Richard's fingers wove through the air at lightning speed, creating symbols out of glowing green ether in the air in front of him, when he was finally finished a four star spell floated before him, before giving off the hum of unity that told a cultivator that it have been done right before dissipating into the air.
To anyone who didn't know how spells functioned, it would've looked like he had failed, but as the wind suddenly picked up around his limbs and torso, creating a strange kind of armor, it was obvious he had succeeded.
Leaping upwards, he rose nearly 10 m into the air before he thrust his spear downward, even with his fourth ring strength, such a move was normally difficult, as when increased in rank both their strength and weight increased making supernatural sites, such as people leaping over clouds, nearly impossible to see.
Anyway, the spear thrust caused a tornado nearly 3 m long to shoot downwards towards where Rico had stopped flying forward when Richard jumped.
Seeing a tornado coming, Rico quickly swiped his staff thro the air, the staff suddenly glowing with Sapphire, light before the water around him, rose to mimic the swipe through the air.
In an instant the two forces clash, a staff nearly 20 feet long made entirely out of water, and A spear tip, made entirely out of wind.
It looked like a stalemate, for around 10 seconds until the tornado of wind suddenly split the staff of water into nothing but harmless drops.
Richard smirked as he prepared another attack even as he fell towards the ground, he began to use the winds making up his armor and began to spin, his spear held out in front of him as he did.
Meanwhile, on Rico's side of things he wasn't doing so well. "I should have known there were drawbacks, why didn't he warned me about the strain of controlling a sixth star spell? What is this all some elaborate scheme to eliminate the coso family? No, the iron bloods may be wealthy, but even they don't have that kind of money, and they damn sure don't have someone of that kind of power just sitting around."
There were two reasons six star spells weren't used by many people, one of them was that they were rare, much rarer to find in common Star spells, but another was the amount of strain, using a high tier spell put on the soul.
This would have been normal for anyone to feel when using a six star spell for the first time, but with Rico's terrible talent, the pressure was even worse. Maybe in the area around, he was considered a patriarch, but in the greater scheme of things, his, and even Richard's talent was abysmal.
The results of the pressure a six star spell put on him, led to a terrible headache, throbbing behind his eyes., And a thin trickle of blood coming from his left nostril.
Quickly, wiping it away, Rico felt that the porcelain star he had put in the inner pocket of his jacket, seem to be burning a hole through it.
If what the strange man had said, was true, and it could truly kill even seventh ring cultivators, people of that caliber were considered almost A myth. And if he had the power to kill someone like that, it could elevate the Coso clan to ppoints they had never been before.
Looking up at Richard, descending towards the ground, spinning so fast now that his body was a blur, and the only thing that could be heard from him was the whistling of Air as his spear cut through it. He came to the realization.
"I am really going to have to use it, if I don't, it's will be taken by the Ironbloods if Richard manages to kill me, and I won't allow that."
Clinching his jaw in determination, Rico gripped the porcelain star in one hand, or as hard as he could grip it without it shattering, he didn't want the damn thing exploding, or whatever it had to do before Richard was close enough.
Looking up, Rico calculated just how long it will take Richard to reach the ground. "Considering the speed he's currently moving at, it should take him maybe 1.3 seconds precisely."
He waited, in the middle of the battlefield, where they both fought, it almost seemed like they were in a different world, the sounds of the battle around him seeming distant.
As soon as Richard's feet were an inch above the ground, Rico shot forward, this time without the six star spell reinforcing him.
While he couldn't lie, it was powerful, it's just drew too much mana ether to truly be useful.
By the time he actually landed any significant blow on Richard, using the spell, he would be nearly drained dry.His speed, even without the spell reinforcing him, was still faster than anyone below His stage could take.Yet Richard still slammed his foot into the ground, throwing himself backwards before Rico's body could impact him, all while still spinning.
As soon as he thought he had gathered enough momentum, he turned, turning his cuts that have been just a horizontal line, into a diagonal/straight towards Rico's hand, Richard couldn't explain why, but something told him if he didn't eliminate that hand, it would be his end. Rico, realized in an instant what Richard was aiming for, quickly pouring a great deal of his remaining ether into reinforcing his body, he used the staff he was holding in his left hand to try to block the incoming spear, but the attempt was futile.
Richard had been gathering momentum for too long for a simple block to work the staff only managed to deflect the spear, slightly, turning the cut that should have relieved Rico of a hand into a cut across his forearm that was so deep that the bone could be seen.
Rico growled in pain as he sent out a wave of water With his free hand, with Richard being not 3 feet away. It impacted him before he could move, but with all of the ether Rico, had been using so far in The fight, the blow only managed to stagger. him, but that's all Rico needed as he moved forward with another swipe of his staff, this one carrying no Ether behind it just pure skill as he aimed for Richard's temple.
Richard easily block the move before redirecting the staff over his shoulder, and slamming a punch into Rico's gut.
The force of the punch caused Rico to double over his grip loosening on both the black star and his staff.
Wasting no time, Richard cut towards Rico's neck with no hesitation, Rico's weekend form suddenly moved with more speed than Richard expected as he launched into a backwards role before coming up on his feet, his back straight, his face blank as if the two wounds on both his face and arm were nothing more than minor inconveniences.
He raised his left hand, pulling the water that hadn't yet sunk back into the ground to form a sphere The spear was wickedly, sharp, reminding one of glass, but even glass couldn't compare, yet Richard only frowned.
"While such an attack would be dangerous to a third ring, or maybe even a fourth ring who just entered the realm, but to me, it's barely worth my notice, what game is he playing?"
Richard thought, his gray eyes narrowing in suspicion as he looked around him, yet he found nothing out of place, all he could see was the sapphire staff that lay on the ground at his side, yet still his instincts told him something was wrong.
Yet he had no time to think about that as the spear launched towards him
"maybe I'm thinking of this wrong, maybe he's using that measly attack just to make me think this much?"
Richard hated fighting members of the coastal family, not because they were particularly formidable, it was just that they were, more adaptable than the other clans.
Instead of just relying on their realms, and the people at their disposal, they everything, they chose every subordinate carefully, not just for a cultivation before their intellect.
They didn't just fight physically, but mentally.This wasn't a foreign concept to Richard by any means, but the coastal clan took it to a whole new level.
There had once been an ancestor of the coastal clan that had taken a sword to the chest and seemingly died on The spot, just to jump up and blast the same man that had stabbed him in the back of the head as soon as he turned around.
It was safe to say Coso clan members also didn't possess much shame.
Richard, just as expected, took a single step to the left, letting The water spear pass him by, it hit the ground where his feet had been before just splashing there, turning the hard packed dirt into mud, causing the spear naff that the Coso family cared about so much to sink into it slightly.
Richard looked at this with confusion before looking back at Rico.
, It was just for a moment, but, Richard was sure that he saw Rico's nosebleed.
A sign of pushing too much, which could leave someone's ether pathways in disrepair four days if they weren't warped beyond redemption.
At this thought, a predator's grin appeared on Richard's face.
"You OK over there, you look a bit shaky on your feet."
By the time he had spoke, Rico's face had gone back to its calm in different expression, and these were emotions were reflected in his voice as he spoke.
" I am doing just fine, I think you should worry about yourself."
Richard's confidence had grown after seeing everything the spear accomplished, which was precisely nothing.
"Bold words coming from someone who looks about two seconds away from death. Actually, two seconds is a bit too generous, so I'll just accelerate that for you."
Richard said, before shooting forward. He didn't have much more mana than Rico currently, the skills he had been using with seeming reckless abandoned, where by no means light on ether consumption. Meaning that Richard was running on barely over 8% of his ether, yet even that much will be enough to kill Rico if he wasn't careful.
Rico tried his best to jump aside, but unsurprisingly, he was too slow.
The spear stabbed through his side, nearly a foot of the black metal sticking from his back as Richard lifted him off of his feet using the part of the spear he still held, he spoke.
"How does it feel Rico, to go from a patriarch to nothing more than a living kebab in two seconds."
The question was rhetorical, Richard could see Rico wouldn't respond by the wide eyed horror on his face as he looked down at the spear embedded in his torso.
"You you, you stabbed me."
"Yeah, that's kind of the point of this fight."
Richard was about to say more, but his words were cut off as Rico's hand suddenly moved in a blur, his palms which had once been wrapped around the shaft of the spear Where it stuck out of his stomach suddenly shot shots towards Richard's face, where he executed a throat, chopped.
The move caused Richard to choke, taking advantage Rico slammed an elbow into his nose.
Not stopping there, he whipped out a foot that slammed into Richard's balls, and finally Rico felt his feet hit the ground as Richard staggered backwards.
A deranged grin appeared on his face.