Instead of answering Alnea, or rushing towards him right away, the Fire Servant shifted his gaze to the pillars of fire around him, and let out a sigh, wondering what he had done to earn the ire of Goddess Ilea. He was such a devout believer of the Gods. A perfect descendant of the Orthodoxies. Maybe even a perfect Wanderer. Why was it then, that things never went as he expected them to go?

  Maybe the Gods were testing him, he thought, as a wave of fire slowly leaked from the crystal on his chest, spreading to the rest of his body like ripples on a lake, shifting the flames on the surface of his body to make him look like the human used to be. But the ripples worked only on the flames that were his own. They could do nothing about the wisps of kaleidoscopic flames sticking to his arms and chest.

  The Fire Servant could not help frowning as he glanced down at himself. Such troublesome flames… Thankfully, they were not spreading. Still, they were flames of an Enthralled Wanderer. That too, one contaminated by nearly a hundred Mysteries from all kinds of lineages. Letting them continue burning on him was not an option. So, he stretched his hands into his body, and scooped out the parts that were contaminated—

  Pain streaked through the Fire Servant’s veins, if he had one, as blood trickled down his body from the gash on his chest. Gash, that he made himself. And though his flames healed that gash right away, they could not take away his pain. But he could not let that pain—any pain stop him. He was Mathias of Fire. And he was not going to succumb to just some mere pain.

  So, after taking a deep breath, the Fire Servant shifted his attention to his arms. Both of them. There, right below his elbows, were the wisps of the kaleidoscopic flames, contaminating his body, his flames. So, he scooped out those flames, and threw them away, while urging his flames to heal his wounds. A process that barely took a couple of moments. The pain that followed though…

  The Fire Servant burned away the thoughts of pain in his Heart, as he turned back towards to the black robed boy in the distance. Different from the information his clan had gathered, the boy was much more mature, not losing his calm even in desperate situations, with no recklessness in his actions. Not even when he knew that he had the advantage. Or when he understood that all his efforts were going to be burned to ashes. Such cautiousness…

  Of all the Wanderers the Fire Servant had met in his life, the black robed boy was one of the most cautious ones. Enough to drive him to desperation. Yet, the information he had said that the boy was the embodiment of recklessness. Even more so, than those muscleheads of the Serpia clan. If not for the information in his hands piquing the boy’s interests, he would have already failed his mission.

  Then again, he could not really blame the people who had gathered the information either. After all, he had seen the boy transform right in front of his eyes. Perhaps, even contributed to that transformation. But he did not regret his actions. He did what he thought was necessary. And once again, he was doing the same thing. Doing what was necessary.

  Without giving any signs, or even making a noise, the Fire Servant flashed through the broken forest, passing through the gap in between the pillars of flame, leaving just blazing trail of fire on his path, covering a distance of over twenty metres in just an instant, arriving next to Alnea, with his fist swinging towards the latter’s face, only to be met with a sword, glowing in a silverish blue and golden light.

  “Your reactions are quite fast,” the Fire Servant said, retreating back a few steps, before conjuring flames in both his hands. “Let us see if your defences are just as good.”

  “…It is not just you who is testing the Fire, Whitebud,” Alnea said, grinning at the Fire Servant, as he used the blessings of Oren, along with the golden lightning coursing through his veins, to flash next to the Fire Servant before the latter could give shape to the flames hovering above his palms, and stabbed his sword towards the crystal burning in the man’s chest, as if he was ‘Piercing the Stars’.

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  The Fire Servant, in turn, conjured a shield of flames just in time to block the sword’s tip, bursting with all of the black robed boy’s Aspects, and glowing in the light of Slaughter, before slamming the flames hovering above his palms towards the black robed boy’s head, only to end up clapping his palms, and releasing a wave of flames in all directions.

  Another missed opportunity, the Fire Servant thought, as the fragments of his shattered shield dissipated into the air. But did not dwell on it. Instead, he just conjured another group of flames. And this time, he did not insist on giving them a shape, shooting them at the black robed boy circling around him the moment they formed above his hands.

  Yet, Alnea did not even care about those blobs of flames coming his way. They were too slow to touch him. And that was without the blessings of Oren. With Oren coursing through the Blood Crystal Patterns, raising his strength and speed to the limits of the False Rank, he easily weaved his way through the blobs of fire, and swung his sword, with its edge carrying the Killing Winds, at the Fire Servant’s chest. But the Fire Servant was not afraid.

  Facing the red edge of the black robed boy’s sword, and the faint hint of crying in the winds, the Fire Servant raised a wall of blood red flames between them, before turning into flames himself, and retreating away from the Crying Winds. A decision that was proven to be correct in the very next moment, when the blade, carrying the Killing Winds, easily cut through the wall of flames.

  By then, the flames that the Fire Servant had turned into had already retreated out of the wind’s range. Still, it was only when the flames were more than ten metres away from the black robed boy, that they coalesced back into the form of the Fire Servant, conjuring another group of flames right away.

  Smaller flames, that he quickly shaped into the form of snakes, before sending them way of the boy rushing towards him, who, in turn, just slashed through them. But they did slow down the boy for a moment. And that moment was all that the Fire Servant needed to conjure a flaming bird, roughly twice his size, yet thrice as fast and ferocious. Fast enough, that even the boy barely had the time to raise his sword, before the bird was already upon him.

  A strange bird, that Alnea could not recognise. It did not matter. He did not need that information. Since it was a bird, and made of flames, the best way to deal with it was the Great Waterfall of Amarand. But the bird was coming from above him, not below. And it was too close for him to jump above its head without burning himself. So, he just turned the waterfall upside down and made the water flow in reverse.

  Another Martial Style’s essence mastered, Alnea noted, as a thin line appeared on the bird, right where his sword had passed through. And as the bird continued to move, that thin line soon expanded into a gap large enough for his body to pass through. Though it was the bird which moved, while he stood still, shifting his attention back to the Fire Servant.

  While he was busy dealing with the bird, the Fire Servant had already conjured another group of flames. This time, in the form of bears and tigers, each releasing fluctuations no less intense than that of Peak Stage Wanderers. Or rather, peak phase Adolescent Oren Beasts. Though their form did not make much of a difference. Neither did their numbers. Six in total. Two bears and four tigers. All drowned out in the Red Floods of the East.

  In the end, the only one left standing was the Fire Servant himself. And the blood red flame boiling around him, threatening to burn the world itself. At least, that was what Alnea thought the flames were trying to do when he first felt their scorching heat on his face. And that was despite standing over ten metres away from the lunatic. If only that stupid Fire Spirit had not ruined his robe…

  “What happened, Tresting?” the Fire Servant said, raising the edge of his lips in a smirk. “I thought you were trying to test the Fire.”

  “…I already did,” Alnea said, trying to ignore the heat. “The few clashes we had were enough for me to finish my tests.”

  “Then why are you standing so far away?” the Fire Servant said, as the blood red flames roared around him. “Are you no longer interested in the information in my hands?”

  “…I never thought that I would hear a man asking me that question. The first one. Though, in a sense, you cannot be called a man, or even a human anymore. In any case, your information is not running anywhere. And neither are you. So, I thought that I might as well give you a chance to perform, so as to not make our battle too boring. How about it? Did you finish your tests?”

  “Not yet,” the Fire Servant said, as the blood red flames roared around him. “I am just beginning.”