After some time of waiting, Ariel heard shouts coming from the right of him. Turning his head he saw Brendon walking towards him from, the entrance with a big smile on his face. All the people around him were staring at him with reverence and worship in their in their eyes as he walked by. Brendon’s previous fight left a deep impression on all of them making him stand out to them.

As he came closer Brendon held up his hand and gave a greeting. “Did you see, I was awesome wasn’t I? He didn’t even leave a scratch on me.” He seemed to be awfully proud of his victory since as he spoke he let out an excited smile.

Looking at him Ariel inwardly smiled while responding. “Yes, you defeated that lower level opponent than yourself so impressively that probably no one could have done it better than you.” His words made Brendon’s smile freeze ad made him speak “Why do I feel like your words were drowned in sarcasm?”

At his words Ariel only shrugged his shoulders. “I think you’re imagining it.” Brendon stood there for a while almost as if petrified and didn’t move a muscle. Only after several minutes did he sit down besides Ariel without speaking another word.

The competition continued as the time went by, some matches were interesting, but most of them held no excitement, mostly those that involved officers, who would instantly surrender. When about ten matches passed, Ariel finally heard Sarah’s name being called out.

She seemed to actually have quite a large fan club since as she entered many cheers rang out through the stadium. On the other hand, her opponent was less popular, but still garnered a lot of attention. She seemed to be a pretty cute girl with brown hair and green eyes. Her specialization was that of an earth mage, quite a bad match up against water which Sarah used.

Ariel started felling slightly worried because of this, but at that time Brendon spoke from the side, as if knowing what he was thinking. “If you are worrying about Sarah, then you shouldn’t. You haven’t actually seen or heard how she fights right?” At his words, Ariel spoke in agreement. “That’s correct. Won’t she be in trouble from fighting an earth mage?”

Brendon smiled as he explained. “It would be correct if you were talking about normal water mages, but Sarah is a bit different. You see, our linage has a special trait, most of the people born in the royal family will have the water affinity, but sometimes they also get a specific variation.”

His words shocked Ariel. Variations are extremely rare and everyone desired them, form the way he was speaking, Sarah had this so called variation. “Yes, you have probably already guessed that Sarah was born with a variation which is born in our bloodline, it turns her water magic acidic. This adds a very large damage boost that dwarfs normal water magic, but the trade off is the lack of healing and support spells she can use.” From what Ariel heard it was mostly orientated about attack and can be extremely destructive, but Brendon spoke as if it wasn’t that special.

Curious he decided to ask about it. “Even if it is only good for attacking isn’t it still precious, why does it seem like you don’t think it is that impressive.” Brendon smiled at him and spoke. “You don’t know much about this do you, well, variations that are passed by bloodline aren’t very impressive, they are usually weaker than the original and could only, maybe be compared to dual elements. They also are already well known by others, unless it is a family or a clan that is really good at hiding secrets, so Sarah’s magic doesn’t make anyone alarmed.”

Ariel truly felt that he found out a lot of new thing today, about magic that might help him in the future. However as they spoke Sarah completely dominated the arena, she was like a bulldozer melting every wall and attack that her opponent threw at her, making the brown haired girls quickly give up.

From what Ariel seen it was fortunate that she was not all powerful and could only overpower her opponent like this because her general power level was higher.

The crowd let out countless cheers as she left the arena after winning while Arial and Brendon just waited for her to come up.

They didn’t have to wait for long until they heard another wave of noise from the side, similar to the one Brendon garnered. Turning to look, of course they saw Sarah happily jogging towards them.

She quickly came up to them while speaking her boasting words to Ariel. “Wasn’t I string? That girl lost so fast that I couldn’t even display my true power to you.” Sarah was clearly boasting and trying to get some attention from Ariel, but he couldn’t really find anything wrong in her words so he spoke a slight praise.” Yes were really impressed, I also didn’t know you had a bloodline variation.” Ariel is already close to being able to see affinities, but there is still a small wall preventing him so currently he can only see other people Mana.

Hearing his praise Sarah only put up an even more proud expression on her beautiful face. As she spoke “That’s right. My water magic has acidic properties which let me melt almost anything instantly unless it has much more Mana stored inside than I used. If Vern does something to you, just say it and I will melt off his face”

Ariel nodded, but seeing her slightly pale complexion, spoke in a calm voice. “Your magic is really powerful, but you should sit down now, from what I see it also takes a lot out of you so you should rest a bit.” Sarah understood that Ariel saw through her fatigue and obediently sat down to the right of Ariel since the left was already taken up by Brendon.

Jus as she made herself comfortable they heard the announcer’s voice. “The next person to fight will be Erna Alasia!” Hearing their friends name they turned to look at the stage where a beautiful and heroic girl walked out under the cheers of the audience.

Unlike her usual smiling expression, her face was resolute and serious, seemingly ready for any situation as she held a rapier in her right hand. While Brendon fought being laid back, Sarah being a “proper” lady, Erna looked like a valiant swordswoman and sharp as a sword, giving Ariel a completely different impression than before.

Her opponent was a youth who wasn’t handsome, but he also wasn’t ugly. He had black hair with soft brown eyes. His build was slightly muscular, although not tall. From what he heard from the announcer, he was the same as Erna, a battle mage a person going down the path of both sword and magic.

Erna practices the rapier together with her wind and light magic while this youth seemingly used a great sword combined with earth magic similarly to Sarah’s opponent.

As the fight began, it looked like Erna wasn’t one to drag out her fights. She cast the wind rider spell which was usually used by mages to escape since it gave a large boost to agility, but battle mages could use it to attack.

She charged over, while stabbing towards her opponent, trying to give a heavy blow to him, but the youth used his great sword to deflect it without being pushed back at all. Erna seemingly didn’t expect to succeed as she maneuvered to the side of him and let out a slash without any delay.

The youth had guessed her intentions and has already cast an earth wall spell to defend. But what he didn’t foresee was Erna casting a light affinity spell radiant blade overlapped with her sword. The rapier easily cut through the earth wall and left an injury spanning from the youth’s right shoulder to his chest.

It was a grave injury, but the youth seemed to be experienced as he quickly changed his great sword to his left hand and slashed at Erna’s body. Unfortunately for him Erna dodged by ducking under his sword and charged at him with abnormal speed.

She let out two stabs that both pierced each of his legs. Then she went behind him and then slashed across his back. The opponent was stunned, but after some time he fell down, passed out from his wounds. This whole match lasted only a couple second making the viewers sdazed, but soon they broke out in cheers as the medic came up to check on the youth’s condition.

Erna didn’t pay any attention to the audience and quickly left the arena after it was confirmed that she won. Ariel and the others felt extremely satisfied with this outcome and discussed the fight while waiting for her.

There is no need to mentions that when she finally came the people were even more exited than when Brendon and Sarah arrived. A she came closer Ariel couldn’t stop himself from praising her. “Your battle was wonderful. I haven’t though your fighting capabilities would be so impressive.” To his words of praise Erna just let out a charming smile like always, completely different to her fierce expression during combat. To the side however, his words made a certain blue haired beauty frown a little.

In response to his praise, Erna started speaking humbly. “It is nothing amazing, I had a powerful teacher. So this should be expected. I am more worried about you. You are fighting next if something happens please just give up.” Her last words were filled with worry and the two people besides him also had the same concern in their eyes after hearing her speak.

Ariel shook his head from side to side as he got up and spoke. “How many times do I have to tell you to stop worrying? I never jump head first into everything without a plan.” His words seemingly made his friends ease up a bit and Brendon asked him. “So what’s your plan?”

As Ariel was about to leave he turned back his head and spoke. “I am planning on crushing him.” When he finished his sentence he continued walking towards the exit while ignoring his dumbfounded friends behind him.

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If you want to read further, visit https://verathragna.wordpress.com/ I will always have an extra chapter there