Chapter 2600: Malleable

Aina stood in the middle, a bit annoyed. A Time Force practitioner was used to account for a million different things at once. Aside from Dream Force practitioners, they were probably the very best in this regard. In fact, it was probably closer than it seemed and there was a ton of overlap.

But this man actually forgot that they were in the middle of an arena. She had even just been using one hand in an attempt to prolong the fight as she had definitely just made years of progress in a few seconds just now. It would be hard to replicate these circumstances elsewhere.

She shook her head and vanished, leaving the world in silence.

...

The entire matter was recontextualized in their minds. They realized that Aina didn't seem to have struggled even from the very beginning. Other than a superficial use, she didn't really rely on her on Battle Ax Force either. In fact, it had only been barely enough for them to realize that she was a Sovereign.

The group looked toward one another. Even Orion, the Cloud Race youth, opened a single eye, taking a peek at what was happening above. Then, a hint of solemnness appeared between his brows.

That... was definitely not normal.

They were certain that the man's Ability Index was influencing Aina as well, so where was the jerkiness? Why did she seem unaffected? Was she a Time Force user as well? Had she used it to counter it?

A Sovereign of a Weapon Force and a Time Force user? And on top of that, carrying that absolutely ridiculous physical strength?

The silence somehow became deeper.

...

Aina appeared in the common room that she, Yuri and Savahn had been using, still swinging her ax absentmindedly.

Just now, she hadn't really been using Time Force. Those people lacked ingenuity, and also didn't know that she was a Blood Force user, so they couldn't see it.

The strength of her body was entirely dependent on how much Life Force she chose to pump into her Blood Force. The reason for her strong body was because of her nigh endless vitality, it was just a natural part of being a Blood Sovereign.

She had countered the man's Time Force from quickly changing the state of her body. The Time Force could only work on whatever the current version of hers was, so she had chosen to strengthen and weaken herself variably to regain her usual smoothness in combat.

However, she hadn't done all of that just to win.

With her Body Clairvoyance, she could feel the changes the Time Force was making to her clearly. She could react to exactly when she should attack even better than the man himself who was relying partially on a roll of the dice.

If she had wanted to just win, she would have chosen the exact moment where the Luck of the Draw Ability Index pumped untold power into her to swing her ax.

Obviously, she was chasing something different.

First, it was this new method of using Blood Force, but more importantly than that, this sort of variability in battle would be a huge deal.

She didn't like the jerkiness of the man's battle style. But she could smooth it out, she could vary the speed of her strike while her ax was already in the air just by controlling the ebb and flow of his Blood Force.

But this still felt like a surface level matter. She wanted something deeper, that deep thing was what she had been chasing before the battle abruptly came to an end. And now she was a bit annoyed, unable to find that feeling again. Her Clairvoyance was great sometimes, but when it was triggered by an external item rather than her own self-reflection, it was harder to grasp.

Then it suddenly clicked.

All this time, her Clairvoyance had made her change from weapon to weapon, shifting her focus again and again just to shore up a weakness she might have had in her usual combat style.

She had used a sword, a spear, even a silk scarf as a weapon before. There probably wasn't a single weapon type that she hadn't tried out, some for longer periods of time than others.

Even so, it had been a while since the last time she had experienced such a compulsion. She thought it was because she had already gone past the limit through which other weapons could help her improve. After all, she had already used all of them.

Unless.... Her Clairvoyance wanted her to lean into that even more. Not just using her understanding of other weapons to shore up her weaknesses, but also making them strengths.

She was still swinging her ax with a single hand, carrying its mountain-sized weight as though it was nothing at all.

Suddenly, she imagined that it was a thin sword and her casual swing seemed to become even faster and more agile.

She imagined a spear and it became rigid and territorial, forming a Domain that others couldn't cross into without fear of death.

She imagined a silk scarf and the pole arm seemed to lose all sense of rigidity it had just gained. It was nothing more than an illusion, and yet it was undeniable that the pole arm moved with greatest fluidity, attacking at angles that shouldn't have been possible.

Aina didn't seem to realize that there were others watching her at all. Her Battle Ax Force surged, climbing to the Middle Life State and then the Higher Life State.

She had come to understand the same thing Leonel had, but on an even deeper level.

Weapon Forces were just the extensions of the people who created them. What she wanted her ax to be... it would be.

Blade marks erupted and covered the room, and yet didn't leave even a single mark anywhere to be seen.

She slammed the butt of her Battle Ax into the ground, a gentle smile on her face.