Yoko immediately took the health potion out and drank it. She could feel her fatigue fading and vitality increasing every second.

She sat down on the floor and tried to stabilize her breathing. Health potions were very miraculous and could restore the user's wounds. They also have a soothing effect for stamina and fatigue though they can't be recovered. Yoko's magic power could not be regained with a health potion but she paid it no mind and just kept sitting down.

Akane had been brought to the infirmary when Yoko had sat down cross-legged. Yoko could feel her left arm slowly being reattached to its socket. She grit her teeth because the adrenaline from the battle had finally faded and closed her eyes.

Kai walked up the stage and sat next to Yoko then sighed.

"You won't be able to beat me in this condition..."

Kai calmly told Yoko as if to persuade her into forfeiting.

"I won't lose."

Yoko also replied with calm.

Kai sighed once more.

"Alright, I'll let you recover."

Kai stood up and sat a bit farther away to let her focus on recovering.

"Because of your injuries, I'll let you recover for half an hour. The health potion's effects should be finished by then."

Yoko nodded in thanks, Kai just wordlessly began to cultivate his magic with a certain trick that Reo had taught him. It would gather surrounding magic in the area and transfer it into the body turning it into internal power. Normally, magicians would only get a bit of power from the surroundings and use them as external power. It won't be able to improve their own internal power but it would certainly improve techniques like [Shadow Ball].

Harnessing external power is harder than harnessing internal power but turning external power into internal power was nearly an impossible feat. Every pore on Kai's body absorbed the surrounding magic and made it his own.

"Kai, remember what I told you when I said in a decade you'll probably reach C-class?"

"Yeah..."

Kai felt down when he thought about that.

"That's only if you stay in this clan and not consume anything to improve yourself. If you go out of your clan and try to improve yourself somewhere else, you'll definitely get stronger than that."

"I highly doubt that my parents would let me out of the clan until I reach fifteen, unless I somehow prove to them that I can take care of weed-class monsters."

Reo nodded in response.

"I've seen how overprotective your parents have been in the past few days and I also think that they wouldn't let you encounter any danger that could potentially threaten your life like those weed-class monsters."

(A/N: In case anybody forgot about the classes of monsters, level one = weed, level two = mob, level three = fighter, level four = disaster, and level five = apocalypse.)

"I assume that after this tournament, you'll all be given a test. You will all need to channel your magic power unto a blank scroll. The blank scroll would give your name, age, and magic power. The name and age are secondary and the true purpose is to see the amount of magic power. One hundred points for F-class, Five hundred points for E-class, Two thousand points for D-class, and Five thousand points for C-class. With these numbers, you can see the disparity between the classes."

"What about the other classes?"

"You don't need to know right now."

Reo instructed Kai to close his eyes.

"You see, a person cannot improve the rate that they absorb magic from the surroundings. A normal person would gain only a few bits of magic everyday. A person's life can span up to a century so why don't some people ever reach F-class? Why don't some people get past E-class even if they spend their whole lives?"

Reo's words left Kai in deep thought.

"Why?"

A simple question.

"Because talent rules everything. The pace of absorbing magic differs from person to person but regular people stop before they reach F-class. Hardworking people stop at E-class. Gifted people never stop rising. This is the true unfairness of this world, achievements are decided when you are born. No matter how hard you work, if you don't have the necessary talent to become strong; you'll never become strong. Those two girls on the stage, I assume that their limit is B-class. That's already pretty good seeing as the strongest in the continent is only S-class."

Reo appeared in Kai's head.

"But your limit...you may very well reach SS-class if you work hard."

Kai grit his teeth, he didn't want to be stuck being considered an SS-class, he wants to reach the pinnacle, how would he settle for that?

"Is it possible for me to go past SS-class?"

Reo paused for a few seconds then continued.

"You see, this continent's aura is quite low. Reaching SS-class in your lifetime could already be considered heavenly talent, but in other continents there are countless amounts of SS-class magicians. This world is very vast, there are three continents that are filled with humans, one continent for beastmen, one continent for angels, and one continent for demons. These are all the continents that I know of."

Kai pondered for a moment.

"So I have to go to different continents if I ever want to go above SS-class?"

"Yes. Even if your talent is otherworldly, without sufficient resources and environment, it'll amount to nothing in the end."

Kai sighed.

"I can't even go outside of the clan let alone, go outside the continent..."

That's because you're seven.

Reo held his words back because Kai didn't really feel like a seven year old at all.

"You don't need to think about that for now, focus on cultivating your magic."

"Nn."

Kai stopped asking questions and focused.

Thirty minutes passed by as Yoko had already mostly recovered save for her magic.

"Recovery time is now over, we will start the battle. Competitors please take your positions."

Yoko stood on one side of the stage as Kai had done the same.

"The finals for the mock tournament will now begin!"

Everyone who had been waiting in the audience had gone into an uproar. It was finally the start of the final battle.

The elder raised his hand.

"Let the battle commence!"

"Yoko."

Before anyone could make a move, Kai had called out her name.

"What is it?"

Yoko asked after being startled by Kai's sudden voice.

"I can tell that your magic hasn't recovered much, I'll give you a handicap for this battle."

Yoko sneered.

"I don't need a handicap! I will defeat you!"

There was a fire in her eyes that couldn't be extinguished, Kai was surprised.

There must be some reason why she's so unyielding.

"I'm not looking down on you; as things stand, this isn't a fair fight. I just wanna give us an even battlefield, are you sure about this?"

Yoko's gaze never wavered.

"Yes."

Kai sighed once more at her tone of voice, she wasn't planning to yield at all.

"Alright, then...take my attacks."

Kai snapped his fingers and multiple magic circles appeared in the air.

"Magic circles?!"

"That's impossible! Magic circles need to be written on a surface with every piece constructed by magic!"

"The common sense of humans is really stupid. But... Kai's common sense is abnormal."

He thought it was insufficient needing to move parts of the body to use magic so he created magic circles. These magic circles that would normally be very difficult to make and only used for high-class spells was created by Kai with only a bit of effort. The magic circles act as supports and can be used to launch magic without requiring contact with Kai's body. This method uses a bit more magic than normal but for Kai's current magic capacitiy, it was sufficient.

Yoko was struck speechless.

"Magic circles...!"

Yoko grit her teeth and stuck her palms together.

"I have to use defense to slow them down and dodge them, I can't evade that many spells!"

Despite the pressure, she wasn't too alarmed. She managed to calm her emotions in front of the absolute force that was in front of her and devise a plan.

"[Shadow Ball]."

Five [Shadow Balls] shot out from the magic circles around Kai and shot towards Yoko.

"[Barrier]!"

A transparent wall of light spread out in front of Yoko and she began to sprint away at full speed.

A large boom rang out as the barrier was destroyed after two attacks and the rest sped towards Yoko.

"[Nimble Footwork]!"

Yoko swiftly dodged Kai's attacks, much like Akane's [Fast Movement].

"What the...? She replicated Akane's technique?"

Kai furrowed his brows.

"No, this is my experimental technique, I had tried to create it under the instruction of one of the people from my household, it boosts my speed by half, slower than [Fast Movement]'s twofold speed but nevertheless, the gap between our speeds aren't large."

Yoko proudly declared.

Kai clicked his tongue after her words.

"This is gonna be a pain..."