Chapter 20 - The Duel

As Winfred comes out Avery stands there in shock, looking up at Winfred and barely seeing the green and brown flowers that adorn Winfred's upper body.

Winfred looks down at Avery "looks like we are teaming up together to beat master"

"Great, I'll give you some time to get acquainted" Ave says as he walks back a bit

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"So how can we beat him? His power level I much greater than ours" Avery states

They share stats and blessings so they can formulate a plan.

"Your spirit vine blessing would work well, not many humans have a high soul stat."

"It would normally but me and master have the same soul stat. Plus he knows martial arts that allow him to block and deflect big physical hits. My blessing will still do a bit but I doubt it will be pivotal"

"Dang… how is his soul so high. I could set up a totem and we both could easily withstand his attacks."

"Hmmm and his strength is too strong for us to try and defend against him till he runs out of stamina"

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Ace walks over to them "looks like you two are getting on. You ready to fight?"

"Sure let's give this a shot" Avery says with Winfred nodding in agreement

Ace draws his sword and gives his newly armoured chest a bang with his fist. As this happens a dull glow of green light surrounds Ace as deep green fire beams along his shoulders and back like spikes on an animal.

"Bet you two didn't expect this special ability of the armour called the Secret Fire Spine ability, this is something I only discovered in the last few hours."

Secret Fire Spine Ability

Discription: the user can only use this ability once per week. The user once activated looses all defensive capabilities but all of their offensive Blessings and stats and speed stat get a two times boost. This ability lasts till the user takes a hit or two hours pass.

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The Aura instantly released from Ace as the fire takes a hold of Ace's body. The aura from Ace sends a shockwave through the area, cracking the stone under Ace and sending pure shivers down Avery's spine and giving him goosebumps.

Avery nervously sets up his Totem to boost Winfred's and his own defensive capabilities.

Winfred boosts Avery's Strength and Defence stat using his earth spirit blessing.

Winfred after setting up Avery's defence launches 4 giant Spirit Vines at Ace, gaining the Soul boost while these vines are active. The 4 giant vines fly towards Ace at a swift pace.

Ace jumps towards the vines and instantly slashes through all 4 vines leaving them in peices on the floor. With Ace's blinding speed leaving behind dust. He uses the blunt end of his sword and knocks Winfred over with a huge slam.

Avery gets worried and tries to run over to Winfred to ensure he is okay.

Ace immediately grabs Avery. "So your support blessings are pretty good but you have no training or equipment, let's get you ready for next time" Ace puts Avery down and uses heal pulse on both of them. "Rest up and meet me back at the house"

Ace walks off to his house in the village.

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Avery kneels there in shock, the hard leafy forest floor against his knees. "How where we meant to beat him? What was the purpose of the duel?"

Avery gets up and decides to grow stronger so he could prove Ace wrong.

He makes his way back to the base. Ace waiting for him.

"Good fight I can see why your power level is so high for a non combat person. Sorry if I made it difficult I just wanted to see what your thought process would be like in the face of absolute danger and death."

"Oh okay… I thought you would go easy or something tbh I was kinda shocked when you rapidly within seconds destroyed us"

"Yeah my bad, feel free to rest up we will be heading out in the next few days"

Avery takes this opportunity to explore the village and see what is in the area and get a feel for the surroundings.

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A few days later

Ace, Avery and Winfred get together and head out to explore the west area of the forest and find the West Forest Guardian to defeat.

They head off, after a few hours of walking Ace notice the monsters in the area keep fleeing, not knowing why he askes Winfred "hey Winfred do you know why all the nearby monsters are fleeing?"

"Not exactly but it's most likely because they can feel your destructive powerful aura and don't want to be targeted and killed by you"

Ace nods understanding that all the monsters on this floor are wimps.

They keep walking till they find a large clearing in which the area is filled with wind element. Ace feels this strange place and carefully enters.

BOOM!!! A huge gust of wind fills the area as Ace stands tall. A Wind Hawk swoops down from the sky.

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Wind Hawk

Blessings:

Wind breath

Power level 18

Class: element (wind)

Discription: the user produces massive amount of wind elements from their body. Making them half their weight but also enhancing all Wind element blessings by 2 power levels.

Wind blade

Power level 5 (+2)

Class: element (wind)

Description: the user forms a dense wind force in front of them and flings it towards an opponent in a slashing motion. This deals wind element damage and reduces the targets speed by 25 (not stackable)

Stats:

Level: 11

HP: 150

Defence: 75

Strength: 150

Soul: 25

Speed: 175

Stamina: 100

Power level: 38

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Winfred prepares himself to fight knowing he is weak to the wind element he needs to be on guard.

Avery sets up his Totem in the centre of the field.

"Oi… wait this will be beneficial to tame." Ace yells out.

Ace quickly pulls out a magic parchment with a contract circle on it and uses his aura to activate it. The circle surrounds the Hawk as a burst of light and energy appear from the Hawk and the circle.

"Ding… you have made a forced contract with a Wind Hawk. It's name is Melanie"

With that Ace heads back to the town to learn more about his new monster Melanie.