"Attack." The young girl commanded.
Right away, five students jumped right at Asher with the girl following right behind. As for Guan and the other three students from the girl's original team, they stood in attacking positions and prepared to cast their spells.
"Don't go easy on him." The girl added following which the five students in front pulled out their weapons.
One should recall that there were no major rules in the test excluding infighting, outside aid and murder, hence, even the use of external equipment was allowed. This was understandable as the location of the exercise was the Manchurian forest, one of the most deadliest zones in the Great Dawn kingdom. Sending a bunch of children, albeit first-second stage Guardians, in without any support was incredibly risky. The best the academy could do to minimise this risk was to permit the students to carry weapons familiar to them. Apart from weapons, potions, artifacts and talismans were also allowed albeit with a certain limit.
Asher stood still as he waited for his attackers to arrive. To an onlooker, it would seem as if he was stunned by their actions as most didn't use their weapons on fellow students but monsters instead. Truthfully, it looked the same to some of the students charging at him, but the truth was otherwise. Asher wasn't stunned by their actions; he was simply stuck in his thoughts whilst assessing them.
'Should I finish this immediately or should I use this opportunity to get a feel of their strength?' Asher thought as the group approached him.
'Hmm. There's no hurry. I might as well just see what they've got.'
"I'll let you guys make the first move." Asher announced just as the first attacker got within two metres of him.
'What the hell?' The student who was about to clash with Asher raised an eyebrow at this but didn't have much time to think anymore.
"Ha!"
The attacker swung his sword at Asher almost as if he wanted to take his life.
Asher frowned at this as he knew that the academy's rules prohibited murder in this exercise yet his opponent attacked with a hint of killing intent unabated.
"Too slow."
Asher stepped to the side and easily retreated from the range of the attack. Nonetheless, he wasn't facing only one attacker upfront, but six.
The second, third, and fourth attacks followed right after. Almost at the same time, the three attackers made their attempts from three different angles in such a fashion that they sealed off any obvious angle of retreat Asher could have utilised.Even so, they had underestimated his skill despite the overestimation they had in mind. Over three million years of battle experience enabled Asher to see through their attacks with ease and dodge it in kind.
'!!!'
Just after he did so, Asher's senses alerted him of danger for the first time. He could sense a threat creeping up from behind him.
Blue mana coated Asher's palm turning it deep blue while encasing it in ice, just as he abruptly turned around and struck in the direction of the threat.
Clang.
The frozen palm clashed with a fencing sabre ending out a reverberating sound.
Crack.
A crack formed almost immediately on Asher's frozen palm right after the collision making him raise an eyebrow.
One should know that the ice on his palm was made with the spell 'Frostbite', which was the exact same spell that had frozen Guan's right arm. Although this wasn't a high level spell, from the fact that Guan had yet to crack through the ice, one would realise that this wasn't an easy spell to deal with. Despite that, the ambusher had managed to crack through it. Also, the force required to do such was not little and would most definitely have taken his life if it had connected.
If the previous attacks were said to have contained a tiny hint of killing intent, then the attack Asher had just blocked was coated completely in it.
"What do you think you're doing?" Asher stared at the young girl and questioned.
"Taking you down." The girl smirked.
Asher realised that he seemed to have underestimated her. Not only was she the leader of this alliance, but she was one to utilise any means at her disposal no matter how despicable they were. This could easily be seen from the fact that she hid her attack in the midst of the other trio and had attacked with enough force to dispatch Asher's life.
"Hmm?" Asher's senses tingled once more as he felt his balance tilt off course.
Taking a look at the floor beneath him, Asher noticed that at some point in time, it had turned into quicksand and got him stuck at the spot.
"Heh." The girl smiled before extracting herself from the stalemate with Asher.
Before he could think much about this, Asher picked up mana undulations in the air which meant that a spell/spells was targeted at him; the four students at the back line had finally made their move.
"Your loss."
Guan, who was the one to cast the quicksand spell and get Asher trapped in place laughed nefariously.
Boom.
All spells -more than three- exploded at the target area which was exactly where Asher stood. Dust and smoke rose from the scene covering the area from the vision of the others, but this didn't stop Guan from grinning in victory.
"Hehe. What a cocky bastard?"
"Asher!"
Melissa who was held down by two students yelled.
This action of hers attracted the attention of James, Noah and Luna towards Asher's battle scene.
Seeing the rising dust and smoke, grinning Guan along with the other students wielding weapons on standby, as well as Asher's absence, made them worried.
"What did you do? Where's Asher?" Noah roared as he shoved his opponent away.
"Probably dead. Oops." Guan laughed.
"Maybe if he were a bit stronger and didn't come off as some top level genius, we wouldn't have overestimated his capabilities and he might have survived. Haha."
Noah's face turned red in anger as he prepared to lunge at Guan and attack him, however, Owen cut him off.
"Stop."
Owen said.
"Look closer."