Endric finally decided to do man up and moved towards Gustav’s position.
“Big brot… I mean Gustav, good to see you again. I hope you’re doing fine,” Endric finally uttered these words, but the atmosphere turned very awkward.
“Hmm? What is this supposed to be?” Gustav voiced out as his eyes dropped.
“I… Um… Just got back yesterday too so I decided to come say hi,” Endric laughed wryly as he tried to tone down the awkward atmosphere.
E.E and Aildris felt like facepalming from behind.
“Well, I can’t say I share the sentiment. Just try to stay out of trouble, kid,” Gustav sounded neither welcoming nor dismissive as he voiced out.
It was like he was in between with his response.
“I have a match to attend to,” Gustav stated before leaving.
Aildris and E.E followed from behind. E.E tapped Endric’s back twice as they arrived beside him.
“It wasn’t completely disastrous, but you can do better next time,” He whispered before walking faster to catch up with Gustav.
p-a- n-d-a-n-0-v-e-l、(c)om Endric stood in place for a while with a wry smile plastered on his face.
‘He exudes the presence of the outworldly… He is the one we’ve been looking for,’
A voice resounded in the very depths of Endric’s mind causing his face to undergo a brief display of astonishment.
‘Are you sure?’ Endric asked again just for confirmation.
‘There is no doubt about it. If you had my abilities you would be able to sense it too… The presence gives off a powerful energy of fate, it feels choking,’ The voice replied.
‘Then, I have to find a way to speak to him,’ Endric said internally.
He recalled that a few moments ago, Gustav mentioned having a match. Endric didn’t know what that was all about, so he decided to head in the direction Gustav left in.
-“How do you think the duel will end?”
-“Gustav is clearly overestimating himself, these are final year cadets,”
-“Hey, did you hear? The final-year cadet Gustav is going against, Rufai Adams, who once battled a group of Halads and managed to hold out his own till backup arrived,”
-“Wow, that’s awesome, but I’m sure Gustav feats don’t pale in comparison, escaping an entire group of MBO officers and some of them happened to be Kilo ranked,”
From the discussions and debates Endric heard all over the place, he figured that Gustav was battling against a final year cadet.
This also came as a surprise to him as he thought Gustav would be fighting a peer.
‘I would like to witness his prowess,’ The voice of the gem once more resounded in Endric’s mind.
‘Me too… I’m sure he has improved a lot during these past months… It’s been eleven months since I last set my eyes on him,’ Endric responded internally.
Everyone was headed towards the location of the duel at this point.
–
In an icy area, pointy iced rocks could be seen positioned in different corners. The ground was rock solid even though it was all ice. It felt like a train could land on the ice, and it wouldn’t even manage to make a dent.
In the center of this icy vicinity, Gustav stood several ten feet away from a cadet with brown skin and multicolored glowing hair.
This was kind of similar to Aildris’s eyes, which had all the colors practically in the world within, but instead, this cadet had it on his hair, and it glowed brightly.
He was literally like a standing beacon of lights.
This cadet was Rufai Michael, who Gustav would be facing today, and this was their battle location. A training officer who was going to supervise the duel was standing in their middle, stating the rules of the match.
The cadets who had come to witness this were standing a considerable distance away from the two.
The training officer moved away from there a few seconds later, and a massive barrier was formed around the battle area.
It was necessary to create a strong barrier since these were two Echo ranked Mixedbloods going against each other. The strength scale of Echo ranked Mixedbloods was quite high that even the government forbade public fights or an overly display of strength since they were capable of causing destruction on a large scale.
“Begin!”
The training officer voiced out after the barrier had been erected.
“Gustav, finally, we meet. It’s an honor to battle you,” Rufai Adams voiced out respectfully as he took a stance.
‘Oh, I guess he’s not like the others who were looking to humiliate me with this,’ Gustav was a bit taken aback by the respectfulness.
It turned out Rufai just wanted to battle with Gustav out of intrigue.
“Please, do not hold back against me,” Rufai smiled as he charged forward.
“Hnm, I won’t,” Gustav nodded as he also charged forward.
Both of them clashed in nearly an instant, causing shockwaves to spread from the point of impact.
Boom!
The strong icy ground cracked and blasted into chunks that scattered across the place as Rufai was pushed back by over a hundred feet.
He did a flip in mid-air as his figure was sent flying backward before landing several hundred feet away and sliding backward.
He hadn’t expected Gustav’s strength to be so colossal without even channeling his bloodline.
He had barely stabilized himself when Gustav appeared in his front once more with his right fist flying towards his face.
Trrrrinnnnn~
Rufai’s hair glowed brighter than before as spectrums of light appeared in front of Gustav, blinding his view.
Bang!
He felt his fist slammed into a solid frame, but he knew it wasn’t a person. As the brightness died down, he noticed he punched a solidified glass frame that seemed to have come out of nowhere.
Rufai had appeared at his back at this moment with both his palms glowing with intensity as he swung them towards Gustav’s back.
Rays of light looking like lasers in disco parties appeared all across the place, encompassing Gustav from all directions.
