What's Your Limit?

Arata looked at the remaining students that were rushing towards him. He again took up the Vitality Bestowal stance and waited for them. Two students decided to attack Arata head on together, both throwing punches aiming for his chest. Instead of catching the punches like previous times, Arata pushed out his chest and pulled his arms back. Both fists landed on his chest but, like before, their momentum stopped as they touched Arata. The force wasn't much for Arata who had trained with the Angel's of Light and Death, so he was able to take the blow with his body.

Then he converted all the energy, bestowed his authority on it and sent the energy to his palms. He then thrust his hands forward; his palms impacting the student's chests and the energy exploded out and pushed them backwards.

The red haired student continued to observe, from watching he had a good idea of what Arata was doing. He waited for the last two students to reach Arata and see what happens.

The last two students rushed forward. One leaped in the air while the other continued to charge towards Arata face on. The one in the air formed a shield of stone on his arm and came flying down, shield first, towards Arata. The other student pulled out a blade and sliced at Arata.

Arata reached up to catch the students rock shield, as the shield landed on Arata's hand, the student froze in midair, all momentum gone. Arata absorbed the energy from the rock shield and then brandished his other arm. His arm began to manifest energy and created a similar rock shield to the one his opponent had.

Teacher Takuma's jaw dropped. Early she had seen Arata use the Light Element to defeat Akari. Then she saw him use a bit of the Metallic Energy and Dark Energy to defeat the two students. She had heard that her nephew, Oishi, was defeated by Lightning. Now he had created a rock shield like his opponent. How could he possibly have an affinity to all these different Element's? He didn't radiate a single Element normally, yet with every Element he used, he radiated a perfect affinity to the Element's he used.

The charging student's blade hit the rock shield and was deflected. The student jumped back to avoid a counterattack, knowing that Arata can't leave the circle.

Arata then turned his attention to the student in the air. He pulled him down, moving the students shield out of the way before hitting him with his own rock shield. The student went flying backwards, off the stage.

At this point, Arata had simply redirected the energy from his opponents, but this was the first time the class had seen him actively use his opponents powers against them. He clearly had the stone shield on his arm.

Although Akari and Teacher Takuma were able to see him use all the other Element's the previous times, the class didn't all have as trained eyes as they did. The class became confused and agitated. How did he use his opponent's element? It was too much of a coincidence for him to be able to use the same rock shield as his opponent.

The red haired youth's eyes lit up.

So that's what it is.

Arata dispersed the shield as he only borrowed the Energy so he couldn't sustain it for long. He looked at the student holding the blade. He once again got back into his Vitality Bestowal stance in the circle. He gestured to the student to come.

The student hesitated before resolving himself and charging forward. He chanted quickly as he weaved to the side and slashed his blade horizontally.

"Excuse me."

The student was kicked to the side before the blade got anywhere near Arata. Arata was taken aback by the student suddenly being kicked away. Arata looked at the red haired youth who was now standing in front of him.

"Hi."

The red haired youth was smiling at him. Beaming. Arata took his stance and kept his eyes on the student. He wasn't normal. The red haired student laughed.

"Calm down, calm down. I'll attack you when I'm ready. But that was impressive, your moves. So how do you transfer the energy back at your enemies? I believe you are who you say are and that must be a technique from the Angel of Death, correct?"

Arata frowned. This guy became awfully talkative all of a sudden. Since when did we become friends? How did I miss that?

The boy laughed again seeing Arata's face.

"Yeah that was a silly question. It's not like you can just tell me your Father's secrets. I don't know how you do it, but I think I know how it works. It looked like you were redirecting the energy at first glance, but the Energy you were emitting was clearly your own and not something that was borrowed. But you can't possibly have all the Element's within your Elemental Reservoir. So here's my theory. You take in the energy, some how control it, making it yours, and send it back out. Am I getting warm?"

Arata didn't budge an inch as he stared back at the red haired boy. Akari raised her eyebrow at his description. He had practically described what the Vitality Bestowal was. The red haired boy's eyes lit up as he continued talking.

"There is obviously more to it. If it was an easy thing to redirect energy then everyone would be doing it. Although the theory is sound, and this is on the assumption that you and the Sato Clan have some kind of technique to actually redirect Energy, the practical application of it is impossible as energy isn't an easy thing to control. You would not only need to have a thorough understanding of one's Elemental Reservoir and the Element's core natures, you would also need to be able to control and tame large amounts of Energy within. So you would need to have the capacity to contain it. So that means that the capacity is what you would need to train as it is the weakness of this move. If something surpasses your limit, you can't redirect it, correct? So what's your limit? Do you know your limit? Have you tested it before?"

The rapid fire questions and evaluation stunned Arata. He was extremely accurate with his observations. Although he looked like a delinquent, it was clear that he was a genius. His analytical abilities were impressive to say the least.

Then he got into a simple stance in front of Arata. Flames began to circle his arms, which caused Arata to tense up. The flames were so close and the heat was extremely hot.

'He summoned those flames without chanting. A Sacred Art?'

The young boy smiled and bowed slightly.

"I wish to test out my theory. My name is Ryouma. A simple commoner. Please advise me, son of Azrail."

The young boy sent a punch directly into Arata's hand. Arata caught it and was shocked at all the power contained within the punch. He hadn't frozen like the others; instead his flames seemed to grow instead. He grinned. Arata's eyes widened.

"Th-This is...."

The power emanating off of Ryouma continued to increase. Arata was shocked at how much power was coming out of Ryouma It wasn't just the quantity of the power that was troubling Arata but also the speed at which the power came out. These flames were clearly a Mortal Silver Grade Spell. Possibly on the Earth Grade level. And his Mastery was very high, the control of the output was impressive.

Arata knew that he could contain and convert this much energy into his own, but the speed at which the energy was pouring out of Ryouma wasn't small. And it kept on coming. Arata was currently at 65% of his capacity, and Ryouma was still pushing. This was definitely his biggest challenge since entering the Academy. The previous encounters he didn't even need to tap into half of his capacity, and that included taking on the multiple students. But this single student had pushed him past 65% already and he didn't look like he was stopping.

In fact, Ryouma looked perfectly relaxed.

Arata smiled. He had found someone interesting.

"Let's see whose limit will be reached first."

Ryouma smiled at the challenge. His eyes turned serious as he sent more energy into his fist and into Arata. Arata concentrated, utilizing all his concentration and power to control and maintain Ryouma's energy.

Although the class could feel the massive amounts of Energy that was coming off of Arata and Ryouma, they didn't know what was going on as the two boys just stood there, neither of them budging. All except Akari and Teacher Takuma. Akari gasped as she realized what was happening. She knew that Ryouma was strong, the only reason he never challenged her for the Class Representative position was that he was a commoner and many nobles in the class wouldn't want a commoner as their Class Rep. Also he didn't like responsibility. He was a free spirit that was only interested in those that were strong.

And clearly, Arata had piqued his interest.

Akari was shocked and amazed that Ryouma could keep Arata in that position for that long. She knew that he couldn't redirect the energy as he hadn't contained and controlled it yet. Even at Minor Accomplishment Mastery, the capacity that Vitality Bestowal could withstand was high. And Akari could tell that Arata was at a higher level than Minor Accomplishment Mastery. So Ryouma was far more powerful than she thought to keep Arata locked in for this long.

Teacher Takuma wasn't as informed as Akari about what Arata was doing, but she was an expert and could read their energies. She could see a large amount of energy being poured into Arata. That was strange and shocking as it is, but then she watched as the Energy circulated through Arata. She guessed that he was making it his own, but she didn't understand how that was possible. As Ryouma said, it was a theoretical concept but couldn't be practically applied. Yet it was being applied before her.

Ryouma began to sweat, his flames were visibly getting weaker. He was reaching his limit. But he could see that Arata wasn't faring any better. Arata had a serious look of concentration. He was getting exhausted from how quickly Ryouma was pouring out his Energy, but he had noticed the speed was decreasing. He knew Ryouma was reaching his limit. Arata decided that he needed to finish it now.

Arata began absorbing at a faster rate. This shocked Ryouma as he struggled to keep up. The energy rushed out of Ryouma incredibly fast until Ryouma looked at Arata wide eyed. Arata smiled as he lifted his foot and stamped the ground. Flames exploded out from beneath him forming a large burn on the stage. Ryouma was able to jump back out of the blast zone and just barely missing the impact. As he landed, he was breathing heavily, he was incredibly drained from his interaction with Arata.

Arata was still standing within the circle. Even after all that, he still hadn't moved. Ryouma smiled as he bowed to Arata.

"I was wrong. It is an honor to have sparred with the son of the Angel of Death. I take back my previous comments."

The room was shocked at Ryouma's acknowledgement. For him to recognize Arata's strength and even apologize for his comments, this shut the room up completely. This meant that Arata was who he said he was. But that was only the beginning of Ryouma's shocking display as he knelt on both knees and bowed to Arata.

"Please allow me to serve under you, Master Sato."