Chapter 143: Tomb

The Butcher, surprised that his attack didn’t work, was completely staggered. He was unable to do anything as Paul finally freed himself from the hook and lunged himself towards the Butcher.

Paul used a variation of the [Golden Hand] and thrusted his palm towards the Butcher.

With a late response, the Butcher Reinforced his own belly, allowing it to be filled with a lot of cushion to lessen the blow.

However, Paul’s [Golden Hand] still pushed through the Reinforcement, sending the Butcher flying through the air, out of the arena itself. If there was any rules regarding an outside area, then he was definitely eliminated at this point.

The Butcher skidded against the floor. He was in pain for a second, before that pain turned into anger.

He quickly tried to pull himself up, but found that he couldn’t even raised his chest. He looked up seeing that Paul was already above him, leg on his chest.

"Surrender now, or I’ll push you down even harder," Paul threatened him.

His hand was glowing with the same golden aura that he had earlier.

And upon such warning, the Butcher immediately cowered. He didn’t want to feel the pain of that hand ever again. "I surrender! I surrender!"

Hearing this, the crowd gasped.

"He actually won!"

"No way... I would have never thought I’d see the day where the Butcher is asking for mercy."

"Who is this Paul guy?!"

Meanwhile, Paul returned to his group, where he was immediately surrounded by the rest of his group. They congratulated him on such an easy win, making him feel that much more happy of his victory.

"Hahaha! Paul brought us our first victory!"

"At this point, he may even defeat the rest of his Carter’s group without us doing anything!"

"I wouldn’t mind that!"

However, Eren approached Paul. "You’re going to need to take a rest."

This surprised his group members.

"Why?" Abe asked. "He looks like he’s in prime position to defeat the other members!"

Eren then grabbed at Paul’s wrist and showed that he was bruising near his hands.

This garnered some gasps and shocks from the rest of the group.

"You’ve overexerted yourself," Eren said to Paul.

Scratching his head, Paul laughed at his own mistake. "Sorry. I know you told us to not use our powers too much. But I just had to. He was humiliating our group!"

Eren had taught everyone how to properly use the Martial Manuals that they had just learned a few days ago.

With his teachings, they were easily able to achieve a minor mastery in the technique, allowing them to reach the Lower Proficiency Mastery.

But with such a fast achievement, this meant that there could be some side-effects that they were not expecting.

In Paul’s case, overexerting his power would hurt his own wrists from using the [Golden Hand] too much.

"Hehe, I guess this is my turn now," said Henry.

Eren nodded. "Show them what you can do."

And so, Henry stepped forwards into the center of the bright spot in the Pitted Caverns.

This caused some discussions from the rest of the people watching.

"Huh? They’re subbing out Paul this early?

"Why? He just showed tremendous skill! I wanted to see what he could do!"

"Who is this new guy?"

Just like Paul, Henry was unknown. Perhaps, he was even more unimpressive than Pual, given that Henry looked like an ordinary individual with no skill or power at all.

He wasn’t short, but he wasn’t tall. He wasn’t thin, but he wasn’t big. He was just normal.

"I’ll just tell you now that there is no subbing out," said Carter. "If you don’t let Paul fight this battle, then he’s effectively out of the duel. This means we’ll both have nine duelists remaining."

Eren shrugged. "I’m fine with that."

Seeing Eren’s nonchalant attitude, Carter clicked his tongue and turned towards his group member.

One of them stepped forward. He looked like a gothic ghost, with his pale skin with dark undereye tones and a creepy smile.

"Tomb, don’t let them have another win," said Carter.

Tomb nodded. He eerily cracked his neck, before looking towards Henry.

As both fighters entered into the arena, a cold breeze suddenly emerged from up above.

Those unaware of the truth didn’t know the significance of this little event. But those who knew, were quite surprised.

The Proctors all looked at each other, intrigued.

"It seems that the big boys have come to see this little fight," said one of the Proctors.

"It is quite entertaining. But I don’t see why it has caught the attention of the Prominent Families."

Meanwhile, Kaiser looked down towards Eren and had an undecipherable look on his face.

And opposite him, Miss Calliope gazed at Eren with a surprised expression on her face. After all, she didn’t think that Eren would have gathered such attention on himself, after everything that he’d been through.

Now, he was forced to accept a duel with a group with all of their Territories on the line. It was quite a dangerous situation for Eren. After all, if they lost this duel, they would all but be guaranteed a loss in the Second Test.

If they lost this, they’d lose their chance to earn a License.

This made her feel worried. However, in the next second, that worry was soon turned into shock.

...

...

...

Tomb moved like a ghost. His feet began to emanate a hazy smoke that obscured his legs, to the point that it looked like it disappeared.

Now, he looked like a disembodied ghost that was floating a few feet from the ground.

Henry stood his ground and prepared for the attack.

However, in the next second, Tomb’s entire body soon dispersed like smoke.

As it turned out, his entire body had just been a mirage this entire time!

Tomb reappeared behind Henry, ready to strike him in the back.

But just as he was about to strangle him, Henry immediately moved and reached towards Tomb’s shoulders in a surprisingly decent grapple.