Right before the first match of the afternoon began, the previously mentioned reward for the winners was revealed.
“The two winning groups will be allowed to take a special class—one personally taught by an army general and the guild’s grandmaster,” a teacher said.
The students raised screams and battle cries when they heard this. Hardly anyone got the chance to be taught by those people; it was an extremely rare and elusive opportunity. Eager to win the reward, the students filled the hall with an aura of abnormal spirit and enthusiasm.
The first match began before their excitement cleared. Cecil and Carlo’s group was among the teams participating. Luca and Zeke were there with them, but Filiel was nowhere to be seen. He was royalty, and it was thought that it might be difficult for anyone to raise a hand against him, so he was just observing. That left their group with one fewer member, but a handicap like that wasn’t an obstacle to them at all.
As soon as the match began, Cecil, who was especially good with wind magic, fired off a spell with a large area of effect. It was powerful magic—something that even a high-level magician would have trouble casting—and it struck everyone in the arena besides his own group. No one had expected a student to cast such a difficult spell. The wind’s invisible pressure instantly weighed down their opponents, none of whom were able to defend themselves. Then, almost as if a boulder had crashed down on them, they were slammed with an immense force, and in the blink of an eye, each of their glass magic items shattered. Only Cecil, Carlo, Luca, and Zeke were left unharmed by this overwhelming display of strength.
The venue erupted with excited cheers after seeing the area-of-effect spell in use, but this wasn’t an ordinary match—its main purpose was to showcase the students’ strength to the observers. Every other group had been instantly defeated, without any chance to perform, and the match had ended with them as mere losers. Flustered, the teachers immediately discussed the possibility of this affecting the students’ futures, and they quickly decided to hold a rematch with all the same students—except for Cecil’s group.
During the rematch, the defeated students, not wanting to be seen as losers again, gave a great demonstration of their abilities. Ultimately, the match ended as it usually did, with a group of fourth-years making it to the end and defeating the final remaining third-years. The teachers all breathed sighs of relief.
“It’s finally over. And this time, it ended normally,” Ivo remarked. Despite how he sounded, the match still bothered him. He was still looking at the field with a frown on his face, probably calculating possible responses to that area-of-effect spell.
“I feel bad for them. No one expects a student to cast an area-of-effect spell, so I can see why they couldn’t raise their defenses in time,” Finney said sympathetically.
“Is it just me, or is something up with those siblings?” Clois asked.
“Normal rules don’t apply to any of them,” Lyle agreed. The four furtively glanced at Yui.
“Hey...” Yui objected. “You can cast area-of-effect spells too, can’t you, Ivo? You can’t complain about my brothers.”
“I certainly can, but the effective area of the spell depends on the caster’s ability,” Ivo explained. “I couldn’t cast one that covers the entire arena that quickly, and it’d be weaker too. At my current level, I can’t use area-of-effect spells in a real battle.” That was how he put it, but thinking about it reasonably, anyone would say that having the ability to cast area-of-effect spells at all as a first-year put him well outside the bounds of normalcy. Still, his standards were somewhat off. Yui was undoubtedly the cause of this.
Next up was the match in which Yui’s group would be fighting. Unlike the first match, no one’s glass instantly broke, and smaller battles unfolded everywhere throughout the arena. Some fought individually, while others coordinated together with their groups against their opponents. Students continually broke glass and had their glass broken. For some reason, in the middle of it all, there was an area around Yui that was completely empty—no one tried anything against her.
Nearly everyone had been instilled with the idea that Liefes were useless failures. As such, she might’ve normally been their first target, but the students had personally witnessed her instantly defeat the magic beasts that morning. The way they looked at her had clearly changed—their gazes had changed from disdain toward someone weak to cautious. Even so, their long-held prejudices weren’t going to be reversed in a day, and they had all concluded that she’d just been lucky. Of course, none of them were confident enough in her weakness that they were able to work up the courage to attack her head-on. Everyone was hesitating and biding their time.
Additionally, far from feeling attracted to the special class as a reward for victory, Yui saw it more as a punishment. She made no effort to actively fight. Instead, she was waiting by the wall for the match to end with a lollipop in her mouth. If the reward had been, say, cheesecake with her dinner, she would have scrambled to join the fight—she might’ve even knocked everyone out right when the match began, just like Cecil had. In a sense, that meant the teachers’ choice of reward had been correct. Also, by this time, Berg’s anger at Yui for not fighting had faded away. He had reached the point where he’d given up.