The Mysterious Black Magician

Rea's hand was so gentle and steady as she was drawing the magic array.

After completing the array, it shone brightly and stayed in the air. Then she followed making another array in front of the first one.

<Eh, two arrays?> Sistela was surprised. Yman was as surprised as her. He wondered what she was doing. He was watching her intimately without averting his eyes.

He was waiting for a vacant Dummy-fighting room, as all the Dummy-fighting rooms were in use at the moment. The last one was taken by Cinde.

Although the Pavilion had 100 rooms in total, and half of them could be occupied by multiple people, the pavilion was still fully loaded with trainees.

Looked like this pavilion was littered with experts that wanted to train every day.

While he didn't have something yet to do, he decided to spectate at Rea as she was doing her training. This girl made him curious for some reason.

Good thing that she allowed him to spectate her.

<Partner, what do you think of Miss Rea's magic?> Sistela asked him out of a sudden.

'Hmm, now that you ask it, I always have this feeling that Rea is also a channeler like me. That painting world of hers is probably space-related magic. If she is a channeler like me, then her channeler magic is related to Space Modifying which is the same level as my Time Modifying ability.

I always wanted to ask her about her magic, but whenever I had the chance to do it, my tongue would twist and my mind muddled up. It looked like there's something purposely disallowed me to do it. Like a curse. No, the truth is, it's akin to a feeling like asking a girl to date.'

Sistela was surprised to hear her partner's reply.

Although he was shameless enough for it, he just said it from a normal person's perspective. 

Rea made another array in front of the other one. 

However, he noticed the frown on Rea's face before she completed the second magic array. Then after her frown, it was followed by a high-pitch sound akin to a glass that broke.

He saw when the first array exploded into tiny pieces  and disappeared a second later like dancing silver dust.

Looked like she failed. Probably because it wasn't easy to control the two arrays without losing one's concentration. He felt sorry for her. However, she did not give up and rewrite again.

In the other room, Cinde was wearing a tight red training suit. She was fighting two rank B dummies at the moment. These dummies were embedded by the monster's core. It depends on the monster core, the strength of the dummy. If the monster core was from a rank A beast, then the dummies were also as strong as the rank A monster. The 

Even its abilities were identical to the owner of the core.

At the moment, Cinde was fighting a dummy identical to a Husky Gnome. Husky Gnomes were known for their affinity with earth elements. They were also known for having dwarf bodies. Though the clones were similar to a doll. Only the skills of it were identical to the Husky Gnome.

The dummies had a dark-gray body. And they had a body similar to a human. But after it rushed forward and gathered small pieces of earth spheres that spiraled on its hand, she immediately identified that she was fighting the Rank B Husky Gnomes.

After all, the Husky Gnomes were known to be residing around the Mountainous Area near the northern border of the Empire.

Cinde produced little fireballs on her palm and fired it to counter the earth spheres that one of the dummies fired.

The two different elements collided with each other and exploded by the impact. The earth element was weaker against fire. But in total, it still depends on the caster's strength.

The second dummy transformed its hand into an ax and rushed to slice her. Cinde immediately jumped back to evade.

Just after she evaded, the ax came slashing the space where she was standing about half a second ago.

Her feet skidded a little on the floor while moving backward. Without wasting time, she created a bigger version of the fireball and fired it at the Dummy with an ax hand. The Dummy sliced the fireball in half but it exploded after, causing the Dummy to lose its hand.

It made a low growl. Probably, replicating the growl of the Husky Gnome when it hurt.

But a moment later, she noticed that its lost hand grew back. "What!" Cinde exclaimed and frowned after seeing it. Although she knew already that Husky Gnomes had such ability, it still surprised her when the Dummy did it as well.

Looked like it was a well-made copy of the Husky Gnomes.

Cinder had no time to be surprised, she immediately followed by firing her favorite Shapeless Flames.

About 5 Shapeless Flames were fired towards the two dummies.

Because of the strength of her favorite attack, the two dummies immediately turned to ashes in a second.

When the two dummies were defeated, the magical circle that could be seen in the middle of the room glowed brightly. Then a few seconds later, another dummy materialized.

It rushed towards her. Seeing the enemy wield claw knuckle, she reached out her hand to the weapon artifact in her spatial ring.

A moment later, a sword materialized in her hand after the two weapons collided.

However, the enemy disappeared a second later. Cinde was flustered as she glanced around her. But she could not perceive its presence.

Then the next second, it appeared behind her. Good thing she managed to dodge before the claw caressed her neck.

Cinde waved the sword to the enemy without a second thought. But it disappeared again before her sword hit it.

'Tsk!' She clicked her tongue. Then alerted herself once again.

The enemy was able to hide its silhouette and mask its presence to avoid being perceived. Such a difficult enemy. It was also right to say that her perception wasn't enough to perceive her enemy's presence. This was what annoyed her the most.

The Dummy appeared again. This time it was above her.

Cinde's intuition screamed for danger. She wasn't certain if she could trust it, but she chose to follow it by activating her Lupine Shield.

After activating the Lupine Shield ability that their family passed down to its new generations, it was followed by a high-pitched sound from above.

Cinde was quite surprised that her intuition saved her.

Without wasting time, she summoned fire on her sword. Then brandished it to the enemy.

The Dummy was sliced in half and its body was eaten by the fire until it was charred and disappeared.

She was too happy to defeat it as it was a rank B+.

Another monster showed up after it, then Cinde proceeded to fight it.

After Yman and Rea exited the room someone handed him a letter.

He read it and learned that it was a letter to challenge him in a duel.

And the one sending it was no other than Czar.

As expected, he would bug him again. And it was stated that they would be fighting in the 5d Arena. Where hundreds or maybe thousands of students were going to spectate.

He even did it to blackmail him by using the department. It was stated in the letter that he would be going to escalate the issue into ruining the Little Garden department if he would not accept his challenge.

In truth, it was the third time that Czar sent him a letter. But Yman disregarded it as he didn't have free time for it. But it looked like he would never stop doing it until he accepted his challenge.

Czar was no ordinary opponent. He was a fairly popular person in the academy. Whoever defeats him would gain popularity in an instant. Such a good way to become popular.

But it has a downside. Except that he was a strong expert, It could also worsen the issue. And the Little Garden department was currently in bad standing. So he wanted to avoid any unnecessary things from happening.

On top of that, if he lost, it reflected the department, and it might become the cause of the early disbanding of the department.

But Yman knew that he could not avoid it for longer.

"What's your plan?"

Rea asked him after seeing the frown on his face.

He was busy with his training and other stuff.

"I guess, there's no use avoiding it now…" he glanced at her with a laugh. "Gotta do it," he added.

Rea stared at him for a second. Her eyes were darting from left to right, seemingly reading her expression. "I see," she said after a couple of seconds.

His eyes blinked twice as he thought, 'So that's the only she can say, huh."

After saying it, Cinde exited the Dummy-fighting room.

"Why are you standing there?" She asked them.

They glanced at her, "how's the training room?" He asked.

"It was a good facility no doubt, although I only managed to reach the stage where 2 rank A boss-type dummies were my enemies," she replied with a sigh.

"Commendable! Only a counted number of experts were able to reach that stage. Now you are one of those few," Rea couldn't believe that Cinde was able to achieve it.

"Really!"

They noticed her surprise yet she was wearing a happy expression.

"Now it's my turn." He said while lifting his sleeves higher.