While Jay and the young mage were having trouble with the Aquga snake, most of the applicants who had been teleported to the island were also having trouble.
Whether they were espers, mages or pugilists, all had landed relatively close to monsters that tested their limits, as planned by the Academy.
However, there were exceptions to this, where the applicants were not having problemns with monsters... but with other applicants.
*BAM!*
A loud bang echoed in a corner of the island, product of the clash of punches between two people, which even caused several surrounding trees to shake slightly.
"...I knew it, you're as strong as I thought!" Said a somewhat striking looking young man as he backed up a few steps, which was also one of the people responsible for the loud bang.
His hair was a striking red color which went quite well with his yellow amber eyes, as for his body, even though he was mostly slender, clear signs of having worked out could be seen on his body.
Although the features of this young man's face could be described as somewhat attractive, it completely paled when looking at the person in front of him.
"If you have nothing else to say, then get out of the way." James said as he ignored the young man and started walking in another direction.
"Hey, wait, we haven't even finished exchanging a few lessons!" the red-haired young man shouted again as he approached James, obviously wanting to continue to confront James.
The two had met only a few minutes ago, after James had been teleported to a nearby shore, he made his way into the forest, which is where he encountered this young man, who upon seeing him, immediately proceeded to attack him without another word.
James of course responded, starting a battle that lasted only a short time, ending with him forcing the young man back, however, that only seemed to have motivated the young man even more.
Without even turning to look at him, James simply kept walking, ignoring him completely.
Suddenly, the young man increased his speed, his fists starting to get covered in pugilistic flames, aiming for James' back.
Although it didn't take him long to do this, the power contained in his fists was no joke, taking into account that this young man was at rank (C-), even James would not come out of this unscathed if he received a sneak attack.
*BAM!*
But to the young man's surprise, before his fist had even touched James, the latter moved at a speed much faster than his own, turning his body to deliver a kick that landed on his jaw.
"Gah!"
*Pam*
Without being able to say another word, the young man fell to the ground unconscious. Although he was also a pugilist, the power of James' kick had been strong enough to knock him out.
"Hm, there really are some pretty reckless people everywhere..." He said as he lifted the young man's body and climbed up a particularly tall tree to leave him there.
He had some experience dealing with people like this, whether they were young men who were overconfident or those that wanted to prove their power by defeating others, James had seen both.
As for a solution to this, a simple beating solved most problems, though of course he always tried not to go to that extent, which unfortunately had only worked a handful of times.
After making sure the young man wouldn't fall off the tree, James climbed down, continuing on his way through this dense forest and leaving the young man to his own luck.
...
...
"Haa..."
However, barely five minutes had passed, James suddenly returned and climbed up the tree to grab the young man before climbing down and putting him on his shoulder.
Originally, he had really wanted to leave him alone, but at the thought that this young pugilist could very likely end up being the prey of some monster, he couldn't help but feel a little bad, which forced him to return.
'Well... I'll just have to make him faint again if he gets violent when he wakes up...' He thought as he continued on his way through the forest, being wary of running into some other postulant that could make things more complicated for him.
***
"Hey, mage...!" Shouted Jay, who was currently clinging to a tree, holding on as best he could to avoid being pulled into the lake.
The situation was undoubtedly bad, even though he had used a wind blade to cut the tentacle-like thing, it had already proven to have little effect, so the only thing he could think of to avoid ending up in the lake was to cling tightly to this tree.
On the other hand, although the wizard right now was too busy constantly freezing the gelatinous mass that was grabbing him at this moment, he still managed to answer.
"What do you want?!" He replied, several beads of sweat on his face, evidence that right now he was giving his best.
"Tell me, how long do you think it would take you to complete your elemental zone?"
While it was true that Jay had seen that most of the young mage's spells had close to no effect on the Aquga snake, he was sure this would change if the mage could finish his zone.
Quickly, the young man guessed what Jay was thinking before continuing to concentrate on casting spells.
"If you can give me 15 minutes, it will be 50% complete, enough to protect us until I finish completing it!"
He had seen Jay escape only a few seconds ago and this made a negative impression on him, but right now he couldn't be picky about any help offered to him.
Hearing this, Jay immediately started to work, gathering the surrounding wind and wrapping his ankle with it, creating an incredibly small but effective breach between his ankle and the gelatinous mass.
Immediately, a small burst of wind took place at his ankle, briefly separating Jay's ankle from the Aquga snake.
Fortunately, this moment was all he needed to escape the grip, quickly climbing a tree and starting to jump towards another.
The gelatinous mass, as soon as it noticed that Jay had broken free, began to chase him wildly, though it wasn't all that easy because of all the branches it had to get through.
"Listen to me, I need you to prepare the big spell from earlier and use it just in time, allright!?" Jay shouted as he was jumping from tree to tree.
"OK!" Replied the mage.
Because some time had passed, right now the mage was only a few meters away from reaching the main body of the Aqugas Snake, so seeing that his spells had no effect and that his fate would be the same no matter if he kept using them or not, he decided to do as Jay said.
Again, his eyes began to glow, the mana in the surroundings gathering into a glowing magic circle whose inscriptions were being completed by the second.
*BAM*
Dozens of branches snapped where Jay passed by, product of the thick gelatinous tentacle that was chasing him, causing him to only be able to flee forward.
Luckily for Jay, as the tentacle had increased in thickness to be able to break the branches, its speed slowed down considerably, although it was still fast, Jay was able to keep a certain distance.
This was also because Jay right now was not only using his muscles to the fullest, but he also was using his wind control to be able to decrease the wind resistance around him, increasing his speed.
As for how he thought of this use, it simply came to him on one of his training days when he was running in his yard, although it was a difficult thing to do and it consumed a low but steady amount of energy, the situation called for its use.
The reason he didn't use this to run away earlier was due to the fact that he hadn't expected the Aqugas snake to be able to move so quickly, a mistake that had created the current situation.
Also, he wasn't sure if even with that he would have been able to escape, after all, when he was running on the ground, it was much easier for the snake to chase him since there weren't as many obstacles as now that he was jumping from tree to tree.
"!"
At that moment, Jay again felt another of the tentacles in his radar, this time coming from below and targeting one of his ankles, forcing him to change trees faster, the difficulty of staying in the trees increased exponentially.
Just like that, Jay had almost made a full circle around the lake.
The snake had foreseen this, so it prepared several more tentacles that were hidden in the trees that Jay would have to pass, waiting for its prey to come and finally capture him.
However, just as Jay was about to complete his turn, he suddenly darted downward, landing on the ground and resuming its march quickly, running in the direction of the lake.
This caught the snake off guard as it didn't expect its prey to go straight towards its body, but since it was a good thing, it didn't care much, just creating more tentacles that came straight out of the lake to meet Jay.
These quickly approached Jay, who didn't stop for a second, but before they could come into contact with Jay, the latter let out a scream.
"NOW!"
*BOOM!*
At his signal, the young mage immediately activated his spell, causing the snake to stop because a considerable part of its body had been frozen.
Since the snake had been bringing him closer and closer to devour him, the young man was close to the main body of the snake, which made his spell much more effective than before.
Taking advantage of the fact that the snake's attention was elsewhere, Jay ran to the edge of the lake and made the most powerful jump he had done so far, even using the parasites' energy and his wind control to the maximum for it.
The reason why he circled the lake had been for this, to be at the closest possible distance to the young mage who was now surrounded by ice.
'Ah, shit, so even this isn't enough...!' Jay thought, being several meters above the air but already beginning to feel that the momentum of his jump was running out.
Of course, also because the young mage was too deep in the lake, even though Jay had jumped quite high, he was still a good distance away from reaching him.
But as he reached his highest point, an incredible amount of wind began to gather near his feet at the same time Jay's eyes began to release a faint green glow.
Just as he was beginning to fall, for a brief moment, an extremely thin stream of air was created right below his feet, gathering in the shape of a square.
Then, Jay stepped on this square and jumped again!
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