hotmtlnovel Chapter 84: Brutal Brawl
Chapter 84: Brutal Brawl
⁜ Lucretia POV
Filled with concern, Lucretia left the royal city and headed to the southern wilds before Lorem could warn her to stay away.
To her, once something became important, everything else became irrelevant. From the moment she saw those assassins approach Asura, using those red balls. She switched to destroy mode.
'Where are you?'
Unlike the students, they provided the instructors and royal knights with the location and a detailed map of the areas. Lucretia knew exactly where they fought.
Her body, wearing a different outfit from before, dashed to Asura, followed by five after images that ran split into separate directions to confuse the viewing stones.
Instead of the usual black combat outfit, her main body wore strange armour that covered most of her body, only leaving gaps for her eyes and nose to breathe. It was dark red with black from the main leathery material.
'Let's go. Those balls only last an hour at most. I don't have time to wait.'
Despite knowing Asura was talented, she couldn't tell whether the leader was Stage Three or Four from the video and that there were assassins from the cult here.
She knew a Stage Four must be waiting somewhere if the first team failed.
Her powerful legs galloped through the forest, and her body sprang off the trees and branches, flipping and twisting. She looked nothing like a human and more like a beast rushing to protect her cub from a predator.
Ten metres from the fight where she last saw Asura, there was a man in black and red robes, his body quite short but lean, bending over the corpses of a dozen cultist bodies.
'It's him! He's the Stage Four!'
Once someone reached Stage Four, their lifespan almost doubled. The average person could live up to 200 years while remaining youthful in appearance until 150. Without surpassing Stage Five, they would age slowly and eventually die.
This was the level most warriors, mages and knights would reach before their end. Asura, who lacked knowledge of the world outside of being a No-Mag, misunderstood the average as Stage Two or Three.
That was because he lived in the lowest-level towns and cities after his father's death, and the Fenix territory allowed its strongest knights to fight to help the kingdom, a foolish thing that left their territory vulnerable.
'Stage Four... Or Five?'
Lucretia stood 50 yards in the air and over 100 yards from the man.
She couldn't take a risk or lose this advantage, but without most of her clones, her combat power against those close to her level shrank.
'Asura killed so many alone. I am so proud of my student, Fufu.'
Thanks to the appearance of this assassin, though, she realised Asura rose above the challenge and didn't lose.
'Let's fight!'
Slow breaths sucked the air into her lungs as Lucretia's eyes shone with a golden light. Her muscles tensed and contracted as shadows overlapped with her movements.
The assassin looked around, his eyes narrowing. "Why is the mana so disturbed?"
He sensed Lucretia's presence, but it was too late.
"Your organisation made a mistake coming after my student. I'll send you to your grave. Don't worry, I will be gentle."
—Dark Assault!
The Shadows merged six became two, but their power seemed close to the original. One shadow with an eerie smile and then whispered.
"But we won't."
After that, she covered the entire area in darkness. Only the sounds of tearing flesh and screams from the tongueless assassin sounded for the next five minutes before silence visited the forest.
The blood vanished along with the many corpses. If anyone hadn't seen them before, they would think nothing had happened in the forest.
Lucretia now stood in a completely different location, her figure hidden from the viewing crystals while she sat across from the exhausted Xavida.
"Since they want to play dirty. I will protect my students' lover while he trains."
Her eyes gazed at the slovenly dragon covered in white, both dried and wet, with a blissful smile on her face, oblivious to the threat Asura faced tonight. Yet Lucretia couldn't hate the girl. She was adorable and trained earnestly.
"Haa... what a fool. Maybe I shouldn't have rushed here if I knew he was fine."
She realised after the battle that her actions were a little too erratic; leaning against the wooden wall, she crossed her legs with one knee in the air, resting her face against it as if to sleep.
'The cabin stinks of him. How comforting.'
⁜ Lorem POV
Lorem worried about the chaos she would create. Instead, she continued announcing once she noticed Lucretia's decoy clones.
"It seems instructor Lucretia is checking all zones for other assassins who have found their way into the assessment site. There is no need to worry!"
'Asura isn't there?'
She watched the side screen to see that the area where Asura headed and the assassins vanished. There were no traces of battle, blood or disturbance, but Lorem could tell the darkness in this crystal lingered was Lucretia's.
'Is Asura unconscious or teleported somewhere? Instructor Lucretia is also dealing with assassins. This is troublesome. Is he back with the dragon?'
Instead of caring about the casualties or that the scores had changed significantly over the past two hours, she searched for Asura.
'Where is Asura!'
She checked every zone, including where Asura vanished, hoping to find him, only to see his figure momentarily in the danger zone's camera.
'Asura!'
His black armour and dragon scales bathed in blood as he held a gigantic monster that looked like a fish with legs in midair, impaled on his sword-lance while channelling a furious black and red flame along the shaft into the fish...
"Is this little bastard fishing in the danger zone? Then cooking his catch!?"
The moment she saw his actions and the strange aura that flickered around him, she realised something, and suddenly, a sense of excitement and anticipation for the future grew in her chest.
'He's going to advance again!'