Manaless Mage-Chapter 191: The duel[1]

"Harry." Nathan said, finally getting closer to Harry. "How are you doing, you good?"

"Huh... yeah." Harry replied, still not sure why Nathan asked him how he was doing all of a sudden. He wanted to question why he did, but he later decided not to, feeling that it would come off as weird.

"I didn’t see you in school yesterday, well, given what happened, it was expected." Nathan suddenly said, causing Harry’s brows to raise in confusion.

"What happened?" Harry asked, his gaze drifting to Nathan.

For a moment, Nathan’s eyes flashed with surprise at Harry’s question, and his brows furrowed slightly.

"What did you mean by what happened, don’t you know about the rifts that suddenly opened around Vernil?" Nathan asked.

"Ohh." Harry said, finally understanding what Nathan was referring to. From what Terry said, a large number of rifts opening up at the same time was very rare, so it was only natural that the incident wouldn’t be a secret.

"Although the casualties weren’t much, and there were reportedly no deaths, a few of those casualties were students from this academy." Nathan said, pausing for a second before continuing: "They were unfortunate enough to be caught up in the mana beast attacks, and I heard a few of them got critical injuries."

’Yeah, guess everybody wasn’t as lucky as those close to the restaurant.’ Harry thought. The situation wouid have been the same or even worse in the restaurant, it he hadn’t put down three of the mana beasts.

"I heard you witnessed one yourself, I didn’t even expect you to be back to school so soon..." Nathan said, his voice slurring slightly at the end.

"Yeah, but luckily for me, the AMO arrived before anything serious happened." Harry replied.

Suddenly, Nathan’s face squeezed into a slight frown, and a strange glint flashed through his eyes.

"Before the rift opened, did you notice anything weird.... anything out of place?" The combat mage asked, the playful shine that was always in his eyes completely vanished.

Though Harry found Nathan’s suddenly change in expression quite weird, he didn’t ponder it too much and simply answered: "To be honest, everything seemed very normal. There were no tell-signs, not even from the mana in the air, the rift just... unexpectedly appeared."

"Hmm..." Nathan mumbled, however, unknown to Harry, he tightly clenched his left fist in anger, before swiftly releasing it.

Harry’s brows curled up in confusion, as he inwardly noted how Nathan’s expression changed repeatedly when he was talking about the mana beast attack.

He didn’t understand what it was, but he could tell something was clearly bothering him. However, he didn’t bother to ask the combat mage what it was; he felt that it wasn’t his business.

Curious about Nathan’s current stats, Harry swiftly used [Probe] to scan him, and almost immediately, a set of tabs and characters flashed across his eyes.

===========

[Name: Nathan Lane]

[Race: Human]

[H/P: 135/135]

[Mana core: 3rd Stage]

[Mana: 3000/3300]

[Strength: 84]

[Agility: 88]

[Stamina: 95]

[Perception: 84]

[Endurance: 92]

[Intelligence: 86]

[Mental: 85]

[Charm: 81]

===========

Nathan’s stats had gone up quite a bit since the last time Harry scanned him, and even his H/P had gotten higher. Although the numbers were still a lot smaller when compared to Harry’s, it still proved that Nathan had only gotten stronger, as increasing stats wasn’t as easy for normal people.

While Harry was still busy reviewing Nathan’s stats, the expression on the combat mage’s face unexpectedly brightened up.

"That reminds me." He said, his head sharply turning to Harry, and his eyes shining with glee. "Now that you’re here Harry, let’s spar!"

"Huh?" Harry mumbled in surprise at Nathan’s words. A few seconds ago, he was acting weird and moody, and then all of a sudden, he reverted to his former cheerful behavior, even asking him for a spar.

"You can just take it as us training in preparation for the next round of the ranking event, and... don’t worry, I’ll go easy on you." Nathan said, with his lips curling into a smug grin.

Hearing those words, a slight smile instinctively broke out on Harry’s face. He didn’t know why, but Nathan’s words lighted a competitive spark within him.

Thinking about it now, he had always been curious to see how he would fare against Nathan in a one vs one, and this seemed like the perfect time to test that out.

"Sure, I agree. Let’s spar," Harry responded, taking a brief pause. He then added with a slight smirk, "Please go easy on me, okay?"

Nathan’s brows furrowed slightly, a little taken aback by how Harry swiftly agreed to the spar.

The only reason he challenged the brown haired boy was because he was curious about his strength, and felt like he was still hiding something.

However, he hadn’t expected Harry to accept the challenge so easily, he thought he would have to convince him for at least some minutes.

Nonetheless, what surprised him the most was the aura of confidence exuding from the mage.

After all, he was a stage three combat mage, while Harry was just a stage one Elementalist. Despite the general notion that Elementalists were more powerful than combat mages, that only applied if they were in the same mana core stage, not when they were two stages apart.

’Not that I’m complaining.’ Nathan thought, with a slight smirk on his face.

***

A few minutes later,

Standing in the center of a large room, were two teenagers, with their gazes locked in on each other.

At the left side was Harry, who was simply looking around the room, surprised at how similar and yet different it was from Susan’s.

At the right side was Nathan, who had a long, thin bastard sword with black handle held tightly in his right hand.

They were currently in Nathan’s training room, akin to Susan’s dorm, which boasted a well-constructed training facility, a common feature among the dorms of elite students.

However, there were still some notable differences between them. Despite being quite large on its own, the combat mage’s training room was still a little smaller when compared to Susan’s. The density of the mana in the air was also a lot thinner.

"Feels kind of unfair, seeing you just standing there without a weapon." Nathan said, lightly swinging the thin sword in his hand.

"You don’t need to worry about that." Harry replied, with his brows furrowing slightly.

’Still confident I see... this will be exciting.’ Nathan mumbled inwardly, with a slight smile on his face. Even though Harry was just standing there, he could still feel a slight chill in his spine, warning him about the danger Harry posed.

’Let’s see if you can handle this!’ He exclaimed in his mind, before swiftly channeling mana into his legs.

Using the mana swirling within his legs, he propelled himself towards Harry at insane speed.

Just before he got to Harry, he hurriedly pulled his sword backwards, before launching a powerful downward slash towards him.

’He’s fast!’ Harry thought, as he watched Nathan rapidly close in on him. However, the attack wasn’t too fast for him to react to, and even without the activation of [Accelerate], he could still follow the attack.

He quickly channeled a little of his energy into his legs, before leaping backwards, successfully escaping the slash that cut through the air in front of him.

’Huh?! He reacted to it?! His speed is insane!’ Nathan thought, with his eyes widened in surprise.

The kind of speed just displayed by Harry, was something he had never seen among Elementalists. The only people he knew who could move or react that fast, were combat mages, and not just any combat mage, but those at the third stage or higher.

’Wind Blade!’ Harry thought as he landed back on his feet, swiftly conjuring three wind blades before releasing them towards Nathan.

Whoosh!!

The blades flew through the air at rapid speed, closing in on Nathan at rapid speed.

However, just as they were about to land on him, the combat mage quickly twisted his body, before deftly deflecting all the wind blades aimed at him.

Pumping more mana into his legs, he charged at Harry, with his sword poised backwards for another strike.

But this time, Harry didn’t plan on letting himself get overwhelmed so easily.

’Earth Hold.’ He thought, and almost instantly, two huge lumps of rocks popped up from the ground beneath Nathan, threatening to swallow up his legs.

But unfortunately, such an attack was just too predictable for the combat mage to fall for.

By applying a little pressure on his legs, Nathan deftly leapt to the side, causing the rock lumps to clamp around empty air.

Thrumm!!

His sword suddenly pulsed with an insane amount of mana, taking on a bright yellow hue as he tightly gripped it with his two hands, before swiftly launching a powerful downward slash towards Harry.

Whoosh!!

With a silent breeze, a powerful sword slash shot through the air, its thin edges gleaming with a bright yellow glow as it flew towards Harry with unyielding might.

Harry’s eyes widened in shock as he watched the yellow slash aura rapidly closing in on him.

His danger sense instantly started screaming, warning him about the danger contained in that attack.

’Accelerate!’ He shouted inwardly, hurriedly activating his speed boost skill.

Immediately, his body became more than five times lighter, and the thin slash hurling towards him greatly slowed down in his sight.

In an instant, his speed underwent a huge leap, and his body felt more than five times lighter. As if time itself acquiesced to the change, the once-ferocious slash hurtling towards him now slowed down greatly within his heightened perception.