Sidhali had taught her what she could in the course of a week. More than the Steward had managed to. Althea didn't blame Steward Ven, he was a Steward, not a teacher. Sidhali was one. And a good teacher knew their students' weaknesses, even if the student didn't.

Althea's number one weakness, apparently, was numbers.

'The way you attack might look like it will deal well with numbers at first glance, but it really won't. A bunch of Novices will be slow enough to be caught in one attack. A Master will dodge you till you reveal a weakness. A bunch of Masters will overwhelm you and then have their subordinates kill you. Take the weaker ones out first.’

As expected, the Masters rushed at her. Three of them, weaker than her in terms of mana, but they might have used battle manuals. Althea was afraid of that. If they had useful manuals, she was toast. Thankfully, this was the south of the Southern Continent, where battle manuals were about as common as in the Northern continent.

Swiping a burst of fire at one of the Masters, she headed for the nearby Journeyman. A part of her felt bad killing someone that could be innocent. There was no way for her to know who had done what. Sidhali had assured her that every single one of them deserved death, but she wasn't sure.

There was no place for hesitation, though. Showing mercy was the right of the powerful, and she wasn't powerful enough to have it. Not here.

The Journeyman died, letting her rush down the mountain towards the weaker people. There were no children here, and the weakest of them were at the later stages of Apprentice, but they still died easily. Of course, exploding them would be a waste of mana, so she sent a wavy line of fire to do it.

A master swiped at her with his human sized sword, the sword surprisingly fast for its size. Althea dodged, quickly escaping instead of fighting him, concentrating on what she had to do. Sidhali had been right. Three at once was a bit much. The other master struck with daggers, striking where she had been just moments before.

The great sword kept swiping, pushing her back and into the air. Althea didn't know what the third Master was doing. And she didn't have time to check it out. Thankfully, she was faster than them, allowing her to keep a lead, but she wasn't fast enough for that lead to be sure.

The Masters continued pushing her, the great sword forcing her in the direction of the daggers. The attacks were simple, characteristic of martial artist attacks that didn't involve battle manuals. But they were still powerful.

Althea dove, jumping downwards as she sent a torrent of fire towards the gathering weaker people. The third Master's mana flashed in the background, but she still didn't have time to deal with it.

Swerving to the right, she dodged the great sword that was falling towards her. The daggers were in her way, and she saw no way out. But she could burn some out of the way. Fire did burn hot.

The daggers did not burn, not quickly enough. The edge turned dull and blackened enough that they clicked off harmlessly against her dress, but she couldn't burn them. Althea grunted, angry that her speed had been reduced thanks to the attack of daggers. Swerving upwards, she sent a decoy attack of flame, before causing an earthquake below.

Althea estimated that about two thirds of the bandits were dead. But the fight in the sky was getting harder. Perhaps she should take this down towards the ground? Gathering fire around her, she swerved downward, dodging a particular sword that was somehow swiping upward. Did he have more than one of those bloody things?

A bunch of screams filled the air as she reached the base of the mountain, turning towards the peak. The base was, of course, in the middle of the path. At least ninety percent of the bandits would be dead after she finished this one.

Fire burned around her, reducing her visibility to nearly zero as she went forward on just mana sense. A bunch of daggers shot towards her, only a third reaching her. Wait, were some daggers stronger than others?

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The next batch of daggers all reached her, though none pierced her dress. The few that were headed for her face she dodged. The mountain was surprisingly high, taking her at least a minute to traverse at this speed.

At least the human sized sword could not reach her through the fire. That guy had tried a few times, but he had not been able to get to her. The fire was bad for visibility for both of them. The dagger guy might be able to target her with area of effect attacks, but the great sword couldn't. After a few tries, he gave up.

The mountain peak roared past her as she felt earth disappear from around her. The fire dispersed as she quickly tore back down, dodging a number of attacks right into the path of a waiting trap.

Althea tried to dodge, but found herself strangely locked into place. The third master stood in front of her, a determined expression on his face. Space magic? What the fuck was a person with rare magic like that doing here. Why were there so many people with that magic hanging around anyways? Wasn’t it supposed to be so rare that there were only a dozen in each Empire? Why was she dealing with them every few weeks?

Calling on her core magic, she let a bunch of it out on him. The only way she got through this was if he was burnt away before she was pierced by the edge of his sword. Or at least his weapons’ edge got burnt away.

The dress still offered protection, after all. A blunt sword wouldn’t kill her. The earth cocooned her as she enhanced her defenses in case the attack failed, finding it difficult to maintain it while the daggers continued chipping away at it.

A second later, she had clashed with the assassin. The man flew off with a yelp, clearly not dead, but perhaps injured. Althea covered him in flames, forcing him to shoot away faster as he tried to escape the third degree burns she was giving him. But she couldn't keep up the attack for long. Swerving to the right, she came face first with a great sword as another narrowly missed her back.

Dodging it again, she felt it impact her arm. The dress screeched as it struggled to hold against the sword. A flash of pain rang through her as she felt her shoulder dislocate, but she was otherwise fine.

The pain continued to distract her as she dodged into the air, sending fire to kill her enemies. The great sword. The great word guy had to die, she could not take another hit from that.

Looking around, she prepared to strike back, thankful that at least the third one was an assassin, and injured. If he had been a brute or some other type that could fight in the open, then she would be dead. The great sword guy was easy to find, but harder to target.

Whenever she made a move towards him, the dagger guy would move to cover, forcing her to reassess and dodge his attacks instead. The fight had turned into a fight of attrition. At least that was something she had confidence in winning.

If someone else did not interfere.

The chances of that happening were close to zero. Althea was already sensing other Masters in the vicinity observing them, perhaps preparing to take advantage once they were sufficiently weakened. No, she had to end this before she got any more injured.

What she needed was an area of effect attack that didn't blind her too. Perhaps something that slowed her opponents down and let her have a better handle on the battle. Fire and Earth were both terrible at that. But perhaps there was something that was less terrible.

Water. And air, but water had more force to it.

Calling on the water in the air, she swiped it out quite like fire, targeting their faces. The boiling hot water rushed towards her enemies quickly, pushing them back and luckily exposing one assassin that was about to make a move on her.

Althea sent a blast of core fire towards him as quickly as she could, the fire hitting him in the chest before she had to shift her focus. The great sword was swiping towards her again. Calling on water again, she sent only a single stream towards the great sword user, which had the dagger user shoot more daggers at her.

Falling backwards, she dodged the daggers as she let a huge amount of fire explode out of her, heading in the forward direction with a diameter as big as herself. The fire traveled quickly, at speeds faster than her own, catching the swordsman before he could escape it.

Althea had it turn a little to catch the entirety of him, while the daggers made trouble for her. As usual, she couldn't pay any more attention to what was going on. There were other matters she had to focus on. Like the remaining master.

The daggers had noticeably reduced in number over the battle, but they were still coming in strong. Althea used the same attack as before, sending a bunch of fire towards him. This time, no one interrupted her concentration, forcing her to dodge and give up her attack. The dagger user died.

A bunch of ashes floated in the sky as she deliberately stopped herself from breathing heavily. This was not the time to sigh in relief. The number of presences around her had grown in number, some even encroaching on the mountain. Althea let out a burst of fire, spreading it across the mountain as she stood there, gathering more mana.

Mana fluctuated in her surroundings, others trying to get a hold of it as she fought them off. The silent struggle continued for a few seconds as others attempted to judge just how tired she was. A few minutes later, they seemed to have been satisfied that she wasn't, in fact, weekend enough to take advantage of.

Althea herself couldn't say if she could take another fight like that. In theory, she still had a good bit of mana remaining. In practice, she was also tired, and hadn't worked out this much since she had fought Feng. Even that might have involved less total flying. That might have more dodges, but the distances were a bit larger for this one.

Floating down as quickly as before, she did not slow down in case someone thought of it as a sign of weakness. The ground was there before her. The Earth separated slowly as she observed it.

Observing mana resistant soil was an opportunity of its own. The soil wasn't that different as far as she could notice, but it seemed to throw any attempt to use mana on it off. If it had been someone weaker, it might even have succeeded.

Perhaps that was why the bandits had such a large group. The bandit Masters did not have Earth affinity, or her mana, meaning they would have had to manually dig it out. Thankfully, that did mean that the treasure was close to the surface.

After spending about ten minutes splitting the ground, she took the entire thing into her space ring and sped off. Before anyone changed their mind and decided to target her. The forests sped out below her as she finally let out a sigh of relief. That was one thing done.

Now to continue her journey north. For some reason, she doubted it would be easy. The earlier she figured out how to make her attacks stronger, the better.