Chapter 5-School arc deserves a tournament

Itachi made his way into the tournament ground filled with all the other students. Most of them just watching the fights while the ones confident in their strength were competing. Most of the participants were seniors since they naturally had the best chances with a few freshman other than Itachi competing to improve not really expecting to win.

Most participants were elements that at least had some destructive capability such as fire, ice, or earth. Not many people of light and water elements participated since any attacks they could do at the novice level would not be very destructive and fighting purely defensive wasn't a good battle plan unless you expected the opponent to faint from exhaustion

While Bo city wasn't the largest the school had a solid number of students. Averaging 120 for every grade it was not to be looked down upon as a good chunk of seniors already unlocked a 3rd tier magic. He doubted anyone had mid tier magic, but even if they did it would probably be Mu Ning xue only, and he was still confident in beating her with just the fire element and at the absolute worst he might have to add his top grade spiritual seed which should destroy her low level mid tier ice spells.

As he walked behind he received a few nods and many glances looking his way. He was considered as the most talented freshman of the school with Mu Bai being a close second. Freshman already being at the second level of novice magic was very rare, so he was hailed as a prodigy much to the shock of his father and many others who knew his poor background.

He checked in and took a quick look at the bracket. Seeing he was facing some unremarkable 2nd year earth mage he figured it would be a pretty easy match. At worst the defensive turtle would hide in its shell and he would have to throw magic at him until he concedes.

The principal took the stage, an older man who was apparently was a high tier earth mage with the fire element and water element being at mid tier. "welcome to all those have come. Now those competing should already have their brackets to know when they are competing. Also as you all are aware the winner will gain the right to cultivate in he holy spring for three days as well as a secret award. Top four will get some cultivation resources that can help increase your magical supply. Fight hard to increase your strength and we will see who takes home the prize

Cultivating a bit Itachi finally got up and walked down to the arena after he heard his name called. While quite a few people were watching, there were 2 other arenas going on at the same time to reduce time for the tournament. Looking at the opponent a medium height kid with black hair already at the other side he internally smirked a bit 'well give it your best shot champ' he thought.

Without any delay the referee counted down and the match subsequently started. He pleasantly surprised that the boy opposite used earth wave movement spells to position himself into a good attack position instead of going into a long winded chunni speech about how I should prevent myself from getting hurt. He decided to not hurt the boy too badly since he was not yet infected with arrogant Chinese mc syndrome and he should be lenient on the boy.

Standing there to see what he could offer Itachi sighed when the opponent threw a wall of mud at him. While he understood there was not many attack options with the earth element he still didn't understand how this would effect him too much. Unless you are a clean freak who would faint at the thought of getting mud on your clothes it would be hard to do any damage.

Besides that itachi quickly jumped over the two meter wave flipping over the wave as he got exclamations from the crowd at his skilled acrobatics. The opponent startled at this tried to throw a few rocks at him using earth magic, but they were practically in slow motion and even a normal human wouldn't have too much trouble dodging the slow attacks, much less Itachi.

Deciding not to delay any farther he quickly used a level 2 ignite as the opponent quickly threw up a frontal earth shield. Jumping to the side with the flame in his hand Itachi threw the condensed fireball into the exposed midsection of the unaware turtle who had effectively blocked his sight with his poor attempt at a defensive move.

Focusing on lowering the heat while increasing the explosive power the opponent was thrown a few meters off his feet hitting the ground unconscious while for the most part he wasn't hurt too badly with some burnt clothes and minor burns the only damage.

His second opponent wasn't too special. Just a physically strong third level wind mage who won his first match by applying wind and speeding around quickly before... punching his opponent? Really?! He won the match quite quickly as the idiotic man went right in for the punch. Itachi sidestepped as he threw the surprised muscle-head to the ground making him submit with an arm-lock.

His third match was actually a good fight with another fire mage who was a senior. They went back and forth a few times shooting ignites at each other with Itachi finally having enough of both of them dodging each-others attacks. As he moved forward he was confident in his ability to dodge any attack before hitting the opponent with a swift counterattack .

He was surprised when the opponent used 3rd level novice magic flame burst proceeding to shoot across the arena towards him. Deciding it was time to reveal his prowess he responded in kind the two different flame burst attacks meeting in the middle of the arena producing a dark explosion of smoke.

Because of the upgrade in stars using minion souls from his lil loach pendant, his fire low tier magic was 2 times as strong. While this isn't enough of a difference to completely obliterate the opponents magic, it noticeably pushed the opponents same move back almost colliding with the him so the explosion occurred much closer to the other fire mage.

As his opponent struggled to get his bearings coughing in the black smoke Itachi's light footsteps of a trained hunter took the opponent by surprise as when he finally saw the dark silhouette through the smoke, it was too late and a highly condensed fireball hit him from the side his half finished spell-work collapsing as the fire mage was violently thrown across the arena from the condensed impact.

As the smoke cleared the audience was stunned to see Itachi standing triumphant over the fire mage senior, and the most shocking of all was his use of 3rd level fire magic. This was a Genius! Not even most 3rd years have 3rd level novice magic proving how difficult attaining the 3rd level is. He is still only 16 and a freshman!

Glancing at the audience many were completely shocked while Mu Bai looked the astonished of all. This guy went from being complete trash in his eyes, to a good rival, and now he even surpassed him. He did not understand this at all. Itachi's cultivation speed was way too fast.

Even though as the most talented of the elite class, he gets the most use of the schools training tools, it still did not explain how he cultivated even faster than him when he should have used the magic training tools that boost his cultivation speed for the same amount of time.

This level placed him on a similar stage to the young miss of the Mu family herself who was arguably a top level prodigy even in those larger cities.

Little did Mu Bai know that Itachi's acceptance at using the tool was just a front to make people less surprised over his cultivation speed making it more believable.

Walking past the stands it was especially awkward when he made contact with the silky white haired senior Mu Ning Xue near the arena. While she was only a year older, she had skipped a grade directly going to her final year of magic high-school.

She was very talented similarly having a evolving spiritual seed for her ice magic, just that it did not evolve as quickly as Itachi's. He estimated that she was either very close to breaking through to mid tier ice magic or she already was one. She would most likely be his final fight as he didn't really remember any dark horses from the series.

Yu Ang would also be here and he was not too sure what to do. It seemed he was destined to face him as this ice mage would be his next opponent. He wasn't sure if preventing Mu Bai from getting horrifically burned would prevent him from joining the black vatican, but he would at least try.If he ever encountered him in the having failed to prevent his change, then he would show no mercy. While he wasn't even close to considering himself a hero of justice, he had no reason to show mercy to any members of this dark group that he met in the future.

Sitting back down in a cultivation pose he agreed that fighting did indeed have a major effect on cultivation. He could already feel his fire element surging as he became much more prepared for his upcoming breakthrough to mid tier than he previously was. Having nothing better to do he continued as the the competition closed down onto the finals.

There were only 4 people left including him, Mu Ning Xue, Yu Ang Along with a talented fire senior who's control and casting could be said to be much better than the previous Itachi had faced as he most likely was very close to breaking through into mid tier .

As he waited for the start of his match he prepared to watch the match between Mu Ning Xue and the talented fire mage. While Mu Ning Xues was a very strong ice mage fire was a natural counter and he didn't think she would have an easy victory.

Sure enough after a few opening attacks Mu Ning Xues 3rd level ice magic blizzard was fiercely met with the opponents flame burst. After a few moments of struggle Mu Ning Xue was forced to leap aside as her magic was overpowered by the fierce third level fire magic that shot past her fiercely colliding against the wall of the arena.

Many others started thinking it was going to be her loss as the flame burst was a good counter to blizzard, but Itachi knew she wasn't going to lose too easily. Sure enough she seemed to concentrate very hard for a few seconds as the opponent was seemingly catching his breath from the intense collision.

Suddenly Ice blue chains sprang out from the grounds completely catching the opponent unaware. Recognizing this as mid tier ice magic: Ice chains the audience was stunned. Mu Ning xue was probably the youngest in the senior class, yet she was the first one to breakthrough to mid tier.

Stepping off the stage she stared down at Itachi with a somewhat challenging light in her eyes, but there was a hint of sadness as well. Ever since that brief meeting on the ridge she had yet to talk to Itachi again even though they occasionally passed each other in the halls.

Refusing to look at her Itachi jumped down making his way over to the already sneering Yu Ang.

*SIGH

'And we have the first victim of chunni syndrome. Not injuring him severely is going to be more difficult than I thought'

"What do we have here? The poor drivers son. Maybe if you step down I'll let your father keep his job as our personal slave." Yu Ang said loudly earning glares from many people throughout the arena. Itachi was quite well liked despite his cold personality and the way Yu Ang said this made him look like a stereotypical villain. Itachi said nothing as he mentally rehearsed inside his head that being a asshole is not punishable by death and he shouldn't kill him.

Yu ang taking his silence as fear quickly said again " You should have stuck with the little kids, so you don't get hurt" Itachi again said nothing annoyed at his stupid remarks. If your going to insult me, at least say something intelligent. Thats the least you can do he thought and the ref getting tired of this bs asked if they were ready before starting countdown to start the match .

Yu Ang started off the match with his strongest attack the wide range ice magic blizzard as he tried to prevent me casting Fire Blast. Having none of that itachi shot a low powered flame blast onto the field in front of him creating a wall of fire creating a barrier instead of directly attacking. Yu ang seeing his attack had no effect on the fire wall started making ice spears in his hands as he threw them towards Itachi. Hoping the condensed ice could break through his fire barrier.

Itachi who was legitimately insulted his opponent thought that would do anything lowered the barrier as he caught the carelessly thrown ice spears that would have missed in the first place if it wasn't for Itachi moving to catch them. Itachi then quickly brought up a flame burst full power cutting straight through his opponents last second blizzard he had thrown up. Realizing he was in trouble Yu Ang quickly jumped out of the way with the help of his magic gear boots of course completely forgetting about the special properties of flame burst.

Activating the ability the hungry flames burst out in a sharp 90 degree turn before exploding heavily on Yu Ang. Knowing he most likely had armor on Itachi moved forward before he could recover to use a pretty special attack he had been experimenting that is not shown very well in the show. While they do show the ability to have flames come out of many different parts they do not show the full extent of it.

You could cover your arm or leg in fire and if you have good enough control, it won't burn your clothes. It increases the strength of the attacks along with adding a burning effect. Using somewhat of an explosion of fire to propel his kicks combined with his strong physical strength as a result of 3x more magic than others, Itachi's strong kicks could even shatter some rocks.

While uncommon for this world of magic, he also did some physical training further increasing his bodies potential for strength. While he wouldn't call himself bulky his muscles were very well defined. His lean muscular body could produce surprising force strong enough that if he was back home, he would be champion in pretty much any type of martial arts he tried skilled at it or not just because of his strength along. He was very excited for space mid tier so he could control gravity, so he could do some gravity training.

Anyway Itachi advanced quickly through the black smoke he had intentionally created using his fire to obstruct his opponents view similar to what he did against the fire senior he faced. He found his opponent struggling to stand up as his shining silver armor showed off his brilliance.

Before he could even react I dashed up covering my entire right leg in fire muttering "I hope this doesn't kill him before Itachi brought his solid magic enhanced leg straight into the opponents torso with so much force he he flew back a 3 meters before promptly hitting his head on the ground and falling unconscious.

The referee seeing this quickly called the match as cheers rang throughout the arena. The way Itachi covered his body with was like a motivation to many students as although it was not unheard of, it was not very common to do, but Itachi showing off his magic combined physical attacks made everyone tempted to copy. He was impatient to start the match, but he would let Mu Ning Xue recover her spent magic as not everyone has as freakish magical recovery ability as him.

Soon the allotted time as the two opponents met at the stage. Their eyes met and for a few seconds they didn't say anything. Itachi bored of stand off this proceeded to throw out casually "Wow, its been a while since we talked huh? Hows it going?" Mu Ning Xue glared at him "You seem to be the one uninterested in talking" she said remembering the few attempts of communication she had made at school where he either ignored her or responded with one word replies before leaving.

"You seem to be as talented as me almost on track to become a mid tier mage at 17" She said superiorly as she planned to go all out to win this match. Itachi deigned to answer as the countdown began to start the match.

Leaping off the start she sent a blizzard towards him which he countered with flame burst before she leapt to the side rapidly casting ice smear sending waves of ice dancing across the ground threatening to trap Itachi. His upgraded novice tier magic however, was easily able stop those by simply throwing a few ignites.

Despite her being a mid tier mage making her novice tier casting much quicker than Itachi, his high control combined with his recovery speed made sure his spam attacks could match hers with little trouble. As the match grew more intense, he could tell she was preparing to go all out.

Sure enough after a barrage of low tier magic she dashed around him before suddenly the icy chains sprang out from beside her shooting out rapidly towards Itachi. Deciding it would be best to just go all out suddenly his flames turned a dark blue as a flame burst completely annihilated the ice chains shooing towards him.

His current attack was almost 8 times stronger than a normal flame burst and the ice chains while strong were already at an element disadvantage, so the sudden 4x increase in fire power left Mu Ning Xue helpless as the blue fire shot towards her.

She desperately activated her magic boots to jump to the side as she casted blizzard to try to decrease the damage of the attack. She was partly successful but it still burst out as Itachi quickly lowered the heat inside the fire so she was not burnt too badly as she was blown into the wall by the explosive force behind the blow before shakily standing up after a few moments proceeding to signal to the ref in surrender. Recovering for a moment she walked up to Itachi before asking the question everyone wanted to know "Mo Fan what was that blue flame you just used"

Deciding to lie about how he got it and the fact it would evolve he proceeded to explain how one day when he was practicing in the woods he came across a dark blue flame springing out of the ground. He said he put his fire covered hand inside it and he absorbed the blue flame greatly increasing his magic damage.

Most of the audience looked enviously at him cursing his luck. He came across an expensive flame spirit just by walking around into the woods. Judging by the power behind the blow, it was quite a powerful spiritual grade seed maybe even a high grade one. Right after his explanation the school chairmen along with the principal walked onto the ground.