The man brought them to outside of the city to the plains near the forest. 

“Hey kid, what’s your name?” He asked 

“It’s rude to ask for someone’s name without giving yours first.” John replied. 

“Hahaha, man you really crack me up.” 

“Let’s get this over with.” John said. 

The man was stood around 10 meters away from John, the 3 guys who threatened them were spectating and Ariel’s job was to keep an eye on them. 

The man who John was about to fight held Deep red daggers, he didn’t see them at the blacksmiths shop so it must have been made by some sort of special ore. 

“See this coin? After it touches the ground we start. There are no rules, this includes killing.” He said. 

The man threw the coin into the air, and John started to apply a constant supply of magic to his dagger and body to reinforce them. 

“Alright.” John replied. 

Time felt like it was moving slowly as the coin began to fall. John felt his heart rate increase and his breathing felt heavier. The adrenaline was finally starting to get to him. Only now did he truly realise that he could die. But he couldn’t give up because of his promise. 

The moment the coin touched the ground, the first one to make the move was him. He lept towards John at inhumanly fast speeds and swung both of his daggers once John was in range. 

John used both of his daggers to parry his and the shock put him off balance. The man took that opportunity to land a side kick on his left arm. 

The force managed to push John back even further than when he had kicked him in the city. John’s left arm felt so numb that it hurt, but he continued to hold on to the dagger. 

“That confirms it, you don’t have any experience fighting people do you. What did your master teach you?” he asked 

“You sure do talk a lot, I never had one.” John replied. 

“What was that?!” He asked both irritated and confused. 

The man leapt towards John again and kept constantly swinging his daggers at him with high speeds. If John had lost concentration for even a moment, he was sure that he would have been sliced. After parrying blows, John’s hands started to feel numb from the shock from each parry. 

Seeing as how John was starting to slow down, the man took this opportunity to speed up and add more power onto his attacks. Since John had slowed down and gotten weaker due to the pressure, he ended up losing balance one more time. 

The man took this opportunity to send another side kick to John’s left arm. Taking another one of these kicks would have definitely rendered it useless. 

Before the kick could hit John though, he strengthened his legs and bent backwards. Resulting in the kick, barely grazing his chest. 

“Not bad, but-” 

The momentum of the kick had turned his body to face the other direction. John had planned for this instance to cast glacies and strike him. 

The man had used the momentum of the kick to spin his body around to face John’s direction again. As soon as John was in his sights, he swung his dagger at John. 

It happened so fast that John wasn’t even able to propel his ice Spike towards him. Instead, it stood there waiting for him to use it. Once John saw that he got an idea. 

While he was still in the air, the man looked surprised after seeing a spike of ice having appeared out of thin air which caused him to slow down for a moment, but he quickly recomposed himself and continued his attack. 

That moment was all John needed. The instant his dagger touched John’s Ice spike, a grin formed on his face as he muttered the words “Scutum Glacies”. 

As John casted the spell, in an instant, many ice spikes were formed around his original ice spike, causing it to expand and take the shape of a shield. Before he could move his dagger away, it had already pierced through the shield. 

“What!?” He let out in surprise as he realized that his dagger had gotten stuck. Precisely because it had pierced the shield. The ice from the shield quickly enveloped the dagger, before it reached him he had let go. 

“So you still had a trick up your sleeve, huh?” He said 

John used this opportunity to get up and said. “Not really, I only thought about it, now.” with a straight face 

The man looked at John with a dumbfounded expression before letting out a laugh. “Man.. You really are interesting..” 

Despite all of this small talk, John kept his guard up. The shield he had recently formed had remained in front of him. It had stopped expanding after completely engulfing the man’s dagger and could move according to John’s will. Despite how big it was, it moved fast and could only go around 2 meters away from him at most. 

‘It will definitely prove itself helpful in this fight, but, he was able to cut through some of it easily with his dagger so I’m guessing it’s not good at defending long range hits, it’s only effective at short range if someone touches or attacks it.’ John thought.

“Well then, shall we continue?” The man asked as he slowly approached John. 

John decided that shield might not have worked a second time, so he moved it behind himself and muttered “Glacies” which caused 4 ice spikes to be formed around him. 2 on his sides and 2 above his head. 

The guy who held his dagger stopped moving after he stood in front of John. He had a cautious expression after he noticed the spikes around him. 

They followed John wherever he went and always remained in the same position. Which is why after casting them all John needed to do is think about them attacking and they would do it. Not to mention how fast they are. Due to how fast they are, dodging them at close range is extremely difficult. 

‘One hit is all it takes. This might end up freezing him to death, but if I hold back, I’ll really die. Not that I’m prepared to take someone’s life, though. I’ll unfreeze his face so that he can breathe after.’ John decided. 

Seeing as how John was focused in his thoughts, the man finally commenced his attack. This whole time John was on the defensive, but he could not afford to drag this fight out any longer. He was running out of mana. 

So John decided to switch things up a bit, he was going to end everything in this attack. His dagger started to glow as he started to pour more mana into it. John started to increase the reinforcement of magic in his body. 

This resulted in his speed being increased, and the power behind his attacks to be stronger. The one who was being pushed back now within the parry was this man. 

The man let out a surprised expression after noticing what was happening. 

“You bastard, you were holding back?!” He said 

“Focus on the fight.” John replied as he pointed towards his legs which had ice enveloped around them slowly spreading up his legs. 

“When did you?!” 

The moment he got distracted, John used the remaining 3 ice spikes around him and propelled them towards him. At this distance he managed to dodge the first one by tilting his head, but the other two were aimed at his stomach and chest 

He wasn’t able to dodge them and on impact, it quickly spread throughout his whole body, leaving only the head out in the open. He was completely frozen. 

After realising he wouldn’t be able to move no matter how much he struggled, he gave in 

“It’s my loss, I surrender.” The man said as he hung his head 

“Good, then I’ll be leaving.” John replied before turning around and making my way towards Ariel. 

As John started making his way towards Ariel and the guys who had frightened looks on their faces, he felt all his energy leave my body. He no longer had enough magic to keep magic strengthening active through his entire body. 

As John was approaching Ariel, he saw her running towards him while pointing behind him. They originally started off around 50 meters away from everyone so that they wouldn’t get caught up. When John realised what she was trying to say. 

After John turned back, the guy who he had frozen just recently was unfrozen, with traces of ice still on his body. 

‘H-How? I had completely frozen him.. Did he use magic?!’ John wondered. 

“H-” 

Before John could finish what he was going to say, he had been punched by him right in the stomach. Without body reinforcement, the single punch made him collapse to the ground. Pain was surging through his stomach. 

As John laid on the ground, he felt the remaining strength disappear. 

As John could feel himself losing consciousness, he looked up to see Ariel fighting against him. She kept constantly pressuring him with ventus, preventing him from approaching. 

‘Even though, I promised to protect her..’ 

Before John could see the rest of the fight, he passed out. 

—————————————————— 

“Where am i..?” 

John looked around and all he could see was darkness. 

“Am I.. dead..?” 

Inside of this hollow black room, all John could hear was his voice. He could feel himself moving but couldn’t hear any steps 

“Again… I was useless… DAMN IT!” John shouted as he punched the ground. 

It then began to shatter, and John began to fall.