The Return Of The Exiled Villain

Ronan blinked at Gray’s expression for another second.

”...You’re scaring me a little.”

”Take a stance,” Gray practically ordered.

Ronan stared at him.

”Right now?”

”Right now.”

”I just showed you my—”

”—Just do it already.”

”Okay, okay.”

He dropped into a stance immediately, the natural instinct of someone who had been training long enough that the motion was faster than the objection.

His transformed arms came up, scales catching the afternoon light, his fingers curling into claws without being told to.

The horns above his head caught the light at a different angle now, their iridescent quality deepening as his mana rose to meet the situation.

His aura expanded.

’...His physical strength must have increased a lot.’

Gray looked at this body deeply and then raised his hands.

Ronan looked at them.

”Are you serious? Do you really want to fight right now?”

”Come.”

Ronan came.

He crossed the distance fast, faster than his size suggested, the bloodline already feeding into his movement speed in ways he probably hadn’t fully mapped yet.

His right claw came in first, a wide hooking strike aimed at Gray’s shoulder with enough force behind it that the air displacement arrived before the hand did.

WHOOSH!

Gray turned his shoulder into it and redirected the arm outward with his forearm, absorbing nothing and deflecting everything, the force passing harmlessly to his left.

Ronan’s left came immediately after.

CRACK!

Gray caught it at the wrist, not stopping it, redirecting again, and used Ronan’s own forward momentum to pull him slightly off his center line.

Ronan stumbled half a step.

”The hell!”

He reset and came again, this time lower, driving forward with his full weight behind a straight tackle that would have moved a wall.

Gray sidestepped by exactly the margin he needed and let Ronan’s momentum carry him past.

”You’re not hitting me,” Gray observed.

”I’M WORKING ON IT,” Ronan replied, spinning back around.

He changed his approach.

Instead of leading with technique, he led with volume, a rapid overlapping combination of claw strikes, shoulder drives, and one attempted headbutt that deployed the horns with what appeared to be genuine creative enthusiasm.

CRACK!

WHOOSH!

Gray moved through all of it.

Until... Ronan suddenly landed one.

Thud!

His left claw caught Gray across the forearm in a glancing strike that wasn’t redirected in time, and the force of it was immediately and unambiguously apparent.

Gray’s arm moved back by several inches from pure impact force alone.

He looked at his forearm.

Ronan looked at it too, and then at this own arm.

”...Oh,” he said.

”Again,” Gray cracked his neck slighly.

Ronan hit him again, this time a direct strike to the guard that Gray absorbed instead of redirecting, both forearms up and taking the full weight of it.

The impact drove him back two full steps.

Two steps.

Gray planted his feet on the third and held.

He looked at Ronan.

Ronan was staring at him with wide eyes and the dawning expression of someone discovering something about themselves in real time.

”I’m stronger than you,” he realized slowly.

”Physically,” Gray confirmed.

”I’m physically stronger than Gray.”

”Currently.”

”LEON IS NEVER GOING TO BELIEVE—”

”You’re also still losing.”

Ronan refocused.

”Right.” He reset his stance, scales flaring slightly, his mana output climbing another notch as he stopped treating the exercise casually.

”Right, okay. Seriously, this time.”

But before he could take another step, Gray stopped.

”Use your mana aswell.”

”Mana too?” Ronan blinked.

”Everything. Don’t hold anything back,” Gray nodded lightly.

Ronan looked at him for a moment.

”...Alright,” he nodded quietly.

He stood up.

Thrum!

A faint shockwave of mana created by Ronan leaking echoed through the air as a now crimson layer of mana could be seen coating his body.

Ronan looked down at it, then back up at Gray.

”You asked for this!”

He exhaled once and let his own mana rise, flooding through his muscle structure in a controlled surge, the body-strengthening output distributing itself evenly across every major system simultaneously.

They looked at each other across four meters of empty battleground.

Then Ronan moved.

BOOM!!!

The stone where he had been standing cracked completely as he launched forward, the combined output of his bloodline enhancement and full mana reinforcement turning his acceleration into something that compressed the air between them into a visible pressure wave before he even crossed half the distance.

Gray met it.

KRAAAAACK!!!

Ronan’s reinforced claw met Gray’s raised forearm, and the collision produced a shockwave that rolled outward across the battleground in a visible ring.

The closest equipment rack slid three inches across the stone from the displacement alone.

Gray held firmly.

And seeing this opportunity, Ronan pressed forward immediately, not withdrawing the arm but driving it, trying to convert the blocked strike into a push that would break Gray’s footing entirely.

Gray turned at the hip and shed the force sideways.

WHOOSH!!!

Ronan’s arm passed, and he was already spinning, the opposite claw coming around in a wide horizontal arc at Gray’s midsection with his full rotation weight behind it.

CRACK!!!

It connected.

Gray absorbed it across his crossed forearms, and the impact drove him sideways across the stone, his feet carving two short parallel lines before he arrested the movement.

He looked at his forearms.

’...This,’ he frowned slighly.

Something was different... he instantly closed his eyes, trying to feel what was wrong, and then noticed that a small quantity of his mana had disappeared.

Gray looked at Ronan.

Ronan was already coming again.

BOOM, CRACK!!!

Gray let the next strike land deliberately, absorbing it full across his palm instead of redirecting, and checked his reserves again the instant the contact broke.

There it was.

...His mana pool diminished once again.

Ronan wasn’t doing it consciously; his expression carried none of the focused intent of someone running a technique.

It was simply happening, a passive property of the Dragon King bloodline interacting with physical contact at full mana output.

’Interesting,’ Gray thought.

WHOOOOSH, KRAAAAACK!!!

Ronan’s horns came down in a forward driving headbutt aimed at Gray’s chest that carried his entire body weight, accelerated by full mana reinforcement, and the impact when it landed was substantial enough to crack the stone under Gray’s feet from the transferred force alone.

”You’re doing something,” Gray said, not moving from where the headbutt had planted him.

Ronan pulled back, breathing harder now, his scales fully flared and his mana output running at a level that was making the air around him visibly distort at the edges.

”WHAT? I’M JUST HITTING YOU—”

”—Your bloodline is draining mana on contact,” Gray said.

Ronan suddenly stopped and stared at him.

”...It’s doing what?”

”Every time you hit me. Small amounts. Passive.”

Ronan looked at his hands excitedly before turning to Gray and happily shouting:

”I’m STEALING your mana?!”

”Passively. You’re not doing it intentionally.”

”THAT’S INCREDIBLE—”

”Come,” Gray said.

”I’M PROCESSING—”

”Ronan. Come.”

Ronan reacted instantly to his words, aiming his right claw directly at Gray’s ribs. The scales along his forearm flared as the arm extended.

WHOOSH!

Gray slipped his upper body left by two inches, the claw passing his ribs close enough to graze fabric, and drove his right palm into the inside of Ronan’s elbow joint mid-extension.

CRACK!

The arm folded inward.

Ronan’s own momentum pulled him forward and off his center line.

He recovered faster than before, planting his right foot and spinning the stumble into a wide backhand that came around at Gray’s temple with his full rotation weight behind it.

Gray ducked under it, felt the wind from the swing cross the top of his head, and came up inside Ronan’s guard with a sharp open palm strike to the sternum.

THUD!

Ronan absorbed it across his reinforced chest without moving, his scales taking the impact and distributing it, and grabbed Gray’s extended wrist with his left hand before he could withdraw it.

CRACK!

He yanked.

Gray went with it instead of against it, letting the pull carry him forward and converting the momentum into a roll across Ronan’s back, landing on the opposite side and breaking the grip before the drain had time to accumulate.

His reserves read sixty-nine percent.

Ronan spun.

BOOM!!!

Both claws came this time, overlapping strikes aimed at Gray’s shoulders from slightly different angles, designed to cover the left and right simultaneously and remove the option of stepping laterally to either side.

Gray stepped forward.

Into it.

Inside the range of both strikes before they reached their extension point, where the leverage was gone, and the force hadn’t fully built yet.

He caught both of Ronan’s forearms at the wrists from the inside, crossed them against each other, and drove his shoulder upward into Ronan’s chin.

CRACK!

Ronan’s head snapped back.

His grip on nothing tightened anyway, instinct activating before his mind caught up, and both clawed hands closed around Gray’s collar.

The drain activated immediately.

Gray broke the grip in under a second, driving both thumbs into the pressure points along Ronan’s inner wrists and separating the hands before the contact extended further.

Ronan shook his head once, clearing it, and came again without pausing.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!

A straight tackle this time, no feint, no setup, just his entire reinforced body weight accelerated at full mana output directly at Gray’s center mass, the Dragon King bloodline turning the simple charge into something that had the structural quality of a boulder deciding to relocate.

KRAAAAABOOOOM!!!

Gray didn’t step aside.

He dropped his weight, planted his lead foot, and caught Ronan’s right shoulder with both hands, redirecting the charge diagonally rather than absorbing it straight, using the angle to send Ronan’s momentum past him and to the left.

The stone floor cracked in a starburst pattern under Gray’s feet from the transferred force.

Ronan’s path carved two deep furrows across the battleground before he arrested himself against a low equipment barrier, the stone crumbling slightly where his reinforced forearms caught his weight.

He pushed off it immediately.

WHOOSH!!!

Three rapid claw strikes in a vertical sequence, high to mid to low, each one following the previous without pause.

Gray’s guard was already set.

He caught the high strike on his crossed forearms, the impact pushing him back half a step.

Sixty-three percent.

Slipped the mid strike by rotating his torso, the claw passing across his front without connecting.

Stepped into the low strike and took it across the outer thigh deliberately, letting it land full, studying the drain as it activated.

Sixty-one percent.

Ronan felt the last one connect and drove forward off it, converting the momentum into a two-handed downward strike aimed at Gray’s collarbone with both reinforced fists locked together, the combined force of his full bloodline enhancement and maximum mana reinforcement behind a single compressed point of impact.

KRAAAAAAAABOOOOM!!!

Gray got both forearms up.

The shockwave from the blocked strike detonated outward in a visible ring, cracking the stone in every direction simultaneously, the nearest rack sliding hard into the wall behind it with a resounding metallic crash.

Gray’s feet carved parallel lines back across the stone.

’...This is it. Just what I wanted...’ he grinned inwardly.

His eyes locked onto Ronan’s figure as if he were some kind of treasure.

’A physical monster has been born!!!’