Preston's Despair

As a Storm Fighter, Preston moved incredibly fast.

Bathed in the wind, he arrived before Olivia in an instant, his twin blades slashing down together. Their intense sharpness caused the air to let out a wailing sound.

But just as Preston's blades swung down, Olivia had already spun away to avoid them.

Seeing his strike miss, Preston didn't overthink it. He swept his blades horizontally and continued his assault on Olivia.

His movements were extremely rapid, like a storm. His attacks were continuous, emphasizing speed, ferocity, and precision.

In past battles, even without using forbidden artifacts, he could often easily defeat opponents of the same class rank by relying on his high affinity for the wind element and his seasoned combat skills.

However, after attacking Olivia fiercely for a while, Preston began to feel that something was wrong.

He discovered that no matter how he launched his onslaught, he couldn't even touch Olivia.

At this moment, Olivia was like a drifting leaf. No matter how he reached out to grab her, the leaf would simply swirl and retreat.

If only a few attacks had been dodged, it might not have been worth noting. But when every single attack was easily avoided by the opponent, things were clearly not that simple.

A shadow of doubt began to creep into Preston's heart.

Even though he sensed something was off, Preston could only continue to pursue Olivia and maintain his fierce attack; he had no way to change the situation.

He could only search for an opportunity to turn the tide during his onslaught.

"Is that all you can do?" Olivia asked with a smile.

Hearing this, Preston didn't stop his movements for a second. At the same time, he said coldly, "What's the point of just hiding? I admit you're good at dodging, but what use is that alone?"

"Do you really think I'm only good at dodging?" Olivia countered.

Almost the instant those words left her mouth, Olivia thrust Cross Grace forward violently, pointing it straight at Preston's neck.

This strike came very suddenly, right when Preston was caught in the momentum of his own attack. For a moment, he couldn't pull his blades back in time to block.

He could only quickly retract his strength and twist his body slightly to avoid the attack in that manner.

But all of this was also within Olivia's calculations.

She had long expected that while this strike was sudden, Preston would still dodge it. Therefore, this strike was merely a feint.

Just as Preston narrowly avoided the attack, Olivia raised her leg and kicked upward violently.

"Bang!"

Olivia didn't hold back in the slightest with this kick, landing it directly on Preston's vitals.

Preston immediately threw his head back and let out a shrill, agonizing scream.

Intense pain radiated from his vitals, spreading through his entire body in an instant, making the whole world seem to distort before his eyes.

He never imagined that he would suffer such a terrible blow from Olivia.

Overwhelmed by the pain, Preston rapidly retreated. He clutched his vitals, his body hunched over, looking as wretched as could be.

"You... you're so vicious," Preston said, his face twitching.

Olivia shook her head. "We were already opponents. There's no such thing as being vicious or not. It's simply that your skills are inferior."

As she spoke, Olivia leaped forward gracefully. Cross Grace traced a beautiful arc through the air as she slashed directly at Preston.

Seeing this, Preston could only endure the pain in his vitals, gritting his teeth as he rushed forward again to attack Olivia.

The two figures flashed rapidly through the market, their weapons clashing from time to time.

The two seemed to have returned to their previous state of combat.

Preston's onslaught was incredibly violent, like a storm sweeping through, enough to give any opponent a headache.

Right, except for Olivia.

With the help of the magic mirror, Olivia could easily understand all of Preston's actions and avoid them with ease.

While dodging, Olivia also looked for opportunities to counterattack, striking Preston every now and then.

Although she couldn't find an opening to wound him with her weapon, she managed to kick him two more times during the ensuing battle.

Although those two kicks didn't hit his vitals, they still left Preston looking exceptionally wretched.

As the battle continued, Preston felt like he was going crazy.

Why could he never hit his opponent, yet she could always hit him so easily?

It couldn't be that there was such a massive gap between them in terms of combat skills, could it?

No, that wasn't the case.

Preston did his best to calm himself down, recalling every detail of his fight with Olivia and deducing her situation.

In his judgment, although Olivia possessed excellent combat skills, he was not inferior to her in that regard. One could say they were evenly matched.

The reason Olivia was able to steadily suppress him during the fight was not because of her combat skills.

Rather, it was because for some reason, she was always able to understand his attack patterns in advance and thus dodge them.

This was what led to the situation where he could never hit her, while she could always hit him.

So, this person can predict her opponent's actions.

What kind of ability was this?

"A forbidden artifact?"

Preston shook his head as soon as the thought occurred to him.

After all, he had just deployed his domain by merging numerous forbidden artifacts.

In his current location, it was absolutely impossible for a forbidden artifact to appear.

But if it wasn't a forbidden artifact, how exactly was she doing it?

It couldn't be purely based on combat intuition, could it?

Preston found it hard to believe that someone could possess such sharp combat intuition.

But he really couldn't think of any other reason.

More importantly, if the opponent truly could predict his actions in this way, wouldn't that mean he didn't have the slightest chance of defeating her?

This was not the result he wanted.

He had taken the initiative to find Olivia and launch an attack, but it wasn't to suffer at her hands.

But forbidden artifacts couldn't be used against her, and he saw no hope of defeating her by relying on his own combat abilities. What else could he do?

As he thought more about it, a sense of despair began to well up in Preston's heart.

Such an emotion was far too rare for him.