章 69: It’s Training Montage Time!
In a certain place on the outskirts of the Dark Forest that Bob seemed to regularly train at, this guy who recently grew some courage seemed to be on fire after I told him that he wasn't alone.
'The universe loves me!'
'Calm down, you have yet to save her yet.' Now I'm curious where he's getting all this confidence from.
'We WILL save her... together!' He seemed to emphasise those last words as he spoke.
'Together, huh? Even though you say that, have you even thought of a plan?' I pressed 'X' to doubt.
'The first stage of my plan is to understand our limits completely!' Oh, so he DID have a plan?
'Then what about afterwards?'
'The second stage of my plan is... wing it!'
'Excuse me?'
'Wing it!' He spoke with stars on his eyes.
...and here I thought he would be more careful.
'You should think of a better plan.'
'Thinking too much leads to hesitation. I would rather use what I have on hand as soon as I get it.'
'That is a plan for disaster... Fine. I will come up with something as soon as we are done.'
'Thanks~' I felt like I had been duped...
'So you have the Affinities of Wind, Death, Blood, Metal, and Wood. On top of those there is the unique Moon Affinity that probably only you posses in this world. For now, we shall control that first.'
From there, I started to teach him the ways of creating clones using Dark Arts. The collective consciousness of the world along with his own mental power was essential to master this.
'How do you create a clone?'
'Conjure some Moonlight Mana and I will show you the ropes.' He did as I instructed immediately.
In his hands swirled the Moonlight Mana he formed from transforming his Light Mana instinctively. This normally wouldn't do anything, but after I moved my consciousness into it, the Moonlight Mana transformed into the shape of my own figure.
"What did you think just happened?" The mouth of the 'clone' of myself moved as I looked at him. The facial expression and looks I had was no different from my 'real self', the clone only missing its colour.
"You became a clone."
"...Hey Sherlock, are you actually serious?"
"Damn straight." *Pah*
"What was that for?!" He held his head in pain after I gave him a good slap on his brainless skull.
"The right answer was I moved my consciousness into the Mana you moulded, turning it into a clone."
"How am I supposed to fight if my consciousness goes into a Shadow Clone?" He couldn't imagine this being useful in the midst of battle as the enemies protecting Dorothy's house might just take his actual body hostage if he 'moves out'.
"Do you still not understand?" I sighed...
"How do you think Dark Users make 'feints'?" This time I tried shifting his perspective of Dark Arts.
"They partially add their consciousness, I think."
"Good! Now try using it." It looks like he wasn't a complete moron as he grasped what I meant.
He closed his eyes and focused, then found that he was able to easily create a third 'shadow arm' growing out his shoulder, but after seeing that he got too invested in showing off, I forcibly erased the Shadow Arm by giving it a good strike.
"Now what are you doing?"
"Teaching you through experience. We will fight each other now, so do your best to adapt quickly."
"Wai-!" I didn't even give him time to deny this trial I was putting forward as experiencing how to use Moonlight Mana firsthand was a lot better than hearing it second had from another individual.
I myself was a Monster who worked by different rules than a Human anyway, so this was fine.
As I had expected, Bob didn't even need to think as he subconsciously relied on his Wind Affinity to dodge. Normally, with me being a 'Shadow Clone' that can only take a hit and him being much faster than me, I'd lose, but things did not go 'normally'.
"Ugh...!" Bob let out a breath as my entire arm extended like a snake and struck his stomach.
"That's cheating!"
"Having 'Arts' is cheating. All I'm doing is relying on my imagination. You should try doing that too~" A sly smile appeared on my face as there wasn't a need to worry about 'power' to retain this body once my true shadowy body superimposed it.
"Why do I feel like you're enjoying this...?"
"You shouldn't think like that. Didn't you say the universe loves you? Here are some of its love taps~ You can always give up if you're scared. I won't judge your cowardice if you go home like this."
"Can't you be a little gentler?"
"So manly~ Wanting a girl to be 'gentle'...!"
"That wasn't what I meant... Hah..." He gave up arguing at that moment and too some initiative.
All he needed to do was give a strong enough hit to dispel her clone. It was just one hit, how hard could that be? Of course, the reason he most likely thought this way was due to underestimation.
Who does he think I am? I might not have been the strongest martial artist of my time, but I was definitely not someone that could be beat up by such sloppy fighting techniques. Did he think being fast meant I wouldn't be able to see his attacks?
He advanced towards me with a pace that exceeded anything a swordsman who wasn't a Wind or Lightning Specialist would be capable of producing and threw out a fist. One that I easily caught and used as leverage to plant my knee firmly into his stomach. This time his entire face paled as he was sent flying back like a football.
I countered in a similar way a total of ten times before this guy figured he should also add feints of Dark Affinity into his attacks. Truly, he tapped into some 'amazing' power I couldn't comprehend.
Oh woe is me! How could I ever hope to win against a Darkwind Specialist with merely my ungodly martial arts and the ability to morph my body freely? He was just too damn strong!
Not! Now this was a riot, does he think he's smart enough to trick me with feints? I guess I could give him some credit when he slowly learned how to make his 'Shadow Arms' real over time, but praise would probably go to his head. I don't want him barrelling towards Dorothy to look for a fight before he had enough strength to properly fight her.
Time passed... One day, two days, three days, an entire month was spent training his 'Affinities'.
The entire place was turned into a mess... Broken trees, holes in the ground, no rock in sight since they had turned to dust, more broken trees that had become rotten, blood all over the place, there was probably every sort of collateral damage here!
"I can do this!" Bob's will was firm and strong like a mountain as a blood sword was held in his hand.
He no longer used his mana wastefully like he did before and approached me one step at a time with his feet rooted into the ground each step. The big difference between how he was when he started and how he was right now was massive!
Of course, if he thinks the tricks he thought of before would work on me now... then he's clearly dreaming. I'd trained him to fight like me, and with the link of our consciousness, he had picked up a lot of things without having to tell him, but that didn't mean he was catching up to me, the finish line got farther and farther as I 'grew' as well.
This wasn't merely training for him, but also good training for myself to understand the true nature of being a 'Monster'. Whether it was how to use the signature Body Reinforcement of Beasts or the spectacular 'Doom Blast' able to be used by particularly magic-orientated Beasts, I was also able to pick up on a few tricks to fighting myself.
"Hehehehe, give up! Fool! You shall be beaten down by my hands!" I made an evil smile.
Hmmm, did I just sound like a villain just now? Must be my imagination going wild. That can't be it...
We clashed once more with great ferocity! His blades made of blood seemed flexible and numerous as he manipulated his body using his Blood Affinity. Actually, I expected more from him as he seemed to revert back to doing straightforward charges a day ago. Has all the times I kicked him silly finally got to his head?
I was about to counter once again, but halfway through my action, I found that my legs were restricted by four arms coming out of the ground on their own. This gave him the chance he needed as he continued his cutting slice towards my neck.
He definitely felt some resistance as he beheaded me with that lucky slice. So THIS was the power of Moonlight Arts! It seems that his body wasn't the limit for where he could 'share' his consciousness.
"Looks like you beat me~" I laughed as I used that opportunity when he let his guard down sent him flying once again. He seemed like he eyes couldn't believe that I was able to 'survive' that attack.
"I definitely felt resistances!"
"You forget that my 'real body' is superimposed onto this Shadow Clone. So what if I'm injured? All I have to do is fill in the gap you made with my own Moon Mana. It's like being intangible except I'm nothing like a ghost." I shrugged my shoulders.
"But I finally beat you...!" He didn't know if he should be happy or not since it was just one hit.
"Wooow~ Aren't you a badass for being able to hit me after ONE MONTH. Should I give a medal?"
"You're too stingy about praise..."
"Fine." I sighed before trying to find the words I could use to praise him for his efforts this time.
"I guess it's time to dye and put on some hair gel because you're the new protagonist of this story!"
"What...? And wait, why would I need that? And is that supposed to be praise?" He lifted his brow.
"You can't be a main character without them." The protagonist is always defined by his hairstyle.
Being by the window and hair gel, that is the secret to success. Actually, I'm adding that to my plan now. We are going to save Madeline by going through a window! I feel it will increase our luck.
"Does this have anything to do with saving my daughter...?" He asked me suspiciously, or maybe this was his version of sarcasm. Either way, I would be embarrassed if I had to explain I was joking.
"You'll have more luck if you do it." Yeah, even though I won't be relying on luck. It's best to have a good amount of it in ANY situation. It's not like we'll be able to get anywhere close if we're unlucky.
Hmmm, I feel like I've forgotten something very important. Like someone who will definitely interfere with us if they came here, I wonder what it is? Ha, it's probably nothing major! Who in the world would be strong enough to endanger us?
Maybe it's Angelica Im worrying over. From what I could tell, these sisters had a stronger connection and greater strength than they let on. I wouldn't even be surprised if they turned out to be one of the ringleaders of Cerberus, the younger sister at least. As for Dorothy herself, such a psychotic character seems to unreliable to be a 'leader'.
Well, that's unless she's hiding something other than her Origin Shards. Despite all the training we went through, I still don't feel sure of actually being able to kill her due to the nature of the four different kind of powers she can tap into.
The Yang Attribute ignores physical damage and the Yin Attribute ignores magical damage. If these two sisters were to team up, would we be able to win? I'm not entirely certain of this right now.
However, my plans weren't so simple as just charging in there like Bob would. After he gave me the location of where she lived, I made a lot of preparations in this month with Lilith's help.
As long as nothing expected happens, we should be able to infiltrate Dorothy's house and silently bring away Bob's daughter. I only hope that once he sees her, he won't lose his temper and try killing Dorothy out of rage. That girl wasn't a good 'Mom'.
"I gotta buy some dye and gel today. We'll go save my daughter after we're done." I didn't expect the switch in Bob's attitude. Is he really going to do what I said? Now this... will be kinda interesting~
I guess we have some time for side action. I gotta give him a ninja makeover with this chance...
Long live Bob being a gullible dork!
クリエイターの想い 
FlowingWaves
FlowingWaves Sorry about the late update, I was writing Xianxia Amalgam System again except making the MC slightly crazy and fully unrestrained, plus Sakura Is Reincarnated on Mondays. Meaning if I don’t update on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, then it’s because I’m doing chapters of those stories.