Allen vs. Rudy, Rudy's Foresight

The moment he finished speaking, Allen kicked up the dirt at his feet and charged toward Rudy like a cannonball.

Then the real "cannonballs" came hurtling toward him.

They were dense Water Balls, each nearly a meter in diameter, packed together in the air like blue balloons to form an entire wall of spherical "bricks." And it was not merely a thin wall.

The Water Ball Magic continued pouring forth, the wall steadily growing thicker and thicker.

Allen smiled faintly and narrowed his eyes, one hand resting on his sword.

Even the wind seemed to grow quieter.

Pretty imposing. But this time, I won't be using just the Sword God Style. I need to keep moving at high speed while cutting through the Water Balls, and I need enough attack range... Twenty Slashes won't work. Then...

North God Style—Combat Faction—Second Form of Standard Stance.

Dirt exploded beneath Allen's feet. His right leg lifted off the ground, and his body twisted through the air. As he spun, his blade swept a full circle around him. The moment he unleashed the charged slash, the wall of Water Balls was right before his eyes—so close that he could see sunlight glinting off their surfaces.

Battle Qi surged.

"Round Heaven Slash!"

Battle Qi wrapped around the blade, and its light seemed to extend immensely far.

The water wall was cleaved straight through, and Allen shot out through the opening!

With one slash, he shattered the Water Balls coming at him again. He wove back and forth through the gaps now visibly widening between them as Water Balls burst one after another around him, their waters rippling across the grass.

Amid those ripples, Allen ran across the water, accelerating rather than slowing down.

He looked toward Rudy in the distance. Water Ball Magic continuously shot from Rudy's raised palm, while Rudy himself bounced rapidly backward like a balloon. He was using repeated Air Blast Magic to quickly widen the distance between them.

No wonder the Water Balls are scattering so much. Rudy can't aim properly while he's bouncing. Bouncing with Air Blast Magic, huh? He releases it twice per jump—once to create a reactive force against his body and launch himself away, then again at his feet to cushion the landing and make it easier to jump again.

But it's not fast enough.

The dense Water Ball Spells, having lost their accuracy, could not stop Allen's advance at all. His reflexes had been pushed to their limits. Each Water Ball burst uselessly around him and became turbulent streams across the ground, while he continued forward like a butterfly skimming over a lake, his movements utterly unimpeded.

The distance between them had closed to fifty meters!

Rudy gritted his teeth in the distance.

"Water Spout! Ice Pillar!"

Allen instinctively twisted aside to evade the Ice Pillar rising beneath his feet, only to discover that no ice had formed there at all. He looked up at Rudy.

A massive cylindrical current of water coiled around Rudy before pouring down in an instant! The enormous volume of water nearly soaked through the ground, forming a shallow stream. Then, a row of Ice Pillars suddenly appeared beneath his feet.

"Rock Bullet!"

Rudy flicked his hand, firing a Rock Bullet compressed into a blade-like shape. With a sharp crack, it sliced the Ice Pillar into a broad shard large enough to stand on. He stepped onto it, raised his hand toward Allen, and shouted.

"Rock Bullet!"

Allen spun aside to dodge, but no Rock Bullet came at him. Looking up, he saw that Rudy had only been bluffing. In reality, he had used Air Blast Magic, using reverse momentum to propel the ice shard beneath his feet rapidly away across the water-covered grass.

It was more than twice as fast as using Air Blast Magic alone.

Allen stared in astonishment.

You can do that?

Then a Rock Bullet suddenly flew at him. Allen knocked it aside with a slash, and the Dragon Saint Battle Qi Core Embryo in his abdomen abruptly contracted and expanded, squeezing out trickling streams of power that melted into the innate Battle Qi throughout his limbs and body.

He cut apart an Ice Spear flying toward him, plowing towering waves through the water before him as he broke into a sprint. Rock Bullets blasted up layers of dirt behind him, but they could not lock onto his movements at all.

Battle Qi surged wildly, and Allen moved so fast that he nearly left afterimages!

In just a few breaths, the distance between them closed again—to thirty meters!

Seeing that his Rock Bullets could not hit Allen at all, Rudy showed no sign of panic. His eyes gleamed with excitement as he shouted.

"Allen, watch closely! This Mixed Magic!"

"Mud Pit!"

The instant he spoke, understanding flashed through Allen's eyes.

As someone who had read the original novel, how could he overlook Rudy's signature magic? Still, the current Rudy could not instantly cast a large-scale Mud Pit. In the novel, when he fought Paul near the end of his childhood, he had used a Mud Pit with a diameter of two meters.

Allen grinned and swung his sword down at his feet. The wind pressure from the swing parted the ground that was rapidly turning to mud. With solid ground beneath his feet, he leaped high, escaping the Mud Pit's range, then split apart an Ice Spear that came flying at him treacherously.

He landed on the ground five meters away.

And one foot sank into the Mud Pit.

"?"

Allen looked at his legs trapped in the Mud Pit, then stared at Rudy in surprise.

Rudy had already stopped his rapid retreat in the distance. He shouted excitedly at Allen.

"My Water Ball Spells and Water Spout Spells weren't cast just to entertain you! Look around! This is an extra-large-range spell I specially prepared for you!"

Allen shattered an Ice Spear that flew at him along with Rudy's words, narrowing his eyes as his gaze swiftly swept over the surroundings.

The bottom of the hillside had long since become a field of mud.

Rudy could not yet instant-cast a large-scale Mud Pit, but what if the conditions had already been prepared in advance?

During the battle, the immense water flow from the Water Cannons and Water Spouts had thoroughly saturated the ground beneath the hill. Rudy had needed only a single "trigger" to complete the large-scale Mud Pit Magic.

The entire area below the hill was now covered in Mud Pit.

Allen silently looked down at his legs sunk into the mud, while Rudy suddenly released several massive Ice Spears that stabbed into the surrounding ground.

"But!"

Rudy folded his arms and chuckled.

"Even if the Mud Pit traps you and slows your movement, I still can't effectively threaten you. You can sense all my magic with the Water God Style and cut it apart, can't you?"

Allen squinted at him and smiled.

"So?"

Rudy waved his hand and released Fireballs, shattering the surrounding Ice Spears. When ice and fire collided, they mixed with the dense moisture below the hill and formed wisps of thin fog.

Rudy lowered his hand and pointed at his eyes.

"So I'm going to blind your senses!"

Then he bent down and touched the ground with both hands. Keeping his eyes on Allen, he chuckled smugly.

"Intermediate Magic—Geothermal Heat! Mixed Magic—Dense Fog! Native of this world of swords and magic, feel the charm of physics!"

Allen felt heat rising from deep within the Mud Pit. Mist began billowing up from the marshy ground beneath the hill, and before long, the area around them had become shrouded in fog.

Tch, he's really pleased with himself. He's even shouting out his inner thoughts. Does he really think I can't understand him?

He rolled his neck, raised his longsword, and aimed it at Rudy's crouching figure, which was gradually growing hazy in the mist while keeping both hands on the ground. Smiling, Allen asked.

"But if I kill the caster while you're casting Geothermal Heat, won't the spell be interrupted?"

Rudy's brow twitched wildly.

"...What do you mean by that? Even if you can get over here, I can still cast magic and run away."

Allen held his sword beside his ear, assuming a throwing stance. Looking at Rudy, he spoke each word clearly.

"The North God Style has sword techniques for throwing blades. If this were a fight to the death, you would already have died the moment you crouched down."