Quarter Finalist (I)

Skills that currently only existed in theory floated through his head, awaiting to be executed on an opponent. That summed up most his thoughts that were so rudely interrupted by the masked people telling him the next match would begin shortly.

To which he came out his room and got healed by the masked individual awaiting his exit, just in case the contestant had hidden injuries. A simple thing that was also done to everyone else.

The crowd was still loud and reverberating through his ears, getting even louder at the sight of Mitzi who won her fight against the girl who turned into a half-dragon. Cheers and boos could be heard, but at this point the two merged into just background sounds.

Seven of the final eight quickly headed to their respective arenas with fierceness, seeing as they were now in quarter finals. Each believing they would win this fight, on to the semi-finals, and lastly the finals.

Vin stared down Alexander who also entered this tournament, apologizing in his head that he would have to beat someone he partied with. Alexander thought the same, but was colder as he was prepared to stop at only murder to win, everything else was fair game.

The last of the quarter-finalist had finally made it, many would recognize them by their robes as a daoist that only existed in fiction. It was a quite odd compared to almost everyone else who were dressed in normal clothes that were enchanted to not become tattered cloth. Vin personally had to admit those robes were stylish, perhaps even enough to make the wearer's, whose hair was tied up like a xianxia protagonist, handsomer than he was.

The xianxia protagonist seemed to be really… aloof as he found his way to the arena he was assigned to. Almost as if he thought he was the main character…

Too bad he was literally and metaphorically outshined by a man who appeared in the sky above the arena just now. Adorned in yellow suit, red gloves and boots, a white cape, and a short-black hair. A ball of golden light floated and shone above his head.

His voice boomed outwards as he spoke, "Hello! I am Jonathan Herculean, otherwise known as the Golden Paragon. I would like to personally congratulate each of our powerful contestants for making it this far," He said with excitement, punching his fist to the sky as if to cheer them on, but all he did was split the clouds above them, removing any chance of fighting in the rain.

"I know you all must not be excited to fight, or see a fight, in such a small area," Moving his hands up from his side and making a tight fist, "This will be my final gift for now so I can enjoy watching this."

The four empty arenas disappeared, and the remaining arenas spread apart till they were equal distance. Then each arena doubled in size, becoming over 70 meters by 70 meters.

The Golden Paragon then threw some small spheres into the sky, with a snap of his finger the entire area seemed to become night and the sphere exploded into different color fireworks. Another snap was made that decreased the how loud the explosion was by half. The very second after the lights faded he snapped, making it day again and spoke one word loudly, "Begin!"

Weapons of each individual's choice appeared next to the remaining contestants, as for the final 3 sets you were allowed to choose a weapon. Sadly, it wouldn't directly help with damage and would only act as a medium for skills. In one arena clashes quickly resounded as those two no longer held back. One was the daoist from before who had a symbol on his forehead and sword in hand, the other was dressed in a black double breasted suit, boasting fighting with kicks.

In the arena with Mitzi and another famed student named Amani who summoned all types of weapons from red portals, though each weapon was made from energy.

Another Arena had two opposites, the girl with an incomprehensible amount of energy, Jannette and a guy with the ability to bypass 99% of defenses. Flames that conformed to the shape of a crescent slashed and were met by 47 quickly made walls of earth.

In the final arena that contained Vin and Alexander, a sword in Alexander's hand wrapped by a golden spirit clashed with the two swords in Vin's hands made from bone. An after image of Alexander's strike came down and applied the attack again, down against Vin who was on the defensive for this first interaction.

Alexander then quickly back stepped while swinging his sword a few times, launching blades of light towards his enemy that were meant to impair his enemy's vision. Vin responded almost as fast as Alexander by summoning floating swords that dispersed the crescents, causing sparks to fly off of the four floating blades.

A second spirit of golden luster had appeared next to Alexander, this time instead of enhancing him it was mimicking his appearance. Alexander's appearance included the blade in his hand.

The clone had already closed the distance between it and Vin while the crescents were still up and quickly put pressure on Vin with a downward slash.

Vin saw this and parried the attack with a quick forward thrust that went through the head of the clone and prevented the blade from reaching him at the same time. Alexander who was attempting to get closer to Vin before his clone died had now broken the four flying swords, leaving them unusable and de-summoning them.

Vin was going to use a spoken skill to make the skill stronger but he quickly stopped by a second clone that appeared. This time Vin used some wind to launch himself away, then created pillars of earth that moved towards Alexander and his clone. Another pillar was made that moved Vin up and above, away from the chaos.

From here he could use two of his new, theoretical skills, "Harmonizing Field. Harmonizing Breath."

His words caused a wave of pastel blue to pass over a circle of the twenty meters around his tower. A second wave of a translucent pastel pink then enclosed a dome around where the blue touched. Vin felt the energy in the area begin to condense around him, slowly being taken from the area. Every time he breathed some of his energy would be restored by ambient energy.

Alexander, of course, wasn't idle while he was recovering energy… rather he had launched crescents that were about to reach Vin, only to be dispersed from the same method as before. The four blades went to stall Alexander but failed before it could even start. Alexander shouted out a skill which caused the four blades to freeze for two seconds, "STAR PALADIN!" He then slashed at the four blades, causing each to split in two. When the two seconds ended, the blades fell and were de-summoned.

Alexander kept a cold poker face the entire time, the clone then merged back into him, causing a muscular, humanoid figure to appear floating behind him. The seemed to be adorned in a robe from the waist down, covering everything below the waist, on the other side, all of its muscles were showing in glory for the upper half. The stan- spirit then launched itself off the ground with high speeds, Alexander following in unison with his enhanced blade and a second blade made purely from this golden energy.

Vin launched his 50 Shades attack towards Alexander but it was sliced in half, the small beam split into disappearing. A new skill was launched out instead with vigor by Vin, "Blooming Elements!"

Fire, water, earth, and wind spiraled around forming a sphere, the energy purely made from ambient energy. The sphere in front of him was then launched at the basically flying Alexander. A second, third, and fourth sphere appeared and were launched subsequently after one another. The first one was slashed, the second one blocked, the third was tanked, and the fourth stopped his movement upwards to which his spirit helped him glide down rather than fall. Since he had almost reached Vin he just launched himself back up, making the fake sword vanish whilst placing both his hands on the real sword.

Energy then congregated around Alexander's sword. To Vin's dismay, Alexander bypassed the Harmonizing Zone and still took energy from the environment. Now he would face the consequences of believing his skill could stop Alexander.