Despite her lead Elizabeth still watched the other participants intently and thus didn’t miss the final participant of the round.

"Great spark of old

Ignite and behold,

Graceful and bold.

Great flame of old.

Combustion"

Crowley chanted devotedly. His eyes closed as he focused all of his attention on the evocation. Flames gathered along his arms before they were discharged towards the dummy, completely enveloping its frame. The audience’s reaction to the 3rd circle spell might be considered dull this time around, but that was hardly surprising considering what they witnessed not long ago. In fact, it would perhaps be abnormal if they showed an extraordinary reaction.

The flames burned bright, churning the replacement dummy until Crowley went white in the face; then the spell began to inevitably decay until only few wisps remained before even those were extinguished. Either way that result was nothing to scoff at, as the display clearly showed he barely surpassed his rival once again.

“Great result of 7.2, the participant will naturally receive his 7 points. Since we had slight delay let’s begin the next round without any further ado. This time the discipline is pierce, where the participants shall use a single spell to pierce as many layers of increasingly hard material; additionally the frame of the device cannot be damaged by the spell,” while Amadeus was making his explanation a lackey already prepared the next examination device. It was a sizeable rectangle with clear layers, quite similar to the the one used during the precision round. This one however did not have a conical cutout and the materials were likely far more durable.

“Then, number one!” Amadeus summoned and Darius stepped forward with a bow, although Elizabeth noticed he seemed slightly dispirited. That was not too surprising though, if he did not outperform Crowley in this round he would be inevitably kicked out before the main event tomorrow. That would mean a great humiliation for both him and his teacher; a stain that might never be washed away. He was after all as old as he could be for this age category. He had to achieve the number 7 if he were to as much as have a chance.

“Kindling which beckons

gods to their slumber,

a binding that reckons,

to those still somber.

Blazing needle”

Darius chanted the third tier spell, with difficulty and a paling in the face a needle manifested above his open palm. The projectile did not hesitate for long and shot towards the prepared device. It passed the first 4 without even slowing down, however, while penetrating the 5th layer the speed more than halved while it reduced to a crawl in the 6th. It was perhaps because of the immense stress, the fear of humiliation, or the shock of his broken pride, but Darius did not reach the 7th layer as he had likely hoped, instead his spell stopped halfway through the 6th.

Ba-dum, Elizabeth could suddenly hear his heartbeat become irregular. Ba-dum, she saw his hands shake. Ba-dum, his knees trembled as though they were carrying immense burden. Ba-dum, and indeed they bent under the vast weight of crushed pride. Ba-dum, Darius fell down to his knees, unable to break free from his daze. Ba-dum.

“It would seem,” Amadeus closed his eyes for a split second to suppress a sigh “that the participant only managed to obtain 6 points in this round. Number 2 if you would.”

“Embers from beyond,

forgotten fire,

I forge this bond,

upon our pyre.

flame needle”

The next participant only used a second tier spell and barely obtained 4 points, but the crowd was completely ignoring his performance either way. Instead they were already ravenously awaiting what sort of monstrous spell that girl would bring.

“Kindling which beckons

gods to their slumber,

a fetter that reckons,

to those still somber.

Blazing needle”

Despite her smirk Elizabeth just chanted an almost identical incantation as Darius. The crowd seemed almost disappointed before they saw the results. It did not slow down in the 5th layer, and the projectile barely lost any speed in the 6th, the 7th was blasted through and it was only finally stopped near the end of the 8th layer. That was enough to begin a round of cheers.

“Impressive score of 8.890, naturally the participant will be rewarded 8 points,” Amadeus said calmly, but even he was astounded. It was one thing to overpower his direct disciple through superior magic, but it was another matter to do so with the same spell and almost identical evocation. The 4th participant did not perform much better than the 2nd and also achieved 4 points, that passed the ball over to Crowley. The boy was still pale as he did not have as much time to recover from the previous round, and it was not yet certain whether he would be able to equal Darius’ performance and claim second place. If he scored less than Darius it would end up being meddlesome for him, as Crowley would be going into the extra round exhausted.

“Kindling which beckons

gods to their slumber,

a binding that reckons,

to those still somber.

Blazing needle”

Since they were both disciples of the mages guild it was only natural that they would both use the same incantation for the same spell. And their effects were just as similar. The way Crowley’s magic pierced the first 4 layers seemed like a replay of Darius’ performance. So did the fact that the needle slowed down in the fifth layer and began to crawl in the sixth, reaching around half-way. But what happened once the needle passed through the 5th layer was no longer important. Crowley had definitely won when that happened. He would be the one to advance, leaving his almost livelong rival in the dust.

“Sorry, it would appear that I will be the one advancing,” Crowley made a pale smirk directed towards the still paralysed Darius, before he dropped down to the ground. Unconscious from exhaustion. He completely overdrafted himself in order to surpass Darius.

“Perhaps it is now time to announce the winners,” Amadeus ignored the collapsed boy and instead gathered the audience’s attention onto himself “however, there is one thing that has to be confirmed before that can be done. It is shameful, but in order to save some time only visual confirmation is often the method of confirming a participant’s age among the officials of our mage’s guild. That was also the case with this girl. Although it is shameless of me, I wish to remedy that mistake in order to eliminate any doubts some of you might have,” Amadeus spoke sweet words as a middle aged man walked out of the backstage, holding a pure white pearl in his hand “this item is a systematic device, which will determine the age of any being with a soul within Logos. The process is simple, the examined needs to summon their own status screen and the device will automatically display a number with their accurate age. Now if please participant Elizabeth would step closer,” Amadeus smiled, but Elizabeth perceived malicious intentions behind those eyes. She hesitated, but under the combined gazes of the entire audience she succumbed and placed her hand on the pearl. When she visualised her status screen something beyond her comprehension happened.

“I see,” Amadeus pretended to sigh, a smirk almost creeping into his face “I was afraid that might be the case.”

But Elizabeth did not register those words, instead the poor child just stood there wide-eyed. She just couldn’t quite believe the number which appeared before her.

[Age: 35]