Seeing the ugly face of the troll quickly restoring as its heavy body pushed itself up from its lying position made Illyan frown.

'I won't be able to get past it.' Illyan sighed as he took out the red mace.

It was the only weapon that he had now.

Aurelia told him that it was a weapon that could also be used as a wand once he learned how to use it.

Illyan looked at the ruby that was at the top, covered with the metal flanges.

A mace would normally be good against a monster like a troll, but because of its second function as a wand, it was created quite small compared to bigger maces.

He would need to hit the joints and other vital places every time if he wanted to do any damage at all. However, even that would regenerate in a matter of seconds.

'I need to hit the head. Ideally, kill it in one blow before it recovers.' Illyan's eyes shone with bloodlust as his muscles tensed up.

And so, without waiting for the troll to fully stand up, he charged forward.

The troll, writhing in pain, barely saw the blur of Illyan sprinting at it before the right side of its head was hit by the mace.

The eye socket cracked as the eyeball fell out of it, only loosely hanging on the nerves.

"Groaaar!" With a roar of agony and frustration, it waved its massive hand as it swatted Illyan away.

Illyan used the hand's momentum to spring himself away to gain distance as he retreated.

"Haah… Haah…"

However, while it seemed that Illyan had an overwhelming advantage, it wasn't exactly true.

'I can't do this repeatedly. Using up all the blood energy at once to attack is already a big burden on the body. But recovering the blood energy in a short amount of time is even worse. I feel power leaving my muscles… I need one decisive blow…' Illyan thought as he stopped using blood energy.

Just as he said, it was difficult to use all of his blood energy at once to attack. The reason was simple.

He didn't learn a proper technique to control it. There was one in the [Thirteen Layers of Blood Energy], but he hadn't mastered it yet.

Because of that, this kind of big burst of power was wreaking havoc in his body.

Then, his body absorbed his stamina, fat, and muscles to rapidly recover the loss of blood energy.

Doing this repeatedly was an immense burden on Illyan, so he promptly gave up.

'Whatever, delaying by another few minutes won't change anything. If nothing else, I can try to learn to use the aura since I have a perfect sparring partner.' Illyan thought as he licked his dry lips.

Sparring with Aurelia allowed him to surpass his limits in technique, but when it came to aura, which was a combination of life force and emotions, Illyan could guess that a real fight against worthy opponents would be a faster way to learn it.

He adjusted his mindset as he started to use the knight's breathing technique.

Meanwhile, the troll's eye started to suck back into the eye socket. It was as if the nerve was pulling it back by tightening itself.

To Illyan, this was quite fascinating as he became interested in the troll's anatomy, but now wasn't the time.

The troll was already towering over him as its back touched the ceiling despite not standing straight.

'The cave is too small. It makes it difficult for me to maneuver, but the troll has it much worse.'

Usually, it was preferred to attack mountain trolls in wide plains with many people.

This was to prevent it from climbing something or using trees or rocks as weapons.

However, mountain trolls were known for their unusual dexterity, so they were usually ambushed from a distance by ballistae while several men surrounding it distracted it.

The problem was that it was usually much faster than them, which caused many casualties in the hunts.

But now, that dexterity and speed couldn't be used. There was nothing in the cave within its reach, either.

The only problem was that Illyan would always be within its hand's reach, but that was fine.

Illyan could hold on. It would be different for a normal soldier, but he was used to avoiding extreme blows in close combat.

"Groooar!" Furious, the troll tried to reach for Illyan, but he simply sidestepped to avoid its fingers before smashing them with the mace.

But this time, the mace easily rebounded as it only left a small white mark on the finger.

"Tsk…" Illyan clicked his tongue in disappointment as he rolled on the ground to avoid the second arm swing. 'Without blood energy, it's impossible to get past the skin.'

Hearing about it and seeing it with his own eyes was something completely different.

Back then, in the underground arena, he was able to hurt the troll with difficulty while using the war hammer, but that was only because the troll couldn't move swiftly and was starving, which made its skin less buoyant and bones more brittle.

'Whatever, I will just do my best.' Illyan thought as he swung his mace with force.

But no matter how strong he was, he couldn't damage the skin enough to draw blood.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

Illyan didn't give up, though.

As such, the dance between the raging beast and the focused warrior started.

The troll wildly waved its hands, sometimes even shaking the entire cave from accidentally swinging them into the walls. However, it didn't care as it slowly proceeded to pressure Illyan farther and farther from the exit.

Instead, he was cornered back into the deeper parts of the cave.

But Illyan didn't even change his expression.

He avoided with the least amount of energy as he focused on his attacks.

He could easily avoid the crude beast's attacks thanks to his unique footwork, which he developed over the years.

It wasn't proper footwork per se, but rather the long accumulation of experiences on the battlefield combined with his prowess in [The Way of the Body], which was now enriched with the knight's breathing technique.

It was a crude technique focusing only on survival.

That wasn't the wrong attitude to have on the battlefield, but it lacked the refinement of the systematic education that knights receive.

However, considering Illyan's body control, strength, and speed, he didn't have to worry about fighting against trolls, let alone regular soldiers.

Of course, Illyan planned to refine his martial arts prowess one day, but it was not on his priority list.

Focusing on aura, which would drastically increase his power, was a wiser option at this moment.

Because of that, the pace of his attacks slowed down.

Instead of a fast flurry of swings that would do absolutely nothing to the troll, he focused his mind and emotions into every swing.

'Aura, by definition, is a body signature given form by life force and amplified by emotions and spiritual energy. That means… stirring the life force within me should be the first step—Haah.'

Illyan's thought process stopped for a second as he exhaled all the air from his lungs and swung the mace down.

This time, the strength and speed were visibly higher than before. It was far from the blood energy boost that he had at the beginning, but it was progress.

"Grrooom!" The troll's spit flew from its open mouth as it roared at Illyan.

He avoided the spit by jumping backward as his face distorted with disgust.

The smell coming out of the troll's mouth was… distasteful, to say the least…

However, that wasn't something the troll would even consider as it charged forward with renewed rage.

It tried to smash or grab Illyan countless times, but he was like a slippery eel, always getting away with his small jabs. Despite not piercing through its skin, it was still stinging when he hit its joints.

Because of that, it was getting angrier and angrier.

But Illyan ignored that as he was deeply thinking about how aura worked.

'The life force is already making the swing stronger. But it is the same as throwing logs at the enemy—slow and inefficient, yet difficult to achieve. Using a knight's breathing technique, which circulates a bit of spiritual energy through the body, makes it easier but still difficult.'

Slowly coming closer to the truth, Illyan found a small smirk forming on his face.

'Then… obviously, the spiritual energy wasn't meant to be used with life force in this scenario. A strong will and emotion are essential. If the life force is the log… the spiritual energy is the wind that carries the log farther and faster.'

The emotion… is a spark. A spark that makes the log burst into fire, with the wind feeding the flames… Once the fire spreads, the only thing left is to control it. And that is achieved with will. A slow and steady fire or an enormous explosion of flames… it all depends on how the fire is maintained.'

Illyan thought as his eyes flashed with enlightenment.

Each of his swings started to be pervaded with his current emotions as he tried to create the spark to cause a blaze.

Pouring emotion into every swing caused the swings to be more violent as his current emotion was tainted with bloodlust.

Realizing the troll wouldn't let him be and that its death could very well be the opportunity to get stronger, Illyan's bloodlust rose quickly as the golden striations in his eyes were overshadowed by his eyes' original blood-red color.

However, at the same time, Illyan didn't let himself be controlled by this bloodlust. That would be a rookie mistake.

Instead, he used it for his own purposes.

Illyan sidestepped as he dodged the overhead arm strike and swung his mace at high speed.

Bang

The finger he struck was still intact, but a few drops of blood were glistening on it.

Illyan revealed his pearl-like white teeth.

This time, he felt it.

His life force that traveled inside his arm was becoming unstable, as if it had a tendency to burst. Like boiling oil gushing out of a cauldron…

'This is the original way of creating aura… Just that instead of the spiritual energy and life force, the flow that was created beforehand by these two was used. The flow was a bridge to connect all these energies to metamorphose part of itself to create aura.'

But that wasn't possible now that he had lost most of his flow.

Not that it was needed. He already had the aura. However, it was hidden in his body.

Finding a way to force it out was the most important thing in this situation, and using the method that originally created the aura was the best approach, in Illyan's opinion.

Not only that, but he also believed that this was a way to strengthen the aura further.

And as such, the prolonged 'duel' continued.

However, after ten minutes or so, Illyan finally felt that his space for dodging was getting narrower.

Behind him, the space he had barely passed through would be a safe haven for someone seeking shelter from the monster in front of him.

But for him, it was an annoying obstacle.

'But I can't get hit by the troll's attack.' Clicking his tongue, he still retreated back into the crevice while the troll tried to force itself into the narrow space.

It failed, obviously. However, its long hands almost grabbed Illyan, who was slowly retreating.

'Even swinging the mace would be difficult here…'

Illyan was getting more and more annoyed.

Ironically, his foul mood was something that actually gave his emotions more drive, which also made them more potent.

His life force was on the verge of exploding.

It was at that moment when something within Illyan finally responded.

His bones were getting warmer, and his heart was beating faster.

The warmth wasn't just his illusion. He could feel the warmth seeping through his pores inside his body as if he had attracted the heat itself.

Just then, the crimson flickering appeared within his body, bursting from its hideout while wreaking havoc in every part of Illyan's body.

The unstable life force was devoured by this unrelenting crimson fire, while his emotions only made this fire even stronger.

Illyan took a deep breath, drawing in the air and its heat into his lungs, which turned out to be just another fuel for the aura that had just invaded his body.

Feeling the extreme destructive power that was on the verge of escaping from his control, Illyan's expression finally changed.

'The will is probably strong enough, but I am not used to it…!' Realizing that it would not be so easy, Illyan decided to let this power loose.

Narrowing his eyes, Illyan adjusted the grip on his mace as he stared at the hand that was stretched out to its limit deep in the crevice…

With an empty expression, Illyan lifted the mace over his head as he prepared for a vertical swing with full power…

…

"Gruu?" The troll, with an oblivious expression, was now on its four limbs as it crouched in front of the crevice with one of its hands reaching inside.

It felt that it had cornered this rat and was prepared to finally end this fight.

It was truly surprised that its own cave was occupied by unknown creature.

But even more surprising was its strength.

The pain was unlike anything the troll had lived through so far. And that made its pride hurt.

Such a small creature could actually hurt it so much?!

"Groooar!"

However, just as its victory was within reach, it felt a sudden chill.

It wasn't just a feeling. The air around it had just gotten cooler. But the troll didn't have the capacity to understand that.

It didn't really care about it.

But the moment the slightly cool air turned into unbearable, scalding heat was something it would never forget.

Boom

A wave of bloody red drowned the troll's sight as something within the crevice exploded, with the troll's hand taking the brunt of it head-on.

"Groooar!" The pain was even more excruciating than before as it hurriedly pulled its hand back with such speed that its head bumped into the ceiling with such force that it almost knocked itself out.

Before it fell to the ground, it finally managed to take out its arm, which was now covered in burn marks, with the hand bones crushed into a bloody pulp.

Seconds later, Illyan, whose hand and mace were covered in a bloody aura, rushed out as he used the opportunity of the troll being incapable of fighting to climb over it and dash toward the exit…

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.