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It had been already 30 days since the tutoring began...
It went quite well for David, as expected, the effect of the {Genius} title truly did not fail him, giving him an easy ride with minimal scoldings from Mr. Cunningham.
From those 30 days of teaching, Mr. Cunningham increasingly had a good impression of him, sometimes even asking him to help out at his business for management, which David refused. He did eventually agree though, as he convinced himself that there are never too many skills, and yes, he did gain a {Business} life skill for himself as well.
Bennett, however, was still quite mad about the whole thing, and he felt wrong too as he kept getting scolded by his parents and comparing David to him, making him feel even worse. Although he did admit that David was better, the pride is still there damnnit!
Bennett had trained quite hard, as this month, he had increased all of his passive and active skill levels by 2, except for {Mana Control} which just increased by 1. He had also gotten a lot stronger with the system continuously purifying his body and strengthening him as he gained more attribute points. By the end of the month, he gained a hefty +15 point increase to every physical attribute! He even gained a new skill which was now at level 2, {Mana Shield}!
From the month of training, David made rocket speed progress, maxing out {Etiquette} which was at level 5, which confused David as his dismantle skill was also level five. He didn't fuss too much over it as he thought that some skills were harder to level so some had fewer levels than others.
From the amount of training in dancing and music, they both reached level 3, and his total attribute gains amounted to 25 dexterity, 10 spirit, and 5 of everything else as training was getting harder and harder for him to get attributes. He even felt that he was slowly reaching the limits of training for rank 2.
Even with Sarah and Ben's help, his attributes had basically reached the limit of pure training, but not necessarily the limit of fighting other monsters to the limit. With the month quickly passing by, he gained a level in {Sword Technique}, two levels in {Mana Shield}, two levels in {Multi-Cast} and a level in {No Chant Mastery}.
Today was the last day before Balfone Academy begins their test and the recommendation test. The days of etiquette training ended just yesterday, and his parents had given him a day off today to prepare for the recommendation test tomorrow.
Currently, David and Bennett were wearing their uniforms and were training in the basement. As they are high-ranking nobles who also invested in the school, their uniforms naturally had some favor, giving them extra protection enchants and even an automatic self-wash and dry function!
... Anyway, due to the appearance of David had already spread around the capital, many people were shocked as some even thought there might be an inner feud with the sons of the family.
Since David had never been outside before and even with everything almost being modern technology, information was passed by birds or via magic orbs, so he didn't really mind it as he didn't hear anyone talking about him except the servants.
The people in the Vale household all respected their new young master as he never did anything to abuse them like the other family members and he even treated them just as kindly, if not more kindly than Sarah did.
And... back to the current situation, David and Bennett were currently on a stand-off with their swords in their hand. How did they get to this point? Competitiveness!
The actual sword usage context? They were in a basement where a special magic circle (now known as an array) was set up so that one would be teleported out of the array when said target receives a certain level of damage.
With that in mind, might as well use real swords to make it more pressurizing and intense, it's quite harsh and scary, but also quite good for mind tempering and pain tolerance as they could still feel a portion of the pain they would normally receive here.
The two stared at each other, but this time, Bennett didn't charge in and instead, went into a defensive stance, blocking his left side.
Due to the increase of David's {Multi-Cast} skill, he could now stabilize a maximum of three spells at the same time now... if they were different elements. Since Bennett wasn't doing anything yet, David made the first move.
Although the skills were separate, David did manage to put together a combo spell. Multiple orbs of water appeared before David before they gather into a circle around Bennett.
As the water spread around the floor, a few bumps on the floor appeared, and a large orb of lightning appeared and covered the waters before multiple earth spikes had surrounded Bennett in an instant.
*Whoosh! Phew! Swoosh!*
Due to the water, the spikes were wet, but they weren't eroding, and instead, had an aura of lightning around them, giving it some more force, quickly trying to pierce Bennett.
Although there was an aura of lightning, Bennett had already set up a {Mana Shield}, blocking the slight AoE damage around him, and finally began charging at David.
Bennett squinted slightly as their swords clashed intensely, creating sparks, slightly blinding Bennett, giving him an opening.
Taking advantage of this, David twisted his body slightly and kneed him before throwing multiple fireballs at him.
Bennett quickly got up from the ground and quickly placed his {Mana Shield} up again as he knew that David had an overall advantage over him.
Seeing that he was able to block his fireballs, he smiled as he rushed to him and slashed downward, with earth mana infused onto the sword, flinging him away as Bennett had launched a larger {Mana Shield} at David as he broke the first layer.
*Booooooong!!!...*
'Not bad... not bad at all...' David looked at Bennett in approval as he was being flung.
Backflipping onto the ground, instead of speaking, they let their weapons speak for them.
He twisted his body again, narrowly dodging the lumps of earth that were being thrown at him. David unconsciously started pouring some mana into his body, enhancing it and bring it a marginal upgrade, at which he disappeared from Bennett's view, making him panic.
Bennett felt a sense of dread, not being able to catch up with David, and instinctively turned to block his backside, only to see that his sword had clashed with David's.
Flinging himself off of Bennett, he was ready to start a clash of furious strikes at him, only to see him back off. He noticed the action and knew why he backed off, after all, as a monster hybrid, even if their attribute points are the same, their physical bodies are way different, meaning he wouldn't win in a close-ranged fight.
Escaping from his eyes again, Bennett could no longer keep up as he was continuously being cornered to the edge of the basement, only able to rely on his instinct to block David's fury of slashes.
*Ching! Ching! Ching! Ching!*
By the time his back hit the wall, all he saw was a blade that was lodged in his chest before his vision darkened.
*Phssss! Phssss!*
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Chapter 43 End...
Were the 'sound' effects good? I'm not very good at using them, sorry!
Hope you enjoyed today's chapter! <3