Chapter 54: Physical Suppression
In an instant, as his body fell into the shadow, everything changed before his eyes.
Before when he used Alice's darkness ability, he could only see small lines with strange lights flowing in them, but now, everything changed.
When he used this ability on the mission, he was too confused to understand what was happening, but with time Alice explained everything.
Now that he unlocked his limiter, he can actually use Alice's elemental powers up to 70%, and just like that, his darkness power obtained a new ability.
Now he can freely use shadows as a gate between him and others. However the range he can use unfortunately has a limit, so he can only travel a distance of one mile at a time, and making even worse, it costs him a lot of power.
At the moment he was floating in the pure darkness, while a lot of small gates were all around him with different images in them.
Greg looked around and started to search for a specific gate and after a while, his eyes brightened.
"Got you!"
Like fish in water, he swam toward the gate, which he looked at. In it, the image of Steve's back could be seen, while several ice fragments were appearing above his head as time went by.
Seeing this, Greg flew into the gate without any hesitation and a second later he appeared behind Steve.
Steve was shocked about the sudden change of events and tried to jump to the side, but unfortunately, it was too late.
As Greg's figure was slowly coming up from his own shadow, he grabbed his leg and didn't let it go.
Steve wanted to escape from Greg's grab, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't get rid of his grip.
"If I can't escape, then I will fight back!", said Steve as he clenched his teeth and shot all of the icicles above him toward Greg.
Chris on the side saw this and wanted to stop the fight because from that distance and with that speed it was almost impossible to escape from those icicles. If one of them hit Greg, there could be a very dire situation.
Greg saw what was happening and suddenly his calm face turned ice cold.
"You have a death wish."
In an instant, Alice in her fox form appeared on his shoulder, and just like a little devil, she turned ablaze everything in the proximity.
The incoming icicles melted in an instant, while the flame engulfed both Greg and Steve, making Chris on the side move without hesitation.
He raised his hands and the platform started to shine with white light. In an instant, the crazy fire has been put out in less than a second, while revealing Greg's lone standing figure on the platform.
Just as Chris and the others thought that Greg's flames burnt Steve into ash, suddenly Greg put his hand into his shadow and started to pull out Steve's unconscious body.
*Paff*
Throwing Steve onto the floor, Greg looked at Chris, while waiting for his announcement calmly.
"W-Winner: Greg Hyde. Points: 27"
Hearing the results, everyone in the Arena was dead quiet. It wasn't because of how Greg won. No, it was because Chris had to use the platform's help to put that crazy flames out.
As everyone knows, teachers just in that case can use the platform's power, if there is no other choice. However, if they do, then that means only one thing. One of the participants had overwhelming power, which not even a Creator ranked teacher had the confidence to defend against.
And what just happened a moment ago, showed everyone in there, that Greg not only had crazy abilities even though he has just a black Soul Stone but unfathomable power too.
Watching as Greg was confidently walking back to his place, made a lot of people to start to talk.
"He... He is like a whole new person."
"Yeah, he wasn't like this before the Soul Ceremony. And also the calmness and the confidence he shows is another level."
As people talked among themselves, suddenly a guy with a muscular body stood up not far away and pointed at the still walking Greg.
"I want to challenge you!"
Hearing the shout, Greg stopped moving and looked at the unknown guy in the distance.
His body was well built, while he had short black hair with dark brown eyes.
Looking at the guy, Greg felt that he should be the other one who Emma and Mila talked about, so he nodded and started to walk back down.
Watching as the two walked down, Emma looked a bit worried and looked at Joe.
"Will he be alright? Isn't that guy a monster if it comes to close combat?"
Joe put his fingers on his chin and said confidently, "I don't know either, but after seeing what Greg just did, I can say he has a lot of chance to beat Gerald."
The two girls looked at each other, but even after hearing what Joe just said, didn't make them calm.
They knew well that Gerald was one of the Charon family. He had a Guardian, which let him suppress anyone physically, making him almost the deadliest opponent in close combat.
As the two walked up onto the platform and took their places, Chris raised his hand and after confirming that both of them were ready, he started the fight.
In an instant, as his signal was heard, Greg appeared before Gerald and punched toward him.
Seeing Greg's act, Gerald wasn't surprised even a bit. He knew too well that Greg loved to finish off his opponents as fast as he could, so what he just did wasn't surprising at all.
Watching as the fist came at him as fast as lightning, Gerald just simply put his hand out to meet Greg's attack head-on.
And as it happened...
*BOOOOM!*
*TREMBLE!!*
In an instant, as the fist met with the palm, a huge shockwave broke out, making the surroundings tremble crazily.
However this time Gerald wasn't as calm as before. The calmness from before could nowhere to be seen, but only disbelief.
After the punch, Gerald needed to step back a few steps, while Greg just merely stood still and looked at him without expression.
"Isn't he an elemental user? Then h--?!"
Just as he asked himself how can Greg posses so much physical power, another attack came at him, but this time from the side and it was a kick.
With fast reaction speed, Gerald turned ninety degrees to the right and put out both of his arms in the hope to block the kick.
However he was late a second again, and it resulted in him stepping back another few steps after taking Greg's powerful kick.
He wanted to fight back, but every time he wanted, Greg's fist, leg, or sometimes even his elbow and knee flew toward him with tremendous power, making him only defending, while taking steps back after every hit.
However, if it happened to be someone else, then that person would have been already hit down from the platform seconds ago.
Greg hit Gerald like a sandbag from time to time, making everybody in the Arena even more dumbfounded.
"Okay, I think I will just give up to fight against him."
"Me too. It's like a bad dream. He not only has a cheat like ability but somehow he suddenly obtained inhuman strength out of nowhere. Nice!"
Joe saw this happening and leaned forward in his chair to see what was really happening, but after watching the fight for a while he couldn't figure out anything.
It seemed that Greg used only his body to suppress Gerald, without any external help, which made him quite confused.
"Should it be in connection with the incident after the mission? But what happened exactly?"
On the platform, Greg was hitting his enemy from time to time, while he felt like every cell in his body came alive, making him stronger and stronger in each second.
"So this is how it feels to temper my body. Amazing feeling indeed!"
However as he continued to hit Gerald, suddenly he noticed that his opponent's resistance against his hits started to harden, while with each hit, it felt like he was slowly starting to hit a metal wall with his bare hands.
Knowing that something was off, Greg instantly jumped backward and looked at Gerald with sharp eyes.
Feeling that Greg finally stopped attacking, Gerald put his hands down and looked at Greg with a smile.
"You made a good decision to jump away from me."
In an instant, as he said that, the platform below Gerald's feet started to crack, while his body gave out of a terrifying presence.