Sword God in a World of Magic

More days passed, and although Shang became better and better, he still didn't win even once.

Shang had come across another problem.

A lot of his opponents were now using Mana Push.

Mana Push was a common Element-neutral defensive Spell. It created something like a force field around one of the Adept's arms, which extended outward by quite a bit.

Mana Push was the very technique Duke Whirlwind used to deal with the Exploding Mountain Turtle's attacks. He had created a huge forcefield and used it to bat the stones of the Exploding Mountain Turtle away like they were pebbles.

Of course, the Mana Push of these Adepts was nowhere near as overwhelmingly powerful as Duke Whirlwind's, but it was still troublesome.

Using Mana Push didn't waste as much Mana as receiving a hit to one's Mana Shield. However, it was harder to utilize since the Adept actually had to anticipate Shang's movements somewhat.

If they messed up their Mana Push, they would have wasted their Mana in using Mana Push while also receiving an attack to their Mana Shield.

Since Shang's opponents were now using Mana Push, Shang's progress was thrown back.

By now, Shang could barely waste 60% of his opponent's Mana.

However, Shang wasn't stupid, and he had realized something.

His initial opponents had been very clumsy, and they hadn't used Mana Push.

But now, his opponents were using Mana Push confidently.

This meant that Shang's opponents had been upgraded.

He was no longer fighting the trash portion of the Adepts but the average ones.

When Shang had just fought against his first few opponents, he had only managed to use up around 50% of their Mana, and these opponents had been the worst Adepts.

Now, he managed to waste 60% of the Mana of average Adepts.

Shang had made progress!

Several more days passed, and Shang learned to deal with Mana Push better.

There were three levels to dealing with Mana Push.

First level: Somewhat avoiding it and quickly charging towards the Adept's new location after they used Mana Step.

Second level: Avoiding Mana Push with a lot of confidence and making the Adept use even more Mana by forcing them to use a Mana Step with all their power.

Third level: Nullifying Mana Push and hitting the opponent's Mana Shield before they vanished with Mana Step.

After five days, Shang managed to confidently reach the first level. By now, he wasn't thrown to the ground anymore by being hit by Mana Push.

After several more days, Shang managed to reach the second level a couple of times, but before he could continue, he had to take a break.

17 days had already passed, which meant that the academy's auction would take place now.

Viera left to deal with several things. After all, she had been down here for over two weeks.

Shang retreated to his room and sat down.

One would think that Shang wanted to relax after 17 days of constant battle, but that was far from the truth.

Shang saw his own progress, and he became addicted to it.

More power!

He wanted more power!

He was making so much progress!

Shang wanted to continue fighting right now, but he had to wait until the room became free again.

Shang wouldn't have to

room with several Spells made by

a couple

slowly growing. By now, his mind had reached the Initial

Initial Apprentice Realm wasn't impressive, but

looked through the list of

the easiest Spells imaginable. It was almost like they weren't Spells but training

required Shang to simply gather Fire Mana from

absorb lifeless Fire and Ice Mana, but he hadn't yet

wanted to test if Shang had the same abilities as people

and concentrated on these

but he

abilities would never reach the power of his physical abilities, but there surely were some

Mage's power was 100% magical and 0%

power was 0% magical

power was 40% magical and 60%

body, he planned on

a Mage, if Shang's Mana in his mind ran out, he wasn't helpless. Because of that, even though his Mana reserves for his mind were pitifully small, he could attempt to gain a one-time boost per battle by completely using up all the

reminded of how Astor used his Affinity to move to the side to change the

Mana Step to move

one Mana Step, he could

to Adepts, but this

Shang had to become familiar with

extremely easy Spells came at

Shang saw

was quickly approaching the limit of his techniques. The Adepts were overwhelming him, even though

only so much technique

part of his power, and one of these

spent the entire day practicing the Spells Mattheo had delivered him, and when Viera returned to get him

some progress in his Spell casting, and he was absolutely sure by now that he

to practice that there wasn't enough

Stage warriors

fueled their entire being, and the Mana

returned to

some progress in his Spell

quite a bit off from using an

practiced dealing with Mana Push and learning all the

his opponents were using more than one Elemental Spell, and Shang saw new Spells every single

was certain that these Adepts weren't

deplete 80% of his opponents' Mana

Only a bit more!

Shang was

Only a bit more!

was the last one!"

Shang became shocked.

The last one?

entire month had

his teeth. "I didn't manage to win even once," he said with

"Are you surprised?"

he heard a familiar

the Dean,

asked with the voice of a pleading child. "I want

at Viera.

said as she excitedly clapped her

Shang! In just one month, you became one of

snorted. "One of the best? I didn't even win against an

Viera only smiled brightly.

to the Dean. "Can I tell

eyebrow

excitedly. "You've not been fighting Initial Adepts but Early

a second,