Throne of Magical Arcana - Lucien’s Identity

Grabbing his sword tight, Tod looked around with great caution.
    

He saw tall firs, assorted kinds of bushes… and there was a unique smell of earth in Tod’s nose. Everything here looked identical to the rest of the black forest, except for a strange-shaped huge stone.
    

“There’s no river here… and the shadow doesn’t lie… Where are they?” Aaron murmured.
    

“Watch out!” In the next second, Tod fiercely pushed Aaron away, knocking him down, and at the same time he lifted up his left hand and produced a square-shaped iron shield with his Blessing.
    

When Aaron was slammed to the ground, Natasha had already jumped down from a big tall fir and attacked with her Thunder with all her strength.
    

Tod’s shield cracked instantly, and he could not believe his eyes.
    

However, Natasha’s sword, whose momentum was greatly reduced by the iron shield, also did not go as far as she intended. A big dent appeared in Tod’s armor, but he was not hurt.
    

“Damn it! My power’s not full yet!” Natasha swore a bit in her mind. She was very confident that she could kill the dark knight Aaron with that one strike, but she failed.
    

Although he felt rather confused, Tod immediately produced a new iron shield out of the pieces of the previous broken one.
    

Knowing that she had lost her chance, Natasha turned around and ran away at her full speed toward the other side of the black forest.
    

Tod soon realized that it must be a potion that was boosting Natasha’s remaining strength. He knew that this kind of boosting would not last long. Pulling out his sword, he started to chase after her.
    

He did not care about Aaron. As soon as Natasha showed up, Aaron’s job was done.
    

With one running in the front and the other chasing after, soon they both disappeared among the tall trees.
    

Using the momentum of the movement that knocked him down, Aaron quickly rolled backwards to get on his feet. He was also very surprised that Natasha could burst out that kind of power after being injured so seriously. When Aaron was about to follow Tod, a second black figure fiercely jumped down from the tree, and the sword lifted by him was shining with a terrifying light.
    

…
    

After a bit more than ten seconds, the distance between Tod and Natasha became smaller and smaller. Tod could tell that Natasha’s power hadn’t recovered to level five, since Natasha was definitely faster than him in the past, but right now he would be able to catch her!
    

When Tod was only a few steps away from Natasha, the princess turned around and started to fight back.
    

Easily blocking her strike with his sword named Blood, Tod sneered, “This is not going to be enough, Your Grace.”
    

Natasha’s eyes turned into light gray again as she kept hacking, thrusting, blocking and dodging.
    

The loud bangs from the metals colliding with each other slightly shook the ground, and the strong airflow caused by that overthrew the nearby bushes, stones and some rotten branches of the firs.
    

“I thought the more seriously injured you were, the more powerful you would be.” Tod was good at disturbing his enemy’s mental state, “It looks like your potion doesn’t really help you that much, uh?”
    

“Are you a knight? Or you’re just a talker, Tod?” Natasha’s Thunder never stopped attacking. Her eyes were full of determination.
    

After blocking all of the princess’s fierce attacks, Tod started to fight back following the formal knight training he received, “There’s nothing wrong with talking while fighting, Your Grace. After all, it is good that I can still spare the effort to talk, isn’t it?”
    

Natasha could not deny that. She felt that her boosted power had started to fade slowly.
    

“Were it not for the annoying sword you’re using, you’d be dead already!” Tod continued talking to distract Natasha.
    

Thunder was a perfect counter to his Iron Blood since Tod’s iron skin was an ideal conductor.
    

“However, your power is not gonna last long, Your Grace. I’m not in a hurry,” said Tod sarcastically.
    

Natasha did not bother bickering back, instead, she stayed even more focused on her movement, attack and defense. She was a very well-trained knight, and she was also one of the most talented knights ever of the Church. She believed that her hard training was worth a lot, even without her Blessing.
    

Her powerful Blessing enabled her to manage almost every one of her breakthroughs relatively easily, and in her previous fights she had was always been in a more advantageous position. However, the battle she experienced earlier tonight and the one she was facing right now gave Natasha the first chance to learn more about her own power.
    

The power of her Blessing and her physical strength started to blend together in perfect harmony. If it could be commented that she usually fought using the power given by God, now Natasha was fighting as a human being, relying on her own willpower and the lessons that she learned before in her tough training.
    

Tod noticed the difference in the way that Natasha positioned herself in this fight. Although she did not burst out any astonishing power, and neither her strength or speed were improved, Tod knew that he needed to be more cautious.
    

…
    

Grabbing Alert with both of his hands, Lucien jumped down toward Aaron from above, hacking with his sword.
    

Aaron’s reaction was fast. He raises the black dagger in his right hand to block the fierce attack, summoned his black fire on his left fist and aimed a punch at Lucien’s abdomen.
    

“Clang!”
    

When the weapons touched, Lucien’s sword left a small gap on the edge of Aaron’s weapon. In the next moment, Lucien pulled back his sword and dematerialized his body into moonlight to avoid Aaron’s fist.
    

“Not even of a real knight’s power!” Aaron sneered. When he recognized Lucien, he became more confident.
    

As a dark knight, Aaron was even faster than Lucien, not to mention his reaction speed and strength.
    

Lucien kept a distance away from Aaron by using his sword, which was longer than the enemy’s weapon. However, Lucien noticed that the black fire covering the dagger could slowly corrode the Alert’s blade.
    

Aaron chose not to launch his attack in the front, instead, he tried to approach Lucien from different angles, and his movements were not meant to actually damage, but more to probe.
    

It was not a waste of time for Aaron, and he was actually very smart. Since Aaron was much more powerful, there must be a reason why Lucien would be confident enough to ambush him like that. The only possible explanation, based on what just happened to Verdi, was that Lucien had some magic items.
    

Aaron needed to keep moving around, in case any of Lucien’s magic item could lock him as the target.
    

Lucien was not as fast as Aaron, and soon his body was covered by wounds left by Aaron’s dagger. Although these wounds were small and not deep, they were covered with small clusters of black fire. As if they were alive, the clusters of fire were trying to enter into Lucien’s body through the small wounds to suck his strength.
    

With another quick attack, Aaron’s dagger tore down a piece of cloth in front of Lucien’s chest, revealing the amulet Sun’s Corona, that Lucien was wearing on his neck.
    

“Look at you.” As he was swiftly moving around, it sounded like Aaron’s voice was coming from all directions, “You’re nobody, but you have a fine sword, a nice magic ring, and even a badge from the Church. I wonder if you are Natasha’s secret lover, haha.”
    

Lucien was still wielding his sword to block Aaron’s attack as much as possible.
    

“But that’s okay,” said Aaron. “Soon, they will all be mine.”
    

As Aaron was talking, he was trying to recall and calculate how many times Lucien had activated his magic items. Then, Aaron’s attack became fiercer and fiercer, since he wanted to force Lucien into using the two items in case there was still any power left in them.
    

Lucien seemed to be pretty weak, and all he could do was stand there and wield his sword. For a couple of times, he could not even stand on his feet since the black fire was eating up his strength.
    

After testing Lucien by pushing him into his limit countless times, Aaron believed that the young man had already used all the power in his magic items for that night.
    

Before Aaron launched his new round of attacks, Lucien’s legs were already too weak to support his weight. With a twist in his ankles, Lucien fell over in front of the strange-shaped stone.
    

Aaron almost felt amused by this scene, “Are you kidding me? Jumping toward me from the tree was all that you had prepared? Very touching… you want to die for your beloved princess?”
    

Lifting his dagger again, this time Aaron targeted Lucien’s back neck!
    

Suddenly, a thin, arc-shaped shield appeared above Lucien and stopped Aaron’s dagger.
    

Neither of his magic items was shining. It was Lucien’s own power.
    

“A sorcerer?!”
    

Lots of memories and thoughts flashed across Aaron’s mind, his eyes suddenly opened wide,
    

“You’re… Professor?!”
    

“Am I?” Lucien turned around and a mysterious smile appeared on Lucien’s face. At the same time, Lucien pulled out his right hand from the dirt, in which there was a dark red bracelet.
    

Before Aaron managed to turn himself into a shadow and back away from Lucien, a powerful fire ball suddenly burst out from the bracelet and pushed Aaron backward fiercely.
    

“Farewell, Mr. Aaron.” Lucien nodded, smiling.
    

Level three high rank magic item, Fire Weaver Bracelet, previously owned by Fire Wolf, which was enchanted with two magic spells: Flame Shield, a second circle spell, twice a day; and Fireball, third circle spell, twice a day.
    

The fireball covering Aaron’s upper body blazed. When Aaron’s body hit the ground a second later, only the lower part was left.
    

When Lucien stood up holding the bracelet, he heard Natasha’s familiar voice, “Professor…?!”
    

Turning around, Lucien saw Natasha standing on the other side with Thunder in her hand, looking rather shocked.