Maxine was calmly walking to the amphitheater for her spar. It was grandma Victoria's idea that she spar with Maxwell and Patrick there. It made sense since the projected forcefields would prevent accidental injuries. However for some reason, grandma Victoria also restricted the audience to the clan elders, Madam Neshan, and the ambassador's group. Normally such an activity would be available to all to watch for entertainment if nothing else.
Maxine just shrugged it off as something to do with politics, but she was fully aware of why Madam Neshan was present. It was most likely to determine if Orianna was insane or not. Even with Maxwell's soul aura interfering with Orianna's, Madam Neshan should be able to determine that with her special eyes.
Before she left the mansion to come to the amphitheater, she had been concerned with what clothing could accomodate her new transformation, but she was able to find something. She was currently wearing a loose-fitting long shirt with loose-fitting pants that she had modified on the spot to allow for the tail to emerge without damaging or displacing her clothes. Fortunately, her clothes were made of very durable arachne silk, so it doubled up as a form of armor.
Before she entered the amphitheater, she spotted Turan out of the corner of her eye as he approached her. What is he doing here and where has he been for the past couple years? I haven't seen him even once since I have been in the Kavros Clan.
"Greetings, Ms. Levings," Turan said politely.
"Hello, Turan," Maxine responded politely even if she wanted to beat Turan half to death, "Where have you been?"
"Here in your clan. Although, I arrived a month or two behind you," Turan answered and started to hand her a book of some kind, "I am here to apologize for all of the inconvenience that my people have caused you and to give you this." Inconvenience? Is that what he calls forcing me to leave Earth?! Maybe I should 'inconvenience' him by ripping off his balls.
"You call what your people did to me an inconvenience?! I had to leave the planet of my birth because of their interference!" Maxine said in a tone that expressed every ounce of her anger while ignoring the book in his hand and paused as she tried to push down her rage, "Is there anything else?"
"No, I may you enjoy the rest of your day," Turan answered with a smile as he set the book on the ground infront of her before he literately vanished into thin air, "Farewell, Miss Levings." Oh, so he knows Neesa's trick of invisibility. I wonder how grandma will react to finding out he is hanging around.
Maxine put the book that Turan left on the ground into her dimensional ring before she continued into the amphitheater and quickly made her way to the arena. She saw everyone there. Madam Neshan was next to Grandma Victoria and Ambassador Sutton was a talking to Patrick and Maxwell. Meagan, Jack and that strange young man that hated her were all together.
However Maxine quickly notices that grandma Victoria looked to be on the verge of tears as Madam Neshan talked to her in hushed tones. I guess Madam Neshan just gave grandma a general idea what kind of shit Orianna has been through. It must be something really bad for grandma to be effected like that. I remember that she only angry when Hellen told her about my childhood, but not once did she shed a tear.
After a short while, Madam Neshan patted grandma Victoria on the shoulder before leaving the amphitheater. Maxine didn't know where Madam Neshan was going, but she guess it had something to do with helping the maids at the mansion to set up a suitable enviroment for Orianna.
Maxine wanted to go up to her grandmother to comfort her, but was waved off by her. "Focus on your sparring matches," grandma Victoria said via spiritual sense while trying to regain control of her emotions, "I will let you know what Madam Neshan told me about Orianna later. Be prepared. It won't be pleasant to hear."
Alright, grandma," Maxine answered via spiritual sense and saw a concerned ambassador Sutton making his way to grandma Victoria.
Maxine looked away from grandma Victoria and took in what kind of equipment that Maxwell and Patrick were wearing. They were both wearing defensive gear. Patrick was wearing plated armor of some kind. He had a kite shield on his back and a sword at his hip. Maxwell was decked out in leather armor and had four blades strapped to his body. Two were on his hip and the other two were on his back. The pair strapped across his back were the Twilight Iron Blades that she gave him.
"So which of you wants to go first?" Maxine asked as she approached them.
"I will," Patrick said calmly. Patrick is a heavily defensive fighter and he won't attack me unless he is certain that an attack will land. That means I won't get to find many openings.
"Let's have a nice match," Maxine said in a friendly tone to Patrick.
"This isn't just a sparring match and you know it," Patrick answered coldly. No, shit. It's a political move by the ambassador. He wants to prove that he has warriors capable of defending the people on Earth from essence beasts. It would allow Earth to start trading chocolate for other resources, but I don't think they are ready yet. Their best fighters don't necessarily reflect their capabilities as a whole.
"That may be," Maxine said as she jumped into the arena, "But this is also an opportunity to sharpen your skills. Is it not?"
Patrick let out an amused grunt before jumping into the arena himself, "That it is."
They both took up their respective fighting stances with weapons in hand and activated their essence armor. Patrick's essence armor had integrated with his armor, shield and sword. It formed a nice crystaline shell over all of his equipment.
He stood his ground while watching Maxine from behind his shield. Maxine smiled to herself as she observed him for any openings, but he had none. I guess I will have to try and make one.
"Fight!" the AI announced.
Maxine charged at him and before she got close, she struck the ground to throw the debris from her strike at his face. He moved his shield to block it and she circled around him quickly to strike him from a blind spot. Unfortunately when she got close enough to hit him, she felt his spiritual sense. At that instant, he moved his shield to block her attack. Her blade bounced harmlessly off of it. It seems he hasn't been slacking off in improving his defense.
However before she could even retreat, ten small crystaline spikes formed on Patrick's shield. Oh, shit! Maxine desperately tried to dodge as crystaline essence darts shot out of Patrick's shield, but it was too little, too late. The majority of the darts were going to hit her if she didn't do anything. She used her blades to deflect as many of them as she could, but three of them still hit her left shoulder and leg. Damn, that took me by surprise. He didn't have that trick up his sleeve the last time that I saw him. It's just good that I reacted quickly. If I hadn't, he would have won. His crystaline essence darts can punch through my essence armor way too easily.
Maxine decided to stop taking it easy as she channeled both of her essence and mana through her body to move swiftly around Patrick at greater speeds in an attempt to confuse him as well as avoid getting hit with a surprise attack again.
She lashed out with one of her blades once in awhile to test how firm his defensive stance was and was blocked or parried every time. Getting past his defenses with speed won't work. It looks like I will have to use more brute strength.
She stopped circling Patrick and charged at him while keeping an eye on his shield in case of another sneak attack. She lashed out at full strength with both of her blades at him and he blocked like she expected. The force of the blow caused him to stagger which she took advantage of as she dropped down and swiped her leg to knock him down. He fell backwards as his feet were swiped out from underneith him.
She jumped into the air as he fell and unleashed a Crescent Moon Blitz with each of her blades. Even though he was falling, he was still able to block her attacks with his shield, but the lower part of his body still got hit. Surprisingly it wasn't enough to beat him according to the AI. Well damn. That armor must be made of some good stuff.
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Patrick tried to get back on his feet, but Maxine stopped him by using shadow tendrils to bind him to the ground. She didn't dare get close since she didn't know what other tricks he had come up with since she saw him last.
She started unleashing Crescent Moon Blades one after another at him. Even with him using his shield to block half of her attacks, it didn't take long for him to be teleported out of the arena. However using that attack so much had drained her essence and mana reserves down to half. If she was going to fight Maxwell immediately, she would have to fight him at half strength. I really wish my ordinary essence darts had more penetrating power like Patricks. Otherwise I wouldn't have had to use so much of my essence and mana to beat him.
"Winner, Maxine Levings," the AI announced.
Maxine looked up at the stands and saw ambassador Sutton look somewhat pale and surprised. Apparently her vicious assault had been a bit too much for him to watch. "Amazing," ambassador Sutton said softly and he turned to grandma Victoria to ask, "Are all of your young warriors this ... effective?"
"Oh, heavens no," grandma Victoria said as she had clearly recovered from earlier, "Maxine is my clan's top young genius. There are perhaps two, maybe three, others in her age group that can put up a decent fight with her."
"You must be very proud of her," ambassador Sutton said.
"I am," grandma Victoria said with a smile, "But you should also be proud to have such a skilled young warrior yourself."
"Thank you, but he still lost to your grand daughter," ambassador Sutton said.
"Indeed, but this is the second time that I have actually seen her take a hit that wasn't blocked or deflected from anyone. Which puts young mister Mason on par with my clan's other geniuses," grandma Victoria said, "And he has a phenomenal defense. It's been a very long time since I have seen anyone take such a beating before they lost."
"He is one of Earth's best when it comes to defense," ambassador Suddon said proudly, "Now I am interested in seeing how she fairs against her next opponent. Maxwell is undoubtedly one of Earth's top three when it comes to offense."
"Oh? That sounds interesting. Shall we find out which of them is better right now?" grandma Victoria asked.
"We could, but doesn't your grand daughter need time to recover her strength?" ambassador Sutton asked in return.
"She might if she didn't have a special method to restore her strength in a speedy manner," grandma Victoria said as she gave Maxine a look. Oh great. She knows that I can siphon essence from my constructs to restore my own, but even with my essence and mana cores fully charged, I honestly don't know if I can beat Maxwell. He has the capacity to boost his strength to match a king-class being, but he may not be able to with Orianna's soul inside of him. However I can't count on that inhibiting him.
Maxine siphoned mana from her main body and essence from her Shadow Wolves in order to restore her strength. She lamented that she couldn't use this same method to cultivate to a higher level, but she wasn't too upset over it. If anything, she was happy that it didn't work that way. If cultivating was that easy, it wouldn't be nearly as satisfying when she reached a new plateau of strength.
Once she fully restored her strength, Maxine looked up at Maxwell and said, "I'm ready when you are, Maxwell."
Maxwell jumped into the arena and said, "You know, I really miss hearing you call me Max like you did on Earth. Why do you have to be so formal all the damn time?"
"Sorry, but I have to be formal. You are guests of my clan. It's one of the drawbacks of being the patriarch's grand daughter," Maxine answered apologetically and asked via spiritual sense, "Is my sister able to help you while you fight in any way?" It still felt wierd to her to call Orianna her sister, but she may as well get used to it. Afterall, they will be posing as twins as soon as Maxine makes her a body.
"I can, but I won't," Orianna replied via spiritual sense, "I thought I would let you two have a fair match." Now, she wondered how Orianna was actually able to help him. She only asked because she was considering the slight chance that Orianna could help him. However she had a feeling it had something to do with the extra blades Maxwell carried. Regardless she didn't have time to think about it now.
"Thank you," Maxine said via spiritual sense and continued verbally, "I want you to come at me with your full strength. I don't want to win thinking that you didn't come at me with your best."
"Alright then. Just remember you asked for this," Maxwell replied with a confident smile as a fiery light grey arua erupted around him and the strength of his cultivation skyrocketed until he was seven times stronger than before. Damn. Even with my new transformation, I will still come up short by a single level strength wise, but I have more experience when it comes to fighting humans. That should make this a close one.
"Impressive," Maxine praised Maxwell, "Now, it's my turn to return the curtesy."
She roared as she began to transform into her new form as she channeled both her essence and mana. As before, her height increased, her skin turned to a light grey, a tail sprouted out of her lower back, her fingernails turned into claws and scales started to appear over most of her body. Grandma Victoria was at first alarmed at Maxine's transformation, but a moment later she showed a pleased expression. Everyone else had a mixture of disbelief, fear and wonder plastered on their faces.
"Ready?" the announcer AI asked and both of them nodded their heads as they held their blades in hand, "Fight!"
Maxine charged first with her blades to either side of her body and Maxwell followed suite with his own charge. She knew that she had to take the initiative in this fight since Maxwell held the edge in raw power. She just hoped that he didn't have an advantage over her when it came to speed. Otherwise she would loose horribly.
However before they clashed, the blades strapped to Maxwell's back flew out on their own and hurtled themselves at her. She was momentarily surprised, but that didn't prevent her from reflexively deflecting the blades away. Unfortunately Maxwell's tactic of distracting her worked and he was practically in her face with a weapon raised high while she appeared to be unprepared for him.
Maxine smiled underneith the white mask of her essence armor as she lashed out at his gut with her tail. The strike wasn't enough to send Maxwell flying. But it was enough to knock the wind out of him and force him to retreat a couple steps. This tail is quite useful in a fight.
Maxine wanted to continue her counter attack, but Maxwell's flying blades had returned forcing her to frantically defend against them. Those blades took up an orbiting attack pattern and forced her to hold her ground. she growled in frustration since these blades were buying time for Maxwell to recover from having the wind knocked out of him. Damn it. How the hell is he able to control those blades so well?! Did Orianna lie to me when she said she wouldn't interfer?
Once he recovered, Maxwell charged at Maxine once more and began to unleash a flurry of blows, which Maxine was barely able to defend against. Each strike she deflected or blocked against, whether it be from the flying blades or Maxwell's own attacks, were making her arms slowly go numb. She knew that she couldn't keep this up for much longer. She made the decision and created a bladed cyclone around herself to force Maxwell to retreat.
She stared at him and got into a perfectly balanced stance while she breathed in deeply. In the next moment, her blades began to change. The blade in her right hand turned pitch black while giving off a white aura and the blade in her left hand turned pearly white with a black aura. This was the effect of her mastery over the Yin Yang Blades technique and it granted her a boost to her offensive and defensive abilities. Unfortunately since she hadn't completely mastered it, she couldn't maintain it for very long, but that didn't matter. She only needed it to help her withstand the force of Maxwell's attacks during their next clash.
Maxwell hesitated for a moment before he continued his assault. As before his two flying blades flew forward first with him following directly behind them. With a swipe of her left blade, she knocked both of his flying weapons to the side and stepped forward as she lashed out with her right blade at Maxwell's chest.
As Maxwell blocked her attack with one of his blades and readied the other one to counter attack, Maxine formed a cluster of essence darts at the end of her tail. As his blade cleaved at her head, she smashed her tail to the side of his blade to divert his attack and aimed the tip of her tail at Maxwell's stomach before firing all of the essence darts at once.
Maxwell was teleported out of the arena, but not before his attack hit her shoulder. The force of that blow made her knees buckle and she knelt down on her hands and knees to keep from hitting the ground. Although the AI recognized that she won, it felt more like a draw to her. Her attack would have been enough to kill Maxwell had this been a life and death battle, but his attack would have left her in critical condition. Even factoring in her regenerative abilities and that she would be using the best healing potions, it would have taken her at least a full day to heal up enough just to leave the battle ground.
Maxine didn't listen to what the AI or what anyone else was saying as she got back to her feet and undid her transformation. While her body shrank back into it's normal proportions, she was only going over the fight with Maxwell in her head to see where she could improve. Unfortunately aside from becoming more powerful or abusing the use of her constructs, there was nothing more she could have done. Well, at least I know Maxwell has the strength to protect those important to him.
"Maxine? Are you alright?" grandma Victoria asked via spiritual sense, "You have been standing there for several minutes."
"Yeah, I am fine," Maxine responded via spiritual sense, "I was just going over my match with Maxwell in my head and trying to find a way to improve."
"That's just like you, but you nearly gave ambassador Sutton a heart attack due to your immobility. He was afraid that Maxwell had actually hurt you somehow even with the forcefield up," grandma Victoria said in amusement via spiritual sense.
"I don't blame him for being concerned, but let him know that I am fine," Maxine said via spiritual sense and decided to ask, "By the way, when do you want me to make Orianna her body?"
"As soon as you have recovered enough strength to do it," grandma Victoria said via spiritual sense, "Orianna has been living within Maxwell's body for long enough."
"Alright, grandma," Maxine answered via spiritual sense, "And you can tell me what Madam Neshan said about Orianna in the mean time."