Chapter 55: Ranked Adventurers (2) (1/2)
After a brief moment of surprise Agni regained her composure and swung her halberd as hard as possible, the sound of the blade cleaving the air was fearsome. Her goal was to sink the blade into the pale man's hip but he easily avoided the blow by hopping backwards with a few nimble movements.
Agni gritted her teeth as a wave of anger and disbelief began to overcome her.
*He almost took me out with one blow!* She thought to herself as a sense of realization set in. This was the power of a Rank 1 adventurer? In one short exchange she'd nearly been knocked out effortlessly and one of her foes hadn't even begun to show his skills yet.
”Interesting.” The dark skinned man named Glint said as he pulled a second dagger from his waist strap and walked towards Agni confidently. It was clear that he planned to engage her directly without regard for anything he'd seen her capable of. This much was apparent from the swagger he exuded as he gripped his blades and headed towards her.
Agni tried her best to focus on the man behind her, but with Glint pressuring her it was a lost cause. With this in mind she decided to be proactive and take the initiative. She got to her feet and dashed forward, timing the swing of her halberd to where Glint would be, almost impeccably. This didn't work however as Glint simply stepped forward by several strides and rolled his body, positioning both blades to cushion the impact of Agni's halberd shaft. With the momentum and power of her blow effectively nullified, Glint proceeded to attack.
His blows were blinding and difficult to predict, and because Agni was now in an awkward position she could do little to react. Glint smashed the round pommel of his daggers into Agni at will, striking her first in the solar plexus. The blow was enough to make her feel like doubling over and indeed her body reacted as such but Glint's next strike smashed her in the side of the neck causing her vision to flicker. He followed this up with several other blows, each lifting her feet from the ground slightly until she was being savaged like a hovering punching bag. Though the blows didn't deal a huge amount of damage on their own, due to the positioning and force behind the strikes Agni found it difficult to recover. As the blows lit into her she did the only thing she could think of, surge her mana wildly. She timed the attack with Glint's incoming blow, infusing it with the power of wind, the easiest to conjure and manipulate. The burst of energy traveled outwards from all directions, slicing at anything nearby -- including Agni's exposed arms and legs.
Though the blast was a last ditch effort to keep from being pummeled until unconscious, it seemed to be enough to force Glint to take a few steps backwards. He lifted his arms in a cross shaped guard as the winds tore into his leather bracers, ripping through them and spurting blood everywhere in the process.
”Tsk. This one's tougher than I gave her credit for.” Glint said through clenched teeth as he glared at Agni.
He'd purposely held back on the lethal blows, otherwise she'd be filled with gouging knife wounds at this point but it seemed he wouldn't be able to hold back *that* much. Without alerting Agni, Glint gave the signal to his partner, Ashe, the signal to attack. Their plan was to apply pressure from all angles, slowly sapping the strength of their target before knocking her out. It was a method they employed to great effect ever since their arrival some two years ago in Adventia.
That is, until they ran afoul of that man a few months ago. Glint dismissed the unpleasant thought from his mind and decided to focus on the battle instead. *Damn Specialists.* Glint thought to himself as he prepared for the next strike -- just in case the Succubus managed to evade Ashe's stealth attack once again.
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