Chapter 22:

Vinci x Headmaster Ember (2)

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“Khh….this young body is really hard to coordinate...now I screwed up and can’t even move, tsk...This old lady...she’s quite strong huh...”

Vinci could only helplessly think to himself as the magical crests on his chest quickly layered on top of each other. Because of his body underwent changes whenever he was transported to a new Sphere, it was difficult for him to adjust to his new body proportion. Especially if he was only in his new body for barely a few weeks. And ironically, as a veteran fighter, he had made the amateur mistake of relying too much on his physical strength rather than resorting to his magic abilities. He had underestimated his enemy. This could possibly be due to the fact that his victories on the other planets have dulled his battle sense a tiny bit, even if it was only for a moment.

As Vinci glanced at the magical layers, judging by the different crest colors, he surmised that there were around eight of them.

“I’m sorry, boya. But this is the end. As this is a duel for the headmaster’s position, the normal school rules won’t apply. If you die from this….I pray you will be wiser choosing your opponent in your next life.”

The headmaster gave him a dim smile as she focused all the energy into her palm. The air around the two began to swirl as the pressure became heavy.

“Hmph!”, the headmaster let out a quiet grunt as she forced her palm into his chest.

*KAA-BOOOM!!!!*

The eight layers of magical crests flared as they burst into Vinci. As he was immobilized, his body was easily blew away several meters back before crashing into the wall. But it did not stop there. The eight magic spells coupled with a Spiritual Rank’s SP energy forced Vinci’s body through the school itself before erupting out of the opposite end of the school and roaring continuing through into one of the Colosseums. Only then did Vinci’s tattered body lay motionless on the Training ground.

Like a ghost, the headmaster at once floated down a few feet away from Vinci’s body. She easily covered the distance in a moment’s notice and arrived on the ground where the boy had fallen.

“With this...it’s over huh...well, I have to say he did an astounding job being able to reach me. But I guess this is the limit of a child huh...if only he were to mature a few more years…but ahh, it’s a shame that he must have died just now from my attack...I got too excited, aiyaa…”

The headmaster quietly thought as she shook her head in dismay. Just how long would a powerful talent like Vinci appear again? In a hundred? Thousand? Never? There was no telling.

As headmaster Ember turned to leave while thinking of leaving the clean up to the teachers laters, she suddenly felt an intense chill that caused her body to involuntarily tremble.

She quickly turned around. What she saw caused her eyes to widen as her complexion slightly paled. Laying on the ground face down was Vinci, but now there was an overly dark aura being emitted from him. The pressure coming from the boy,who was supposed to be dead, was terrifyingly heavy. The elder felt like she was being suffocated alive. It was a feeling that was a thousand times worse than any of the times she felt from the child. If the aura the boy had displayed before had surpassed the headmaster’s and caused her to feel ‘pressured’, then this time the atmosphere was one that had exceeded the limit of what the elder could withstand. Her body was not helplessly trembling as she stared at the fallen boy.

Slowly, she noticed a twitching from the body.

“K-kh...please...don’t get up…”

Headmaster Ember panicky thought in her head as she watched Vinci first raise his right arm to support his body before slowing rising from the ground. He was like an un-dead, slightly swaying around as his head tilted backwards, his wavy covering his eyes. But the elder could see a dim, but surely, bead of blood-red light from underneath the masses of tangled hair.

And then the next thing that happened, made Ember hold her breath as she watched in awe.

As Vinci tilted his head back for a few moments, his hair suddenly fluttered backwards as it flashed from nightmarish black to snowy white. At the same time, a new wave aura burst forth from Vinci’s body as it washed over the headmaster. She was sweating now as she took the wave of pressure at its fullest. It was even stronger and more monstrous than the previous suffocating one she had felt. For a second, she literally could not breath at all. And she was only able to catch her breath when the pressure lighten up.

“Ack! *cough!* *cough!*...t-this…this child cannot possibly be human!”

Ember stammered as she watched the boy slowly lowered his head and faced her.

As Vinci faced the elder, his eyes now were like the ageless winter, an extreme coldness that only lightly let off steamy mists of murderous intent. Under his breath, he began to whisper at an expeditious rate,

“ «Chaotic Bolts» “ [Mid-tier Rank]

“ «Spears of Time» “ [High-tier Rank]

“ «Shadow Flame» “ [Mid-tier Rank]

“ «Aesir’s Wrath» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Odin’s Lightning» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Demon Lord’s Last Slash» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Thor’s Hammer» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Mystic Shower» “ [High-tier Rank]

“ «Death's Knocking» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Eight Gates’ Tirade» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Dance of a Million Shatter» “ [High-tier Rank]

“ «Ice Rapture» “ [Mid-tier Rank]

“ «Yuusha’s Last Slash» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Hex Judgement» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Orb of Void» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Phoenix's Storm» “ [High-tier Rank]

“ «Ares’ Rage» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Royal Break» “ [Grand-tier Rank]

“ «Lunar Skewers» “ [Mid-tier Rank]

“ «Crimson Waves» “ [Mid-tier Rank]

Several magical crests began to appear around Vinci as they covered the sky, the ground, and even in the mid-air itself between the elder and himself.

“?!...h-how can this be!! Boy...a-are you even human?!”

The headmaster could only sputter as she glanced at the magical crests flashing around her in horror. The boy had cast twenty magical spells at once, easily shattering the world record of multi casting ten magic spells at once. And the child had did it with relative ease, making the latter world genius pale in comparison.

But this was not the time to remain stupefied. Sensing the incredible amount of SP in in each of the magical insignia, Ember realized that if she does not properly defend against them she would most definitely die.

With a swift movement, she tried to leap back out of the Colosseum to avoid the magic attacks, but she was a step too late. Without warning, all the magical crests fired at once towards her. Icicles of deadly cold, fiery flames, draining darkness, space rippling beams, and piercing lights flew at her in a flurry of dancing luminosity. The ground around her rumbled as it crumbled and eight black colored eights rose around the colosseum. A Grand-tier Rank sealing spell, «Eight Gates’ Tirade», which has the absolute ability to prevent anything and everything from escaping within its confinement. The headmaster was trapped within the blazing attacks. Trapped...within the cage of a monster.

“K-kh!...I have to defend now!!”

The elder anxiously raised both her trembling palms in front of her as she gritted her teeth to endure the monstrous pressure from Vinci.

“ O’ a-ancient gods above, offer me y-your almighty protection, «Panacea»!”

As headmaster Ember finished her incantation, a bright golden light enveloped her entire body.

She had just cast a Transcendent-Rank magic spell.

For many practitioners, being able to use a Transcendent Rank magic is almost impossible, but since Ember is one of the very few who’ve reached the ranks of Spiritual she was able utilize this spell.

But more than that, Transcendent Rank magics are rarely seen so not many people know of them, much less being able to learn one even.

And «Panacea» happened to be one of only three Transcendent Rank spells Ember was able to discover throughout her entire life journey. And it took her tens of years to master each of of the godly spells.

Although each Transcendent Rank spell’s power is colossal, it takes an equally gargantuan amount of SP energy to use. Simply using one would instantly drain Ember of her abundant energy tank even as a Spiritual Rank. Thus, she tend not to use it as she would be automatically unable to fight after a single Transcendent Rank spell.

But at that moment, she could not hesitate any longer as the elder realized that she was unable to avoid any of the oncoming attacks. There were simply too many of them, and each of the spell had a great magnitude of power stored within to potentially deal a fatal blow to her. So, she employed one of the top protection spells from her ‘bag of tricks.’

*BOOM! BOOM! KRASH!! KSHH!! ZZZT! BOOM!*

Explosions and dancing dusts erupted around the Colosseum as everything crumbled and shattered like glass. As each magic attack landed on headmaster Ember’s body, it was instantly negated no matter the size or power. She was safe within the flimsy glow of golden light covering her body. The spell was truly worthy of the rank Transcendent as none of Vinci’s magical attacks even scratched the elder’s body. Not even the Grand-tier spells affected her.

But alas, because of the massive drainage that follows upon constant activation of the almighty spell, the headmaster’s SP tank was quickly used up. Slowly, but surely, the golden light began to fade away within the bombardment of the magic blasts.

“Ah…”

The headmaster could only quietly gasp as the golden light completely disappeared. There was a slight pause as the elder stood there stunned before shortly after her whole figure was engulfed under a rain of sorcerous assaults.

*BOOM!*

After a while, Vinci released the spells as they all quickly dissolved. He slowly approached the spot where the headmaster was last seen before being covered under his attacks.

As he arrived before the headmaster, Vinci saw that the elder’s body was completely torn up. Legs are sprawl around the hair, tattered arms lay twisted at grotesque angles, organs and intestines splattered on broken ground, shattered bones, and melted skin laid glittering in the red sun. It was surrealistic sight to behold. But Vinci paid no heed to the wreckage before him. He was waiting for something.

Before long, a black box flashed in front of him. Seeing it, Vinci faintly smiled but soon a regretful expression replaced his usual look as he read the texts.

[box border=2 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=3 width=140% bordercolor=#232323 bgcolor=#232323]You have killed the Headmaster. Due to this, you are unable to receive the title of Headmaster.[/box]

The screen flickered briefly before a new text box appeared afterwards.

[box border=2 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=3 width=140% bordercolor=#232323 bgcolor=#232323]The headmaster may be restored back to Life to complete the mission for the price of... (-10% Progress). If not, you will automatically forfeit the Event..[/box]

[box border=2 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=3 width=140% bordercolor=#232323 bgcolor=#232323]Revive the Headmaster?:

Yes | No[/box]

“Ahh...this function..”

Vinci thought in his head as he looked at the screen with a complicated expression. This was one of the many other functions incorporated in True System. Since many times when Vinci did [Events] on the other worlds, there were moments like this where he would actually kill or break the required [Event] element. During that time, the True System would appear to notify him of his mistake, but it would always give him a chance to restore the item in order to complete the [Event]...at the price of severely decreasing his Progress percentage, of course.

And this time, Vinci had went overboard and forgot about keeping the headmaster alive in order to receive his title. After all, the headmaster may kill him and nothing will happen, but if Vinci kills her then he would be unable to get an official approval of the title ‘headmaster.’

“Dammit...I guess I’ll have to suffer some losses this time…”

Vinci grumbled as he raised his hand to select a button.

The black screen flickered and a new message appeared.

[The Headmaster will be restored now. Please wait…]

Suddenly, an eerie black light surged from the ground, where the pile of the headmaster’s corpse was, as the broken parts slowly submerged into the shadowy pool...