"Good luck out there man!" Exclaimed Rai, as I began heading for the arena.

"Oh, uh...thanks."

​​

"If you don't win, you'll be the only one out of the three of us who got eliminated in the first round. That'd be pretty embarrassing!" Winked Persia teasingly.

"Wow, thanks for the thoughtful encouragement," I replied sarcastically, before heading for the arena.

My opponent was already there.

It was a pretty strange experience, to be surrounded by a large crowd and having all their eyes on me. As an assassin, all my jobs involved taking out targets without being spotted, so now with the complete opposite; fighting in front of a large crowd, I was feeling slightly overwhelmed.

"There sure are a lot of first years in this tournament. I'm afraid it's not your lucky day, kid. I rank in the top forty at the Academy, my name is-!"

"Don't bother, I won't remember it. Let's get this over with, I doubt you'll be a challenge for me," I interrupted, giving him a look of disinterest.

I had no intention of underestimating this guy, but a riled up opponent tends to leave a lot more openings, make irrational decisions and was just easier to deal with than a calm and collected one.

"Tsk, cocky little shit! I'll show you!"

The barrier activated around us. I placed my left hand on my dagger and got ready to trigger Lightning Boost.

"Ready...FIGHT!"

My opponent charged up lightning in his hands and began firing a barrage of lightning bolts immediately. His firepower was pretty impressive, each bolt that he fired had enough intensity to really scorch your skin off upon impact.

However, I could still dodge his attacks pretty easily in my normal state. They may be powerful, but they were slower than normal lightning blasts.

Three bolts were homing in on me, I sidestepped out of the way of the first one, jumped to avoid the second one, and twisted my body in midair to dodge the third one.

"Not bad, kid. But try and dodge...this!"

He suddenly fired a massive barrage of lightning bolts towards me, like a giant flock of birds swooping down on their prey. Crap, if I knew he had this kind of firepower, I wouldn't have riled him up and instead would have used Lightning Boost and gone for the kill right from the very beginning.

Okay, so maybe I ended up kinda underestimating him after all.

Dodging all this would be...tough.

I activated Lightning Boost, streaming a bit extra into my eyes to give myself more reaction time.

I needed to be fully focused right now, so...I'll let my bloodlust take over.

Since coming to this world, this was only the second time I had fully immersed myself in this state, after that time down in the Goblin maze. Block out everything else, forget about the barrier and the audience, just focus on the fight.

Focus on...killing my opponent.

With my reaction time enhanced, I perceived my surroundings in a slow-motion like state, as I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. The lightning bolts slowly crept closer and closer, as I felt my mind clear and a dark sense of calm filled my body.

There were hardly any gaps to slip through in the oncoming barrage, but...it wouldn't be a problem.

I slipped past the first few bolts, maneuvering across the arena floor as dozens of powerful electric streaks zoned in on me.

There were so many that it was impossible to avoid getting grazed here and there, but preventing any major impacts was child's play.

As the distance between us shrunk, his accuracy became erratic as the intensity of his attacks increased, as did his desperation the closer I got.

As I neared point blank range, my right shoulder got fried, as did three of my left fingers. I couldn't wield my blades. No matter.

As I calmly dodged another blast and slid forward, I had moved right in front of him. He charged up a blast that would go through my stomach, I ignored it, and in a single motion with my two remaining left fingers, I drew out a needle from my right arm guard and aimed to stab it through his neck.

Right as my needle began to prick his skin, he fired the lightning blast he had been charging up, drilling a hole through my abdomen. The impact slightly shifted the course of my left hand, the trajectory now aimed to stab through his shoulder.

Before the needle could pierce through his skin, he disappeared, teleported to the outside of the barrier. No one responded for a while, the audience seemed baffled.

"Did the barrier teleport out the wrong person?"

"He looks completely unscathed, what just happened?"

"How is the guy in black still alive? He has a hole through his body!"

Loud, confused whispers and speculations began flowing all around me from the audience. As the barrier was deactivated, the Headmaster walked up to me with my opponent next to him. He began to say something, but stopped when he saw me regenerate my injuries. My opponent stared at my closing wounds in shock.

"I have to say...this is one incredibly detailed and complex barrier. Not only was my healing factor taken into account, but so was...my poisoned needle," I remarked.

"P-poisoned?" Stuttered my opponent.

"Hmm? The rules said we could use any weapons we wanted, so I coated some needles in a lethal poison. I gotta thank you, I had been pretty worried about whether or not this barrier would account for my regenerative abilities and wrongly teleport me out, but this fight alleviated those concerns," I replied with a triumphant smirk.

"The winner is...first year student, Kuro Black!"

Oh God, don't say my full name out loud in that booming voice, it's so embarrassing! Well, at least he didn't interrogate me about my Healing Factor, having to explain it every time was starting to be a pain.

Anyway, with that, I began heading back to the waiting area. You're probably wondering what happened to my bloodlust fueled state. To make things easier, I'll refer to it as Bloodlust Mode from now on. Never out loud though.

Well, as soon as my opponent teleported out and my needle just stabbed thin air, it felt like I'd been, well...blueballed. All my bloodlust and intense focus dissipated instantly, and I felt really, really unsatisfied.

It's like, imagine that you're absolutely starving, and you buy an amazing looking burger or something, but before you can bite into in, someone bumps into you and you drop it on the floor. Now multiply that feeling by ten.

That's how I felt right now.

"Hey man, congrats on the win! You took a lot of damage though, are you alright?" Inquired Rai, as I re-entered the waiting area.

The twelfth match was about to begin, with Gela fighting in it. So far, four out of four first years had won, would she be able to make it five out of five?

"Yeah, no worries. All that healing burnt up about half my stamina, but I was able to get clarification on my concerns regarding the barrier, so it was worth it."

"You're way too reckless with your body, I'm getting way too used to seeing normally fatal injuries just close up in a matter of seconds, thanks to you. Well, at least you won. Even though you had to put in a lot more effort than we had to," Smirked Persia playfully.

"Not to make excuses, but I had a tougher opponent that either of you did."

We then turned our attention to the arena as the next match began. Gela was fighting a guy with Fire Magic. As he sent waves of flames her way, she jumped and headed straight up, until she was almost touching the barrier ceiling. She was out of his range.

"Looks like her mastery of Flight has improved a lot since she fought you," Observed Persia, as Gela appeared to be floating in midair effortlessly.

Back during our fight, she had been able to sort of 'walk' in mid-air, but right now it definitely looked like she was properly flying.

"Has she fully mastered it? She's flying, but not very quickly. I know you said that Flight can't match Propulsion in terms of speed, but still..."

"No, someone who's fully mastered Flight can move around in mid-air at speeds similar to most birds. It depends on how well they control the air all around them. Propulsion is a lot different, it works by how well you can blast out wind from a particular point, in my case it's usually my feet, and the better you can do that, the faster you'll be able to move. After that, you work on controlling it. And then, as you already know, being able to maintain that speed requires you to be able to continuously blast out from that one point at the same, even intensity. I can reach the same heights as someone with Flight can, but the difference is that, in exchange for superior speed, I can't hover or float in mid-air. In other words, Propulsion has better speed, while Flight has better maneuverability," Explained Persia, as the match reached a standstill with Gela's opponent's flames unable to reach her current height.

"Her opponent can't attack, but neither can she. She didn't use any long range attacks when I fought her-."

I cut myself off as she gathered wind around her talon hand and swiped down, sending blades of swirling wind towards her opponent, contradicting what I was just about to say.

He managed to dodge it, but she then began swinging her left hand down over and over, sending down wave after wave of scything blades of wind. Her opponent's armor was in pieces, and he had cuts all over.

Meanwhile, her smile was only growing wider with every injury she inflicted upon him.

"She's deliberately sending attacks that'll only scratch him up, to prevent the barrier from teleporting him out before she's satisfied...that is one hardcore sadist. So hey, I heard that Flight was supposed to be as difficult as Lightning Boost to master, but you said that Propulsion is harder than Flight, didn't you, Persia?"

"Well, that's what I said...but it's pretty subjective, depends on the individual."

"In terms of difficulty alone, plenty of the other Elemental Magic techniques as as tough to master as Lightning Boost, but none of them carry the same level of risk, after all, if you mess up Lightning Boost, you could easily die. Well, in your case, your healing kinda minimizes that risk, I guess," Chimed in Rai, as the one-sided fight continued.

Her opponent showed no signs of giving up, but he had no way to counter her. This continued for a while, before he eventually collapsed from blood loss. She showed no sign of relenting her assault even after he passed out, so the Headmaster quickly announced her as the winner and took down the barrier to end the match before she could kill the poor guy.

A couple of instructors came and carried her unconscious opponent away, as she returned to the waiting area with a satisfied stretch.

She walked over to me.

"I'll see you in the next round. I'm looking forward to introducing you to a world of pain, you better not disappoint me," She said, in a creepily seductive voice, before walking away, earning a look of disdain from Persia.

"Well, she's disturbing as always."

"Hey, by the way Kuro, what are gonna do about your gear, it's all torn up," Reminded Rai, staring at my ripped up armor.

I had multiple sets of my battle gear, so I had it covered.

"Not to worry. I figured this would be inevitable in a tournament like this, so I brought a couple of spares. What, you didn't really think I was wearing the same gear every single day, did you?"

Next up was match number thirteen, featuring the fourth member of The Big Five, Fuo Wesroh, considered to be the fourth strongest in the Academy. She had long blonde hair that she grew in front of her right shoulder, light blue eyes, and a bad tempered look on her face. She was clad in elegant looking white armor, both her torso and arms were well protected, she wore a white skirt that stopped above her knees with a slit on the right side to make moving easier, her legs were covered by lightly armored black tights. Her weapon was a sturdy-looking bow, but...she didn't seem to be carrying any arrows.

From what I'd heard, she had Water Magic, and her Anima was a swan, though she had no visible physical mutations.

As the match began, he opponent charged towards her with his sword raised. If her strength was archery, then forcing her into close range combat would presumably be the best move.

But given her rank, it couldn't be that easy.

Water formed by her feet, and she glided away from her incoming opponent with effortless elegance and grace. Wait, that wasn't water...that was ice.

"Guess I should have figured that creating ice would be possible with Water Magic. First time seeing it though," I commented, as she raised her bow and pointed it towards her opponent.

It sort of looked like she was ice-skating.

"Adventurers call it Ice Magic, it's another highly difficult technique to master. The Water Mapping technique that Azyl used to find you guys in the maze is apparently child's play in comparison," Replied Rai, as Fuo formed water in the shape of an arrow in her hand, before hardening it into ice and firing it from her bow.

She then repeated it, drawing back the bowstring while forming the arrow and then letting it loose, all in a single motion...and then she drew it back again, forming another ice arrow as she did.

And then she did it again. And again. And again.

She was firing arrow after arrow in a ceaseless barrage of rapid-fire shots. She formed each of those arrows in the same motion she took to draw back her bowstring, and fired them instantly. And then, with the arrow barely having gone past her bow, she was already forming the next arrow.

Her opponent was rather skilled with the sword and managed to deflect the first few arrows, but it wasn't long before her barrage overwhelmed him and the barrier teleported him out of the arena as an arrow shot towards his head.

"The winner is...third year student, Fuo Wesroh!"

Man, so far each of The Big Five that we'd seen were absolute powerhouses. There was only one of them left that we hadn't seen yet, he would be fighting in the sixteenth and final match of the first round. The fourteenth and fifteenth matches didn't have any particularly remarkable fighters, and the crowd were certainly quite unenthusiastic during those fights.

Those had probably been the least one-sided battles by far, but it looked like the crowd wanted to see displays of sheer power over actual competitive contests.

So far, none of the matches had two fighters that were crazy powerful, that was why so many of the fights in this first round had been completely one-sided.

And this last match would probably be the same.

However, the crowd certainly seemed excited at the prospect of seeing another of The Big Five fight, they had once again picked up the volume of their cheering after a rather quiet two matches.

The final member of The Big Five, Siert Huet, ranked the 3rd strongest in the Academy.

Wait, which one was he? Both the participants in the middle looked extremely nervous.

"Wait, I can't tell which one is the rank no. 3, neither of them look confident in the least," I said.

"Siert is the white haired one. Don't let his visible lack of confidence fool you...he's very, very powerful," Stated Misen, walking up next to us.

"...do you need something?"

"I'll stand wherever I want to, first year."

This bastard...

Whatever, just ignore him.

I turned my attention back to the arena. So that was Siert Huet. His gear was pretty bland, he wore chainmail under a light blue leather armored top, and his lower half was clad in light grieves.

He was said to have a polar bear Anima, he had medium length, wavy white hair, his pupils were light gray, and he had white fur on the back of his hands and forearms. He used Water Magic, and didn't have any weapons.

"Hm, wonder if he creates weapons out of ice too," I mused.

"Nope! He can't use Ice Magic," Corrected Misen.

"...stand wherever you want but don't talk to me."

"Oh, my. How rude."

The barrier activated, and both fighters took their places.

"Ready...FIGHT!"

The other fighter shot small but rapid water bullets at Siert as soon as the match began. Siert didn't move, as a stream of water formed from his back in the shape of a tail or a thick whip, and blocked his opponent's attack. His opponent then fired more water bullets, to which he responded by extending out two more water tails from his back and using them to block and slap away the incoming bullets.

It looked like he had three tails growing out of his back, and he could control them with incredible precision, as if they were his own limbs.

"Siert can't use Ice Magic, and he can't control any water that he isn't directly touching, in other words he can't shoot projectiles with his water magic. So he focused on improving his precision and density control, as well as the length of how much he can extend those 'tails' of his. I believe his range is about ten meters. And those may be made of water, but get hit by them and you'll be in for a world of hurt. I keep challenging him to duels, but he never agrees to them. He's probably the guy I want to fight the most in this Academy, but his lack of self confidence gets in the way," Sighed Misen, as the fight reached a standstill.

Siert was easily blocking everything that came his way, but his opponent was more than ten meters away, out of his range. With his attacks rendered futile, the other fighter charged forward and continued shooting his water bullets.

Guess he'd decided to take his chances by getting into Siert's range and dodging his attacks. More water sprouted from his back, as the number of 'tails' suddenly went up to ten, and the tips of each of them began spinning like a drill.

The water 'tails' lashed out towards his opponent from every direction, leaving him no room to dodge. One of the whips then shot forward rapidly, drilling towards his head, as he was teleported off the arena before it could shred through his brain.

"The winner is...third year student, Siert Huet!"

And with that, the first round was over, and the competitors were down to sixteen. As Siert returned to the waiting area, Misen approached him.

"Hey, impressive as always, Sii! You sure are strong!"

"N-no, it was j-just a fluke. That guy's w-water shots were pretty quick, if any had s-slipped past my defense, I could h-have lost," He replied nervously.

...is this guy serious?

What was up with him, his expression was one you'd expect from someone who'd just gone through a crushing defeat instead of an overwhelming victory. Those water tails or whips, or whatever you want to call them, were no joke, they were seriously fast, he moved each of them around in a snake-like unorthodox manner, and they were clearly dense and powerful too.

Each time he swung one of them across to block his opponent's bullets, it disturbed the dust on the ground even though it was nowhere near the ground.

"Those top five are really impressive. Sure glad I'm not facing any of them in the next round. Sucks to be you, Rai," Commented Persia, as the first round came to an end.

"Yeah...I'm screwed," He sighed in resignation.

Instructor Tabbs and a couple of the assistant instructors then walked into the room.

"Attention, students. First of all, let me congratulate the sixteen of you in making it past the first round. Now then, we'll be taking an hour long break, head upstairs to have your lunch. The Academy will be providing free meals after each round, though only for those who make it to the next round. We've set up a buffet in the lounge upstairs, eat to your heart's content in preparation for the second round, which will begin an hour from now. Dismissed!"

Sweet, a free meal.

The first round had ended with the majority of matches being one-sided, but with the number of players cut in half, the second round was bound to have more competitive battles. This tournament was just getting started.

For now though...I'm hungry, and I won't refuse a free meal.

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Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Don't forget to vote, and feel free to leave a comment, I appreciate any and all feedback and criticism! Also, check out my Instagram account @aimdaqs for posts relating to this book.