Brad's smile sent shivers down my back, and although I understood that he was probably just a young man afflicted with a little bit of a crush, it made me extremely uncomfortable. Still, took his hand and replied with a polite smile, "Yeah, let's have a good match."
Having finished the traditional pleasantries, we walked in opposite directions, making sure to reach the white lines on the ground. As Ms. Rose was talking a bit, entertaining the audience, Brad brought out his huge mace and I took a breath to ready myself.
It didn't take long before our teachers started the second countdown of the day, "5,4,3,2,1, fight!"
Both of us started to circle our way forward, keeping our eyes on each other to try and gain as much information as possible.
Brad was an incredibly muscly, bald man and the mace he was carrying was a clear sign that he, like me, was a close-combatant. I also assumed him to be more strength oriented than most, as that would explain his weapon of choice.
There was also the fact that James had already clearly shown that he had, at least to some degree, mastered his element, so there was nothing that said that Brad couldn't have done the same, meaning I had to be ready for elementally enhanced attacks as well.
After a couple of seconds of slowly inching closer to each other, it was as if we both recognized how silly we were acting. We weren't tacticians, nor were we magicians or archers, we were warriors!
"Hup!"
So we both dashed forward in sync, our dance starting with him launching an overhead attack at me. It was, relative to the size of the mace, a pretty fast attack. Still, it was nothing that I couldn't dodge, yet I chose not to. I wanted to know just how powerful his attack was.
Therefore, I quickly transformed my hands, not caring about showing my powers to all of the people watching, and caught the attack. *Bam!* "Urgh!"
It was heavy, much heavier than any attack Arthur had thrown at me during our spars, but I could take it. Noticing that his mace wasn't moving anymore, Brad's face lit up into a bright smile, "You are so strong! If things don't work out with that love interest of yours, please do give me a chance!"
Not wanting to humor his flirting, I redirected the force of his attack to the side, throwing him off balance. Before he could steady himself, I kicked him in the stomach, pushing him back a couple of meters. "Gah!"
However, he didn't seem to have taken much damage at all, as he just straightened his back and rushed at me. He started to swing his mace wildly, making sure he still had some degree of control as he started to pressure me.
*Bam! Bam! Bam!*
Every single hit I parried with the scales on my hands was powerful, numbing them in just a couple of hits. 'This is fun!'
It was my first experience fighting someone with a similar style to my own. Granted, I had only really fought Arthur and Peter so far, with Arthur having a very artistic swordsmanship style and Peter being Peter.
Knowing I couldn't find an opening like this, as the man who was almost as tall as I never stopped swinging his mace, I activated [Draconic Strength]. When I felt my body filling up with power, I knew I had started a timer for how long I could fight.
[Draconic Strength] was an amazing skill, but it did have one very severe drawback; It drained my energy very quickly. This meant I had just made the decision to try and end the fight as soon as possible.
*Boom!*
"Argh!", Parrying the mace that was threatening to smash my head with my left hand, I managed to land a huge punch right in the pit of Brad's stomach, making his body fold from the impact. *Bam!* A knee to his head sent him flying back, with his head looking at the sky.
When he landed on the ground with a *Thud*, I was confident that I had managed to knock him out. There was no way he could fall victim to that combo, enhanced not only with [Draconic Strength] but also by manually powering up my attacks with mana, and stand up. However...
"So I guess you are serious now? Good!"
I had been wrong. With his nose bloodied and his uniform dirtied, he stood up once again. But this time he didn't have the same expression. His smile was still present, but his eyes were filled with determination. Suddenly, his body grew a size larger, his already big body getting absolutely huge as he quickly became more than two meters tall.
The mace that had looked huge in his hand suddenly didn't look as big at all, as his bulging muscles expanded. 'I wonder how that uniform is still hanging on, it must be struggling right now...'
"Here I go!"
'Why do they all say stuff like that?'
He ran forward and when he was close, he was towering over me, his size making the swings of his mace so much more powerful. *BAM! BAM! BAM!* My whole body was blown to the sides when I deflected his attacks, as his skill made him physically a lot stronger than me.
"Got you!"
A large big horizontal attack was the last one he sent out, my arms already out of position to defend my body as they had been blasted away from the swing before. "Ku!" The attack hit me right in my chest, letting me feel the pain of getting my ribs crushed and making me fly through the air before landing on the ground, pushing the air out of my lungs.
'I fucked up... It was just so fun to fight him head-on...'
It was not like I didn't understand that it was foolish to just keep on trying to catch the attacks of the giant, but I wanted to see how much I could take. Now, things weren't as fun as I felt the pain rushing through my body, quickly followed by anger.
My whole body suddenly started getting completely engulfed in a raging fire of rage as I saw the dark-skinned hulk walking toward me, though it wasn't him I was angry at. There was some kind of pride inside of me that didn't let me accept the fact that someone was stronger than me, and thus I needed to change that.
Shakily, my body started to act on its own, getting up to my feet as I instinctually had a feeling that I could suddenly do so much more. It was as if I had gotten washed over with information, and knowledge about the potential that my body was holding. Potential I wasn't using.
A burning sensation was felt on my back as two huge, blue wings emerged, their scales glittering majestically under the sunlight. "What the..."
Before Brad could finish his sentence, I dashed forward, syncing it up with a huge push from my wings, making me reach the giant instantly. "Shit..."
*Don! Don! Don! Don!*
Numerous punches started to fly against the unprepared man, all concentrated right in his stomach, forcing him to bend over again. With his head now in reach, I took hold of it with both of my arms and enhanced my legs as much as possible.
*Bom!*
A huge jump, assisted yet again by a huge swing with my wings, sent me up in the sky, still carrying the giant. Seeing his face, I saw him pale as he understood my intentions, which I reciprocated with a sweet smile. "See you later. Hup!"
Now gathering mana in my arms, I felt them bulge as I mustered all the strength I had left. Every single fraction of strength that I had gathered celebrated the joyful event that was about to happen. And with that strength, I swung my body, keeping my right hand on his face as I threw him down to the ground.
*BOOOM!*
A huge cloud of dust emerged as the giant Brad greeted the dirt head first. At the same time, I slowly descended from the sky, my wings helping me control the fall, as I gracefully put my feet on the floor with a *tap*.
The whole arena was silent, with no one understanding what they had just witnessed. 'Guess they are as surprised as me with these wings...'
Knowing I made a breakthrough in the understanding of my Manual, I was still a bit speechless at what the skill looked like in this world. In the game, you would get two different buttons to press when you reached level 25 with the Dragoon Manual, a dash, and a powerful attack where your character would use its wings to increase the potency.
These had been combined, making me just able to [Dragonize] wings on my back which helped me primarily with movement. Sadly, I also inherently knew that I couldn't actually fly with them yet, at most they could be used to glide in the air or jump higher.
"The winner is Sophie Red!"
*WOAHHHH!*
Finally, Ms. Rose broke the silence, which was quickly followed by the cheers of the audience. Though it felt amazing to hear them scream in excitement, there was something much more urgent that I had to do.
*Gurgle...*
I had to find something to eat...