53 Match Resumed

When the new set of players from both Ravenville and Magnolia finally came out on to the field, the few college students who'd been watching the game all raised their heads to look at the new list of participants of the match.

As supporters who had even come to watch a simple sparring match of their school team, obviously many of them were rather knowledgeable regarding their team's roster.

And from all the lines of numbers and names on both sides of the monitor, the Magnolia students' attentions were currently attracted towards the active list of their own school's team.

Magnolia had actually substituted several of their starting players as well.

Amongst them were even the Solver, Jade, and also the Second Fielder that had sustained certain amount of damage during the first half of the match.

However,

The more eye-catching thing was the fact that their Captain and Main Fielder, Sylphie Hunter, still stood on the field along with the rest of the newly put in players.

The reason why this attracted much attentions was because even for a more amateur fan of the sport, they would be able to tell that during the entire first half of the match, the player from Magnolia that had exhausted the most stamina would be none other than the said Captain.

Not only had she used up the most of her Ability to charge back and forth, she had always been present in every core battles on the field.

Whispers of speculations began to spread amongst the students who had arrived in groups to the university's stadium.

"Why did they still allow the Captain to play...?"

"Wouldn't it be better to let her rest first before going back in? On the monitor, there's no substitution limit after all--"

"Though, her HP's actually still pretty high."

Many thoughts were let out amongst the local fans.

To be fair, Sylphie's current HP was not actually that bad for her to stay for the rest of the game.

Even before the substitution bell had been rung, she had still managed to retain roughly 67% of her max HP.

Most of that damage towards her had been done by the Ranger Clint Silver instead of the Fielder Dan or Dennis.

But considering she had to withstand the trio's combo of a Ranger and 2 [String] users while chasing after Renee, the fact that her HP was still above two thirds and she still had enough stamina to fight prove what level of player she was more than enything else.

And still, no matter the concerns, the only reason that she could still be in right now meant that Magnolia's Head Coach, Reyner, had approved of her continuation of the game.

Nobody else thought too deeply of it beyond their initial confusions.

.

.

Amongst the center of these scattered groups of students, Rex and Rory had also been giving several of their own observations towards the respective coaches' choices on this selection for the next half of the match.

"They kept Sylphie Hunter on after all." Rory muttered.

"There's probably no other choice... Unfortunately for the current Magnolia, though they're still a strong team overall, they might lack any other core players to utilize their main weapon, which is their quick attack formation, to its fullest extent." Rex replied.

*nod*

"Now that you mention it, their last batch of 4th years held many of their key players for that formation, great players all of them... Two had even gone on to the OPL."

"Yep, if not for that, there would be many other ways to make use of Sylphie Hunter's charge aside from letting their Solvers activate their disablers every single time." Rex concluded.

"On the other hand, Ravenville is..." Rory's voice trailed off at the end.

"--Now that one's something else, alright. Hoho."

On the list of players on Ravenville's side of the screen, Unlike Magnolia, almost every starting players but one had been substituted out to make way for the rest of their 1st string members.

"Only their starting Rear Guard's still there." Rory noted.

"And the two of our Zeta City's prided Starseeds are here as well, finally." Rex pointed with his chin.

On the screen, almost at the bottom of the list were two familiar names:

...

#14 Medea Dormer [Ranger]

#15 Irvine Lang [Solver]

"Nn?"

One little detail immediately caught Rory's attention the moment he saw the end of the list,

"Wait, that's--"

"Most interesting isn't it?" Even Rex with his usually calm composure was slightly intrigued the moment he'd seen it.

Irvine Lang's position in Ravenville was a Solver!

"Didn't he take a Fielder's test during the License Exam?"

"He did." Rex nodded.

"Still, many Fielder's capabilities could become a Solver's strength depending on what kind of playing style you have. With a Gene Mod like [Overload] or [Ghost], becoming a Solver like Renee Morgan isn't entirely impossible with his License Exam results."

At that comment, Rory was brought back to the time Irvine took the highest record after finishing the 1-minute dodge test.

Even though at the end of that exam, there're a few more people with the same 2 hits score as him, for someone who at the time was still a player with Late Stage-1 Physique, such a feat was most impressive.

"Guess we'll see the skills that made them regulars this early. Dormer's as well."

.

.

On the field,

Sylphie, along with Magnolia's newly replaced Solver was standing face-to-face against Irvine, Derrick, and Naomi who were positioned slightly within Ravenville's side of the field.

Beside them was exactly the building containing their first tower that stood almost attached to another building in front of it.

The reason that they were already standing so close against one another even before the match resumed was because of the rules.

The rules of substitutions dictated that if a player replaced another on the field, they would need to resume the match within the exact same position as where the substituted player left off.

Of course, this rule had certain exceptions including of when a substitution occured during times that the player was in the mid-air or something of similar nature.

But basically, when the bell of substitution was called, all the players on the field would have their approximate coordinates marked for them to begin there when the match resumed.

And when last they left off, Magnolia was in the middle of chasing back their 2nd point and pushing the Ravenville's players back a bit from the halfway line.

Sylphie looked at the numbers and recognized the two players she was currently facing because they've been briefed with the enemy's roster beforehand as well.

Truth be told, she was also rather surprised when she'd first heard that the number #15, the Starseed Irvine Lang was one of Ravenville's Solvers instead of Fielders.

'Irvine Lang...'

But as the time got closer to the resuming of the match, her mind just became filled more and more with how to go past these new enemy players and retake the lead on the game.

'Just play like usual... The Solver will step back into hiding while I move forward to engage!'

Several other players aside from her also became more focused the longer they stood on their place.

The ticking time felt slightly longer just for these few seconds before the game resumed for both Magnolia and Ravenville's players.

And eventually...

[MATCH RESUME]

**DASH**

The sound of the pre-recorded voice marked the signal for several stomping sounds to echo across the field.

Medea who was still in the previous position of Clint that was relatively close to the main battlefield took a couple long steps back into the shadow of an alleyway to disappear.

Unlike the more mid-range style of Clint Silver, her current position was too close for comfort.

Not only her, in an attempt to throw the scent off of her Solver, Sylphie also made a normal dash forward towards Irvine and Derrick to distract their line of sight.

*step* *step*

In several places on the field, both muffled and hurried footsteps could be heard from different players repositioning themselves the moment the game resumed.

.

Noticing the still far from normal speed of Sylphie's charge even without her using [Blast], Derrick quickly intercepted the huge oncoming lance coming towards Irvine with his short staff.

"Ngh...!"

*CLANK* *SCREECH*

The sound of two metallic objects swiping off one another resounded loudly as he tried to parry and redirect the lance outward!

Behind him, Irvine noticed the apparent sluggishness in Sylphie's current move compared to the start of the match.

'She's fatigued...!'

As Derrick got closer to the Magnolia's Captain, the advantage of his short staff become more visible against the huge jousting lance.

One of his hand that was holding the other end of the stick separated for a brief moment before he performed a neck hold with his staff against Sylphie's throat!

At the end of that one exchange, Derrick was already standing back-to-back against her while clenching her neck with the staff in preparation to perform a shoulder throw.

"Got her--"

However,

Even while tired, Sylphie herself was still a top-notch fighter on all accounts.

Before getting caught up further in Derrick's pace, she started twisting her whole body violently counter-clockwise!

*SWISH* *THUNK*

The momentum of the rotation, along with the scraping blow against Derrick's chest armour with the hilt and base of the lance's body inevitably pushed him back while breaking his hold on her.

With that one move, Derrick was knocked back a few paces away.

"Damn..."

In the end, there was still a difference in Muscle Strength between him and a top 3rd year player.

"Hmph!" She gave a rare snort with fiery eyes.

Currently, even though she was more exhausted than the rest of her teammates, Sylphie's concentration was at its peak!

Not wasting any time, she turned back once more to lock onto Irvine who's now behind her, but then.

*whoosh*

Unexpectedly, the target who she thought was still quite a bit away from her was already rushing in front of her face-to-face.

As she turned around, the figure of a dashing number #15 player was already so close to her face that she didn't have the time to do anything else!

"!!"

A Solver was taking the initiative to attack the enemy's Fielder!

*swish* *BOOM!!*

The first attack that was unleashed by Irvine was a straight [Joint Blast] kick towards the knee of Sylphie's pivoting leg!

"Guh...!!"

And it was followed by,

*BAM*

A right hook that was also imbued with an exploding compressed air was reaching towards the head that still had its momentum from turning around.

And in two moves, the Ace Fielder and Captain of Magnolia Thorns-- Was very unexpectedly brought down to her knees!

"""!!!"""

.

It was an unexpected surprise attack following a grapple from Derrick.

Furthermore, the opponent was an already tired main 'contain' target of the match that had been playing from start up to now, going against a player with a yet unknown Ability.

Even if the same scenario were to be tried out one more time towards this still exhausted Sylphie Hunter, Irvine was sure that the end result would've been very different and not be this successful.

But nonetheless.

With that one combination move of him and Derrick, what little crowd that had gathered together inside the large stadium today quickly went dead silent!

.

.

"[Blast]..." Rory mumbled in his surprise.

Beside him, the silent Rex also nodded without turning his head, "A Solver with [Blast]."

"..."

"Good day fellas. Mister Rex."

As each of their thoughts churned, suddenly a casual voice greeted them from behind their backs, added with a more polite sounding tone towards Rex.

Without the two looking back, they'd already recognized the owner of such voice without the slightest need to guess.

But in the end, because they still had to greet the person back, the two representative had no other choice but to formally reply, one more reluctant than the other.

"--Mister Lambert. Good morning to you." Rex turned his head first with a smile, sitting on the seat directly behind Rory who was beside him was John with his usual scruffy bedhair and lazy looks.

"You two should've come find me first when you've arrived, I would've reserved a better seat at least for Mister Smith here." He continued to speak, causing Rory to scrunch up his eyebrows further and retort.

"...The seating's free and we're at the dead center of it. What better seat?"

"Haha."

"Now, now." Rex grimaced and tried to mediate between the two polar opposite persona beside him,

"So-- Irvine Lang is a Solver with [Blast], your school's website has yet to update its roster so it was indeed a nice surprise to see. A very... Interesting combination if I may add my opinion." He spoke.

Usually, all players of a school would have their rather comprehensive data and stats posted publicly on their official site.

This was one of the requirements for them to participate in a public tournament.

But knowing the schedule for the Warrior Crown still had some time before the deadline, not many colleges had finished updating their rosters yet during this 1st week of the new semester.

This situation allowed for the earlier scheduled sparring matches to be filled with more tensions and surprises for the audience when a school were displaying their newfound talents.

Of course, such cases wouldn't really apply towards people working in the industry such as scouts and coaches, since the information of talented players would've already been leaked to some extent.

However, the current surprise held between these two representative of Zeta City's top colleges were leaning more towards the combination of Irvine's position and Gene Mod rather than his combat prowess just now.

.

John simply shrugged at Rex's comment,

"We haven't finished updating the roster yet I guess, maybe the training has been busy, us scouts wouldn't know right?" He turned towards Rory once more for support.

"...Indeed."

"Now then, Mister Rex... why's an Assistant Head Coach like you doing our job today?"

"Hoho, you can ask Mister Smith here for that--"

"--Figure it out yourself." Before Rex could finish his words, Rory had already interrupted the conversation first and put a stop to any further inquiries, causing John to put on a wry smile on his face.

.

.

Back to the scene of the field.

Irvine didn't linger too long to celebrate a well-planned surprise attack that could probably only work this well once.

After Sylphie had been brought to her knee, he was just about to gesture for Naomi who's standing a bit behind to get ready when a message suddenly flowed through his speakers.

[Lang, Wallace, Fletcher. Their Solver's approaching our front tower.]

Medea's voice resounded from the other end.

At first, Irvine didn't quite understand the point of the message.

They'd already known that the Solver would attempt the same thing from before and activated her disabler. All they needed to do now was just focus on pushing Sylphie back since there's no chance for her to go past Baron alone.

If they could successfully drag back Sylphie towards the halfway line, the Solver would have no choice but to retreat or lose all her disabling time eventually.

He was just about to continue with his attacks on Sylphie since the momentum was on his side, but the next message caught him by surprise.

[She's not activating her disabler anymore, their new Second Fielder's with her too.]

'?'