Hate Me, Witch!-Chapter 59: Ailora Felt a Sense of Crisis

For the next stretch of time, Xia Ya completely immersed himself in the training room within the estate.

He was conducting special training for his summoned beasts.

Or rather—

To be precise, he was focusing on training Crimson.

Shiny and Silver's abilities were primarily support and control-based, and they had already matured significantly.

If they wanted to improve further, they would mainly need to acquire new Skill Seeds to develop entirely new skill combinations and ability frameworks.

But Crimson was different.

As a newly added main combat-type summoned beast, it was still highly inexperienced in many aspects. Compared to Silver and Shiny, who were already near completion, Crimson had significant shortcomings.

However, this also meant it had immense room for growth.

Especially considering that in Crimson’s skill set, aside from Slash, Sword Bones, and Bloodburn, all its other skill proficiencies were virtually undeveloped.

It was practically the perfect target for Xia Ya’s Point Allocation.

…

Whoosh—

A silver-white spear light tore through the air.

It ripped through the atmosphere, stirring up a storm.

The fierce pressure that erupted seemed as though it would shred everything around it to pieces.

Yet, in the face of the golden-haired girl standing before him, clad in a knight’s dress armor and exuding an awe-inspiring presence, Xia Ya merely closed his eyes.

In the next moment—

Through the connection deep within his soul, bound by the Soul Pact—

Faint crimson light coalesced at Xia Ya’s fingertips.

Then, in an instant, the ethereal light gathered into a tangible entity.

A blade of blood-red.

Immediately after, Xia Ya emptied his mind of all conscious thought.

Following the instincts and intuition that rippled from the depths of his soul—

He swung his sword.

Clang—

The crimson blade traced a simple arc through the air.

A fraction of a second later—

The blood-red blade clashed against the silver-white knight’s spear.

Metal struck metal, unleashing a deafening explosion of sound.

The resulting magical shockwave made the reinforced metal walls of the training room hum and tremble.

Moments later, the magitech glow of a small energy storage formation flickered, restoring calm to the scene.

As an in-house training room of a high-end estate, this facility was built to luxurious standards.

Theoretically, it was designed to withstand the full-force attacks of any Beastmaster and summoned beast below Fourth-Ring level.

Yet now, after just a brief exchange between two Third-Ring Beastmasters, this training room was already showing signs of collapse.

“Let’s call it here for today.”

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“If we keep going, I might lose my home.”

Xia Ya waved his hand, releasing his Fused State with Crimson. The crimson blood blade in his hand once again faded into scattered light and disappeared.

Almost at the same time Xia Ya spoke, the oppressive killing intent that had shrouded the training room dissipated.

The mithril dress armor enveloping Ailora vanished in a stream of light, revealing the pristine white academy uniform beneath.

The golden-haired girl took light steps toward Xia Ya, picked up two towels that had been prepared at the side of the training room, and handed one to him while taking the other for herself.

She looked up at Xia Ya’s profile, a flicker of surprise flashing through her sapphire-blue eyes.

“Your close-combat skills are improving so fast.”

As a combat-specialized Armed-Type Beastmaster, Ailora was more familiar than anyone with the nuances of melee combat.

She knew very well that contracting a powerful new summoned beast could certainly bring about a qualitative leap in a Beastmaster’s strength, speed, and defense—essentially improving their raw physical stats.

However, if all they had was strength and physical enhancements but lacked the experience and technique to match—

Then no matter how high their raw stats were, it was no different from handing a child a massive battle axe. They’d be lucky to wield even thirty or forty percent of their full potential.

Ailora’s own combat skills and experience had been honed through countless military missions, in the relentless grind of iron and blood.

And from what she knew of Xia Ya, his combat style was completely different from hers. He almost never fought head-on.

Rather than overpowering opponents in a frontal clash, he preferred using illusion techniques and other means to outmaneuver them, taking victory without them ever realizing what had happened—an infuriatingly cunning playstyle.

Because of this, Ailora had originally assumed that even though Xia Ya’s Third Soul Pact was with a high-tier physical combat summoned beast, it would still take him a long time to accumulate the necessary battle experience.

But now—

That assumption seemed to be wrong.

Over the past few days, Ailora could feel Xia Ya’s combat experience and techniques improving at an astonishing rate.

That last Slash just now—

Even against her, it hadn’t fallen short in the slightest.

“It’s a bit of a trick.”

Xia Ya sat down at the edge of the training ground, taking the damp towel from Ailora and wiping the sweat from his face.

“I know I’m not like you—someone born with an instinct for battle, someone who doesn’t need to think and can simply rely on intuition to make the best decision in a split second.”

“I also don’t have a pure devotion to the ways of warriors and knights.”

“Even if I forced myself to train, I could never be like you, Xiao Ai—hammering away at myself day after day, year after year, with unwavering focus and dedication.”

“So, I took a shortcut.”

Xia Ya put down the damp towel, casually grabbing a strand of the girl’s golden hair that had fallen to her side, twisting it around his fingers.

Her hair was smooth and silky, carrying a faint fragrance—the scent of Ailora’s favorite shampoo.

Not bad. Xiao Ai’s hair had a really nice feel to it.

“By using my high compatibility Soul Pact with Crimson, along with the self-hypnosis aid from Tsukuyomi…”

“I shut off part of my conscious awareness and completely handed over my combat decisions to Crimson’s instincts—instincts honed from tens of thousands of sword swings.”

Xia Ya knew his own limits. He wasn’t built for direct combat.

His mind was too meticulous, always prone to overthinking.

In most situations, that wasn’t a bad thing.

But in the split-second exchanges of blade-to-blade combat, where the tide of battle could turn in an instant, overthinking would only slow him down.

However, it didn’t matter if he wasn’t suited for it. As long as his summoned beast was, that was enough.

To have honed Slash, the most basic of skills, to a level of Transcendent Mastery—without the aid of Transcendent Materials or Evolution Resources—

Crimson’s combat instincts and intuition were undeniable.

Even compared to a natural-born knight like Ailora, it was every bit as formidable.

“Oh.”

Ailora nodded, letting Xia Ya play with her hair.

But in her heart, she quietly made a decision.

Previously, Xia Ya hadn’t been strong in direct combat, which had made her his sole complementary partner.

But now, as Xia Ya’s weaknesses were being patched up, Ailora suddenly felt a sense of crisis.

“To be—”

“Someone who is always useful to you…”

Feeling the fingers idly twirling her hair—

Ailora silently repeated the vow she had made to the boy eight years ago, amid the ruins of Ceylan.

It seemed she had been slacking off lately.

She needed to take on a few more Military Department high-level bounty missions—

To better adapt to the power she had gained after breaking through to Third-Ring.