Rogue Villain-Chapter 207: Next Level
Ackster didn’t know how long it had taken since he had devoted his entire being to it, but he had finally reached a realm where he could fight Dala on equal grounds. The major breakthrough that led to it was the fact that Dala read his movements by reading his eyes. It was like she had an entire movie to see that telegraphed all of his movements.
As soon as he became aware of it, Ackster immediately noticed a difference. When he thought of what to do, even subconsciously, his eyes would point and draw a path through the air before he actually did it.
If he were about to block Dala’s trident with his arm before returning the favor with a low kick, his eyes would jump from her trident, to his side, where his arm would be, and then to Dala’s legs, where he was going to kick. All Dala had to do was look at his eyes to know what he was going to do several moves ahead.
It was a different matter entirely, being aware of his flaw and fixing it, but knowing what to fix made it a whole lot easier for Ackster to improve. It was different from before when he could only follow his instincts and base understanding of the Unimportant Whatever Arts to sharpen his moves and defense.
Learning not to telegraph all his moves in advance was the final push that got Ackster to the same level in terms of combat ability as Dala. He still lagged in technique, but he had superior physique, talent, and instincts, which were enough for him to fight against Dala on equal footing.
Their fights went from being decided in seconds to minutes and finally to lasting up to several hours. But there had still yet to be a fight that ended with Ackster as the victor. Dala wasn’t going to wait for that to change.
It was time to bring the fight to the next level.
Dala stopped holding up the dam that blocked her excitement from fully taking the reins and let her mana fill her body, giving it strength, speed, and renewed vigor to make up for the fact that they had been fighting basically non-stop for several days and weeks.
An overwhelming pressure flooded out of Dala’s body and filled the arena. It was enough to stunt Ackster for a moment. Only when he burst a drop of his mana to boost his body did Ackster break free from the pressure to continue the fight.
Ackster shot forth with explosive speed, far surpassing anything he had displayed so far and surpassing Dala’s expectations.
Ackster didn’t have as much mana as Dala since he had only trained it for just over half a year, while she had trained her mana since she was a child. Dala’s mana also belonged to the ruling family of Diaga island, the main island of the Central Isles of Matar, so it wasn’t lacking in quality.
But there was still a significant gap between her training method and Ackster’s training method, which wasn’t far from The Hero’s in terms of quality and potential, especially not in the hands of someone suitable and talented, such as Ackster.
So, even while using a fraction of the mana Dala used, Ackster had enough speed and power to close the distance between them in less than a second.
However, if speed had been enough to overwhelm Dala, Ackster would have won a long time ago.
The three prongs on Dala’s trident shone with a bright blue light for the time it takes a light bulb to break when hitting the floor before shooting out a streak of concentrated mana imbued with the power of lightning.
The lightning was even faster than Ackster, and he had no choice but to take it head-on despite having an idea it would come in advance. The speed in unleashing mana attacks with the trident surpassed Ackster’s guess, just like he had surpassed Dala’s expectations.
However, with his mana rushing through his body like a coursing river, Ackster had a natural defense against Dala’s lightning, and a scorch mark on his arm was all that remained as the light faded.
Ackster reached forward with that arm, aiming to grab Dala’s trident.
Wary of Ackster’s sudden and unexpected growth in speed, Dala was also wary of his strength. She moved her trident to the side and out of reach from Ackster’s hand, opening up a path to herself.
But the path wasn’t free of hurdles, as Ackster still had to avoid getting front-kicked in the torso before he could attempt a strike. And he did just that by bobbing to the side opposite Dala’s weapon so he would get more time before she swept it back and cut him in half.
Ackster threw out a punch from the waist when he was finally close enough.
Dala blocked it with her free hand. She quickly realized she had made a mistake when she could barely feel Ackster’s strike. It was a feint and a convincing one at that.
Before Dala could reposition her arm or dodge, Ackster relaunched his rocket-like punch and landed a solid blow to Dala’s ribs. He felt it crack but not break.
Still, Dala shrugged off the hit and damage as she dropped her weapon and brought her other fist straight at Ackster’s head with overwhelming force. Ackster, having dedicated himself to landing his punch, didn’t have time to retreat and caught Dala’s fist with his face.
If it had been before they started using mana, Ackster would have almost lost consciousness. At the least, he would have gotten dizzy from such a powerful blow directly to his cranium.
But now, his mana cushioned the blow and let the force spread to the rest of his body like the ripples on a pond after a stone breaks the water’s surface.
’This...?’ 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖
Ackster could feel that he was on the verge of realizing something. It was on the tip of his brain. He didn’t know what or why, but the blow and, more specifically, how he had reacted to it didn’t make sense.
However, before he could squeeze in even one more thought, Dala’s mana-powered fist shot up from below and straight into his chin, knocking him square out.
