Chapter 205: No Plans?

And with both of them working together, Axel and Heinz joining hands like that, the enemies didn’t even last 3 minutes, and everyone, every single one of the attackers from Section-C, was now eliminated in its entirety.

Axel fist-bumped Heinz’s shoulder and said, “This victory belongs to you, brother. Go and break the flag pole.”

Though they didn’t honestly need to break the flag pole anymore, as they had won by simply eliminating all the enemies, it was more of a gesture of accomplishment. Heinz nodded, and with a barely limping body, he walked closer to the flag pole and broke it with a simple swing of his sword.

And with that, he collapsed, as his 300% boost simply vanished. A terrifying amount of pain assaulted his entire being, a profound weakness overcame him, and his consciousness was forcefully shut down. His body was about to fall to the ground, but Axel grabbed him before that could happen. Professor Regina immediately appeared right beside him.

She pushed Axel away and floated Heinz’s body with her mana; she had a very serious expression on her face, as she inspected his body. Axel asked her, “Will he be alright?”

She stated with a sigh, “He should be, but I don’t know. Such an increase in power also comes with a similar steep cost.”

After saying that, she teleported back to the professor’s platform. Gareth flew out from the platform and stated resoundingly,

“The victory of the first round of the first battle goes to the Gold Section.”

But unlike what he expected, there was no cheer or celebration; he almost forgot that he wasn’t in an arena with a large crowd watching them. As for the two sections that were watching from above, they only looked at the gold section with lingering fear. Though they all had one thought in common in their minds, excluding the Valkyrie, the one who was the most dangerous was actually Heinz Gil.

Gareth flew down and stood beside Axel, who was now sitting on the ground. Many other academy staff members were going around treating everyone who was injured. Or carrying the injured ones to a temporary infirmary that has been built on one side.

The eliminated ones were also in there being treated. Gareth stated to Axel in a pleased tone, a satisfied smile on his lips,

“That was quite a show you guys put up.”

Axel let out a small laugh, “Well, you’re damn right. Never in a million years did I expect Jaden to pull out that kind of move.”

“Indeed, that was truly an unexpected twist. He is worthy of praise; he almost won, if not for Heinz.” Gareth thought.

“Yeah, he almost won,” he agreed.

But honestly, no, they would not have won. If he decided to go all out, he could have taken them all out and broken the flag’s pole. But that was the catch; he needed to go all out, which he would not, even if they did lose.

Gareth spoke again, “And you? You also did well, extremely well, dare I say, creating those kinds of artifacts is not something anyone can do. Not to mention you actually held on against 80 Seekers of your own level as Runecaster, it still sounds almost impossible even now. If I did not see it with my own two eyes, I would not have even believed it.”

Axel smiled and corrected the master forger, “I didn’t actually create them from scratch, I brought them from the academy store and modified them according to my needs, they were also quite expensive.”

Axel tactfully did not comment on the last part of his statement. Gareth also tactfully did not say anything about it, as he shook his head, “Not everyone even has access to those kinds of tools, only runecasters do. And the fact that you could modify them itself speaks a lot about your capability.”

Axel chuckled and stood up; he had almost recovered by now. He revealed, “Well, they weren’t exactly rune-engraved tools, so that was the reason I could even attempt to modify those.”

Gareth patted his shoulder, “Regardless of the specifics, you did well, Axel. Be proud of that and continue to deliver such performances.”

Axel nodded with a smile, and Gareth left while saying one last piece, “It seems Miss Sophia likely has things to discuss with you. So, I’ll let you two be.”

Axel raised an eyebrow at that statement and looked towards the bridge. The Valkyrie, with her usual icy expression, was crossing the hanging bridge; she was looking straight at him, and so it seems she perhaps did want to talk with him about something. Though he didn’t know what it was about.

He glanced towards the fortress. Why wasn’t Lucien with her? he should have recovered by now, considering it was him. Did she leave him and come first? He shrugged and stopped his thoughts; he didn’t care that much, honestly.

She reached in front of him and said, “Walk with me.”

He looked at her for a moment, he wanted to wait for a bit and see if Lumina, Thorian, Heinz, and Vyra would regain their consciousness and go back with them together, but he supposed that wasn’t happening, they would be taken back to the main infirmary by the staff to make sure that no hidden injury or problem remains within them.

The two remaining sections also started to walk down from the floating platforms; they all looked at Axel and Sophia with a silent tension. He sighed and nodded toward the valkyrie, and they started to walk back together, toward the main campus area.

Axel did not speak and waited for her to say something. For a few minutes, there was only silence, but he reckoned that she wanted them to be at a certain distance from that place first, and when they were indeed at a certain distance, she spoke in her ethereal voice,

“We almost lost.”

Her tone did not carry a single emotion as if she didn’t care about the loss or win, but Axel could tell she did. Losing the round would have wounded her pride.

He looked at her again and shrugged, “I guess.”

She asked him, “Would you have revealed your true strength if Heinz didn’t take care of it?”

Axel was for a moment surprised by the question, but he supposed there wasn’t a need to lie to her; her senses were of the most unique kind, so it made sense that she could sense the real power hiding within him, at least the real power of his runecaster aspect that is.

“No, I don’t think so.”

She asked him, as if fully expecting that answer, “Why?”

He answered nonchalantly, “The same reason you have for not showing your real power.”

Her eyes flickered in slight surprise, but she hid it well. She asked,

“And what might that be?”

He turned towards her and stated with a smile of his own, “Didn’t you say, were both monsters? And people are afraid of monsters.”

To which she gave a subtle but dark smile, Axel still found that smile of hers to be…very uncomfortable, and the look she gave him was… unnerving as usual.

“So, what’s the plan for the next round?” he asked.

“No plan yet, I haven’t thought of anything. You guys can make plans on your own this time. I’m not interested,” she revealed in an uncaring tone.

Then added after a slight pause, “Though if you have any plans in mind, do share.”

Axel sighed, “I do have an idea, but no complete plan yet. Why are you not making a plan this time? This time, your plan was almost foolproof; no one could have expected Jaden to pull up a move like that. It won’t work anymore, now that everyone knows what to expect against him.”

She looked at him with a trace of visible interest. “Oh, are you trying to console me, perhaps? For the fact that my plan almost did not work out?”

Axel almost became embarrassed at that statement and immediately rebuked, “Console you? As if you would ever need consolation?”

She sighed to herself internally, and a trace of disappointment flashed through her eyes as she looked forward, hiding it naturally, then she asked, in order to redirect the conversation, “Now, tell me what you have in mind?”

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