She is slightly disappointed

Kiara lowers her head and I can hear her sigh. I also imagine her closing her eyes while doing so.

“Well, I guess that is one way of dealing with it.” Kiara then replies. “But you do realize you are just sidestepping the issue. It could work just fine if you can completely forget about the what drove you apart at first. But are you sure you can forget about the past so thoroughly?”

Even though I don’t like what Kiara says, I know she says it out of concern. I have already experienced that little voice reminding me of our broken thrust, so I haven’t forgotten. I am just choosing not to deal with it right now. If it is merely a matter of time until it demands attention, then me reuniting with Amelia is just a timebomb counting down until the whole thing explodes again.

“I didn’t forget about it, Kiara. I doubt I will ever get past it unless we talk it out, so we will be having that conversation. It’s just that if I do this during the tournament, I’m sure it’ll cause me to get distracted. I shall wait until the tournament is over, then I will confront her.”

Kiara cocks her head, signifying that she thinks it over. “Hmm, given the situation, that’s probably the best thing to do for now.”

The next day, I meet Amelia in the contestant’s area again. There are only half as many contestants as yesterday, and I’m sure that tomorrow there will be half of what we have today. We study all the duels happening before us and discus what we would do if it was us facing an opponent like that. This time Monica gets called early. That makes me guess is that the fights are selected random, at least for now. This way you at least can’t predict who your next opponent is and also can’t try and target him/her in between the matches.

I see that during her duel, Monica makes use of a lot of earth magic. She makes the ground erupt around her and her opponent and even make some spike shoot out of the ground. She will already be quite the opponent with just her earth magic. But earth is not the only magic she can use. As a B rank mage, she has 2 elements at her disposal. She is merely using 1 so far. She is probably keeping her 2nd element a secret so she can catch future opponents off guard.

Eventually, Monica wins her match and is permitted to move on to the next round. Then the judges call my name again.

“Good luck, Darx.” Amelia says as I head out. “Show me how strong you’ve become.”

I hand over my adventurer card to the judges like yesterday and so does my opponent. A monk by the looks of it. His name is Zachary and he is from a guild named 'Honorbound'. He’s got plate mail sabatons and greaves to protect his feet and legs, as well as plate mail gauntlets and vambraces to protect his hands and lower arms. I’ve seen him fight yesterday in one of the first duels. I saw him use skills like [High Jump] which allowed him to jump twice as high as normal and [Steel Fist], a skill that allows him to punch with incredible strength.

We get to our positions and wait for the judges to give the signal. My opponent raises his fists, I draw my sword. My intention is to run to the fountain as soon as the start signal is given, just like I did against Ari. Except, when the judges start the match, my opponent faces the fountain in the arena himself and then uses [Deadly Rush], a skill that Ryul has too, and is already there before I can do anything. Then he performs [High Jump] to get above the fountain and when he comes down, he uses [Steel Fist] to demolish it in one blow. Water leaks out of the fountain and gets absorbed by the sand that makes up the arena floor.

“There, no more water magic for you.” Zachary says as he slowly walks in my direction.

I’m sure that he thinks he sabotaged my usage of water magic. But that is because I didn’t show off the water summoning ring I have in the last duel. I raise my left hand and activate the ring. Water flows from it and I used it to summon a [Water Elemental] next to me. It is quite enjoyable to see the look on his face.

“You were saying?” I ask with a grin.

Zachary didn’t let my surprise trouble him much and he raised his fists to battle me. Not like he will be able to do much against my water elemental, though. I ordered my summon to restrain him in the same way she restrained Ari last time. But as she went for my opponent, Zachary raised his right foot and gave a mighty kick, sending an energy blast right to my water elemental which caused her to explode. I’ve seen this skill being performed in the Dark Dragon arena. It’s a monk skill called [Bullet Kick]. This will be harder than I thought.

While my water elemental is still reforming, Zachary dashes past it and his firsts start burning. He is using [Flaming Stance] now. A monk stance which I saw him use yesterday. It is a stance that adds fire damage to his attacks. I quickly cast a [Water Barrier] to defend myself. Zachary then performs another [High Jump] and come down with a mighty punch. As soon as the flaming fist hits my water barrier, I hear the flames sizzle and extinguish. He then punches my shield over and over and with every punch, some of the water that makes up my shield evaporates. Not a big deal, I can add new water all the time. All I have to do is keep him distracted until my water elemental reforms. Yet when she has almost reformed, Zachary turns to her and performs another [Bullet Kick], this time with added fire due to his [Flaming Stance] skill. When the water elemental gets hit, she breaks apart again and has to reform once more. She did however **** Zachary to turn his attention away from me. This is my time to strike.

I slash with my sword at Zachary and I manage to get I hit in on his armor. But he then turns around and grabs the blade of my sword, his metal gauntlet preventing his fingers from getting cut.

“Gotcha.” Zachary replies.

He pulls at my sword, dragging me to him and knees me in the stomach. Then he twists the sword out of my hand and takes me in a **** hold.

“Just faint, dude. The tournament is over for you.” Zachary whispers.

My windpipe is being squeezed so hard, I can tell it won’t take long for me to pass out. I have to do something. I reach with my right hand for my left spaulder. The one I had the Dark Dragon emblem placed on. After I got it back, I added three runes on the inside. I activated all three of them before leaving the guild hall. I get my thumb under it and feel for the [Migraine] rune. Once my thumb is touching the charged rune, I activate it and cast it on Zachary.

My opponent screams out it pain and lets reaches for his head. This makes him loosen his **** on me and I pull out. I also kick him in the face for good measure. Once Zachary is struggling on the ground, my water elemental has reformed again and captures him like she captured Ari yesterday. I then pick my sword up and point it towards the captured Zachary.

“Yield!” Zachary tries to yell.

The judges seemed to have heard him and the gong goes off again.

“Zachary yields! The winner is Darx!” One of the judges calls through the loudspeaker.

The audience starts cheering for me again and I dispel the water elemental. I start walking back to the jury to get my adventurer card back. But when the audience calms down, there is someone who suddenly yells “CHEATER!”

I look around to where the accusation is coming from and close to the judges, I see a blonde woman in one of the front row seats.

“Darx is a Templar! That means he can only use water magic. But the Migraine spell he just used is a dark magic spell! Someone else cast that spell on Zachary!”

What the … bitch!

One of the judges grabs the loudspeaker and announces to the crowd, “Darx has the [Runemaster] skill. It is therefore possible for him to cast spells other than water magic.”

“Runemasters need runes to cast their spells!” The blonde bitch continues.

“Darx, please come forth and show us where you have the migraine rune hidden.” The judge replies.

I was hoping to keep the location of my runes secret. Even if that woman’s claims are false, now all the other contestants I still need to face will know about it. This sucks.

I walk up to the jury while loosening my left spaulder. I then hand it to one of the guards who then passes it to the judges.

“The inside of Darx’s spaulder has the Migraine rune, along with 2 others. The Migraine rune has lost its charge, the others are still charged. We declare that Darx has not cheated and Oblivion needs to pay a fine for a false accusation.” The judges declare.

The audience replies with an applause. Thank Imris. At least she didn’t turn the crowd on me.

After having my spaulder and adventurer card returned to me, I head back to my seat amongst the other contestants.

“That was awful.” Amelia say when I sit down. “I can’t believe someone would make a false accusation like that.”

I stare at the blonde from all the way over here and say, “I don’t think it was her idea. Kase is sitting next to her.”

I then tell Amelia about the times I met Kase in the capital and the things he did to try and get under my skin. Amelia just listens to me without commenting until she gets called for her next duel.