By now, the teachers in the academy had realized that Cyrus was a genius in many fields. He was a genius in the devouring magic, but on top of that, he seemed to be very gifted in potion and pill making, runes and inscriptions, botany, magic theory and they guessed that he had many other hidden talents.
As such, since he was already a level 3 acolyte, he was invited to join the annual battle of the acolytes.
Normally, acolytes of the first few years would not participate, since most of them would not be powerful enough.
So most of the acolytes participating tended to be acolytes who have been there for more than 5 years, hence being a level 5 acolyte was a minimum. Although Cyrus had not reached the benchmark, he was invited too, due to the fact that he was such a genius.
Due to the subsequent missions he finished easily, everyone knew that he was not a mere level 3 acolyte, as most of those missions would be difficult for level 7 acolytes, let alone a mere level 3.
Theresa was not trained in battle and although she had quite a few spells in her arsenal, declined her invitation.
Dalmier was the runner up last year, and had placed top 10 several years before. The previous year’s champion and most of the strong acolytes had become official mages already, leaving him the favorite to win it. So of course he participated as well.
Surprisingly, Damien the first year as well as the sisters Annabelle and Aribeth had leveled up to level 5 as well, much to the amazement of most of the teachers.
As the school wasn’t very large, and most of the acolytes were not adept in combat, only 30 students ended up participating.
The draw was made and Cyrus was pitted to face a 7th year level 6 acolyte who called himself Skullgore.
Skullgore looked like some sort of cyborg, Half his face was covered with metal parts, and his right arm and left leg were replaced with metal replacements.
He stood there and started summoning lightning from the surrounding. His whole body crackled with electricity as he started charging.
As he punched Cyrus with his metal hand, Cyrus lifted his left hand calmly and touched his hand.
The punch landed on Cyrus’ hand when a strange thing occurred. He absorbed the electricity as well as the kinetic energy from the punch as well as from his charging body.
Skullgore stood in amazement as his whole body stood still and was unable to move. Then he blacked out not knowing what happened.
Cyrus had absorbed his energy and even his manna, leaving him unconscious and defeated. The audience had no idea what to make of it, but Theresa was happily shouting and cheering.
In the other matches, Damien demonstrated his demonic abilities and summoned a large demon that easily beat his opponent.
Annabelle easily overpowered her opponent with her mental powers, causing her opponent to pass out while stills standing on the opposite side of the stage.
Aribeth used her illusion powers and her opponent screamed and ran off the stage.
Dalmier showed off his abilities. He opened a potion beaker and a purple cloud came out of his beaker. As it expanded, the clouds appeared to form skulls and it swirled around and around before charging at his opponent.
His opponent tried to cast a few spells, but to no avail. The smoke passed through his body and left the opponent frozen in place and he collapsed to the floor, his whole body shivered and collapsed in fear. Dalmier walked off the stage with a proud look on his face.
The other matches were pretty standard. There were acolytes who summoned zombies and skeletons. Others cast hexes and curses. However as they were all only acolytes, their battles were not as exciting as they were still inexperienced and only had minor abilities.
The next round was more of the same and Cyrus, Damien, Annabelle and Aribeth made it through the next round again in the last 15. As they had an odd man out, Dalmier, being the favorite, was given a bye.
In the last 8, Dalmier was drawn to meet Cyrus. Dalmier sneered as he finally had a chance to take his revenge.
As they met on stage, Dalmier again used his potion and released the purple cloud skulls who rushed directly at Cyrus.
Cyrus didn’t bother doing anything and the back of his robe tore open as a black hole the size of a shield flew out and floated in front of Cyrus, absorbing the purple cloud.
Dalmier was shocked and started taking out another potion. Without giving him a chance, Cyrus lifted his left hand and pointed at Dalmier, who fell down weakly.
“What happened?” he asked as he lay weakly on the floor. Cyrus had absorbed his energy from afar. Dalmier was so weak he had to be taken off the stage by the judges.
Cyrus left the stage slowly and Theresa’s voice could be heard cheering above the stunned crowd.
In the semi-finals, there were 4 contestants left, and they were surprisingly composed of Cyrus, Damien, Annabelle and Aribeth, all 4 were first years.
Cyrus was matched up with Aribeth. The match was surprisingly fast and uneventful. Aribeth cast an illusion on Cyrus, but Cyrus seemed completely unaffected. He walked up right next to her and she surrendered before he attacked.
In the next semi-final match, Annebelle surprisingly defeated Damien. Her mental abilities completely crushed Damien who didn’t even get to show off his demonic summons.
Thus the finals would be between Cyrus and Annabelle. They appeared on stage and stood at opposite sides of the stage.
Instantly, Annabelle attacked Cyrus with her mental ability. However, like with Aribeth, it had no effect on Cyrus.
Cyrus calmly walked towards Annabelle and just as he approached her, she surrendered.
The crowd was again stunned. What kind of stupid match was that? Nearly all of Cyrus’ matches were boring and looked like nothing happened.
The teachers themselves felt like booing, only Theresa’s voice could be heard cheering the champion.
The victors were brought to the stage. All of them would be given an opportunity to view the secret Wall of the Insight to gain inspiration.
The Wall was supposedly created by the founder of the Abominable Abyss. His name was simply called Nameless One. He was a cultivator from the days of creation and supposedly the wall contained the forbidden arts that made him crazy before his death.
He could not put everything down as the knowledge was supposedly too evil, too profound, too damning it turned him mad. However, he managed to carve his impressions and emotions of the knowledge on the wall.
The losing semi-finalists would get half a day viewing the wall. The losing finalist would get a full day while the winner would get two full days viewing the Wall of Insight.
Why would one want to view the Wall of Insight? The reason is that to walk the path of magic innovation is to walk the thin line of insanity and genius without any moral boundaries. The wall gave insight to the thoughts of possibly the most legendary mad genius magus in history.
Miranda had told Cyrus that the Devouring magics that she was pioneering was inspired by her visit to the Wall of Insight, when she won the acolyte championship many years ago.
Dalmier, who had entered the realm before had received all kinds of minor treasures. In fact, last year when he was second, he received the inspiration for the human cauldron.
He had hoped to get another chance to gain inspiration since his plans for the human cauldron were ruined by Cyrus.
However, in this year an unprecedented event happened, all the 4 semi-finalists were first year acolytes.
The four were led away to the heavily guarded area where the Wall of Insight was and Cyrus glanced back to give Theresa a smile and vanished with the rest.
Theresa smiled and turned around to leave and head back to the potion factory.
Unnoticed by everyone, Dalmier followed her in the shadows.
No comments:
Post a Comment