Ivrea shook her whip violently once again and lashed out at August. The whip shot through the air as if it was a snake lunging at its prey and it reached August’s position in mid-air within an instant. However, August made dashing movements in the air and accurately evaded her attacks
When Gaius saw this, his eyes narrowed. He had his suspicions but August’s dodging movements just now confirmed his hypothesis. Just earlier when August fought against Arjen, he initially thought it was a coincidence but August dodged Arjen’s metallic hoop easily and was able to defeat him by finding flaws in the latter’s attack.
This time Ivrea’s whip attacks did not manage to land on August not because he was fast. In fact, August’s movements in the air did not leave any afterimages and everyone could see him. Instead, it was as if he was able to predict the opponent’s moves and hence he was able to react quickly.
’He is able to read opponent’s moves and find flaws in one’s attacks. But how is he able to do that?’ Gaius whispered in his heart.
If August was able to hear Gaius’ inner thoughts he would be surprised because Gaius was able to grasp almost accurately his true abilities. When it came to the conundrum of how he was able to avoid his opponents’ attacks, it was he was finally able to implement his battle style efficiently in battle.
Apart from having Rhea’s battle support interface which allowed him to aim his attacks accurately and anticipate his opponent’s moves, he was also able to activate Rhea’s ability to detect magic elements in the air- he called it the magic particle vision. Just like infrared and x-ray vision, this mode of vision allowed him to see the flow of magic elements and natural energies in the air which allowed him to predict the power and range, etc. of an opponent’s attack. Also, he was able to see the composition of an opponent’s sorcery and find out flaws in them.
However, a shortcoming of using the magic particle vision was that the amount of information that Rhea was able to provide him was dependent on his spirit power and seeing the flaws in first-rank sorcery would have a tremendous strain on his spirit. But he had no problem dealing with an intermediate sorcerer like Ivrea.
Also, although he could predict and react quickly to attacks, without his sorceries that improved his defence, mobility and attacks, he would not be able to do anything even if he saw an opponent’s attack coming.
"Dodging and evading my attacks. Is all that you are able to do?"
Ivrea began getting irritated when she realized that she was not getting anywhere with her attacks so she tried riling him up with her words. However August just stood in midair, his magic robes floating in the air and did not bother giving her a response.
Seeing that her words did not have any effect, she prepared another attack. This time her whips split into three and attacked August in all directions. August dodged that attack by moving out of range of the whip lashes and launched four wind blades in quick succession.
"Wind blades again? You know it is futile. Don’t make me laugh!" Ivrea snickered.
However, the wind blades curved in the air and sped swiftly towards her direction at different angles. Their trajectories were tricky and they left Ivrea with no immediate option other than blocking the attack with her whip. August showed his expert control over his wind blades as he made three of his wind blades hit a damaged portion of the whip and pushed it to the side while the last wind blade slipped through the gap created and struck her on the shoulder
AHH!
Ivrea let out a painful grunt as she held her shoulder that was grazed by August’s attack.
"What was it you said about my wind blades again?" August’s voice rang out in the surroundings.
"You!!" Ivrea’s face was as black as coal and she felt like squeezing his throat after he mocked her in front of everyone. Nevertheless, she realized that August was trying to use the same tactic she tried against him and she remained composed. She took out a small vial which had a light green liquid in it from her pouch and gulped it in one smooth action.
Immediately after taking this liquid, the wound on her shoulder began closing up and she no longer felt any pain. She had just drunk a healing vial that cost her a lot of healing stones. She did not have a lot left.
When August saw her take out a vial, he was able to recognize that it was a healing vial from his database. He did not take the opportunity to attack though as he relished such battles. They were a great avenue for gathering data about various kinds of sorceries, and battle styles and testing the might and applicability of certain sorceries and strategies in battle. Hence he normally preferred to drag the battle a bit to enhance his ’research’.
Whereas August saw the whole battle as his ’testing session’ Ivrea did not look relaxed in the least as she glared at August hatefully.
"You had your chance to attack me just now. Are you looking down on me or what?"
"I’d defeat you anyway no matter the number of healing vials you consume, so it doesn’t matter," he responded coolly.
"We’ll see who will defeat who!"
Seeing that her whip was badly damaged, Ivrea put it away and took out a leather talisman from her clothes and channelled her entire magic power inside of it making it shine in a bright yellow colour due to the talisman gathering lightning elemental energy within a five-meter radius.
Lightning Sorcery: Lightning Beam!!!
A large beam of lightning energy shot out from the talisman and was as straight as an arrow as it flashed the air towards August. It was too fast for even August to react in time as wind elemental energy formed a shield around him with rapidity.
Wind Sorcery: Wind Spiral Barrier!
The beam of lightning smashed against the shield as if it was a hammer hitting a nail and it pushed August backwards by several meters. Although August’s spiral barrier was able to deflect the beam away from him, portions of the barrier also received massive damage.
Rhea’s voice rang out in August’s head. "That attack just now was enough to destroy some parts of your spiral barrier. This means that that attack is about 30 degrees, equal to an attack from an elite-level sorcerer."
"Yeah, I know."
Ivrea laughed when she saw the result of her attack. She channelled her magic power into the talisman and cast the beam once more. Just before she could do that two azure flashes of light advanced towards her and she halted her attack and focused on defence by casting her lightning coil sorcery.
However August was not planning to let her get another opportunity as he used his float sorcery to glide through the air towards Ivrea and he stretched forth his left hand. The wind elemental energy gathered around him to form a giant claw that was made out of wind element and it created a large shadow on the ground due to its size.
After months of reverse engineering the sorcery belonging to Black Hands-the Black Encompassing Claw, he was able to put his own spin on it and with Rhea’s assistance, he managed to use the Black Encompassing Claw Sorcery to create a new spell of his own after months of research and optimization.
Wind Sorcery: Wind Talon Descent!!
The massive ’talon’, made purely out of wind elemental energy smashed downwards towards Ivrea who shot out another lightning beam as well. However, the tables turned this time around as the wind talon tore through the beam as if it was nothing and continued its momentum, unimpeded in any sort.
Ivrea’s eyes twitched in fear and her body shuddered incessantly as she had never felt closer to her death before than this moment. The talon had not yet landed on her but she coughed out a mouthful of blood as the solid ground beneath her began experiencing cracks due to the enormous wind pressure alone.
Earth Sorcery: Earth Dragon Palm!!
Suddenly, Gaius flashed beside Ivrea in an instant as his eyes began glowing red and both of his arms were covered in dragon scales. He slammed his right palm against the massive wind talon and held it up, causing a booming sound to echo in the surroundings. However, the wind talon seemed to have become heavier and pressed Gaius even harder as he struggled to hold it up with a single hand and started using both hands.
The ground below him cracked to form a small crater and his body sank downwards like a nail. After the wind talon disappeared, the onlookers who had earlier rushed away from the battle due to the fear of being caught in the crossfire now opened their mouths in astonishment as they saw the esteemed sorcerer Gaius covered in dust and his hands were covered with blood standing beside an unconscious female sorcerer lying on the ground. They all stared at the blond-haired sorcerer floating above Gaius with looks of reverence on their faces as they chanted loudly "Storm, Storm, Storm!!’