Draga and Phylex suddenly lifted their heads to the ceiling and muttered together telepathically, “I sense danger.”
“That was odd,” admitted Draga, turning to look at the Eternal Phoenix with a troubled look on his face. “For some reason, I sensed a shudder in the elemental plane as if something was happening.”
“Begun to happen,” Phylex corrected him, but he also looked worried up at the ceiling. “It’s almost as if something had begun to move, something really powerful and terrible!”
“Well, we can’t be certain but it definitely didn’t bore well,” said Draga in a nervous voice.
The two of them were very powerful beings, but the fact that they were worried about something unknown was worrisome. However, with them not sure what it was they should be worried about, they could only contemplate about it. They remained to look at the ceiling for a few more seconds before turning back to look towards their master, Lakshman.
The king from another world was sitting upright on his bed and had his eyes closed while placing his clenched fists together on his lap. He had woken up a few minutes ago after a good sleep and immediately decided he should train himself in his Unconscious World by going up against his past self, Asura. And so, deep within his mind, the two warriors stood separated by quite a distance with smiles on their faces as they looked towards one another.
“You know, when you requested this fight, I felt strange, and now, it feels really weird fighting my current-self,” said Asura with a small grin on his face.
“Yeah, but I want to check something out, that’s why I need your help,” replied Lakshman with a smile.
Asura nodded and said, “Alright. Enough talk. Let’s do this,” and he instantly began surging with power while radiating red aura that surrounded him as the wind began to glow strongly around them.
Lakshman raised an eyebrow, impressed by the power that his past-self had in him before nodding and saying, “Right,” before surging with power while radiating golden-red aura that surrounded him, further adding to the force of the wild blowing wind that buffeted them.
The two warriors stared at each other over the distance that separated them before Asura exclaimed, “If you won’t come, I’ll come!”
He aimed his hand towards Lakshman and exerted his energy, causing Lakshman to widen his eyes in shock and quickly leap into the air. It was a good decision because, a moment later, the place where he stood erupted with immense force that caused clouds of smoke to spread everywhere.
While floating through the air, Lakshman turned to see his past-self charge towards him at high speed and land a powerful blow to the side of his face. However, Lakshman was no slouch as he quickly turned his body around and slammed his right leg against the side of Asura’s face, forcing each other away from their blows. After coming to a stop, they towards each other again and began battling it out with great intensity and speed, each blow sending shock waves in all directions, cutting the ground apart, and causing their world to shake as they lifted off the ground and flew through the air while moving at incredible speeds.
“Not bad for an old timer!” Lakshman commented with a grin on his face while in between the blows.
“Old timer?!” Asura scoffed, looking incredulously at him. “I’m your predecessor,” and he delivered a powerful uppercut straight to Lakshman’s jaw before soaring above him, putting his hands together and slamming them down on top of his head.
Lakshman flew towards the ground at high speed, but he quickly recovered and landed forcefully on the ground, causing it to crack around him. He looked up and saw Asura charge after him, which made him aim his hands up in his direction and unleash a powerful wave of destruction straight at his past self. Seeing the coming attack, Asura’s grin broadened as he channeled Energy Force into his arms and swung it down at the last second down at the wave.
For a few seconds, there was resistance between the two forces, with Asura pushing his arms down with great intensity against his present-self’s attack. Finally, he succeeded in splitting the wave apart and continued to fly down while aiming his right hand down and unleashing a wave of destruction of his own down at Lakshman. For his part, the king from another world quickly clenched his fists tightly and aimed them above his head before activating a powerful energy barrier that shielded him from the wave.
“Gah!” Lakshman grunted, struggling to hold his barrier up against the force of the attack that Asura had unleashed. “I won’t… be downed! ARRRGGGHHHH!!!”
With a roar, he swung his arms to either side and caused the wave to get split away into the air harmlessly. As soon as that was over, he had to contend with Asura soaring down towards him at an incredible speed, who held his fist out to smash through the barrier. Realizing his barrier would not hold against such force, Lakshman dropped his arms and leaped out of the way just as Asura came down and struck the ground with his fist, causing a great explosion that sent rocks flying everywhere.
Lakshman put his arms out in front of him to defend himself against the rocks before he saw Asura flying in-between the rocks towards him with a crazy smile on his face. Reacting in a split second, Lakshman caught the fist that Asura unleashed at him before throwing his own fist towards his opponent’s face. Asura took the fist head on with a grin on his face before bringing his face really close to Lakshman before smashing his head against him, disorienting and sending the king from another world flying backwards.
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“Ouch!” Asura complained, rubbing his forehead and looking towards his current-self with a satisfied smile on his face. He quickly aimed his hand towards him and shouted, “Ground Crash!”
Lakshman, who was soaring through the air, recovered and landed on his feet, which got dragged for several meters before coming to a stop. He looked towards Asura before seeing the ground around him suddenly split apart and rise to close in on him from all sides like a flower closing its petal around itself. Lakshman instantly reacted by surging with power and conjuring a barrier around him, that successfully stopped the rocks from converging on him.
It was then that he noticed Asura fly towards him and smashed his fist against his barrier, breaking it into pieces with relative ease due to how strong he was. Lakshman was a little taken aback, but he immediately reacted to this by gathering energy balls in his and launching them in between them, causing a strong explosion that sent both warriors flying away while the converging ground closed in and smashed against empty air harmlessly.
The first Phoenix Titan quickly recovered and landed on his feet before straightening up and asking, “Why aren’t you using your magic spells on me, Lakshman?”
Lakshman, who had recovered at the same time as him, looked back at him and replied, “I want to see if I can beat my opponent with just the Energy Force and the Weapon Force.”
This made Asura raise an eyebrow in puzzlement and ask him, “Why?”
“Right now, I’m not as strong as I should be,” said Lakshman, looking down at his hands.
Asura could not believe what he just heard, causing him to burst into a loud laughter before exclaiming, “You’re not as strong as you should be?! What?! Did I hear right? Because, I swear, that logic is silly!” He spread his arms out wide and shouted, “You have the power to destroy worlds, and you think you’re not as strong as you should be? Are you being stupid?!”
“I know that, but… it’s not that kind of strength I’m talking about,” replied Lakshman, looking firmly at his past-self. “You faced our enemy, right? The alien. He’s very good at using his magic with the Voiceless Incantation! I think you found yourself come under his spell’s attack without even realizing it since he doesn’t announce what he was going to do while we shout out what we’re going to do like some kids playing games!”
“How is that a weakness?” Asura demanded, looking angered by the way his current-self phrased it. “It’s much easier to use our techniques without the strain because of the great mind power one requires to use Voiceless Incantation!”
“That basically means we’re weaker than him,” replied Lakshman, causing Asura to widen both of his eyes in shock. “He’s smart, clever, plans things through, and always has a backup. We, on the other hand, fight our enemies head on in a straight up confrontation without any sort of plan, not even a plan b!” He looked back down at his hands and went on to say, “I realized my weakness when I watched your memories and saw that he was quicker than us in using the techniques. Sure, we’re mighty powerful and all, but what good does it do if the method we use weighs us down?”
“And? That made you opt to rely solely on Energy Force and Weapon Force?” Asura asked, looking exasperated. “That’s the silliest reason I’ve ever heard someone come up with in my entire life to avoid doing something!”
“What do you want me to do then?” Lakshman demanded, looking very angrily at him. “I’m not good at Voiceless Incantation! In fact, I failed to succeed in doing it a while back.”
“That was because you only practiced for about a month!” Asura retorted, looking very annoyed. “Life is not easy, Lakshman! You should know that from the memories you share from our past lives. Throughout this life, you were very lucky in doing many things, but luck won’t save you from everything, but escaping from the problem isn’t a solution either. It’s just another form of giving up.”
Lakshman remained silent for a moment, taking in the philosophical advice his past-self gave him before saying, “But… Asura, I don’t know if I have the time to train my mind to master Voiceless Incantation.”
The first Phoenix Titan sighed and spread his arms wide to either side before saying, “This is your world, your Unconscious World. You control the time in here, so focus your mind and make yourself time to train, even slowing down the time to give yourself extra training time to master Voiceless Incantation. It’s that simple, Lakshman!”
His current-self looked quizzically at Asura and asked, “Okay. That’s a good advice, but in that case, how come you never mastered Voiceless Incantation? Surely you also had this knowledge back then, right?”
To that, Asura chuckled and shrugged his shoulders as he said, “I never had to face an enemy that made me have to take the extra step to become truly powerful. But times have changed, and today is not like how it was in the past, which means that you change to fit the need, and that need is there right now!”
He raised his hand into the air and clicked while saying, “Time Pendulum.”
In an instant, a very large clock appeared behind him and it began to tick the current time on the outside. Lakshman stared at the materialized clock in amazement before looking down at his past-self in awe.
“What was that spell? I don’t remember having ever learnt it,” he commented in a surprised voice.
Asura shrugged his shoulders and said, “It’s a spell I recently discovered. You know, with you being in control, I had too much spare time, so I got bored and started tinkering around in this world to see what I can learn. That’s how I discovered the way to slow down time on the outside to give us more time to spend in this world. After all, it takes is for you to feel the courage and try it out,” and he winked at him with a prideful smile on his face.
Lakshman looked surprised before he smiled and said, “You’re right, but let’s not strain ourselves because torture is not training.” Then he looked shrewdly at his past-self and asked, “But you have to tell me what else you discovered while you had so much time to spare.”
Asura grinned broadly and said, “In due time. Now, come! We have Voiceless Incantation for you to master!”
“Both of us, you mean,” corrected Lakshman with a smile.
Asura looked at him in surprise before he folded his arms in front of him, smiled smugly and said, “I was right about your behavior and actions, but Lakshman, do not underestimate your predecessors, especially me.”
Lakshman grinned and said, “We shall see about that,” and he surged with power while beginning to surge with power.
The first Phoenix Titan chuckled and surged with power as well as he took on a fighting stance while saying, “We shall!”
The two warriors looked at each other for several seconds before Lakshman took the initiative to kick off the ground and soar through the air towards Asura, who was ready to react in an instant as the training to master Voiceless Incantation commenced.