Child of Destiny

”A flying battle, huh? Looks a little interesting. Should we play along with it?” muttered Shin as he observed the strange bird flying above the battlefield.

As Shin was observing the strange bird, Akailu ordered this monster pet to descend beside him as he hopped on it and mounted on its back. Then he immediately ordered the bird to fly back in the air.

After all, he was not an idiot that would leave himself on an open ground where his opponent could attack him freely. Especially that Shin was someone that could appear in front of him in just an instant.

While hovering in the air, Akailu looked at Shin with a smirking look on his face. He thought that the latter was currently wracking his brain to deal with his current situation. And he seemed to be quite confident that this fight would surely lean on his favor this time.

”Even if flying pets are available to most of the players, finding one was still quite hard. Much less finding a rare one just like this ’Seven-Elemental Bird’ that I have. So, how are you going to deal with such rare cases now, Nameless Swordsman?” mumbled by Akailu while observing Shin.

The staredown continued for quite some time before Shin finally made his move. First, he ran towards the nearest tree before climbing on by running on its truck. And when his momentum was about to decrease due to the gravity, he immediately jumped on the branch of the nearby tree before hopping up to another.

Naturally, Akailu would immediately understand Shin’s current plan the moment he saw those actions. And of course, he was not going to let that happen. ”Do you think that you can get near me by just climbing up those trees? I like to see how you are going to do it.”

Having that in mind, Akailu immediately ordered his Seven-Elemental Bird to send a barrage of magical spells at Shin. And at the same time, he also gave an order to fly up in the air as he planned to kite Shin to death.

On the other hand, Shin was nimbly dodging all of the incoming barrage of spells by jumping from a tree branch to another. And no matter how powerful the incoming spells were, they still failed at finding their target due to Shin’s speed. What’s more, he was also using the tree trucks that he came across to block some of the spells that had tricky angles.

But even if that was the case, Akailu still looked confident as if everything was still under his control. After all, they were continuously moving upwards. And the more they moved up, the lesser the tree branch and trucks Shin could use.

A moment later, things went according to what Akailu was expecting. He was now flying above all of the trees in the forest while Shin was just about to reach the top of a tree.

Akailu currently had a smirking smile on his lips as he watched Shin ’desperately’ run up on the treetop. Especially when he saw Shin jumped up in the air right after reaching the uppermost part of the tree.

”Jumping up to maximize the distance before using a teleportation skill to get here? Or are you going to use that strange air-walking of yours? Either way, I am not going to let any of them happen,” muttered Akailu before ordering his seven elemental bird flew a little higher while also telling it threw a few more spells at Shin, trying to test the waters.

Since Shin was still in the air, it was quite understandable for others to think that there was no way for him to dodge these incoming fireballs and icicles. But for the players that were aware of Shin’s special ability to defy gravity, these attacks were just something ordinary.

And just like what Akailu was expecting, Shin easily dodged the spells that his monster bird had sent with some aerial maneuvers; a single flip and one spin roll in the air was more than enough for Shin to avoid getting hit by any of them.

But that was just the start for Akailu. Because he immediately sent a much intense barrage of spells towards his opponent right after Shin dodged the first batch of attacks.

Seeing that new set of spells coming after him, Shin immediately kicked the air below him and sent himself out of the way of the incoming attacks. And right after dodging those spells, he quickly did another kick on the air to launch himself towards the Akailu’s direction.

Pa! Pa!

Swoosh!

’Legacy Skill: Mondi’s Jump’

Akailu was already expecting for Shin to do that, so just ordered his seven-elemental bird to move away from Shin and start his kiting strategy once again.

Given that he was an experienced expert of the gaming world, he knew that all kinds of skills had some limitations on them; especially this type of special skill that Shin was currently using. He also understood that this skill might either be a special state skill that gave Shin an ability to walk on the air or a rechargeable skill that had some stocks on them.

Having that in mind, all that Akailu needed to do was to wait for the right time where Shin had lost his ability to walk on the air. And just like that, their battle in the air continued all the way until Shin used his final aerial jump.

”Tsk! Looks like it was still not enough, huh?” muttered Shin as he adjusted his center of gravity to let himself hover in the air for quite some time.

Then he suddenly added after a little pause. ”I guess I also need to use that flying ability this time.”

While Shin was thinking about that, Akailu finally found the window that he was waiting for. Now that Shin ran out of aerial jumps, he was not going to let this opportunity slip away from his hands.

Given that, Akailu immediately ordered his seven-elemental bird to throw a barrage of spells that rained down at Shin. Fireballs, icicles, wind blades and any other spells that his monster could send. There were even some spells that were travelling with a strange trajectory if ever Shin still had some hidden cards under his sleeves.

While he was watching the spells that were flying towards Shin, Akailu couldn’t help but wear a victorious smile as he knew that he was about to win this battle.

Unfortunately, Shin had other plans.

Right before the incoming spells managed to reach him, Shin quickly sheathed his sword with a one swift motion before waving his right hand to release a bunch of Eclipse Powers from his body. And right after that, the power of Eclipse that was surrounding him suddenly formed a huge energy sphere that protected him from all directions.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Boom!

The entire process was too fast for anyone to notice what had happened. All that everyone saw was Shin being bombarded by a barrage of spells that even created a huge cloud of smoke right after the final spell landed on its target.

But right after that, everyone seemed to be confused since the battle still hadn’t ended despite all of what they saw.

It was the same with Akailu as he was sure that Shin shouldn’t have survived that kind of situation. What’s more, even if Shin somehow managed to survive, he should be falling towards the ground right now since he should have run out of any ability to stay in the air.

Or rather, that was what he thought. Because while he was frowning his brows, trying to figure out what had happened, there was a streak of light that suddenly rushed out for the cloud of smoke and flew straight at him.

Swoosh!

But despite being caught off-guard, Akailu was still an expert. So, he immediately came back to his senses and threw away all of his confusion the moment he saw the incoming streak of silver light.

At the same time, he immediately ordered his seven-elemental bird to fly upwards so that he could get away from the path that the streak of light was taking.

Shing!

And while a streak of light was brushing past him, Akailu heard the metallic sound of a sword while it was being pulled out from its sheath.

After that, he squinted his eyes as he made his monster pet turn around to face the direction when the streak of light went. He was squinting his eyes as he closely observed the figure that suddenly materialized when that light reached its maximum ranged.

There, he saw Shin who was slowly turning his body around while tapping the back of his katana on his right shoulder. And right now, there were a pair black wings on his back that seemed to be a hybrid of an eagle and crow’s wings. Each of those wings had a span of one and a half meters which were currently spread out widely to let Shin float in the air.

”Tsk! Looks like that kind of simple ambush will not work, huh?” said Shin while looking at Akailu.

After that, he paused for a moment as he stopped tapping his sword and let rest on his right shoulder. Then suddenly added. ”That should be good enough for the warm up, right? How about we start the next round immediately?”

...…