Grievous P.O.V

I looked down upon the courtyard, a habit I picked up back when I first joined the army. The only difference was that back then I was looking and trying to learn and now I’m inspecting how my own people advance and what help they need that I can get for them.

One of the first things I picked up in the army was that so long as you are a little picky, people who come from small villages to join the guard are the easiest to build loyalty with. Even now if my old sergeant was to ask me for something there are few things I would refuse.

My gaze was locked on to a sparring match for the last few moments. Just from a glance it would look highly miss matched but I knew better. Ever since the small skirmish expedition took place I had kept an ear out for the young kid and what else he could get done.

As the fight began a lot of the information I had was being both confirmed and missing. He was clearly very high level for his age, something that would serve him well as the sooner you start stacking that vitality the earlier the aging process is slowed.

His level however is the only thing that somewhat matches the information I have. I would place him somewhere in the low 30’s range for a balanced warrior build, maybe a bit focused on vitality. The information however classified him as a hybrid fighter, is he just building his magical stats through sheer practice and looking to keep progressing with free points for as long as he can? He would easily be at fifty across the board if that was the case yet I can’t feel any magic from him.

The fight draws to an end much closer than I would have thought, though his team did win his partner was taken out and he would be left with some massive injuries. I decided that was enough spectating and I should take a look for myself at what he can do and jump down.

“You’ve grown quite a lot from the runt who used to get his ass kicked in this very courtyard not too long ago.” I say once I land silently behind him, enjoying the way he twitches in surprise.

All the guards present give me a salute but I remain focused on the adventurer who is said to have been to the second floor of the dungeon repeatedly.

“Why don’t you and I have a round?” I offer.

“... Sure” he agrees after a few seconds of indecision and a look towards his brother.

As the rest of the people back up to give us some space we square off against each other. I feel my skill [Vigilant] let me know that he just used [Judge Threat] on me. Sadly despite it being a rare skill it doesn’t provide any protection against identifying skills, all it does is let me know who it is and what skill they are using on me.

My interest is peaked however when I feel [Spot Weakness]. Not letting overconfidence get to my head I use my own [Judge Threat] on him in return and am surprised to feel that he poses a large danger to me. I used the same skill on him a few months back when he joined our unit and he was barely a slight threat.

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“Ready?” one of the guards on the side asks, deciding to referee the spar.

“Ready” he says as I start feeling some mana start to gather around him with [Detect Mana].

I simply nod and wait for the signal to start. The moment the referee waves his hand I explode forward, letting [Charge] take me right up to him and swing an overhead blow with my axe.

I can see the shock in his eyes as he barely manages to move his head out of the way and lifts his shield to deviate the strike to the opposite direction. As the blow connects his hand gives way to my superior stats and he rolls away to create some distance.

I can’t help but feel a little disappointed. He moves the same way he did in the previous match, I thought that maybe there was something he was holding back that let him enter the second floor of the dungeon but perhaps I should go a bit easier on him, after all I do have at least twenty something levels on the kid, not to mention the skills that I have polished for more than twice the time he’s been alive.

As all this is running through my head the amount of mana I sense suddenly spikes and [Danger Sense] alerts me in time to bring up my own shield as slash from his sword comes straight for my neck. His speed is on a whole other level now, moving even faster than I can, not only that but I can feel the cold seeping into my arm through the shield where his blow connected.

“Well that’s rare.” I hear myself subconsciously mumble, a mana skill that allows physical enhancement. It’s not something unheard of but definitely one of the things the nobles try to keep to themselves.

I don’t have time to say any more as I find myself on the back foot for the first time in quite a while. The mana in the surrounding area increases further and he starts pressing me back. His speed and strength are now even higher than my own and it takes all I can do to deflect his onslaught of attacks.

As if that wasn’t enough the elemental nature of his attacks changes from one swing to the next, my shield hand is slowly starting to numb from the cold while my axe handle is about to burst into flames from the heat. That’s not all he is doing either as I feel the earth beneath us move, trying to trip me up as well as give him a better footing.

The one bright side to this is that I know he can’t keep this up for long, just the boosting skill should be eating through his mana like a pack of starving wolves let alone the rest. He quickly comes to the same realization as I do and decides to switch to a fully aggressive style.

He throws away the shield and takes out a hammer before charging me again. I see through his feint, and move with him as he dashes to my left trying to side-step my shield. The sweat coming off his body letting me know just how much of a toll this is taking on him. As I parry the sword with my axe I tank the hammer blow on my shield but for some reason I easily rebuff the hammer at the moment of contact.

An instant later I feel a sharp pain as the whole arm goes numb. My eyes catch a coating of dark mana that enveloped the hammer fading away. With this strike I know I am in a bad position, I never expected him to push me this hard.

I’ll have to apologize to everyone after this I resign myself as I draw in a deep breath.

“RAHHHH” A bellow comes out of me as I use my sole epic skill [Debilitating Shout].

The debilitating effect works perfectly on him as he almost loses his balance giving me a much needed break. As I see him stumbling for a second step I take the chance to go on the offensive again but he quickly rebuffs me with a strong blow that creates a small explosion as our weapons collide.

Each of us slide to a stop breathing heavily as we keep our eyes locked on each other, only to be interrupted as the referee intervenes putting an end to the match.

“Sorry about the shout everyone.” I quickly get that out of the way as I look around to see that more than one or two people have ended up falling, the shadow cat is laying flat with both paws covering its ears.

Despite all this my eyes don’t leave the clearly exhausted young man that relaxed his stance as he was swarmed by his brother and the rest of the people who knew him, all of them congratulating and questioning him about his magic.

Despite not being able to keep it up for very long, nothing more than a minute or two he was quite some ways above me, his lack of skills made up for the variety of his magic and inflated stats, I would place him somewhere around level sixty-five in terms of strength, if he is able to keep that up for longer than two minutes I doubt I would be left standing.

I jump back up to my office to catch my breath but I’m still tracking him with my eyes as he says his goodbyes and turns to leave the courtyard. I make a mental note to keep an eye on his family after he leaves the city.