Hearing Raymond's cocky tone, Victor wanted to punch him in the face but decided to give him a dose of reality by sending him flying with his wind manipulation.
Clover family descendants mostly had an affinity with wind or elements derived from wind. Victor too had an affinity with wind and he could already form a tangible aura around him which could increase his control over the wind element.
But he thought that would be overkill against Raymond, so he pushed his palm forward and sent a blast of air towards Raymond. If a normal person was hit by this, they would be lifted off their feet and cause them to fall on their butt.
But Victor was surprised to see that his attack managed to accomplish nothing. A burst of wind hit Raymond's chest and did nothing to him.
"Come on, uncle. My clothes aren't wet, you don't need to blow air on it, next time send something sharper and stronger." Raymond yelled.
Victor's eyes twitched when he heard that. He circulated his mana and formed a sharp blade of wind and sent it towards Raymond.
"Quickly dodge it, if you can't take it." Victor warned.
Raymond casually tried to grab the wind blade with his bare hands but as soon as it touched his hand it dissipated into nothingness, only ruffling his robes.
Victor's jaw fell to the ground in astonishment when he saw his attack getting countered so easily. He sent a series of wind blades towards Raymond in quick succession.
Raymond dodged all except for the last one which he allowed to touch the end of his sleeve.
It managed to slice through the edge of the sleeve and dissipated when it touched his forearm.
"Hehe, next time when I want to cut weeds near my home, I will call you, uncle." Raymond shouted in a mocking voice.
Victor gnashed his teeth in anger and unleashed a torrent of wind blades at Raymond. Soon Raymond found himself surrounded by a net of sharp wind blades which would chop any mortal man into pieces.
Raymond jumped and performed a spinning kick in the mid air and blocked the wind blades using the air force generated by his kick.
'This brat, how strong is he to counter those blades with just a kick? I need to go all out, if I have to teach him a lesson.' Victor was panicking inside.
He unleashed his aura, manipulated his mana and started to form a miniature tornado which created a strong suction force enough to uproot the surrounding trees and chunks of ground which joined the tornado making it even more deadly, he started adding his sharpest wind blades into the tornado and kept pumping in his mana to increase the size of the tornado.
Raymond was soon in front of a gigantic 15 metres tornado made of sharp wind blades, trees and sharp rocks.
'Looks like this is uncle's strongest move, I need to end this quickly or else my clothes will be shredded.'
Thinking of saving his clothes, Raymond took a deep breath and held it in his lungs, he bent his knees and jumped high above the tornado.
He kicked the air pushing himself towards the centre of the tornado and clenched his fist and punched the ground as soon as he reached the middle of the tornado.
The force of that casual punch was so great that the ground instantly shook under its impact, spider web-like spread on the ground and reached the nearby mountains. Even the mountains vibrated due to the powerful impact force.
The shockwave caused by the punch was not only enough to disperse the tornado, it even sent Victor flying for a mile and he only stopped when he crashed into the nearby mountain.
Victor coughed up blood and slowly stood on his legs. His back was hurting like hell due to the collision with the mountain. He needed an intense massage from his servants to get well soon.
He felt someone tapping on his shoulders. He turned around to see Raymond standing there smiling like nothing happened.
"Damn Uncle, what was up with that tornado? Were you trying to kill your dear nephew?" Raymond asked, chuckling.
"Cough, cough, You! H-how strong are you? You aren't even sweating, there is not a scratch on your body?"
"Well, I am strong enough to protect myself against anything." Raymond said confidently.
Cough, cough.
"What kind of a body cultivation technique are you cultivating? How did you become so strong so quickly? You weren't this strong a year ago, now you can probably slap a Martial King to death." Victor asked in a daze.
"Hehe, sorry uncle. I can't tell you about my cultivation technique, it's a secret. It has something to do with fractured cores." Raymond casually concocted a lie.
After all, he needed a reason to explain his strength. Since there was no one alive with a broken core, no one would bother him to share his technique with them. He thought it would be perfect to use this excuse.
Victor looked at his nephew with doubtful eyes and didn't ask further. His nephew was allowed to keep his own secrets and even if he wanted to know he just couldn't beat up his nephew and get the answer, that would be asking for death. He would be dead before he knew what happened if his nephew went ballistic on him.
'Sigh~ If I had a broken core I could easily guilt-trip him into sharing his secrets. I can only blame myself for not having a broken core.'
Victor shook his head to get rid of such thoughts.
'What am I thinking? I should be happy for my nephew, if my brother was alive he would be so happy and proud. Yes, I should invite him for a drink to celebrate this occasion and show how proud I am of him.' Victor thought inwardly.
He put on a bright smile and patted Raymond on the shoulder.
"Of course, you can keep your secrets. Your father would be so happy if he was here, come let us toast a drink to celebrate your achievement." He quickly dragged Raymond with him back to the city.
They soon entered a famous tavern and ordered two cups of Crimson Dew Wine which was the most famous wine in the Empire.
"Only one cup, okay? We don't want you to go back to your drinking habits again now, do we?" Victor laughed and clinked his glass with Raymond's.
Raymond's lips twitched when he heard that, he didn't feel like explaining himself and sipped his wine in silence.
He saw that his uncle was hesitating to ask something.
"Uncle, if you want to know something just ask, no need to hold back with your nephew." Raymond said to his uncle.
"Sigh~ It's about the princess, I heard that she broke off the engagement with you, but don't worry, your uncle will find a prettier wife for you." Victor patted his chest and declared boldly.
"Haha, don't worry about that Uncle, I don't care about the engagement, I cannot force someone if they don't like me. Anyway I have Jasmine with me, she is much better than that princess." Raymond chuckled thinking about his airhead maid.
"Ohho, it seems that my nephew has finally manned up to make a move on Jasmine." Victor said laughing.
"What do you mean by 'finally'?" Raymond asked curiously.
"Hah, she has been lovestruck with you for many years now, almost everyone in the family knows except for you, how dense you can be to notice the obvious hints? " Victor chided his nephew.
"Hehe, I am not that dense." Raymond scratched his nose in embarrassment. He didn't have anything to do with his predecessor's stupidity.
"So, tell me, have you dual cultivated with her, it's popular nowadays, you should pick a technique from the library if you haven't done it yet." His uncle whispered in barely audible voice.
Raymond's eyes twitched when he saw his uncle acting like a gossiping aunty.
"I have already done it, uncle." He replied hurriedly stopping his uncle from asking further questions.
"You know, in our Empire's tradition, that makes you husband and wife." Victor whispered in a quieter tone.
Raymond did a spit-take when he heard that, splattering wine on the table.
"Eh? What? When did that happen?" He asked dumbfounded.