CHAPTER 184: RUNIC BURST

The sixth day of the Royal Academy Tournament was both the quarter-finals and the semi-finals.

Today, the ducal heirs will be facing each other in combat. The Tower Masters and more nobles came to watch. Even the Royals had come to watch the matches.

Only the Iron Duke was not present to watch the match. Most people did not find this strange, since the Dukedom of Stellhart was Norvaegard’s first line of defense against any invader.

Still, a few found it a little suspicious that the Iron Duke wouldn’t come when even the royals had.

There were also some who thought that the reason the Iron Duke didn’t come was a statement saying that there was no need, since he believed that his son would win.

***

The coliseum was filled to the brim. The nobles’ gallery shimmered with gold and silk, while the common stands pulsed with restless energy.

The air was thick with excitement, the kind that made hearts pound and breath quicken. Today, the only ones left were the true monsters of the younger generation.

It wasn’t just the ducal heirs, but there was the son and daughter of a marquess, the daughter of a viscount, and the only commoner who got this far, Eisen Terre.

In the morning were the quarter-finals, and in the afternoon were the semi-finals. The first match was Lucen and the son of a marquess, Marco Reinon.

The other party was a mage from the black tower, meaning he was either very destructive or not at all.

Mages from the black tower in other kingdoms were considered to be evil, the reason for this is because of the forbidden spells they deal with. Most spells a powerful black mage uses have to do with the soul.

Depending on what kind of black mage they were, their soul could be corroded, making them very erratic. Those whose souls have been sold to a higher being were usually people who became very antisocial and also very destructive to themselves and their surroundings.

Of course, in Norvaegard, they don’t discriminate against black mages. Power in itself is not evil; it is the user who decides if it will be evil or not.

There were also the rune route for a black mage. Those who do not want to make deals using their souls focus on runes instead.

They do summon higher beings from different dimensions to gain knowledge and/or power. They pay with different things like lifespan, artifacts, and such things.

Most of the audience leaned forward with curiosity. This was the first time in years that a student from the Black Tower had reached the quarter-finals.

Marco Reinon, son of Marquess Reinon, stood in the center of the arena. His dark gray robes rippled faintly, covered in faintly glowing runes that looked more like scars than patterns. His eyes were calm, too calm, and his expression almost lifeless.

He didn’t exude killing intent, nor did he release mana. He simply stood there like a man half-asleep, but everyone who could sense mana felt it immediately. That eerie pressure.

Most mages had mana that pulsed and flowed like a living current, even when restrained. But his didn’t move at all. It was stagnant, heavy, like a pool of water that refused to ripple.

Black Tower mages below the fifth circle couldn’t form contracts or summon entities, but they could study and replicate the effects of otherworldly interference through runes and rituals. Marco had clearly taken that path. His control over mana was precise, unnervingly so.

Marco had engraved runes into his hands. These were used as a medium to bind multiple low-level spells into one burst. It uses a great deal of mana upon release, but the power is incredible.

Marco was one of the few who had the ability to display the power of a third circle mage despite being a second circle one.

Lucen had some idea of Marco’s fighting style, since he had seen various black mages in the game.

’Marco would most likely use powerful burst spells. One clean hit will be all he needs to defeat me. Well, that is if he can hit me.’

Lucen created his two revolvers in his hand and got into a fighting stance from his gun kata skill. The referee looked at the two competitors and raised his hand.

"Begin!"

Lucen moved the instant the referee’s hand dropped. Twin flashes erupted from his revolvers, echoing like thunderclaps across the stone arena. Lucen shot while dashing as fast as possible.

The sound of gunfire still surprised a few people in the audience, but after seeing it the other day, they weren’t as startled.

But they were instead surprised to see Marco evade the bullets by using enhancement spells on himself. Marco then started dashing towards Lucen.

It didn’t take long before the two of them were now within arm’s reach of each other. Lucen’s skill battle instinct was warning him, so he immediately ducked, evading a blade of wind.

Lucen then fired his revolver, aimed at Marco’s head, but the other party blocked the attack with an earth wall spell.

Marco then copied Eisen’s move, but instead of telekinesis, he used a fireball spell in point-blank range to make the earth wall burst.

Lucen had already anticipated this move, and before Marco even initiated the spell, Lucen had already backed away, evading the exploding earth wall.

Lucen then used his skill ricochet to make the bullets bounce from one another, making it difficult for Marco to follow.

Marco then proceeded to use the earth wall spell to surround and protect himself from the bullet. He then used the second-circle water spell fog to cover his tracks.

’He hasn’t used any black magic yet.’ Lucen thought to himself as he relied on his battle instinct skill to tell him were the danger was.

It was at that moment that Lucen’s battle instinct was practically ringing in his ear. Lucen quickly moved out of the way as a chaotic spiral of elements came into the area he had been in before. It was that moment Lucen remembered one of the more devastating skill a black mage use.

’Runic Burst. A skill that uses a chunk of one’s mana to forcefully combine different low-tier spells into one powerful spell. If I get hit by that, I might turn into dust. Still, it’s obvious what the weakness of this spell is.’

Lucen looked at the area where the spell came from. He saw Marco breathing heavily; he had used a ton of mana for that spell.

Marco exhaled slowly, his breath misting in the air like smoke. His pale hands trembled, and the runes engraved across them flickered faintly, some already cracking from the strain.

Yet despite his exhaustion, his face remained serious. Lucen had a thought of what Marco was about to do.

"You’re going to use the second burst spell, right? A spell that instantly replicates the last spell used with even more power. Of course, using that spell with Runic Burst would give you a spell as powerful as a fourth-circle spell, but it would require a great amount of mana. So that means the next attack will be your last."

Lucen spoke to Marco, who, for a brief second, showed a surprised look on his face, but then he looked even more determined.

He understood that since Lucen already knew what spell he was going to use, he would be able to catch the other party by surprise, so that means Lucen, who evaded the first runic burst, will be able to do it again.

’I need to find a way to restrict his movements. But I don’t have enough mana to use anything but Second Burst.’

Marco gritted his teeth as sweat rolled down his pale cheek. He had no choice but to make a bet that his spell would be fast enough that Lucen wouldn’t be able to evade.

"Second Burst!"

Upon the activation of the spell, a blinding light of a spiraling swirl of elements moving at incredible speed came toward Lucen, but the second the spell was activated, Lucen jumped upward.

Lucen then used the move he created during the monster wave. Using his skill, Elemental Bullet, he imbued his bullets with a fire element. He propelled himself upward using controlled explosions.

Everyone was stunned not only by the powerful spell Marco released, which almost made the barrier protecting the audience crack, but at Lucen, who was practically flying.

Both had used the creativity of what they could use at the moment, and made them seem like they had used high-level spells.

Marco, who had exhausted every bit of mana he had, was on his knees, panting. Lucen then descended in front of him, the barrel of his revolver touching Marco’s forehead.

Lucen didn’t even pull the trigger. Marco collapsed before he needed to. The referee raised his hand, his voice echoing across the coliseum.

"Winner! Lucen Thornehart!"

For a heartbeat, there was silence. Then the coliseum roared to life, cheers, gasps, even cries of disbelief from the stands. The nobles in their private boxes rose to their feet, and the sound of applause rippled like a storm.

Lucen simply lowered his revolvers, the light fading from their form before they vanished into motes of mana. His breathing was steady, his eyes sharp. He glanced at Marco, who lay unconscious on the arena floor.

"That was a good match," Lucen murmured to the unconscious Marco.

As Lucen left the stage, the next names were already being called. The day had only just begun, and the monsters of Norvaegard were far from finished.