A Contest Of Strength VI

"A warning beforehand, I won't be going easy on you so you better give it your all," Ammine told him. Her fists flared up with magic and she charged at Kies without even giving him time to prepare. He dodged the first few strikes and jumped back when she punched downwards, smashing the ground and sending dust and rock flying everywhere.

Kies shot three jets of wind in rapid succession at Ammine and then rushed towards her while chanting Wind Shell. Ammine parried all three wind jets with her hand and dropped down to her knee. She accelerated like a bullet into Kies who luckily managed to get his Wind Shell up just in time as she crashed into him. The impact sent him sliding across the dirt a couple of feet. From just that attack, Kies felt his Wind Shell weaken drastically. He began to pour magic into the shell but Ammine didn't let him do so and attacked him again.

The Wind Shell exploded into a shockwave of wind that pushed both her and Kies back away from each other.

"Hey, watch it!" yelled a voice from behind Kies. He turned back and saw that he was really close to the spectators in the crowd and that they had been hit by his winds as well.

"Sorry," Kies apologized to the demons and quickly moved deeper into the ring where the attacks were less likely to reach them.

"What are you doing!? Your back is open!" Ammine shouted as she closed the gap between her and Kies in an instant again and threw her fist out, aiming at his back. Kies turned around and tried blocking the blow with his arms but the force was too much for him and broke his guard. Kies was sent flying back through the air but somehow managed to do a backflip and land on his feet.

Kies heard a cheer go off in the crowd and looked around. The demons were all rooting for Ammine. "Pay attention!" Ammine punched Kies again and he stumbled backward. "Is there something wrong? Why are you looking around like that?" Ammine didn't know why Kies was so distracted by everything.

Kies shook his head. He didn't know why he was so distracted either, but he was ready now. "Sorry about that. I'm good now." Kies chanted Wind's Blessing as fast as he could and ran towards Ammine.

Ammine didn't expect Kies' speed to be so fast and was completely caught off guard by it. Kies managed to dash to her left and hit her point-blank range with a blast of wind. Unfortunately, it didn't any more than push her back a little. "You will need to do better than that!" Ammine kicked Kies in the gut and knocked him onto the floor. Without thinking, Kies rolled to the side just in time as Ammine's foot came down on that spot where he just was and jumped back up on his feet.

Kies wasn't going to win using chantless magic. He needed to use the spells that Haro taught him but that would be difficult because Ammine wasn't going to give him time for the incantations. In the fight between Reepmn and Allal just a few moments ago, the two of them both were able to use spells just by shouting their names. What was it that Haro had told him before? Once one has enough experience with a spell, they could cast it just by saying the name of the spell, and once they master it, they could use it just by thinking of it. Kies felt that he had enough experience in using the spells that Haro taught him and decided to give it a go.

"Wind Jet!" Kies tried casting Wind Javelin by calling out its name instead of saying the entire chant. He felt a bit of wind gather in his palms and shot it at Ammine. What he did not expect was how little force the winds were shot with. The Wind Javelin was so weak that Kies doubted it wouldn't even be able to blow the seeds off a dandelion let alone do any actual damage.

A light breeze hit Ammine's face, blowing her hair back a little. "What was that?" Ammine brushed her hair with her hand, pulling the strands back to their original places. "Were you trying to cast a spell by calling on its name?"

"Yes?"

"You need a lot more practice before you can do that. I suggest against it for now. Instead, why don't you try chanting while moving around at the same time," Ammine suggested. "Most mages learn to do that before they learn how to do what you were just trying to do."

"I already am doing that, but it's still too slow."

"Then I don't know, just chant faster I guess." Ammine cracked her knuckles and said, "Anyway, enough talk, the crowd's getting unhappy."

The crowd was yelling at them to stop talking and fight. Kies took a deep breath and said, "I'm ready."

Before Kies could react, Ammine was already in front of him again and punched him in the gut. Kies slid back, somehow keeping his balance. He started running diagonally to Ammine while shooting blasts of wind at her but none of them hit. Ammine dodged them all seemingly without effort and ran at him. Kies quickly changed directions just in time to dodge Ammine as she flashed by right in front of him. Even though he had Wind's Blessing still active, he was nowhere close to her speed. Since he wasn't going to beat her in speed, so he will have to figure something else out.

Since Ammine could just dodge any spell he shot at her, he needed to either restrict her movement or use something that she wouldn't be able to dodge. Luckily, Haro had taught him two spells precisely against opponents who were too fast for him to hit. "Winds, heed my call and serve my will. Bind my foe and tear them of their wings."

The winds rushed to Ammine and began to chase after her as she was running towards Kies. But even with her insanely fast speed, she was still no match against the winds, and they quickly caught up to her and began to circle around her. Ammine, having not seen the spell before had no idea what it did but she wasn't going to take the risk of finding out. Two dark orbs of magic appeared in both of her hands and she smashed them together to create a massive shockwave that dispersed the winds that were trying to get to her.

But Kies had expected something like this to happen. He knew that Ammine had some way to deal with Wind Chains so while she was dealing with that, he was already chanting his next spell. Kies wasn't sure what Ammine was capable of since he had never seen her fight seriously before, but he was sure that even she would have difficulty dealing with something such as Wind Vortex.

"Winds, heed my call and serve my will. Take my foes before me and trap them in the endless winds." The winds gathered in front of Kies and began to spin fiercely. Within seconds, a vortex formed in front of him that sucked everything in.

Ammine tried to back off from the vortex but was unable to and was slowly being dragged in by the winds. Since she couldn't escape, she decided to try to break the spell by doing the same thing as before. Two orbs appeared in either hand and she smashed them together, creating a shockwave. But unlike the previous time, it didn't seem to have any effect. The vortex disrupted the explosion, shifting the shockwave elsewhere causing it to only hit the edge of the vortex.

"D*mn, that owl taught you a spell like this!?" Ammine shouted as she was getting pulled closer and closer to the vortex. The speed at which she was being sucked in was gradually getting faster as she was nearing the center and she needed to act quickly or else she would get caught up in it.

Luckily, Kies gained enough experience with the spell to make sure that it wouldn't affect him, the caster, or else he would have never used this spell against Ammine. But like before, maintaining the vortex drained his magic greatly. Even though his magic capacity had grown significantly from the last time he used it, the cost of the spell seemed to have increased alongside its power. He could only keep the spell running for the same amount of time as before, which frankly wasn't very long.

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