The Fire limb of the girl's Essence Soul moved to hit the prince that had just appeared, but at the last second an ice arm came out of the prince as well, stopping the fire arm.
The girl was too slow to stop the actual attack.
The prince swung with his fire axe, but at the last second stopped. Instead, another white arm flew out from his right, passing through the girl entirely, snuffing out any flames around her.
A chilling cold surrounded the girl immediately and before she could even react, the ice swallowed her, completely freezing her over.
Then, the prince delivered the final kick that sealed the deal. The girl was sent flying far away, where she struck the wall of the barrier, losing the battle.
The prince looked at the axe in his hand and wondered if he should have used it. However, not using it felt like the correct answer here, given that he needed to keep the secret going for at least until the next round.
He couldn't let the people strategize against him for the whole time tomorrow.
He walked back to the hall, quite happy with his performance.
With 2 members of the Blackhawk Academy moving into the Top 16, that was already more than the statistical average number of people that could move onto the Top 16 from the 10 academies.
The teachers were already more than happy with the current scenario, and they still had 3 battles to go, of which they hoped that even more would pass along.
The 7th match took place and then the 8th.
The 8th match included the prince's bodyguard, Hyandus, who once again showed incredible ferocity in his battles. The wind whipped around his opponent, while he himself went in and attacked with his spears.
His Essence soul, a Wind soul that had two spear-like arms also attacked his opponent's light Essence Soul. He managed to defeat his opponent after a rather lengthy back and forth, which now send 3 of the Blackhawk Academy's disciples into the Top 16.
The competition ended for the day, and everyone started leaving the hall. The atmosphere around the students and teacher was quite energetic, as everyone happily walked away.
Even the three that were already knocked out of the competition couldn't help but feel happy seeing how up their school was doing so well.
The headmaster joined them soon and started laughing outside the arena even as the passersby walked away with weird looks in their eyes. His ecstatic laugh made the others feel even better about themselves.
"I can only imagine how much anger those that made a move against us must be feeling right now," the headmaster said, clearly intending for the people that drugged their food to listen to his words.
"To think they helped us find such good students. I should probably go and thank those people."
The other teachers laughed with them as well.
Ning and the rest didn't know how to respond at all, so they just remained quiet and let the teachers laugh for a bit.
"Ning!" a voice called out suddenly. The teachers didn't care, but Ning and a few other students did.
Ning turned around, searching for who was calling him. When he did, his eyes fell on a blue-haired girl that waved at him very enthusiastically.
"Oh!" he was a little surprised to see her here.
"Ooh, a beauty," the prince spoke, but the princess quickly slapped him on the back of the head.
"Stop being a hungry pig whenever you see a girl," she said before looking at Ning. "You know her?"
"Y-yes," Ning said. "She's a friend from back home. I didn't expect her to show up in this place."
"Hehe," Kaleb nudged him on the side with his elbow. "Come on now, don't be shy. Friend, eh? I don't know about that, look at how happy she is at finding you."
"Ning!" the girl shouted again, gesturing him to go to her.
"Invite her over," Tenn said quickly.
"I don't think she wants to," Ning said, not wanting to call her over.
"Tsk," the prince clicked his tongue in response.
The teachers heard the commotion soon and joined in as well. "What's going on?" one of them asked.
"My friend is here to visit me. Is it alright if I go meet with her for a while?" Ning asked.
"Friend?" the headmaster spoke up and look to the side to see the girl that was waiting for him on the other side of the road. "You can go meet her for a while, but make it short."
"It's been nearly a year since I saw her, headmaster. It will need to be a bit longer," Ning said. "How about you guys go ahead? I'll see you all later."
"It's the final day of the competition tomorrow," the headmaster said. "I don't know if I can—"
"I'm just visiting a friend, headmaster," Ning said. "I don't think there's much you have to worry about."
"It should be fine, headmaster," the teacher Hayan said. "He's worked hard. Let him meet his friend for now."
The headmaster thought for a while and sighed. "Fine! Go meet up with her," he said. "You can take your time, but no more than 2 hours. I want you back by 8 when we have dinner."
"Yes, headmaster," Ning said with a small smile.
"Also, every hour that you are late, I will remove the rewards that I said I will give. Since you got 2, if you're late you won't get any," the headmaster said.
Ning frowned a little hearing that. "Alright," he said. "I'll be back in time."
"Good, you can go now," the headmaster said.
Ning didn't like the headmaster's words, but at least he left him to go. He walked away and crossed the road, arriving in front of the blue-haired girl who excitedly went in and hugged him.
Ning was a little surprised, not knowing what to do.
"Hug me back," the girl whispered.
"Okay," he said and hugged her back. "It's good to see you too, Sophie."
