A bout of swords ensued between Lucian and Sofia, although only one of the two parties was a willing participant in the fight. Sofia was relentless in her attacks, and she made it abundantly clear that she wasn't pulling her punches. The full force of her 2.6 strength bore down on Lucian, and he could barely hold out.
To Lucian, it felt like he was facing a grizzly bear in terms of the disparity between the power of the two of them. Each strike he parried with his own sword put intense strain on his arms, and he quickly felt his body becoming worn down. If it weren't for his recent increase to 1.01 vitality, he had no doubt that he would have lost already—perhaps even succumbing to injury.
"Hrah!" Sofia swung her long silver sword at Lucian, bringing with it the heavy whooshing of the wind as it split apart the very air that blocked her path. Lucian swept his rusty sword upwards in an effort to block it and succeeded.
"Your technique isn't so bad! But it's clear you have little to no experience in using it in a fight!" For the first time since the spar began, Sofia actually spoke to Lucian in a manner that wasn't either a direct insult or just entitled. It was clear that Lucian's successive attempts to fight back against her had surprised her enough to gain a tiny, minuscule amount of respect for the boy.
However, the difference between 0.6 strength and 2.6 strength was not something that could be overcome with just the willingness to fight back. Lucian hadn't been counting, but he guessed around 5 minutes had passed since the fight started, and he could feel his body was about to give out at any moment in time. This was something he wanted to avoid, as the threat of injury when he did eventually give in was not something he wanted.
Becoming injured would massively impede his plans for the next three weeks, and he might actually miss his goal of becoming an official Knight before the Mage selection began. If that happened, Lucian wouldn't care for any further pretences — maintaining a grudge against Sofia until he got his revenge one way or another.
He was willing to be rather passive when it came to minor things like bullying or teasing, but when things crossed a line and directly impacted his goals… Lucian wouldn't just let that go.
'The most important thing for me right now is to maintain a healthy body. I need to find a way to stop this fight without becoming injured.'
With his mind settled, Lucian decided to take a bold action.
"Come at me!" He pronounced valiantly to Sofia, as if he were suddenly coming out of his shell and decided to put his all into this spar. This caught her attention, and she smiled as if praising his actions for the first time. She, just like Lucian, despised cowards — so seeing the infamous weak coward of the preparatory academy suddenly growing some balls amused her a little.
Obliging his wishes, she tightened her grip on her two handed shining silver sword and made a strikingly beautiful sprint towards him. If Lucian were any normal man, the sight of such an undoubtedly beautiful young woman running towards him like this would put him in a trance. But Lucian was no normal man; all he saw at the moment was the equivalent of a charging bull.
She reached him in mere moments, closing the gap to just barely under two metres. The moment her sword came within range, she cleaved it through the air towards his abdomen. She knew this was where his armour offered the most protection, so she was doing him the mercy of not injuring him too badly. But she applied her own logic to this; she failed to realise that Lucian's armour was nowhere near the quality of her own. Even if she struck his most protected point, it would still penetrate through.
Lucian arched his body backwards in a desperate attempt to dodge the incoming sword, but it was futile. His agility was nowhere near high enough to match Sofia's, so the speed with which her sword came in was far faster than Lucian's mismanaged attempt to dodge it.
With nothing left to lose, he could do the only thing that could possibly save him in this situation. He didn't want to run the risk of injuring her, but that was the only choice he had now. Sofia called him inexperienced within a fight, but it was clear that she too wasn't used to fighting in such a serious manner either.
Her right side was wide open thanks to her grip on her sword being so tight, and with the speed at which she swept it his way, she wouldn't be able to suddenly switch her stance in time for what Lucian had prepared for her.
Claaaang!
A loud sound of metal meeting metal rang out through the empty field, and Lucian bounced backwards onto the ground before rolling a few times, dirtying both him and his clothes in the process. However, he managed to catch a glimpse of Sofia digging her feet into the ground and being forced around a metre backwards before she stopped moving.
Her swing met the empty air thanks to the absence of Lucian, and she just barely managed to save herself from stumbling, but that didn't stop the astonished look on her face from showing.
Sofia's armour was made up of a chainmail-leather hybrid, so his rusty sword couldn't even penetrate through it, let alone cause any harm or flesh wounds on her. The kinetic force behind his attack was the only thing that could possibly hurt her a little bit, but he doubted that would be the case since her vitality was so much higher than his, and his strength itself was so low.
"That's it, I'm totally all out of steam! No more!" Lucian pleaded between heavy breaths, but Sofia's expression didn't budge one bit. He was unsure whether she heard him or not, so he repeated himself a second time after catching his breath.