I Woke Up as the Villain

Chapter 196

It was a very minor flesh wound. However, this minor flesh wound was the trigger of a significant change in the flow of the battle.

This was a battle between a spear and a sword. A clear difference in speed began to appear between the wielders of these weapons.

“The young master…is a bit faster.” Do-Yoon, whose eyes suddenly sharpened up like a predatory wolf’s, showed extreme concentration.

“Then…” Yu-Ri’s eyes opened wide in surprise as she focused on the fight..

Once again, Yu-Seong’s spear scraped Do-Jin’s thigh.

Whoosh~

Although his flesh was revealed and blood gushed out from his wounds, Do-Jin did not even raise an eyebrow as he maintained his concentration. A moment later, a blue pentagram magic circle appeared at the tip of Do-Jin’s sword.

Surprised, Yu-Seong quickly lifted his spear to defend himself as a magic sphere condensed by Do-Jin shot out toward him.

Bang!

With a loud explosion, Yu-Seong stumbled and was pushed back by a considerable distance.

‘When did he prepare this kind of magic?’

The magic sphere had greater power than what Yu-Seong had expected.

With blood flowing from his lips, Yu-Seong looked straight ahead. However, he could not see Do-Jin, who should have been in front of him. Quickly taking seven steps of his Wind Control, he then used its chaotic and confusing movements to avoid Do-Jin’s subsequent attacks.

Whoosh!

At that moment, Do-Jin slashed at Yu-Seong with his sword and almost ran him through. As Yu-Seong’s clothes became tattered, blood splattered everywhere.

If Yu-Seong’s Wind Control movement had been a bit more predictable, Do-Jin’s current attack would have immediately won him the battle.

‘As expected… Kim Do-Jin.’

Clearly, Do-Jin had not wasted time while Yu-Seong was receiving training from Park Ok-Rye. Do-Jin’s offensive movement was much sharper than what Yu-Seong had expected.

Having barely managed to evade Do-Jin’s attack, Yu-Seong used his arm to rebound off the ground and fly into the air, creating some distance between himself and Do-Jin. He wanted to be able to better see Do-Jin’s movements.

As Do-Jin continued to attack, Yu-Seong defended against his onslaught.

Do-Yoon, who was watching the unfolding scene, let out a short sigh. “The young master has lost the momentum.”

The most important thing in a fight between equals, or those who were similarly skilled, was momentum. Once someone started to lose momentum and timing, they would inevitably be on the backfoot and be pushed back; thus, it would become difficult for the one who had lost momentum to regain the upper hand.

Due to this fact, it became difficult for Yu-Seong to escape his defensive posture and reinitiate an attack.

At first, when the battle went back and forth, it was clear that Yu-Seong had the initiative and momentum.

However, the powerful magic that Do-Jin had quickly prepared and used instantly reversed the momentum. Now, it was Do-Jin who was initiating the attacks. Naturally, the movement of his sword started to surpass the speed of Yu-Seong’s spear, and Yu-Seong ended up on the defense.

To turn the situation around, Yu-Seong needed to bring out a trump card, just like what Do-Jin had done earlier.

“Young master!”

“Yu-Seong oppa…”

“Kim Do-Jin…!”

Cold sweat trickled down the backs of the three people—Do-Yoon, Yu-Ri, and Ah-Rin—who were watching the battle from afar.

At the center of everyone’s attention, Yu-Seong, who was focusing on defense, suddenly had a thought.

‘If I keep getting pushed back, there will be no way out.’.

He had come to the same conclusion: now that he had lost the initiative, he was going to be suppressed and there was nothing he could do about it.There were many trump cards that he could bring out, but the same was true for Do-Jin as well.

‘Like how Kim Do-Jin used magic earlier…’

Yu-Seong needed a means to turn the tables once Do-Jin revealed an opening.

While considering his options, Yu-Seong was being increasingly forced onto his back foot. His top was already ragged and tattered, practically torn to shreds, and his well-trained upper body muscles were covered in blood. Nevertheless, his eyes maintained a sense of vigilance.

‘There’s no way I’ll let myself collapse from just this alone.’

Do-Jin looked at Choi Yu-Seong and inwardly laughed. He had no intention of defeating Yu-Seong through an ambiguous, non-committal approach.

‘When you see a small gap…’

Do-Jin was planning on landing an immediate, fatal blow.

‘Now!’

Do-Jin’s eyes shone brightly once he saw Yu-Seong struggling to avoid the tip of his sword. He transferred his mana into the magic circle at the tip of his sword. However, right when the rune magic circle was on the cusp of being completed, it was suddenly scattered by a foreign energy.

“…?!”

Stunned, Do-Jin looked at Yu-Seong, who had seemed to be on the brink of collapse just moments earlier.

Yu-Seong straightened himself out using Wind Control, struck out with his spear, and extended his arm out with an open palm. He commanded, “Dancing Electric Doll.”

With the activation of Yu-Seong’s skill, Do-Jin quickly took a step back and opened a magic defensive barrier. Once again, as if to nullify his magic, a foreign energy tried to interfere and disperse his magic barrier.

This time, Do-Jin just snorted. “You dare…!”

Once he was able to complete his spell, imprisoning the Dancing Electric Doll inside the magic barrier, Do-Jin looked straight ahead at Yu-Seong, who was lunging straight at him.

‘When did he learn Dispel?’

Do-Jin knew that he was the one who had taught Yu-Seong about magic. However, he had no idea how far Yu-Seong had progressed in it.

‘Choi Yu-Seong, you must have trained and developed your magic ability quite a lot. It seems you have already become a Class 3 expert.’

Yu-Seong, who could sense Do-Jin’s misunderstanding, poured out a quick offensive to not lose his regained momentum.

In truth, Do-Jin’s thoughts were not entirely wrong. However, they were not quite right either. In fact, it was right after Ok-Rye’s training that Yu-Seong had reached Class 3.

‘Actually, to be specific, I reached Class 3 during training.’

Moreover, there was only one type of Class 3 magic that Yu-Seong had learned—Dispel, a kind of magic that could interfere with an opponent’s magic.

‘I see… Master deliberately focused on training me to use Dispel…’

As the spar continued, Yu-Seong slowly recalled bits and pieces of what he had learned during his training with Ok-Rye.

Those training sessions had been long and difficult. And within that training period, Ok-Rye had focused on teaching Yu-Seong Dispel.

‘Anyway, it is obvious that Kim Do-Jin is in a higher class than me.’

It would be foolish for Yu-Seong to fight head-on with the same type of magic against Do-Jin, who used a much more eclectic variety of magic. However, he did think that constantly using the only Class 3 magic he knew of, Dispel, could help him keep Do-Jin in check.

Dispel had a high failure rate as it was a difficult spell to execute, but once it succeeded, it could break an opponent’s magic even if one was only a lower-class magic user. Thus, if it worked, one could break an opponent’s tempo and gain the upper hand in terms of momentum. This was because, if one’s magic failed once, gaps in their defense were bound to appear.

Having regained his momentum, Yu-Seong maintained his offensive rather easily and placed Do-Jin on his back foot.

‘Raging Snake, Coiling and Rising Snake, Poison Fanged Snake.’

Yu-Seong unleashed Cu Chulainn’s spear moves, which were now naturally ingrained in his body, one after another, leaving cut marks all over Kim Do-Jin’s body…

“Ha-!” Do-Jin burst out laughing and deployed a spell once more.

This time, it was with his palm rather than his sword.

Belatedly noticing the spell that Do-Jin had secretly prepared during their fierce battle, Yu-Seong tried to use Dispel in turn, activating it through the tip of his spear, but he was a step too late.

Do-Jin’s rapidly unfolding magic wrapped around his body and sword. Though Do-Jin had been on the defensive, he instantly switched toward the offensive.

‘The tempo…!’

In an instant, Do-Jin’s movements had become twice as fast.

‘He used Haste on himself!’

Haste was, quite literally, magic that made one move faster.

The problem with using Haste was that most wizards could not adapt to the sudden change in their movements, so they would inevitably make mistakes. However, this did not apply to Do-Jin.

Do-Jin adapted to his accelerated movement relatively easily and launched an offensive without revealing any new gaps.

Indeed, it was not easy to regain momentum once it was lost. Having such thoughts, Yu-Seong did not want to miss this opportunity.

‘I wanted to hide this as much as possible…but since my opponent is Kim Do-Jin, I guess there is nothing I can do about it.’

In order to win the battle, Yu-Seong had to pour out everything from the start. Thus, he did not hesitate any longer and activated another skill, one that he had acquired but had not yet used.

‘Gale Force.’

When he had defeated the Black Gauze King, Emilia, one of the Twelve Dark Kings of the Demon King Worshipers, Yu-Seong had received skill offers from two gods. Between the two, he had rejected the offer from Odin, the Father of Magical Hymns.

‘Loki and Odin do not get along anyway.’

Nothing good would come about if Yu-Seong simultaneously accepted and received the support of two gods who were at odds with each other.

In any case, the moment he chose to hold hands with Loki, Yu-Seong had no choice but to distance himself from Odin.

As a result, Thor and the other gods expressed their disappointment at his choice, but there was no other alternative for Yu-Seong. Thus, he had accepted the offer of an equally powerful god who was not at odds with Loki, the Cold Wind of the West.

And the skill Yu-Seong had received from that god was Gale Force, which only had one effect.

‘Within a radius of 30 meters around me, paths of wind will form.’

The skill had an area effect that accelerated one’s speed when riding the wind flow and decelerated when not riding the flow.

Gale Force was an advanced skill where different paths of wind met to create chaotic gale force winds and allow one to completely subdue one’s opponent!

The reason why Yu-Seong had not used Gale Force earlier was simple.

‘If I do not ride the wind paths properly, it is more of a poison than a benefit.’

Gale Force resembled Haste in that both were difficult to use properly; however, the difficulty level was much higher for Gale Force.

The magic’s powerful effects could only be realized if one took advantage of a tailwind to move faster while at the same time the opponent’s range of movement was restricted by a headwind or tailwind.

The more skilled one’s opponent was, the faster they would realize the effects of the skill; hence, Gale Force was difficult to properly use. Of course, that was usually the case for most powerful spells.

Yu-Seong had learned some ways to properly utilize Gale Force during his training with Ok-Rye.

‘Be clearly aware of the space around me.’

One had to rule over one’s surrounding space. In other words, one had to have control over the surrounding air.

Yu-Seong had not yet perfected this concept, but he had learned the skill well enough to be able to apply this air control within the range of his spear.

Yu-Seong activated Gale Force and sensed the currents around him through the tip of his spear.

The most important thing for Yu-Seong was that the effect of the wind pushing him forward would be compounded by another gust of wind taking the opponent by surprise and pushing them from behind, right into the path of his attack.

Do-Jin, who was unaware of the rapidly changing situation, naturally fell into Yu-Seong’s trap as a gust of wind pushed his back. As he was caught up in the tailwind, Do-Jin’s eyes widened.

‘Just one fleeting moment of distraction,’?thought Yu-Seong.

Do-Jin would not fall victim to the same move twice. As the main character in the novel, he would undoubtedly be able to copy and imitate Yu-Seong’s skill the second time around.

However, now was Yu-Seong’s chance. He used his tailwind to drive forward while Do-Jin was being held up by a gust of wind from behind. Then, Yu-Seong’s spear pierced through the air between the two clashing wind paths.

A vacuum formed, a space where no sound could be heard and nothing could be sensed.

Feeling the impending danger, Do-Jin hurriedly activated a spell, but Yu-Seong did not pay much attention to Do-Jin’s actions.

‘This sort of attack cannot be stopped with hastily cast magic.’

A moment later, the vacuum space exploded and sent out a powerful gale that spread across the entire training center.