Chương 31: Goldman’s Gym [2]

"You're more full of it than I thought if you challenged me to a duel, Adrian. Did you want to get your ass handed to you that badly?"

"As if dumbass. Someone like you'd only serve as a practice target for me."

After changing out of his uniform, Stella dragged Lucian to watch the duel.

While Lucian didn't particularly feel inclined to watch it, Stella thought it was a good experience for him to see a duel like this in person.

Perhaps Lucian might take inspiration from those two to better himself.

Realizing her intentions, Lucian sighed in defiance, but he couldn't overpower her even if he used his full strength, and ultimately decided to just comply with her demands.

After all, all he needed to do was just watch those two duke it out.

Taking a sip from the water bottle he brought with him, he emotionlessly stared at the two on the field, carefully making sure to hide the red substance that stuck to his teeth after drinking his 'water.'

"Me being a practise target? Big words for a dude who isn't even 6 feet," Ian responded with a smug tone.

"As long as I'm big where it counts, it doesn't matter to me. I don't think you can say the same, though. After all, I heard your girl left. You failed to 'satisfy her'"

Ian's face went beet red at Adrian's words.

The fact that his girlfriend dumped him right after their first date was a touchy subject, to say the least.

Unfortunately, no matter how hard he tried to cover up what happened, issues like these tend to spread quite quickly through word of mouth, letting everyone and their aunt know of his shame.

Impatient to begin, Ian glared at the person in charge of refereeing their match as if egging him on to start the duel.

The referee sighed and shook his head before raising his hand.

"The match will begin in 5 seconds. So, fighters, get ready!"

Adrian threw one last smug smile at Ian before his body began rapidly changing in real-time.

Ian's face turned a deeper shade of red as his face flushed with visible anger, but he two began to morph his body as the instructor started to count down.

"5"

Ian's transformation ended with him fully transforming into a furry creature with black beady eyes and a long snout.

His fingers appeared to have elongated and turned into sharp claws that looked as if they were strong enough to cut through metal.

"4"

On the other hand, Adrian's body below his waist was replaced with a long scaly tail, while his mouth grew a pair of fangs as long as his fingers.

A thin membrane of scaly skin seemed to cover his body like chainmail armour.

People with transformation-related abilities were quite common, with almost 25% of all ability users possessing one of these abilities.

While this was the case, most of them varied as to what they could transform into, and it was exceedingly rare for two non-related people to possess the same transformation ability.

Most people with transformation-related abilities can transform into human-animal hybrids of animals that would have been a common sight before the appearance of gates, such as dogs and cats.

Even rarer than those are people with pre-historic animal transformations, such as the ability to turn into dinosaurs.

Only one out of every 10,000 animal-transformation ability users can do this.

Above them are the legendary "myth embodiments" who can turn into hybrids of mythical beasts such as dragons and phoenixes. Still, these people are so rare that most people would go through their entire life without meeting anyone in this category.

"3"

Lucian's eyes shone with amusement as he watched the two finish their transformations.

"A snake and a mongoose… How fitting," Lucian muttered to himself with a smile.

Even in the past, the two were known to be natural enemies, constantly fighting each other to the death.

"2"

"A mongoose is known to survive the bite of a poisonous king cobra, so It looks like Ian has the advantage here."

Stella shook her head at Lucian's words.

"That may be the case, but Adrian typically puts in more work than Ian, which could theoretically bridge the gap between them.

"1"

Lucian nodded his head at the new insight he received.

"Basically, this fight can go both ways… That makes this more interesting."

"Start!"

As soon as the word left the referee's mouth, Adrian sucked in a lungful of air while Ian kicked off the ground and began barrelling straight for Adrian's chest.

Tilting his head down, Adrian exhaled deeply, causing a cloud of smoke to appear and cover up the stage.

Not paying attention to the surroundings, Ian continued on his trajectory, aiming straight for Ian's stomach.

"TAKE THIS, YOU BASTARD!"

Ian's lips curved as he imagined the beaten and bloody Adrian falling to his feet and begging him for mercy.

Not that he would let him off easy after the words he said earlier.

Upon reaching where he saw Adrian only moments prior, Ian took his clawed hand and prepared to stab it through Adrian's head as if trying to gouge out his eyes.

The referee was stronger enough to stop them from killing each other, so Ian didn't hold back.

While Ian had a certain degree of poison resistance in his transformed state, he didn't want to even give Adrian a chance to fight back.

While Adrian had covered his entire body in scales, it was obvious that his slit-shaped eyes would have been exempted from this.

Planning to capitalize on Adrian's glaring weakness, Ian naturally aimed at that exact location.

Ian's eyes widened in disbelief as his claws sank into where Adrian's head should have been.

"What? Where did he go?"

Instead of feeling Adrian's soft eyeballs get punctured by his sharp claws, all Ian could feel was his hand sail through the empty air.

Too preoccupied with where Adrian had disappeared, Ian neglected to notice the dark shadow looming over him from behind.

(CHOMP)

"AHHHHH!"

Ian writhed in pain as a pair of fangs sank into his right shoulder, injecting some substance into his body.

Ian's eyes turned slightly cloudy as his motions became slowed and exaggerated.

Stumbling to keep himself up straight, Ian bit his lip enough to draw blood and used the momentary clarity to throw a stab straight at Adrian's head, still injecting venom into his shoulder.

(Bang)

"COUGH"

Adrian coughed a mouthful of blood as some of the scales covering his cheeks were dented and punctured by Ian's claws.

However, without succumbing to the pain, Adrian turned his body and sent his tail straight at Ian's chest, causing him to fly backwards.

Due to the earlier poisoning, his senses were dulled to the point where he couldn't entirely dodge it, sending his body crashing into one of the nearby walls.

The referee walked up to Ian's body and nodded his head.

"Since competitor Ian cannot continue, the duel winner is Adrian!"