Chapter 31: 31

Seeing Michelle’s expression, Alexander snickered. “I wouldn’t die if I didn’t know, but…” he spoke with a sneer that annoyed Michelle into speechlessness. “I was just curious…” he hummed. “What would happen if my tongue slipped, and I let the world know that you can combine two contradictory cultivation methods?”

When his words fell, Michelle felt her anger raising with the desire to punch him. She took a deep breath before answering. “No one would believe you since…” a smirk creeped to her lips as she spoke. “My handwriting is different from that of the original Michelle. Of course, some would come to bother me. But once someone notices the difference in the handwriting, they will take it that you lied and will come after you.”

Michelle’s reasoning was perfect, making Alexander lift a brow. More and more, he realized that he needed her for the turmoil to come. “Your handwriting is indeed different compared to the original Michelle. Yours is sharp and clean, while hers was flowy and elegant. The two handwritings are completely different, and if the people realize that, they will stop troubling you, but!” Alexander smiled coldly.

“They will continue searching for the creator of the method, and after some time, they will find letters that you, not the original Michelle, wrote, and the handwriting there will be the same.” Alexander’s words were going right towards the core.

He continued. “If that happened, not only would they find out that you created the method, they would also realize that you are a different person from the ‘Archduke’s daughter Michelle Grace’. Both you and Philip Grace will be questioned by society and if he doesn’t want to lose his name, he will say you filled him and cast you out.” Alexander’s voice was calm as he kept smiling coldly. He was one of the most calculating people Michelle had ever met, and he clearly didn’t even show her his full capabilities.

Though… Michelle didn’t reveal her full capabilities either, so the both of them knew only a bit about each other. But Alexander knew more about her than she knew about him, and that was like salt in a wound.

“I can just use different handwriting from now on! That way, no attention will be brought to my handwriting and the change won’t be noticed. Or I can learn to have the same handwriting as the original Michelle had.” Michelle spoke after a while, her words causing Alexander’s sneer to widen.

He placed the two notebooks down and leaned against a bookshelf. “Do you think changing one’s handwriting is so easy?” he snickered. “Did they not teach you in your old world that a person’s handwriting can be similar to that of a different person, but there will always be some habitual differences?”

To that, Michelle chuckled. “But I inherited this body, so I also inherited the habits of this body’s muscles. The muscle memory. If I want to, I can easily use Michelle’s handwriting or make a completely new one.” Michelle’s words were spot on.

Because if she combined the muscle memory of her body and the habits she had in her mind from her past life, her hand would move somewhere in between the two handwritings if she let it move naturally. Then, her handwriting would be sharp and elegant, or flowy and clean at the same time.

Alexander frowned a bit, hearing Michelle’s words. She was right. “But you should still be careful…” he finally gave up. This time, Michelle beat him, and it was a strange feeling. “If you ever let it slip that you can combine contradictory methods, you will be hunted down by all powerhouses,” he spoke with a lazy smirk. It was strange that he was talking about dire stuff with a careless expression.

That much was obvious to Michelle. “Does that mean that the merger I created is useable?” she took the notebook and opened it. “Or is there something needed to be edited?” she sat down at the table and started turning pages.

Seeing that she put away her hostility towards him, Alexander knew that the only thing Michelle cared about at the moment was whether her cultivation method merger was safe to use. “It’s useable. But there might be ways to alter it so it would be more effective.” He smirked as he sat on the window frame.

“How?” Michelle’s purple eyes gleamed a bit. “What should I change?” She reached under the table and took out another blank notebook.

Alexander sneered. “Why should I help you, little girl? Improve it yourself!”

Nearly instantly, Michelle’s eyes turned deadly cold. The one thing she hated the most was being led by her nose. “Very well then!” She stood up and picked up the two notebooks with the cultivation methods mergers. She put the notebooks into her sleeve and as she was pulling out her hand, she pulled out her shifting weapon, at the moment in the shape of a fan. She knew that Alexander definitely recognized that it was a weapon with a spirit stone, but that didn’t stop her.

“How about… we have a fight without any spirit power. If I win, you will tell me how to improve the cultivation method. And if you win, I’ll give you useful knowledge from my old world.” Michelle spoke with a smile, already itching for a fight after not fighting for over three months after killing the assassins in the forest.

Seeing Michelle’s eyes determined to win, Alexander raised a brow. “And how do I know that you do have knowledge useful to me?” he asked with a sneer.

Having expected such a response, Michelle sneered. “Well…” she shrugged carelessly. “It’s up to you whether you’ll believe me or not, but let me put it simply. Just what I told you and David Elether when you asked me about my world is enough of a proof that my old world was completely different from this one. And a world so different would definitely have knowledge that isn’t here…”

That reasoning was valid, so Alexander sneered. “We shouldn’t fight in a library. Let’s go use the training grounds.” He turned to walk out.

Michelle took two empty notebooks additionally to the filled notebooks she had in her sleeve and went after Alexander to the training grounds. She placed her things down and picked a weapon from the armory. Alexander did the same.

“Little girl, don’t you want a change of clothes?” he asked with a sneer as he looked at Michelle. She was still wearing a simple dress.

Michelle glanced down at her dress before looking at him. “I could say that back to you. I highly doubt that you can move properly in those tight pants.”

“Since none of us is changing, we can begin. No spirit power allowed and only weapons from the armory can be used.” Alexander said lazily, his stance careless.

In each hand, Michelle held a dagger. She wanted to use a scythe, but that wasn’t in the armory, so she went for her second-best proficiency.

Kicking into the ground, she rushed at Alexander, her eyes turning murderous and cold. She completely set her assassin instincts free, something she rarely did even as an assassin and never did since waking up in the new body. To her surprise, maybe because she now had spirit energy, her assassin instincts were heightened, but that also let her know that Alexander’s instincts would be heightened much more than hers since he had much more spirit energy than she had.

Alexander’s weapon of choice was a sword. He was useless with other weapons as his usual weapon, except his spirit energy attacks, was a flute which he would use to manipulate corpses. The flute also had sharpened edges, like a sword, so he could slice someone if needed.

Michelle glanced at Alexander and the sword in his hands and sneered. She loved messing with people whose weapons had longer range than hers, but she wasn’t sure if she could do that with Alexander. Well… she was actually quite sure she couldn’t do it, as it was clear that Alexander was skilled in fighting, and he would be able to fight her even if she had a scythe, and he was weaponless. But that didn’t mean he would win.

Alexander didn’t attack Michelle as she rushed at him. He only blocked her attack and dodged the other one as she slashed and stabbed her daggers at him. Her way of attacking seemed reckless, but she was actually always aiming for weak or blind spots while having one hand prepared to block him if he attacked. That caused a smile on his lips.

After a while of only blocking and dodging, Alexander’s back hit a wall and he smiled. “It’s time I attack…” he muttered before blocking for the last time. Then, he slashed forward and struck heavily on Michelle’s daggers. She felt the force as she blocked, having to use bothe blades to hold him back, but that only fanned the flame in her eyes. She was getting more and more excited with every passing minute.

“So you finally decided to attack, huh?!” she suddenly retracted her daggers and dodged, with a jump getting above him and striking down with force that caused wind to form around her.

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