Here is the bonus chapter, for the bonus chapter on Monday, 800 Powerstones is the goal.
Whether this fic would continue or not would depend on the support I would get.)
The sun could be seen setting in the distance.
It looked truly beautiful.
Two figures stood at opposite ends of a forest.
"I am going to beat you this time," Leopold said, his one fist meeting his other palm.
"We will see about that," Akeru replied, tossing a rock into the sky.
Fuegoleon had already returned to his base, leaving just the two of them.
As the rock hit the ground, both rushed at each other, bursting fire and mana respectively.
A reddish-orange glow covered Leopold while a blue glow surrounded Akeru.
A kick clashed with another kick.
BANG
Neither side gave ground, and they broke the kick deadlock with punches.
BANG BANG BANG
Each clash of body parts created a loud sound reverberating throughout the training field.
'I need to be only slightly above his level, as that's the optimal level to grow. I've seen Captain Yami do the same for me, ensuring I feel challenged throughout the entire fight.'
Akeru began observing Leopold closely, checking his limits before gradually increasing his abilities.
It truly tested his Ki and in-battle capabilities with this move.
'I'm surprised he could improve this much over a month. Then again, just having good control over his mana would help him improve his large reserves, so fast growth is kind of obvious.'
After multiple punches, Akeru used a mana burst from his elbow to increase the strength of his punches.
This was similar to Moonwalk but could be applied to any body part instead of just the feet.
'Ouch,' Leopold cursed while trying to infuse more mana into his fist.
But that obviously failed as he was already fighting at his peak from the beginning.
Leopold attempted to do the same, using fire bursts from his elbow to increase his punch strength.
It worked, and he was now able to match Akeru and even overpower his punches.
However, in the next instant, the strength of Akeru's punches increased even more, returning the situation to its previous state.
'Heh, I'm not even going at my maximum. I guess that mana compressing training had increased my limits even more,' Akeru thought while releasing a water ball that clashed with Leopold's fireball.
Steam rose between them, but neither backed off, protected by their mana skin.
'Crimson Laser' Nearly a dozen fire beams shot from Leopold's back towards Akeru point blank.
'Seraph's Shell' Akeru stomped on the ground as a water dome covered him instantly and withstood those lasers.
Fire clashed with water, creating a massive amount of steam that affected visibility.
'Damn it, I won't be able to sense him in the mist with my sensory field alone. I need to not let him get away.'
Leopold continued his punches at Akeru, which were met with his water dome.
'This is hard, it doesn't even feel like water at all.' Leopold suddenly felt a mana fluctuation at his right side and ducked.
A water bullet passed through that spot in the next instant.
"You really are a good sensor," Akeru said, kicking at the now crouching Leopold, who quickly crossed his arms to protect himself.
He was sent flying backward like a rag doll.
To prevent Akeru from taking advantage, multiple fire beams materialized near him, shooting towards Akeru.
Akeru quickly performed Moonwalk to return inside his defensive water shell just as the lasers passed through his previous spot.
Multiple more lasers started bombarding Akeru's shell, this time from the side, ensuring Leopold could still see Akeru.
'Tch, I can't really leave this water shell for a large distance as my control would start dissipating. Maybe I should alter it so that it could be possible.' Akeru, now having a decent knowledge about mana, had confidence in implementing that.
He shelved the idea for the future.
Akeru's eyes widened as he felt a large amount of mana gathering in front of Leopold.
Besides the red lines aiming at him from the sides due to the lasers being shot, this one was a large blast directly aimed at him from the front.
"Dodge this," Leopold warned.
'Crimson Cannon' In the next instant, a large amount of condensed fire blitzed at Akeru's defensive spell at very high speed like a bullet.
Akeru quickly moonwalked out of the shell while using his mana barrier to ignore the previous lasers.
A bullet met a wall.
BANGGGGGG
Mist covered the entire training ground.
'Tch, I went out of my shell for nothing, it still is standing.' Akeru was not that far away from his shell, so he could feel it remained unbroken.
He used the mist as cover and sneaked up to attack Leopold.
"I win," he said.
Leopold surrendered.
"Yeah, I am tired. That spell took one-third of my mana," Leopold admitted.
Akeru really wanted to twitch his eyebrows at that declaration.
"Well, you have improved a lot in this past month. I would say you could be considered an intermediate magic knight now," Akeru said with a smile.
"Yeah, I can probably beat Solid now," Leopold said, fired up.
'Probably,' Akeru thought, saying nothing as he anticipated the trouble Leopold would cause.
He would just watch from the sidelines.
They talked a bit about the fight before going their own ways.
***
For two months, Akeru worked on his mana method and increased the speed of casting mana words, making them usable in battle.
After this, he started external mana control exercises, creating complex shapes and increasing their distance from himself.
This soon helped him gain some control over natural mana even without mana words.
Soon, six more months passed.
A sphere of mana could be seen outside Akeru, its size similar to Seraph's Shell.
However, unlike the latter, within this zone, all mana within that radius was under his control.
'Mana Zone, I have finally reached this level. Now that mana is not the problem, I could increase its size with not much difficulty, but it would be hard to have control over all of it. That's the only limiter stopping me from increasing its size,' Akeru thought.
For the next four months, he worked on his water spells, making them more advanced and trying to incorporate them into his mana zone.
In a blink of an eye, a year passed.
Akeru was having a meal with the siblings.
"Fuegoleon-san, I want to challenge you to a battle," Akeru suddenly said.
This caught the other two off-guard, as challenges were generally given by Leopold every once in a while.
In the last year, he had dueled with Leopold four times, and each time Leopold learned a new trick.
According to Akeru, his strength would be around the second to third class of Intermediate Magic Knight.
He could have easily fought Akeru of the previous year to a standstill.
However, unlike Leopold, whose stage progression had slowed down, Akeru's had only increased tremendously.
'I might be able to win,' Akeru had a ridiculous thought.
"Interesting. I do seem to see that you have grown tremendously in the last year, so I am excited to battle you. How about after the meal?" Fuegoleon responded.
"Sure," Akeru agreed.
With that, they talked about more things before going to the training ground.
Unlike previous times in the forest, this time they went underground.
"Woah, I did hear you mention this place before, but seeing it in action is a whole new thing," Akeru said while looking around the area.
He could see numerous runes and arrays present.
'I wonder how many people worked to create this, and at what level they were,' Akeru wondered.
He hadn't worked much on his skills regarding runes and arrays in the past year, other than during the first two months when working on his mana method.
They arrived at an open floor with lines representing the battle area.
When both of them entered the area, a barrier lit up, separating them from Leopold who stood outside.
"How strong is this barrier?" Akeru asked.
"It would take me around five to ten minutes of continuous barrage at one point to break it," Fuegoleon replied.
Akeru was shocked, but it did make sense to have their battle in such a protected area.
***
A/n- If you want the next chapter quickly, then let's aim for 529 Powerstones, otherwise, it will be dropped at the usual time tomorrow.
Next Chapter - 32. Clash of Mana Zones
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