"You ain't going anywhere, you armless muppet." Zooming through the air, Asta maneuvers between the trees and crashes into the running mage and armed attacker, he flips and lands as he quickly puts the swords at the their necks.
"Who are you? What is your objective?... I give you five seconds, five, four , three, two, on-" as soon the he reached one asta felt a burst of hostility but before he could move, the move had already hit.
Asta flew like a ragdoll and plants his feet into the ground, he drags across the soul until finally reaching a stop few seconds later.
"You two lost to a kid? I should suggest demoting you to the master." A masked figure wearing a bandages all around his body says as he looks at the battered up figures of his allies. He turns to Asta and his figure vanished before his very eyes as his senses screams for him to move.
"He is strong, stage 6 or 7?" Asta barely blocks a ki infused punch from the figure and flew away before crashing through a bunch of trees. The figure follows and released a flurry of punches and kicks.
Asta raises his shortswords and slashes as he releases his stage 3 ki which barely allowed him to block the attacks, his sword managed to hit the figure once but bounced off as if hitting metal.
"Kid. Least to say I am impressed, I have seen hundreds of students along they way but non as tenacious as you. I will make sure to play with you well." Through he couldn't see through the mask, asta knew the figure was smiling like a psychopath, before he could think further the ground begins to tremble and everything in the vicinity launches itself at asta.
"Entertain me more. Telekinesis magic: shower of terror." The rubble breaks down and then compressed into giant boulders before launching itself at asta. Asta like a dragonfly, weaves through the boulders coming his way but the sheer amount overwhelmed him.
He redirects a few but without closing in he was just a target bound to fall sooner or later, his ki not enough to split the boulders like Yami's dark magic and not fast enough like the figure in front of him.
Constantly battered up by the boulders while the figure laughs at him from far away, asta's rage reaches its peak. One by one his body begins to shift, his posture bending as battle instinct kicks in.
The words and moments of his orc teacher's advice appears in his mind, the urgency gave way to success as he barely managed to control the flow of ki instead of just pumping it out.
"That's right, suffer more for my- huh? What is that?" The figure stares in confusion as the boulders begins getting split in half like a game of fruit ninja. Asta loses his logic and his instincts took over his thinking.
Like a eagle he dives towards the figure, the boulders splitting in his way as he arrives in front of the figure, his swords swinging while Goliath blocks a punch from the figure and asta slashes at the neck.
"HahahahahahHAHAHAHAHA, PITIFUL. SO. VERY. PITIFUL." The figure laughs as the swords barely leaves a small shallow cut which barely bleeds even after all of Asta's efforts. The figure pulls back his fist and slams it into Asta's chest.
Asta flew like a ragdoll, his wings fades away as the swords flop onto the ground and he crashes through a bunch of trees and then drags across the ground leaving behind a trench before coming to the stop on a giant tree's trunk.
" If you were a neutral person, i would have gratefully took you with me and made you an ally. A pity you had to be a student of this academy." The figure slowly walks towards him in a relaxed manner while his voice turns to one of pity and pure disappointment. He comes closer and crouches down in front of asta and puts a hand on his shoulder, "Show me anything else you got before I send you to afterlife." The figure says as he gestures for asta to attack with whatever he could while He licks the blood covered hand disgustingly without care.
"Nnnn... NOW CAPTAIN" Asta screams as he sends a wind bullet which the figure blocks easily but panics at the wave of hostility he felt on back of his neck, he turns around and punches but his punch only meet air. "what? But i fe- you little sh**" he quickly turns to only see Asta smile at him before he felt a sudden pain throughout his body.
The figure bleeds from his nose, eyes and ears while he falls down clutching his head, "Should have thought it through before licking that blood sh**head. Die" Asta uses blood magic to turns the blood in the figure's foodpipe he infused with mana into a blood bullet and shot it towards the figure's brain.
The figure falls down as his brains gets pierced through and then shreds to sludge. Asta breaths heavily as he calls back the blades and returns them to the grimoire before laying down on Goliath and begins flying away from the place after pocketing the figure's grimoire and mask.
"I should get myself healed, it hurts a lot.. oh hello the-" "DODGE." Asta comes across licht who seems to be in a battle when Licht screams at him to dodge. Confused and injured he couldn't understand until he felt something hit his chest and grabs him by the neck.
"Would you look at this? A student and a ranker no less. now will you hand me the artifact or should I cripple him for life." A winged person in a suit says as he holds onto Asta's neck like a doll.
****
"Urghhh.. where am I?.. this place see-" Asta looks around as he finds himself in a dark room with red sky and light all around him, the ground in pitch black while dusty winds flow across.
"This is your mindscape, your inner soul." A voice enters Asta's ears as he quickly turns around to see a familiar face in his mindscape, Jassen.
"Confused?.. i guess not, curiosity it is th-" "Why are you here? This place is supposed to be-" "liebe's" Jassen predicts Asta's emotions before being interrupted by him, asta asks and Jassen answers which puts Asta in a wierd spot.
"Can we talk about the necessary stuff first? I am pretty sure you are being used as a bargaining chip as we speak." Jassen says he directs Asta's thoughts to the danger instead. "What do you want?"
"It's not what I want but what we want. I will make it Quick so you can understand it easier, I am literally a, how do you say.. what you were in your previous life. A version of your former life in simple terms." Jassen explains which goes Mostly above Asta's head.
"So basically I have lived more lives before and you are a leftover shell of my previous self? Sounds wierd." Asta comments as the wheels in his head spin before jamming again
"More like seven lives, you are the eighth. Enough with this monologue, we can deal with it later.. I propose you accept me into you." " That sounds wierd. No thanks" Asta respectfully declines as he backs away in a standing posture like a bugged npc.
"You are overthinking, basically you start getting the memories of your previous life back over time while I merge with you, technically we are the same person so it will be easy." Jassen clearly states again to which Asta sighs In relief. Asta looks at him with suspense but.
"Can you help us get out of this situation? I don't want to die this early atleast." "Sure, but you will probably have to suffer some temporary side-effects." "Do it." Asta agrees to Jassen's proposal and as they shake hands the process begins as the mindscape begins changing on a widescale.
****
"So bring me the artifact quickly, i have limited patience." The demon says as he puts his sharp claw at Asta's neck and a smile appears on his face as wide to reach his ears almost.
"hehehehehahahaha, Oi pigface, get your damn claws *grabs the demon's hand* Off me." Asta laughs in a low voice before throwing the demon towards the ground with a insane amount of strength that he doesn't remember having.
"What?.. that voice, that tone and now that I focus, JASSEN" "What you mutt? Want another beating like the one at the eurodito? The one where you transformed into a- woah." The demon rushes for Asta as it's fist enlarged,Asta's mana and ki merged together perfectly that it seemed like he has done it for years, his strength and reflexes sky-rocketed as he dodged the punch with barely any movement.
Licht arrives from the side and leaves a strong cut across the demon's chest and asta swings Goliath like as it grew tenfold in size, the demon got him in the face and crashes down onto the ground.
Asta swoops in like a hawk while licht overtakes him and bombards the demon with hundreds of arrows, two pairs of wings one black and other metallic pop out of Asta's back as another grimoire appears in front of him alongside his own.
"Machine magic: metallic nightmare, anti magic: Blood piercer" a huge amount of metal forms around Goliath and It's runes begin to change Meanwhile a spinning blackish red arrow made of blood forms launches out of a magic circle and pierced the demon's chest.
"Eat this you insect" Asta screams as he slams the Goliath which grew even more at the place where the demon was but the demon dodged before he could hit, the arrow however burst into a bunch of blood needles and turn the demon's inside into a shredded ant hole.
"I will kill you today... EAT THIS YOU PIECE OF.... Seriously?" The demon roars and prepares a big attack only to see Asta retreating in the distance while giving licht a thumbs up. His rage sky rockets and just as he was about to chase Asta, licht comes from the side and forced the demon to dodge and retreat.
"I can't use magic because of this wierd heavy mana, Consider yourself lucky you piece of sh*t" the demons begins to fly away at high speed and licht stops giving chase and decided to help the other places instead.
Just as the demon flew away out of the academy's barrier, he sighs in relief and slows down before tending to his wounds as he curses Jassen from his heart. A split second later, he saw the world blackout in his eyes as he felt his body not responding to him.
"I still got that skill in me. Perfect as always." Asta is now sitting on top of the first year's campus with a giant 15 feet weapon that looks like a cannon in his arms, he has marked the demon with the arrow and used that anti-magic to aim the cannon. He slumps down on the ground and straight into slumber out of exhaustion as the Cannon fades back to it's former form- Mana.
"I finally found ya kid.. Oi wake up.. somebody get the healers here." Yami says as he arrives with the treant summoner in his arms tied up with chains. He nudges Asta with his feet before picking him up and running to get a healer.
*****
"That felt good, i thought I could just keep going." Asta says as he down on the rock in his mindscape. the black sand desert has now changed into a rocky quarry with a bridge crossing over a Cavern.
"Kicking a demon's a** always feels good, how did you like the power you had there?" Jassen says as he lays down on the rocky surface and eating rocks. (That's right eating rocks.)
Asta looks at him with a nervous smile and says "It was pretty good, why are you eating rocks anyway?", "they are not rocks, this place is imaginary so this tastes like cheese to me." Jassen gulps down a rocks as big as his head in a looney tunes style which almost shocked asta.
"Don't look at me like that, I need some Enjoyment after all this solitude. Should we get to main point anyway?" Jassen asks as he looks at asta who nods and leans back onto the rock.
"You see, I am you but also not. Like a clone with your memories only, even if you absorb the memories I won't die so.. I have a proposal to make." "Go on" Jassen says as he slowly walks onto the bridge, he looks back and gestures for Asta to come.
"You remember the dragon that give you that race change?.. She was supposed to be Jassen's wife.", "THE HELL-", "wait a sec.. It would be better to tell you now but I don't plan on getting full absorbed okay. I made a few contingency plans before coming here." Jassen calms asta down and looks down into the endless Darkness below.
"What she wanted was not Asta but Jassen so we together made a plan, The dragon's blood you have was part of deal and now you can't back away." He points at Asta in a lawyer pose who backs away in bafflement.
"I made a spare body for myself somewhere and after you absorb the memories you will get me to it.. I will take it while you get my grimoire and experience, a fair deal in my opinion." "Wouldn't I get the memories of you and that dragon as well? It would be like there are two Jassens." Asta asks out of curiosity while Jassen shakes his head at him.
" I will make sure you don't get some specific memories but still get most of it, What do you say? Asta." He raises his hand for a handshake of confirmation, Asta smiles and accepts as he saw no down side as he already had nero and other two to deal with.
"Also you will be sitting here for 3 days. You body was greatly overburdened even with the hybrid body." Jassen Adds to the conversation and recieved a stare of stupidity from Asta.
"You can't be serious? I just g-" "Let's go." Jassen interrupts asta's words and jumps off the bridge, he also grabs Asta's arm and brings him to the darkness.
"I will start by the early memories first so grab a popcorn if you will." Jassen says as Asta notices the surroundings change and his perspective changes to first person view like the dream he had when he saw Jassen first the swarm with the same old no control.