It had been quite some time since Jason and Jennifer had fought against someone together.
As such, they feared that their teamwork would not be up to the mark.
After all, they had never attempted to devise a proper combat style to adjust to each other's strengths and weaknesses, to begin with.
Despite that, they knew each other quite well, including their combat style, affinities, abilities, and special traits.
With that in mind, they entered the combat ring before choosing their opponents.
There was a large crowd of people they could choose from.
The easy and safe bet would be to pick up the two weakest, but when the two of them made their final decision, the others looked at the dumbfoundedly.
Contrary to their earlier belief that Jason and Jennifer would choose the weakest of them, it was almost the exact opposite.
Both of them chose Linus one of the strongest humans from the rest.
Their opponents entered the ring with a confused expression as they looked at each other.
They couldn't understand why they were picked.
However, they gave a sly smile to each other which made it clear that the two knew each other, and that they were friends too.
But that was what Jennifer and Jason were already aware of.
In fact, this was the biggest reason for them to choose these two as their opponents.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64ce79d606107d003c23ea27", id: "pf-5140-1"})Having seen their fighting style in addition to their behavior while talking to each other had helped Jason and Jennifer pick them up.
They had noted down several things about the two before arriving at a decision.
First, Linus' behavior and fighting style were comparable to parallel lines, but that was not the case for his friend, whose behavior didn't represent his combat style, at all.
Rather, his fighting style was the complete opposite of his rather timid behavior as he fought his opponents rather aggressively.
Everyone in the weekly comparison event seemed to know this, which was why they didn't like fighting the young man. And, from the looks of it, this had also been the case for Linus.
Yet, oddly enough, Linus was like a leader to everyone, while his friend was submissive when it was not about fighting.
Because of that, Jason and Jennifer believed their choice was the best.
If their guess was true, their opponents should have more problems than they were currently thinking about.
With that in mind, they smiled at each other before going into their combat stance.
Jason circulated mana circulating throughout his body, while the three fused energies were coursing through Jennifer.
This increased their strength from the beginning, but Linus and his friend were doing the exact same thing.
As such, Linus, and his friend believed that they were at an advantage.
Linus was at the Initial phase of the Ascendion stage, with a combat prowess of a Low Ascendion stage being.
Meanwhile, his friend had the same cultivation base, but an even higher combat prowess.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "64cc9e79c7059f003e4ad4b0", id: "pf-5109-1"})But, it would be only minutes before their confidence would come crashing down.
Their false hopes of emerging victorious in the simple spar only increased when they fused with their soulbonds.
The transformation saw fur growing out of Linus' friend, and his body enlarging while his eyes turned pitch black.
Simultaneously, feathers sprouted all over Linus's body and gray wings emerged on his back.
His hands were also transforming, and a tail grew out of his coccyx.
This confused Jason a little bit because the tail was furry while the rest of Linus' body was covered in feathers.
Despite the confusion, he quickly averted his attention before allowing Petri to enter his mana core.
Initially, Jason didn't plan to fuse with his soulbonds, and even now he was reluctant.
Yet, thinking back on the way in which all the humans from Argos treated their soulbonds was more than enough to change his opinion.
Fusing with Petri would normally allow Jason to grow scales all over his body followed by the several-meter-long tail.
Yet, instead of doing so, Jason decided to grow scales above his right eye, preventing the others from seeing the newly emerging Stigma.
Other than that, his eyes turned into reptilian slits, and the ferocious aura of the Basilisk, the king of serpents, leaked from his body.
Fueled by the anger he had suppressed within, it was next to impossible to block off the aura of the Serpent King.
As such, he released it to a certain extent, and the aura enveloped a part of the combat arena.
window.pubfuturetag = window.pubfuturetag || [];window.pubfuturetag.push({unit: "663633fa8ebf7442f0652b33", id: "pf-8817-1"})However, he concealed the rest that would be more than enough to enshroud the entire dojo.
Seeing the change in Jason's eyes that were now golden and reptilian, the black scales above his right eye, and his aura, everyone except Jennifer was baffled. Linus couldn't help but exclaim,
"You…have already mastered the fusion with your soulbonds?!?" But only a moment later, Linus saw several more scales forming on Jason's face, only to fall off.
This made Linus assume that Jason was far from mastering the soul fusion.
Little did he know that everything was a trick and that the scales that fell off were the loose scales on Petri's body. Jason cleverly utilized the fact that the Cursed Basilisk would soon shed his skin.
Because of his phenomenal track, everyone believed that Jason had been able to create a natural fusion, but that his connection with his soulbond was not yet firm enough to master the fusion process.
Despite knowing that their fusion was better, they were astonished about the sudden revelation of Jason's natural fusion, as it was different from their artificial one.
But even then, they were not shocked to the extent that they were unable to fight.
Rather, it motivated Linus and his friend to give their utmost efforts as the ferocious and anger-intertwined aura was challenging them for a fight.
Thus, the four charged at each other without hesitation the moment the fight started.
Linus and his friend shot at them with great speed; Linus from the air and his friend from the ground.
Yet, rather than advancing to their opponents, Jennifer and Jason first approached each other.
In a swift move, Jason instinctively grasped Jennifer's waist before he threw her towards Linus, using all his physical strength.
This was more than enough to exceed the speed Linus could reach within the short moment that had passed. Jason's momentum allowed Jennifer to appear right in front of Linus as a longsword manifested in her hand.
It was only a moment later that darkness enveloped Jennifer and began expanding explosively.
It enshrouded the entire arena within a moment.
This required lots of mana, but this was more than fine with her.
The only thing she had wanted to do was to distract Linus' partner, making both of them believe that she was about to attack Linus.
However, this was not the case, because she had just wanted to shroud the entire combat arena in darkness, preventing them from seeing anything.
Thus, only their other senses worked, which included her own.
Merely Jason was able to see everything.
Because he could see everything, while the others couldn't Jason was unable to avoid grinning as he released his petrification and race specific weakening curse, targeting Linus' partner with it.
Through that, Linus was severely restricted, while everyone else could only perceive a tremendous amount of mana being consumed by Jason.
Following that, a sword appeared in his hand, and without hesitation, he slashed it at the young man, who sensed everything.
Ready to deflect the attack, his entire focus had been on Jason.
Thus he was oblivious to Jennifer advancing towards him from above.
It was only a split second before Jennifer reached him that the young man's senses warned him.
At that moment, he could see the brightly glowing, golden reptile eyes of Jason that were filled with wrath as the attacks from two sides, and the aura of the Serpent King reached him!
Yet, instead of giving up, the young man didn't accept losing so quickly or easily as if he was nothing but a pushover.
Triggered, the bloodline of his soulbond was activated, and surged through the young man, as his entire body enlarged further.
His crimson eyes turned blood red while his body released a presence that was more of a beast than a human!
'Now we can fight!' He could barely think as the wild instincts of his soulbonds began to overwhelm him.
