Chapter 127 - First Stance of the Free Flowing Fist - Whirlwind

After the first three battles were concluded most of the audience and the special guests in the Main Box had more or less decided in their hearts the ranking of each student for the three years. The third years still needed to enter a decisive battle between Julieth and Roman, however, the latter was clearly the favourite. It was not the first time both had fought, and Roman had come out on top on numerous occasions.

The same more or less could be said about the second years, since Albert was good friends with Marcia, and both had also battled each other multiple times, and Albert had been victorious at least seven out of ten times.

Therefore, unless there was a huge upset, most people present had more or less guessed what the final rankings would be.

The one that had everyone guessing was, of course, the battle among the first years. Specifically, the battle between Nerun and Gonzo, both great geniuses in their own right, and both great candidates for the top-ranked position.

In the Main Box, Prince Philip was talking spiritedly with Karel and Magick Emperor Tobias about Cindy and Julieth's fight. Since both of them were experts in the Magickal arts, they were among those currently present, the most authoritative to make a comment on the bout.

"Miss Julieth has shown the characteristics of a great Adept. Her adaptability during the bout, as well as her use of her opponent's Magick power for her own, showed a calm mind. That last spell was quite impressive for a Mana Scholar since it had the power of a true Mage. Probably none of the students down there would manage to withstand it," said Tobias with sincere praise in his voice. Karel made no expression to indicate agreement or disagreement.

"Please, don't overpraise the lady. She did ok, but that spell takes too much time to cast to actually be useful. Had it not been that lass Cindy that wanted to overwhelm her opponent and did not truly notice what she was doing, Julieth wouldn't have won so easily."

This voice belonged to Old Man Corena, that was entering the main box, accompanied by steward Menke. Along with Old Man Corena, entered Abraham Dai Baruna.

"Can you be more shameless, you dumb-dumb Corena? Not for a minute think you can fool anyone by trying to undermine your daughter when your pride can be seen from a mile away." said the Headmaster that had been silent so far.

The rest of the people present tried to stifle their laughter, but Old Man Corena acted as if he heard nothing, and directly sat next to the Headmaster while opening a bottle of aged wine and pouring himself and the Headmaster a cup of it.

"You still look good, old pervert Raciel. I haven't seen you for ages, you rarely visit me anymore," said Old Man Corena.

"I just don't want to see your ulgy face, you make me feel old after all, dumb-dumb," answered Headmaster Raciel while drinking from his cup and laughing boisterously.

Their banter made people understand that they were or at the very least used to be very close, and none tried to enter the conversation. Abraham saluted the rest of the people present and then stood next to Elijah while making merry conversation with each other.

Two more people then appeared close to the Headmaster and Old Man Corena. The two were middle-aged men, one of them very slim and somewhat sinister-looking that directly sat some chairs apart from the Headmaster and did not speak to anyone present. The other was a rubicund and rosy-looking man with a grand smile on his face and an amiable exterior. The Natural Energy seemed to bow to him wherever he passed. Karel was the one who noticed this the most and muttered: "A Sage. It is indeed true that the depth of the Great Academies in the Major Territories is not to be underestimated."

"Well, you finally decided to show up my esteemed Academy Elders. I thought that I would have to go looking for you personally," said the Headmaster with slyness to the new arrivals.

"We apologize, Headmaster, there were some tasks that impeded us from coming earlier. However, we'll be able to witness the final part of the Ranking. In any case, I'm sure Samuel and Anastasia have already made a preliminary list of the likely candidates to enter the special course you want to create, Headmaster. So we are right on time, I'd say," said the smiling rosy-looking man who directly went towards the table with delicacies and started choosing from the finest of them and putting them directly in his mouth with great delight visible on his face.

"Don't chide them so much Old Pervert Raciel, you are the most unreliable of them all. They simply follow your lead," said Old Man Corena laughing loudly. The Headmaster simply ignored the latter and kept drinking.

Meanwhile, the battles from the third-year students ended as expected. Roman defeated Mathew with a single punch, and the latter got some inner wounds due to Roman's heavy-handed attack. He had to be treated immediately by the healers present around the stadium.

The other battle was a bit more showy, between Hernani and Cindy. Cindy felt bummed by having lost to Julieth and tried to pummel Hernani with many mighty spells. She even tried summoning a herd of Magickal Seahorses at the same time, her most powerful Magick art, however, she rushed into it and had not created an appropriate condition to do so. Thus, she gave Hernani the chance to avoid her low-level Waterguns and approach her with a movement skill, and in the end, managed to defeat her with a powerful technique in which his arm acted like a spear that stopped barely an inch in front of her neck.

The battle of the second years didn't show much upset and Albert and Marcos kept their winning streak, although the latter had some difficulty to do so.

The third-year students ascended to the arena. Marcia would battle Gonzo, while Karles would fight Nerun.

"I know that I don't have much of a chance to defeat you Nerun, but still, don't think for a minute that I'll make it easy for you. I haven't shown you this technique yet, since I can't control it properly. But, since it's my last fight, I want you to see it," said Karles spiritedly.

"I wouldn't expect any less from you," answered Nerun with a smile, and quickly assumed his usual fighting stance.

Karles accumulated power and then rushed towards Nerun with full power, with a powerful aura surrounding him, and the image of a mighty Buffalo superseded on top of it. This technique was very powerful, and Nerun noticed that its power was quite close to the top power that a Praetorian could execute.

"Here I come, Nerun!"

"Oh... Interesting. An incipient Aura Technique. Such a talented lad. He hadn't shown it so far. It's probably his most powerful technique, and it's an all-or-nothing type of attack, and it seems he can't fully control the technique. Once it fails, he should be completely expended. Dragon General, your brother seems to be a talented young man as well, having come so far into the competition. He just needs to avoid the other lad's onslaught and he'll be the winner of the match, and enter the top two among the First Year students," opined Abraham with a smile. He was after all good friends with Elijah and was quite happy that the latter's brother had shown so promising results. After all, Elijah was his very daughter's disciple and one of his closest allies in the Kingdom. Elijah, on his part, didn't answer and kept his look entirely on Nerun. He knew his brother's mind and had got to know Karles during the last month in which the latter had been helping Nerun with his full effort so Nerun could do his best during this Ranking. So he was sure Nerun would make a different choice.

An Aura Technique was a special secret technique, which was one of Ansem's secrets and the speciality of the Lyceum students. The Aura Technique allowed a Warrior to burn his very own Qi and to let it flow at increased speeds through their meridians. This would cause a special aura to appear around the warrior, and it would power him up greatly, allowing them to fight above their own rank for a short amount of time. It could even be combined with other techniques to amplify them. Normally, a warrior needed to be a Praetorian with at least 8 opened meridians to be able to execute the technique with some liberty. The technique also required a great amount of control from the user, and even for many high-levelled warriors in Ansem, not that many knew or could use this technique.

Karles himself had been taught by the head of his family prior to his entry into the Lyceum. The Santana's family head had obtained his very own Aura Technique from the Lyceum when he had attended it and had gotten permission from them to teach it to his descendants.

Nerun didn't know what an Aura Technique was, but he noticed that Karles was giving his all and that he was looking directly at Nerun's eyes. This was a challenge. A challenge from a friend. Actually, Nerun had many ways to deal with Karles' all-in attack, the easiest of them would be to use his ethereal walk to avoid him, and Karles would lose irremediably, since it was obvious that the latter could only use this attack once and afterwards he could do nothing. Quite likely, the reason Karles hadn't used this attack so far in the competition, would be the long preparation it required and the fact that he did not have full control of the technique.

However, Nerun didn't choose to avoid him. He could see his friend's resolution in this attack. He knew that all of the students that managed to enter the Lyceum were true geniuses. Karles and Reina, especially, being among the best students of the inner class were quite proud, however, they had good and gentle hearts, and truly considered him a friend. They had done their utmost to help him during the last month since they had sincerely approved both his strength and his dreams. That didn't mean they were happy being inferior, nor that they were irresolute in their personal pursuits. They just wanted to help Nerun, but they still considered him his rival. That was the reason Reina hadn't conceded either.

And so, Nerun decided to answer his friend's challenge. This was his way to show both his respect and appreciation.

"Good!" said Nerun and moved as well.

Nerun used his very own movement technique not to evade his friend's attack, but in order to face it directly. Nerun's Qi and Mana started to flow rapidly in his meridians and then gathered in his right hand spiralling in a synchronous manner, which caused an energy spiral to surround Nerun's hand as he extended it towards his friend's charge.

This was the small improvement he had gotten from his non-stop training in the gravity room and his improvement in the First Form of the Free Flowing Fist. Attached to each of the seven forms of the Free Flowing Fist, there was a special technique that could be used. Before Nerun reunited with Elijah, he had not been able to master even one of the techniques, since Nerun needed to adapt them to his new improved forms which used both Qi and Mana. That was the reason that the original techniques couldn't be used by Nerun.

Finally, after Nerun started to understand his very own path as a Magickal Warrior, and after the epiphany during the Royal Military Academy, Nerun's constant accumulation of experience and knowledge allowed his technique to undergo a qualitative transformation. This was the result.

Nerun extended his arm twisted inwards as his palm was facing Karles and then clashed directly with his friend. Nerun then cried silently:

It was an incredible image, a grand buffalo made of Qi surrounding Karles clashed with the small hand of Nerun that was barely surrounded by a small amount of energy spinning in a delicate spiral that went from his hand towards his arm.

There was a silent explosion after the clash. The magnificent buffalo imploded upon touching Nerun's attack and Karles flew backwards at great speed while there was some blood coming out of his mouth. Nerun, on his side, had to take three steps back in order to disperse the recoil he felt from facing his friend's full-power onslaught.

Finally, Karles landed 20 meters away from Nerun and stood up with difficulty and panting. However, he was smiling towards Nerun and gave him a thumbs up, while saying in-between breaths... "Good... That was great. I give up!". Then he sat on the floor completely tired.

Nerun had a numb arm, but he was otherwise ok. He approached Karles and helped him up. Then both descended the Arena among the applauses from the audience.

But once they stepped down from the Arena, both faced an angry Reina who started yelling at Karles:

"Hey stupid Karles, did you become even dumber from getting pummeled by Nerun constantly? Why did you have to go and do all that? Did you want to let others know about Nerun's full power or something?" said Reina fuming.

Karles got scared for a bit when he listened to Reina's holler and then turned towards Nerun who was also looking at him dumbfounded. Afterwards, both started laughing silly, and Reina after giving them a supercilious look started laughing as well.

After this battle, they had become a lot closer to each other. Both Reina and Karles had made peace with themselves and were completely convinced by Nerun's power and had decided to support him completely from here on out. The final battle of the Inner Class Ranking was approaching.