Chapter 38 Fighting An Advanced Tier Opponent
Bernard fiercely swung his hammer at Ray, while Ray circulated the mana in his body and started casting spells continuously.
Lately, he had been using the skill points he gained every time he leveled up to unlock new skills. Using the skill points, Ray had unlocked a varied repertoire of skills belonging to his affinities of lightning and fire.
Right now, Ray had many types of skills. They ranged from offensive, defensive and auxiliary to movement skills. Furthermore, Ray had also leveled up his previous skills, making his strength unparalleled at the intermediate tier.
However, Ray was still a 16-year-old and did not know the difference between tiers. The intermediate tier was still a huge step behind the advanced tier.
Therefore, throughout the battle, Ray could only attack passively and dodge the attacks Bernard threw at him.
Ray had enough of attacking passively. Therefore, he started going all out.
The mana in his body continuously churned and his mana core pulsed with vigor and started circulating mana to his body at a faster rate with needle-like precision, causing the loss of mana during spell casting to decrease.
– – – – –
Ray took out his intermediate-tier sword beast soul. The sword hummed with energy as Ray fused his mana with it.𝑂𝒱𝓵xt.𝔠𝔬𝐌
‘Thrummm’,
Ray slashed forward and hit Bernard with all his strength, but Bernard was also not someone belittled, he had experienced countless battles.
Hence, he immediately reacted and used his hammer to block the sword from advancing.
“Clank!”,
The sword and hammer clashed. The clash caused Ray to stumble backward due to the recoil and momentum caused by the clash while Bernard only took a couple of steps back to balance himself.
Ray stood up and balanced himself suddenly,
‘Spatt!’,
Ray spat a mouthful of blood as he felt his knees buckle. The previous clash had shaken his organs. This caused Ray to be alarmed as he knew, that if things continued like this, there would be no way out for him.
Therefore, Ray decided to ultimately finish the fight as soon as he could. Ray used his barrier-type ability and cast a newly learned skill,
[Barrier Domain],
This was a skill Ray had spent quite several skill points on. However, Its usefulness outweighed its price. The skill allowed Ray to form an inferior domain where he could extend his ability to the environment and control barriers freely while inside the domain.
Using the skill, Ray cast a hexagonal multi-layered barrier on himself. Then he enclosed the space between him and Bernard with a barrier while his sword surged with mana.
‘Crackle!!, Buzz!!’,
Electricity crackled on the sword as Ray also fused his sword with his lightning affinity along with mana.
This was the premise to use another skill,
[Lightning strike],
This skill allowed Ray to fuse his lightning-type mana into any weapon and consequently attack the enemy with it. It also increased the weapon’s penetrative strength while the chances of causing paralysis increased as well.
With both of his skills ready, Ray activated his speed-type ability and rushed forward to attack Bernard.
On the other hand, Bernard was interested he saw Ray wielding a sword that had electricity crackling on the sword.
Then suddenly, the person he had been observing vanished from his previous position and appeared in front of him. Bernard was alarmed and just as he raised his hammer to block the strike to come forward, he was yanked forward and a gash opened up on his back.
‘Pichuii!!, Splatt’,
Bernard’s expression darkened as he felt immense pain radiating from the wound on his back. Other than pain, he felt extreme shame. After all, how could he accept a young kid to injure him in such a way?
He looked back and gritted his teeth. Then swinging his hammer forward, he counter-attacked Ray.
Meanwhile, Ray knew that the feint attack he had just done would only work once and now he had to directly battle the man in front of him.
Therefore, as he saw Bernard coming forward to attack him, Ray also retaliated and started attacking.
‘Crack!, Splatt!, Crack!!’,
The battle went on and both sides suffered immense damage from each other. Ray had his armor cracked in several places while blood seeped from the corners of his mouth.
Whereas Bernard was in a worse condition, his armor was slashed open from different sides while blood gushed out from the wounds he suffered. Furthermore, the lightning strike took its effect as Bernard felt his body numb.
Bernard, who was a warrior that relied on his explosive strength to finish off the enemy could not control his body movements well as the paralysis effect from Ray’s strike took effect.
Ray used the opportunity to step forward and slashed repeatedly at Bernard while Bernard could not even try to retreat from the relentless assault of sword strikes.
‘picture!!’,
A large gash opened on Bernard’s body. It went from his chest to down his waist. Blood gushed as Bernard screamed in pain.
Arghhh!!, Ahhh!!,
Then suddenly something strange happened as Bernard disappeared from his position.
Ray was alarmed when he saw the man in front of him disappear. He looked around and did not find anyone near him.
Then suddenly, a strange glow suffused the sky. Ray looked up, and what he saw left his heart dilapidated as his pupils trembled and he felt his knees buckle.
He was alarmed and hurriedly turned to run but to his dismay, he could not even move a finger much less run.
Ray tried his best to move his body but to no avail, it felt as if countless arms were holding him in place.
Then the glow that had suffused in the sky become brighter as it got closer to Ray. After some time, the glow came in front of Ray and spoke,
“Do you think that a mere child like you could defeat me”, said the glow.
Ray naturally knew what the glow was, or rather who was it that was glowing. It was Bernard who was on the brink of death just a few moments ago.
Ray knew that he had used some hidden card of his to gain such strength. However, Ray did not yield, he kept silent and struggled with all his might.
Seeing this, Bernard spoke again,
“Do you think that your intermediate tier strength could break from my ultimate advanced tier domain. If so, then you are sorely mistaken”.
Bernard sneered and spoke in contempt,
“You know what, I will let you try. Let’s see how much your pitiful struggle could do”.
With that, Bernard also started exerting strength on Ray, as the hands that held Ray in place started pushing in towards Ray’s body causing his bones to creak and his tendons popped.
Ray tried all methods available to him so that he could regain control of his body but to no extent could he even move his fingers.
Ray was stumped as to what to do, he did not even try calling Aurora, after all, it was his fight and he wanted to finish it himself.
Having not much time left and pain ravaging his entire body, Ray failed to come up with any solutions. He thought about it and finally got an idea.
“Something is better than nothing”, he muttered under his breath.
He then focused entirely on his mana core and the energies flowing within his body. Then, he directed all of the energies that flowed in his body towards the mana core.
The energies followed towards the mana core and instantly changed something. The mana core which was before pulsing rhythmically started throbbing.
‘Arghhh!!’,
Ray felt immense pain radiating from his mana core. Causing him to scream. Whereas, when Bernard heard him scream, he was overjoyed at Ray’s misery.
Then suddenly, Bernard’s expression turned ugly. An immense amount of energy radiated from Ray and Ray’s body disappeared.
….
A/N:- Another chapter for you all to enjoy. Hope you guys enjoy it.