The Final Theocracy Volume 1 Chapter 4

Volume 1 Chapter 4—Battle of Inheritance (Part 1)

Translator and Editor: SaltyTank

Mithian frowned; she honestly had not thought that Loki would actually accept her duel. It was the complete opposite of what she thought the coward who would do anything just to survive. It was unexpected, but that also saved her the trouble of rambling more insults and provocations.

"Your Highness Mithian, do you plan to battle it out another day…" Loki glared directly into her eyes, his own void of any emotions. "Or should we just do it right here, right now?"

"Right now is fine." Mithian pulled out a gold coin, which had her father's face forged on it, and tossed it into the air. The sparkling coin spun as it drew an arc through the cla.s.sroom.

Everyone was bewildered by the unfolding of events; they planned to duel in a cla.s.sroom?

This is preposterous! Many of those here are the ones who will hold great power of the empire in the future!

The traitor Loki is as insensible to anything as always, but the princess going along with his madness is too much!

People who sat on the audience seats always acted leisurely and relaxed. The results did not matter to them because the blood spilled was someone else's, the lives lost were not their own. They only had to sit there enjoy the death show, the cruelest of all performances. But what if they were seated within the arena? That was no longer a show, but a battlefield. Everyone realised that and scrambled from their seats to run away from the war zone.

"Stay back and don't interfere," Loki commanded Alice. She humbly nodded and retreated to a corner in the cla.s.sroom.

The coin landed onto the ground, creating a crisp clang as it clattered against the marble floor.

Mithian took the initiative to launch the first attack. It was a well-executed textbook attack for inheritance mages. Her white, delicate fingers drew small patterns as a fireball condensed in front of her and shot out like an arrow.

If Loki used a normal defensive magic spell, he would fall into the trap of inheritance mages. That was not an ordinary fireball but a complicated spell. There was another spell concealed within the fireball, and it would activate upon impact as a follow up attack after the fireball destroyed the opponent's shield.

It was certainly a wonderful technique, but it was clumsy in Loki's eyes. Mithian had underestimated him as she didn't know he was an inheritance mage also.

She sure is an inheritance mage, but her lineage probably doesn't have much history. Almost every book written by archmages had the concept 'never underestimate your opponent' ingrained into it… Or, Mithian simply ignored all the advice she was given. Thinking that because you're an inheritance mage you'll absolutely win, huih?

Loki believed that the latter was more likely the case. He did not cast any defensive magic, but instead fired a wind blade at the point of contact between the fireball and the spell concealed inside it. The fire elements in the fireball were disturbed by the wind elements, causing the spells to lose control. The fireball was sliced into two and flew past Loki harmlessly into the walls while the concealed spell was destroyed.

It was an ingenious countermeasure against the special fireball attack. If only Mithian had not been so conceited, she would have quickly noticed that this technique was not something an orthodox mage could come up with. However, she had yet to notice her opponent's ident.i.ty as an inheritance mage.

Loki swiftly gathered wind elements below his feet. It was not really an actual spell, but it could still buff his agility and jump height greatly for a short while. He immediately leapt up and dodged Mithian's second fireball.

"Dammit!" Mithian swung her hand horizontally as she gathered strength into her fingers. A blue bolt of lightning lashed out from her fingers like an unblockable flood as it drew a fiery hot line towards Loki.

Converging Thunderbolt!

The magic instructor who had yet to leave the cla.s.sroom had his jaw drop to the floor. It was a spell which combined two fundamental elements, earth and wind, to form a secondary element—thunder. For those of Mithian's age, it was impossible to control such a difficult spell unless they were inheritance mages. Its power was also very potent; Mithian was dead set on killing her opponent.

Loki accelerated once again, avoiding the roaring thunderbolt which struck the pillar behind where he had been standing. The marble pillar cracked and exploded, creating a large hole and spraying debris everywhere.

Mithian sneered. She tracked the jumping Loki with her finger, moving the continuous bolt of thunder towards him. No matter how quick he was, there was no way for him to be faster than a mere swipe of a finger. 

Loki planted his foot onto the roof and sprung downwards. As he dropped, he pointed his finger at the incoming thunderbolt, firing off a thunderbolt of his own. It roar ferociously as it rushed out to devour its counterpart. The clash of elements caused a loud, metallic clang.

Mithian frowned slightly. So he's an inheritance mage also, that explains why he's so fearless. But so what?

With a flick of her finger, her thunderbolt dissipated into thin air, replaced by a non-conductive wall of stone which rose from the floor in front of her. Loki's magic hammered onto the stone wall, spraying rocky chunks and dust across the room and shaking the entire building.

Loki knew that it will take too much mana to penetrate the stone wall with Converging Thunderbolt, which will then make him p.r.o.ne to Mithian's counterattacks. Putting his thoughts into action, he cancelled his spell. The thunderbolt flickered out of existence as though it had never existed, the only proof of its presence being the crater in the stone wall.

Stone Prison—that was the spell Mithian used to create the stone wall. Loki landed lightly on the prison walls and reached for the mithril dagger on his waist, his cloak fluttering in the air. The stone wall quickly turned into sand and fell to the floor as commanded by its caster. Mithian's purple pupils were directly in front of him, glaring at him.

Several blades of wind brushed past Loki's torso. He nimbly dodged the strikes by a hair's breadth and landed right next to his target. His dagger struck out quickly and accurately like a viper, its target being Mithian's throat.

Shing! Mithian unsheathed her rapier and parried Loki's attack.

For orthodox mages, sword fighting between mages was almost unimaginable. Inheritance mages, however, are more than familiar with melee combat. What they had to learn in magic towers were not merely knowledge about magic. They were the personifications of knowledge itself, and they needed the power to back up their ident.i.ty. Not only were they mages, they were also masters of combat. Everything that could kill an opponent would belong in their repertoire.

The nature of sword fighting between mages were different than that of swordsmen. Swordsmen had superior technique and forms, while mages fought on a completely different level of speed thanks to their elemental powers. The two had crossed swords over five times in mere seconds.

Mithian had inferior power, but her flexibility allowed her to strike from peculiar angles, often forcing Loki to stop in the middle of a combo to defend.

It seemed that Mithian had the advantage, yet she retracted her sword and retreated to a safe distance. She looked at her opponent with eyes full of questions.

"I don't get it," Mithian said. "Are you really that afraid of death? That you would even slay your sister to save yourself?"

Loki's azure eyes regained his normal calmness. He stood there for a few seconds, thinking about the standard answer to the question.

"There is no one who does not fear death. Also, she committed a great mistake, it was a deserved punishment."

"You know that's a lie forged by the Senatus!" Mithian was enraged. "Blasphemy? Nonsense, it's just an excuse to exterminate your lineage!"

The magic instructor who stood alongside Alice in a corner looked at the devastated cla.s.sroom in despair; that was not something he should have heard. He almost wished that he was deaf just so he would not have heard what Mithian had said. Such blasphemous speech coming from the mouth of the Pope's daughter; he would be the one to be executed if it spread out.

Loki shook his head and answered, "Your Highness Mithian, I will forget about the nonsense you have just spoken of. Now then, do not say such a thing again."

Mithian was startled for a split second. She lowered her head and muttered, "You used to be different… Yet now, yet now… You're just the same as those tyrannous garbage up top."

Loki ignored her and raised his mithril dagger as he asked, "Your Highness Mithian, are we going to continue our duel?"

"Of course we are!" Mithian lifted her head, this time her eyes filled with burning anger. "To keep people like you alive is a disaster in itself! Might as well kill you earlier."

Before her voice faded away, she had already launched a magic attack. Wind Slice—it was not an easy spell to cast, and casting difficulty was often proportional to its power.

The jade blades of wind cut through the air in a straight line right towards Loki, to which he frowned.

What was the meaning of such an attack? If she used this attack which was void of any technique, did it mean that she was blinded by rage? 

To be hit by such a direct attack was a simple mistake that even orthodox mages would not make. In this situation, the best solution was to block and counterattack. Loki was confident that he could end the duel with his next counterattack because Mithian could never gather the elements in time to block it. A stone wall rose from the ground and easily blocked the blade of wind.

Mithian merely snickered and flicked her finger.

Something's not right!

Loki only realised that after blocking the initial attack. Giving up his plan to counterattack, he put all his mind into defending.

Another three walls of stone sprouted from the floor behind him, but they were promptly destroyed by a powerful spell. Loki scrambled away from the area affected by the spell. He was, however, too slow. A strong wind pressured against his back, with small blades of wind tearing his robe apart and leaving streaks of blood on his body.

It was clearly not the killing move, and Mithian would not stop attacking because he was injured. Before Loki realised, her rapier was already merely an arm's length away.

Volume 1 Chapter 4—Battle of Inheritance (Part 1)

Translator and Editor: SaltyTank

Mithian frowned; she honestly had not thought that Loki would actually accept her duel. It was the complete opposite of what she thought the coward who would do anything just to survive. It was unexpected, but that also saved her the trouble of rambling more insults and provocations.

"Your Highness Mithian, do you plan to battle it out another day…" Loki glared directly into her eyes, his own void of any emotions. "Or should we just do it right here, right now?"

"Right now is fine." Mithian pulled out a gold coin, which had her father's face forged on it, and tossed it into the air. The sparkling coin spun as it drew an arc through the cla.s.sroom.

Everyone was bewildered by the unfolding of events; they planned to duel in a cla.s.sroom?

This is preposterous! Many of those here are the ones who will hold great power of the empire in the future!

The traitor Loki is as insensible to anything as always, but the princess going along with his madness is too much!

People who sat on the audience seats always acted leisurely and relaxed. The results did not matter to them because the blood spilled was someone else's, the lives lost were not their own. They only had to sit there enjoy the death show, the cruelest of all performances. But what if they were seated within the arena? That was no longer a show, but a battlefield. Everyone realised that and scrambled from their seats to run away from the war zone.

"Stay back and don't interfere," Loki commanded Alice. She humbly nodded and retreated to a corner in the cla.s.sroom.

The coin landed onto the ground, creating a crisp clang as it clattered against the marble floor.

Mithian took the initiative to launch the first attack. It was a well-executed textbook attack for inheritance mages. Her white, delicate fingers drew small patterns as a fireball condensed in front of her and shot out like an arrow.

If Loki used a normal defensive magic spell, he would fall into the trap of inheritance mages. That was not an ordinary fireball but a complicated spell. There was another spell concealed within the fireball, and it would activate upon impact as a follow up attack after the fireball destroyed the opponent's shield.

It was certainly a wonderful technique, but it was clumsy in Loki's eyes. Mithian had underestimated him as she didn't know he was an inheritance mage also.

She sure is an inheritance mage, but her lineage probably doesn't have much history. Almost every book written by archmages had the concept 'never underestimate your opponent' ingrained into it… Or, Mithian simply ignored all the advice she was given. Thinking that because you're an inheritance mage you'll absolutely win, huih?

Loki believed that the latter was more likely the case. He did not cast any defensive magic, but instead fired a wind blade at the point of contact between the fireball and the spell concealed inside it. The fire elements in the fireball were disturbed by the wind elements, causing the spells to lose control. The fireball was sliced into two and flew past Loki harmlessly into the walls while the concealed spell was destroyed.

It was an ingenious countermeasure against the special fireball attack. If only Mithian had not been so conceited, she would have quickly noticed that this technique was not something an orthodox mage could come up with. However, she had yet to notice her opponent's ident.i.ty as an inheritance mage.

Loki swiftly gathered wind elements below his feet. It was not really an actual spell, but it could still buff his agility and jump height greatly for a short while. He immediately leapt up and dodged Mithian's second fireball.

"Dammit!" Mithian swung her hand horizontally as she gathered strength into her fingers. A blue bolt of lightning lashed out from her fingers like an unblockable flood as it drew a fiery hot line towards Loki.

Converging Thunderbolt!

The magic instructor who had yet to leave the cla.s.sroom had his jaw drop to the floor. It was a spell which combined two fundamental elements, earth and wind, to form a secondary element—thunder. For those of Mithian's age, it was impossible to control such a difficult spell unless they were inheritance mages. Its power was also very potent; Mithian was dead set on killing her opponent.

Loki accelerated once again, avoiding the roaring thunderbolt which struck the pillar behind where he had been standing. The marble pillar cracked and exploded, creating a large hole and spraying debris everywhere.

Mithian sneered. She tracked the jumping Loki with her finger, moving the continuous bolt of thunder towards him. No matter how quick he was, there was no way for him to be faster than a mere swipe of a finger. 

Loki planted his foot onto the roof and sprung downwards. As he dropped, he pointed his finger at the incoming thunderbolt, firing off a thunderbolt of his own. It roar ferociously as it rushed out to devour its counterpart. The clash of elements caused a loud, metallic clang.

Mithian frowned slightly. So he's an inheritance mage also, that explains why he's so fearless. But so what?

With a flick of her finger, her thunderbolt dissipated into thin air, replaced by a non-conductive wall of stone which rose from the floor in front of her. Loki's magic hammered onto the stone wall, spraying rocky chunks and dust across the room and shaking the entire building.

Loki knew that it will take too much mana to penetrate the stone wall with Converging Thunderbolt, which will then make him p.r.o.ne to Mithian's counterattacks. Putting his thoughts into action, he cancelled his spell. The thunderbolt flickered out of existence as though it had never existed, the only proof of its presence being the crater in the stone wall.

Stone Prison—that was the spell Mithian used to create the stone wall. Loki landed lightly on the prison walls and reached for the mithril dagger on his waist, his cloak fluttering in the air. The stone wall quickly turned into sand and fell to the floor as commanded by its caster. Mithian's purple pupils were directly in front of him, glaring at him.

Several blades of wind brushed past Loki's torso. He nimbly dodged the strikes by a hair's breadth and landed right next to his target. His dagger struck out quickly and accurately like a viper, its target being Mithian's throat.

Shing! Mithian unsheathed her rapier and parried Loki's attack.

For orthodox mages, sword fighting between mages was almost unimaginable. Inheritance mages, however, are more than familiar with melee combat. What they had to learn in magic towers were not merely knowledge about magic. They were the personifications of knowledge itself, and they needed the power to back up their ident.i.ty. Not only were they mages, they were also masters of combat. Everything that could kill an opponent would belong in their repertoire.

The nature of sword fighting between mages were different than that of swordsmen. Swordsmen had superior technique and forms, while mages fought on a completely different level of speed thanks to their elemental powers. The two had crossed swords over five times in mere seconds.

Mithian had inferior power, but her flexibility allowed her to strike from peculiar angles, often forcing Loki to stop in the middle of a combo to defend.

It seemed that Mithian had the advantage, yet she retracted her sword and retreated to a safe distance. She looked at her opponent with eyes full of questions.

"I don't get it," Mithian said. "Are you really that afraid of death? That you would even slay your sister to save yourself?"

Loki's azure eyes regained his normal calmness. He stood there for a few seconds, thinking about the standard answer to the question.

"There is no one who does not fear death. Also, she committed a great mistake, it was a deserved punishment."

"You know that's a lie forged by the Senatus!" Mithian was enraged. "Blasphemy? Nonsense, it's just an excuse to exterminate your lineage!"

The magic instructor who stood alongside Alice in a corner looked at the devastated cla.s.sroom in despair; that was not something he should have heard. He almost wished that he was deaf just so he would not have heard what Mithian had said. Such blasphemous speech coming from the mouth of the Pope's daughter; he would be the one to be executed if it spread out.

Loki shook his head and answered, "Your Highness Mithian, I will forget about the nonsense you have just spoken of. Now then, do not say such a thing again."

Mithian was startled for a split second. She lowered her head and muttered, "You used to be different… Yet now, yet now… You're just the same as those tyrannous garbage up top."

Loki ignored her and raised his mithril dagger as he asked, "Your Highness Mithian, are we going to continue our duel?"

"Of course we are!" Mithian lifted her head, this time her eyes filled with burning anger. "To keep people like you alive is a disaster in itself! Might as well kill you earlier."

Before her voice faded away, she had already launched a magic attack. Wind Slice—it was not an easy spell to cast, and casting difficulty was often proportional to its power.

The jade blades of wind cut through the air in a straight line right towards Loki, to which he frowned.

What was the meaning of such an attack? If she used this attack which was void of any technique, did it mean that she was blinded by rage? 

To be hit by such a direct attack was a simple mistake that even orthodox mages would not make. In this situation, the best solution was to block and counterattack. Loki was confident that he could end the duel with his next counterattack because Mithian could never gather the elements in time to block it. A stone wall rose from the ground and easily blocked the blade of wind.

Mithian merely snickered and flicked her finger.

Something's not right!

Loki only realised that after blocking the initial attack. Giving up his plan to counterattack, he put all his mind into defending.

Another three walls of stone sprouted from the floor behind him, but they were promptly destroyed by a powerful spell. Loki scrambled away from the area affected by the spell. He was, however, too slow. A strong wind pressured against his back, with small blades of wind tearing his robe apart and leaving streaks of blood on his body.

It was clearly not the killing move, and Mithian would not stop attacking because he was injured. Before Loki realised, her rapier was already merely an arm's length away.