Child of Destiny

...…

Shin closed his eyes as the system teleported him towards the final's battle arena. And right after appearing in the center of that ruined city, his ears were immediately assaulted by a lot of loud shouting from the audience stand – all of the players watching from the audience stand started going wild the moment they saw Shin and Demon standing at the center of the battle arena.

"Tsk! Such a noisy place for the final battle," muttered Shin as he reopened his eyes. And just like his previous matches, he immediately swept his gaze around him to observe the whole place.

At the same time, Demon did the same thing as if it was a usual routine for him. And when they were done checking everything, both of them simultaneously looked at each other and tried to assess each other's auras.

That stare down lasted for a couple of seconds before 'Demon' started talking first. "Looks like we really have gone through a similar training discipline, hmm? So~, from what camp did you come from."

Hearing that, Shin raised brows behind his mask while saying. "So, you really came from that place after all."

He paused for a moment before giving his answer from the previous question. "Since that was the case, I don't need to answer you since we both know the rules, right?"

After that, both of them suddenly turned quiet as they waited for the system to announce the start of the fight.

Even if Shin really wanted to know more about this guy's origin, he was still too eager to start the fight so that he could assess his opponent's real strength.

What's more, he also didn't need to put more thought on it currently since he would know about it later – after seeing Demon's real battle style and habits.

During his time in that hell-like training camp, Shin learned that the Black Serpent Mafia had a lot of other training camps and each of those camps had their own style of training. And since these camps had their unique training regime, the agents graduated from those places and had their own style of fighting compared to the ones who graduated from the other training camps.

Even if Shin didn't officially graduate in the initial phase of his respective training camp, he still adapted most of the battle styles from that place – which was the style that focused on 'versatility'.

The training camp that he came from trained their agents to become flexible on all kinds of situations – and this particular style clearly had a huge influence on his current battle style.

At the same time, this style was further enhanced by Professor Plum when he took Shin as his disciple since his own version of Yin-Yang Arts was a quite complex Martial-Arts. After all, his martial-arts was a balanced combination of offense and defense.

Shin and Demon looked at each other as they were trying to see if they could guess what type of agents their opponent was.

Each agent type of the Black Serpent Mafia had their unique air on them. And if Shin and Demon managed to guess from which category of agent their opponent fell into, then they could easily formulate a plan to beat each other.

Unfortunately, both of them were quite cautious of showing any signs that could become useful for their opponents.

Actually, they could even make a guess about that based on the previous battles of each other. It's just they chose not to completely trust those data since some of them might be there to mislead them. After all, there was a certain rule on the Mafia regarding it. And that was the assassin rule no.9 – "Don't trust everything that you see since it can be a trap set by your enemy." –

After the whole minute of 'talk time' set by the system, the signal for the start of the match finally rang at everyone's ears which also silenced the entire audience stand – all of their shouting and yelling suddenly came into a halt the moment they heard that familiar sound.

And as if coordinating with their silence, both of the fighters standing at the center of the arena quickly started their battle right after hearing that particular signal.

Swoosh!

Demon suddenly rushed forward and instantly appeared in front of Shin while thrusting his jade spear along with his charge.

The tip of that jade spear went straight at Shin's face as if Demon was trying to execute his opponent right off the bat.

Unfortunately, all it hit was the fading figure of his opponent as Shin dodged it by doing a simple yet fast ducking motion while taking his signature sword-drawing stance.

He was planning to use his opponent's forward momentum to his advantage while he himself was pulling out his sword as fast as he could.

But Demon was also clever enough to prevent himself from being in disadvantage. He used his momentum to accelerate forward before using his other hand to prevent Shin from pulling his sword from being drawn.

Pa!

With a strong push, the [Yamato] was immediately sent back to its sheath!

After that, Shin and Demon simultaneously did a slight turn with their bodies and made themselves to brush past each other.

During that time, Shin was turning his body along with Demon's movements to have the dominant position to attack. But before he could even pull his sword out from its sheath, Demon suddenly jumped and turned his body around while thrusting his jade spear at Shin in the process.

Swoosh!

Shin was not fast enough to unsheathe [Yamato] in time so he immediately leaned sideways trying to dodge the sudden thrust. But while he was trying to dodge, Demon suddenly used the remaining momentum of his turn to change the trajectory of his jade spear and turned his forward thrust into a wide swing.

Seeing that, Shin quickly raised his sheathed sword at the path of the spear, planning to use it to block the incoming strike.

Clang!

That swing was not that strong since it already lost a lot of its initial force when Demon forcefully changed the trajectory of the spear. Given that, Shin didn't have much problem at blocking that attack.

At the same time, Shin also saw that opportunity to throw a counterattack since Demon was still hanging in the air due to his previous jump.

Having that in mind, Shin immediately abandoned the idea of executing his 'Quick Draw' skill and quickly decided to attack with a different approach.

After nullifying the force from Demon's previous attack, Shin suddenly adjusted the position of his sword, making it inclined a little.

Due to that, the blade of Demon's spear moved upwards – sliding along the sheath of the [Yamato]. At the same time, Shin intentionally choked the spear blade with the guard of his sword while moving the scabbard downwards.

Shing!

Because of that, the [Yamato] was unsheathed by a spear and hovered in the air for a moment.

That odd move by Shin confused Demon a little as his eyes were unconsciously attracted by the flying sword while his body was falling back to the ground. Fortunately, his sharp senses managed to perceive a coming threat from below.

Swoosh!

Hearing the air being cut by a sharp object, Demon suddenly leaned his head sideways, barely dodging the pointed tip of the rapier that was coming after his head.

Ta-ta!

And that was only the time his feet landed on the ground.

At the same time, he immediately took a couple of consecutive hops backward to gain some distance away from Shin. After all, he was going to be at a great disadvantage if he fought too close with his opponent.

Shin couldn't chase after Demon immediately because he was in a quite awkward position after the latter dodged his previous stab.

When Demon saw that, he wanted to immediately take that opportunity to do a counterattack. But before could even make his move, he suddenly saw the rapier that Shin was holding on his left hand suddenly turned into a whip sword before its blade extended along with Shin's previous movements.

'Legacy Skill: Mondi's Style: Abyssal Form'

After that, the extended blade of the whip sword suddenly grabbed the hilt of the falling [Yamato] midair, making Demon foresaw what was about to come.

And just like what he was expecting, Shin suddenly swung the whip sword downwards in a powerful manner and sent the [Yamato] flying towards his direction with a great speed.

Swoosh!

Seeing that, Demon immediately did a quick hop to the side so that he could dodge the incoming sword. And when his feet touched the ground once again, he quickly launched himself forward while dodging the flying [Yamato].

While he was doing all of that, Shin was already doing a thrusting motion with his whip sword

'Weapon Skill (Sword: Crippling Punisher): (Modified) Shadow Impale'

The moment Demon saw Shin's actions, he suddenly felt a very dangerous feeling from his opponent's body. And that was the same moment when he was brushing past with the flying [Yamato].

Following his instincts, Demon immediately abandoned the idea of throwing his attack before hopping away from his current location. And that was the time when he saw Shin flicked his wrist, making the extended blade of the whip sword to move in a spiral motion.

With another flick of his wrist, the leading blade of the sword wrapped around the hilt of the [Yamato] before pulling it backwards.

And when Shin caught his sword, both of them didn't attack immediately as they stared at each other for a moment.

After that, Demon suddenly said. "A 'Joker', huh? I didn't expect that I would meet an extinct agent here. Interesting!"

Hearing those words, Shin suddenly said with a smirking tone. "You are not that bad either. An 'Executor' is such a rare species too. Looks like you are some bigshot from your camp."

When they were done with that short conversation, the aura that they were releasing from their bodies suddenly became heavy.

And while releasing that powerful pressure, Demon suddenly said with the same smirking tone that Shin was using earlier. "Since we are already done with our warmup, should we start doing the traditional duel?"

"Well, I am actually quite curious what the 'Executor Agents' can do. So, come at me," replied Shin while releasing a powerful pressure of his own.

Then Demon replied . "Then try me, 'Joker'," while grinning behind his jade demon mask.

...…