Chapter 911 A Spar With The Marchioness
I stood on the training field facing against Unerolia who seemed really excited about the prospect of sparring with me.
Mother, Katsuki, Mary and Esmeral were standing at the edge of the training field to watch our spar.
I eyed the sword in Unerolia's hand which seemed to be an artefact as well since I spotted embers appearing around the blade when she was swinging it just now.
Yep, we're using real swords for this spar.
Mother apparently said that she would be able to heal us as long as it wasn't an instant death so the only rule for this spar was that we shouldn't aim for the area above the neck in our attacks.
She then added that even if we did get instant killed, it would just be a little inconvenient since revival magic would need to be used, suggesting that either Mother or someone she knew could use that as well.
I hefted my Light Sword that was in my right hand while shifting my body to somewhat cover the Shadow Sword in my left hand to 'hide' it.
Thankfully this training field had trees around it for shade so I could use my Shadow Sword's passive ability to hide it for now.
Unerolia grinned at me, "Ready to start, Aster?"
I nodded, "Just to be clear… We're actually fighting seriously, right?"
"That's right! Everything goes except for the single rule of not using magic!"
"What about sword enchantments?"
"That is allowed!"
I'm pretty sure she only said that because her sword also has enchantments so she wants to use it.
Well, so do I, so it's good that she agreed to it.
Unerolia lowered herself into a combat stance and nodded at me to signal that she was ready.
I also lifted the Light Sword in my hand to point it at her before giving her a nod as well.
Mother then raised her hand and shot a small fireball into the air that exploded with a loud bang.
Unerolia's figure disappeared and I focused my senses to try and catch sight of her.
Her figure reappeared to my left in a blaze of fire as she swung her sword that was coated with flames towards my chest.
I lifted my Light Sword and blocked its path, but the flames exploded out from the sword which ended up pushing me skidding back.
I managed to stay on my feet as I kept my eyes on the Marchioness, who seemed to have a really big smile on her face right now.
"You blocked it! Hahaha! That means I can go a little bit more serious!" She laughed.
Her figure disappeared once more and I managed to see the after image of her running towards my other side.
I shifted my Light Sword once again and raised it to block another blow from her, only to get pushed back by the flames once again.
This time, she did not stop there and rushed after me to deliver a diagonal slash aimed at my shoulder.
Instead of receiving it, I sidestepped the slash and spun out of the way, letting her sword slice through empty air.
Unfortunately, it seems like the fire from her blade would still be shot out from the sword even if it did not hit anything.
I leapt backwards and did a somersault to avoid the blast of fire and Unerolia took that as an opportunity to link her next attack by swinging her sword in an arc upwards.
The fire that was shot out from the sword was then propelled towards me, threatening to engulf me in its fiery embrace.
I activated the enchantment on my Light Sword and extended the size of the blade before swinging it down, creating a gust of wind that blew against the fire blast.
The gale stopped the fire blast in midair and dispersed it, allowing me to land on my feet without being burned.
Unerolia chased after me with her sword held behind her.n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om
I shifted my Light Sword to hold it at an angle with the tip pointing downwards, predicting correctly that she was going with an upwards slash.
Her blade clashed against mine and unfortunately for me, she was using two hands to wield her blade so there was no way I could withstand that blow with just one hand.
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Although… It seems like she might have a higher strength stat than I do anyway so I might not even be able to block it with both hands.
While I was in the midst of recovering from the blow, she let the momentum of her swing carry her blade over her head before she held it still in the air.
The sword then glowed and I realised she was going to send something flying my way so I crossed my swords in front of my chest.
"[Sacred Slash]!!" She yelled, swinging her sword down.
Light and fire mixed together before it was sent hurtling towards me.
Damn, I saw Justinia using that Valour Skill before and I guess I shouldn't be surprised to know that Unerolia could do it as well.
The blast hit dead centre on where my swords crossed and I did not try to completely stop it. Instead, I let the force push me aside and spun myself away from it, letting the wave of light and fire fly past me.
I then kicked off the ground and lunged towards the Marchioness, going on the offensive for the first time in this spar.
She seemed to be genuinely impressed at how I managed to deflect her Valour skill away and she raised her sword once more in order to receive me.
I pulled back my light sword before slashing it down once.
"[Sixfold Multi Slash]!" I yelled out, activating my Valour Skill.
My first slash was parried away with a deft flick of Unerolia's wrist with a loud metallic clang.
Six invisible slashes then flew towards her one after the other and it looked like she would be cut to ribbons when she suddenly spun her sword in a circle, deflecting all the slashes that had been aimed at her.
Seriously? You can just counter that skill like this?
She then pulled back her sword with the tip pointed at me before delivering a sword thrust aimed at my abdomen.
I actually saw that as a chance as I swung my Light Sword downwards to parry it away.
By all accounts, I should be stepping back to regain my footing after that move so that I can either counterattack or parry another blow coming from her.
Yet instead of doing that, I stepped towards her which would have been a bad choice as I was now exposing my body to a potential attack.
That is, if I was only using one sword at the moment.
I swung my seemingly empty hand towards her, expecting to end the fight with this by stopping the blade just short of her neck.
She would probably be confused as to why I swung an imaginary sword at her but I would just activate my sword's enchantment to reveal she had been played from the very beginning. There's a reason why I was trying to show that I was only using one sword this entire time.
Alright, now I just need to time it right so that--
Clang!
I found my Shadow Sword being deflected by the Marchioness who didn't even seem surprised by the sound nor was she even looking in the direction of the blow.
I had to leap back to avoid another horizontal slash from Unerolia and create distance between us.
She smirked at me, "Nice try, Lady Aster! But I rely on my sword senses to know that there's a blade there instead of just relying on my eyes to see! I felt your sword intent coming and knew you had an invisible blade there!"
Sword intent? Really? She's really OP isn't she?
Even if that was true, I only had the intention to slash at her after I had parried her sword and she's really telling me that she managed to react in those few seconds to block that slash from me?
She's definitely OP…
I considered activating the enchantment on the Shadow Sword but I decided that might be a little too overkill as I might accidentally burn her to death so let's just use its passive ability of being invisible instead.
Since she said that it was my intent that gave away the existence of my sword… Then what happens if I suppress or hide that intent? Maybe that might confuse her or even cause her to ignore the invisible sword altogether.
I suppose I might as well just take this as a learning opportunity.
I settled back into my stance again and Umerolia smirk got a little wider.
"As expected of Lady Aster~ If it was any other person, they might have just conceded right now~ Let's continue shall we?"
I mean… It's because we don't need to worry about being killed isn't it?
Well whatever, let's do this then…
What do you think?
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