With a hit on her sword arm, Levi's attack missed the target and her Water Dragon spell was interrupted. N quickly delivered three follow up attacks as Levi took 3 more steps back.
After getting hurt, Levi concentrated on defense while parrying N’s attacks.
Casting spells required such a high level of concentration that even a Saint had difficulties trying to cast spells in the middle of sword exchanges. "How can he attack with such ferocity while doing Triple Cast at the same time?" Levi was impressed by her enemy once again.
Levi then calmed down and thought, "His strength is only at the Holy Knight's level. If I use that technique, I should be able to finish him off. Still, before that, let me see if I can recruit him."
"It's a shame to lose a talent like you. I will pardon all of your crimes if you work directly under me. The pay will be good, too. What do you think?" Levi said as she fought on the defensive. She took 2 more steps back from defending N's attacks as she said it. "While the Kingdom is not perfect, if you look back at history, people on average are having a much better life than before. You can help improving it by working directly under a Saint."
"Is he the greedy type or the virtuous type?" Levi observed N and waited for his reply.
N did not respond to Levi's offer and focused on attacking. Getting no reply from N, Levi suddenly dashed back about five meters. Her physical prowess was much stronger than N’s so N could not follow. Now, their sword exchanges stopped.
"You see, my strength, speed and Mana are all much stronger than yours. I can stop our fight anytime I want." said Levi.
"You mean by running away from me." N replied at an attempt to provoke her, but it did not work.
N then thought, "She is catching on to the rhythm of my Triple Cast. She was able to jump back at the precise moment between my casts. Now, what is she planning to do?" Levi was standing far enough such that N could not cast spells behind her. Moreover, Levi could easily defend against any frontal attack spells. Therefore, N stopped and maintained his fighting stance, concentrating on Levi.
After a few moments, "you got nothing to say?" Levi asked again. Obviously, N was not interested.
Suddenly, Levi vanished and reappeared a few feet behind N with a shockwave followed right after, confident that the fight had ended. It was the technique she used against Bob earlier: Phantom Blade School: Vanishing Thrust. This was one of her favorite attacks. In her long life, the Vanishing Thrust had always succeeded against Holy Knight level opponents. Even in her current condition, she believed that this attack could end the fight.
Standing behind the demon, her throat felt hot and painful. "I got hurt?" Levi felt lightheaded, dropped her sword and found that her throat was bleeding. She put more Divine Power near the wound to slow down the bleeding. She looked back and saw the demon swung his sword to get rid of her blood.
N saw Levi use this attack on Bob from afar. Therefore, he had prepared and waited for it. Moreover, N's swordsmanship was much higher than Levi's, which allowed him to fight on par with the Saint despite being much weaker in strength. Even though he was successful in countering, N was still wary of Levi. He watched Levi as if she was a wounded lion, maintaining his fighting stance and prepared for more of her attacks.
"He could have cut off my head if not for my superior Mana and Stoneskin." Levi realized. In a moment, Levi’s eyes suddenly started glowing with silver-blue light. She took several steps back from N and jumped into the river.
In about 15 seconds, a giant blue scaled winged serpentine dragon emerged from the river. It was the Leviathan.
The Leviathan stood up, using her five-fingered eagle claw-like front feet to grasp the riverside. This raised her head and upper body above water, towering over N at 10 meters tall. Her eyes glowed with silver-blue light, and light blue crystalline scales covered her entire body. Her sparkling wide wings extended and blocked the sky, turning the heaven into a deep blue night sky with twinkling stars.
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There were six Saints in the Kingdom. Their prowess in combat were unparalleled. Other than the King, only the Saints could request Goddess Liliana’s audience. Therefore, especially for the older Saints, they had great influences in the Kingdom’s politics.
Saint Levi, as the Saint of Justice, was responsible for enforcing the law. Under the reign of the previous King, the Kingdom enjoyed prosperity. During that time, the Inquisition Knights, led by Saint Levi, were loved by the populace.
However, after the new King took the throne, the politics in the country became unstable. The cost of the war against the Demon Realm gradually increased. The nobles refused to give up their luxurious living standard for the war, so taxes increased every year. Those who could not pay the tax, especially those who suffered from natural disasters, had to become bandits or migrate into the Demon Realm to survive. Some citizens who left for the Demon Realm also came back to the Kingdom as spies.
With multiple problems looming over the country, Levi had traveled around the Kingdom all year long for decades to keep peace and help its citizens. A long absence from the capital caused her political powers to decrease. Despite her repeated efforts, no one answered to her calls to decrease taxes or provide supplies to areas that suffered from natural disasters.
"Decreasing taxes? Sure! We'll reduce funding to the Inquisition Knights." the Royal Family and the nobles declared. The conflict between the Inquisition Knights and the Royal Family caused the funding to decrease even further year by year.
The lack of funding resulted in insufficient manpower for the Inquisition Knights to police the country. To protect most citizens, Levi allowed the judges and Inquisition Knights to swiftly convict suspects. In the process, many laws were created such that, depending on how one interprets them, anyone could be convicted. Over the years, the Royal Family and many nobles took advantage of the new laws to eliminate their political opponents.
As if Levi did not have enough problems in her hands, recently, there was also a rumor about Levi working with the Demon Realm and that she was the one who allowed the situation to worsen.
A few weeks ago, Levi received confidential information from the King regarding demon spies. The report involved a former Knight Exemplar and a former Knight Commander. Despite not being in good terms with the King, she could not ignore the report because a defecting Knight Exemplar could become a national scandal. Since she was busy at a border outpost defending against the Demon Realm, she sent her most trusted aid, Travis, to investigate the case. At the same time, the King demanded her to send Daniel, a former Royal Knight, to "assist" with the investigation. Even though Daniel was officially an Inquisition Knight, he was openly the King's spy. She did not want to put Travis through all these political power struggles in his work. However, she had no other option.
When she received a report from the King about Travis and Julie having gone missing, she had a very bad feeling and departed immediately. As a knight, Travis was very professional and had never forsaken his duties without telling Levi. Despite her hopes that Travis and Julie were simply hiding, she immediately assumed the worst case scenario: he must have been killed by someone at least as strong as a Holy Knight.
There were only four paths for Travis' killers to escape. They were:
1, 2) the paths to the Demon Realm to the East or South,
3) the path to the Kingdom's capital to the North, and
4) the path to the Redcliff Duchy's capital to the west.
Additionally, there were children involved so they could not have moved fast.
Levi, with the Behemoth's help, scouted the paths one by one. Without eating or sleeping, the two godly beasts extended their Mana to cover as much ground as they could, and scanned the paths for people with strong Mana. While this may be exhausting for a typical Saint, the godly beasts could do it over a long period of time. On the second day after she received the report, the Behemoth found Bob and immediately sent her a message through a spell. She happened to be nearby after scanning the path to the south.
When she arrived, Bob confirmed her suspicion of Travis being dead. Moreover, she was not able to keep her promise of protecting Julie. She was very distressed and could not focus in the fight very well. With every fiber of her being, she wanted to give up the fight, go home and mourn her student. However, as a Saint, there was a demon in front of her and she needed to do her job.
"Don’t you know that demonic races are to be executed on sight in the Kingdom?" said N.
"It is fine as long as no one finds out." said Levi in her dragon form. Using her tail, she lightly tapped the Behemoth and said, "Time to wake up, don’t slack off. Use your maximum size and finish the fight with me."
The Behemoth immediately woke up. "Aren’t you worried that your husband might be dead?" it grumbled, its voice deep and masculine.
"Worry about your allowance." Levi stated without looking back at him. The Behemoth glanced at her and gulped.
The Behemoth returned to his maximum size, standing at 30 meters tall, and took a position beside the Leviathan. Now, two majestic beasts were towering over N. Levi's Mana was much stronger than before her transformation. With the combined Mana of the two godly beasts, the area covered by N's dark silver aura decreased significantly.
The situation looked hopeless.