Eiro stood there in the center of this arena, and slowly turned his head over toward James. With a quick wink toward him, the Demon confirmed that this was really the Eiro that he knew. Not that there were many people with that name in the first place.
James let out a deep sigh and returned a nod, showing that he roughly understood the situation. Although he still seemed to be rather curious about why Eiro chose this sort of form to use in public. But that was a topic for later.
Solomon's speech was now over, so instead, the man that was in charge of organizing this event was taking lead, "We will now start with the Magic Division. Each student will demonstrate their extraordinary abilities. And then, our new Faculty Member will proceed to show his own magical prowess, to show the students the height that is possible for them to reach!"
That guy was clearly speaking from a script, and his voice showed that he himself wasn't particularly sure about if Eiro was really as powerful as it said he was on the piece of paper in front of him, but that was fine. He would believe it soon enough.
Eiro now slowly made his way to the sidelines of this arena where James was also standing while ten students came out into the arena as well. One of them was Clementine, wearing Mage's robes given to her by the school, while also holding a rather generic staff built for the Water Element in her hands.
"James, why aren't they allowing them to use their own staffs..?" The Demon asked, and James turned his head toward Eiro with a slight sigh, "So that people can't say that the power of a specific spell comes from the staff they use."
"...But the staff that Clementine is using is so much weaker than the one that I made for her, that's just-"
"Eiro, let's just talk later, alright? Let's focus on the performance for now." James suggested, before the Demon reluctantly nodded his head, "Fine."
The first student slowly walked up into the center of the arena and started to cast the spell he would use. It was a simple Earth Elemental spell, probably 'Pillar'. The moment that Eiro saw the nearly finished magic circle, he glanced at the magic circle array that was created along the edge of the arena, creating a barrier between the arena itself and the place where the audience was sitting.
The Demon sighed lightly and tapped the magic circle array, sending a slight pulse throughout the barrier. This showed Eiro that his suspicion was right. He pressed his palm onto the part of the array right behind him and started to alter part of it temporarily. Eiro had to keep part of his concentration on this, since it would immediately return to normal once he didn't.
And just then, the student finished his just so slightly altered magic circle, that created a pillar underneath his feet. It seemed like the student altered the spell on his own volition judging from one of the teachers' expressions. It was way too tall compared to normal.
If Eiro didn't remove part of the barrier, then the student would have been smushed completely, but now, the performance could go on while the audience seemed quite impressed. While the teacher that was supposed to take care of this was busy panicking, Eiro turned his head to the side and nodded at Gondos, who swiftly flew over there and quickly lowered the pillar down safely so that Eiro could let the barrier return to normal.
The audience applauded and the student returned to the row of ten while the teacher was sending a glare over to him. The next few performances went down without a hitch. One of them showed a flame storm, another one showed a wind blade that cut through a wooden log that was prepared for this. Overall, for their age and apparent level, their magic was quite impressive.
And then, the last of the group came out. It was Clementine. And sure, while those other children were impressive... Clementine's magic would be much greater than that. But for some reason, she was just standing there looking back at the teacher, who was nervously rushing around.
Eiro rubbed the bridge of his nose as he realized the situation. Seeing how things weren't working out properly, Eiro swiftly stepped into the center of the arena next to his daughter. Using Wind Magic to make his voice carry further, the Demon quickly explained, "There seem to be a few minor difficulties behind the scenes. But so that we won't make you all wait longer than necessary, I have to intervene for a moment."
Eiro quickly snapped his finger, and with bubbles of water gathering next to his head, Nelli appeared. The Naiad quickly held her hands forward and prepared water for Clementine, while Eiro first formed a large bowl of water out of ice and then let Nelli pour the rest of the needed water into that bowl.
The audience was more than just surprised to see a Naiad, something that most people here could have only read about.
Clementine looked at Eiro surprised but soon just smiled, "Thanks, Dad..." She said awkwardly, while Eiro simply smiled back, "Show'em what real magic looks like, will you?"
"You got it!" Clementine exclaimed happily. As Eiro made his way back to James' side, he saw that the teacher that was rushing around before was finally relaxing again. Eiro waved at him for a moment and the teacher pressed his hands together to show how thankful he was for the help.
But then, Eiro focused on Clementine instead, and immediately saw that she was trying to really one-up everyone else in her group. After all, she wasn't just creating her magic circle out of mana like everyone else was, but she was directly controlling the water and was turning it into the magic circle. That in itself was going to increase the potency of the spell she would make use of.
However, Eiro immediately realized what the spell Clementine was going to use was. The Demon taught all of his children ways to somehow overwhelm their opponent. Not in actual power, but in apparent power. He showed them ways to seem far more powerful than they actually were by actively creating spells for them that were big and flashy but were simple to create and didn't take too much mana to activate.
And the one that Clementine was making use of was exactly one of those spells. Honestly, it really wasn't all too powerful in itself. It would make enemies hit by it wet, and maybe bruise them a little. Maybe if Eiro used it with a lot of mana he would be able to kill someone, but it was really quite unnecessary to use this sort of spell. It was really just there to be flashy, and that was it.
Soon, Clementine finished the Magic Circle in front of her and tapped the center with her staff. The air itself seemed to suddenly start waving around like water. Ripples that were running vertically through the air were creating a large wall. That wall absorbed the water that Eiro and Nelli prepared for Clementine, and created the truly 'flashy' part of this spell.
Out of the center of those vertical ripples came a snout. And then a head. And then a lengthy, snake-like body. It was a large mass of water using every last drop that was prepared for Clementine, in the shape of a sort of lesser-dragon that was known to reign over many large bodies of water. Whether it be the oceans or even large lakes.
It was a 'Sea Serpent', floating through the air as if swimming in it, and moving throughout the whole arena.
The Sea Serpent floated around there for a few more moments, and stopped right behind Clementine as if it was a living creature directly under her control. The audience applauded louder than they did with any of the other performances, as the Sea Serpent slowly fell apart. The water it was made of was of magical nature after all. Usually it would just fall to the ground and create a large puddle, but that would be a bother here, so Eiro took the liberty to pull the leftover bits of his mana in the water that it was created with and made sure that everything worked out without any lasting damages to the arena.
Clementine waved at Eiro with a broad smile as she joined her group again, and the announcer soon spoke up again.
"What a tremendously amazing show that was! It seems like this year, we have quite a few talents in the Magic Division! But now, give it up for the Physical Combat division! Instead of having simple demonstrations like with the Magic Division, to show everyone's prowess even better, we will be having 5 separate duels between the students, chosen specifically to help them bring out their power to the greatest extend possible!"
"Oh, so that's how that works? Do you know who Arc is fighting against?" Eiro inquired as he turned his head toward James, while everything was being prepared for those five duels. James thought for a moment and looked at the 10 students that were coming out into the arena now, before seemingly remembering, "Ah, right... That one's a piece of real work, I'll tell you. He's a kid, so I'm not going to insult him, but if he was an adult... Well, let's just say I wouldn't hesitate to call him out on his bullshit immediately."
"What's so bad about that kid, then?" Eiro asked surprised, and James scratched the back of his head, "It's the one with the metal bands in his hair. Just look at him." James pointed out, and Eiro glanced over at him and noticed what the issue was immediately, "Ah, of course... I get what you mean."
That kid was carrying himself as if he was undefeatable, the King of this world. He was rather tall and seemed quite fit, sure, but the weapon that he was going to use was clearly not meant for him in the slightest. It just seemed... Off completely. It was an incredibly large greatsword, something that looked cool to use, but was hard to actually make proper use of, especially considering that the kid seemed rather thin.
He didn't have the build to use a heavy weapon, it was likely that it was going to swing him around rather than him swinging it around. But nonetheless, he seemed like he felt he would never ever lose a fight.
Well, there's no way that Arc would ever lose to a kid like that.
