Chapter 27 Combat exam (Part 7) “Finals”

(Author's note: Hi guys for those who cannot properly visualise the moves written by me.

The 'dash' which is frequently used by Sean resembles that of Shiba Tatsuya's move from Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei where he fights Hattori from student council. It is a cool move where after the match starts Tatsuya moves so fast that he appears behind Hattori within seconds.

The Qi which Sean used to fortify his fingers making it resemble like a knife is also a move similar to Shiba Tatsuya where slaughters the terrorist using his bare hands by fortifying his fingers to that of a knife).

Sean and Melinda walked up to the main stage and stood 15 yards from each other ready to battle as soon as the judge indicates the start of match. As soon as the match started Melinda sent three Qi slashes towards Sean who instead of evading just ran towards the Qi slash while having his guard up. Sean received the Qi slash head on in his arm which tore his sleeve in his t-shirt. However it did not hurt him as during the half hour break given before final he decided to wear a bulletproof vest and an arm guard in both hands which had the capacity to go up against a maximum of level 5 warrior. Ever since Sean upgraded his equipments to hold his own against a level 8 warrior, these older equipments which he used when he was in the Shell city had become obsolete and were in his inventory without any use. Sean did not use these equipments for the first few matches because he wanted to experience hand to hand combat after gene enhancement while also experiencing this world's combat prowess and was satisfied with the power generated from the gene enhancement.

Though the students were not allowed to use any weapons, they were allowed to use defensive equipments like leather armours. The arm guard which Sean wore received a scratch from the Qi slash attack and arrived near Melinda in a blink of the eye. Melinda did not have any change in her expression as she never expected to hurt Sean with these attacks. She had already seen his matches and knew that he was strong and experienced in fighting and she was not naive to believe these attacks would harm him. Melinda used these attacks as a diversion in order to force Sean to evade and planned to mix her Qi slashes with Qi explosion attacks but her strategy was defeated by Sean who did not evade her attacks and just faced it head on taking the full brunt in his body.

Though this messed up her plan, Melinda did not plan to retreat instead she met Sean head on by sending a flurry of attacks using her palm technique. Sean saw a total of ten palms strikes coming towards him within a span of one second and each palm contained her Qi. Sean met the attacks with his own palm and either parried them or deflected them and then gave a straight kick towards Melinda's abdomen. Melinda activated her bloodline and enhanced her defence technique and blocked his kick however the sheer power of the kick made her take a few steps back before coming to a stop. However during the time she took few steps back Sean followed through to continue his attack but Melinda sent a few enhanced Qi slashes to stop his rush attack which was once again blocked using his arm guard while recieving a few more scratches. Melinda was shocked to see an equipment this sturdy that it could take an enhanced slash of level 5 warrior and receive so little damage.

"The armour he is using is good. It can probably take the full brunt of a level 5 warrior going all out. The material is black in colour and does not seem to be made of leather or iron. I don't know where he obtained such an equipment?" said Lucy to which Carmella said "Perhaps it is a mid grade equipment". "But President he is only a level 3 warrior and he is from a small family. I doubt he can even afford a mid grade equipment and his armour seems to be different from the steel armour we have seen in various shops" said Lucy

"Well we can ask him about the equipment when we recruit him in our student council" said Carmella as she continued to watch the match. Sean and Melinda had been exchanging blows for 2 minutes without taking any damage. From the spectators point of view Melinda was the one mostly on the attack while Sean seemed to be on the back foot however only limited number of people with experience could see that it was Sean who was controlling this match. From the start of the match Sean has made a composed attack on Melinda and was barely sweating. He had not even taken a step back and while Melinda has been attacking Sean her rhythm has been erratic and has been retreating due to pressure created by Sean.

Every time Melinda has attacked Sean with a rush there was a time lag between the attacks to catch her breath and to let her bloodline cool down from continuous enhancement of attacks and Sean has observed this point even during her match against Sirius. He fully exploited that time lag and made her retreat by striking her arms and lower leg which though did not cause her any damage due to her defensive technique, she has been suffering from a stinging pain. Once again Sean defended against her Qi slashes and Qi explosions at point blank range and the second she paused to move backward he gave a sharp kick on her ankle instead on side of her knee. The sudden strike on her leg made her slip and almost fall to the floor but balanced with her left hand. Sean who timed his attack in such a way to make her loose balance did not allow her to recover as he sent a straight kick to her chest.

Melinda who saw the kick coming towards her did not try to stand up but let her body fall to the floor by removing her hand which was balancing her body while using her right arm to try and send a Qi slash on Sean's leg. However Sean did not let that happen as he stamped on her right hand which was in the process of accumulating Qi and kicked her in the abdomen continuously. Melinda tried to hit his leg in order to make him remove his leg which was stamping on her right hand however before she could even hit his leg she felt sharp pain on her abdomen and followed by continuous hits. The pain was unbearable for Melinda as she curled her body like a ball but Sean was relentless as he kick on her hip making her stiffen her back effectively opening her abdomen which received even more kicks as she vomitted blood while crying out in pain.

"Horrible". "This guy is ruthless". "This guy is a monster. How could he have heart to hurt such a cute girl like this". "Oi Stop hitting her she is already crying in pain" shouted the people in the crowd but Sean turned a deaf ear. He turned her over and saw her eye lids red from crying while there was blood on the side of her mouth. She was holding her stomach and her face was scrunching in pain.

Sean who saw this felt like he was bullying a defenceless girl and thought 'Shit did I get way too serious. This is only a competition and I was way too brutal. No matter how strong she is, in the end she is only a teenage girl.' Sean tapped her face and saw her open her eyes after not feeling any hits on her abdomen. She looked at Sean with grudge in her eyes while Sean who saw this laughed in embarrassment and asked "Do you give up? I don't think there is reason to continue any further". Melinda who heard this just nodded while wiping her tears and tried to stand up but because of the damage her knees buckled and started crying once again and this time due to embarrassment. Sean who saw this felt even more guilty and said " Alright....Alright here take my hand" as he held Melinda's arm and placed it over his shoulder and helped her on her feet and asked the medic to bring a stretcher. The judge had already announced Sean as the winner of the tournament and he received a huge round of applause from the stands. No one felt that Sean was lucky as from the beginning he fought against people with higher level than himself.

Sean set Melinda down on the stretcher while the judges announced the end of the exam and asked the new students to wait in order for the top ten to receive a prize from the Academy Principal.