Floating a few meters in front of his grandfather, Riven returned to his usual form.
"So you saved these wretches again," The Royal grimaced, the mere thought sickening him.
"How dare you use a Royal's body for such a task?!" he shouted, only for a cough to immediately follow afterwards. Though this time, when he pulled back his hand from his mouth, he was greeted with a crimson stain.
Enraged at the sight, he glared at Riven.
"Undo this—" he tried to demand, but he barely got through his sentence before he fell to his knees with another coughing fit.
Remaining silent all the while, Riven just stared down at his grandfather, Lord Ignatius Cross, one of the Seven Great Royals. The man he idolized and that raised him—brought to his knees and coughing.
This should have made him feel happy or angry or perhaps even guilty, but he had only one impassive thought:
This is going to be a short fight.
Looking up to see those hollow eyes staring down at him, Ignatius clenched his teeth.
"You dare look down on me?" He groaned as he struggled to his feet, the cold feeling of humiliation pushing his body upright.
He raised a single hand, causing flames from the burning building to fly over and gather behind him in several large orbs that were at least several meters across, swirling in their own heat and density like miniature suns.
"I'll burn you out of him... abomination," he growled and launched the orbs toward Riven like comets.
As the volley of projectiles came sailing towards him, Riven continued to think while taking an assessment of the situation.
Seems he's only using external magic.
"I guess I did more damage than I thought," he murmured as he condensed razor-thin compressed ash into a blade before planting his feet firmly and, with near-perfect form, slicing three that came his way.
Quickly he dissolved the blade and shifted its form into a thin-coated, armor-like mist that protected him from the initial heat and blast that followed.
Seeing the result had no effect, his grandfather flicked his hand, causing the orbs to swerve to both his front and his flanks, forming a trident-like pincer attack.
Observing the many attacks coming at him from all directions, he materialized his wings again and flew up, avoiding them entirely.
But before he could relax, his grandfather shouted.
"You're not going to get away!!!"
He quickly raised his hand; the orbs that missed Riven flew up, following him like furious wolves.
"What is he plotting?" he muttered while side-stepping the obvious attack, but as they flew past harmlessly, one quickly turned on a dime and hit him dead center, sending him flying back and falling out of the sky as the rest of the orbs followed close behind, struck his falling body one after another, and accelerated his descent.
His body looked akin to a falling star.
Accelerating to the ground at enormous speed due to the impact, his mind drifted in a haze of unconsciousness as the one remaining orb was hot on his tail.
But just before he was about to hit the ground, his eyes suddenly shot open and—
Fwoom
His wings materialized once again, and he shot forward, his body barely skimming across the ground as the final orb hit the ground, unable to turn in time.
Soaring back into the sky, his head was a mess of ringing, and his white t-shirt was nearly burned through, revealing his lightly burned, grey skin underneath.
The pounding headache lasted a few more seconds before the majority of it began to fade.
"He added a tracking spell," he murmured as his vision came back into focus.
I shouldn't have completely discounted him using internal magic, he thought to himself while shaking his head to make the residual ringing fade faster.
The action unintentionally made his eyes glance downward at the scene below.
He saw the woman he saved and the other firefighters, along with paramedics, herding everyone away from the scene. But the people in the crowd were rebellious, pushing back and even fighting the civil servants just so they could get a closer view of the spectacle.
"I want to see," he heard a few of them shout.
"Isn't that a Royal?" He heard more exclaim their curiosity literally about to get them killed.
"Commoners," Riven muttered, a look of disdain briefly appearing on his face before he turned his attention back to his grandfather.
I can't fight him at range if he's using tracking spells.
The idea of flying between buildings to lose the spells crossed his mind but was immediately shot down by the presence within him.
"Too much risk of people being hurt," he muttered as he felt his hands shake uncontrollably from cutting through those attacks. "I can't keep blocking his attacks for long, and they're too big for me to phase through them."
Even in this state, he can use external magic for longer than I can hold out, he thought as memories of his grandfather training him cycled in his mind.
I'd run out of internal magic before then.
But as the thoughts cycled through his mind on what to do next, the most outlandish idea appeared in his head.
I need to force hand-to-hand combat and exhaust his physical stamina.
And as if his grandfather heard him, more orbs of fire came surging at him.
Barreling out of the way, he flew at full speed at his grandfather, dodging left and right as a flurry of blasts came at him.
"Release him, you abomination!!!" his grandfather repeated in fury as he shot out a huge stream of flames. Riven barely rolled out of the way before he landed on the ground right behind his grandfather. His stance was low as he did.
Seeing what was coming but not having time to summon the appropriate magic to shield himself, his grandfather gathered as much internal magic as he could muster into his fist, setting it ablaze as he twisted his body to meet his opponent with all the strength he had.
In the same moment, Riven, using the momentum he got from his landing and his current position, cocked back his arm before solidifying and condensing the smoke to coat his own fist in a similar manner.
Mirroring each other in every sense, but their direction, their fists clashed and—
BOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!
The punch sounded off like an explosion between them—two forces clashing together, a never-before-seen reaction, orange and gray light up the sky and briefly blinding the cameras trained on them. But as the reaction ended, only one of them was sent flying…
LORD IGNATIUS.