The blood dyed sword glistened under the dark sky, illuminated by the faint silvery gleam that pierced through the thick canopy of the forest. The frail girl lay twitching upon the ground with a devious slash wound on the back that poured out trickles of blood onto the luscious grass. Water gushed out like a stream from within the bandit's red eyes that resembled hot and scalding crimson orbs. A deep frown lay plastered upon his face as he furiously rubbed them under burning pain.

shudder!

Such a vivid image brought the zombie-like Legas out of his trance in an instant with a vigorous flinch. The condition of his sister who almost lay on the verge of death sent blades of sorrow stabbing deep into the boy's heart. Tears rolled down his cheeks, the emotional trauma being so heavy, it wiped out any agonizing physical pain that had bored like needles into his mind.

Let go!

'No.'

Let go of your thoughts! Be free!

'No!'

Strange voices pounded the boy's head like the whispers of a devil, as Legas found his hard-earned final strand of consciousness submerge into the quicksand of darkness. He resisted. Legas resisted hard, trying his best not to lose himself.

It was scary, to be desperately warned by one's intuition. The boy had a gut feeling, that if he ever loses this mental tug of war, by the time he would come back to his senses, everything would have been concluded. He didn't want that. Legas strove to see through the end of all with his own eyes.

Glancing at the figure of the bandit vigorously rubbing his face, the tragic and unstable emotions within the boy's mind turned into one of insatiable wrath. His body trembled. It was as if each one of his cells couldn't stand the very sight of the human figure in the distance.

"grrrr..." a menacing growl escaped Legas' throat, as he clutched the steel sword in one hand and the short dagger in the other with a vice-like grip that turned his knuckles pale white, before...

"I"LL KILL YOU!" bolting towards the bandit like an unstoppable arrow.

With his senses being distracted under the shearing pain, the bandit had not noticed the arrival of another presence. The abrupt shout made him flinch in fear due to the prickly feeling that was conveyed under the immense murderous intent. The man displayed an expression of shock and confusion glancing at the small figure charging at him like a bloodthirsty beast.

"What! How are you here!"

But it didn't take long for the veteran fighter to immediately switch his state of mind and the brute entered into a battle stance as he brought forth his sword, ready to meet the boy's charge head-on.

"Haaaah!"

slash!

Legas pounced forwards with a beast like jump before swinging down the steel sword that traced a perfect circle in the air. The bandit patiently moved his weapon, countering the obvious strike with a casual block.

ding!

"Ughh! He-Heavy!" the man groaned with a numbed wrist, the sword slash far exceeding his expectations.

Reddish aura covered the bandit's weapon in that instant, swiftly redirecting the fierce momentum to the ground as he parried the strike. Right in the next moment, just before the brute could prepare to deliver a counter, the hair on his neck stood on their ends for a second as he noticed the pointy end of a dagger closing in on his forehead.

swish!

The short blade whizzed past the man's head as he barely tilted his neck to dodge the sudden and accurate thrust. Not failing to take action this time, the bandit planted a vicious front kick at the boy's guts before he jumped back with the recoil, widening the distance between them.

Legas flew back a few meters sliding atop the ground and the blow upon the stomach had flared up the vicious bruise. But the boy appeared to ignore any of the pain as he growled with fury, a crazed look visible within his pitch-black pupils.

'What the hell is this!'

The bandit's expression of shock only deepened after the brief encounter. It was just a matter of a few dozen minutes before when the boy had struggled, using all sorts of tricks and traps to barely escape their clutches back in the village. Additionally, compared to then, his current physique appeared to be in no state whatsoever to display such aggressiveness.

Just the dark bluish patch atop his abdominal muscles spoke volumes about the crippling pain Legas should have felt from simply moving his upper body, let alone performing crazy mid-air maneuvers. Moreover, a severe amount of blood incessantly flowed down his head, dying the boy's entire face a dreadful red.

'Just what is this...change!'

To confirm his suspicions, the brute dashed forwards with a wide haymaker aiming to cleave the boy in two.

swish!

Legas had also charged right away, diving headfirst into the terrific slash. An eerie sense of déjà vu assaulted the bandit as the current scene stood to be an exact replay of the one that happened at the back of the hunter's house. The only difference being,

swish! pssh!

Not only did the young hunter dodged the strike with perfection, rolling on the ground as the sword tore through the air above, but Legas also managed to land in a clean slash at the bandit's calves with the old dagger before he continued behind the man's back, halting at a distance.

"Uggh!" the brute groaned in pain. His face had further distorted in an expression of disbelief with his pupils widening to the extreme as he gazed at the bloodied young figure.

"You!" he screamed at the next instance. "How are you using Aura all of a sudden!" the man appeared flabbergasted at his own words but the unbelievable truth lay right in front.

Milky white mists of aura emerged from within the boy's physique, almost invisible to the naked eye. Such is the case for any person who is a novice when it comes to the said technique. As the user gets experienced in handling the skill, the aura's quality changes, getting more vivid and powerful. Right now, Legas was at the initial stages of utilizing this power.

A glisten of seriousness flashed past the bandit's eye in the next instant. Now that they somewhat stood on equal grounds, he did not dare underestimate the boy any further. A single error could cost him his life, and with that resolve, reddish aura churned out from within that suppressed the burning pain in the brute's eyes as he lowered his waist, entering into a battle stance.

As a response to the bandit's sturdy guard, Legas dashed forwards with an explosive lunge, inciting a heart-stopping death duel.

swish! swish! swish! Clang! Clang! Clang!

The intense sounds of sword clashes echoed among the still and silent vegetation. Legas fought like a nimble rabbit, constantly attacking from different directions with amazing agility. The bandit did not dare be careless, either blocking or skillfully parrying the boy's heavy strikes while he occasionally slipped counters in between.

Both the fighters piled up a number of flesh wounds during the intense battle, with the bandit surprisingly being more often at the receiving end. However, despite being pushed back in almost every encounter, the man's face gradually relaxed as the fight continued.

Clang! poof! CLANG!!

Legas deflected a heavy sword swing from above his head before he planted a ferocious sidekick to the guts, pushing back the bandit for a few feet. The boy instantly gave chase, swinging down his sword with an aim to rip apart the brutish body. The bandit blocked the mighty strike with his sword as the sheer force of the collision vibrated the entire physique of the two combatants.

Just as when the boy was about to follow up with the dagger, he found himself stumbling forwards in a loss of balance. Glancing ahead, the bandit had already retracted his sword to the back, just an instant after blocking the strike. The boy could only see a massive fist, almost equal to the size of his head closing in as it tore through the air before he could even regain his stature.

Bang! pssh!

Two attacks simultaneously landed over their respective targets, for Legas had sliced the man's torso with his dagger, splattering a good amount of blood on the ground before he flew away like a bullet with a mangled face.

Boom!

The boy's body broke through a number of trees and shrubs, later impacting against a giant trunk with a loud thud! Legas coughed up a mouthful of blood under sheer agony and just before he could steady himself to hop onto his feet...

stab! pssh!

A sword thrust drilled into the flesh just beneath the collarbone, all the way into the thick bark behind his back, essentially nailing the boy to the tree trunk.

"AAHHHHHH!!" Legas screamed. His battered body was in no state to move any further after being pinned to the wood. The severe concussion felt as if his head had cracked open like a walnut while the immense blood loss multiplied the wave of dizziness.

"Even if you can use aura now, you are still a greenhorn in terms of real fighting," the bandit said. A deep crevice could be seen atop his bare body, running from his right chest, halfway onto his muscular abs.

"Dodges, parries, blocks, footwork, feints...it goes on and on," he spoke with a smug face and a proud look within the eyes. "A close combat fight is far more complex, yet equally simple. Just because you have heightened physical abilities, doesn't mean you can cover the wide gap in our experiences."

"It's quite a pity though. You do have some serious talent and...!!"

Just as the bandit went on rambling his mouth, Legas threw something from within his pockets that caught the man off guard. He hurriedly brought forth the steel weapon to block the projectile, but very soon the man realized that he had been tricked, a second time in fact, as the object exploded into a mist of reddish powder upon colliding with the sword.

"ARGHHH!"

"Fuck...you," Legas squeezed out the words as he watched the bandit cover his eyes in agony. It was a pouch of spice powder, generally used to agitate and blind the stronger monsters.

"*cough* *cough* You fuckin brat! I'll let you experience pain worse than death!"

The man's eyes burned as if fiery molten lava had been poured upon it. Water wouldn't stop gushing out like a fountain that essentially declined his entire sense of vision. He had even inhaled some of the burning powder that flared up the nose with a scorching itch, inciting a trickle of watery mucus from within.

A wave of fury flooded the bandit's temper as his face distorted to the extreme. He wanted to skin alive the little devil but the unsaid rules of banditry refrained his anger. Picking up his teammate's weapon from beside, the man clutched out the boy's arm with a hard tug.

With a sinister smile lacing his hideous visage, the bandit swung down the aura coated sword at the boy's outstretched hand in an attempt to completely sever the hateful limb.

swish!