Chapter 94

With a sharp gaze, Zoe launched flying cuts with her katana to intercept the attacks headed her way, but her expression turned grave when she realized they were not enough. She quickly concluded that it was not a three-way clash, but rather three against one.

Seeing her own attack intercepted and two more coming at her, Zoe had no choice but to cover herself with her katana to withstand them with a dark expression on her face, shortly after being blasted backward at high speed.

In the midst of her flight, Zoe ended up crashing into a wall of light that materialized out of nowhere, causing her to let out a groan of pain. But not letting that get to her, she quickly recomposed herself and used the light wall as a platform to propel herself towards the young man who had managed to take the staff and was fleeing the scene at full speed, flying on a sword.

A proud smile appeared on the face of the young man with the sword as several barriers protected him from the spells chasing him, which, despite trembling heavily with each impact, held firm, keeping him safe from the powerful onslaught that filled the air with a burnt and murky smell.

Countless attacks of all kinds struck the barriers covering the young man, who was speeding away from the scene with the help of his flying sword, but suddenly one of the barriers covering him disappeared, taking everyone by surprise.

Almost as if it were timed, the moment the barrier fell, a powerful fire arrow made its way through, which the young man deflected with his sword in haste, but before a smile could form on his face, an invisible arrow reached his chest, causing him to teleport to the station, eliminating him.

The staff, now ownerless, began to free fall towards the ground while all kinds of mana constructions and elemental spells tried to reach it, but just before anyone could, a burst of flames appeared next to the staff, taking the shape of a nine-tailed fox. The fox took the staff in its mouth and shot off in Zoe's direction, catching her in mid-air as it materialized completely, revealing a beautiful white fur with red details on its face and tails.

Immediately after Zoe landed on the fox, several powerful barriers surrounded her, shielding her from a powerful onslaught of spells coming from all directions, so without a second thought, Zoe fled the scene at full speed, quickly reaching her group, who were already ready and flying on all sorts of magical artifacts.

"Switch to full defensive mode, cover our departure as we trained and move to point 3!!!!"

A powerful shout from Elara echoed amidst the group, causing everyone to position themselves in a defensive formation while fleeing at full speed, keeping the white fox in the center and covering any possible attack flank in three dimensions, while Zoe jumped off the fox's back and landed on Elara's flying carpet.

From that moment, the group withstood the horrific onslaught of powerful spells, while Zoe and three other students repelled the knights who got too close to the group. Spending large amounts of mana and stamina in the process, they were left almost totally exhausted within minutes, breathing heavily while doing their best to keep up, drinking recovery potions.

With great effort and dead tired, the group managed to enter a beautiful forest, which was quickly brutally destroyed by the colossal attacks that the group defended with all they had, using the last of their energies. This brought wide smiles to the leaders of the other groups chasing them, who immediately began to think of countermeasures against the other pursuing groups, as those overeager novices were about to fall.

But contrary to what the leaders expected, the expressions on the faces of the group they were chasing did not fill with despair and weariness as expected, but instead, they were filled with smiles as a young woman with short golden hair screamed at the top of her lungs.

"DISPERSE!!!"

With her powerful shout, the group launched spells with all they had left while a thick fog covered them, causing all the others to panic and start firing spells and attacks in all directions to try to stop their escape. But to their surprise, what ended up happening was that many of their spells were reflected, catching some off guard and eliminating them from the tournament.

Meanwhile, those who managed to cover themselves in time avoided that fate, but in exchange, they lost sight of the prey they were about to capture, who used the chaotic mana to hide from their ethereal projections, disappearing into the destroyed foliage of the forest, which quickly filled with fog, completely concealing them.

The pursuing leaders, with irritated expressions on their faces for having lost something they were about to achieve, ordered air spells to be deployed to clear the fog in one fell swoop. But contrary to their expectations, the more air entered the fog, instead of dispersing it, it grew, reaching the point where it almost covered them, putting grave expressions on their faces.

Seeing no other option and to not give time for those in the fog to escape, the pursuers entered the fog, keeping their guard high and extending their ethereal projection to the maximum, in preparation for any stealth attacks.

The stealth attacks, as the pursuers expected, did not delay, and from the moment the fog covered them, they began to fall like rain, coming from all directions, forcing them to defend and counterattack, gathering in a circle to improve their defense.

…

In the meeting room of the space station, the Masters watched with interest the battle displayed on the holographic screens, especially Ryoma, Thalía, Eleonora, and Jessica, who had concentrated looks on their faces, detailing each of the movements of their disciples.

"Really these tournaments are a good opportunity to see firsthand the performance of the youngsters, my little Zoe, for example, made a couple of mistakes here and there that we need to work on when we get back." Ryoma commented trying to sound casual and humble, but the smile full of pride and complacency on his face, a result of his granddaughter's outstanding participation, betrayed his true intentions.

"Fufufu, You're right Ryoma, I also noticed a couple of errors in the precision of my Liliana's spells, and her mana constructions need a bit more polishing." Eleonora casually added, but the emphasis she put on mana constructions was a clear reminder that much of the success of the young people's strategy was thanks to Liliana's exquisite mana constructions, which were key in the initial battle.

"Certainly, my Elara also failed a bit in the precision of her spells and her strategy has several points for improvement, hehehe" Thalía joined the boasting competition, highlighting the key role her little disciple played.

"I couldn't agree more with your words, my Ethan was a bit slow to infiltrate the enemy camp to eliminate the wizard in charge of one of the barriers and without a doubt, we need to work on his illusory fog matrix, it's still a bit green and has several important errors." Not to be outdone, Jessica joined the fray, emphasizing the strategic importance her disciple had in the entire battle.

While the Masters boasted among themselves about the great achievements of their disciples, Sigrún, a bit bored, watched on the screens as the young people sneaked through several tunnels out of the forest, while illusions and magical traps attacked their pursuers from all directions to buy them time.

"Really the youngsters showed an exquisite display of strategy and skill, they are truly geniuses who carry the future of the order in their hands," Adrián added politely, further inflating the egos of the masters who were boasting about the achievements of their disciples.

"Although it really is a bit surprising the affinities of your disciple, Jessica, fog and illusion, a curious combination," Sigrún commented with some interest while holding her face with her hands and her elbows on the table, evidently bored as she watched the images on the holographic screens.