Chapter 61

"Unfortunately for you two, weapons will do very little the stronger you get. Even the fancy weapons you got this year will barely be able to withstand a full powered blow from anyone with a domain." James said while attempting to land an attack on Alex with his flame covered fists.

"You will have to use your domain." Alex instructed as he easily evaded the oncoming blows.

James didn't answer, he only smirked as an invisible dome around them appeared a red filter seeming to be applied to light as it passed through it.

Alex was forced to continuously dodge as flames appeared around him at random.

He stopped as he felt flames coming from every possible direction.

James was almost confident that he would capture him, if it weren't for the calm look on his face. However he shook off the doubt as he felt his flames completely surround Alex. Ge could feel Alex fighting back from within, and see tendrils of darkness through the flames. He watched as his flames got more compact and powerful and darker.

'Darker?' James thought thinking something was wrong.

Yes, darker. James watched as his bright flames which had tinges of yellow and orange without turned red, and then purple. Continuing until the light from his flames was completely drowned out and the only way he could confirm their existence was from his affinity.

He felt his flames dying out as an opposing energy clashed with his own. He tried to overpower it but the more he tried the faster his mana reserves were depleting. When he stopped he felt himself being surrounded by the dark energy and heard Alex from in front of him.

"So… how do I get rid of it now?" Alex asked as he tried to get rid of the domain.

"I hope you're talking about the domain and not me." James joked.

"Yeah the domain."

"Two ways; first you can absorb all of the mana that you had released into the domain which is kind of brute forcing it, and the second way is to go to the center, or the place where you had summoned it, and you should understand what to do from there." James explained.

Alex retraced his steps for a few moments until he felt a familiar aura. After a few moments the domain faded and Alex walked over to where James was seated releasing him as he got next to him.

"So that was a true domain of darkness. It lives up to its reputation and was quite a bit more fearsome than the improvised version you created a few months ago."

Alex nodded. "It's a lot more useful, but not as efficient. Although, I am sure that if I combined the two things would get pretty interesting."

"Even thinking of that possibility scares me." James said before turning his attention to the other two mages fighting. "So, do you think Taylor has his domain yet?"

"He hasn't used it even when we sparred, but that doesn't mean anything. If he does have it that already puts him ahead of me as I didn't get mine until I had broke through to the Master class." Alex said as he watched Tom dance around Taylor who was having trouble keeping his feet on the ground.

Taylor, who seemed to have given up for a moment pulled off his jacket as torrents of winds collided with him pushing him in several directions. The loud poundings reverberated through the empty room.

Taylor glowed brightly and he started rotating not even trying to keep himself grounded anymore. He held out his arm with his jacket. Spinning faster and faster as a bright glow emanated from himself, pulsing and growing brighter.

Tom for the first time had trouble hitting Taylor, his own wind was colliding into itself as it was repelled of of Taylor. He charged up his energy ready to finish the fight in one move.

"Splat"

Taylor's released jacket wrapped around Tom's head and caught him off guard for a moment.

Taylor landed taking advantage of the time, stumbling as everything in his vision rotated, but still glowing and moving at an impressive speed.

Alex grinned as he watched James throw the jacket off only to be trapped in a headlock. His massive torrent of wind missing Taylor as he simply passed it and got to Tom.

"You just got defeated." Taylor said.

"You did much better than that girl at the competitions. Although she didn't have a jacket to blind me with, she did try to blind me a few times with her own light."

"But you knew I was expecting that didn't you." Tom said with a smirk.

"Maybe."

"You really didn't hold back, that hurt more than school on Mondays." Taylor said while lifting his shirt to see a few purple bruises from the beatings he had taken. He winced for a moment while watching the bruises slowly changing back to a normal color.

"That was holding back, I have wind-blades just like Alex's, well not as impressive as his, but they would have hurt a lot more if they landed. Would've used them too if we had a high level healer on standby but Michael was 'busy'." Tom said before laughing as he saw the fearful look on Taylor's face.

"Let's go." James spoke up and exited the room.

"Where are we going?" Taylor asked.

"It's a surprise." He said to Taylor before turning to Alex. "As long as no one is already peeping around that is."

Alex didn't respond only a small smile filled his lips as he knew he had been found out. His spacial energy was already scanning two sets of armor that were brimming with energy. They were in a room and several other people were standing around and waiting for them to arrive.

"By the way even if you had survived and not lost in those thirty minutes you would have gotten the surprise. No one else Has been able to last that long in a spar against us. Not at our school at least." Tom said while opening a door.

"Hey everyone, I'd like to introduce your captains for next year." James said to those who were looking at him expectantly. In response applause were heard, but not everyone was convinced.

Ignoring their questioning faces and Taylor's look of astonishment, he spoke up. "Four hundred and sixty two. That is the number of master class beasts that the hunting club alone has hunted this year. Nearly a quarter of that came from these two standing in front of you. Sixty percent was from me and Tom. Only sixty nine beasts came from you all combined. That is still a record breaking number for this school, but up against these two Goliaths you couldn't hold a candle up."

"Last week we had our yearly sparring two test your growth, ninety percent of you had broken through while the rest had made significant progress. And yet, Alex broke three times in the time that you had done so once." He looked at the now astonished crowd.

"That's right, he has already reached the same level of power as you all, and with two rare affinities. But he isn't the only one, Taylor has also surpassed you. We just sparred with these two. Do they look like you did last week? Hmm? Do they look like they just took a heavy beating and lost?"

A big smile filled his face as he looked at the hunters who's prides he had hurt.

"No, we wouldn't leave you with any weak captain which is why we are gathered here to announce who will be taking over next year."

Paul who was sitting down in the back of the room typing on a computer clicked a button and a video played on a screen. A heavily edited version of the spar that had just recently happened played out and cheers were heard as the hunting club watched Tom get put in a headlock, and James sitting on the floor kept in place by a mass of darkness.

"Get over here and put these on. A lot of people worked hard to get these ready for you before the year ends." Tom said as he pulled the captain's uniforms that were worn by manikins off and gave them to the two.

Alex looked at the uniform in his hands, they looked similar to the current uniforms than the captains wore, but were more suited for combat. Scales from a massive snake, were placed everywhere that needed to be flexible, chitin covered everything else. It was all painted to match, and runes were scattered everywhere among them, making it hard for Alex to tell what they did specifically. He looked at the silk cloak that would cover most of the armor recognizing that this was made from some of the earlier beasts that they had defeated this year.

'Spider silk from a nest we had cleared out, the snake, a crab and several more.'

Alex went into a separate room and reentered a minute later wearing the uniform. James walked up to him and pinned a badge onto his shoulder.

"I still think it's strange that you dislike wearing anything like jewelry, to the point that you wear your badge on your shoulder, but I have got to admit it looks more badass like this."

"Thank you." Alex said with a chuckle.

Alex froze as Paul walked up and pinned an emblem onto the badge. "The runes club as well?" Alex asked.

Paul smiled. "We had a vote and it was a unanimous decision." He said with a shrug

James laughed before speaking. "I tried getting you to be the captain of the potions club, but Lockhorn said it was too much extra work and you had to focus on potions."

Alex remembered how many carts of empty vials James had pushed around and cleaned out, and internally thanked god from the tedious work he had been saved from.

"That's understandable." Alex said.

"What is this?" Taylor asked as he saw a screen appear in front of his face.

Paul smiled and summoned some mana in his hand.

"An early version of the combat visors that the military uses. You can see magic before it takes form with it."

"It's not as refined as the real one, but it will still give you and edge."

Taylor looked at the gray cloud surrounding Paul's hand with amazement. "Cool."

Alex activated the visor and looked around. 'Very useful, I still can't feel most types of energy with my spacial affinity.'

"Alright from today these two are your captains." Tom said to everyone.

"We will teach you the ropes before you leave. Don't worry, you still have us to mess with you for a few months." He continued before Paul proceeded to teach Alex and Taylor how to use the uniforms.