𝗈𝗏𝓵xt.𝚌𝐎𝓂

“Who the hell put Best Mix in the same combat ring as the Blazing Sun team? Aren’t there more than enough other teams?!” Alice asked, not quite understanding how the schedule could be that messed up.

The Battle Exchange focused on putting Awakened with similar power levels against each other until there were no more enemies at the same power level to fight with. That way, the strongest Awakened across the different power levels would fight each other in the last few rounds of the respective disciplines. 

The Best Mix team’s determined average power level was Late Tier-2. That was one of the lowest power levels left in the top 100 of the Team discipline. On the contrary, the Blazing Sun Team’s power level was between Late, and the Peak of the 3rd Tier. There was no way that the Blazing Sun team would be put in the same combat ring as Michael and the others, not yet at least.

“Looks like they attracted too much attention. The Saints must have interfered,” The War Priestess remarked as she appeared next to the Berserker Chieftain.

Until now, the War Priestess didn’t say anything. However, her attention was pulled to the Best Mix team. She only noticed that she responded to Alice’s complaint when it was already too late.

“The old ones… Well, that was expected. They don’t like the attention this mixed team receives,” The Berserker Chieftain said, the corner of his lips uplifting as he added, “But it’s already too late.”

The Chieftain looked across the spectator area with a satisfied smile as he saw dozens of Berserkers and Warlock Centaurs pointing at the Best Mix team. They gossiped about the Team discipline and the tremendous power Thaor, Lokai, and Mekhaz could unleash with the two humans by their side.

“The Saints…you mean the old Warlocks, who’ve long since retired, right?” Alice asked the Berserker Chieftain. 

She knew the answer to her question already, but by making it sound like she was interested Alice got the Berserker Chieftain to talk more to her. 

“We call the retired Warlocks Saints, yes. They value our traditions more than their lives because they braved death to protect them during the last thousand years. That makes it harder to create new traditions, or alter old-fashioned traditions,” He revealed, which got the War Priestess to add, “But it looks like this group ignited a spark within my people. Some will view humans in a new light after the Team discipline.”

The Chieftain agreed with a nod.

“That would be great. Maybe we can help each ot–…” Alice was just about to use the opportunity that appeared in front of her when she sensed something.

She suddenly felt goosebumps spring up all over her body, and her eyes widened in bewilderment. Alice’s head flicked to the combat ring where the fight between the Best Mix team and the Blazing Sun team had just begun, her entire focus on Kaleb, and both Michael and Lokai who stood beside him.

Kaleb grasped the Legendary Ice Staff tightly with both hands alongside Michael, whose eyes were shut closed. Meanwhile, Lokai pressed her flat hand against Kaleb’s broad back, using more than three-quarters of her energy to overclock Burning Fury as she used it on Kaleb – and no one else.

Burning Fury jumped into effect, enhancing Kaleb’s strength, agility, and most importantly, his perception. The Soultriat’s mutation was also fully unleashed. Burning Fury determined the four Peak Tier-3 Lords as enemies immediately, further enhancing Kaleb’s strength, agility and perception.

Following the enhancement he had received, Kaleb could perceive everything in his surroundings down to the finest detail. He could easily perceive the changes that occurred within his enemies as a humongous War Flag manifested on the other side of the combat ring. The War Flag hovered high in the air, enhancing the power of the designated targets.

Simultaneously, Kaleb could easily determine the changes in his surroundings as a dark, semi-translucent dome expanded all over the combat ring, with Zelda Norman in the center of the dome.

Kaleb perceived the changes in space as Ashryn Hard unleashed his Soultrait, but he didn’t pay any attention to them. He watched Thaor and Mekhaz charge at Ashryn all while a terrific power was unleashed to his left. 

Michael tapped into the Power of Enhancement that he had stored in his Legendary Ring Artifact. He grasped the Legendary Ice Staff even tighter than before and used the stored Power of Enhancement at once, enhancing Kaleb’s Legendary Ice Staff with eight layers of Enhancement.

Enhancement’s effect was a lot weaker if applied to objects unrelated to Michael. Its energy consumption was much higher as well. However, Michael didn’t pay any attention to the weakened effect nor the tremendous energy consumption as the eight layers of Enhancement shrouded the Legendary Ice Staff with a dense white hue. 

From one moment to the next, the Legendary Ice Staff’s effects grew exponentially. Kaleb realized this at once as he tapped into the Power of Frozen Nova through the Legendary Ice Staff.

His energy consumption upon using Frozen Nova dropped drastically. Frozen Nova was much easier to use and control all of a sudden, and Frozen Nova’s creations grew even sturdier than before.

One moment the battle started, and in the next moment, Kaleb used the entire energy stored inside his body to unleash Frozen Nova.

Time slowed down, the temperature in the entire Underground Colosseum dropped below zero at once, and the ominous black dome of Zelda Norman began to crack, long white gashes of ice spreading across the dome like cobwebs. 

The combat ring froze and cracked open as humongous pillars of ice shot out of the ground. The pillars of ice split up the combat ring, separating Maria Wang and Sera Kani from the rest of her team.

Ashryn Hard, Zelda Norman, and Ludwig Pearl were separated from each other as well as several thick ice walls burst out of the ground.

Last but not least, Ludwig’s War Flag was pierced as dozens of human-sized ice shards shot across the combat ring, tearing huge holes into the War Flag before it began to freeze and crumble.

The battle had just begun but the combat ring looked completely different than before. Kaleb split up the Blazing Sun team, and he even destroyed both Zelda’s gloomy dome and Ludwig’s War Flag.

After Kaleb had unleashed his full power, he collapsed to the ground. Meanwhile, Lokai took a step to the side, put her hands together, and bent her knees. She looked at Michael, who charged toward her.

He lightly jumped upon her flat palms just to use his entire strength with the second jump as he propelled himself high into the air by kicking his feet from her hands. Simultaneously, Lokai straightened her legs as Michael jumped the second time. Her hands moved upward alongside Michael’s kick, providing Michael with even more momentum.

Michael flew across the combat ring, avoiding the ice pillars and ice walls beneath him. The moment Lokai threw Michael, she used her remaining energy to pass along an overclocked version of Burning Fury to everyone else. Though much weaker than the earlier version she had given to Kaleb, Burning Fury was stronger in its usual form. 

Afterward, Lokai charged toward Zelda Norman, who was trying to erect a new gloomy dome.

Burning Fury’s mutation effect came to full display as Lokai faced Zelda Norman. The same could be seen as Thaor and Mekhaz charged toward Ashryn, unleashing the tremendous power that surged through them.

Michael was no different. He used the chilling air around him to manifest more than a hundred Glacicles as the gravitational force pulled him back to the ground. Michael crashed hard onto the ground right after the Glacicles poured down on Ludwig Pearl. Using Enhancement on his body as he landed, Michael remained unscathed as he smashed onto the brittle frozen ground. He looked up and turned into a white flash as he dashed ahead. 

The Wyvertooth Spear manifested in his hands while the Spirit Armor Set covered his entire body, further enhancing his strength. Threads of Extraction’s power shrouded Wyverntooth’s blade alongside Enhancement’s white hue and Reinforced Sword Qi’s silver energy.

Bursting with strength, Michael faced Ludwig head-on. He made use of his Soultraits and means to artificially increase his strength to move rapidly, inflicting several injuries all over Ludwig’s body, thus allowing the threads of extraction to break past his enemy’s defenses, infiltrating him.

Michael slowly drained Ludwig’s origin energy, which he then used to slowly accelerate the energy drain. Simultaneously, Michael made use of Glacicles, Qi Swords, Spirit Whip, and the Wyverntooth Spear to wear down Ludwig and inflict more injuries, slowly but steadily defeating him.

Unsure how much time Michael had, he decided to accelerate his pace and defeat Ludwig quickly. Since Ludwig was focused on supporting others, his combat prowess was not as exceptional as most descendants of powerful families. Nonetheless, he was at the Peak of the 2nd Tier, and a descendant of a powerful family. He couldn’t be underestimated. Fortunately, Michael could still make use of Burning Fury’s effect to defeat Ludwig at last.

However, once he turned around, the scene shocked him greatly. He felt searing heat burning down his back even before he had turned around but had not expected to be face to face with a humongous inferno that ravaged throughout the combat ring. The combat ring burst apart due to the sudden increase in temperature that followed the rapid decrease in temperature.

Michael’s eyes narrowed as his Eagle Eyes found the Peak Tier-3 Lords Maria Wang and Sera Kani combining their Soultraits’ powers to create the humongous inferno. They could control the inferno precisely, melting down the ice pillars and ice walls rather quickly. But despite the marvelous display of great power, it took the inferno several seconds to break down the ice walls and pillars. However, that was something Michael had been hoping for when he came up with his plan.

The ice walls and ice pillars were the results of the combined effort of two Legendary Artifacts, a 7-Star Soultrait, and two overclocked Soultraits.

Michael’s eyes moved quickly across the battlefield. He saw that Ashryn had been defeated by Mekhaz and Thaor, but also noticed that the Berserker and Warlock Centaur had been greatly weakened. Due to their sorry state, the blazing inferno was all it took before the referee had to interfere. Knowing that he dragged Mekhaz and Thaor out of the combat ring, just like he had done with Kaleb as the young Zenovia had collapsed on the ground.

Lokai ended up dragging Zelda Norman out of the arena. The Berserker didn’t want to lose, but she realized too late that Zelda Norman was too strong to defeat after she had used her entire energy to overclock Burning Fury several times. A Peak Tier-3 Lord was not easy to defeat, yet Lokai used her weight and strength to her advantage to sacrifice herself by grasping Zelda and throwing her and herself out of the combat ring, disqualifying both of them.

Zelda had been fighting against Lokai’s grasp, but the Berserker overcame and endured the heavy injuries she sustained to drag Zelda out of the arena.

Meanwhile, Kaleb was in an even worse state than anyone else. He was bleeding from his eyes, ears and nose. Only the white of his eyes was visible as well. Alice had already appeared next to Kaleb outside the combat ring to tend to his condition alongside the healers.

That left only Michael, Maria Wang and Sera Kani in the combat ring. Unfortunately, the effect of Burning Fury wore off.

Then the inferno hit Michael, burning him…and his hair.

**

[A/N: The Author is back in the game with bad news. Michael…lost his hair… Poor him. How dare I burn his hair again? Will he always stay a baldie, or will his hair grow out sooner or later? Find out in the next episo–… Joking aside. I hope everyone enjoys the story as much as I do. 

If you enjoy the story, how about leaving a nice review to support me? That would be great. 

Either way, back to work.

Over and out, 

Your hideous author :]