As one went, another came. What was once spectacular became mundane. This wasn’t in any way disingenuous. Simply, the more the two fought, the less attractive the sight was.
To be fair, neither the enemy goblins nor the caravan members saw the two as beautiful sights. One was a bit shocking and memorizing. While the other was consistently simple case of shock and awe.
Jumping through the air, Saleh put mana into his hands. Creating pressure far, exceeding anything physically possible.
Jerking down, black blood spewed from the opening created by broken bone sticking out of the arm. Behind him, a fair distance, was Jessica.
Currently, there were two goblins attacking her. At least from the outward appearance. Going back a few seconds, told a different story.
Two goblins ran at her. Slipping under an overextended strike, sliding into position between the two. Comically, and unnaturally, however fluent the movements were. Her movements continued to look exaggerated.
Over extension caused the first to be slow in response. The second was using an unorthodox approach. Normally, two fangs extended out from either side of their mouth. Grade E goblins had larger fangs. At Grade D, these fangs turned into large tusks.
While only being Grade E, this goblin had a large set of tusks. Attempting to bite down on his opponent, sadly, his target had other ideas.
Almost like she felt she was in over her head. Jessica flipped over the now recovered goblin, inadvertently dodging the bite. While the first one that had recovered wasn’t given enough time to send a second strike.
Unbeknownst to either, death had come and was about to leave. This battle was more of an experiment. She wasn't using her normal flying dagger type of battle style.
Jack, who had finished off to the side. Came to help. Seeing the opportunity, Jessica actually handed her dagger to him.
"Pull this." Without asking why, he simply did. Not giving the opponent any opportunities, Jessica kicked the approaching goblin.
As Jack pulled, the foot landed. Very soon, Mana left her at an astonishing rate. Watching silently as Jack pulled with all his might.
During the initial clash, Jessica wrapped the wire around the neck of both goblins. Having done the same in the dungeon, this time, she tried to apply her Grade E mana through the wire. Knowing full well, it wasn’t the best idea.
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She gave the dagger to Jack so that she could concentrate her mana into the wire. Sure enough, her face turned pale as the amount of mana required to cut through was vastly more than anything reasonable.
Having Jack's aid, she was able to observe the results far easier. Soon, two heads rolled to the ground. Following suit were two black blood producing sacks of meat falling to the ground.
Leo, watching from the side, he could only click his tongue to himself silently. How far she had come, from the last time he had seen her do the same thing to the same type of enemies.
He understood that these goblins had intelligence, even if only a little. They had also attacked them first. However, through the connection, he was able to come to terms with this new cold side of her.
If he said he liked this side better, that wouldn’t be completely true. Contradictory, he liked both. Soft side was more understanding. He hated how soft she really was. Deep inside, he knew his biggest problem was seeing how much he had lost.
This cold side of her, was logical. It made perfect sense to him. That didn’t mean he was happy seeing it. Just because he understood it, didn’t mean more people like him was a good thing. Only, what could he do.
This world was different from Earth. What he could remember, he knew that neither world was perfect. Only those hiding in society, at least, were able to pretend the world wasn’t as cold as it really was.
In the beginning, he also felt the same about this world. Even being locked away didn’t stop the slightly different normality from slipping in.
Now? He didn’t know.
This group was alone. There was no larger group hiding and watching. Far more sloppy and weak. After a few similar groups, Jessica started to experiment. With only but a few words.
Ever since that incident, she has been looking to improve. She meditated, ate, sparred, and trained. Outside of doing her job of protection detail, she never stopped trying to get stronger.
There was a reason the request only considered to be five days. The majority of the time they would only need to fight for a few minutes. Outside that time, they were able to watch the surroundings, not needing to do very much.
Meditation was never a quick method. Still, slowly over time, mana was stacked. As time passed, this small addition added up.
From her normal progression as a Grade F, she was progressing extremely quickly. Having noticed an oddity, after being informed, her progression increased further.
After using mana, by fighting. Somehow, sparring didn’t count, when she fought with her life on the line. If she meditated immediately after the fight. She seemed to have an increased absorption rate. This was later shown to be true, such that she was able to confirm herself.
Leo had an increased sensitivity to mana. As a type of spirit, his ability to gather and use mana was manufactured.
Because of this, his ability to sense mana was the same. That was to say, Leo's ability also followed the lines of talent.
Of course, Leo's talents had a lot to do with what he could do. Only the abilities he often used had zero to do with his own talent.
Leo could feel the same thing through Saleh. In fact, he discovered this anomaly through him. All thanks to the person who made him.
As a sword spirit. He was simply a sword with a spirit haunting its body. He couldn’t do anything but observe. The runes inside the blade were what gave him the ability to do more. Including sense and gather mana.