NOVEL NEXT Chapter 101 Development
Zero accepted that Nyx was teaching him so he resolved himself and charged at her. Before Zero reached her Nyx was gone causing Zero to stop and look around. No matter what direction he looked he couldn’t find her but suddenly Zero was impaled by a blade. Zero was shocked and looked in the direction of the blade but Nyx was nowhere to be found.
Zero pulled out the blade and while wielding it charged in the direction it came from. Suddenly Zero was hit from behind launching him forward causing Zero to cough up a bit of blood. Zero managed to slow down and turn to find Nyx smiling at him waving for him to attack her.
Zero threw the blade at Nyx but dodged to the side and caught the blade throwing it back at Zero in one single motion. The blade flew at a faster speed than when Zero threw it so Zero was unable to dodge it and had to teleport to avoid the blade. When Zero reappeared Nyx was already standing there and gave him another palm strike to the chest damaging his Zero heart. This time Zero was launched back since Nyx grabbed his arm and pulled him towards her.
“How are you this weak with a body this strong?” asked Nyx as she looked at her weakened son breathing heavily. She tossed him back and said, “Zero you’re wasting the physical abilities of that body. Also, why aren’t you using your mana?”
“You’ve… disabled my… skills.” said Zero as he struggled to breathe.
“Even if you can’t use any skills you can still use mana to increase your strength, speed, and boost your defense. Moreover, your body is that of a vampire so why aren’t you using any racial skills?” asked Nyx
“Racial skills?” asked a confused Zero
Nyx sighed as she looked at her confused son “Racial skills are abilities that every member of a species can use. Since they don’t require external mana and only use internal mana, unlike regular skills they can be used even in a mana nullification field such as this. Like a dragon would be able to breathe their elemental breath attack regardless of the nullification. You’re a vampire so turn your body to mist or bats to avoid my attack and use your senses to find me.”
Nyx rushed at Zero and attempted a palm strike but the attack passed through him as he turned to mist and reformed behind her. Zero then attacked Nyx with a kick from behind but Nyx dodged the attack by moving forward enough and turned and attacked Zero in the chest. Nyx smiled and said, “That was a tiny bit better but you’re still too slow.” as launched Zero forward teleported, and struck him again.
Zero crashed through the items held in the space and turned himself into a flock of bats to avoid the blades he was flying towards. The bats spread out to avoid the blades and coalesced back into his normal body. Zero looked and saw that Nyx had disappeared while he was distracted. Zero closed his eyes and listened for any sounds of motion.
Zero’s vision turned into a sonar-like vision now that he was focusing on his sense of hearing. Zero heard a sound to his right and dodged accordingly but the sound disappeared before Zero could retaliate. A sound approached Zero from behind and Zero managed to dodge and attack simultaneously but rather than hitting Nyx, she caught the attack.
“I’ll give that a D+ and if you want to pass my class then you need a C or higher. Try to actually land an attack on me that I can’t dodge or block.” said Nyx as she tossed Zero’s leg back
Zero retreated and observed Nyx who was standing still. Zero started to circulate his mana throughout his body focusing mainly on his legs. Zero launched himself forward but his new speed caused his aim to be off and he missed Nyx by a wide margin. Before Zero could regain his balance, Nyx leaped forward, slammed Zero to the ground heavily, and kicked him aside. Zero skid until stopping when he hit something. When Zero turned to look at what he crashed into only to notice it was Nyx’s foot stepping on him.
Zero transformed into mist and appeared behind Nyx would had lost her footing and wasn’t able to evade. Zero transformed his hand into a claw and attacked Nyx who jumped forward to avoid the blow last minute.
‘Damn this is getting me nowhere I can’t hit her but she managing to hit me. I need to think of a way to catch her off guard.’
Zero turned into a cloud of bats and flew towards Nyx but she disappeared before they could reach her. The bat became confused and looked all over for Nyx but found no trace of her as a blade impaled one of the bats causing all the remaining bats to turn into mist and assemble together.
Still in mist form to avoid any surprise attacks Zero focused on his senses to find where she might be. He found no traces of her in his immediate vicinity but located her quite far away. The mist traveled to where Nyx was and turned back into his vampire form.
Zero turned his hands into claws and charged at Nyx slashing away as she dodged his strikes. Nyx jumped back and readied a palm strike. Zero stood still as the palm strike came closer to him. Unknown to Nyx; Zero had been using his void sword style but adapted it for unarmed combat and had slowly been learning and absorbing her attack and knew them intimately now. Zero first used his counter-style to divert her palm strike to the side to avoid the blow and seamlessly shifted into the oblivion style and attacked her with a palm strike with the added benefit of his claws. Nyx used her free hand to try to divert his attack but Zero tried to stop her with the hand he had used to counter, however Nyx grabbed it and was successful in diverting the attack although it still managed to lightly scratch her neck.
Nyx released Zero's arm and jumped back while rubbing which had started to bleed slightly. She looked at her son who had taken up another stance and said, “Well you managed to get a C barely but it counts. Congratulations, Zero did you understand the meaning of this lesson.”
Zero let out a deep breath at Nyx’s words and said, “I think so you were trying to teach me the importance of using mana not only for skills but to augment my body and the value of the things I learned as a human including my fighting style which I started to neglect when I gained enough strength to overpower my enemies. Mainly you wanted me to understand that I need to spar with those the others to help us all understand and figure out the best ways to use our bodies to the fullest extent.”
“Yup, my lesson was definitely meant to teach you all of that. It’s good that you understood your sweet mommy’s intentions.” said Nyx as laughed nervously
“Please don’t, stick with Mom in front of the others.” said Zero oblivious to Nyx’s nervous laughter
“What!? Did you grow to dislike Mommy? How can this be? My dear son no longer wishes to lovingly call me mommy!” said Nyx in an over-exaggerated tone
‘I missed you while I was away and now that you’re here I feel the need to leave and travel again’
Nyx stopped exaggerating and seriously looked at her son, “Looks like my dear boy needs a lesson on how to think of and speak to his mommy.”
“So, you can still hear my thoughts. I didn’t mean it, I wholeheartedly apologize.” said Zero as he bowed his head in fear.