"Haha ha ha... Tasher, where have you been hiding this one?" Baldor's laughter lit up the atmosphere immediately.
Richard, however, was planning to be a little petty. "This is becoming a very common sight. What do you think, Asakai?"
The head of the Umbra family spoke with a straight expression. "Good job of your kid exploiting his flaws in an instant. Still, if that's all he has going for him, my grandson Hida should be able to make quick work of him."
Richard grinned at this response. "We could make a bet, for old time's sake?"
Asakai refused with a straight face. "Whatever advantage you think your kid has will vanish if relics are allowed."
Richard adopted a fake shocked expression. "Oho... if that kid was allowed to use his relic, trust me—your kid would need regeneration for both arms right this moment."
He bragged openly without fear. He had already tested the ability of that terrifying black blade. Even he would have to be careful fighting Neo with a relic like that if Neo were a few ranks higher. But at his current rank, he would need twenty-five times his total spiritual energy just to slice through Richard's basic spiritual defense.
"You think if Hida is allowed to use his relic alongside my family's martial art, your son would be victorious? Your time away has left you with much to catch up on, Tasher." The head of the Umbra family replied with a straight face.
Although he bragged, he still had reservations about allowing his son to fight a Tasher to avoid giving Richard a reason to brag that his family had defeated the Umbra family, a high Noble family, when it came to individual strength in three consecutive generations.
"Please, please... My daughter is about to go next. Let me just watch in peace." Baldor's high-horsed interjection drew sharp looks from Richard and Asakai.
"Oh...., I don't know what the deal is about your kid not using spiritual energy, but you'd better ask him to quickly. Venus isn't—how do I put this—'gentle' like her sister by any means."
"Don't worry, Neo doesn't need it."
Richard waved him off dismissively, seizing the chance to irritate the noble while trying to bait Asakai into sending his son out to the arena. All the time he spent training Neo, if he said it wasn't for moments like this, then he'd be lying.
Baldor's mouth twitched at the response, but he restrained himself and focused on the upcoming fight.
---
Neo stood before a bright-faced noble girl around his age with blonde hair and a smile that reminded him of an overexcited child seeing a piñata. It freaked him out, sending chills down his back. He gripped his new wooden sword—replaced by the servants—very tightly while focusing his True Sight on her.
She was nothing like the girl he'd spoken with moments ago. That grin on her face completely changed her demeanor.
Unlike Atys, her spiritual energy manipulation displayed intense control that wasn't shoddy at all. In fact, if he had to compare, it was almost on par with what he could achieve with his current spirit veins.
'Hmm... Mid Rank 1.' Sensing her rank.
Neo didn't underestimate her, focusing solely on her despite that unsettling smile plastered on her face. Her weapon choice was a little too intimidating for his liking as well.
A mace. Though it was wooden, it was still a mace.
She spoke, excitement rippling through her voice. "The way you defeated Atys Fang was so cool!"
"You better not think I'm easy just because I'm a lady. Or trust me—you're gonna lose."
Neo responded with a smirk. "Don't worry, I have no intention of losing."
Seeing them both ready, the principal amplified his voice with spiritual energy. "Fight."
Neo maintained his stance, True Sight active, as he watched her approach with quick, light footsteps in her blue leather armor. She came in with a wide swing at his head, her mace wielded in a single right arm.
Neo moved to deflect with his sword, parrying the incoming mace. He calculated that this action would reduce his sword's durability—he wasn't using spiritual energy—but he wanted to gauge her strength, so he committed.
SNAP!
Neo's eyes widened as he watched his wooden sword break in half. 'What!!!?'
'Does she have the bloodline of an ogre or something?'
He didn't miss a beat. The mace, though losing some momentum, was still coming for his head with splinters of wood.
He took a couple of steps back, letting the attack shoot past his face while his eyes remained fixed on the excited Venus.
"See? I warned you not to think I'm easy. Now you have half a weapon."
He wasted no time recovering from her attack as she closed the distance in three steps, smashing her mace down from above.
"Half my weapon is still enough to defeat you, though."
Her strike came fast, but not as fast as Neo, who jammed his broken sword in a thrust at her exposed side. She abandoned her strike, retreating a step as Neo zoned in like a homing missile. During her retreat, she centered her gravity and aimed a kick at his left side.
Neo, already in her space, saw the strike coming as inevitable. He loosened his body weight and used the force from the kick to leap back several steps.
He looked at her quietly from across the arena. She stared back, then spoke. "You will lose against me if you don't use your spiritual energy, you know that, right?"
Neo smiled. "It's so sweet of you to worry about me. But as I said, I have no intention of losing."
Suddenly, Richard's voice boomed from the crowd. "Hey, kid! Defeat her in the next ten moves, and I'll let you get a hit in."
Neo and Venus paused their attacks with the distraction as they both turned toward the source—Richard, Asakai, and Baldor standing together.
"You mean it?" Neo asked with deadly seriousness.
Most nobles didn't understand the specifics of their conversation, but they grasped one thing: it involved Neo with his broken sword defeating Venus, who seemed to have dominated the fight so far.
"Yes." Richard's voice was firm with his usual wild grin on his face as he spoke.
Baldor spoke in an embarrassed tone right after Richard's response to Neo. "My little girl....., hehe... we old men have a little bet going on."
"All you have to do is get through ten of his moves without being defeated."
Venus pouted at this, turning to Neo, who had his head down, already imagining the scene of striking Richard.
'Ahhh... such pleasure.'
He raised his head, looking at the fuming Venus.
"Ten moves? Survive ten moves from 'you'?" Her voice dripped with offense.
"It seems even my grandfather doesn't think highly of me. I'll show them who should be defeated in ten moves."
Neo watched her mutter, then shook his head. "Tsk tsk tsk tsk... sorry, kid, but playing around has to end quickly."
He suddenly threw away his broken sword and took a stance with bare hands outstretched. Neo zeroed in on Venus completely, standing perfectly still.
Venus, still seething at not being taken seriously, tightened her grip on her mace and approached with deadly speed.
Neo calmly activated True Sight to its maximum. This was mentally draining—in the course of an entire battle, he could probably do this twice before collapsing from sheer mental and physical strain.
---
Venus bit her lip as she faced Neo, his green eyes fixed on her with deadly calm, his breath barely noticeable.
'What's this I'm feeling?' Her grandfather asking her to survive ten of Neo's moves even after seeing the state she'd already placed him in after a few minutes of fighting really brushed against her pride.
Tightening her grip on her mace, channeling spiritual energy, she propelled herself forward, closing the distance in a moment. Her mace cut through the air in a horizontal arc aimed at his ribs.
Neo's True Sight tracked the flow of spiritual energy through her body, seeing the strike before she fully committed to it. He didn't move backward. Instead, he leaned back just a couple of inches, taking a position that seemed like he was falling backward, and suddenly caught Venus's wrist mid-swing, aiming for his side.
Confusion flickered across her face. She moved to counter, but with her target gone and Neo using his falling momentum, he pulled her body weight through the air, making her lose balance for a second.
She adjusted at the last moment, pushing the tip of her left foot off the floor and reducing the pull from his grip by pushing herself in the same direction. Unable to loosen his grip instantly, she saw this as the best move to avoid losing balance.
Suddenly, Neo let go and pushed his entire body into a backflip.
The last thing Venus heard after her decision to push toward him was a ringing sound. Her vision blurred, and she crumpled to the floor unconscious with a thud.
---
"That was—?"
"Yes, a single move."
"But they gave him ten moves, though."
"Who is he?"
"I've never heard of a male grandson in the Tasher family."
"See? He still didn't use any spiritual energy. That's what you're missing here."
Waves of murmurs flowed through the hall as the fight ended. Richard, seated in the stands, smirked at Baldor.
"That's amazing. He still didn't use spiritual energy!"
"How?" Baldor Sapphire asked with an incredulous look, staring at the exhausted Neo, who looked like he might collapse at any moment. Neo breathed hard while speaking to the grinning Reaper, who waved him off, replying as smug as always.
"Heh. I told you he doesn't need that thing!"
Neo knew this fight was won only because of his True Sight. It was almost like precognition—seeing moves ahead by studying tiny changes in posture, predicting direction based on positioning and momentum.
But this went further. He could combine multiple factors: how spiritual energy responded to movement, posture, and eye direction, with the System helping him track these functions simultaneously.
Despite Venus's precise spiritual energy manipulation, he had detected small fluctuations that revealed her actions. He'd been surprised by her strength at the start and the fact that she wore armor, even if light. It didn't help his case, so he targeted the most unguarded place: her head.
If he'd simply thrown a punch, she would have guarded against it. During combat, the first thing he'd learned was to guard his head before attacking. So he had two problems: her strength, which surpassed his by a small margin and was reinforced by spiritual energy, and a way to bypass her defense.
He disrupted her defense by grabbing her wrist and pulling, keeping her from throwing another attack as she focused on regaining balance. That allowed him to drive his foot into her head, putting all his energy into the strike. She lost consciousness before recognizing where the attack came from.
Looking at the grinning Richard from the stage, Neo muttered between labored breaths, "One hit."
He walked off the stage with firm steps toward Helen, beside whom stood Ronald, looking terrified at Neo's eyes.
"Hehe... w-what's with the look?" Neo spoke to Helen, who regarded him with a complicated expression. She'd never looked at him that way before. If he had to describe her attitude toward him, she was like an older sister who saw him as a kid, no matter how mature he acted or spoke. It was as if she closed herself off to the thought of him being a stranger in her life.
"Hmph. You're a little strong, I'll admit it. But you still can't beat me. Not yet..." Her voice trailed off at the end.
"Yes. Not yet. Still, wait a few more months.. who knows?" Neo said with a grin that made her shiver.
The past seven months in the Blackstone Empire had been nothing but fun times for her—especially the 'fun times' she spent bullying Neo with her Peak Rank 2 strength, forcing Neo to want payback for the longest time, although she hadn't considered that Neo might actually catch up to her in power.
But watching him fight an ascendant within his rank, beating a Mid Rank 1 while at Low Rank 1, and still not using his spiritual energy... it threatened her position as the older, stronger sister.