Path to Transcendence

The mana flowed right into the constructs. It was like his body was starting to get used to using mana like this and was now doing it instinctually.

Aubrey dodged the spikes using her clones and teleported between them in order to avoid the attack. She had also gotten an idea of Julius\'s style and was no longer caught off guard by his long-range attacks.

Julius knew that the spikes had little to no chance of hitting her, but that wasn\'t the point of them. He was only delaying her for as long as he could. In the time he had distracted her with his constructs, he was able to create layers of hardened mana over his skin.

It wasn\'t quite armor yet, but the layers of mana were quite strong and were compacted with a lot of mana. Then he used [Empowerment of Will] to enhance [Arcane Construct] and [Pure Compression], making the layers even stronger.

Aubrey was on top of him at this point. He dodged the flurry of strikes she blitzed out, with an ease that he wouldn\'t have been capable of yesterday. She had always been faster and stronger than him by a noticeable amount.

The only thing that had allowed him to keep up was his perception skill and [Savage Dance]. Now, he could track her punches and kicks with much more clarity. This allowed him to predict her strikes more easily and gave himself the space to capitalize on her mistakes, not that there were many of them.

If anyone had paid close attention to their previous spars, they would notice that he wasn\'t dodging as much as usual. He was dancing in and out of her reach, much more confident now that he was stronger and faster than before.

For a few minutes, both of them were brawling it out. Julius deflected a strike that was set up by a particularly nasty usage of [Mirage Phantom] and tried to back away. She didn\'t let him do that and continued with her aggression, pressing Julius further back and closer to the barrier.

However, unlike most times, he was controlling the pace of the fight much better. The way he retreated wasn\'t as panicked or frantic. He was much more calm and steady. He was just waiting for his opportunity to strike.

Finally, he got his chance.

There!

Aubrey pulled her eyes away for a quick second and lowered her guard just a little. But in that short period of time, Julius sent an overloaded mana spike right at her, forcing her to protect herself with her [Diamond Skin] because she didn\'t have enough time to teleport to one of her clones. He then created small balls of kinetic energy all around her and started to bombard her to oblivion, not giving her a chance to recover.

While he was doing that, he was bum-rushing her, clearing the distance within a blink. His speed was much faster than when he was Tier 1 since his body could take much more stress, and he made sure he took advantage of that. He flooded his body with so much kinetic energy and aura, that his body felt the toll even though he had already advanced to Tier 2, then he pushed it even further, creating small explosions at his feet.

The rush of power was exhilarating and addictive. He couldn\'t even begin imagining what Tier 3 or 4 would feel like.

He appeared right in front of Aubrey\'s face and unleashed a brutal punch, full of kinetic energy, aura, and pure raw strength, everything he could possibly use, straining his new body to its limit. She had been so distracted by his bombardment that she failed to react in time and took the shot right in the chest.

Julius felt his constructs shatter upon impact and his fist made direct contact with her, crushing into her sternum with a powerful boom. He broke his hand, his feet were burned, and the energy that flowed through him created tears throughout his body while doing so, but he had also finally broken through her defenses.

At the very end, he had felt her [Diamond Skin] crack. It was unable to withstand the force of his punch and he felt something inside of her break upon contact. Aubrey went flying away much like Julius had not too long ago, but somehow she managed to control her flight and land on her feet.

She was wincing in pain while grabbing her chest. There weren\'t any actual injuries, but Julius knew from experience that it still felt like there were.

"God damn! You hit like a Tier 3 that\'s for sure," Aubrey complained loudly, still rubbing her sternum.

"What, I didn\'t before?" Julius asked her.

"That was different, your constructs hit like a Tier 3, but your physical attacks weren\'t even close. Now, that is no longer the same case," she grumbled.

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Edgar had been off to the side watching their fight unfold and decided to say something too. "I agree. That last attack was powerful, not to mention the speed you showed to split the distance was ridiculous for a newly advanced Tier 2."

"Yeah, I almost didn\'t see you move. I thought you didn\'t have a movement skill yet?" Aubrey asked him.

"I don\'t," he told her.

"Bullshit."

"I promise I don\'t," he said seriously.

"Then how did you move so fast?" She pressed.

Julius shrugged his shoulders. "I don\'t know, I just used as much kinetic energy as I could."

Edgar turned to him. "You were able to gather that much kinetic energy in such a short period?"

He shook his head. It seemed like they had misunderstood something. They might have thought he had taken kinetic mana from his core to go to his legs.

"I used the kinetic energy that I had been siphoning from the fight to power the technique, that was why it activated so quickly. I didn\'t have to gather anything, I had control over it the entire time, I just needed to detonate it at the right moment," Julius explained to them.

Aubrey looked confused. "So you\'re saying you can absorb the kinetic energy from my attacks to fuel your own techniques? Doesn\'t that mean you barely need to use any kinetic mana of your own?"

Julius shrugged his shoulders again and gave her a smug grin.

Aubrey threw her hands in the air, exasperated. "How is that fair? How is any of this fair? You already have such massive mana reserves, you hit like a Tier 3, you move like a Tier 3, and now you are saying you don\'t even need to expend your own mana? Will I even have a chance if you were Tier 3?"

Julius knew she was just venting like usual, but he did feel bad because he did sense that she was genuinely frustrated.

Edgar must have seen it too because he wrapped his arm around her shoulder and said, "You are still one of the best Tier 3s among the fourth years. Julius just counters your [Mirage Phantom] and [Prism Stealth] very well. Against any other Tier 2 and most Tier 3s, they would not even be able to tell where you are attacking from. Also, that movement technique can only be used once after he built up a reserve, it\'s not like he can move that fast all the time. Don\'t beat yourself up too much, just focus on what you could do better."

Edgar was right. Julius was a very good counter for Aubrey, even then they were well-matched. He still thought that he would beat her most of the time if he was using [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] or if he could use that kind of movement technique often, but without them, she still had a good chance against him, even if her main skills were limited by his [Spatial Perception].

Julius didn\'t have the same confidence if he was fighting against the others. Derek and Edgar were very strong. If what he had seen during their spars said anything, it was that Julius would find it a much more difficult task taking either of them down. They didn\'t rely on deception like Aubrey, they focused on raw strength.

Derek had a perfect lightning affinity that brutalized anyone from range. His attacks were extremely fast and Julius didn\'t think he would be able to dodge them in time. His defense was also quite poor, without [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] he was a bit of a glass cannon. Even if he had the skill, Julius suspected Derek could just stun him with lightning until he found a way to put him down for good. If Julius was a good counter to Aubrey, then Derek was his counter.

Not to mention Edgar was a totally different problem. He was like Gabriel in many ways. He had an impenetrable defense and was extremely strong. However, he differed in the way he dealt with magical attacks.

He had a fire skill that specialized in blowing up mage\'s constructs or other spells. Julius didn\'t know how it worked exactly yet, but there was a good reason why Derek chose to fight Edgar with his spear most of the time. The best way one could take Edgar out was to fight him up close and personal, the area where he excelled.

Julius had confidence in his close combat ability but against someone like Edgar, he didn\'t think he would last that long. It would probably end up very similar to how his sparring with Gabriel ended. The only thing he wasn\'t worried about was dealing with Edgar\'s fire affinity.

He hadn\'t seen Kyle fight that much other than the occasional spar, and when he helped out the others, but he was apparently a good fighter too. The scariest one, at least to Julius, was Lily.

She had used her psychic abilities against him once, and he had not been able to do anything. She told him that it would change once he got to Tier 3. She didn\'t go into too much detail about why that mattered so much, but at the moment, he was completely at her mercy.

Even if he managed to fend off her mental attacks, she would probably just throw a blast of telekinesis at him. Maybe, it would be slightly different now that he was Tier 2, but he still believed that psychics like her were scary people.

Edgar and Aubrey were off to the side still discussing the fight, talking about what Aubrey could have done better or what she had observed in general. It was clear that she believed that she had lost that fight. Julius disagreed though, he would not consider that a win for him. Even if he came out on top of that last exchange, it wasn\'t like they were fighting as desperately as a real battle. Their first fight was the only time they fought with such intensity, since then it had been much more about learning from each other.

After they were done talking, Edgar came on over to him. He had a suspiciously large smile on his face, which put Julius on edge. He forgot to mention another thing about Edgar that reminded Julius of Gabriel. Both Edgar and Gabriel loved a good fight.

Before the large fourth year had the chance to speak, Julius already had a good guess about what he was planning to say or ask him.

"Hey, Julius, how about the two of us give it a go?" Edgar asked him, barely reigning in his enthusiasm.

Julius chuckled to himself. Called it. He thought to himself.

He didn\'t even bother answering the big guy and headed right over to the center of the room, activating a pair of silver bracelets. Edgar watched Julius\'s silent challenge and his smile got even larger, swiftly following behind Julius.

Before Julius began their fight, he wanted to heal the remnants of his fatigue. If he was going to fight Edgar he wanted to make sure he was in peak condition. So he activated [Pseudo-Phoenix Renewal] with a quick burst of mana.

However, that was when he noticed something was off.