The first round was a massacre.

It was designed to be. The bracket pitted the battle-hardened survivors of the Open Culling against the fresh, elite Direct Entries. It was a brutal display of the gap between the haves and the have-nots.

“In the Red Corner!”

Bruce announced, dancing out of the way.

“From the elite mage family House Garrick…The Mage Prince himself! Viktor Garrick!”

Viktor walked out. He didn’t wave. He stared across the ring at a nervous-looking 1st-Circle Novice with earth affinity who had barely survived the open culling.

“Begin!”

The earth mage panicked. He stomped his foot violently against the sand, squeezing his eyes shut as he screamed the words, desperate to force the magic out.

“Terra! Murus!”

The ground rumbled. The earth mage casted a 1st-Circle Earth Wall spell, a slab of crude, unpolished granite shot up from the arena floor, shielding him completely. It was a solid defense, for a normal fight.

Viktor didn’t stop walking. He didn’t raise his staff.

His lips parted barely a fraction of an inch, a cold, bored exhale that no one in the stands could hear.

“Malleus.”

He thrust his palm forward. He casted the 2nd-Circle Arcane Hammer spell.

KA-BOOM.

The air pressure in the arena dropped. The invisible hammer didn’t just breach the wall; it erased it. The granite slab disintegrated into a cloud of fine gray powder instantly.

The shockwave didn’t stop there. It punched through the dust, catching the earth mage in the chest. The opponent was lifted clean off his feet, hurled backward like a ragdoll, and plastered against the protective wards of the arena wall with a sickening crunch.

“AND IT IS OVER!”

Bruce screamed.

“The Garrick Guillotine has arrived!”

Next up was Darian Varrus.

His opponent, a fire mage, unleashed a stream of flame. Darian didn’t dodge. He casted 1st-Circle Iron Skin spell and charged straight through the fire, tackling the mage with the force of a runaway cart.

“Strength is Supreme!”

Darian roared to the crowd, flexing as the academy healers peeled the flattened mage off the ground.

Kogar and Kima Ramsey followed suit, executing military-precision takedowns that looked more like assassinations than duels.

The 1st Level Groups, violent, and predictable. The favorites were advancing, leaving a trail of broken bodies in their wake.

Then, the bracket shifted.

“That concludes the warm-ups!”

Bruce’s voice dropped an octave, the hype man sensing the shift in the atmosphere.

“Now, we move to the 1st Round of the 2nd Level Group!”

The crowd quieted down, leaning forward in their seats. In Solhaven Academy, rank wasn’t given by age; it was taken by force. The First Level Group was full of fresh blood and those who had failed to rise. But the Second Level Group, these were the mages, spellswords, alchemist etc., who had passed the Promotion Trials twice. A fourth-year student could still be stuck in 1st rank of whatever college they belong to, while a prodigy could rise in a short time.

The first match set the tone immediately.

A 2nd-Circle Apprentice with fire affinity Mage from the College of Arcanum stepped into the ring against a Rank-2 Pathfinder from the minor College of Rangers (Valor). There was no hesitation, no screaming desperate chants. The Fire Mage didn’t just blast heat; he used short, controlled bursts to zone his opponent, conserving mana. The Pathfinder student didn’t panic; she retreated as and dodged in the gaps with practiced footwork, firing enchanted arrows to fight back.

There were no one-shot knockouts here.

The fights were technical, vicious chess matches. In another match a 2nd-Circle Apprentice with Plant affinity mage didn’t just grow vines; she set traps, luring her opponent 2nd-Circle Glass Vial from the minor College of Alchemy (Arcanum) into a bed of plants that has grown in the arena grounding him.

Matches were won by inches, by counter-spells, and by superior tactical understanding. By the time the dust settled on the first round of the 2nd Level Group, the arena floor was stained with blood, but the bodies weren’t broken, they were just defeated. The winners here didn’t win by overpowering; they won because they had earned their Rank. The bracket had been whittled down, leaving the true veterans ready for the next stage.

After a couple of hours of brutal beatdowns from the 1st and 2nd Level Groups, the mood in the arena shifted.

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“Alright, settle down, settle down!”

Bruce crooned, smoothing his suit.

“You’ve seen the sparks then the fire. Now… let’s see the explosion!”

He gestured to the massive projected screens.

“We move to the 3rd Level Group! As Master Alvon said, these are the Titans of Solhaven, folks. One step away from graduation. One step away from becoming a legend.”

The bracket shuffled, and a collective gasp went through the crowd.

Usually, the seeding algorithm kept the heavy hitters apart in the first round. But sometimes, fate, or a sadistic administrator decided to roll the dice.

“Oh my,”

Bruce purred, looking at the matchup.

“It looks like luck was not on the menu today! We have a finals-caliber match… in Round One!”

Bruce pointed to the Eastern Gate.

“In the Red Corner! The top representative of the minor College of Rangers (Valor), a Rank-3 Vanguard! The Hunter of the High Woods! Accompanied by his terror of the skies, Sky-Talon… give it up for LAZLO DURKIN!”

A tall, wiry Ranger strode out. He wore flexible leather armor and carried a massive composite bow. Perched on his shoulder was a hawk the size of a dog, its feathers shimmering with metallic steel enhancement.

The bird shrieked, a sound that made the students near the arena covered their ears.

“And in the Blue Corner!”

Bruce bellowed, pivoting to the West.

“She’s the rising Queen of the duelling arena! The Iron Rose! KAELEN THORNE!”

Kaelen walked out. She wore her standard 3rd-Circle Adept uniform, she held her battle staff and a short sword sheathed at her hip. She looked calm, focused, and utterly unimpressed by the hawk screaming at her.

“A Ranger against a Battle-Mage!”

Bruce hyped.

“Range vs. Battle-magic! Beast vs. Spells! FIGHT!”

Lazlo didn’t hesitate. He backflipped instantly, putting distance between him and Kaelen.

Three arrows, glowing with green wind-mana as he used his skill Multi-Shot, the arrows whistled through the air, curving unpredictably as they sought their target.

Kaelen didn’t flinch. She slammed her heel into the sand, grounding herself. Her Battle-Staff became a blur, spinning so fast it hummed.

“Ventus… Aegis!”

The air obeyed as she cast a 2nd-Circle wind based spell Zephyr’s Ward. A violent, localized vortex sprang up around her, a dome of cutting wind.

Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.

The arrows hit the turbulence and were instantly batted aside like twigs in a gale. Their momentum died on contact, and they spun wildly out of control, embedding themselves harmlessly in the sand to her left.

“Sky-Talon! Dive!”

Lazlo commanded, seeing his ranged attack fail.

The massive hawk screeched, folding its wings against its body. It dropped from the sky like a feathered missile, reaching terminal velocity in seconds. Its talons, reinforced with razor-sharp steel, were extended to tear Kaelen apart.

Kaelen didn’t look up; she could feel the air pressure dropping above her. She shifted her grip, locking her elbows and turning her body into a structural pillar. She drove the iron-shod butt of her staff violently into the sand.

“Obex!”

The air around her instantly calcified as she cast a 3rd-Circle kinetic based Repulsion Dome spell. A shimmering, hexagonal barrier of pure force expanded outward with a deep, resonating thrum.

CRASH.

The hawk slammed into the Kinetic barrier at full speed. It was like hitting a solid glass wall. The impact shook the ground beneath Kaelen’s boots.

SKREEEE.

Sky-Talon shrieked in frustration, raking its steel claws furiously across the surface. Sparks of friction-burned blue mana sprayed like welding torch debris as the bird tried to tear through the construct, its heavy weight pressing down on Kaelen’s defense, testing her endurance.

“He’s pinning her down!”

Bruce shouted, leaning over the railing.

“The classic Ranger pincer! The bird suppresses the mage’s casting ability while the hunter takes the kill shot!”

Lazlo grinned. He drew his bowstring back to his ear. The arrow tip began to glow with a blinding, he used his skill Piercing Comet, white light that hummed with concentrated piercing power.

“You’re open, Thorne!”

Lazlo shouted.

Kaelen was trapped. If she dropped the Repulsion Dome to cast an offensive spell, the bird would tear her face off. If she kept the dome up, the Piercing Comet, designed specifically to shatter the kinetic barrier, would punch right through it.

Up in the stands, the students held their breath.

But Kaelen didn’t look panicked. She looked… bored.

She remembered one of her many sparring sessions in the last three months with Ray. She remembered how he fought, not with overwhelming force, but with calculated bait.

“Make them think they have won, then change the rules.”

Ray had said to her.

Kaelen’s eyes narrowed. She didn’t reinforce the shield. She cut the mana flow.

The Repulsion Dome

vanished.

The crowd gasped.

Sky-Talon screeched in triumph, wings flaring to brake as it dove for her eyes. Simultaneously, Lazlo’s bowstring twanged. The arrow, glowing with piercing mana, was already in flight.

It was a perfect pincer movement. A checkmate.

Or so they thought.

Kaelen didn’t try to block. She released her right hand from her staff, thrusting her open palm directly at the hawk’s beak. Her eyes flashed with the amber glow of Kinetic mana.

“Repello!”

BOOM.

She cast a 2nd-Circle spell Kinetic Burst. It wasn’t a refined spell. It was a crude, violent shotgun-blast of invisible force.

A concentrated cannonball of pressure exploded from her palm at point-blank range. Sky-Talon didn’t just stop; the bird was blasted backward as if it had hit a speeding train. It tumbled through the air in a chaotic cloud of loose feathers and indignity.

The bird was gone. But the arrow was inches away.

Kaelen didn’t stop moving. She used the recoil of the blast to twist her body, channeling green mana instantly into her boots.

“Velox.”

She cast another 2nd-Circle wind based spell Slipstream Step.

She blurred. She moved faster than the eye could track, a phantom of gray and green that sidestepped the Piercing Comet by a hair’s breadth. The arrow grazed her shoulder, she suffered a minor wound but she did not flinch; she just stared at Lazlo before burying itself deep in the arena wall behind her.

Lazlo’s eyes went wide.

“What?!”

He reached for another arrow, but Kaelen was already there. She rode the tailwind of her own spell, skating across the eighty feet in a single heartbeat.

Lazlo swung his heavy composite bow like a club in a desperate panic.

CLACK.

Kaelen caught the bow limb with her Battle-Staff, locking it rigid. With her off-hand free, she drew the short sword from her hip in a fluid, practiced motion.

She didn’t cut him. She drove the heavy steel pommel into his solar plexus.

OOF.

Lazlo folded. Kaelen finished it with a low pulse of wind magic to his ankles, sweeping his legs out from under him. He hit the sand hard, gasping for air.

Before he could scramble, he felt the cold bite of steel against his throat.

Kaelen stood over him. Her staff was leveled at his chest, glowing with a charged Kinetic Bolt, while her short sword pressed against his jugular.

“Yield,”

Kaelen said calmly, her mana flaring around her like a storm.

Lazlo looked at the short sword. He looked at the glowing staff. He looked at his dazed hawk trying to stand up in the dirt.

He raised his hands.

“I yield.”

For a second, there was silence.

Then, Bruce Doyle lost his mind.

“UNBELIEVABLE! THE VALKYRIE CLIPS THE WINGS OF THE HUNTER!

Bruce screamed, jumping up and down on his platform.

“A point-blank Kinetic Disruption! A Wind-Step dodge! Kaelen Thorne moves to the next round with a DOMINANT performance!”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep