The reveal of a new mana aspect might not have been that impactful to the dwarf who was now trying to recover from his own blow, the same couldn’t be said of the numerous people who were watching the fight.

“What was that?”Arianwyn asked as she tried to comprehend what happened.

“I don’t know.” Aranor said, surprising the princess. “I’ve never felt a humanoid use that mana type before.”

“So you’ve seen it somewhere else?” the king asked.

“Only inside the dungeon, even then it is extremely rare.” Aranor answered. “The mana affects metals, sometimes drawing them towards it, sometimes pushing them away.”

Ajax didn’t let the opportunity in front of him slip, with the dwarf on the ground from his own strike Ajax was quick to launch a follow up attack. Ideally he would land a decisive blow from close range but despite the hit he’d taken Ajax wasn’t yet comfortable being anywhere near the dwarf and his runes.

Ajax decided to attack with more direct magic. Creating his best Darth Sidious impersonation, Ajax launched a stream of lightning from both arms towards the dwarf. Despite the attack looking dangerous Ajax intent had nothing to do with actually harming the dwarf, instead he used his full focus on getting the lightning to circulate through the dwarf’s armor as quickly as possible.

The dwarf was quick to react to his new circumstance. Even without seeing the new lightning attack coming at him he quickly activated his last line of defense. A shield made of unaspected mana formed around his flesh, the shield was very durable however its efficiency was rock bottom.

The moment Ajax felt the shield snap into place he started his [Mana Syphon] once more. In the heat of the battle Ajax was actually hoping the dwarf wouldn’t realize how little damage the lightning was actually doing thanks to the additional drain of his Legendary skill.

“Why isn’t he standing up?” Xavier asked confused as he looked at the dwarf waddle around on the ground.

“Because his balance and movements are all thrown off.” the prince replied with a predatory grin as he looked at the struggling dwarf. “His shield might be protecting him from the lightning’s muscle spasms but Ajax just made his entire set of armor attracted to itself. Not only that but the force of attraction isn’t constant, the closer two pieces are together the stronger the pull.”

This technique had taken Ajax two years before he was confident in using it against a live opponent. The whole reason why Ajax wanted to get the dwarf soaked was so that he could fire off multiple chains of lightning, turning each individual piece of armor struck into its own magnet as opposed to the entire armor set becoming a giant magnet. On the upside despite the extreme concentration required the mana cost was not that exorbitant.

“That is really impressive, or maybe it’s a trick…” Aranor mumbled as he took in the odd scene.

“What trick?” Arianwyn asked.

“It seems like he is holding up ten different spells at once.” Aranor explained. “Five separate bolts of lightning and using that odd mana type on five different pieces of armor, perhaps he needs the lightning there to be able to use the new mana type?”

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Ajax didn’t know it but by using lightning in combination with magnetic mana for the first attack had actually given all the high level mages watching him the idea that lightning mana was required in order for magnetic mana to activate.

It took the dwarf almost an entire minute before he was able to finally get back on his feet. For the first time since the start of the tournament the common people had actually gotten a little bored of one of the fights. SInce almost all of them couldn’t properly analyze what was happening between the two fighters, all they had seen for the last minute was a mage trying to break a shield with lightning.

For his part Ajax was more than happy with the result. As he saw the dwarf finally gain some stability on his feet he simply took a few steps back to give himself more time as he continued releasing his lightning. By this point he had burned through half his mana pool but he was finally ready to meet the dwarf head on in melee combat.

The dwarf slowly approached with careful steps moving only slightly faster than Ajax who was slowly back away. As soon as there was only three feet between them however Ajax dropped his lightning spell and quickly pulled out his axe and his shield. Much as he preferred his aggressive dual wielding style, not using a shield here would have taken much of a risk.

Even as he was expecting it the dwarf was still caught on the backfoot by the sudden change. That split second it took him to adjust from the presence of magnetic mana back to normal was enough to force him on the defensive as Ajax began swinging his heavy axe infused with Magma.

Now just because both fighters had started fighting within arms reach of each other didn’t mean that any of their blows actually connected. If it ever came down to a contest of physical strength Ajax empowered by his [Mana Syphon] would see the dwarven mage squashed in less than a second. Each swing of the axe did however land heavily on the shields the dwarf was generating.

It was here that Ajax found himself on the backfoot for the first time in this fight. Despite his prodigious talent Ajax had almost no experience fighting a rune mage in close combat, his only sparring partner being a prince more than three times his level. The dwarf on the other hand had faced plenty of hybrid close ranged fighters, even if they used runes instead of Ajax’s more unique casting methods.

Exchange after exchange Ajax was slowly being caught scuffed more and more, either by the swing of the hammer or by the edge of a spell, it was nothing all that serious his enchantments being enough to weaken the glancing blows to something that his healing could manage but Ajax was being pushed back.

A minute of constant clashing was all it took for Ajax to finally make a big mistake and give the dwarf an opening. The dwarf didn’t hesitate, he saw the opening and went for a match ending blow.

As the mana channeled through the rune on his right gauntlet the dwarf hadn’t expected for the metal to shatter. The metal had been severely weakened during the minute that Ajax had spent channeling his lightning into it, all it had taken was for the rune to be pushed with a bit of mana for a larger blow for the armor to break.

This came as a surprise to everyone, even to Ajax, but while it was still surprising that it happened now it was something he was expecting to happen. The situation had flipped on its head from Ajax being vulnerable to him gaining a massive advantage, one he didn’t waste as he pushed himself to land a deep cut down the now exposed arm of the dwarf.

“It ain’t over yet.” The dwarf growled as he saw Ajax’s victorious smirk bloom on his face.

“I’m sorry to say but it is.” Ajax responded as he relaxed his combat stance in order to bring up his arm and release a wave of Holy mana.

For the second time in this match the dwarf dropped to the floor. Whereas the first time was from his own blow he now crumbled due to the excruciating pain that radiated from the cut on his arm.

“He’s a curse mage?” the elven king scowled as he took in the scene.

“Not a mage.” Aranor's voice was soft, the complete opposite to the deep frown as he took in the end of the match. “He generated the curse mana from his Stamina.”

“I’m more interested in why the dwarf’s armor shattered.” one of the elven royal guards spoke. “There is no way it was in anything other than peak condition before the match started, for it to have a critical failure like that is absurd.”

“He caused it.” Arianwyn said, her eyes still wide open in surprise as she saw the match end with Ajax placing his axe to the throat of the dwarf. “He didn’t know when it would happen but he was expecting the armor to shatter. It’s why he reacted so fast when it did.”

“It would seem so.” the elven king nodded as he processed his daughter’s words. “We will have to visit Gryndor for dinner tonight, too many odd things have happened in this fight.”

“I’m sure we won’t be the only ones there.” Aranor said as he watched the dwarven member of the Republic’s Council send a messenger to Gryndor’s king.