章節 27: Precision And More Training

It was a noise that filled everyone's ears, a signal of the incoming end. But the finale was opposite from what they expected. As all the onlookers saw was Leopold's fists bursting. His bones cracked and split, partly breaking through his skin. Blood was flowing down his hands endlessly. No one had expected an outcome like that.

Beta didn't seem to take notice of it as he quickly followed up with another attack, planning to finish off his opponent.

"O-oi! I give up!", Leopold screamed.

With that, the staff halted a few centimeters away from his rib cage. Relief was written all over Leopold's face, glad that he didn't excrete something he shouldn't. A teacher was already running towards them. When he arrived, he looked at Beta and Leopold calmly.

"What happened?"

"We had a duel.", Leopold answered while gritting his teeth.

The teacher then looked at Beta and said, "Who are you? Why did you have to go this far? It will take a few months before his hands will be completely healed."

"I'm Beta from class 1-S. If I had not done this, it would've taken more effort to beat him. Also, he was the one who wanted the duel. If I don't let him suffer for a while, people will keep pestering me with duels and I just don't have enough time to play around like that.", Beta said without batting an eye.

When others heard his words, they were conflicted. It's true that he would not be challenged as much from now on, but still, why did he go that far? In a few months, Leopold will be perfectly fine and probably challenge him again. At that time, he surely wouldn't hold back his soulpower. Did Beta actually think he could do what others did for a year within a few short months? How daring!

"You are an interesting kid. Whatever. Since Leopold was the one to initiate the duel, I won't make things difficult for you. But, I also won't stop him from taking his revenge in the future.", said the teacher, obviously siding with Leopold.

"That's enough for me.", Beta said to the teacher. He then turned around to Leopold and continued;

"I hope we will meet again."

When Leopold heard Beta say that, he couldn't help but shudder. To him, it felt like he was looking at a butcher who looked at the parts of his body that were the most delicious.

"Are you a cannibal?!", is what Leopold wanted to say. But he didn't dare to in the end, afraid he guessed it right.

"Show me your hands.", said the teacher, interrupting Leopold's thoughts.

The teacher looked at Leopold's hands seriously and emitted a bright blue light from his own hands. The blue light formed into water, which slowly covered Leopold's hands. It didn't take long for him to feel a cool sensation caressing his hands. It alleviated his pain and sunk into his skin. Soon, the bleeding stopped and the torn flesh mended.

Every single one of the freshmen who saw this was astounded. Is that the power of a water elementalist? As expected of a wonderful element! After seeing this, everyone wanted to have a water element in their squad. But would that be possible? For most, not. Exactly because they are desired so much, they had the privilege of having to choose their preferred squad. So, all the weaker squads would have to rely on themselves and advance slower than those who were fortunate to have one. That was only a problem at the beginning though. At a certain point, the wood elementalists would be able to heal as well. They will be able to create herbs that can emit spores which accelerate regeneration. Of course, these plants can also be used to concoct medicine but that would require time, an alchemist, and a doctor, who knew how to use it.

Beta looked at the whole process as well and swore in his heart that he would find a way to heal himself with his own powers. He then left the avenue, ignoring whatever else happened after that, and headed to the dorms with Brian.

"How did you do it? His fists were always able to block your staff until that point, so why did his hand suddenly burst?", Brian asked in a curious tone. He went over the battle in his head over and over again and just couldn't find the reason.

"It's simple. I attacked the same spot over and over again. He has hard bones so at the beginning I was only able to create cracks of a hair's breadth. But as the fight continued, I just widened these cracks.", Beta answered, making sure that Brian understood it.

Brian was stunned.

"So, you didn't aim for his body at all and instead focused on his hands that would block your staff anyway? And you even managed to hit the same spot every time? You've got some scary precision..."

"Never underestimate precision. Brute strength won't bring you any benefits if you can't handle the power. You need to be able to hit wherever you want to hit, even if it's the tip of a hair. If you ever encounter a monster whose weak point is as small as a hair, you will need to be able to take advantage of it. If not, then you might endanger yourself or someone important to you.", Beta explained carefully.

The more Brian heard his explanation, the more his face changed. He felt like he was listening to a wise old master teaching him a lesson. He felt enlightened. He didn't want to lose anyone just because he was too negligent with increasing his precision. What he didn't know was that Beta himself realized something as well. He neglected his body. This fight was much harder than it could have been. Because of the awesome sensation he felt of having soulpower, he neglected his body training. He only trained it to get into the shadow world and neglected it completely after that. Additionally, his body has become weak and deteriorated.

He used to have a very strong body, but over hundreds of years that passed, his body wasn't much different from a dead one, even with all the training he went through. He would still be able to increase his strength but the starting point compared to others is just way too different. If simple training wouldn't do, he only needed to get a better starting point. How? By taking it from others of course. He didn't undergo any body parts upgrade ever since he woke up, so he decided it was finally time to put his skills in action.

"Good thing I noticed before anything happened. Still, this is a fatal mistake. It cannot happen again. Looks like I'll have to sacrifice some sleep in order to improve my body. Also...", Beta mumbled up to this part, making Brian unable to hear anything he said. But Beta suddenly raised his voice.

"Brian, I need you to acquire some information for me. Find out if there are any young talents with natural inborn strength or any other kind of peculiar body."

"Sure. What do you need it for though?", Brian said with raised eyebrows.

Beta just answered with a smile and then entered his room in the dorm.

"Sometimes, he is a bit weird.", Brian thought while scratching his head.

Beta didn't know his dear friend thought this way and neither did he care. Being a bit weird is perfectly fine, isn't it? He sat down on his bed with crossed legs and entered a serene state of mind.

"Fortunately, Death's Soul came with a method to enter the shadow world, otherwise things might be hard now... Wait... Why exactly am I still calling it shadow world? There's not a tiny bit of shadow in there... I'll just call it the void world for now since it's more fitting." Beta's plan was to increase his soulpower and for that, he had to go to the void world.

He slowed his breath and rotated his soulpower in a strange way, letting it pulsate in a certain rhythm. This was something that was only possible if you had both, the element of death and void. He felt his body becoming lighter and opened his eyes. There he was, as simple as that. He floated into the direction of the soul river and arrived there shortly. He then looked at the river from up close and thought of his cultivation technique, a crazy smile started forming in his head.

"Hmm... This will be interesting. If I won't try it, I won't know if it works. Here goes nothing..."

He wasn't scared, instead, he was a bit excited. He moved closer to the river and felt the souls looking at him again. He then slowly entered. Unlike the souls, he didn't follow the stream. He resisted it. He let all these souls, no matter if they were powerful or not, hit his body and sliding along it. At the same time, he guided his soulpower in his veins according to the path of his cultivation technique.

The souls could only look at Beta before, but ever since he went in the river, they were now even more interested in him. They tried resisting the river's flow, grabbing Beta. But the flow was too strong for them to stay still in one place like him. It forced them to continue going with the flow but since they're grabbing unto him, the souls started to tear on Beta's soul instead. The more they clung, the more he suffered. A pain no one even dared to imagine filled his mind. It felt like someone tore his body into small shreds and left a gaping hole. But that hole was quickly filled up. The souls that ripped something out of him didn't just rob him. They left a part of their power with him, slowly but steadily strengthening him.