“Why didn’t you use impose earlier?” Killian asked as he watched Amira re-sheathe her swords. “You wouldn’t have gotten yourself backed into a er if you had.”

  He knew Amira’s not using it earlier wasn’t because she didn’t want to; he could se during their heated exge; at the time, she had genuinely been giving it her all, but that’s why it didn’t make seo him.

  Although it seemed equal, the truth was, Amira came off slightly worse after each exge, and even if they both had unlimited energy, eventually, he would’ve won – but that was to be expected as he was one sub-rank higher than her.

  Still, if she had used impose, he never would have stood a ce.

  “I only prehe this m with Uncle Aiden’s help,” Amira expined. “My trol of it is still shaky at best. I’m not quite able to use it freely mid-battle.”

  Other than Ad Arianna, who seemed to have already guessed the truth, the others all turo the drunkard with a hint of surprise.

  “So that’s what you meant when you said about things being different had he challenged her the day before…” Mathias said, giving voice to his new uanding.

  “Hmm? Why’s everyoaring at me?” Aiden asked with raised brows before summoning a new wine gourd. “Don’t you have a petition to finish?”

  Mathias merely rolled his eyes before turning his head back to the stage. “Mira, as the winner of this round, you have now been promoted to sed pce.”

  “Sed?” Faye blurted out. “Isn’t Julius sed?”

  “I already told you that to keep things fair, since Julius isn’t peting, one could take his pce as long as they dispy strength matg or surpassing his,” Mathias expined slowly to dispel any doubts the rest of the css may have. “And in that st round, both Amira and Killian dispyed strength at Julius’ level.”

  His words seemed to e as a shock to all the students, bar Amira, Killian, Ace, and Julian.

  “He’s right,” Julius casually shrugged, not seeming that bothered by the decision to lower his rank to fourth. “As it stands, with my prehension stepping into the profound realm, I attack with the power of a ninth-ranked mage, and although her Mira nor Kil match that in raw power, Amira’s speed has reached that level allowio dodge those at that level, and Killian’s defensive capabilities have also reached that level, though he still ’t maintain it for long.

  But that’s just part of the reason; the most important factor is their freakish battle IQ.

  Even if I were to fight, I don’t doubt that I’d be beaten bd blue by either of them.”

  His words were right on the money, allowing his cssmates to uand the truth. Still, they couldn’t help but look at him weirdly.

  “Who knew fatty could be so perceptive wheepped out of the kit?” Yuna voiced as she took a mio reassess her judgement of the ht genius mage.

  “I’m not just a pretty face, you know?” Julius excimed shamelessly.

  “No oh skin as thick as yours could ever be pretty!” Aorted.

  As the students began bickering and ughing amongst themselves, Cirulus watched it all in awe, having never seen anything like it.

  “It’s ohing to have so many little monsters under one roof, but for them all to be as close as they are… It’s inprehensible,” Cirulus muttered to himself.

  He better than anyone uood the innate pride and arrogance of geniuses. Even though he was not quite at the level of his new young master and the rest of his cssmates, he was still ae-level talent at one point.

  That’s how he was all too aware that whenever a group of peak-level talents gregated, it would eventually bee hostile due to their innate petitiveness and desire to be number one, but with these ten, there was none of that. Instead, they genuinely resembled a family.

  “We shared your same thought process prior to taking them in,” Lazerim, Arianna’s third disciple, expined as he stroked his beard and watched the group of youngsters with a smile. “And had it not been for Ace’s preseheir batch may have been a little more troublesome to manage.”

  “Because of young master Ace?” Cirulus asked, not uanding Lazerim’s words.

  “It’s simple,” Arianna’s fourth disciple, Kimika, expined. “If you take Ace out of the mix, though there are still some slight differences in potential and natural ability, it’s not te, and the ws of the jungle would apply with everyone fighting to be number one, but because the throne is sat on by Ace, everyone else basically fell into line, knowing that chasing his shadow was basically futile.”

  “Haha, this king still remembers how hard they all traihat first year, challenging Ace at least once a month, hoping to close the gap even a little bit.” Wukong chuckled. “But because Ace improves too fast, they eventually stopped challenging him as it was being too depressing.”

  “We couldn’t ask for a better first batch,” Lauriel sighed. “I just hope this batch won’t be too troublesome.”

  Though she didn’t e out and say it, the other instructors knew what she was getting at. The ces of them finding aalent on the level of Ace, who was simply unreachable to his peers, were virtually zero, which meant that the pride and arrogance of this batch would go untamed.

  “You worry too much,” Wukong replied. “If the new pups start getting ahead of themselves, we still have the older lot to put them ba their pce.”

  “Little Kong’s right,” Mathias nodded. “But we’re getting ahead of ourselves; we still o today’s festivities.”

  As he said that, he turned his head back to the stage. “Mira, as the new sed pce, would you like to tinue challenging or end things there?”

  “tinue challenging,” Mira grinned as she turo face Ace. “I o ensure our top disciple hasn’t gotten rusty these st few months.”

  “Rusty?” Ace asked as aing grin suffused his lips.

  He had a feeling this would happen; it was why he had initially wanted Arianna to heal him pletely.

  Although Mira wasn’t jealous of Ace, it didn’t mean she had given up on chasing his shadow. On the trary, she would take whatever ce she could get to challenge him.

  Even though he wasn’t 100%, he had recovered enough to remind his cssmates why his ranking would never ge.

  “Good luck, Mira,” Killian decred before hopping off the stage to give the pair room.

  “Mira?” Ace asked, feignibreak. “What about me?! I’m your brother!”

  Killian took an the battle-ready little Amazonian before looking back at Ace. “Yeah, but she still scares me more.”

  “Traitor!” Ace said back before turning back to face his oppo with a smile.

  “Aren’t you going to take out your on?” Amira asked as she re-uhed her twin katanas. “You better not go easy on me!”

  “Don’t worry,” Ace replied calmly. “I learnt my lesson a long time ago; I won’t be making that mistake again.”

  She khat Ace was a better warrior than a mage, so she didn’t uand why he didn’t take his give out, but as she could sense his siy about taking this seriously, she let it go.

  Seeing that both fighters were ready, Mathias gave the signal for the match to begin, and as he did so, Amira took off at her fastest speed.

  Julius was right. After using [Soru] in tandem with the fused [Supersonid [S], Amira’s speed had reached that of a ninth-rank warrior.

  Despite having close to 20 meters separating the two of them, Mira had still closed the gap in a fra of a sed, making Ace sigh in appreciation, as he khat Mira had officially surpassed him in terms of speed now.

  Still, before the bde of her sword could make tact with his neck, a bzing red skin-tight aura coated Ace’s body slowing her ssh to a near crawl where it went on to be stopped by his now bed skin.

  Though power wasn’t her stro attribute, that was still the most powerful physical attack she could muster, bining both states of wielding, impose, and her speed. All things sidered, she relutly had the power of an early-stage ninth-rank warrior, a Ace was able to block her attack with retive ease.

  “Were y to kill me with that st attack?” Ace asked as his fiery palm stretched towards Amira’s fwless neck, snapping her out of her dazed.

  “Only if you had held back,” Amira said with a fiendish grin as she leapt back, easily evading Ace’s palm.

  She was just about to attack again whee the fact that it was the middle of the day, the sky seemed thten tenfold, and the temperature in the surrounding area skyrocketed.

  Subsciously looking up towards the source of the sudden illumination, Mira’s eyes turo pinholes as her face was covered i.

  “[Scorg Spear Shower].” Ace said calmly.

  In the skies above were hundreds of crimson, fiery gives, identical to Ace’s ‘e’.

  “You… that…” Amira stammered as she looked at the spears in disbelief before looking back at Ace. “Peak Arch-Magus…”

  That’s right, the power of Ace’s spell had reached the peak of the ninth rank, meaning he held the power of one of the generals. If he were to truly attack… Fet Amira, the whole of the Yin-Yang mountain would end up ied.

  No one could believe what they were witnessing.

  Though the other students were shocked by Ace’s power which had apparently reached the very apex of the mortal world, the instructors were surprised by something else entirely.

  “Is that… Has he really…” Lauriel stammered as her shock got the best of her.

  “How’s that possible?” Mathias asked, no less surprised than his wife.

  The most shocked by this sudden dispy was, without a doubt, Cesar, which hen he heard Aiden’s zy voice firming their suspis, he almost fell on his back.

  “That brat has officially prehended his first plete profound mystery.”

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  Book 7: Chapter 30 – Kannal’s Swordsmanship