The entire was silent, the people were too overwhelmed to speak.
Until someone broke the silence, speaking out what everyone else is thinking.
"Am I seeing this right?"
Benedict lay on the ground, unconscious, the floor behind both him and his opponent had caved in immensely, but the opponent didn't even seem affected.
That comment woke up the people, and a commotion grew.
"Who is that person?"
"He won against Benedict so easily! He has to be from the top clans or somewhere close"
The spectacle maker was having different thoughts.
Ezra looked at Benedict on the floor, nodding in appreciation.
'He's good'
It was understandable why Benedict was fourth place.
Ezra body was cleansed of impurities by adept rank, boosting his musculature by an inestimable amount, and that amount only increased as he flourished to higher ranks.
His obsessive and consistent training refined it even further, boosting his reflex speed and combat instincts.
Not to mention his unbelievable mana quality and the size of his mana pool, and then, the elixirs and herbs from Bard augmenting his already insane capabilities.
Then, his breakthrough to master rank took these things and compounded them.
Right now, Ezra measured his strength to match a late stage master despite being in the early stage.
He knew he could wipe the floor with mid stages, because the head assassin was mid rank, which was why he didn't care for whatever the professors thought of him.
All the more reason Ezra was amazed right now.
'To think he'd push me back'
At the start Ezra used only ten percent of his strength, yet even that proved too much more an Expert in the early stage too overcome.
Guessing this, Ezra laxed, but then, Benedict took him by surprise and managed to push him back by using a secret technique.
It was only one step, but Ezra still thought of it as a major achievement.
'I'll have him show me that technique when he awakes'
He looked to Mr. Milos, who hadn't announced the end of the duel.
Reading his expression, Milos replied. "A duel ends when a challenger either surrenders-making his intent known vocally, or one is knocked unconscious or out of the arena"
"He's unconscious though"
"No, he is very much conscious, only that the use of his last technique has him strained him to his limits"
"Can he still fight?"
"No"
"Then the duel is over"
"Yes…" he says, "I guess it is"
He goes to Benedicts and takes off the crest, and then hands it to Ezra.
"Thank you" Ezra says courteously.
"Not at all, you won it fair and square" he says, stepping backwards before. "I declare the duel over. Winner, Ezra Miller"
The arena went into an uproar.
Boys went:
"Miller? Did he just say Miller? As in the ROYAL FAMILY?"
"That explains it!"
"No wonder he's so strong"
"Right. Right" another nodded.
"But which prince is he? None of the princes I know fit the description"
"Right? I didn't even know we had a prince named Ezra"
"Me too"
"Me three"
"Ezra, Ezra, Ezra…" Someone murmured his name over and over again, until… "I've got it. He's the fourth prince!"
The crowd wen "Ahh!"
Another continued, "Yes, now that you mention it-
"Quit the bravado Kelly, we know you don't know him, you've never seen him before!"
A slap was delivered. "You weasel, why must you think everyone's a dumbass like you"
"What did you say?"
"I was going to say, that I recall his name from my father a few years back. They say he felt mana when he was just three years old"
"What nonsense? You must be-
"It's true, I've heard of him too from my uncle as well. This was eight years ago if I recall correctly"
"…."
The boy was dumbfounded as were many others the more Ezra's identity was uncovered.
The girls went:
"Oh my! He was a prince?"
"Right? How coincidental"
"I did suspect it something with those good looks of his, but never did I think he'd be a prince"
"Yah~ He's totally my type" she turned to other girls. "Say, does anyone know how old he is?"
"Must be at least fifteen with body, right?"
"Yes, should be so. And that silver hair is just gorgeous, if I only I looked like that as well"
"I didn't want to believe it. But this confirms it, the blood of royalty is certainly different"
Ezra facepalmed. Annoyed. 'Why did he have to reveal my full name?'
He simply shrugged off the attention, digging into his ear.
Such level of attention was new to him, but Ezra kept calm as Benedict was carried away for treatment.
"Next challenger!" hollered Mr. Milos.
Umeron, Valencia and Emerson looked at each other.
"Who's going next?"
Both boys pointed- "You"
"What why?"
"We need to cause him as many injuries as possible. Benedict's strategy seemed ineffective, but he must've gotten tired, no matter how effortless he made it seem. Then me and Umeron will finish him in his weakened state"
Umeron spoke right after. "And we'll hand you your crest once we win"
Valencia contemplated, "Okay" then steps into the arena.
Facing Ezra, Milos raises his hand. "Are the challengers ready?"
"Ready" says Valencia.
"Ready" replied Ezra.
The moment he drew his hand down. Valencia backed up while Ezra didn't move.
Stopping eight feet away, Valencia and Ezra stare down.
'Let's see what you can do' says Ezra.
Then, she touches a ring on her right arm's pinky, a small sharp edge shoots out, and she uses to cut the side of her left arm.
As the blood poured out, it coagulated, taking the took form of long thin sword.
Ezra eyes widened. 'A blood mage'
Those with blood affinity were rare, he expected to find one or two at the academy, but this he hadn't expected.
He smiled, "Cool"
"Excuse me?" Valencia raised a brow, taken aback by the sudden compliment.
"It looks cool" Ezra repeated. Looking to his own hands and then the sword.
He sucked back one sword into his space ring, rolling back his sleeves
"What are you-
Ezra cut his left arm at the wrist joint, causing blood to spill.
"Now" he muttered, putting his other palm beneath the pouring blood. "Was it like this?"
It began coagulating.
Valencia was bewildered. 'It couldn't be!'
Oh, but it was.
The blood coagulated and a longsword manifested.
Ezra sucked in the other silver sword into the space ring, and then the longsword became two daggers.
Valencia was in shock, her calm demeanour had evaporated.
"You-You-You-
"Yes, I'm like you. Problem?"
Valencia was silenced.
She looked at her sword, it had a plain surface and no hilt.
Ezra daggers had intricate markings, a hilt, and was blackish red.
'Although his longsword seemed worse than mine'
'Still!'
Annoyance swelled in her heart as she witnessed him do some thing she'd always wanted to try, but always failed-and made it look easy too!
She took a stance.
Voom!
Next moment, she was reaching Ezra.
"How did you do that?!" She slashed vertically, aiming to cut Ezra in half.
She didn't think he'd be that easy, but then…Ezra suddenly disappeared.
She looked behind; he wasn't there.
"Where did he-
A huge force landed on her weapon, faulting her balance.
It was Ezra, he stood on her sword with one leg.
"Do what?" he asked.
Valencia felt she was being mocked and tilted the blade, having Ezra fall to the ground.
"Don't play jokes with me"
She came hard, weaving slashes like a dancer.
Ezra followed up, parrying her weapon.
Too him, she was too slow, he had to restrain himself to match her.
Valencia noticed the difference as well.
'He's predicting my moves in advance!'
She hadn't one hit in.
Most of the audience couldn't make out their actions from the speed the two were moving.
Excepts to the likes of Umeron and Emerson, who watched closely.
They made one solid deduction.
"That guy's a monster"
"Yeah" Umeron nodded.
At some point, Ezra got bored.
'Can't I make things a bit more exciting?'
A thought came to him. Ezra shut down his mana circulation, and then close all the cores.
He immediately became slower, because now, he had but his body capabilities.
Not slow enough for Valencia to surpass, but slow enough to make things dangerous, or otherwise exciting.
He started putting his back into the attacks, twirling both daggers as he clashed with Valencia-who felt the change immediately.
'He's slower'
'The strength behind the attacks also reduced'
Her confidence was boosted.
'If it's like this, I can win'
Big mistake, Ezra sped up to her, and because her focus was elsewhere, her response was a few seconds late.
'Shit!'
She sought to back up, giving more opening to exploit.
Ezra didn't hesitate.
The twin daggers coalesced into long sword, and then…Shin!
Her left arm was severed.
A loud gasp came from the audience.
Valencia on the other hand didn't even muffle, much less groan as her arm was held on by the connection of blood as she backed up.
She could have a comeback, but Ezra didn't give her chance, with his sword at her neck.
"Surrender"
She was frustrated, but could only sigh in defeat. "I surrender"
She reattached her arm, well, held it in place with blood.
"The challenger has surrendered. Winner, Ezra Miller"
This time the audience shouted in joy.
"Did you see that?"
"They moved so fast I got dizzy"
"That's Experts for you"
Valencia huffed down her regret. Looking into Ezra's eyes. "Where did learn to wield blood like that?"
Ezra shrugged. "Nowhere, I taught myself"
She stared at him with a 'You don't really expect me to believe that, do you?' look.
"What's your affinity rank?"
"B"
"Oh? I'm A rank"
"Good for you then"
Right then, Milos sent her out of the arena and asked the next challenger to step forward.
Emerson came on without any weapons and a lose cloth.
The third round quickly went underway.
