With a smile that screamed happiness and glee, Aura Nova's blade tore toward Kingsley's heart without a single trace of mercy in her motion. But Kingsley did not care about her merciless intent, because he too was merciless. His hands blurred upward as he caught Aura Nova's blade between his palms, stopping it dead in its tracks with terrifying precision.

Before Aura Nova could even properly react, Kingsley shifted immediately to the side, forcing her to move with him. Without missing a single beat, he jumped off his feet, the sole of his foot slamming directly toward Aura Nova's chest without remorse. He did not care whether she was a woman or a man, an enemy was an enemy, and nothing more.

Aura Nova instantly raised her forearm to block. Like an asteroid tearing into another asteroid, the two body parts collided, the air screaming in madness as it detonated outward. Aura Nova felt an overwhelming force slam into her body, the intensity maddening, far greater than anything she had ever experienced before. The next moment, the momentum blasted her backward, inertia acting with full, unrestrained force.

As Aura Nova was about to crash into a tree, she regained control over her body at the very last instant. Her feet landed against the bark with effortless precision before she pushed off and dropped back down, landing with a graceful, controlled step. Aura Nova glanced at her arm. It had swollen noticeably from the block, her skin tinted with shades of purple and brown from the injury. Her eyes then shifted to her other hand, it was broken.

Within that tiny fraction of a second between impact and being sent flying backward, Kingsley had injured the very hand she had used to hold her blade. Aura Nova did not react to the pain. Instead, her injuries healed instantly, without even the slightest delay, flesh and bone restoring themselves as though nothing had happened.

'I wonder when last I was injured,' she thought to herself, her gaze shifting from her now-healed hands to the man standing before her. Kingsley remained calm and composed, gazing at her without rushing, without tension, as though the exchange had meant little to him.

She could not remember the last time she had bled. The more unsettling question was whether she had ever bled at all. With her ridiculous talent, she had always ended her opponents with extreme ease. The Dusk Planet had been no different, it had been nothing more than a playground to her, a world that had birthed something it could not possibly contain.

And yet now, on a grander and far larger stage, Aura Nova found herself injured. Even before this moment, she had taken numerous hits from Kingsley, while Kingsley himself remained untouched and pristine, as though she were the student and he the master.

'He truly is a specialist in his field,' Aura Nova thought silently. But to her, that alone was not the true reason she was the only one receiving damage.

'I see… battle experience,' she concluded after a brief moment of reflection. While she might possess overwhelming power and raw strength, she lacked battle experience, or rather, to be more precise, Kingsley Sky's battle experience completely eclipsed her own.

While Aura Nova had spent most of her time training, honing her abilities through repetition and raw talent, Kingsley had spent most of his life in actual battle. As a soldier from the Blue Planet, he was always on the move, shifting from one hellish battlefield to another, from one sea of blood to the next, with barely two weeks of rest between missions. The battle experience he carried was immense beyond measure, and when coupled with his Martial Art talent, Aura Nova had little hope of defeating him without resorting to her Omniedit innate ability.

A normal person would have immediately turned to their Omniedit innate ability in such a situation, but Aura Nova was not normal. She had identified a flaw within herself, and she had every intention of correcting it. Since this was a spar, a friendly battle that could still very well end in death, she might as well learn from it. And since Kingsley stood at the very peak of his craft, there was almost no better teacher she could have hoped for.

With that realization, her demeanor shifted once more. Her expression sharpened as she decided to raise the tempo even further than before. But this time, for the first time since the battle had begun, something new stepped onto the battlefield.

Sword Intent.

Aura Nova's Sword Intent was blue in color, calm yet profound. It flowed gently into her twin short swords, then coursed through her entire body, augmenting her to even greater heights. She was not a fool. Throughout the battle, even while moving at full speed, she had seen just how easily Kingsley moved, the casual precision with which he parried, the effortless way he responded. The man had not even been serious up until now.

Although Aura Nova had identified her lack of battle experience as her greatest flaw, it did not mean she intended to swing her daggers mindlessly at Kingsley. That would have been foolish and pointless. That was precisely why she went straight to Sword Intent, an energy she had mastered to near perfection.

For the first time since the battle began, Kingsley's expression shifted, if only slightly, before returning to its usual calm state.

Aura Nova caught that subtle change, but she did not comment on it. It did not matter. All that mattered was the battle, and the experience she intended to gain before eventually resorting to her Omniedit ability. With that, she took a single step forward. With that step, the space between her and Kingsley vanished entirely as she erased the distance at a speed far greater than anything she had displayed throughout the spar.

Her blade rose toward the sky, then fell from above as she aimed to cleave Kingsley straight through the shoulders. Kingsley stood unmoving for a brief moment, as though he had been caught off guard. His perception expanded instantly, stretching to match Aura Nova's newly elevated speed and strength.

This time, Kingsley did not block as he had before. He moved, barely. He dove to the left at the last possible moment, narrowly evading the strike. The next instant, Aura Nova's blade tore into the earth beneath them. A massive chasm ripped open, stretching for kilometers as though the abyss itself were rising to the surface.

But Aura Nova did not care.

Before Kingsley could blink or even process his next thought, she was already upon him again, her blade singing toward his heart without a shred of hesitation or mercy.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.