Davi's eyes stung, and his brain ached and twitched within his skull. His body felt like it was full of millions of different lines, all of which were flaring and twitching. Like tiny nerves firing off warnings at the speed of light.
This was his Danger Sense. The trait was going wild, and he felt it seep into his muscles and bones.
It was only thanks to this trait that he was able to dodge the strike.
One moment, Ragna stood before him, and then the next, the giant man stood before him, swinging his glaive out so hard that he caused a rippling wave of air to blast out. Davi managed to move his head to the side, half his helmet being peeled away as Ragna's weapon made a small bit of contact with his head.
Davi stumbled back from the force of the blow, and he felt the blade barely miss his flesh. The wind kept coming from the force of the attack and rammed into his chest, pushing his armor in, and that made him grunt, but he forced himself to take a step forward and swung his sword at Ragna, pouring all his mana into it!
This wasn't a match he could win with brute force. Ragna was above him in every category, but the point wasn't to win; it was to simply land a single hit, and that's what Davi aimed to do! He allowed Way of Self Iron to absorb the force of Ragna's powerful strike, and he channeled that kinetic energy into his arms, allowing him to swing faster than he usually could.
It wasn't enough, though.
Ragna vanished, literally, and Davi's sword went through the air. Not even a moment later, his Danger Sense screamed at him, and he felt a sharp pain in his back.
Ragna stood behind Davi now and used the blunt end of his glaive, ramming it into Davi's spine so hard that Davi was sent flying off the boat. Davi spun through the air, getting dizzy, and then he smashed down onto a pile of jagged trash. His armor kept him mostly safe, but his body ached and hissed at him, and he groaned, clenching his teeth.
His spine felt battered from that one strike, and his legs didn't want to listen to him at first as he tried to force himself to sit up. The back of his armor was exploded and caved in, but he absorbed some more shadows and forced it to fix and mend.
"Davi!" Davi looked up and found Olivia running toward him. Her eyes were wide as she looked at him. "Are you okay?"
Davi didn't say anything at first, and he instead looked back to where Ragna stood, the man waving down at him from on top of the ship. Finally, she spoke. "You fought him also, right?"
Olivia blinked, caught off guard by his question, but she gave a nod. "Yeah. It sucked! I seriously thought I would die!"
"How did you hit him?"
Olivia let out a sheepish laugh. "To be honest, I cheated."
"You did?"
"He was way too freaking fast, and I couldn't keep up, so I made him think I was tired and out of energy! I was told that wouldn't work, but the thing was, I actually did run out of energy and had used all three of my spells, so I wasn't able to fight anymore. Then I popped Polymorph and got him when he was up close to me!" Olivia folded her arms and frowned slightly. "I guess I really didn't beat him in an honest way. Oh! Wait, you don't know about Polymorph, do you! We seriously need to have a talk, Davi! I got the skill during the exam, and it's what—"
"I know about Polymorph." Davi cut her off and kept staring up at Ragna, who had gotten bored and started to do push-ups, each one shoving the boat a little further down into the sand.
"You do?"
"We'll talk about it later." Davi shifted his grip on his claymore. "After I beat this guy."
"Still think you can win?" Falco had finally gotten out of the ocean after having to swim back from the last strike he received from Ragna. The bird man stood next to Ghost, still soaking wet. "Most people give up after being hit by him once. Of course, I didn't since I'm not a bitch, but still, you got balls, Davi."
"Don't listen to him, Davi." Ghost giggled and nudged Falco in the side. "He cried the first time he fought Ragna."
"I did not!"
"Did too!"
"Did not!"
"Did too!"
"Did—"
As soon as Ragna looked to where Falco and Ghost were, Davi struck. It was the middle of the day, but clouds had begun to form, indicating that rain would soon fall. A rather large one was directly over them, bathing everything in shadows.
"Row Shadow Vault." Davi vanished into the ground, and in the next instant, he flew out of Ragna's shadow, coming up from beneath the man's sword first.
Ragna somehow saw the attack coming and squeezed his gut in and pushed up with both his arms and legs, doing a strange crab claw-like motion to avoid the strike. As Davi kept rising up, Ragna pushed off the boat and bent backwards, doing a fluid backflip, preventing the strike. He used his foot to catch the handle of his glaive and grabbed it, swinging it at Davi, but Davi dropped into a crouch, dodging the strike.
As Davi crouched down, his mana surged, blue fire crackling out of his fully repaired armor. "Row Shadow Vault." He spoke again, and this time he flipped his vault upside down. Beneath Ragna, the claymores surged up, all stabbing out of the ground toward him. Ragna dodged them, though, by stabbing his glaive into the ground and using it to pole vault all the way up, balancing on the tip of it with his pointer finger. "Row Shadow Vault." Once more, Davi flipped the vault, but only around the shadow that Ragna's weapon was placed over.
Ragna's glaive began to drop rapidly through the darkness, and since Ragna was on top of the glaive, he also began to fall, being pulled directly down to the swords.
It was a good strategy, as no matter where Ragna fell, a sword would nick him. Even with his impressive defense, he'd be touched by a blade, thus resulting in failure. Against anyone else, this would have likely achieved victory, especially if the person Davi was fighting was close to his current level of power or even slightly beyond, but Ragna wasn't just anyone.
Ragna was a man who had mastered almost every single mana technique that existed.
Right before Ragna dropped onto the blades, his own mana surged out. It was like hundreds of flower petals suddenly began to bloom across his body. They compressed around his feet, which were still pointed to the sky, and it looked as if a pair of giant lily pads, big enough to fit both his feet, appeared at the base of his heels. The air rippled around the lily pads, and suddenly, Ragna wasn't falling anymore.
Ragna floated in the air, standing upside down, and he yanked his glaive, ripping it out of the shadows before it could drop any further.
Davi was stunned and shocked by what he was seeing, but he acted a moment later, causing the claymores to blast out of the ground like bullets toward Ragna. However, the man suddenly began to fall toward the sky, still upside down, as he rose into the air. He then started to run, using the sky as if it were the ground, allowing him to dodge and weave out of the way of the raining claymores, which all missed him and then fell back down toward the ground.
Davi sighed and reopened his vault, pulling all the swords back in save for the one he was holding.
Ragna laughed, still upside down and flying, but his body began to slowly rotate, and soon he was back on his own two feet but still flying high in the air, floating in place. He placed his glaive over his shoulder and had his other hand on his hip, giving Davi a large grin. "Not bad! You almost had me! I think this is the first time a recruit has made me use Sky Walk before!"
"What gives? I thought you said you had Qi lines? Isn't that a wind spell?" Davi tried not to sound salty.
Ragna dropped from the ground and landed feet first. The man shook his head. "Sky Walk is something any mage with an E1 Core or greater can do. There are three forms of it, and I plan to teach you the first two soon if you don't know them. The first is Wall Walking, which allows someone to walk on walls and up surfaces. The second is the advanced form known as Water Walking, which allows someone to walk on water. Lastly is Sky Walking, the most advanced version, and as you just saw, it allows someone to walk on the air itself. Pretty cool, right?"
"I guess. Water Walking would be good for fishing." Davi said quietly.
Speaking of fishing, something was a little off. In the battle with the two monsters, he had been placed under the effects of Olivia's Polymorph trait. During that time, something about him had changed. Not only had his outfit shifted, but the way he looked at the world and his mana changed as well.
It was like his fishing skills had translated into sword skills, allowing him to use a line to strike and cut his enemy. He didn't know what those lines were, but he knew that in that state, it was like he had been stronger. Actually, his level of strength hadn't changed; instead, it was more like he had been complete.
It made him a little down, because he wasn't seeing the world like that anymore, and he felt off now. If that version of him had been a complete version of him, then was he a broken version? What had his eyes been like when he was in that state?
Were they blue, or were they purple?
He had a feeling that whatever that version of him was, he'd never be able to reach it on his own now that his Core had been messed with. Perhaps even before the king, his Core had long been changed; the moment he was put onto the current path, he was on.
In the end, it didn't matter.
Davi regained his focus and shifted his grip on his sword. "Sky Walking is why you were able to avoid the last attack. If that's the case, then beating you is simple."
"Is it?" Ragna raised an eyebrow, and his excited look seemed to grow. "Well, why don't you show me what you can do then!" And with that, their battle began once more.
Ragna charged forward and vanished, reappearing in front of Davi, but thanks to Danger Sense, Davi was able to once again duck underneath the strike. He swung out with his sword as hard as he could, but Ragna blocked and deflected the blow and kicked his foot forward, caving in the front of Davi's platemail. Davi rolled across the ground and opened his vault up, sinking into it. He then reappeared underneath Ragna, but the man vanished out of the way again as Davi sliced up into the air.
"Row Shadow Vault." For the second time that day, Davi opened his vault and spun it around. His claymores jutted from the shadows, and just like last time, Ragna jammed his glaive into the ground and lifted off the floor. "Row Shadow Vault." Davi flipped it again and tried to pull Ragna to the ground.
Ragna's eyes narrowed a little, confused why Davi was trying the exact same strategy. He activated Sky Walking and lifted into the air again to avoid the strike. Davi twisted the vault for a third time and began to fire the swords out like bullets.
Ragna began to dodge the swords, running in the air as they missed him. He also dodged them when they fell back down as gravity carried them down. As he dodged, Davi watched with keen interest.
On the ground, it was impossible to keep up with Ragna due to his insane speed. The man would literally teleport and appear. Davi could only react to the strikes as they came at him, but he couldn't land a single hit on Ragna. In the sky, it was different, though.
Ragna was still remarkably fast, so much so that Davi knew he'd still never be able to land an attack under normal circumstances, but that was the thing. Ragna was moving.
Whatever that teleport skill was that high-level mages and Knights used, it wasn't traditional movement. They would appear from point A to point B in an instant. It really was like a form of teleportation. Ragna didn't seem to be able to do that while he was in the air, though, as the man was manually dodging all the swords and having to make an effort.
That meant it would be easier to attack Ragna while he was in the air. Davi formed his plan and got ready to strike.
Ragna laughed and weaved in and out of the way of the swords. Davi kept firing them at him over and over again. The swords would fly into the air, then fall down into the open vault, only to be spat back out at high speeds to repeat the process.
"Are you hoping to make me run out of stamina?" Ragna called down. "Because I'm pretty sure you'll run out of mana before I do—" The man stopped, and his eyes went wide as he looked down at Davi.
Davi had his sword raised into the air, and his mana compressed and swirled around the blade. It was a mana technique, made to deal a massive amount of damage. Using the Sky Cutting sword style, Davi rammed his claymore down into the boat he stood on as hard as he physically could and sliced through the roof, splitting part of the boat in two and tearing off a chunk.
The sword had shattered on impact, but he ignored it and dropped the broken blade, instead reaching out and using his fingers to dig into the hull of the fractured part of the boat. The portion he was standing on began to slide down, sending out a wave of sparks as the ship fell apart, and Davi used the momentum to turn himself in the air and lifted up, raising a car-sized hunk of metal up above his head.
Then he chucked it as hard as he could at Ragna!
The metal cube blasted through the air and spun out of control as it was launched at the stunned Ragna. Ragna couldn't help but grin, though, and at the last second, he jumped out of the way, using the air as footing. The cube flew past him, but as it did, it blocked out part of the sun and cast a shadow directly onto Ragna's back.
"Row Shadow Vault."
Once more, Ragna felt shock as a tingling sensation went through him, and from his back, Davi burst out, appearing in the air directly behind Ragna, holding a new claymore. Ragna managed to spin around and held his glaive up just in time as Davi's claymore stabbed out. He deflected the attack, and his and Davi's weapons clashed. All Ragna had to do was give it a moment, and Davi would fall while he remained in the air, but Davi knew that as well and fought with everything he had.
Davi's sword pressed down into Ragna's glaive, but there was no way he'd be able to outmatch the man in a battle of strength, so instead, Davi kept Ragna's hands busy and kicked up with his leg. "Row Shadow Vault." From the darkness, his boot, part of his armor, exploded as a claymore jutted out, and he kicked at Ragna's stomach, about to slice into the man.
"Greenie!" Ragna clenched his teeth and was still smiling. His glaive bubbled, and a long tendril shot out and wrapped around Davi's leg mid-kick, stopping Davi from reaching Ragna. It had been close, but Davi wasn't fast enough—
"Vil Shadow Vault."
The front of Davi's chestplate tore open, and dozens of shadowy hands jutted out of his body. They all looked like black ink that had transformed into twisting limbs, and they wrapped around Ragna's limbs and tried to pull him into the vault. An intense chill filled the air, and Ragna felt his body freeze every time one of the hands touched his flesh, causing him to shiver.
That was it, though.
The hands touched him, and that meant Davi had landed a blow.
For Davi, that wasn't enough, though. The hands grew tighter around Ragna's body, and Davi pulled himself closer. Right as he did, the chunk of metal finally came crashing down from above, and it rammed directly into Davi's back. Davi absorbed the kinetic force, and with Way of Self Iron and his armor, he channeled it all directly into his fist. He let go of the handle of the claymore and pulled his arm back and punched forward.
Ragna watched the fist as it flew toward him in slow motion. His arms were busy blocking Davi's sword, which the man still held in one hand, and Greenie was also busy blocking Davi's kick. Ragna couldn't move either, as the hands jutting out of Davi had managed to pull him into a tight embrace. He could break out if he flexed his muscles, but the time it took would cost him a second that he simply didn't have.
He had lost.
Ragna grinned, and he accepted the punch as it rammed into his jaw. Davi forced all his mana and his power into his hand, channeling as much energy as he could, and he managed to shove Ragna's head back.
The two of them then began to fall, and they both crashed down into the beach hard enough to leave a small crater. Davi panted and spat up some blood. His armor was utterly destroyed, and his arm was completely broken. Even staying conscious was proving to be difficult.
His eyes lit up when he saw Ragna standing over him. The man had blood trailing down his lips, and he spat out a tooth, which stabbed into the sand next to Davi's head.
Ragna now had the largest smile ever seen on his face, proudly showing off his rows of teeth, one tooth now missing. Blood rolled down his busted lips, but he ignored it and placed his hands on his side.
"You pass."