted to pin her in a place, so I made a small explosion sound with my throat, making an upward arc with my arm.

The very next instant, a giant wave of ice shot out of the sky and landed right atop her.

Nari was caught completely off guard and her legs were frozen solid as she fell down onto her rear end. The only reason why I chose this Hill of Pain was that I remembered a long time ago the author mentioned that this was the place where the hero of the book was found.

After that, numerous magical acts kept happening, things like this...

The icy rain continued to pour down on her, leaving a thin layer of ice that covered every inch of her body.

But since she was flexible, she tried to move around in order to break free from the ice, but that's when I used my technique.

I knew it was pathetic of me, and I could have done something way cooler than this, something more powerful to make myself stand out and force her to respect me, but right now this wasn't my goal.

My goal was to make her lose and completely give herself to me.

As she struggled to remove the frozen water from her body, I called out, "Zuri!" I pressed my two hands against each other and made myself look as if I was praying and then stretched one to the front, bending my ring and little fingers together and forming a pistol-like sign with my hands.

I was trying to look cool, and I knew that Zuri will appear.

[Understood]

Zuri spoke behind my ears as her eyes focused on the target, the now struggling Nari.

Her weakness was water, especially Ice.

She didn't know she had this weakness until she turned twenty-one, and it was the hero of the book, 'Dante' who brought this up to her.

Her parents were killed before her eyes, brutally murdered and then thrown into icy, cold water... That was when she jumped into the lake, at almost seven years old she tried to rescue them by herself and almost killed her own tiny body.

It was that time when the secret guild removed her from the water and without supplying her with first aid, they put her into the carriage and escaped from the place.

Nari was afraid of ice, snow and cold water, yet her own technique was poisonous ice. This was interesting, indeed.

I saw her struggle, as her widened eyes and furrowed eyebrows were too obvious.

At this point, I could easily defeat her, "NOW," as Zuri's vision behind me became more clear, I shot a small amount of mana from my fingers... The energy surrounded Nari, building a small house of mirror glass around her and trapping her inside.

After that, I walked towards her slowly, making sure that she could see me coming, "You should be happy about this, for you are now saved from the cold and ice that surrounds you," I lifted my right hand and pointed it towards her.

I walked inside the glass easily as it was my power and not Rowen's.

It was like walking in a bubble, the outside world was cut off from me, but Nari could see everything that was happening from her position.

"Give up," I spoke in a deep tone, "come and join my side." Her body became rigid and her eyes were affixed to the spot where I stood.

She knew she was cornered and didn't have any choice but to attack the mirror I was in.

As she pulled out her kunai-looking knife, she strived at the image she thought I was at.

I could hear her heavy breathing approaching me, that ice was really making her panic or maybe even making her remember the past, but that didn't matter now.

Right now her focus was only on that image, I came out from the back, and with a quick speed, I moved my foot and swung my leg around and caught her right under her chin.

Reaching my fingers, I tickled her neck, "Don't worry, you won't die." I repeated again.

"It's just a slight bump on your head, no big deal," I then smirked, letting my finger rub along her cheekbone, "what I want from you is to come with me willingly, and not by force..."

My words took Nari off guard and I could see her slowly releasing the blade she was holding in her palm, 'this is my chance!' Immediately grabbing the knife off her hand, I pressed it against her neck.

"You belong to me now."