River exited the ring and took a seat away from the other students. They had no idea how someone they believed to be so completely untalented could have defeated them. A few of the students admired his tenacious attitude and saw it as a chance to improve themselves. The majority did not.

They felt using anything but magic was below a true wizard and when they saw River it was a slap in the face of those ideals. The teacher got up in front of the students and congratulated them all on a job well done. He informed them that each of the students who won their bracket would go on to the main tournament and would be competing for the top 16 slotted points.

Those were of course, the students who would receive 100-85 points. However, there was still the other students who were competing for 84-1.

"Alright, the 7 students who made it into the final 8 but failed to win here will get to go on and fight for the match points in another tournament. As to the rest of you, you will receive a 0 in the match part of the tournament. It is my determination everyone here showed enough magic ability to enter into the academy.

This is, of course, provided your score averages 45 over both test. If that is not the case we thank you for your time and I plan to give you all a recommendation to other top schools. Leave your information with the front office on your way out and good luck."

It was said the head master would determine who passed but he simply could not be everywhere at once and usually listened to what the instructors recommended.

That was rather a short good bye River thought. Doing it this way they must have lost a lot of potentially very good wizards over the years. However, they no doubt kept enough talented ones that they probably didn't care. A few of the students who scored 0 here were able to stay. Most would not.

Of the 24 students who failed to make the top 8 only 3 stayed in the school. The rest left with slumped heads and some were even in tears. River did the math in his head and figured if similar outcomes happened in the other tournaments then the class who applied was already cut in about 1/3rd. It would be cut even further as not all the other students would get points in the consolation tournament and even for some who did it might not be enough.

None of that was his concern at the moment. He planned to look only forward to the matter at hand. He wondered how his friend Hill did in these matches. He had a score of 90 on the written test and so would pass no matter what, but he was curious none the less.

The teacher used his healing magic to heal any leftover injuries the students had before the next set of matches began. It was announced there would be a short rest to give students a chance to regain their mana and socialize. Most went to the training center to get a good seat for the main event.

River went to the training center himself as he could think of nothing else to do. It was a large and lavish room. The walls went up well over 50 feet high and it must have been nearly 1000 feet long and wide. Large ancient looking support beams held up the massive ceiling. Surprisingly only 4 of them were needed.

River assumed there must have been some sort of magical support to hold up the great structure. He walked over to see the list of the top 16 students who would be in the tournaments. One name he immediately recognized was Mary Saint Cloud, a noble who cut him and the commoners when they were waiting in line.

Besides him all of the other 15 names listed was a noble. It was about the result he expected. He knew the nobles would come into this school with a huge advantage over most other commoners. The commoners admitted in would have a good chance to close the gap depending on their hard work.

He looked over to the other bracket that was to decide the remaining top 100 outside the top 16. His was happy to see Derrick Hill made that list. Just as he was looking, Hill walked up from behind him. “Wow, so you made the top 16? That is really incredible. I was told a commoner has not made the top 16 for years!”

River simple shrugged. “Perhaps it was that my opponents weren’t too strong? I really don’t know, this is the first time I've ever been in contact with wizards my own age”. Hill found this very odd. Generally wizards were constantly in contact with each other to learn about different kinds of magic and measure themselves.

“So how many wizards have you met so far Lee?”

“Only my teacher, besides him no one else, before coming here.”

Learning magic through a single wizard and not associating with others was incredibly rare Hill knew. He was about to inquire further but it was then announced the next matches would be starting.

Hill and River wished each other good luck and went on to fight in their respective brackets. Hill would be fighting in one of the smaller training rooms outside of the main training hall. A few teachers went with them to monitor and referee the matches.

River saw a fair amount of people were going to watch those as well but most of them stayed in the main hall afraid to miss anything from the highest ranked fights. He sat with the 15 other students on a bench. It seemed a number of them knew each other.

Most were social, laughing and enjoying having even made it to these matches. He noticed a few were very silent and focused. Obviously some of them expected to get this far and were determined to make the top ranking. Of all of the students it seemed Mary was the most focused on these matches.

A pot was put in front of the students by a teacher. Each student put their hand inside to pull out a small piece of paper with a number on it. The head master explained the reason. “The structure of this tournament is as follows. First #1 will fight #2, #3 will fight #4 and so on until #15 and #16 fight.

The 8 advancing students will each go in that same order with whoever won. As for the 8 students who lose they will have their own tournament to decide the lower 8 spots in the ranking. The same will happen for the losers of each round. Those matches will be held elsewhere and not in the main hall. Please, do not get discouraged if you lose and remember you can still fight and improve your rank a good deal.”

River pulled out #3 and looked for who pulled out number #4. It was a noble by the name of Tom Sky. Unlike other nobles he had met, Tom seemed to be incredibly friendly. Tom walked over to Lee to shake his hand “congratulations on making it this far, being one of the first commoners in a while to do so is a huge achievement. You must have worked very hard no doubt; but then again so have I. Let’s have a good clean match and may the best wizard win”.

Tom had a large easy smile during this entire exachange. River could find no lie in his words or his face so smiled back. “You know, most nobles don’t think I'm even worth talking to except to insult. I'm sure none of them would offer to shake my hand."

Sky sighed. “Yeah, most nobles grew up listening to their parents and other nobles. They live sheltered lives and only hear their parents complain about how the commoners unfairly took power away from them. I guess when that is all you ever hear about commoners, forming such bad opinions is bound to happen in many cases.”

River agreed with this but he still thought it was no excuse to treat someone as lesser than yourself. Before they could discuss it more it was announced the first matches would begin. They both sat down to see the fight against #1 and #2. It was Mary Saint Cloud vs an opponent he had not seen yet. It appeared to him she seemed to favor the wind element magic.

The opponent looked to be more water based. As soon as the match began her opponent cast a spell that created an incredible amount of water that spread over the ring floor. River thought it was a fairly smart move. It would save him the trouble of having to do a chant to create any more water and would make the entire ring his domain. Of course that all depended on how well Mary can defend against it.

Before he could do anything else Mary simply summoned the wind element and chanted. It was not a direct attack at her opponent but it caused a whirlwind around her that blew the water away from her. She held out her hand and chanted now meaning to strike.

Her opponent was surprised by such a powerful wind magic being used and his water being blown away. He prepated to counter her attack with a water attack of his own.

He didn’t know why, but it appeared his attack was ready first. He shot it directly at her. Mary stood still and took the attack. The wind still being created in her hand blew the water attack away with ease. She kept infusing more power into her palm and that made it much more powerful than his.

Now with her opponent disarmed she finally unleashed her spell. Her opponent was knocked clear out of the ring. The match stopped with Mary declared the winner. Most were shocked by her talent. River heard whispers behind him in the seats. “So that is the beautiful genius of the Cloud family. No doubt she will be as strong as her grandfather someday!”

River looking at the match was fairly impressed with her pure magical power but found it all to be a bit too straight forward. Such attacks were powerful but would only work if your opponent stubbornly attacked head on and was clearly visible in an open flat area.

Sky and himself were the next ones called into the ring. Though Sky was kind to him he could tell he had a strong desire to win and felt a great deal of confidence. The match began and Sky simply waited and watched what River would do. It was the first time River felt an opponent using any kind of strategy and not just raw power. He smiled and thought to himself “Okay, let’s see how you handle this attack.”

In his hand Lee gathered a small amount of mana and created a tornado without a chant. Sky was clearly surprised but held his ground as it was thrown at him. He summoned earth magic and chanted at a quick speed to meet the attack in the air. He looked at River “Wind magic is it? Seems you have a bad match up with earth. Can you use other forms?”

“No, wind is all I've been taught so far. I was told until I master it I should keep my trap shut about learning anything else."

“Wow, that is a harsh teacher you've got there. Too bad for you, I've mastered 3 elements and will now only use earth. You really should be careful what information you give your opponents you know.”

River thought he was probably using the term 'mastered' fairly losely. “Mastering 3 elements? That would be truly impressive if you've done that already.”

Sky put earth defenses around him to guard against the wind. He knew wind was weak against earth just as the mountain cuts the wind. On the other hand he didn’t want to fire a bunch of earth based attacks as Lee as they drain mana too quickly. For offense he had both water and fire. They would be more effeicient for attacking. He decided fire would be risky to use against wind as it could make his opponents attacks stronger and blew back in his face if he messed up.

Water was probably the better option. Behind his defense he held out 2 hands and put water element in each.

“This is the first time I've seen a student here focus mana in both hands. That must be very rare even for top wizards in this school.”

Sky laughed and hi comment. “Of course, it takes double the concentration to summon in both hands. If you want, you can resign now. You have to admit your position is highly unfavorable and I really have no wish to hurt you.”

“We'll just have to see how it goes. I have no plans to resign from this fight.”

Sky’s face turned sullen. He shouted at River “As you wish! I don’t plan to lose either.” He fired both spells at River. They moved quickly towards him but were just plain old straight shots. River managed to dodge them fairly easily.

“Two spells at once is great, but if you're predictable then it's meaningless. Also, neither spell was all that strong even if it hit me. You had to drop the power low to use both hands. Duel casting is a great skill but not you're not ready to use it for practical combat yet.”

Sky was annoyed “Well you can say as you like, but I can just keep shooting till I finally hit you. Nothing has changed.”

River started to cast wind magic “You said you mastered 3 elements. I still have yet to master wind. I was told to master an element is just not about summoning strong power but being able to use it in various and unique ways. For instance, I was told it could not have been said I've fully mastered wind till I found out how to fight its supposed weakness of earth element properly.”

Sky was a bit surprised “What do you mean fight earth element properly? Wind is simply weak to earth. The only thing to do is either use another element or have stronger magic. As the saying goes the mountain stands tall and cuts through wind.”

“I was taught that saying as well. But I was also taught as wind is cut it also wraps around the mountain. You must make a weakness into strength and find ways to make disadvantage into advantage. Only then can it be said you truly mastered the element.”

He summoned a fairly large amount of wind magic in his hand and Sky started to worry. He decided to build up his defenses more with earth to prepare for the blast making less and less openings in his defense. River started to run at him with the wind element in tornado form

“Let me give you one last piece of advice Tom Sky. While defense is important and it's smart to pick an opposing element to fight my wind: you focused too much on defense and became unable to move. To win a battle you must attack and for all attack and all of life, movement is required.”

Sky put both hands together and launched a large water blast as River was running towards him. Using both hands and a large amount of mana he would make the blast so big it would be impossible to dodge by ducking left or right.

River with one hand holding his large wind attacked pointed his other towards the floor and instantly created a gust of wind to push him off the ground and over the attack. He landed next to Sky and the opening in the earth defense he built.

“That was a good example of how to use both hands when casting magic. Being able to use different spells and attack different locations is required to use duel casting well.” He shot the wind attack through the opening where Sky’s hands were poking out of.

With nowhere for the wind to escape due to the earth defense the wind attack was kept inside and spun around hitting Sky against the earth walls he created. River soon cancelled his magic when he felt enough damage was done to his opponent.

Sky slumped down and the earth walls crumbled. He looked up to River. "You know, you are really something else.”

“I had to show off a lot of my abilities to beat you. I think you are pretty impressive too. You can grow a great deal more if you stop listening to bad advice on magic. If you want I can give you a few of my opinions.”

“Sure thing” Sky said “As for this match I don’t think I can fight anymore more. I quit.”

River was declared the winner. Everyone was very surprised by him. Duel casting and no chants. This was something very few students who came in here were able to do, even nobles. It was unheard of for a commoner to be able to do them just upon entering.

Mary observed the match and her next opponent slipping back into his chair She gave him a sideways look. “Who cares if the opponent is a commoner or noble or demon. The winner and strongest is all that matters. I will be the strongest in the zero province and then the whole continent.”

Sky was healed and told to wait outside in another training room to fight the other losers in round one. River turned to Mary. “You seem very determined to win this and be the strongest. Do you have any particular reason why Ms. Saint Cloud?”

“I have no reason to answer your question. Also, if you think you're the only one here who can duel cast or cast without speaking a chant you are mistaken.”

The rest of the matches went by. Before long it was on to the next round. River and Mary entered the ring together. Mary took faced him with a look of complete determination. “I don’t intend to show any mercy to you. I saw the tricks you used on your last opponent, they won’t work on me.”

River smiled, “I really like the motivation you have. I think with that determination you will go on to be a great wizard.” Just as the match was about to be announced River turned to the head master. “Excuse me sir, if possible, I’d like to forfeit the rest of the tournament.”

Everyone was in shock. No one had ever forfeited before a match in this tournament. Perhaps they may be unable to continue to fight after a particularly rough battle. But not outright forfeiting The headmaster asked the student “why is it you wish to forfeit this match? Don’t you want to see if you can make the top ranking?”

Rivers shook his head “I'm not really concerned about it. I believe if I quit now I will be ranked 8th best and have 93 points. That gives me a high enough total to make it into the school correct? That is all I was looking to do.”

The headmaster paused to consider. “That is so. If you do not wish to fight anymore no one will try to force you.”

River gave a slight bow “thank you head master” and began to walk out of the ring.

Mary was ready to shoot fire from her eyes “What the hell do you think you are doing? Are you that scared to fight me?”

River shrugged. “Why do you care? You get to move on to the next round without using any mana. That's good for you isn’t it?

She yelled “NO, it's not good. Now if I win people will point out I had a free match and got to save my mana. I want to show clearly that when I win it's based on my abilities and nothing else."

River stood still a moment and thought about what she said. “Well, I guess you'll just need to figure out another way to prove yourself Ms.Saint Cloud. After thinking about it, I came to the conclusion that's simply not my problem.”

As he walked out of the ring the people booed him feeling they were cheated out seeing a match. Mary would go on to win the tournament. Some did bring up that she got a free pass and it gave her an unfair edge in the later rounds as she suspected they might.

River was just happy to be enrolled. His only goal in coming here was to learn the magic other wizards used and how they treated it, gain experience in the outside world and see if he could make friends. Of course there was that other reason. The main reason he was told to come here. If things didn't work out then finding a few strong allies wouldn't be a bad idea either.