As it turned out, only two of the glasses of juice had been spiked with poison...mine and Persia's. Thankfully, she didn't drink any.
No doubt about it...this wasn't an indiscriminate attack, someone had targeted me and decided to try and take her out in the process too. The poison used was the same type that I use on my poison needles...well, at least I now know that my Healing Factor is immune to it. Still, my heart and other organs had definitely stopped working for a moment there...apparently, I'd been out for about twenty seconds.
Still, it didn't change the fact that someone had tried to, and almost did, kill me. But more than that, the fact that they had also tried to kill Persia especially infuriated me. Too bad I don't have a clue as to who did it. Multiple people, including hired staff and a few of the instructors, had helped with setting up the food on the tables.
On top of that, plenty of other staff members had also passed through the area, and any one of them could have done it, so I didn't have anything that I could use to narrow down the suspect list. I hadn't felt any bloodlust when I drank the juice, so the person who did it hadn't been in the room at the time.
Between this and the other day when I felt like someone was following me...it was clear that someone was after me. But who?
The headmaster decided to carry on onto the second round of the tournament as scheduled, while increasing security around the dining area, infirmary and other spots in the stadium that could be compromised.
"I'm so glad you're okay, Kuro...I was really, really scared when you collapsed, and you weren't breathing or moving," Said Persia, holding onto my arm in the waiting room while I waited to be called for the start of the second round.
"Hey, don't worry, I'm totally fine. I'm just glad that you didn't end up taking a drink of that juice...I'll definitely find whoever did this...and kill them."
It wasn't long before I was called on for the first match of round two, my opponent was Niski.
If I remember right, she can't use Lightning Boost, her strength was her skills with the sword, and her Lightning Magic was limited to firing mid-range bolts.
"Even though you were just poisoned, I won't delude myself into think that I can defeat you...but I'll certainly try," She remarked, drawing out her sword as the headmaster activated the safety barrier around us as we stepped onto the arena.
"Sure...give me your best shot."
The headmaster then signaled the start of the fight...
"The first match of round two, second year Kuro Black vs second year Niski Torfa...begin!"
She shot towards me and drove her blade towards my torso, I sidestepped to avoid it and fired a bolt of lightning at her to counter. She quickly got her left forearm in the way of my attack, before regaining her footing and springing back. Hm, looks like she was wearing a rubber armband on her left arm, and used it to block my lightning.
If I used Lightning Boost, I'll win this no problem...but I wanted to see how my own sword skills compare.
I drew out my short-sword and dagger and shot after her, springing forward as I neared her and slashing my short-sword at her head. She stepped back to avoid it and unfurled a barrage of rapid thrusts at me, I managed to block her strikes using my blades, though she did manage to graze me a couple of times. She then sprang back and fired a bolt of lightning from her palm, I countered with a bolt of my own, fired from my mouth since my hands were full.
Our lightning canceled each other out, as we both shot forward at each other. She drove her sword towards my head with her right hand, I parried it with my dagger and swung my sword across to the left side of her neck, she flicked her grip on the handle of her sword upside down, getting the blade in the way of my sword swing.
I then flung my dagger at her neck, she quickly sprang back and brought her blade in front of her, using it to deflect the dagger away from her throat, but she didn't do it perfectly, the change in trajectory resulted in the blade slicing past her left shoulder, leaving a deep gash.
It was bleeding profusely and it looked like she couldn't move her left arm properly anymore. This fight is over.
She won't be able to put up much more of a fight with just one arm. I activated Lightning Boost at x3 and dashed towards her, she began to raise her blade, but she was too slow, as I slashed my sword across towards her face, teleporting her out.
"The winner of the first match of round two is...Kuro Black!"
I headed back to the waiting room, as the rest of the second round progressed. I stayed on alert, looking to sense any hostility or bloodlust around, while keeping Persia close to me. If someone was really out to get me, I can't take any chances.
The second match was Key vs Lesca Harkens, the girl with the black-haired twin braids and glasses. She fired multiple water blasts at Key, but with the latter unleashing her Retractable Anima, she was way too agile to get hit by those attacks. She could fire about ten spheres of water at a time, each about the size of a football, but it wasn't enough. Key waited till her opponent's barrage ceased and then dove into the opening and won the fight with a fiery thrust of her flaming blade.
The third match of round two was Gela vs Oreg Dinwiy, the third year with the shaved head and rhino horn forehead. He had previously dueled Gela thrice, he had won the first two times, but the third time ended with his brutal defeat.
Side note, Gela's opponent from round one had survived, but just barely.
The fight began with both of them taking to the air using Flight. Oreg fired a couple of arrows at her using the crossbow on his arm, speeding them up using Wind Magic. Gela dodged one and deflected the other using her talon, countering with a swipe of it to fire a couple of wind blades at him.
He flew down to avoid them while firing three more arrows. She blew away the first one with a swipe of wind, knocked away the second with her talon, and narrowly dodged the third one, before swooping towards her opponent.
A crossbow fires an arrow with more speed and penetration than a regular bow, but it also takes more time to reload. Oreg's crossbow could load three arrows at a time, and either fire them one by one or all at once. Given how much he further enhances the speed and power of his arrows by surrounding them with spiraling wind streaks, most people wouldn't be able to dodge his attacks.
However, if they could dodge them, he'd be vulnerable while reloading the crossbow. Apparently, despite having an above average Mana capacity, his maximum output was low, meaning that his regular wind blasts were far too weak to do any damage, and he didn't have any other weapons.
Gela reached him before he could reload his crossbow, and as she flew past him, slashed at his right forearm, breaking his crossbow and leaving a deep cut, which was bleeding profusely.
It was over...there was no coming back for him.
Before he could regain his bearings, she had already turned around and was zipping back towards him.
Her mastery of Flight had improved drastically since I'd fought her, she could fly at an incredible speed, almost matching Persia's Propulsion speed, which was kinda insane because the main advantage of Propulsion over Flight was that the former is superior in speed. That a Flight user could even come close to the speed of a Propulsion user was extremely impressive, but I guess not unheard of...Instructor Tabbs was also ridiculously fast with her Flight.
Maybe it's because they both have Animas of animals that fly, Gela had a hawk Anima and the instructor had a bat Anima.
Anyway, the rest of the fight was kind of a bloodbath. She zipped across and struck him multiple times in mid-air with her talon, before he eventually lost control of Flight and plummeted down, crashing onto the ground and breaking a few bones. She then began to swoop down at him, but as she reached him, he grabbed onto her left arm, before pulling it down towards his throat, teleporting himself out instead of letting her torment him.
She had an unsatisfied and disappointed look on her face, as the headmaster announced her victory and she headed back to the waiting room. She really didn't care all that much about winning, it was completely secondary to her, her primary objective was to draw out as much blood as possible.
The fourth match was Tuck Lehosa vs Necola Witniar, the former winning it easily. He used thick walls of earth to block his opponent's flames and force her to come at him in close-range, where he used hand-to-hand combat to open up her defense, and before she could recover or counter, he rapidly raised a spiky column of earth shooting up towards her chest, the barrier teleporting her out before it could pierce her.
She looked disappointed, but she was kinda unlucky, Tuck was a pretty bad match up against her abilities.
The fifth match was Persia vs Ilian Tinior, the blue-haired archer first year guy with Lightning Magic. I made sure to keep a close eye on the surrounding area as the fight began, in case someone tried to attack Persia. I entered Bloodlust Mode and used Lightning Boost to heighten my senses, sharpening my ability to sense any hostility or bloodlust as much as I could.
Persia won the fight, knocking away her opponent's arrows with her wind slashes and then knocking him off balance by blowing out a powerful gust of wind from her mouth. Before he could regain his footing, she extracted a quarter of the full extent of her Retractable Anima and shot towards him, driving her claws towards his heart, teleporting him out the barrier and winning.
I returned to my normal state with a sigh of relief as nothing happened, nor did I sense anything violent or aggressive. Well, there was some frustrated bloodlust emanating from Gela, but that was because she hadn't been able to fully satisfy her violent urges during her previous fight, it wasn't actually being directed at anyone right now.
The sixth match was Rai vs Siela Larwas, the third year with white and blue striped hair, a bladed whip as her weapon, Water Magic and a walrus Anima with two tusks growing from her mouth, just past her chin.
The fight began with her cracking her whip at Rai, who dodged it and sprinted towards her using Lightning Boost with his scythe raised. She swiftly pulled the whip back, the blade slicing through the air, the trajectory would take it in the direction of the right side of his waist.
He noticed and stepped off to the left just in time, the blade at the end of the whip grazing his right side. Siela flicked her wrist rapidly, the blade lashing out to the right as the momentum and direction of her flick went through the whip. Rai managed to block it with the blade of his scythe, but she was already lashing it towards him again, with another wristy flick.
Her control was something else, and her wrist was insanely flexible, it was like a rubberband, the way she rapidly and effortlessly flicked it to adjust the strength and direction of the lash of her whip in a split second.
She then fired pressurized water shots to ensure that he couldn't get close to her, while relentlessly cracking her whip every time he dodged or evaded. This wasn't looking too good for him, this was a tough match up for him considering that he can't use long range attacks.
He then sprang back and away to get some distance, before stopping and taking a deep breath.
Was he...thinking? That was unusual.
She was firing water blasts at him, but he was currently far enough that dodging was easy, and he was also out of the range of her whip.
He then maxed out his Lightning Boost and began running around her, rapidly circling her. In response, she raising her arm up and began spinning her whip around herself, the blade swiftly slicing through the air as she spun it. She was holding the handle of the whip above her head in a way that would spin the blade around close to the ground, preventing Rai from getting past it and closing the distance. Right now, he was circling her just outside the reach of her rapidly spinning whip-blade.
That whip was definitely spinning faster than he was running, how was he planning to get past it?
He then raised his scythe and slammed it into the ground within the range of the whip, blocking its path, as the length of the whip slammed into the blade of the scythe, the momentum causing it to wrap around it. What that meant was...the whip was stuck, meaning that Rai could finally get within close range of his opponent.
He shot towards her as she sprang back and let go of her whip handle, firing a couple of water blasts at him, which he easily dodged. The moment she let go of the whip, he grabbed his scythe with his tail and dashed forward, springing towards her and slashing at her with it while infusing it with lightning, and exclaiming out...
"Lightning Reaper!"
That was yelled so loud that it echoed despite the noisy crowd, no doubt every single person in the stadium had heard him. He swung the lightning-enhanced blade at his opponent, she began to spring away but was too slow, the barrier teleporting her out
He headed back to the waiting room with a triumphant grin after the headmaster announced him as the victor.
"That was...so embarrassing. Who names and yells out their attack like that, anyway?" Groaned Key, cringing and burying her face in her hands.
"Aw, that's so mean, Key-Key...I thought it was badass!" He protested.
Persia gave me a teasing look from the corner of her eye, I ignored it because I had no way to respond.
The seventh match of round two was Vi vs Riefe Elrurs, the first year guy with the bushy squirrel tail, bomb and projectile launching slingshot, and Wind Magic.
He managed to dodge a couple of Vi's kicks and counter with firing some bombs and spiky metal balls, but Vi managed to dodge them by jumping up as high as she could, which was pretty fucking high, and then unfurled a brutal dropkick as she dropped back down towards the ground. The arena was devastated into a crater, the barrier was shattered by her for the second time in this tournament, and she won.
There were a small delay before the eight and final match of round two, as Instructor Tear Tones, the Earth Magic instructor, and a couple of other staff members who used Earth Magic quickly repaired the arena.
The final match of this round then began, Lusk Cotuid vs Poderl Witniar.
The fight started off with both of them firing off their Elemental attacks while keeping a distance from each other. Poderl had a higher degree of output, so Lusk dodged whenever he could, and used his water bullets to weaken the concentrated fireballs that came his way that couldn't be dodged, before blasting the remaining cinders away with steam.
He was quick on his feet, and his control was as impressive as ever. He also had multiple daggers strapped to his back, a total of eight. Guess he had taken my suggestion. Depending on how well he wields them, he would be a very difficult opponent to fight in close range.
And with his flames proving ineffective, it wasn't long before Poderl grew impatient and shot forward, looking to take this fight into the close range.
Lusk quickly drew out five of the eight daggers with his tentacles, while firing a barrage of water bullets from his fingers. Poderl evaded them nimbly, using his short-sword to deflect the ones he couldn't avoid.
As he neared his opponent, Lusk responded by swinging three of the daggers towards Poderl, one thrust straight at him while two swung in from either side. Poderl ducked under the two that were slashing towards his shoulders from left and right, before parrying the third one with his sword. He began to use the momentum to slash forward, but Lusk responded by using the remaining two daggers he'd drawn out to block the forward slash of his opponent.
And then, using the three tentacles that weren't holding anything, he grabbed onto Poderl's wrists and torso, partially immobilizing him before plunging all five drawn daggers towards him, the barrier teleporting Poderl out before he was stabbed full of holes. With Lusk's victory, that wrapped up the second round of the tournament, as well as day one.
As the crowd began slowly dispersing and streaming out the stadium, Instructor Tabbs came into the waiting area and informed Persia and I that the headmaster wanted to speak to us.
"You guys go on ahead, we'll catch up with you later," I informed Rai and Key, as Persia and I followed after the instructor.
"Sure thing, dude! See ya later!"
Instructor Tabbs then led us to a room and opened the door, the headmaster was inside, along with Erhtaph Ragiu. Instructor Tabbs then excused herself and closed the door, leaving us to talk to the two in the room.
"Ah, Kuro, it has been a while. Allow me to congratulate you on advancing past the first two rounds of the tournament," Greeted Erhtaph, before turning to Persia and adding, "Allow me to congratulate you as well, Miss Persia Gerit."
"Oh, uh...thanks, sir," I responded with an awkward grin.
"Yeah, um...thanks," Persia replied, just as awkwardly.
"Indeed, it was a splendid showing, to win so comprehensively while holding back is impressive, Mr Black, and Miss Gerit, your Wind Magic is truly promising as well, your potential is more than impressive. I am curious about what you did when you won your first match, Mr Black, but I shall set that aside for now...let us get to the matter at hand."
Naturally, they wanted to talk about the poisoning attempt.
"Do you know of anyone who would be likely to target the two of you for any reason?"
I thought about it for a bit, before replying...
"No, I'd say plenty of people dislike me, but I don't think anyone in the Rustlands actually hates me to the point where they'd want to kill me, not that I know of, anyway...well, there's Neo Lapunder, but it's safe to say he's the type who'd attack directly instead of using an indirect method like poisoning."
"Hm, are you certain? Perhaps you are overlooking an important detail?"
"Indeed, think carefully."
Stop grilling me, I'm thinking as hard as I can! These two were being really- ...I held that thought as I suddenly recalled the last time that I was in the same room with the two of them. That had been at the headmaster's office at the Academy...
I closed my eyes and went through all the recent events again, looking at them from every possible angle, and...
"I...I think I might know who the culprit is. But I can't prove it. In which case...we'll have to catch the suspect red-handed, I'll use myself as bait...here's what I think we should do..."
I relayed my suspicions to them and my idea on how to prove my suspect's innocence or guilt. I also considered what possible ways the suspect could try to strike next...
"Additionally, headmaster...I'd like you to inspect the safety barrier scroll to make sure there aren't any discrepancies, and then keep it somewhere safe...there's a chance that our suspect may try to change the command lines in it so that the safety teleportation doesn't work. A sabotage like that would be a huge problem."
"Hm, that is a good call, I shall make sure that the barrier scroll is not tampered with," Responded the headmaster affirmatively.
I went on to further clarify my plan, as well as a few more minor precautionary measures. If this goes according to plan, the person targeting me was in for a rude awakening, I'll show them that assassinating me was going to be no easy task. I'll take care of this as efficiently as possible...
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Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Don't forget to vote, and feel free to leave a comment, I appreciate any and all feedback and criticism! Also, check out my Instagram account @aimdaqs for posts relating to this book.
