Å̸̟̪̻͙̟̅̋ ̴̭̝́͌m̴̖̫̥̲͈̑̀̈̉͝ō̶̠̠̭̬̘̈́͂̓͆n̵̦̗͎̒͊s̷̨͙͕̩̩̆ţ̷̩̂ȇ̶͔̭r̶̼̝̲̈͗̾̄...(2)

"This brat....I'll kill him!" a woman whose arms and legs were bleeding from what seemed to be stab wounds yelled with exploding fury. She had pulled out the knives that wounded her before attempting to rush towards the culprit. But she was unfortunately stopped.

"Sally? Stay out of this! I'll be the one to knock this brat out!" Ralph declared as he got up while dusting off his armor and clothes. He had bruises and cuts in multiple places, but his eyes burned with determination.

The child he was facing used some sort of wind magic to blow him away, causing him to crash against the earth. Before that, at one point he also used water magic to extinguish Ralph's fire magic.

He knew there was no point in trying to deny it anymore. The kid was strong. His age didn't matter anymore. This was an opponent he shouldn't hold back against. Now that he's determined to give it his all, he wanted to fight and win on his own.

"SHUT UP! You keep saying you'll finish him but here you are, getting beaten up like a ragdoll! Even so, I didn't plan to interfere but this kid's done it this time!" She held out her arm where there was a stab wound.

Ralph could see there was another wound on her leg as well. Despite her wearing leather armor she got wounded due to the attacks being aimed at where the armor was the thinnest.

"He threw FUCKING KNIVES! Kid or not, I'm going to fucking kill him!" Sally screamed as veins could be seen on her forehead.

Ralph didn't know what to say. He wanted to fight the kid on his own but it's kind of the kid's fault for targeting his companion. It also seemed like Sally wouldn't back down. So in the end, he remained silent.

Sally stormed towards Dusk seething with anger until she reached her desired distance. She then held out her hand as mana coursed through her fingertips.

"I'll kill you with one attack and get this over with, you brat!" She exclaimed as a sickening grin spread across her face.....

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Dusk could see that the woman he had thrown his knives at was coming for him. It seemed like Ralph wanted to stop her for reasons unknown, but in the end, he failed. He overheard Ralph calling the woman Sally.

Sally rushed toward Dusk while glaring at him. If looks could kill, then Dusk would probably have been dead by now.

'Is it her first time getting attacked while she had her guard down? What a drama queen. It's just some throwing knives.' He couldn't help but sigh from secondhand embarrassment.

Dusk would have liked to make a few more comments in his mind on how overly dramatic his new opponent was being, but he didn't have the time for that as the surrounding environment suddenly got chilly.

The woman in front of him had her hands held out as dense mana coursed through her fingertips. Sally was about to use some sort of magic, it was obvious. Judging from the sudden chilly environment he assumed that she was about to use ice magic.

If Dusk wanted to he could stop her before she finished casting her magic. But this fight was no longer a fight for survival or to save Dawn. It was a fight purely for his entertainment and to test out his new skills. So instead of stopping the magic cast, he decided to do something more daring.

"Recreate Fire. Modify temperature to 1500 degrees Celsius. Shape: Fireball. Recreate...."

Dusk created a small yellow fireball in the palm of his left hand. Yellow flames are the second last when it comes to how hot fire can get. Yellow only burns hotter than red. Yet, due to Dusk's low magic level, this is the strongest fire he could wield with his magic. But the problem with increasing the temperature of this fireball was that he had to decrease its size, as the mana cost would get too high if he tried making it larger.

"Haha! You want to counter my magic with that puny fireball? You're done for, kid!" Sally laughed with vigor.

The mana she was charging up finally formed into large glaciers of ice. As Dusk had expected, it was Ice magic.

"NOW DIE!" she let out a battle cry before shooting the glaciers at Dusk that came at him with threatening speed.

"Recreation complete," Dusk muttered to himself as he positioned his fireball in front of him. However, he didn't shoot the fireball at the glacier. As his left hand was busy positioning the fireball he revealed his right hand, which was glowing green charged with mana.

Ralph had noticed this and immediately felt the need to warn Sally.

But before he could do so, Dusk suddenly thrust his other hand forward before speaking out the name of his new attack.

"Firestorm."

The fireball suddenly turned into a large flamethrower due to the gust of wind that came from Dusk's left hand. The attack was the combination of his recreations: "Fireball" and "Storm gust".

The glaciers collided with the flamethrower, but only for a moment. They melted away in an instant, overwhelmed by the inferno that was shot toward them.

"What the fu-?!" Sally was shocked to see the small fireball turn into such a destructive flamethrower. Her mind had gone blank due to the unexpected threat that was fast approaching. She stayed rooted to her spot like a tree that was fated to be scorched to a crisp by the flames of oblivion.

"You fool! You're going to get yourself killed!" Ralph ran towards her and carried her away with superhuman speed, allowing her to avoid the inferno of doom.

The "Firestorm" passed them by them and both were able to come out relatively unscathed from the attack due to Ralph's quick actions.

"Seems like your Ice magic wasn't as powerful as I thought. I honestly expected much more and yet, they melted away in an instant." The silver-haired boy that was the source of their troubles walked towards the two leisurely.

Ralph didn't say anything. He was a battle-loving maniac but the situation had taken a turn for the worse. Their opponent had turned out to be much more capable than they thought. Although this would only further excite him, he had worries about something else.

The woman at his side was crouched down taking deep breaths as she glared at the figure. As the boy approached nearer and nearer at a leisurely pace she gritted her teeth and shouted,

"I'm not done yet, you bastard!"

She got up and shot totowardusk with impressive agility.

"Sally, stop! You can't beat him!" Ralph warned her as he knew that in close combat the boy was leagues above both of them.

Her feet coated with mana allowed her to reach Dusk in a second. The moment the boy was within the range of attack she thrusted her sharp spear to penetrate his heart.

But Dusk just side-stepped to dodge the attack.

This didn't seem to discourage Sally at all as she let out a flurry of stabs aimed at everywhere on the boy's small body. In response to her aggressive attacks, Dusk met them with skillful parries, elegant sidesteps, and lastly, a stylish backflip just after her last attack.

"Your agility isn't half bad. You lack strength like the muscle-brained friend of yours but I can tell your technique has been honed much better than his. Although, right now you're not using it to its full potential because of your flimsy rage." Dusk commented with a thoughtful expression.

"You....stop toying with m-"

"If I had known that you fight with much more finesse than your friend, then I would have tried engaging you in battle instead of him." Dusk sighed in regret.

Veins started forming on Sally's head again. She swung her spear with all her strength to kill the arrogant brat but as usual, all her spear met was air. Dusk vanished for a moment before reappearing in front of her. He grabbed the shaft of her spear before punching her in the stomach with a mana-coated fist.

"URGHH" Sally groaned loudly before coughing up blood.

"It's a shame I threw those knives at you. I won't be able to fight you for much longer now." Dusk said as he leisurely twirled his knife as if he was playing with it.

"What are you talking about? I'll kill yo- Ack?!" Suddenly Sally couldn't speak. Not only that, she felt like she couldn't move either. Her vision blurred as the figure in front of her seemed to multiply.

"W-What did y-you d-do?!" She stuttered multiple times to just ask one question.

"Hmm. A bit earlier than I initially expected. Guess my calculations were a bit off." Dusk spoke to himself. He ignored Sally's question and instead ask her his own.

"So? How do you like my venom?" He said as he examined her closely as if she was the lab rat of an experiment.