Ascendant Path of a Lustful Vampire

Chapter 525: Still after that Get-back?

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Despite agreeing to let Arlette handle things, neither Aylin nor the others really managed to keep their minds off getting involved. Plus, the only thing Aylin had actually discussed with Arlette was about the threat to Caius. Even if they did put that aside, there would still be the matter of Aurelius’s trials to think about.

Lochxen wasn’t the only place in danger if Aurelius failed the trial. As the entire world could be destroyed, it was definitely something to be taken seriously. Alas, Aurelius insisted he had no idea when the next would be, and the ladies finally decided, after the tenth time of asking, that he really might be telling the truth.

Also, nothing truly out of the ordinary happened during their first week back at school anyway, so any trouble might truly be far into the future.

Speaking of the week back at school;

The Class schedules became more demanding and began to go on till late evening, with lots of impromptu classes and extra lessons that the teachers were organizing. It was a miracle that Kaya, Eloise, Aylin, and Delia even had time to think of anything with how much stress they were under.

Extra lessons spilled into the weekend, and they practically had no more time to themselves besides nighttime. Had they all acquired the higher Magic Circle ability to go days without sleep, Kaya was sure they would have had classes at night as well.

To make things worse, the weekend ended, and the second and last week of the semester began with Caius still not back. He was going to miss the Semester exams for sure. Which might be for the best, considering he had missed the intense week of lecture that came before.

The End of Semester Exams eventually began, and, honestly, after the very eventful Mid-semester tests, it ended up being a big letdown. The trio of Combat Magic, Study of Magical Beasts, and Mage-Knight Training Professors didn’t come together to draft even something as simple as obstacle courses.

In fact, the exams didn’t have special days and planning put into them, and were just tacked on to the end of the final classes of the semester. They were also to be graded leniently, with the grade of the Mid-Semester Tests accounting for more than 80% of the total Semester grade.

This was very welcome since the class had had more time with the first half of the Semester and the tests. And after the incident in Lochxen Forest, they had all also received bonus points, unlike the second half of the semester.

Anyway, not even those who had dreaded the exams were all happy about how easy it all eventually seemed. It was as though the week of intense and jam-packed schedule of classes had been a waste.

Not all the exams were entirely boring, though.

The two most practical classes, Combat Magic and Mage-Knight Training, used duels for assessments.

With Combat Magic, Cynthia Kragsten grouped them in fours to be able to assess more of them at once and get it over with quickly.

With Mage-Knight Training, Professor Raoul Raoul paired them in twos and let fights go on until he was satisfied. Which could even be after they threw the first blow at each other.

Delia heard him mutter a few times after he stopped a duel about how he was really missing his favorite student.

Only one person was missing in class, so it was all too clear that Raoul meant Caius. Delia found that funny because she was sure that, despite how much Professor Raoul respected Caius’s Father, Count Lucian Von Helsing, he would never have called Caius his favorite student until he watched him fight Belron the Fiend.

It could not have been clearer that Caius hadn’t used anything he learned in Mage-Knight Training class during that fight, but Professor Raoul was taking all the credit and using Caius as the bar to reach to be satisfactory in his class.

“Enough!” Professor Raoul yelled to stop Baler Khione’s duel with Marcus Arognite.

“But—” Baler started. He had just gotten slapped right before the duel was stopped, and really wished it could keep going long enough for him to get back at Marcus.

“Go back to your seat, you’ve been graded,” Professor Raoul said dismissively as he looked down at his note pad for the last names and instantly brightened up,

“Here we are, the last pair; Delia Kragsten and Aurelius Du Aristide!”

It wasn’t just Caius who had impressed Raoul, and as far as he was concerned, only Delia and Aurelius had taken to his lectures as well as Caius.

There were some resentful looks, mostly from Baler, who didn’t like Delia because she was close to Caius and didn’t like Aurelius because he had taken Doran Langston’s side, and the two had essentially phased him out of their trio that had now become a duo.

No matter what feelings any of them could have had about Delia and Aurelius, though, they knew Raoul was right about them being above them in skill. They also knew it had nothing to do with Raoul’s lessons. If it did, they would all be on that level or at least close to it.

Delia and Aurelius—and Caius—clearly had something extra they weren’t sharing with the class.

“A friendly spar or you’re still after that get-back?” Aurelius asked with a good-natured smile. He was referring to defeating Delia once and how she had since professed that she was going to even the score.

“That get-back would be nice,” Delia said lightly with a smile of her own as they both took on ready stances, armed with practice weapons enchanted to do no harm. Of course, if coated with magic, some harm could still be done.

“Begin!”

Aurelius was bathed in light and dashed aside just in time to avoid Delia’s kick that came swinging at his face at the speed of lightning.

While Delia’s back was turned to him just after her kick struck nothing, Aurelius swung his practice sword at her, but there was a sound of rushing wind, and his sword met the handle of Delia’s practice Warhammer.

The Warhammer was heavier at the top, so the contact of the two weapons wasn’t a stalemate. Delia won that contact, but the front-loaded weight of her Warhammer caused her swing to keep going even after the contact, while Aurelius was able to control his sword’s more manageable weight to draw it back and make a thrust at her chest.

Delia had known that would happen, though. She had used a Warhammer enough to have expected the weight of the hammer to spin her off course. So just followed the weight and turned her entire body around.

She did this very quickly and was able to face Aurelius again just in time to parry his sword with the handle of her Warhammer. The parry was so hard that he stumbled backward and lost his footing.

Before Aurelius regained his balance, Delia took a purposeful step forward and struck her hammer at his midsection. Another bathing of light, and Aurelius sped his body up enough to avoid the attack. But Delia pressed on, getting close again, but this time, Aurelius was ready.

And so, with the class watching, the two went back and forth, trading parries and swings as well as near-misses. Where no one had yet been allowed more than two minutes, Delia and Aurelius sparred for fifteen.

Professor Raoul looked very taken with the fight, watching and waiting as though at the edge of his seat for who would make first contact.

Delia and Aurelius didn’t attack each other with spells, as that wasn’t allowed in the Exam. Every spell used had to be a movement spell or one that affected the caster and not the opponent.

In other words, when Aurelius created footholds of Light and took off into the air, it was allowed. It was also allowed when Delia fashioned herself a stormy cloak and took off into the air after him so they could continue to clash weapons.

They whirled and twisted, soon coating their practice weapons with their magic, not to bypass the safety of striking each other with the harmless weapon but rather to extend their reach and finally strike the other person.

Delia didn’t get frustrated at not succeeding so many times. She had gotten a lot of practice with Caius before the Mid-Semester break and had learned to temper her annoyance and just be more patient. Looking for that opening she could exploit.

And then, it presented itself.

In a rush, Aurelius had coated his sword with so much Magic that it basically became a spear, but rather than press him, Delia leaned back in the air, exposing an opening. Aurelius lunged for the opening, but before he could make contact, Delia struck her Warhammer against his weapon. But she didn’t try to parry it, and instead surged the magic around her Warhammer into the magically elongated sword blade.

Delia forced her Storm Magic to clash with Aurelius’s Light Magic, and the two reacted against one another, and burst into a brilliant flash of light.

The light blinded Aurelius, but Delia had closed her eyes as she already knew what to expect. And when she opened them, there was her opening:

Aurelius’s spear was a sword once again, and he couldn’t see clearly enough to avoid or block a definitive Warhammer strike to his chest that sent him falling out of the air and onto the ground below with a *bang!*