Lareth collapsed on the ground, unable to take another step. The judge defended him with a cage of stone and ended the battle.
"She won! Without a single injury, she defeated a genius of the empire that was expected to win the tournament!"
The crowd cheered and applauded; the noise was second only to the cheers Gale won. To be fair, Gale couldn't hold back his charm from affecting weaker people while fighting, so when he faced another mage, he looked even more attractive to the crowd.
However, not everyone was as happy to see one of the top two fighters of the empire fall. One of them was a representative of the imperial family. Although he wasn't there to recruit people, he was there to represent the emperor since it was considered an imperial tournament.
His job was to pick fighters who would undoubtedly win first place to win for the empire, yet he already failed in two brackets. To make things worse, the last bracket didn't seem to be any better.
"Come outside for a moment, I need to talk to you."
The participants of the empire heard his voice from their waiting room. They all left their rooms and went outside to meet with him.
"Listen, no matter whether you're going to win or lose your fights, do your best to prolong them to the maximum. I don't care if the crowd boos or gets bored, you must make the bracket too long for the semifinals to take place today."
The empire's candidates looked at him patiently and waited for his explanation, but it never came. As a magus, he didn't find a reason to explain himself to the young mages in front of him.
"Yes, sir."
Some bowed, and those of a higher social status didn't, but all agreed to follow his instructions. Although he didn't carry words from the emperor, he was still given authority over the tournament by the emperor.
They went back to their waiting rooms and the tournament resumed as normal, yet one thing changed. At first, nobody noticed it but slowly it became evident.
The mages from the empire changed their tactics and focused on dodging and blocking. Almost every fight an empire's candidate took part in was stretched to the maximum, ending only when one side was out of mana.
Every fight ended with both fighters completely drained in both stamina and mana, and the crowd started to get impatient.
"What's going on? The battles seem to be long, are the empire's candidates dragging the fights on purpose? It seems like they're trying to gain time for something!"
Steve's commentating only agitated the crowd who grew bored of pointlessly long fights. They were quite monotone, and everyone grew tired of them.
"But for now we are having an interesting fight! Lena is fighting her friend from the empire, a fellow student under the Fire Witch of our kingdom, Violet Mirth!"
pαпdα`noνɐ1`сoМ Violet had an ugly expression on her face. She was hoping to get to the top 3, yet she was matched with that monster.
"Good luck Violet, do you need me to hold back to show your talent?"
Lena asked insensitively, not even conscious enough to lower her voice. Violet wanted to scream at her "It sounds sarcastic if you say it like that!". If she admitted she needed her opponent to hold back to display her powers, wouldn't it mean she had none?
"Ahm, no, thank you. Just fight normally."
She held her exasperation back and answered the only answer she could give considering the setting.
"Hahaha! Is she taunting her friend or is she really that insensitive to ask it aloud?"
Steve asked the crowd who replied with laughter. The judge took a moment to collect himself from the surprise and started the battle.
Violet was experienced with fighting Lena. Lena forced all the girls to fight her until she overtook them and then kept challenging them just to try to beat them faster. She would keep a record and track her improvement by trying to beat the girls faster than before. Needless to say, she was the only one enjoying this type of training.
Violet used a huge burst of mana to trap Lena inside a storm of fire. It was a spell aiming to kill, but she wasn't worried about Lena for a single moment. She knew she didn't have long, and she planned to go all out from the very beginning.
Indeed, large waves of water were shot from the spot Lena stood and the deadly firestorm turned into a simulation of a rainy day. Violet didn't bother switching to her sub-element to counter the water spells; Lena would just change her element too.
She used a large explosion of fire in front of Lena, trying to distract her with the bright light following and the shockwaves. Lena, however, remained impassive. As soon as firebirds rushed out of the light they were each faced with a water snake.
Each bird was directly swallowed by a snake and the fire was extinguished directly, leaving half-evaporated snakes behind. Lena shot powerful beams of water, each containing immense power and water pressure.
This time, using fire to defend herself wouldn't be wise. Violet used her wind magic to cast a strong wind to push herself away from the water beams. She was sent flying by her own spell and rolled on the ground to lessen the impact and got on her legs only to duck again.
Lena just kept pumping mana into the spell and turned around towards Violet. The water beams were pretty much chasing Violet as she used wind spells to keep throwing herself around the arena to dodge them.
Now, both Violet's casting slots were taken; she used one to generate winds to help her dodge the attacks and buffed herself with speed to react fast enough for when the water beams followed.
Lena still had a casting slot free, and she used it for water snakes. They scattered around Violet, waiting for her to land within their reach to bind her.
"Violet seems trapped! Does she have a plan to survive this?"
The crowd was holding its breath whenever a beam missed Violet by a few centimeters each time, and they couldn't move their eyes away.
