Chapter 361: Theodore Ashavatalia

"This is unimaginable."

"I know, right? To think that there is someone with such swordsmanship from Esfrata. She even rivaled Clarice."

"The biggest problem is the fact that this girl is actually a second-year student. Clarice is one year older than her."

"Are you saying Clarice will lose to her if they’re the same age?"

The people couldn’t stop talking about Vera’s performance. It was simply too shocking.

Auric also felt it was a shame. Vera could have won if she had actually managed to fully fuse that power.

Unfortunately, Vera’s mastery was nowhere near enough to achieve that. However, he could also understand why Vera tried to use it.

Vera must have thought that the situation was unfavorable for her, so the best way for her to win was to unleash everything she had at the last clash.

The fusion was something that would definitely bring her victory. Unfortunately, it didn’t look like she was lucky enough to get what she wanted. The last two strikes dispersed the combined strike.

"..." Ellia secretly clenched her hands. Both of them had been rivals since they were young. She just never expected Vera to be this strong.

It looked like she had been doing all kinds of extra training without anyone knowing.

If Auric had known about it, he would have helped her in the fusion process.

After what happened to Professor Schad, the fusion technique was granted to Auric. Auric chose to upload it to the internet, allowing anyone to learn it.

In the end, he had mentioned that at the conference, so there was no point in hiding it. Vera might have realized how useful it was during the hunting event, considering Auric could unleash an attack far surpassing his rank.

She learned it secretly and tried to use it at a decisive moment.

If she had Auric’s help, she would definitely have mastered that technique. Unfortunately, just like Auric didn’t trust her with some of his secrets, she also wanted to keep her own secret.

In the end, no one could blame each other. This was the path they had chosen.

"I never thought Vera would be this strong." Katarina crossed her arms.

"Vera is always strong." Auric shook his head. "She may be a bit... innocent and pitiful at times, but she’s definitely strong. It’s just... she might have never been that desperate to unleash 120% of her potential."

"Is that so?" Katarina nodded in understanding.

Auric remembered what happened to Eric. It looked like Vera had been changing after rescuing Eric. In a way, her close relationship with Eric somehow elevated her to a new level.

Clarice looked at Vera, who was being taken away. She showed no emotion on her face, but she felt like screaming.

’Vera Schneider... I shall remember that name forever.’ Clarice raised her head, looking at Ellia for a few seconds. She knew Ellia would be next.

Unfortunately, both Clarice and Ellia knew it would be impossible to meet in this competition.

The reason was simple. Vera had made it impossible as she dealt such an injury and forced Clarice to spend so much of her power just to defeat her. Clarice didn’t know whether she could even win her next match.

"Well, I’m sure that Vera is going to be just fine." Auric smiled.

"Yeah." Katarina nodded. "Besides, the next match will be interesting for you."

Auric checked the bracket and saw one name. Selena Bellegarde.

"This is indeed quite interesting."

She definitely wanted to know about Selena’s power, wondering if he could use the gentleness of his mother’s element and Selena’s powerful element to create an all-purpose healing element.

After the instructors repaired the arena, the referee called the next names. "Selena Bellegarde, Kate Miettle."

The two women reached the stage at the same time.

"This is a problem. I don’t really like hurting people." Selena tapped her chin a few times as though she was carefully thinking about it. "My element is to help people, so when I hurt them, they get healed as well, which makes them have no choice but to get hurt more times than they’re supposed to. I don’t mind the energy consumption, but don’t you think it’s too cruel for you?"

"..." Kate Miettle simply stared at her as though she didn’t intend to back down. Besides, all of them knew that because of her element, she usually took the role of a healer.

Selena was definitely not good at fighting. That was what everyone thought.

However, as soon as the match began, Selena proved to everyone that she wasn’t bad at fighting. She merely had an element that helped her enemy.

After the referee announced the beginning of the match, the first thing Selena did was rush toward Kate.

Kate gathered her lightning in her fists, but Selena simply formed a blinding light that forced Kate to cover her eyes.

In the next instant, Selena was already standing at the edge of the arena. Her energy formed a bow and arrow.

Before Kate could even recover, Selena shot her with an arrow.

"Gah!" Kate didn’t understand what was going on. The next thing she realized was that a sharp pain had already spread from her stomach. At the same time, there was a warm feeling that made her stomach feel uncomfortable.

Right after the light was gone, the referee actually shouted, "Selena Bellegarde from Lech-Aistia won!"

"What? I haven’t lost!" Kate tried to argue, thinking the arrow in her stomach wasn’t enough to take her down. However, the referee simply stood in front of her because there was no need for an explanation.

The referee didn’t stop her because of the arrow on her stomach. Rather, it was because of the second arrow that was about to hit her forehead.

He was the one who grabbed the arrow, preventing it from piercing through her brain. If he hadn’t stopped this, Kate would have died.

That was why Kate immediately shut her mouth upon realizing what had happened.

"..." Kate looked down and turned around, dejected.

Selena smiled. "I guess this is the end. I’m glad I could end it in two arrows."

"..." Katarina couldn’t help but furrow her eyebrows. "There is no information about her using a bow and arrow. In fact, she is supposed to wield no weapons at all."

"Is it a distraction?" Auric frowned. He was watching Selena’s energy.

He had captured the flow of her energy, but he hoped she would actually use a much more powerful battle technique. He wanted to copy something that could give him a 30% increase or more.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t exactly tell her what to do. Judging from Selena’s reaction, she might actually surrender if things don’t go her way. No one would most likely get angry at her.

After all, her element was supposed to be used to heal people, not to harm them. If not for this competition, she wouldn’t have used it that way.

Auric narrowed his eyes. ’The life element is quite scary.’

Lindwurm nodded in agreement. "You can basically beat people up while healing them. They will feel the pain multiple times, so they will most likely break under interrogation."

’I am not talking about that, but you are quite sinister, aren’t you?’ Auric’s eyebrows twitched. All he thought was to use the overwhelming healing power for something other than healing.

Lindwurm shrugged. ’You need to be cruel if you want to survive in this harsh world.’

Auric couldn’t deny it, considering everything that had happened to him. He certainly needed to be decisive, even if he needed to be cruel.

In the end, the competition continued quickly. There weren’t as many participants, but they were all extremely strong.

Antonio had also come to the stage to win some glory for Dermania. It could be said that Antonio was being forced to use flashy moves to gather some support for Dermania.

Because of the previous incident, they ended up incurring wrath from everywhere. That was why they needed to fix their image by gaining some absolute victories.

Antonio completely suppressed his opponent, showing that Dermania still had many geniuses to compete with.

The tournament continued quickly. Everyone was doing their best for themselves and their countries. They fought with the intention to win, which made the battle much fiercer.

In the second round, Ellia encountered a student from the UK. She dominated the battle and defeated her opponent in less than thirty seconds.

Once again, she made another wave since she was competing as a unique element evolution master. That element made her an opponent they had to worry about. They knew how powerful a unique element user of the same rank was, after all.

Unfortunately, there was nothing exciting in the second round, as the seeded students would start facing each other only in the third round.

Yes, it was unfortunate, but Ellia and the seniors from Kallarnos University had the opportunity to become seeded participants.

Vera failed to become one simply because she had been hiding her power. If she had just shown what she was capable of, the others would have shown no hesitation in giving her the spot.

Then again, it allowed Vera to meet Clarice right away, so she didn’t complain.

At the same time, as people expected, Clarice actually lost her match in the second round. It wasn’t because her opponent was overwhelmingly strong. She had simply used up too much energy. In the end, she forfeited the match after exchanging a few blows.

This was when the fun began. Ellia defeated her opponent in the third round, but the fourth round was actually a match between Ellia and Theodore Ashavatalia. Yes, the main successor of the Ashavatalia family, the family that was trying to get Auric’s Moon Store.