'I thought they were fighting so why are all eyes on me.' Blake shook his head when he saw that some fights yet to begin and some that weren't that serious had paused because the students were watching his fight.
[Not everyone has seen you fight and the explosion was totally captured their attention.] The system explained.
To the students, Blake's fight was bigger than a blockbuster movie. They were shocked by how easily he defeated Esmeralda, the rank 9, and also, they had a lot of questions.
Sitting in the resting area, Camilla had a question that was more important than anyone on or watching the training grounds.
[AN: for those who hadn't noticed, I made a mistake in the matching up. There are 63 students and after the 1st round (which Blake was exempted), there are meant to be 31 students plus Blake making it 32.
That means Camilla was meant to battle, but since she who she fought won't make any difference because she is the rank 5, I'll say let's move on.]
'Wasn't that the Raiju breathing?!' Not everyone had noticed Esmeralda twitching like a fish that had been out of water for a long time and those who had noticed didn't think much of it because that was meant to happen when someone was shocked by electricity.
For someone like Camilla who came from the Karius family who had the strongest lightning cultivators, she knew that it wasn't any electric shock. If it was, then the safety array in the school's badge should have been able to protect her from the shock, but it didn't and that was how she knew it was the Raiju breathing technique.
The Raiju breathing technique's true power lay in its ability to ignore the opponent's defenses move straight for the internal organs and that was something the school badge couldn't protect hence confirming her suspicion.
'That is surely the Raiju breathing technique, but how did he find what the Karius family had been searching for centuries now?' Camilla couldn't wrap her head around how Blake would have been able to get his hands on such a technique.
…
At battleground 16, Luciano had watched Blake's match and had decided to get serious.
"Just like he said, things will get serious from here on." Luciano thought aloud which confused his opponent.
Not wasting more time, Luciano enveloped his arms with golden flames before launching himself towards his opponent with mini flame bursts.
His opponent was a submerger, which was the champion level of the water pathway. Normally, Aquamancer had the ability to conjure water from thin and just like pyromancers once the spell had been released it couldn't be controlled, but a submerger was more powerful.
Just like the name implied, a submerger had the ability to cover their entire body with water while controlling it like an extension of their bodies. The greater the volume of water, the stronger they would be and if they had a flame versus water combat they would waste a lot of time and mana, so he decided to go with his fists.
When he was 5 meters away from the submerger, the flames on his arms flared up as his fist collided with the water barrier.
BOOM!
'Shit! He cast a flame burst on his fist!' The submerger cursed as the water dome protecting him shook vigorously from the flame burst strike.
Not giving his opponent any time to react, Luciano kept on landing blows after blows on the water dome that began developing cracks all around it. When he raised his right hand to land the final blow that would shatter the dome and leave the submerger defenseless, thick spikes erupted from the water dome and ground surrounding them, but Luciano had expected something like this.
'Do you think I would go all out when I don't know the opponent's full strength?' Luciano shook his head in disappointment as he launched his head backward.
'Fuck! I wasted so much mana defending thinking that he would fall for the trap…' The submerger cursed. The water dome he had cast came from the water membrane covering him and to prevent it from collapsing so easily, he had to keep supplying it with mana. Meaning the more hit it took the more mana expended.
'Now for the finale…' When his feet finally touched the ground, he raised both his hands, causing the golden flames he had purposefully dropped around the submerger to flare up with great intensity.
"Ignite!" Luciano shouted as he used his will and mana to make the golden flames instantly increase in size causing a massive explosion that rang through the entire training grounds.
Boom!
'Not done yet!' Luciano jumped into the air and made multiple flips and twists that sent flaming wind blades to the area covered with thick smoke.
'Fuck me.' The submerger couldn't help but curse when he saw the number of injuries he had sustained. The flames were too strong, causing both the water dome and the water membrane protecting him to shatter, leaving his body to take the brunt of the unblocked flames.
Most of his clothes had been burnt off and his skin had received a second-degree burn making all of his movements extremely difficult.
'I knew the golden flames were powerful but this is just too much…' The submerger gritted his teeth in pain as he got up from the ground. 'Let's hope he thinks am out… Shit!'
He sensed multiple wind Blades hurling towards him, but with the pain and having used most of his mana, he could neither dodge nor cast a spell to protect him leaving him with the only option and that was accepting his fate.
DING! DING! DING! DING!
When the wind Blades were about to slice him into bits, a golden halo protected the submerger, marking the end of the battle.
'The badge is really interesting I wonder how it knows when the wearer is in a life-threatening situation?' Blake said in a pondering tone as he watched how the wind blades ended the match.
[They should be able to scan the wearer's to know how strong he/she is and also be able to detect the incoming attacks to know if the wearer can withstand the attack.] The system explained from his knowledge.
'Then it really is a godly tool!' Blake was shocked by the badge's mechanism.
[You have no idea how powerful a godly tool is… The badge is really nice but it needs a high supply of energy and maintenance. Seeing that every student has one, the only thing that can power the badges is the castle and if you get out of range it won't be able to work if not there would have been no need for me to have released the barrier when you were hit by the knox.]
'Then why didn't it work in the survival exercise?' Blake asked.
[For the exact process, that I am not sure, but they must have used an array that extends the connection, but things like that cost a lot of energy maybe that was why it only lasted for a week.]
'Why are they both beasts?!' Camilla shook her head when she saw both Luciano and Blake seating together.
Their little display of power had caused quite some commotion in the training grounds. They had the strength to beat their opponents but they all made it end with a bang!
From her perspective, Luciano finishing the submerger with the wind blades were unnecessary, while Blake propelling himself upwards to stab Esmeralda to the cake.
Some minutes after Luciano's display, most of the other battles had come to an end. Brian had once again made it to the next round, while Castiel was as lucky as always to be paired up with a lower rank student that faced another lower rank student in the first round. Meaning he still had the darkness element as a hidden trump card.
"What if we get paired against each other?" Brian's question made everyone ponder.
"May the best man win then..." Blake replied.
"Don't give me that bullshit, all I ask of is that you should take it easy on me..." Brian said with a wry smile.
"Then your wish will be my command." He saw the look on Brian's face and knew he had already accepted reality, so he agreed to his request.
The second break was made to be longer than the first because things were more heated and students needed the rest.