This simple looking girl was Haory, the sand girl who he fought against in second elimination round. She was strongest for he had to fight until now. So he had remembered her.
"Fight with all you got. I'll decide based on your performance if I should allow you to choose a spell from academy for free or not. Let the fight begin." The elder announced.
Hearing this Haory, Wille and rest of the disciples became excited. Everyone wanted a spell from the academy as their spell would undoubtedly be stronger than what they were using now.
Hoary was first to react, she chanted her spell and sand appeared around her. This time her spell took only half the time compared to what it took against Max because, this time the ground was not concrete like arena and it helped her conjure up sand from the ground faster.
Wille was an earth element user. He also chanted his spell and an earthen armour covered his body leaving only joints exposed as not to hinder his movements.
Everyone focused more after seeing this matchup. They wanted to see which element will prove to be stronger, Earth or sand.
Hoary chanted another spell and the sand around her took the shape of a giant hand and punched at Wille.
"Hah!"
Wille shouted and punched the ground, his mana poured in the ground and a giant earthen spike came out of ground and punctured the punch in mid-flight.
"Oh, he got a powerful spell." Someone commented.
"Yeah it's powerful however, don't you know that this sand girl's strength doesn't lie in her first attack but the following one." Another one commented.
Swoosh! Swoosh!
Just then, more than a dozen one feet long sharp spikes shot out from the sandy hand and flew toward Wille, intent on turning him into a sieve.
Even after seeing this, Wille's expression didn't change much as he already expected it after watching her fight with Max.
He poured his mana into the ground once more and a two feet thick earth wall appeared in front of him.
Boom!
Sand spikes collided with the earth wall and drilled into it. However, they couldn't pierce through completely.
After the spikes stopped, the earth wall retracted in the ground. However before it could completely disappear in the ground, three one-meter long earth spikes also shot out towards Haory.
"Whoa, casting two spells at the same time. This guy is surprisingly talented."
"Tch, it's not dual casting. After he casted that earth wall for defence, he quickly cast this spell to take her off guard. However, to do this in such a short time, he wasted a lot of his mana" The other guy judged.
"Even so, he is quite talented. Can you do the same even after wasting the same amount of Mana." Another guy sneered.
"Yeah, you are right, I can't do it. But I don't think it'll be enough to tak this sand girl down."
...
Although Haory was surprised as she didn't expect him to be so decisive to not care about mana consumption to launch another attack right after, didn't panic.
If it was before, she might have lost to this sudden attack but after tasting Max punch in the elimination round, she realised that she must have something to defend herself in unexpected situations. Therefore she had conjured up more sand than she normally would and kept one-fourth around her.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Six half a meter long sand spikes shot out from the sand around Haory and crashed into the incoming spikes and turned each other into dust.
After that a few more spikes shot out from the giant sand hand toward Wille.
Willie had exhausted almost all of his mana in his previous attacks as he was only in the initial stage of two-star realm and didn't have high enough mana. Seeing that his final strike had been shot down and more were coming towards him, he raised his hand "I give up."
Swoosh.
Just as he said this, the spikes turned to dust before they could pierce him. Haory then retracted her mana and let the sand merge back in the ground.
'Such control.' The elder was surprised to her control over her element. She then looked at Wille and said "You need to have more dynamic attacking pattern so you won't need to squander your mana in a fight that might decide your life and death. However your talent is good and I like you calm temperament even in midst of battle, I'll allow you to choose one lower-rank middle grade spell from the library." Saying this she tossed a token with one line carved on it. "Show this to elder in charge of the academy's library.
She then looked at Haory "You are performance was good and your elemental control is among the top of your realm. I'll also allow you to choose one spell of the same grade and get 50 more mana stones from the resource hall." She then gave her two token that were to be used in library and resource hall respectively.
Seeing this everyone became even more excited. Although the spell reward was amazing and all, normally every disciple would get to choose a spell for free. Therefore, mana stones were much more lucrative to them.
"Next is Lacron and Max." The elder announced.
Max was expecting his turn to be last like usual therefore he was sitting leisurely with Flavia. Hearing his name called out, he walked to the open area where previous fight was fought.
The other party was a boy, around 20+ years old. He was looking at Max with a murderous look on his face. Max frowned seeing this.
'Does he have some enmity with me? I don't think I've met this guy before.' He wondered before his expression also became serious.
"Begin the battle!" The elder announced.
'Huh?' Max was focusing on Lacron when he suddenly vanished from his sight.
Flavia looked at this and mumbled "Such high agility! This is going to be a tough battle for you." Without her knowing, her fists were clutched as if she was feeling worry. If someone saw this, they would think that she was someone very close to him.
Woosh!
Lacron appeared beside Max and used his hand as a blade to strike at his neck. Although it looked like a normal strike but he had used his wind element and formed a wind blade around his hand.
"Huh?" Elder frowned seeing this. She didn't expect someone to use such deadly attack right at the start and from his demeanor, it didn't seem like he was going to hold back.
However, just as she wanted to save Max. Max's voice sounded. "So you are a wind user. No wonder you are this fast." Saying this, he leaned to his other side to dodge and sent a powerful kick at Lacron's abdomen.
Bang!
Lacron was sure that Max wouldn't be able to dodge his strike however, when he did dodge it, he was stunned for a second and got hit by Max's kick.
"Ugh!" He was heavily struck and was thrown more than ten meters away, spitting out blood. Haory saw this and her abdomen muscles contracted unconsciously.
Flavia stared at this scene wide eyes. She had watched him fight in the elimination rounds and he didn't show that he has such fast reaction and speed. Although she already knew about his physical strength after watching his fight with Earth giant.
Not only Flavia, others who watched him fight previously thought that his agility was barely comparable to any average Two-star mage's so they were surprised to see him dodge such a close strike.
Max didn't stop after kicking him away and conjured a 200 mana point fireball and without hesitation, he shot it at Lacron who was still on the ground coughing up blood.
Max clearly felt his killing intent. If he couldn't dodge his attack, his neck would have been sliced off.
So he wasn't going to show mercy to him. Although he won't be able to find out why he wanted to kill him, that wasn't important anymore.
As for academy's punishment, the elder must have noticed this and it shouldn't be considered killing when they were already spar and in a spar, it was normal to be killed by mistake.
Lacron's eyes widened seeing the fireball inching closer to him at a fast speed and he cursed inwardly 'F.u.c.k.! I shouldn't have tried to kill him.' He could also see what Max was trying to do and why.
