Chapter 786 - 786: A fundamentally special kind of fight (part 8)

Of course, the evil mermaid Karla couldn't stay behind, especially because it is normal to target the weaker side in a group fight and with the first Karla now being a battle mage, even with the dark red trident she was the weak one now.

"Malicious Sea and Sky Union!", the process was inversed this time though, the evil mermaid Karla turned into a wave of black-red liquid which flowed towards the evil siren Karla and "drowned" her in it.

As a result, a Karla whose body radiated black-red water battle aura with black-green currents in it appeared on the battlefield, yup, you heard right, unlike the good now mermaid-siren Karla, who was a battle mage, the evil mermaid-siren Karla was a magic knight.

This showed how an administrator could change the type of energy they used, as previously mentioned, but they could only use one as the base at the time, in this case the good mermaid Karla used mana as the base and made the good siren Karla change to use battle aura, which integrated with her mana, giving as a result battle mana, thus granting her the state of a battle mage.

The opposite applied to the evil Karla, she changed from mana to battle aura as she was the base and the evil siren remained with mana which was integrated to form magic aura, thus granting that Karla the status of a magic knight.

"Well, she was born a mermaid and only later after a lot of betrayal and shady schemes she obtained the siren lineage, so I guess it's normal that the main base for both of them is still the mermaid part", said Aisha, which made both Karlas grit their teeth.

"Don't talk about my life as if you knew everything, "Royal Black Fierce Hurricane Battle Domain!", shouted the good Karla as she exploded in dark blue and dark green battle mana.

A storm that forms in the sea is also known as a hurricane and since she now had both the sea and sky powers of a mermaid and a siren, she now used the word "hurricane", also the "royal" part was back.

What's more, one could see the obsession Karla had with "standing" because when Marcus used his battle domain, the "battle domain" part went before the name of the battle domain which was also related to royalty as its name was "Devil King's Castle".

But in Karla's case, the royal part and the name came before the battle domain term, and this is especially amusing considering that Marcus was a "devil king" system user, and whatever Ereth's system concept was, it was hero related so royalty is not exactly its main focus.

Though like Daimon said, heroes and "royalty" do end up being directly related in a sense, because heroes are always paired up with princesses, perhaps that's why Karla was a compatible administrator for Ereth, she achieved the status of a princess, though it was not through her own efforts.

"Booooom!", a dark blue sea of mana expanded in every direction with Karla as the center, but that wasn't all, high in the sky a giant dark blue and dark green spiral formed above Karla, the "eye" of the hurricane was incredibly small barely covering the area around Karla herself.

"Looks like the sky is not on your side anymore huh", mockingly said the good Karla, as she radiated her pressure all over the place, she was now a half step Stellar and her hurricane battle domain had covered the whole sky within the demonite field indeed, in other words, her battle domain actually covered a huge area of thirty kilometers.

Also, Karla no longer feared having her mana suppressed by the antinite's effect, nor stolen by the unknown metal property due to which she was slightly traumatized earlier.

"Unlike with Arlion, your battle mana can actually fight against antiite and sea devil ore suppressing properties, I guess that's because instead of advancing after reaching the minimum or normal requirements, you stayed at the half step Stellar realm to instead increase your battle prowess, not bad", said Aisha, the good Karla's battle domain was colliding with the demonite field but it wasn't being dispersed by it.

What's more, while she could still take some mana and battle aura from it with the help of Disaster's devouring property, the amount was incredibly minimal, that being said Aisha not only didn't look worried in the slightest, but she even chuckled as she added.

"But then, you wouldn't happen to believe that you are the only one with something "interesting" to show, right?", she said to then gaze at Freya who had two banners appear, but this time they were both above her.

And here we must make a little pause from the battle, it has been explained that administrators can use both mana or battle aura, since they transform origin into the energy of their need right, but origin is something that they only obtained after becoming administrators.

Which means that previous to that they were like everyone, either a mage, a knight or a combination of both with one as the main path while the other acted as support, only Daimon was both and neither a magic knight nor a battle mage at the same time.

The previous would explain why despite Freya's appearance, which included full body armor and also the fact that her powers were supposed to be related to weapons because as it has been said she used Alicia's crossbow at the medium to use her severing ability, the two times we have seen her fighting previous to accepting a challenge from this place, she was using mana.

Because while sure appearance might not be a determining factor at the moment of showing in which path someone has the highest talent, it must have crossed your mind before right, that Freya perfectly fits the image of a knight.

And you are right to think so, because before becoming an administrator, her main path was that of a knight while the support one was that of a mage, in other words she was the equivalent of a magic knight, though at her place of origin which is of a way higher ranked status than the four galaxies, stellar kingdoms and the like, a different term was used to refer to that.

This opens the door to the question of why was she, who used to be a main knight path powerhouse, using mana instead, because even if she lacked the origin to use magic aura back then against the former half of Karla, she could have used battle aura instead of mana and the answer is something that has been mentioned before too, the system put as many obstacles to Freya as it could.

Though her initial concept was not weak in the slightest, it wasn't high ranked enough as it should have been given her achievements and power before she was an administrator, she should have had a higher start than even the original one Lezabel would have had if she didn't rebel.

That doesn't mean that the valkyrie girl was "better" than that ghost older sister of Ariel, but Freya was older than Lezabel and her realm was also higher, it can even be seen appearance-wise, Lezabel looks like a girl in her early twenties, while Freya looks a bit more mature in her mid-twenties.

It might not sound like that much of a difference, but that would be from a mortal perspective, given the fact that they weren't even members of the human race to begin with, that bit of a difference could equal hundreds, thousands, dozens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of years, it's impossible to know without asking, but Daimon has never been a fool, why would he step on a landmine willingly by asking that.

Anyway, the point is that following the trend of the system putting as many obstacles as it could for the valkyrie girl, her system's concept and thus the hosts with which she was paired, were to be strongly incompatible with what she had experience in, so that she couldn't help her host advance too fast.

Alicia was a mage, well, a battle mage to be more accurate, don't forget that neither she nor her sister were natives of Neptune, just like Ereth, Dorian and the con artist system user who misguided the members of the white walker race into becoming skelefiends, they came from other places.

But the system didn't stop at that, it even made it so that Freya couldn't use battle aura if she were to ever come out to help her user, administrators have neither mana nor battle aura, they have origin which they turn in the energy of their preference, for when they come to fight.

In other words, back when Freya and Alicia defeated Ereth and Karla, the valkyrie girl was fighting only with mana, while Karla was in the state of a battle mage, and even with all those obstacles and the fact that Ereth had developed his system way more than Alicia for obvious reasons, they still won, but fell short to kill those two.

It's worth mentioning that said restriction was completely eliminated from Freya the very moment she finished processing the origin Daimon gave her, but it had been such a long time since she ever used battle aura, like, we are talking about hundreds of thousands or perhaps millions of years here, because the system didn't assign her to a host before Alicia's sister, and you already know that she was prepared as a sacrifice for Ereth.

What happened after that wasn't in the plans of the system, because had it not been because of the mission seed which Alicia's sister managed to create with her monstrously strong "will", then Freya would have been sent back to wait for who knows how many years again, but instead the valkyrie girl was connected to Alicia through the late "sister" they shared in common.

Due to all the time she was out of commission and the few times she could fight having to make do with mana, she actually went with it during the first part of her fight with Karla earlier as well.

And then when Aisha joined, she changed to use energy for her challenge, which amusingly enough, resulted in her still using "mana", given the way her energy first worked by creating explosions and condensations to attack the enemy which was a pretty spell-like result.

But just like with Aisha, Freya's energy has both mage and knight properties, as to why it started with mana characteristics by default that's simple, a challenge initially gives the participant a harsh start because they are supposed to use what is considered their weakness, only after improving, do their proper strengths join with their former weakness, resulting in new potential for the participant.

So yeah, since the very first time they met, to their current fight, Karla has only seen the "weakest" version of Freya, but like Aisha had stated, the valkyrie girl progressed in her challenge as fast as she did so during her third challenge.

So, it was time for her to show something different, which amusingly enough it was still not a new technique, but certainly it was totally different to the way Freya has been using her conceptual banner technique.

The two banners that appeared above the valkyrie girl had the words "mage" and "knight" engraved on them.

"Conflict", interestingly enough you would believe that the "mage" banner would be destroyed as soon as Freya made them fight, given that as previously stated she had the knight path as her main one, but nope, it actually took way longer than what it had taken for a winner in the concept banner wars so far, for a banner to be destroyed, of course since in all previous situations the winner was decided in fractions of a second, it only took one second for one banner to be destroyed here, but that was a really "long" time in comparison.

"Crack!", the mage banner burned down and that would also lead you to believe that a spell-like result will be formed from the grey silver energy it was released by it, but that wasn't the case, in fact the loud shattering sound from a moment ago wasn't caused by the "mage" banner burning down.

It was because the result of the grey silver energy that was released by it, which took the form of a sword that was now making the space around it crumble just by floating there, at least until Freya held onto its hilt.

Ah right, when the valkyrie girl triggered the conceptual banner war of a moment ago, she crossed to the Arch rank in terms of energy, but that wasn't all, she went straight up to the peak of the Arch rank in a single go, as the realm pressure which her energy was radiating which now equaled that of Aisha's, suggested.

"You see, I think that if the "heavens" have abandoned someone, it would be you~", jokingly said Aisha, just in time for Freya to tighten her grip on the burning energy sword she was holding onto, which she then slashed frontwards.

"Booooom!", the space in the immediate direction at which Freya had slashed her sword ruptured on the spot, before a thin grey silver line which travelled all the way from one side of the demonite field to the other one, appeared.

Yup, not only did her sword attack what lied ahead of it like any long-distance slashing type attack technique would, but even the area behind of Freya, was cut, everything that aligned with the direction at which her sword was slashed, was affected, within a certain range of course, but that's normal, this was a "knight" effect technique and thus had a shorter reach, though it still cut everything in its path for half of the total area of Aisha's demonite field.

"Crack!", and the previous included the huge hurricane which was covering the sky, a part of the good Karla's domain, which got split in half by the sword's slash.

"Aghh!", and that forced a pained scream from the good Karla who vomited blood due to the backslash of her domain being cut like that.

'No way, she did this much damage to my battle domain with a single slash, I remember she manifesting a mana sword back then and if she was a mere peak Arch rank like now, it wouldn't have done this much damage to me!', inwardly screamed the good Karla as she instantly injected battle mana into the hurricane to repair it on the spot, she would be in trouble if she allowed her battle domain to completely crumble after all.

"Crack!", luckily for Karla, after releasing that terrifying slash, the sword in Freya's hand ended up breaking apart to then disappear, but the valkyrie girl rather than being disappointed had a nostalgic expression on her pretty face.

'This energy is not exactly battle aura but it can properly assume its qualities, it's slightly similar to origin… on the other hand these energies are clearly lineage related and they can't be used to create real objects out of thin air like origin, so the principles and the level of the energies are way lower than that of origin, not that it makes it less interesting', thought Freya.

That wasn't battle aura, but it pretty much reminded Freya of using it before she became an administrator, and that made her softly smile for a second, before she gritted her teeth with anger.

"The damn system really spoiled you two pieces of trash, if instead of Neptune or Kerrol, we would have been sent to the blood prison realm, you both would have died before having the chance to ambush my first sister", said the valkyrie girl.

"Don't get carried away, so what if you whose appearance screams "I was a knight" can use battle aura again, I'm a magic knight!!!", shouted the evil Karla who had appeared above Freya, her body was radiating black-red water battle aura with black-green currents, which then expanded as she shouted.

"Magic Avatar, Royal Black Hell Blood Queen!", with those words, a giant figure three kilometers tall, made out of black-red battle aura appeared in the battlefield, what's more, the sea of black-red battle aura guided by black-green currents emerged from the abyss below creating "ground" for the magic avatar to step onto.

It was as if the normal existence wasn't worthy enough to be stood upon by the magic avatar which looked exactly like the evil Karla, and speaking of which, she was able to use replica too, though unlike in Arlion's case, with a single thing, namely the dark red trident.

But that was enough, after all, it meant that the evil Karla's magic avatar could use a giant version of a promise level treasure, that was the same as saying she had two promise level weapons, which is why the normal sized dark red trident was now in the hands of the good Karla, this way both of them had weapons to fight with.

But before the good Karla could arrive at her other self's side, Aisha who was floating next to Freya said.

"That didn't do much for Arlion earlier though, Violet Empress Armory, Demon Execution Sword", with a snap of Aisha's fingers, two different things happened, first and formal, all the violet energy armor pieces that had been used by her separately so far, appeared at the same time.

Namely, the right arm vambrace and gauntlet as well as the legwear which consisted in boots and armor that covered her legs completely, that's because she needed at least this much to use the previously casted technique.

You have seen Aisha use the "demon sword" before, it's what she used to defeat Arlion with a single strike, but this went beyond the previous, as it had the word "execution" in it, just like the guillotine from before, the difference being that for the guillotine she only needed a vambrace.

"Blegh!", the good Karla who was in the middle of charging at Freya with the original dark red trident in her hands, while the evil one aimed the giant replica at the valkyrie girl, suddenly froze midway as blood was forced out of her mouth, what occasioned it this time you wonder, well, it's because the hurricane part of her battle domain was attacked once again.

"Booooom!", this time it wasn't slashed though, but had a hole blasted through it as a five-kilometer large white-silver energy sword descended from above, right in time to block the advance of the replica dark red trident.

"Clang!!!", a deafening metal colliding sound was produced as sparks flew all over the place due to the clash between the demon execution sword and the dark red replica trident which was stopped before it could reach Freya.

"Also, it would be a problem if I don't progress in my challenge while my companion is doing her best to break through hers", added Aisha whose right arm was burning in white silver energy as she motioned with her hand which made the giant sword move and force the giant trident replica which by the way was equaled in size by the demon execution sword, as well as the evil Karla alongside her three-kilometer-tall magic avatar to be forced backwards.

"Damn it!", cursed both the evil and good Karlas in unison, their battle domain and magic avatar both had the rules of "power up" and "especial weapon" shine in them, as they stimulated their power.

"Royal Black Fierce Hurricane, Torrential Calamity!", the first one to attack was the good Karla, the hurricane above in the sky took battle mana from the sea part at ground level and then concentrated it in a single spot to release a huge pillar of dark blue water mana which was pressurized by dark green wind.

"Royal Black Hell Blood, Corrosive Piercing Thrust!", the evil Karla injected a whole bunch of magic aura into the giant dark red trident replica to then thrust it frontwards releasing three black-red piercing streams of magic aura which upon passing through the air made sizzling sounds as they corroded the space around it.

"Humph!", Freya softly snorted as she extended her right hand, two banners appeared above her, they were the "knight" and "mage" banners again, and just like before the conflict between them was lost by the mage banner.

The weapon formed by the grey silver energy that was released by the banner wasn't a sword this time though, it was a spear, yup, Freya's power wasn't related to "swords" exclusively, it was related to "weapons", well, that was the case when she was limited to use mana an energy in which she didn't focus before becoming an administrator, and in which she had no chance to train in as her main, until she had a host assigned to her, because without said limitation, her power was instead related to "war" itself, and well, spears are also normally seen in a war right.

"Crack!", the space behind of Freya cracked as she thrusted her white silver energy spear towards the huge stream of battle mana which was released by the hurricane above in the sky.

"Don't leave me out of the fun", said Aisha as she beckoned her right hand which was burning in white silver flames towards the magic aura streams flying towards them head on, making the demon execution sword swing in their direction, sending a single slashing light at the incoming martial art, well it would be more accurate to called a "magic art" as that's the name a martial art used by a magic knight has, as for battle mages, they use battle spells, it's also worth mentioning that so far neither of the examples of either a battle mage and a magic knight, in other words Marcus and Arlion, properly used the previous, they adapted their spells and martial arts to work with their improved energies only, but couldn't make the most out of them, as they weren't the real deal.

As a proof of the previous, the atmosphere itself shook as the attacks of those four clashed with each other.

"Boooooom!", before a huge energy explosion engulfed everything within the demonite field, no, this time the effect of their attacks clashing, was actually noticed even far into the distance by a certain silver haired masked youth and a long black haired one who were in the middle of clashing themselves.