As he came to a realization of what he needed to do, Torus rapidly came up with a plan, his gaze sharpening into a pinprick.
Focusing his attention completely on his Master, Torus gazed directly at her eyes. Even as his figure began to flash forward, swaying in an erratic pattern, Torus' gaze stayed locked onto Sofia's own.
With his focus so intently concentrated on her gaze, it was no surprise that Torus caught it - the moment her gaze seemed to sharpen, honing in on a specific location.
At that exact moment, Torus' eyes shot wide open, his gaze following her own and calculating the trajectory where she was looking, his figure swaying once more like that of a swallow.
Instead of moving in the direction he originally planned to head however, Torus' figure instead came to a complete stop before then heading in the opposite direction.
At the same time as his figure rapidly shifted, another 'Poof!' sound rang out, a hole appearing in the ground once more.
However, this time, there was one major difference between this attack and all the previous other ones, the hole was actually in a completely different location than where Torus's figure currently resided, instead being where he had originally planned to move to.
As he witnessed this, Torus could barely suppress the smirk of victory that threatened to grow on his face. Instead, a serious look maintained on his hardened visage, not allowing the slight victory to overwhelm his current emotions and distract him, 'While I've managed to dodge Master's attack this one time, that was only with me fully concentrating on her.
This battle has already shown me a number of my own weaknesses, such as the fact that she can predict my movements and send out attacks at locations she predicts me to land in accurately, showing to me that even through my erratic movements, I must be subconsciously following some type of pattern that others can spot,' Torus thought deeply, his concentration unwavering, his love for learning and improving shining through in his thoughts even in the midst of battle.
Even with all this thinking, Torus refused to allow himself to come to a stand-still, his figure still rapidly flashing in an erratic dance of concentrated motion as he slowly made his way forward.
Almost every second, a spurt of dirt would rise into the air signifying Sofia had sent out one of her air blades, only for it to miss its mark as Torus predicted their trajectory, rapidly shifting his figure to dodge the attack.
However, if one were to pay close attention to the battle, they would actually notice something rather strange - something that would cause their eyes to widen in utter shock.
Torus' figure, which had once needed to consciously adjust his trajectory to avoid Sofia's intended attack, began to do so subconsciously, his figure becoming even more erratic in its movements.
Being on the receiving end of this, the amount of shock Sofia was suffering from could only be imagined, 'To think he can grow so fast in the midst of a battle! This must be some ungodly combination of his own natural talent and his Aspect,' Sofia mused, her mind undergoing a sudden wave of astoundment at this unexpected development.
Little did she know, this development was far from something subconsciously done by Torus, but rather something he purposely put in the effort to accomplish.
After realizing that Sofia was attacking him based on the pattern of his movements, Torus began to analyze her gaze, calculating the positions she was looking at before then adjusting his movement to not incorporate these patterns into his future movements.
However, this would still lead to some new pattern appearing, so he began to incorporate an entirely new aspect to his movement - randomization.
Rather than following erratic patterns in his movement, Torus instead incorporated the patterns he noticed were the most confusing to his Master into his movements, switching between them randomly so as to not follow a set path.
Torus would wait until the last possible moment before then switching his patterns, allowing for Sofia to have the smallest time-frame possible to attempt predicting his movements.
However, accomplishing a feat such as this in such a short time-frame would take someone's mind computing at a speed far faster than anything Torus could hope to accomplish in his current state.
This was where his Aspect came in, it somehow seemed to nudge him in the right direction, as if pushing him toward the correct answer rather than providing it for him directly.
And the longer that this went on, the less help he actually needed from his Aspect to accomplish this and the more natural and subconscious it became.
This was in no way the first time his Aspect had done something like this; in fact, this had occurred so many times that Torus was beginning to grow accustomed to it, almost anticipating the sudden moments of growth he would undergo while in combat facilitated by his Aspect.
This was also the one point of his Aspect that Torus could never fully comprehend, if his Aspect was supposed to be Beast, then why would it give these little nudges in tasks that had nothing to do with a beast?
Shaking off these random thoughts, Torus once more focused his attention on the battlefield, and as he did so, he noticed that he was now approaching the five-meter mark from his Master.
As he noticed this, Torus' eyes suddenly gained an even deeper glint to them as he realized the danger he was about to be put in.
This danger stemmed from the simple fact that these air blades his Master released still seemed to follow a trajectory and had a set speed even if they were invisible, meaning the closer he got to her, the faster his Master's blades would reach him.
As such, Torus began to put his full attention into dodging the seemingly instantaneous strikes, his body now needing to contort into inhuman positions to dodge the seemingly random attacks, as if he were performing some deadly dance.
However, it was also around this point that a crafty light seemed to flash in Torus' eyes, a small silvery glint seeming to be reflected on his arms as his body contorted backward into the shape of a bow, sending his sleeves into the air and revealing the base of his arms.
As this silvery glint was shown, Sofia's eyes seemed to naturally hone in on the bright color, something that was a bit odd in the blur of combat they were currently engaged in.
Squinting her eyes in an attempt to recognize what exactly these silver-colored objects were, Sofia's eyes widened in panic as her figure rapidly shot backwards.
However, before she could even manage to move a distance more than three meters backwards, Sofia's figure seemed to snag against something, her momentum suddenly shifting and causing her upper half to slam backwards into something.
At the same time this occurred, a metallic *Clang! rang out, and the object that had stopped Sofia's momentum was revealed.
This object was also what Torus had been forging all last night, as well as the object Sophia had noticed on his arms right before her attempt to flee, and it revealed itself to be none other than a pair of chains that appeared around ten-meters in length, with the majority being wrapped around Torus' arm.
Before Sofia could attempt any other form of escape, she suddenly felt her momentum being reversed as she was now pulled back toward Torus, the said young man having just grabbed onto the pair of chains constraining her with his two large arms, his muscles visibly bulging as his veins began to pulse on the surface of them.
As she stared at Torus' figure, she could see the way his muscles bulged under the strain of pulling on his chains. So much effort was going into his grip, that a vein could be seen protruding on his forehead, his teeth gritted as he exerted all the force he could muster to pull her toward him.
While this may seem unusual, it would come as no surprise if one was to understand just what these chains Torus was using are.
Not only are the chains themselves incredibly large, with each link among them being around 12 inches wide, but they also weighed a shit-ton as they were made of Agar, a low-grade energy conductive material that was a step above regular metal.
In fact, most would consider it a miracle to even be able to hold the things up, let alone whip them around like Torus was doing.
That was why, even with his considerable strength, Torus found it nearly impossible to wield these chains effectively. However, Torus considered this a mere setback, something to be rectified with his growing strength
Careening forward at the sharp tug Torus had given the chains, Sofia felt her eyes widen as she witnessed the sight of the now grinning Torus rapidly approaching her airborne figure, one of his hands letting go of the chain that still wrapped around the majority of his forearm as it slowly cocked back into a fist at his waist.
At the sight of this, Sofia's own face morphed into a look of shocked panic. With the speed she was being dragged backwards at however, Sofia had little time to do more than tighten up her core in preparation for what she knew was coming next.
As soon as her figure reached around one-and-a-half meters from him, Torus' fist that had been previously calmly resting at his side in silent anticipation moved, its pace blurring as he sent out a devastating punch with the tightening of his core and shifting of his waist. And by the time it had reached its peak momentum, Sofia had been flung directly into its trajectory.
….
"Puah!" Sofia let out a gasp as spittle flew from her lips, the air being driven out of her lungs as Torus' fist directly impacted her stomach. With eyes bugging to the size of saucers, Sofia's airborne figure rested against Torus' fist for a moment in silent agony before he retracted his extended fist, letting her fall onto the forest floor below.
This left Sofia time to take a second to desperately gulp in a couple deep breaths of air, involuntary tears appearing in the corner of her eyes as she recovered from the sudden impact.
Instantly, Torus was concerned over her current state, leaning down to comfort her currently bent-over form.
Slowly drawing circles on her back in a gesture of comfort, Torus asked in a concerned tone, "Are you okay?" his tone carrying genuine empathy, the bet between the two being temporarily forgotten over the more pressing matter.
Still, even while feeling guilt and concern for his Master, Torus couldn't help but to feel an overwhelming sense of pride at what he had managed to accomplish after spending one month training his Aspect by himself - at the progress he had managed to make.
Even knowing she was most definitely taking it easy on him didn't diminish his pride; only managing to make his determination to grow even stronger more evident.
Eventually, Sofia managed to regain her bearings, her breathing coming out in more steady exhalations as the unshed tears disappeared from her eyes, replaced only by a slight reddening due to the situation that added an unexpected charm to her appearance.
As soon as she recovered, Sofia once more stood to her full height, turning around and giving Torus a genuine smile, one that seemed to convey the happiness she felt for her disciple's success.
For a moment, she seemed to hesitate, as if unsure of her next actions, before her features hardened into a teasing smirk, seeming to have finally made up her mind, "It seems you won the bet, now what type of reward do you want from me?" Sofia said, sending a teasing look toward Torus as a saucy spread across her lips.
As he listened to these words, Torus could feel a sudden wave of desire overtake him, the feeling so strong that it left his eyes reddened to a much deeper color than his Master's had as he took a couple of heavy steps forward, suddenly enveloping his Master's much smaller frame.