Blood Queen Reborn

Chapter 158: Raten Vs Quinn

At first, Quinn was hesitant on accepting. He had seen first hand what Vorden was capable of, but he also knew that he wouldn’t be able to grow without taking some risks.

’If anything happens, then the teacher will get involved,’ Quinn thought.

"Sure, we can spar," Quinn replied.

The two stood on opposite sides of the room, facing each other.

"If you sparring against Erin made you improve your ability in the moment, then—" Vorden was in the middle of explaining, when Quinn charged at him.

He swung two massive earth fists towards Vorden, and he narrowly blocked with an earth wall. Then, he retaliated by forming a fist shaped pillar that shot up towards Quinn’s chest.

Quinn took the fist pillar on, using his gauntlets to block the attack. He threw his arms out in an X shaped formation to deflect the oncoming assault. However, he didn’t realize just how powerful it was, causing him to stumble back.

’I was thinking that a surprise attack would’ve been the best move here.’

Then, before Vorden could make his own move, Raten took control over the chair, and Vorden’s outward face shifted into a smirk.

Suddenly, "Vorden" lowered his body into a fighting stance, and before Quinn could blink, he was already bombarded by several kicks shooting water. They were pressurized, and were fired not unlike Erin’s blood swipes. In order to withstand the onslaught, Quinn had to adapt.

Earth from below Quinn’s feet enveloped his body, nearly covering every inch of his skin, save for his eyes. He raised his arms to block, and the water lashed against his armor breaking parts of it off, but Quinn simply shifted the earth, instantly repairing it on the spot.

So long as he was standing on something he could control with his ability, he would have basically an infinite amount of material to fix his armor whenever he wanted.

Then, Quinn circled around "Vorden" firing out stone hands like rockets as he did.

"Vorden’s" smirk grew even wider, and he displayed an impressive feat of acrobatics, kicking and punching the rockets midair. By utilizing a bit of qi, he was able to focus its energy in his legs to destroy the rocks.

Quinn raised his hands, as the dust from the broken stone fists rose into the air, and shot towards "Vorden." Before it could reach him, he made a shield of water.

"Heh, didn’t expect to do this move again," Raten commented.

Merah looked up from her book, getting briefly distracted by all of the commotion, and watched in awe as the two fought.

’Woah, that boy is skilled! I would’ve wondered why he wasn’t in my class, but I’m sure he thought there wasn’t anything he could be taught already.’

The two continued to fight, clashing water against earth. Quinn was mostly on the defensive, but he was pushing his limits and trying out new techniques on the spot, allowing him to push back a few times. Despite the intensity of the fight, Raten was actually holding back. He was keeping to his word, and Vorden kept watch to ensure he didn’t go too far.

Forming a water knife, "Vorden" jumped in and sliced against Quinn’s armor, but he overexerted himself by accident, creating a brief opportunity for Quinn to tackle him.

With the weight of his armor pressed against his body, Quinn raised his hands about to swing them down, but he hesitated. It would’ve been too far.

Unfortunately for him, Raten kicked him off, then jumped to his feet, and raised his hands as a 20ft wave lifted out of the box of water, and crashed it onto Quinn.

"Crap!" was all he was able to say before he narrowly covered up the mouth part of the armor.

The force of the wave nearly took him off of his feet, but he was able to plant himself into the ground. Then, when the water spread out, he was about to charge again, when he suddenly froze in place.

’Damn it, I didn’t put mud around the joints, so I ended up using more MC than I needed to,’ Quinn worried.

Internally, Vorden was watching over Raten’s shoulder, and noticed that Quinn had stopped moving like he initially did.

"Raten, watch out, he might be out of MC."

Raten, however, didn’t hear this, and fired a pressurized jet stream of water into Quinn’s head, breaking apart his armor.

"Raten!" Vorden shouted, "What the hell are you doing?! How can you not notice when someone’s low on MC with how talented you are?"

Raten’s eyes widened, surprised at how much damage he had done to Quinn’s armor.

"... My bad."

While the two were talking, the little one in the back of their mind had shuffled, unbeknownst to either of them. For the first time in what felt like forever, his eyes darted to the image of Quinn’s head flinging back, revealing black curly hair.

Something in his heart lurched, memories swirling of how he used to be treated by that nightmare of a grandfather they had. Memories that were only soothed by a person long gone from this world.

Quinn fell back, his helmet shattered, falling to the floor.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TWO DOING?!" The little one screamed, "YOU’RE HURTING HIM!"

Raten and Vorden turned around, astonished the little one spoke after so long.

"I’m sorry!" Raten apologized, but it fell upon deaf ears, "I really didn’t realize he was out of MC, I swear!"

The little one didn’t care, and ran over to the chair, shoving Raten off of it. He awkwardly sprinted over to Quinn’s side, almost not quite used to moving anymore, but desperate to make sure he wasn’t injured

Quinn was already getting back onto his feet, only to get surprised by "Vorden’s" face being so close to his own.

"What’s up? I’m okay, I’ve been through worse," Quinn said, but "Vorden" just stared at him.

There was an intensity to his eyes, like they could cry at any second.

Quinn blinked a couple of times, then glanced behind himself thinking that he was looking at Merah, but it didn’t seem like it was her that caught his attention.

"Hey man, are you good?" Quinn asked, confused.

However, instead of getting a spoken response, "Vorden" tightly hugged him, nearly squeezing all the air out of him. Quinn was about to protest, but he heard an even stranger response.

"Vorden" was sobbing uncontrollably.