Odyssey of the Blind God

'Finally, I got rid of this fucking taste in my mouth!!'

Nial had no idea that Jase had already been informed about his arrival, so he was quite nonchalant. Meanwhile, he had finally gotten rid of the annoying problem that had bothered him the most- the bitter-sweet taste in his mouth.

However, once that was taken care of, he focused his range of perception on the surroundings, which allowed Nial to visualize everyone in his proximity.

He perceived Jase, who was slowly entering the arena, as well.

"Finally, you're here! Were you too scared to come over?"

"Stop spouting bullshit and fight me. I don't have all day, and there are still two more challengers after you, who I'll have to fight!"

'F*ck! You were the one who wasted my time because I had to wait for you for almost 16 hours, you b*tch!!"

The corners of Jase's mouth twitched and he grit his teeth while forcing himself to calm down.

A large longsword manifested in his hand, followed by a Tier-1 runic armament chestplate.

'Looks like he was also able to plunder through the ancient ruin's dungeon as well.' Nial thought. He was unimpressed by Jase's tactics as he accessed his spatial ring to take out the Dragonflame spear.

Nial noticed something exciting as he slowly changed his stance while wielding the Dragonflame spear,.

'How do I not feel any soreness? My body is full of energy as well and my mana veins have expanded as well!!'

Mana circulated smoothly through his entire body, at a much faster rate than usual, allowing Nial to experiment quite a bit.

Excitement surged within him like an adrenaline rush and he couldn't help but feel as if Jase's challenge came at the perfect time.

'I should show everyone how much I have improved in a single month, right?'

A faint smile emerged on his lips, provoking Jase instantaneously when he saw it.

His Innate ability [Blade Intent] leaked from his body, shrouding him and his weapon tightly as his eyes turned ice-cold.

He became one with his weapon, and his presence changed in an instant, turning deathly dangerous as he stared in the depths of Nial's milky eyes.

"I will kill you, you blind f*cker!"

Nial was seemingly unbothered about anything Jase did in order to provoke him. He was cool-headed, contrary to the hot-tempered Jase, who was provoked by just about every single thing Nial did.

This was quite intriguing and it confused Nial more than anyone else.

'Did I kill his family, or what? Is it really necessary for him to act like this? Isn't this just a challenge?'

Smoothly moving the Dragonflame spear around his body, Nial looked unaffected by the intimidating presence Jase released.

This was already quite surprising for many Instructors, who couldn't help but avert their attention from Jase to Nial for a short moment.

"Weird…truly weird…" Ullyr mumbled, only to hear a familiar voice next to him.

"Nothing is weird about this. Jase's presence is simply too weak to affect Nial in any way!"

'Too weak, are you nuts?' Commander Ullyr thought agitatedly before he noticed that Miranda, Junades, and the others had come over as well.

"What do you mean 'weak'? In the batch of new Originals, Jase's presence is among the strongest. There are only a few Originals, whose presence can be considered intenser than his!"

Even if Commander Ullyr didn't adore Jase, he was not able to blatantly downgrade the young Original's capabilities just for the sake of it.

Jase might be an unlikable character but his power and talent were real, that was for sure!

"Didn't you notice Nial's presence when he entered the arena? He didn't even release his mana fluctuations with the intention to intimidate someone but he was still able to change the atmosphere in the room.

And that was without doing anything except show up and walk inside the arena!"

Miranda was proud of her disciple. She was once again reassured that taking Nial and the others under her wing had been the right choice.

While training the three young Originals, it might have felt as if their progress was too slow, but that had only been the case because Miranda, Junades, and Kassandra had too high expectations.

They didn't treat Nial and his friends as if they were still kids or less than 20 years old. Rather, they looked at the three Originals as if they had to achieve everything they had been asked to.

This was a lot of pressure for young Originals but they had to be taught early, otherwise, their foundation would crumble the moment they faced the real pressure of the battlefield!

"But Brother Junades and Sister Kassandra's presence is more frightening than that plaything. He doesn't radiate the sharpness a weapon to kill should have…it's quite disappointing." Mathias mumbled, feeling somewhat disappointed at Jase's presence.

After hearing Mathias' words, everyone looked at him weirdly.

'BROTHER Junades and SISTER Kassandra?! How the hell is this brat treating his direct Instructors?!'

However, neither Junades nor Kassandra seemed to bother about the way Mathias talked about them. In fact, they merely smiled oddly before Bella mumbled,

"I guess he is not releasing his entire strength at once. His Innate ability is called [Battle Intent] and he is the son of the Sword Master, so he should have more than enough tricks up his sleeve."

Bella's words were certainly true, however, this didn't change the fact that Nial was not affected by anything Jase was doing.

It was as if he didn't treat Jase as his opponent, at all!

But that couldn't be farther from the truth.

Nial tried to wear his opponent's defense down by provoking him and forcing Jase to attack him.

This would make things much easier for him.

He was waiting for the battle to start because his taunting seemed to have reached its peak already.

And it was not long after that the countdown initiating the start of the battle had begun.

[3]

[2]

[1]

[Fight!!]

The moment the battle began, the arena's floor cracked and Jase catapulted his body forward.

Debris of rock and mud were shot through the surrounding area, and a whirlwind created by Jase's sudden movement stirred up the small pebbles on the ground.

Jase's speed was extremely high. He shot out faster than one could lash out with a sword and it looked like his speed kept increasing.

He was like a razor-sharp weapon that had been unsheathed. His [Blade Intent] was fully unleashed, and if one looked closely it was even possible to see the faint halo of a huge sword shrouding Jase's body.

The sword halo was pointed at Nial whose lifeless eyes were fixated on Jase.

Yet, instead of feeling frightened by the sudden intensified Blade Intent, Nial remained calm.

His expression turned ice-cold when he noticed that Jase was also releasing killing intent.

It was directed at Nial, which was not something he could accept.

Everyone with the intention to kill someone was unlikely to be able to control themselves and hold back upon defeating their opponent.

Whether it would be accidentally or intentionally was not important anymore by then because they would certainly kill or heavily injure their opponent.

As he understood this clearly, Nial didn't even think of holding back anymore.

Streams of dark energy were released from Nial's body, shrouding him tightly.

A moment later, black miasma created through [Hodur's Heir] was released explosively.

However, instead of remaining in the fog-like state, the explosively released black Miasma was shaped into dozens of compressed balls.

They surrounded Nial in a radius of more than ten meters and blocked the advance of his opponent.

At least, that would be the case if the black miasma had any attack or defensive power.

But as Jase couldn't sense anything, he merely slashed at the first black miasma ball that entered his sight before advancing ahead.

The black miasma ball burst open, releasing the compressed miasma inside the ball explosively.

Jase was shrouded by the black miasma in an instant, but he was still able to see due to the thinness of the miasma's shroud.

Thus, he kept advancing while simultaneously ignoring the effect of the miasma.

It didn't affect him in any way as the thick layer of his Blade Intent protected Jase from being negatively affected by any kind of external factors.

This was something Jase had worked hard to attain…this special effect of the Blade Intent.

By clearly showing his opponent that his attack was meaningless, Jase smiled arrogantly as he kept advancing further.

However, his overconfidence prevented him from perceiving that something was odd when the black miasma balls were all floating around him in a circle so as to prevent him from advancing ahead.

A much more intense and dark tone of floating balls had merged with the black miasma balls.

But that was simply because they were not balls of black miasma but compressed darkness balls created by his dark energy.

Shrouded in the dark energy, Nial released them from his entire body and Jase did not even realize it. Only when darkness currents shot out from the darkness balls did he perceive that something was wrong.

In an instant, all black miasma balls exploded, shrouding Nial, Jase and a part of the arena in darkness.

At the same time, all darkness balls shot out darkness currents, reaching Jase in an instant.

However, Nial did not make the mistake of colliding with the protection layer of his [Blade Intent] and taking it head-on.

He knew that the weak darkness currents were not powerful enough to achieve this. Thus, he focused on restricting Jase, by using more than 30 balls of darkness, which had shot out darkness ropes to hold the hot-tempered youth in place.

Nearly half a minute had passed, and Nial was only slowly retracting the black miasma to recuperate some of his mana, thereby allowing everyone to see what was going on.

Around 30 floating balls of darkness surrounded Jase with each of them holding the young Original down with a rope of darkness.

"Isn't that…the same thing Olivia Meradnin did? Does he have the same ability as her? Are they acquaintances? No, that's not it…Nial's attack is different, even if both use similar powers….What is that?"

Commander Ullyr couldn't help but be dumbfounded. It was impossible for him not to feel weird. He and everyone else present had seen Olivia Meradnin's fight.

That was why it was quite easy to tell that Nial used a similar, yet even shrewder tactic to defeat his opponent in the same way.

"It's not over yet," Miranda merely stated, completely ignoring Commander Ullyr's comment.

She knew that Nial was powerful and that he had many tricks up his sleeve but that didn't mean Jase was already defeated.

How could the son of the Sword Master be defeated so easily?

Revealing his trump card, a bright golden light was released from Jase's body. It expanded rapidly, weakening the darkness ropes that shackled him.

Using his brute strength which seemed to have increased drastically, Jase tore the darkness ropes apart without any issues.

'A Holy aura?' Nial wondered, taking a few steps back as he noticed that Jase's entire presence had changed once again.

Meanwhile, Jase was licking his dry lips as he took a deep breath.

"I didn't expect you to force me to go all out. Congratulations, you receive my respect…but now, face the might of a double awakened Original!"