Humility

Colonel Riverdon let out a rare smile as he took in the scene on the fighting platform, and decisively stood up to leave. But this was something that not even the professors who were seated near him had the time to notice.

All of them now had their eyes wide open, staring blankly at the fighting platform where the fight just ended.

Other than the two on the other fight platform, everyone had their eyes darting repeatedly between Adrian and Kyle, as if trying to confirm that their eyes were not playing tricks on them.

What kind of turnaround was this?

Elise was the first to start clapping her hands, before a few people around her followed. The soft and sporadic claps gradually grew into a thunderous applause as it spread throughout the courtyard, inducing cheers from all the audience.

Not everyone fully understood what happened in that final exchange, but they were impressed all the same.

Adrian closed his eyes and took a deep breath to relish in the applause. He could feel the envy and idolisation coming from his peers among the audience, and he especially enjoyed that feeling of superiority.

In fact, he was enjoying the moment so much that he had even temporarily forgotten about the pain in his arms.

A warm white light shone upon both Adrian, and that was when he noticed the difference it made to his arms. At the same time, he also realised that he had been too obvious in his actions.

In order to build on his reputation, he ought to have immediately walked over to Kyle and said some humble words. Perhaps something like 'I simply got lucky' would have sufficed.

He took a mental note not to make the same mistake again next time, before walking over to Kyle who was getting up after similarly being healed by Professor Xen's healing magic.

"I got lucky. You almost got me there," Adrian stretched his hand out for a handshake.

His timing was a little late, but it was still better than not saying it.

Kyle gave a wry smile as he took Adrian's hand, "that was impressive. I had no answers to it."

Adrian simply smiled in response.

There was no need for more pleasantries. While it was good to be humble, he still needed to show that he was in control, even if it was just an illusion and he was not in as much control as others thought.

After all, even though people admired the humble, Adrian believed that strength was still the one thing that mattered most.

Just as they were shaking their hands, the match on the other fighting platform was coming to an end as well.

Having to face the one who defeated Henrik, the Sand Academy apprentice was mentally shaken from the start. This caused his concentration to waver and performance during the match to drop.

While Sam might have been able to win regardless, this made things a little easier for him, clinching the victory for a ticket to the finals.

As he was announced the victor, Sam quickly turned around to return Adrian's gaze.

Seeing the smile on his friend's face, Sam no longer had to wonder about who he would be going up against in the next round.

"I can't believe it! Both of them are in the finals!" Elise slapped Daemon's thighs repeatedly in excitement.

"Ouch! Stop!" Daemon hurriedly blocked the Elise's hand after a few hits. "But yea, those two really are amazing."

"Look at them staring at each other up there! How I wish I could be in their positions!" Elise let out a sigh of helplessness after Daemon held down her hands.

"You are probably not the only one here who envies them," Daemon nodded, sharing her sentiments as well.

Adrian took the mana potion provided and drank it while carefully circulating his mana. While a mana potion was meant to replenish a certain amount of mana for an individual, if the individual did not process the mana potion internally, the potion would not be able to hit its maximum efficiency.

At their level, a mana potion was definitely sufficient to completely fill up their mana reserve, but Adrian did not want to cultivate the habit of not processing the mana potion properly.

This way, when he needed to tap on the full effect of mana potions in the future, it would come naturally to him without the least of efforts.

So, one could be said that this was a form of training as well.

Even before Adrian had finished his potion, Sam was already starting to make his way up onto the fighting platform.

Adrian did not say a word as he finished up the mana potion and followed Sam up.

The two stood around ten metres apart and locked eyes from that distance, both of them burning with the thirst for victory.

They were friends, but that did not matter at this moment. Both of them were intending to try their hardest in order to achieve victory at the expense of the other party.

Professor Xen sensed the tension in the air, and smiled in satisfaction.

"This will be the final round. The victor between you two will be the overall champion in this year's ranking tournament. I don't think you need me to tell you this, but do try your best. Now, let the fight begin!" Professor Xen announced.

Without a moment's delay, Adrian immediately leapt backwards and tried to call forth his Spiritual Aura to create the pressure he used to defeat Kyle with.

Eh? It's not working?

While Adrian could still materialise his Spiritual Aura in preparation for a burst attack, he simply could not stretch his Spiritual Aura out to reach Sam in order to apply pressure.

This unexpected situation caused him to lose his cool for a moment, but it was only for a moment.

Adrian understood that he had only gotten lucky previously, so it was not surprising that he was not able to easily replicate the same move.

However, he still believed that his chances of winning were extremely high.

After all, up to now, Kyle had been the only one who was able to completely evade his Spiritual Aura bursts.

Just as he prepared to fire off his first shot, a huge explosion occurred in front of him.

Adrian had yet to do anything, so the cause of the explosion could only be Sam.

Adrian squinted to carefully observe the black cloud of smoke in front of him, ready to fire at anyone who emerged, but saw no movement.

His spiritual sense spread out immediately after, enveloping the entire cloud of smoke.

Just as he managed to lock onto his opponent's figure hiding within the smoke, Sam rushed straight out towards him with both his fists burning with raging flames.

Spiritual Aura burst!

Just as Adrian thought he had it in the bag, Sam swung his right fist forward.

Bang-!

The second explosion of the match occurred as Sam's flaming fist seemed to have struck an invisible wall in front of him.

Adrian was shocked. This was the first time that someone had actually blocked this attack of his!

And it was not just Adrian who was shocked by this scene.

The professors present, including Professor Xen, felt like they were on a rollercoaster while watching these last few matches.

When they believed that Henrik would defeat Sam, the latter decisively forced a completely one-sided exchange in order to pave the way for his win.

When they believe that Kyle had won the fight, Adrian came back from behind and surprisingly took the win with an inhuman display of talent in Spiritual Aura control.

When they believed that Sam had no way to evade Adrian's Spiritual Aura bursts and would lose without being able to do anything from the start, he actually managed to block the attack with an attack of his own?

How was this even possible?

"Did this Sam manage to form his own Spiritual Aura as well?" the professor from Sand Academy abruptly rose from his seat in agitation.

"That does not seem to be the case," Professor Lenington knitted his eyebrows in deep contemplation.

"Then how is he able to read the trajectory of his opponent's Spiritual Aura?"

"That…I do not know…" Professor Lenington could only admit in embarrassment.

Yes, embarrassment.

The two participants fighting for the top place in the ranking tournament were both apprentices from his Gryphon Academy. Yet despite that, he, as a professor, actually had no idea about the capabilities of these two talents.

This could also imply that their current standings were the results of the apprentices' own talents or hard work, and that the professors did little to help bring out these fighting capabilities.

Even Professor Xen, as one of the figures heading a school of his own within the prestigious Gryphon Academy, could not understand how Sam managed to do so.

He even let out a slight gasp in surprise when Sam managed to block the Spiritual Aura burst.

A grin hung on Sam's face as he emerged from the smoke once again, punching forward with his flaming left fist.

What are you grinning for, you cocky guy!

Just as Adrian was about to fire off another burst, he saw Sam pull back his fist and ducked to the side.

Sam's act of stopping his attack halfway and dodging away without Adrian doing anything in response might have seemed silly to the majority of the audience, but it set off alarms in Adrian's head.

Had Adrian continued to fire the Spiritual Aura burst as he intended to, he would have completely missed!

How is he doing this? How can he read my attacks so precisely?

Adrian took the opportunity while Sam dodged to the side, and leapt backwards to increase the distance between them.

He immediately followed up with another Spiritual Aura burst.

This time, it hit Sam in the shoulder as he was charging towards Adrian, knocking him back.

Huh? It hit?

Adrian was still intending to continue observing Sam to see how he managed to read his moves, so as to slowly adjust his own attack patterns to bypass Sam's train of thought.

But surprisingly, there was no need to do so.

The expressions on everyone started changing grimly as the next few hits struck Sam as well, knocking him further and further away from Adrian.

Sam flailed his flaming fists around in a struggle to block the invisible attacks, but it was all in vain.

Finally, Sam was knocked down.

Nobody knew what to think at the moment when Professor Xen announced Adrian's victory.

With the kind of start that Sam had, everyone thought they would be in for an exciting finish to the ranking tournament. Who would have thought that it would end in such an anti-climactic manner?

If so, what was that at the start?

"Was that a lucky block?" Professor Lenington thought out loud.

"Seems like it. Looks like we read too much into it," the Sand Academy professor had already sat back down in his seat, calmly sipping on his glass of water.

Professor Lenington let out a deep breath of relief upon hearing that.

Sam was an apprentice at his academy, so he knew it was wrong of him to think this way. But he had already felt quite overwhelmed by how monstrous this batch of freshmen had been, thus he was genuinely relieved that Sam did not exceed their expectations yet again.

Even so, he could not let his feelings show.

"What a shame. I truly hoped for him to surprise us there."

The other professors had calmed down as well, and merely nodded in response.

Professor Xen flew up to the fighting platform and landed gently beside Sam. With a wave of his hands, both Sam and Adrian were basked in a warm white light.

Even though Adrian did not incur any injuries this round, Professor Xen had still cast a healing spell on him.

There had been too many times where inexperienced fighters injured themselves by simple things such as landing on the wrong foot after their own sharp movements. Even though Adrian did not show any symptoms of pain, Professor Xen would rather not take the chance.

"You fought well, Sam. But it is time to stand," Professor Xen said to Sam who was still lying on the floor after being healed.

"Yes, professor!" Sam hurriedly got to his feet after hearing his voice, before turning to see Adrian approach.

"Hey," Adrian greeted with a smile.

This was the first time they had spoken since they each defeated their opponents to break into the top 4. It had not been present for long, but the tense atmosphere from before had finally lifted.

"You little monster! Are you happy now?" Sam put on an angry face as he glared at Adrian.

"Hahaha, hurry and get off the fighting platform. This is a place for winners," Adrian knew Sam well after interacting with him over the course of one year and knew that Sam was not one who would hold a grudge over losing in a fair competition, and thus Adrian could bring himself to jokingly put down the other party.

"You little monster! I will show you who is boss later!"

But before Sam could turn to leave, Professor Xen grabbed his wrist and brought his arm up high.

"Introducing your runner-up, Sam from the Gryphon Academy!"

Adrian and Sam couldn't help but wince in shock as the powerful voice bellowed through the courtyard, heralding a thunderous applause from the audience. There were even wolf-whistles mixed among the cheers and applause.

Even though Sam was not the eventual victor, he was still ranked above every single participant who was not standing on the fighting platform right now, so the other participants clapped in genuine congratulations.

On top of that, he had always been a person with good social skills, and many in the audiences were his friends. They were the sources of the wolf-whistles.

Professor Xen let the applause continue until it finally died down naturally, then let go of Sam's wrist.

After receiving a verbal cue from the professor, Sam quickly made his way off the fighting platform.

That was when Professor Xen turned to face Adrian.

"And here is your winner. The champion of the freshmen ranking tournament this year is Adrian from Gryphon Academy!"

Adrian smirked as he felt all eyes on him. This was just like when he defeated Kyle earlier.

That's right, strength is still the most important of all! As long as I can continue to grow stronger, today I stand above all my peers, and tomorrow I shall have the empire under my feet!

Adrian quickly snapped out of his daze and adjusted his facial expression just in time, before his smirk turned into a mocking sneer. He almost lost control of himself there.

"You have done well, Adrian. You truly live up to your title as a young genius," Professor Xen laughed heartily.

"Thank you, Professor Xen. It is all thanks to the wise guidance of the professors," Adrian made a short bow.

"Excellent. You are strong, but it is your humility that will carry you far in life. Never forget this feeling," Professor Xen smiled in satisfaction as he received the bow.

"I will not, professor. I will definitely remember for the rest of my life."