283 Chapter 283: After Action Analysis (1/2)
”Huff…huff…”
Lilith panted as she hung limply, suspended in the air by countless vines. Around her, flowers bloomed as they drank her mana, blossoming in a myriad of colors that turned the coliseum into a temporary garden.
”That technique…doesn't that belong to the Stuart clan? I'm pretty sure Uncle Shun Yin never learned anything like that!”
”Perhaps.” I shrugged nonchalantly. ”I learned this from neither Dad nor the Stuart clan. I learned it on my own.”
”How?!” Lilith glared at the chibi Green Dragon that had curled up on my shoulder, trying not to splutter. She probably could have summoned Kagutsuchi by now, except that I had drained her of all of her mana, and she didn't have the energy to pull off such a powerful summoning spell.
Around the both of us, the others were also finishing the last of their battles. Sheila was down, having been taken down by Kassim, but Victor had turned out to be not the victor because Craig had impaled him in the chest. After that, he had charged the worn down Kassim, and the two of them were locked in a bloody stalemate.
Theodore was on his knees, looking as if he had passed out, but Brutus had been battered and badly bruised despite his narrow victory. Nothing Harrison couldn't take care of, for Riley had already been taken out. At the cost of severe injuries, but Harrison still had enough left in his tank to deliver the knockout blow to an exhausted and unsuspecting Brutus.
That left me and Lilith, but I had already clearly defeated her. Loosening my vines, I then sent a storm of flower petals at Kassim, catching him by surprise and almost cutting him apart. He crashed onto the ground, a pool of blood spreading under his body.
”Hey!” Craig growled, even as blood streamed down his face. ”I almost had him!”
”Yeah, I know,” I replied wearily. ”Sorry.”
Craig shook his head, but he flopped down in exhaustion, and thankfully didn't pursue the matter. While he did so, I turned toward Harrison, but he was done earlier than I was. With Kassim down, all of Hell Beasts team's members were down, while Jing Tian Academy's team was down to three. Two, if we counted the slack Craig as out as well.
”Jing Tian won?!”
”Holy f…! How?!”
”The Hellfire Bear Goddess has fallen!?”
”Isn't this the second time she lost to that constellation summoner guy?”
Oh. So now I was known as the ”constellation summoner guy.” What the hell was with that weird nickname? At least it was better than Stargazer Summoner or Rising Star Richard or some bullshit nickname like that.
After absorbing so much of Lilith's mana, I was bursting with energy and thus I ended up feeling restless and overly energetic. Striking a contrast to my clearly drained and unconscious teammates, I did the best I could to help them get off the stage the moment the medics arrived. Fortunately, Pearl was a healer and she began casting her recovery spells right away.
”You…” Harrison was shaking his head as he stepped right up beside me. He ended up just patting me on the shoulder. ”Good job back there.”
”You too. Great work!”
While we got off the stage so that other teams and students could have their practice matches, I spotted Lilith approaching me. She waved a little frantically, but her movements had clearly been dulled by me sucking all her mana earlier.
”Richard.” She stopped beside me, trying to suppress her frustration. ”The way you evaded my attacks during the match was really impressive.”
”…but I didn't evade your attacks?” I glared at her, wondering if she was trying to rip off Laura Potter (or was it Lola Porter?) from Battle Frenzy. ”I took them head-on and overwhelmed them with strikes of my own.”
”Ha ha, you certainly did. I never expected you to have such good swordsmanship. I assume you'd have neglected them in favor for summoning magic.”
”I actually did, for a very long time. But don't forget who my dad is.” I had resisted using swordsmanship for a long time, which ended up in my ninety-nine match losing streak. In the end, in trying to reverse that losing streak, I returned to my dad's dojo, stopped being stubborn and focusing too much on summoning alone, and ended up combining summoning magic with swordsmanship. That was what led to my current hybridized skillset today.
Okay, yeah, I was stupid. Or you could just treat the whole premise of this story as ripping off Wang Zhong from Battle Frenzy, all right? Don't need to think too much about logic or intelligence or whatever, and just enjoy the ride. A little too late to be complaining about the beginning of the story almost three hundred chapters later, don't you think? I was just trying to do a Battle Frenzy reference, but most readers didn't get it and instead focused on complaining about how stupid, retarded or illogical I was. Maybe I should have turned this into a Battle Frenzy fanfiction or something.
”That's right.” Lilith nodded, and then she scowled. ”But what you used to defeat me wasn't a Miyamoto sword technique. It was a Stuart clan sword technique.”
”I told you, I learned that on my own. It's not as if the Stuart clan is the only one who learned how to use wood magic.” I sighed heavily. ”Or are you going to accuse Dong Fang Yue Chu and every fire mage in the Federation of copying and learning from the Porter family?”
”No…you're right. Sorry.” Lilith's head drooped for a moment and she sighed. After a moment of contemplation, she glanced back at the scorched stage, particularly at the blackened craters that our exchange had left in the ground. She then turned back to me seriously. ”But the way you beat my ultimate move…it was so disheartening. I understand that even ultimate moves have weaknesses, and they can be easily countered once your opponent is familiar with them.”
”What ultimate move?! Your Hellfire Bear isn't your ultimate move! That's your Kagutsuchi! The only reason why I won was I stopped you from summoning Kagustuchi. The moment you pull out your ultimate Soul Beast, there is very little I can do to defeat you. Even my most powerful Constellation spirit will be hard-pressed to fight against something of Kagutsuchi's caliber.”
I doubted any of my Celestial Guardians could stand up to the sheer firepower of Kagutsuchi. Even Draco, my strongest Constellation spirit, probably would have trouble rivaling that monster. There was a reason why it was named after the Japanese kami of fire.