Chapter 8

Standing opposite each other, Arthur and Emily were ready to begin the fight. Everybody else who was looking at the side could feel the pressure both of them were releasing.

Arthur was at a major disadvantage only looking at this. But if one looked closer, and through the battle-hungry face of Arthur, one could see the completely calm eyes of his. They felt like they could see through anything like they were piercing even the soul.

On the other side, the usually flustered girl Emily showed a serious expression. She looked like she was ready to fight, with no smile on her face. Only pure concentration could be seen on her. Her domineer had changed as much as Arthur's, if not more.

"Let's begin!"

BOOM!

Before Arthur could even do anything, Emily suddenly appeared in front of him, already halfway through her swing with the sword. Already feeling the air pressure from the sword, Arthur reacts by lifting his sword and redirecting the sword to the ground by his side. This created a huge dust cloud.

Not leaving Emily any time to react, Arthur used his right leg to do a leg sweep. Emily could not react in time, so the sweep hit her and tipped her over to the ground.

Even though she was on the ground, Arthur felt the pressure from her grow, which meant the fight was far from over. He swung his sword towards her head in hopes he could end the fight like that. But before he knew it, she was already three meters away and on her feet again.

"What kind of freakish training have you done?!" Arthur could not help but blurt out in shock. The power and speed she was showing at the moment were truly freakish, and he had never seen it before.

The only answer Arthur got to his question was another charge from her. This time she came in the same way as before. Before Arthur could deflect the sword, though, she forced the trajectory of her sword to change, which made her hit Arthur's shoulder.

"Argh, f*ck!" Arthur could not help but course. The pain from that one hit could be imagined by looking at the explosion from their first encounter.

Right after the hit to the shoulder, a leg came sweeping in from the side, towards Arthur's stomach. All he could do against this attack was to move his arm down to the side and take the hit.

BOOM!

Arthur flew to the side and landed on the ground, 4 meters to the side. He was shocked to see the strength of Emily. He had never been beaten this badly by any other person than his dad. He was getting excited, excited to fight a strong opponent.

Trying to get back up, Arthur was stopped in his tracks when Emily appeared on top of him. She was in a standing position, with arms above her head and sword in hand. Arthur did not feel fear of losing at this moment. He could honestly only admire the majestic beauty of this warrior lady.

His admiration did not last long, though, as the sword came crashing down, straight for his head. He was not ready to lose just yet, so he snapped out of it and used his leg to push himself away from her.

At the moment, Arthur was in a bad state. He had a shoulder that could not be used, which rendered his whole left arm unusable. The spot on the stomach that she had hit hurt quite a lot, but Arthur had already established that nothing had been broken.

"What are these freaks?" At the side, Ethan suddenly said. He might be a commoner, but he had seen bandits fight with his village before. He had never seen a fight like this, not to mention this was only a sparring match.

"HAHA, I don't know, but I feel we might have been lucky to be able to join this guy's team!" Ned said from the side. He knew he was mediocre, might even be worse than that. But he knew they would undoubtedly become stronger by following a strong leader.

"I agree with Ned, but this is honestly too freakish!" Franz suddenly said by the side. His eyes glistened from the fight going on in front of him.

Back in the fight, Arthur had gotten back up to his feed. Using his wounded hand to hold the wounded spot on the stomach. His eyes did not look like he was in påain. It looked more like his fighting spirit had been fueled.

On the other side, Emily had not been touched at all. Her face was still the picture of concentration. It felt like nothing could get to her at this moment. All that mattered was this fight.

Arthur suddenly took it upon himself to charge in. He used the tactic of ignoring defense and going all in on attack. He charged forward with sword in hand, pointed forward, becoming something like a spearhead going to pierce whatever armor was in front.

BOOM!

Emily didn't even flinch when she used her hand to push the sword to the sword while using the other hand to smash her sword down unto Arthur. Making it, so Arthur was smashed to the ground.

Now on the ground, Arthur felt a lot of pain from his whole body. It felt like every inch of his body was being penetrated by needles. This was the most pain he had ever felt.

"AAARGH!"

Suddenly he screamed out with a face that was twisted in pain. Everyone looked at him with surprised eyes. After taking so many hits, they never expected that this one hit would be the one that broke him.

After a few seconds of this pain, Arthur suddenly started to feel pleasant. All the wounds on his body disappeared, and his shoulder healed. He felt like he was flying on a cloud and feeling a nice warm breeze going over his body.

A light hue of red had started to form around his body. Arthur could not see this, as he was face down on the ground, but everyone around him could see it.

"What is this?" Brian had never seen anything like this and thought that something bad might have happened to Arthur.

"Hahaha, it seems our leader is stronger than expected!" Franz said with a small smile. Which caught the attention of everyone, and they were all looking at him like they were saying elaborate.

"It is what we call Aura. It is what we humans use to strengthen our bodies in fights!" Emily pitched in. She had seen this before from her grandfather, but the Aura she saw from her grandfather was much greater.

Standing up from the ground, Arthur saw that everyone was looking at him in shock. "Uhm, was my defeat really so bad?" Arthur smiled wryly, feeling a little embarrassed.

"Don't you feel it?" Emily suddenly asked from the side. Smiling cutely once again.

"Feel what?" Arthur looked at her with a weird expression. He felt no different from before the fight. 'Wait, wasn't I injured?' Arthur thought as he looked down himself. His face showing some realization and shock.

The red hue had disappeared, but so had all of the wounds. He tried searching his whole body for the wounds, checking his shoulder. There was absolutely nothing to see.

Seeing that Arthur was just looking at himself with shock, Emily said, "You just used Aura. Congratulations!" Showing a huge smile.

"So this is the power of Aura. It feels great!" Showing an excited smile, Arthur tightened his grip on the sword. 'I am getting closer to helping my family!'

Everyone came over to congratulate him. Arthur could not help but feel a little warm, they had not known each other for long, but it seems after these fights, they all started to look at him like both a leader and a friend.

The previous awkward atmosphere in the tent had disappeared completely after these fights. Some of the men even started to fight each other, trying to see who the stronger one was. Arthur was very satisfied with this, as he had not expected that it would all go so well.

The commoners all normally hate nobles from the beginning. Most of the time, the high-ranking nobles never treat the commoners like people. They usually treat them more like slaves.

In the beginning, they didn't like Arthur either. But seeing how he acted with them and the power he had displayed, they had grown a little fond of him and got a lot of respect towards him.

Emily and Franz never really disliked Arthur, but now they had become quite close to him. Emily had talked to him before the test, and Franz was the kind of person with a mentality that only gets to know a person through fighting. So after fighting him, he determined Arthur's character and decided to follow him as a fighter and friend.

"Arthur! Sir Gary wants to see you. Please follow me!" A feminine voice broke through the darkness of the night outside the tent.

"Hey Jasmine, please lead the way!" Arthur responded as he recognized the voice from when he was shown his living quarters.