Duel

After that, the only fight that Aion got interested in during the day was Vangel's, but since he was playing with Vergil's style, he defeated the opponent in a single instant and with a single sword strike again. His opponent predicted that, but he was unable to do a thing to stop it. Thus, the second day of the tournament ended.

People began to party early that night, but Aion headed home to make his mother rest easy again. Still, he was unable to relax. His opponent will be hard to defeat using normal means, and Aion wants to try to protect his pride until the end, but he might have to go all out to win…

"Who are you going to fight tomorrow?" Artemisia asked.

"The guild master of the capital," Aion replied.

Aion thought that there was no point in hiding that, but he soon regretted it a little… his mother got nervous for some reason, and he soon learned why.

"Be careful with him, Aion…" Artemisia said. "He had his reasons, and they were probably justified since my brother made him and his friends lose many battles, but he was the one who killed my brother… he might still be holding some grudges against our family since he clearly was against the plan of the king to keep me alive."

"Hmm, is that so…" Aion said. "Well, I have some surprises in store for him, so it will be fine. If he shows too much eagerness in the fight, he will end up regretting that."

"Getting overconfident is forbidden…" Artemisia said.

"Yes, honorable mother," Aion said.

Aion was just trying to ease her worries by looking confident, after all. Thanks to that, he ended up falling asleep pretty late. The next day, Aion noticed that the house was more silent than before. Aside from a few servants, everyone had left the house. Aion stayed until noon again with his mother, but she still looked lonely when he left.

"Just a few more days, mother, and you will be free from this prison…" Aion muttered under his breath.

This time, it was Aion's time to concentrate until the time of his fight. He didn't watch any other fights for several hours even though he had to study his next opponents after the guild master. It couldn't be helped. He had to sharpen his will as much as possible. He didn't know if people had come to talk to him during that time, but he only stopped when he had been called by the referee. In the end, he discarded the idea of using gauntlets as well. For his plan to work, he needed the highest attack power.

When Aion showed up, the crowd got silent again, but he didn't even notice it. He was too focused on the target. Jagger also looked different that day. He wasn't showing much of his anger…

Still, when the duel started, his aura changed as he charged to attack Aion. He planned to punch him faster than he could react, but at the last moment, Jagger stopped when one of his axes suddenly got too close to his neck. He twitched his body backward and dodged the attack… he knew that Aion was strong for his age… but not that much. That wasn't the reaction speed of someone who had never been in many fights to the death.

Jagger suddenly used Chaotic Punch, and then he charged forward insanely fast with his fist aimed at Aion's head. It was a charge that was faster than when he was running. Still, he found Aion's axes in the path of this fist, and he was forced to grab the sides of the weapons while he stopped. He succeeded with that and then used a roundhouse kick, but Aion lowered his stance… he was supposed to be slower, and yet…

"Is he predicting my moves?" Jagger thought.

That wasn't supposed to be something an inexperienced kid should be able to do… only those who participated should be able to do that since they knew most of Jagger's moves, but only a few handfuls were fast enough to pull it off.

Jagger decided to test that by running around Aion. Some people might think that he was going too far fighting a ten year old boy, but he fought enough to know that there are some abnormal kids in the world, and those shouldn't be underestimated. In any case, Jagger began to run, and he wasn't able to turn around fast enough to follow him with his eyes. He could, but not without breaking his stance.

Eventually, Jagger found himself with a clear view of Aion's back and then attacked with Chaotic Punch again. Still, at the very moment of the activation, Aion began to turn around insanely fast while fixing the posture of his arms and axes.

In the last moment, Jagger moved both of his gauntlets to block the axes since he knew that they would damage his arms too much and the damage that he would inflict wouldn't be enough to defeat Aion. In the end, he pulled that off, but the impact still pushed him to the side and left some deep dent marks on the gauntlets. Two or three more hits on the same spot, and the gauntlets will break…

"He isn't even using the Inner Force, and he has this much speed and power…" Jagger thought while furrowing his eyebrows. "It can't be helped… I have my own reasons to win this, and I won't fail."

Jagger's aura changed again, and Aion could tell that something troublesome was about to happen… Aion put both axes in front of his face in the shape of an X and then waited. Eventually, Jagger charged, and his posture seemed off. To make things even weirder, he turned around completely, and at the last moment, he pointed both hands toward Aion… and then a powerful explosion of energy happened…