The thought of finally getting an easy quest excited Ashrosaliera.
'Saying sorry? Nope, befriending strangers? Too hard, but beating up a snotty noble kid? Now you're speaking my language!'
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New Quest Available: Making A Name
Details: Subdue Roshia Naveria and Pusha Varrie
Reward: 0.05 System Points
Status: Ongoing
===
Ashrosaliera looked up at the hanging Pusha on a low-hanging tree branch. She tiptoed to touch his nose, just barely making sure he wasn't dead, otherwise that'd be a lotta trouble. The little bright fiery soul then cracked her knuckles while staring at Roshia from a distance.
"After I'm done with you, I'll unlock [Flame Pillar] and destroy anyone else who wants to get in my way."
Roshia Naveria was visibly angry, with her teeth gritted and her eyebrows bent down at a sharp angle. Moreover, she was very confused about Ashrosaliera's word choice.
"Unlock? Don't you mean you'll go and learn a new spell and practice it? Ugh, whatever! You will pay for disrespecting me AND messing with my ear, what if you damaged my gold earrings? You don't look like you can pay for these!"
Ashrosaliera saw the perfect opportunity to mock Roshia and immediately hunched forward, raised her own elbows like chicken wings, and started flapping them exaggeratedly.
"YoU WiLL PAy FOR DisrespeCtINg ME And MEssinG with My EAr, whAT If YoU dAmAgE mY gOLD EArRInGS" Ash squawked in a warped, mocking tone, mimicking Roshia's voice with clucking noises.
"YOU…! ARGH!" Roshia screamed as steam started coming out of her ears, "Water Magic: Ocean Wave!"
The blonde noble was using a wide and low stance with her knees spread, which would help her have better magic control compared to Zofia's fencing-like stance, where she minimized the target area and stood in a relaxed posture for faster reaction time.
With both hands placed in front, palm facing towards Ashrosaliera, the spell [Ocean Wave] was cast, it summoned a literal giant wave of water that came crashing forward trying to consume her, the wave was taller than three Ashrosaliera and wider than three Cecilia, all coming from the palm of a girl's hand.
"Advanced Water magic? You're well-taught!"
Ashrosaliera's laughter started to increase in volume, with high spirit, she immediately knew how to deal with this attack.
"Fire Magic: Fire Flight."
Ashrosaliera activated [Fire Flight], timing the burst of speed just in time to jump right over the [Ocean Wave], before immediately disabling the skill to conserve mana. The first quick boost was enough for her to do a high jump. Even if initial activation still costs a good amount of MP.
'My Mana Point… 50 for initial cast of [Fire Flight], then 2 for each second… that's like what, around 2 minutes?'
She remembered how during her flight from the inn to the academy, she only took one stop to refill her MP stat, it was tough to keep track of since MP could regenerate during usage at a rate of around 1 MP per second, and she used the word "around" because she tried counting it before. Still, it was inconsistent; sometimes it felt longer than one second, almost two. There were times when she regenerated faster than one.
'I should use it more often! I think I can fly continuously for five minutes if I stretch it!'
After having a random, mid-battle train of thought running through her mind, Ash immediately activated [Fire Flight] again and went straight up into the air.
"Try and dodge this, you slimy greaseball!"
Roshia yelled out before getting into an unusual magic casting pose. With her right foot carrying the weight and her left foot right behind, she opened up her right hand. She faced the palm down, almost in a hand blade, and her left hand was also in a blade form, but placed on her right shoulder as if anchoring it.
"Water Magic: Controlled Whip"
From Roshia's hand blade, a long water tendril the width of her arm stretched out and flew towards Ashrosaliera with average running speed.
Sensing danger, Ash simply flew right to the side with [Fire Flight] to dodge it, for she did not know what kind of spell [Controlled Whip] was, so her focus was entirely on where Roshia was standing, and that was a mistake.
"Got you!"
Roshia quickly swung her hand, and the water tendril followed her motion, which came flying towards Ashrosaliera in the air, crashing into Ash's lower body and grabbing onto her left leg.
"Hey! What are you- Get off me! My socks are gonna be wet!"
Ash tried flying away with the flames of [Fire Flight], but the speed that it carried her wasn't sufficient to outweigh the power of Roshia's grab. She struggled and wiggled her legs, trying to shake the water off, even grabbing onto a nearby tree to get more leverage.
'So this is the power of a B-Rank.' Ash thought, 'This [Controlled Whip] seems like a [Sustain Spell] like my [Fire Flight], which she'll have to hold and cost mana with time, so is this going to be a competition of who will run out of mana first?'
"I knew I should've put some points into MP!" Ash exclaimed in frustration, "Fire Magic: Blazing Blade"
With a fiery knife in hand, Ash reached down and cut off the water tendril that was grabbing onto her legs. It barely worked as the water at the cross-section evaporated alongside the knife, cutting off the connection between Ash's legs and the hand. Loosening the grip for half a second, but it was more than enough for Ash to fly away.
"You can't run!" Roshia exclaimed, trying to follow Ash with her water arm.
"Nuh uh! Blehh!"
Ash was mocking Roshia in the air as she circled around the blonde girl at a 360 angle, trying to disorientate her. The sounds of flames bursting and roaring, tearing up some innocent leaves and birdhouse in the 6th floor of the academy, mixed with the sloshing of water hitting against branches and trunks, filled the air with intensity as they continued to hold their spells, waiting for the other to make a wrong move or give up first.
"Urg, you're insufferable!" Roshia exclaimed, still chasing after Ash after the squirrel already spun around her 5 loops, "Huff… Hah…"
Roshia Naveria started panting, sweat rolling down her forehead as she placed her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath.
"Almost out of mana already? Wahaha, you're weak!"
Ashrosaliera deactivated [Fire Flight] and stood on a pine tree branch. Even with those mockings, she was also drenched in sweat, exhaling through her mouth. All that spinning took a toll on her mana and head as much as it did Roshia.
"I feel like throwing up… I shouldn't have ate that much… burp" Ash held her stomach and looked at Roshia, "But I admire that, you can use two advanced [Water] spell at such a young age, one day you'll be as good as me, well, maybe back when I'm 6 years old or something."
This provoked Roshia, making her shriek in a blind rage.
"Water Magic: Controlled Whip!"
Another tendril was made from Roshia's hand blade; she threw it at Ashrosaliera, trying to grab onto the white haired girl again.
In response, Ash smirked.
"Right into my trap," she said, "Fire Magic: Fire Flight."
All Ash needed to win was the initial quick bursts of speed, costing 50 MP of [Fire Flight]; she couldn't have deactivated and reactivated [Fire Flight] before without leaving a gap in her defense. And, now she had an opening to do so.
With a boost of acceleration, she blasted through the air, easily dodging the [Controlled Whip] water, and she flew straight at the user, Roshia Naveria.
"Fire Magic: Blazing Blade."
A fire knife appeared in Ashrosaliera's right hand, she primed it right in front, aiming the trajectory of her flight so that the blade would hit Roshia right in the face.
"This might hurt, but it's an F-Rank spell, nothing a good healer can't fix," Ash thought. 'Are all B-Class students this dumb?'
The fire came diving down onto Roshia's beautiful, smooth skin. Ash didn't hold back, ready to claim that 0.05 System Points, totalling 1.00, and she could unlock a low-level spell.
"Right in my trap," Roshia said, "Water Magic: Water Armor."
Ash's knife didn't make contact with Roshia when it got extinguished by a coat of water covering her entire body.
Before Ash could make any more sense of the situation, Roshia landed an easy punch on her face. With the fact that Ash was flying with great speed and couldn't change course in time, she flew straight into the fist and hurt herself without Roshia needing to move a single muscle.
Fire stopped coming out of Ash's feet as she lost focus on sustaining the spell. Her head was stuck on Roshia's fist, and the rest of her body got carried forward by the momentum, making her land on her back, defeated on the ground with a bad nose.