Child of Destiny

...

Cloe continued to circle around Alices with her stealthy movements while also hiding behind the latter's blind spot. She was moving like an assassin who was stalking her target without being noticed.

While that was happening, Alice also realized that her opponent seemed to be trying to exhaust her before striking the moment when her guard was down. She slightly knitted her eyebrows as she was fully aware that she couldn't let this situation continue.

Having that in mind, she quickly adjusted her control over the revolving Mental Energy around her and suddenly turned it into a spear with an unstable form. At the same time, thin lines of invisible lines suddenly spread them around her like spiderwebs that were waiting for the prey to mistakenly come over.

She was rebuilding her Spiritual Sense once again!

Swoosh!

But right at the same moment, Cloe immediately made her move. She quickly charged at Alice as if she knew that the sensing threads that the latter was trying to build were not fully set properly yet.

She bypassed the invisible threads as if she could see them before arriving behind Alice within an instant. And clenched her fist that was surrounded with transparent Internal Qi before smashing it to the Mental Energy Barrier that was protecting her opponent.

Bang!

The barrier was immediately shattered right after getting hit but her punch. But at the same time, Alice was able to find Cloe's location now.

With that, she quickly flicked her hand to send the Mental Energy Spear with an unstable form that she built earlier to behind her.

Swoosh!

Cloe took a deep breath and took a slight step behind her while also throwing her other fist towards the incoming spear made of Mental Energy.

Bang!

The spear was also shattered right after the collision, but Cloe was forced to take a couple of steps backward to stabilize her footing.

At the same time, the scattered Mental Energy in the air suddenly transformed into multiple petals before gathering towards a single spot. They all gathered around Alice as she waved her hands in a gentle matter.

'Formless Lotus Arts (Family Arts): Dancing Lotus'

Swoosh! Swoosh!

And all of a sudden the lotus petals floating in the air suddenly flew towards Cloe in waves, as of they were planning to bury her with them.

Seeing that, Cloe quickly hopped away from her previous locations, trying to distance herself away from the incoming waves of lotus petals that were made of Mental Energy.

She flipped, jumped, and hopped backward as she continued to run away from the lotus petals that were chasing after her. And from time to time, she was also looking at Alice who was controlling the lotus petals with gentle movements of her hands.

'It looks like she couldn't move when she was controlling them,' thought Cloe after seeing that Alice who didn't move an inch after summoning the lotus petals.

'But I also can't ignore the fact that she may be baiting me to fall to her trap,' she added inside her mind while knitting her eyebrows.

She hesitated for a moment but she knew that she had no other choice but to try getting near Alice.

She was originally planning to drag this battle for as long as she could sense it was the most optimal way to win given their current situation. But since the lotus petals that were chasing her were getting more and more troublesome due to the increasing numbers, she could not afford to go with that plan.

After all, avoiding them was also quite taxing for her and she also didn't know if Alice was plotting something else aside from this one.

Cloe followed her intuition and suddenly changed the direction of her retreat path before surrounding her body with a thick Internal Qi before charging forward all of a sudden, breaking through the wave of lotus petals in front of her.

And right after her feet touched the ground, she quickly charged ahead without any hint of hesitation and sprinted straight to Alice while increasing the amount of Internal Energy that was surrounding her body.

Alice tried to stop Cloe from getting near her by controlling the lotus petals floating in the air with each movement of her hands. But despite how hard she tried, the best she could do was only hinder the charge of the latter for a brief moment due to how nimble Cloe avoid those waves of lotus petals.

Cloe drew quite a couple of arcs when she was dodging with her zigzag and curving movements. Her speed was not that fast when compared to other Martial-Artists but she was still doing pretty fine at dodging the attacks that were thrown at her.

Seeing that her opponent was continuously shortening the distance between them, Alice decided to abandon the idea of stopping Cloe's charge and just chose to set up a defensive line instead.

Alice did a pulling motion with both of her hands and gathered all of the lotus petals surrounding her before moving them in a circular motion around her body.

They created a spherical barrier with their circular movements while also hiding Alice and whatever she was doing behind them.

Cloe slightly knitted her eyebrows when sew saw that but didn't immediately halt her advance. She was trying to figure out what her opponent was trying to do this time. And after a brief moment of thinking, she quickly increased her speed as the Internal Qi surrounding her suddenly became violent as if they were a wildfire in the forest.

'Unnamed Martial-Arts Skill: Breakthrough'

Swoosh!

During her charge, Cloe raised both of her arms and crossed them in front of her to protect her head as she charged at the blockade that the lotus petals in front of her.

Bang!

The spherical barrier in front of Cloe was suddenly obliterated as charged through it. But despite what just happened, she was still wearing a deep frown since there was no one behind that barrier.

Alice suddenly disappeared!

Cloe quickly turned her head left and right to look for her opponent as soon as possible while halting her charge. But despite looking anywhere, she still couldn't find Alice nor any traces that were left behind.

But even if that was the case, Cloe still had a calm look on her face. It was as if the sudden disappearance of her opponent was not an issue.

'If she is nowhere to be found on the surface, then there could only be a single location for her to escape,' thought Cloe before gathering a large amount of Internal Qi on her right-hand fist before smashing in on the ground with a very powerful manner.

'Unnamed Martial-Arts Skill: Destruction'

Boom!

An explosion immediately occurred and spiderweb cracks started to spread in every direction starting from where Cloe's fist landed.

The scale of her punch was quite large as it almost covered the entire backyard. And when Shiella saw that, the corner of her mouth couldn't help but twitch. 'Looks like I also need to call someone who was skilled at repairing the landscape.'

Bang!

Then Alice suddenly jumped up from underneath the ground as she coughed quietly. There were some bloodstains on the corner of her mouth, indicating that she couldn't properly block the vibration that Cloe had sent towards the ground.

But at the same time, she powerfully swung her hand upwards as if she was commanding something to emerge from the ground.

'Formless Lotus Arts (Family Arts): Emerging Lotus'

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Then spear-like Mental Energy suddenly flew up from the ground underneath Cloe's feet.

Feeling the slight vibration on the ground, Cloe quickly flipped backward to get away from her previous locations as an explosion occurred in there.

She continued to flip back as more and more spear-like Mental Energy shot up towards the ground as if they were flowers that were sprouting out from the ground.

The expression on Shiella's face started to become weird as she watched that scene. It was not because of how intense that fight was, but because their backyard was really starting to become destroyed. It was just repaired after her little duel with Shin, but it was getting wrecked once again. And it was much serious compared to that time since there was no barrier to prevent their attacks from spreading out.

'This is not going to happen if that stupid pervert is not here!' thought Shiella inside her head as she cursed David for being absent.

...

Achoo!

Somewhere on the road, David suddenly sneezed loudly while driving.

He knitted his eyebrows quite deeply before muttering to himself with a serious tone. "Looks like someone is thinking about me once again. And based on how loud it was, I am pretty sure that they are thinking about me quite passionately."

With Shin's current sense, hearing such conceited remarks was practically impossible, especially since he was currently sitting in the passenger seat.

He looked at his senior brother with a weird expression on his face before asking. "Are you sure that that person is not cursing you instead?"

...