The Minister suddenly had a bad premonition, he abruptly turned around to see Vincent, just to catch a glimpse of the Trident Marshal, grinning at him, it was almost unnoticeable as it lasted less than a second, so the Minister even doubted it actually happened.
'I must be seeing things, whatever the case, with the trump card I prepared for Walford, even the crowned prince shouldn't be able to win outpower him at least for six minutes', thought the Minister.
Back at the maze, Daimon whose body was covered in lightning kept advancing through the corridors without stopping, but then he reached a dead end in which he was forced to go through one of the wooden doors.
"That old bastard must have done it so every certain distance you have to enter a door at least", said Daimon to himself.
He dissipated his boosting spell and then opened he door, for Daimon it was as if time stopped, he saw in slow motion a large spike of metal coming at him, aiming at the right side of the chest.
Daimon smirked, the traps from the Minister were thought to harm or incapacitate but not kill, taking as a base the strength of the stronger participant, in this case the unit of measure was the crowned prince, in other words a middle-ranked Mage Lord, if converted to a Knight Lord, the spike had around 25 tons of strength behind, while Daimon's current physical strength was of 40 tons.
Under the surprised eyes of the spectators Daimon's hand blurred and then the next thing they saw, was that he grabbed the metal spike on the air, just in time to stop it from piercing his chest.
Daimon then jumped int the room, his eyes behind his mask glowed, in a second he located all the shooting points, from where the arrows that were the trap set up in this room, will be coming.
"Ding-Ding-Ding!", small metallic sounds echoed through the room as Daimon advanced through it, he used the metal spike to smack away the arrows all the way to the exit, normally a person would take three minutes to surpass this trap and yet Daimon did it in less than one.
Needles to say but the spectators were dumbfounded at the scene that unfolded in front of their eyes a few seconds ago.
"W-What the hell, he caught the spike on the air, even if he is a knight, how strong is that guy!".
"Forget about the spike, how good are his reflexes for him to fend off against all those arrows while moving, he didn't use a defensive martial art or an, spell!".
And similar comments could be heard coming from the different participants, as for the adults who actually managed to see Daimon's hand moving at an insane speed for a member of the younger generation, frowned, there were bets involving the results of the tournament, and so the information brokers sold the data of the participants who outstood so far.
Daimon was listed as a black horse from the beast hunt, but his battle prowess prediction was the early stage of the Lord realm, which made him weaker than the crowned prince and Lance, and equal to Walford or Ezequiel.
Oblivious to the effect that his infinity eyes combined with the explosive strength of forty tons he had, Daimon kept advancing towards the northeast, though the Minister mentioned that they will be split randomly, Daimon was willing to bet that the old bastard played some tricks, meaning that his team mates should have spread through the whole maze, to make things harder for him.
"Unfortunately, you had to do the same with others, and placed all your hopes in the captain of the team, bad move old man", mumbled Daimon, he arrived just in time to see three people fighting.
…
"What the hell are you doing, aren't you an ice affinity knight, what do you mean with I can't approach her!", a sportsy man with a black armor punched the ground and an earth wall raised to protect him, but it didn't last long before the wall was blown away due to an explosion of bright orange fire.
"Shit, what's up with this fire, I'm getting burned through my battle aura!", shouted a member of Walford's team, just as Walford he is a member of the Arcarius, and an ice affinity knight, and here he was being suppressed by a fire mage and a slim fragile looking girl on top of that.
"Humph, this ice is trash, Lili's ice is stronger than steel, a wall of earth is nothing, burn and go to hell", a mellow and lively voice which didn't match with the harsh words it was saying, came from within a curtain of fire,
"Feather Massacre, Fiery Blossom", with Leslie's fairy like voice, the ground around lit up in orange light and then fire raised from below blowing everything in twenty meters away.
"Aghhhh!", the two guys were taken by surprise and both were hit by the fire explosion, when it ended both of them collapsed on the ground, their hairs were gone and their clothes were burnt as well as their skins.
The curtain of fire disappeared and Leslie who was using her metal spiked fan came out of it, then without stealing another glance at the enemies she just defeated, she proposed to leave but, she felt a familiar sensation in the mana circuits of her back, and turned around just to see Daimon arriving.
The fierceness that was invading her earlier immediately dispelled, she smiled and then approached Daimon.
"You saw it right, what do you think I eliminated two at the same time, I'll soon be able to challenge Lili~".
Daimon chuckled, maybe it was due to the explosive nature of fire, but when using her wings Leslie became quite fierce, unless he was around or if she used his mana to form the wings, but the amount of mana they could get from him was limited and Leslie wasn't going to waste it with these nobodies, so she just used a bit of the time of her regular wings… or the life-saving array would have immediately activated earlier, since Leslie turned some of the pirates and Skelefiends into ashes back then at the beast hunt.
"Sure, sure, our little Leslie has gotten "hotter", jokingly said Daimon, which made Leslie blush, she then looked at her chest which has developed a bit more thanks to the potions her mother handed her, and she looked away.
"What little, it might be a couple of months but I am older than you", she mumbled.
"Which part of you looks older than me though", said Daimon as his body exploded in lightning before he started moving again.
Leslie pouted, Daimon was right, the body shape of her race is naturally slim, gracious and elegant, which makes her look younger than her age practically forever, at least that was the case until her mother found a way to "develop" their bodies, the result which could be seen in Veronica were pretty convincing.
'Humph, just you wait, mom told y-you'll drool over me later', she thought, her slim figure was clad in fire and then she followed Daimon, who naturally didn't accelerate too much, so that Leslie could catch up with him.
"You three can feel each other's position right, where are Lili and Yvi?", asked Daimon, as he saw Leslie running next to him.
Daimon saw the slightly bitter expression in Leslie's face and he didn't know whether he should laugh or cry, Leslie cleared her throat and then pointed at her right.
"Yvi is in that direction, I was going to reunite with her, but those two got in my way".
Daimon nodded; he then offered his arm to Leslie before saying.
"Hold onto me tight, I'll accelerate, don't be scared, the lightning won't harm you", Leslie's eyes sparkled, she grabbed Daimon's arm and then she felt a strange tickling sensation in her chest, as her body was covered in lightning along with Daimon's.
Daimon applied more strength into his legs and he nearly tripled his previous speed, he couldn't use his darkness boosting spell, but his lightning could be excused since the outer aspect of Demon Light contains both light and lightning as well as fire.
"Kyaaa!", Leslie wasn't prepared for such a big change in the speed and she nearly let go of Daimon's arm, but her little hands tightened their grip on it.
Daimon saw the stubborn expression on Leslie's face and he chuckled, she might be an energetic and even a bit clumsy girl, but her determination is no joke.
Outside of the maze, the spectators were going crazy right now, they saw a little girl who isn't even an official of her team, easily destroy two enemies in a matter of minutes, and that was only because the other party was oriented to defense and even counted with a knight, if that wasn't the case, they would have lasted even less.
"None of them are at the middle stage of the Mortal realm… but still how can there be that much of a gap", whispered some people in the public.
The Risha sisters were now all at the three-star mage realm, thanks to the resources Daimon gave them prior to entering the magic ruin, Liliana even managed to get to the middle stage, being just one lesser realm lower than Aisha, the average for the regular members of the top four teams, is around the seventh- or eighth-star mage realm, which means that using her wings, Leslie didn't take a few minutes to defeat someone with a realm twice as hers.
It made sense though, even if it had a time limit, Daimon classified them as early-stage Mage Lords when using their wings, if they added his mana their elements became strong enough to kill middle stage Lord ranks, unfortunately it was just an increase in the strength of their spells and elements not an overall boost, unlike his Core Synchrony which makes it as if he has trained and advanced, considering he even gets a Manifestation Phenomenon, while they don't.
At the judge's skybox, the face of the Minister was frowned, the same applied to the Blackfin Duke, since the guys who got their asses handed a moment ago, were members of their grandson and son respectively.
"A team full of vice-captains, I wonder how much will those sheep last when a pack of tigers is loose in a closed space with them~", playfully said the queen as she took a sip of a cup of tea.
Leaving that aside, Daimon and Leslie were dashing through the maze, Daimon suddenly jumped at the left and avoided falling on a trap door that opened on the floor, he also punched with his left arm stopped a log that swung which hanged from the ceiling and was swung at him, though a door that opened on the wall.
The purpose of the trap was to give the participants a fall sense of relief if he avoided the trap door, just to be hit by the log and thrown into the trap door anyway, but it didn't work.
A bit unwillingly, Leslie let go of Daimon's arm and they entered on the door at the left of them, and both were met by a light blue frozen world and a harsh decrease on the temperature.
"Ice Blade, Pierce", Liliana's cold voice made its way to Daimon's ears, Liliana thrusted her rapier frontwards and a large ice spike was condensed from the tip of the rapier.
"Booom!", the ice spike clashed against a large sized ice cube and pierced through it, destroying it on the spot.
"Aghhh!", once the ice cube was destroyed a pained sound came from within it, and the life-saving array activated, the remains of the ice cube were pushed aside to show a person whose shoulder was impaled by the ice spike which was still connected to Liliana's rapier.
"W-What the hell, that was my best defensive spell and her ice pierced it just like that… blegh!", the poor guy coughed blood, though the array avoided Liliana's attack from piercing his chest, her ice was still burning his flesh and the impact made his organs shake.
Daimon recognized that guy was one of the crowned prince's soldiers, that being said he was around the ninth star mage realm.
Since the array has activated, the guy was out of the tournament, Liliana sheathed her rapier on the lace that was hanging on her waist and then her ice wings disappeared from her back.
She then turned around and saw Daimon nod in approbation, and her face turned red as an apple.
"You three should use my mana if you can't control your emotions without me around you know?", said Daimon.
But the two sisters shook their heads, the shyness slowly disappeared from Liliana's face and she recovered her cool before saying.
"No, if we were to run out of it and then clash with their vice-captains, we will win for a very small difference using our mana for the wings".
'Besides I only get shy if I think of you now', she thought to herself.
"Ahem, let's move on, Yvi is ahead of us, she has been stuck for more than five minutes, so she should be up against at least six opponents including a decently strong one", said Liliana.
Leslie laughed at her sister and then she grabbed Daimon's arm, which took Liliana by surprise, her eyes gazed at Daimon with expectance, until he made the same offer to her.
"Be careful to not slip", said Daimon.
"Mm", though Liliana kept her cool, a slight reddish tone appeared on her pretty face as she held onto Daimon's arm, they then became a flash of purple light and left the room.
