Chapter CXXIX - Right Before Our Event (part 1)

Me and Manda left the arena and headed to where the others were waiting. 

Jericho looks like she has been patched up by the healing team, but her wounds are still there, so I might have to heal her to completely remove her injuries. The others don't really look that bad. A simple healing on them should do.

Everyone else congratulates the contestants for doing their best against a godlike existence like Arfius, but it still lingers in their heart that they should have done a lot more.

I patted on Jericho's shoulder and glared at the contestants that just fought.

"That is the most you guys can do. If it was anyone else, you guys would have won. Besides, it was already unfair for that super talented guy to fight against you guys who only trained for around two months... Don't you think so?"

I said to the contestants to cheer them up, and it looks like it worked. The other three who were with Jericho looked to be a little bit brighter than before, and even Jericho nodded at my words.

"But still... I should have at least done something."

"You have done what you could, Jericho. Trust me. That guy is crazy, even for me."

Hearing that from me made Jericho chuckle. Then, she threw a slight bump using her fist at my left shoulder.

"Go beat him down at the final battle arena."

"I will. Don't worry."

After hearing my answer, Jericho quickly let the most wanting to talk person forward. It's Manda.

"Rize... I-"

"Ah, me first. Sorry for interrupting your little... courageous stand. To me, it just seemed foolish to stand against someone like him and just end up getting beaten down in the end."

"R-Right... I know it was foolish, but... I don't want to lose."

"I know… and you are amazing for it."

I patted her on the head, but she moved up and hugged me. 

"W-Wait… your hand was wounded!"

"Hmm? What wound?"

Manda remembered that I took Arfius's attack head on, and she quickly released the hug to check my left hand.

But I lifted my left palms to her, and not a single blood was sighted.

"W-Wha…"

"Now you understand why I'm confident in beating that guy?"

Manda quickly chuckled and nodded. Noticing that she has felt much better now, I turned my gaze away from her and turned to everyone else.

"I'll beat him down for you guys later… But for now..."

I lifted my hand and pointed my thumb at myself.

"Watch us beat up everyone else."

I said to everyone else and they all nodded firmly at my statement.

We all then head out to our own dorms and rest up. Because later on 10, there will be the second event. The battle royale game.

Before we went to the dorms, I called Alden and Lemillia to group up at the canteen so we could talk about strategy.

Alden said he has learned that the battle royale will happen on a custom terrain that the council has set up. It will be quite away from the academy, and will take place in another place in the kingdom.

A custom arena on the other side of the city…

He said that there will be spectators from outside the academy who will also be watching, and there might be some important people watching too.

Why are they bringing some spectators from outside? Is it to prove something?

There's also been a change in the rules. Previously, we will only fight students from our year, but since we are using a much bigger arena, we will be fighting students from the second and third year too. 

Which is stupid, by the way... It's obviously a bad impact for the first years.

Alden heard this from a friend he has in class C. Apparently, he has a friend outside of class E he has never spoken of, and that friend was quite neutral in the whole class E thing.

Must be nice having a friend like that.

"Anything else?"

"While we are out on the field, everyone else will also be there to spectate on the arena. Which means, the academy will be quite empty."

Oh no.

This is bad.

I hope Milly has something to do about this, or else we might be looking at a large number of intruders in the academy. The timing cannot be anymore perfect... 

In two days, the seal will collapse and the rock of energy will resurface.

Or maybe... This is the bait.

Milly… I hope you have a plan.

"I see… Then I guess we will be fighting outside the academy."

"Yeah. We will go using carriages, I think."

"How far will it be for us to use carriages?"

"That, I don't know. But, I don't think it's far since the other students won't be using carriages."

"Ah... Then they just walk there?"

"Yeah. They just walk there."

Wow... I also wanted to just take a walk.

I asked Alden if there's any information about the arena, but he shook his head. The council has been very closed about the arena's details, aside from the fact it is outside the academy.

Which means… We are up for a surprise.

After discussing the strategy we will be using, we decided to head back to our dorms and waited until it's 10. 

I waited while reading some books and tried to simulate techniques in my head. Using shadow magic relies completely on your will and imagination. If your will is weak, then your shadow will be easily shattered, and if your imagination is slow, then the shadow won't create anything good at all.

The part about will is something I have come to terms with, but the imagination...

I can barely think of anything aside from forming a sword and a shadow tail. Oh, and the wall. I couldn't think of anything else.

Making a gun, I have no idea what the inside looks like. 

A vehicle... How do I make it move?

Hell, I can't even form a second wing. But, I do realize that it's not that my imagination is not enough. 

Something… has been blocking my use of shadow magic.

All this time I can only conjure some simple stuff like the shadow tail and the shadow wall. To make the shadow wing and sword requires me to use a full focus, and that is quite difficult.

I want to know why I just can't use my full imagination on shadow magic. There is something blocking my ability, and I don't like it.

Maybe this is the limit of shadow magic. Maybe this is as far as my imagination can go. I'm not sure anymore.

But, there has to be something I can do by merging fire magic and shadow magic. I could make a bullet out of shadow and launch at high speed using the explosion, but I could have just used fire magic for that.

In the end, I couldn't come up with any new techniques and just read my book like a total nerd. Once the clock showed 9.9, I closed the book and left the dorm.