Re: Love & Magic

Everyone managed to pass the first level of the Obstacle Race after Zevien, but none could break his record. Dan and Erica tried Zevien’s method but couldn’t clear it. So Dan had to make a 3rd attempt to pass, but he ranked just after Erica and cleared it in 16.98 seconds.

Vernisia cleared it in 17 seconds as she only had one movement type spell. Her speed was not that fast, but her focus and dodging were great, which resulted in her taking 17 seconds to pass the level very smoothly.

Kerolin also cleared it in 17.39 seconds, while Tiger cleared it in 19.11 seconds.

Jacky took 23.09 seconds, Roman took 21.48 seconds, Leena took 22.34 seconds, and Hemil took 18.03 seconds to clear in his second attempt after he failed in his first attempt since he tried Zevien’s method.

After everyone cleared the 1st level, they attempted the second level of the obstacle race.

The ground started constantly trembling while wind currents appeared occasionally on this level.

Zevien took two attempts to clear the 2nd level, but his 1st method is not working on this level due to the wind currents. He couldn’t predict the positions of obstacles perfectly.

While descending from the mountain towards the training center base, Zevien muttered, “Well, I can do better if I try a few more times, but 17 is good enough.”

He didn’t feel like wasting his time more on this because they still had to challenge other training centers.

Roman smiled wryly after Zevien entered the training base. “17 seconds to clear the 2nd level. Well, you once again broke the record.”

“Where did you get that blood hook and wings spells? I want to buy them!” Leena asked with anticipation. She really felt that those spells were useful in general.

“You can’t buy,” Zevien shook his head while smiling. “They are awakening spells.”

“Oh… wait, awakening spell?” Leena was confused. “But… ok, I understand. So you have those sub-spells type awakening spell, huh?”

“Yeah,” Zevien didn’t bother to clarify that he had 2nd magic labyrinth because she would soon know about it on her own.

“Let’s not attempt the 2nd level right now and clear level 1 stages of other training challenges first,” Vernisia said. “Zevien did it, but you all know that it’s going to be harder to clear it and will take more time.”

“Yeah, we can first gather Skyward Merits after clearing all level 1 stages, so we can buy some things and use them to boost ourselves,” Jacky nodded.

“Then next we go to Slaughter Spiral,” Dan grinned as he rubbed his hands. “It’s about staying in a big field for 30 seconds and killing as many magic beasts as possible while keeping our health points above 50. Naturally, those magic beasts are fake as they are conjured from some kind of enchantment magic formation like those obstacles.”

“They give us a bangle that displays 100 HP, and if they hit us, the HP reduces,” Erica explained. “The current record for level one is held by someone named Donxin. He had 78 HP left and had killed 94 magic beasts in 30 seconds.”

“What’s the passing condition? Is it just to keep HP above 50?” Hemil asked with doubt. “That sounds easy.”

“Ah… nope,” Dan shook his head. “You also have to kill at least 50 magic beasts while keeping HP above 50. The tricky thing is that the magic beasts will disappear after releasing their attack, whether long-range or close-range. So we have to react fast and kill them.”

“Let’s get moving,” Zevien said with a grin. “I want to break all records today.”

…

[Congratulations to Zevien for breaking the existing record of level 1 Slaughter Spiral. The current record for Slaughter Spiral is now 87 HP and 113 beasts killed.]

“Not again! What the heck is going on? He just finished breaking the level 2 record of Obstacle Race for god’s sake.”

“If you break a record, you get bonus Skyward merits, Keke. This guy is going to hoard a lot of them, it seems.”

…

[Congratulations to Zevien for breaking the existing record of level 1 Siege Defense. The current record for Siege Defense is now 1 minute and 12 seconds.]

“Screw it. I am going to watch his performance. Sounds interesting; since he broke some records already.”

“Yeah, let’s see what kind of beast he is.”

By now, many students were actually following Zevien’s group to watch their performances. Currently, at the Siege Defense training center, they were watching, in pin-drop silence, Vernisia’s performance.

The Siege Defense was about defending a big building from powerful beasts. The beasts sometimes came in waves, or sometimes a big beast would arrive. This training center was the size of two cricket grounds. Four Entrancement boards with magic formations were stationed in four directions that would spawn magic beasts towards the center where the student had to kill them and prevent them from damaging the base.

They would eventually overwhelm students and destroy the base, but it was about who could defend the longest.

The students were watching Vernisia as she was defending and had actually surpassed Zevien’s time while the base was still 4% left. Most of the credits went to her 3rd style of Primal Conjuring, Raging Phoenix Inferno.

A big phoenix made of pure fire had created a ring of inferno surrounding the base that killed all the beasts that approached and also shot fireballs from its mouth as controlled by Vernisia.

“That is her awakening spell for sure, but which magic labyrinth is that? That spell is so freaking powerful!”

“I’ve been trying to find a record regarding similar spells that she displayed, but I couldn’t find any. There are elemental labyrinths, but this one is by far the most extreme since I assume that the tiny fish that created the whirlpool, that wind tiger, and this phoenix are part of the same awakening spell, and all of them are pure offense-type spells.”

“Yeah. Well, her phoenix ran out of gas. But she succeeded in breaking the record.”

[Congratulations to Vernisia for breaking the existing record of level 1 Siege Defense. The current record for Siege Defense is now 1 minute and 18 seconds.]

“Those big area spells really worked in this mode,” Erica smiled before she snickered at Zevien. “Hehe, your record was broken.”

“Haha, not that I have any complaint against that,” Zevien laughed heartily.