The organizers of the arena had a quick discussion between themselves as Mathias and his group got back to their position, near their own gate. If you manage to kill someone in the arena, no matter how or why it happened, it puts you danger level at max. You stop being treated like just a fighter and the organizers not only can but will try their best to end you in a fight.
With a few telepathic messages the plan was put in place. The rest of the fighters were to go into the arena all at once. 59 people, men and women of various races, all armed and ready for a real fight. Hearing that the person who had to fight before you has died has a way to put people on the edge.
The fighters didn’t really know what happened in the arena, they were told more or less about the challengers so they might extrapolate some information to help them win but the fact they are now emitting an aura of pure and deadly rage made any thoughts of treating them as kids went out the window.
Battle lines were formed, the 59 fighters ready to do a suicide charge and finish the fight as soon as they could and not risk death.
The gates closed and the signal that the fight could begin went off. The melee fighters dashed forward while a group began to launch various spells towards the boy’s group.
“Turtle Shell!” Mathias commanded, not taking his eyes off his opponents for a moment. With the command all the boys grouped together while Moon and Luminus created a two layer barrier that blocked all the spells coming their way.
Once the spells stopped as the melee fighters got closer, Mathias signaled for their barrier to be brought down. He concentrated a lot of his mana into a spell, focusing it via his sword and then stabbing it into the ground. A giant wall of stone rose from the ground, stopping the charge coming their direction suddenly, some people even smashing into the wall as they couldn’t stop in time.
Mathias removed his sword from the ground and stopped feeding the spell, the stone getting a little loose from the ground. With a nod he informs Klaws that the boy can proceed. Klaws takes a deep breath and jumps, putting all his power in his arms he then punches the wall, sending it down on everyone who was advancing towards the group, eliminating all of them.
As the stone breaks and makes a cloud of sand and rock, Kaki once again throws his spear but this time he is fishing. His spear flies in a straight line, impaling two people. That didn’t eliminate them because it wasn’t necessarily something that would remove them from a fight but once Kaki recalled his weapon using a string made out of mana, the two fighters didn’t really get half the distance between them before they were eliminated from the fight and sent out of the arena via the spell.
Luminus, not wanting to be left behind, grabbed any and all pieces of stone he could with his telekinesis and rained them down on his enemies. Various flashes of light of the safety spell going off appeared.
Lastly, a group of people tried to move a little more stealthy around the arena but were quickly eliminated by Moon as he created various small dark bullets and shot them in all directions. Once the dust settled it could be seen that only 30 people remained of the 59 that came into the fight.
The giant group of people didn’t like that they were so easily cut down to almost half their size so they had an extremely quick discussion and came up with a plan. One of the mages in the group began to prepare a spell that would eliminate him as soon as he casted it but as long as his side won he didn’t mind much even if he wouldn’t receive as much money.
It took 10 seconds for the spell to activate, 5 more people were eliminated protecting the mage from the boys but the spell finally activated, dealing a lot of recoil damage to the caster. A giant pillar of mana appeared somewhat on the center of the arena and all 5 boys were sucked towards it. It didn’t actually deal any damage but they got stuck there for a few seconds, enough that the rest of the arena fighters managed to surround them before the spell vanished.
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The boys all had their backs to each other when the enemy group advanced towards them. Parrying, dodging and blocking they did their best to not receive fatal damage but bruises and small cuts were appearing on them as they barely had space to maneuver, much less use spells without hitting their allies, nor the time to prepare one.
3 of the arena fighters, seeing that their pokes were not doing much, decided to commit to a more thorough attack. One of them had a spear and the other two basic swords. The one with the spear advanced towards Klaws as the boy was already dodging out of the way of another sword stab. The boy barely managed to move out of the way of the spear but he was stuck in a position that wouldn’t allow him to dodge the two men coming to slash him. The first man attacked and Klaws grabbed the sword with his hand, the second man never reached Klaws as Kaki ignored everything happening with him and stabbed the man on his back, eliminating him. Luminus and Moon, using the moment of panic generated by that, stabbed the other two that attacked Klaws before turning to their positions. They took some damage doing that but the cost was worth it as 3 people were eliminated.
Another minute passed as the boys were poked and poked back. Another group decided to try their luck. They all went towards Mathias. Two men with greatswords advanced toward him as all the other boys were somewhat occupied themselves. Their blades clashed and Mathias held on, being a little stronger than both men combined. A woman with a dagger tried to weave around the three and hit Mathias from below but he just held his sword with one hand and shoved one of the men attacking him into the ground, straight at the woman. The two other men with short swords took that opportunity to stab Mathias, hitting his face and shoulder but not going very deep due to the distance. The other boys, seeing an opening, pounced on the group of five. Klaws punched the man still clashing with Mathias so hard that he was eliminated and probably dead with the sound of his neck breaking was really that. Moon shot another of his dark projectiles, that one towards the woman on the ground while Luminus, using telekinesis, stabbed the other man with a great sword from behind, eliminating him and the woman below him. Mathias took the opportunity to advance a little and increase the area they had available by doing a smash attack with his sword at the direction of the enemy group. Nobody got eliminated but a few people fell to the ground as the enemy group had to go backward. Mathias, seeing defenseless targets, quickly shot small peebles using magic straight at their heads, eliminating 2 more.
After taking a moment to breathe, the group advanced, they had the momentum.
“Pincer!” Mathias shouted, everyone knowing what to do. Their enemies were a little confused as there was no one behind them to do a pincer attack but then Luminus threw Moon and Klaws behind them using his telekinesis.
“Shit! Behind us!” One of the men shouted as he turned around, only to be impaled in the head by a flying spear coming from Kaki.
Not the entirety of the arena’s fighters were being pincered by the boys, they were still somewhat surrounded, at least the ones still in the middle, but not one of the people not being attacked was near enough to do anything as the boys advanced.
As Kaki’s spear was returning to him, Mathias covered his sword in stone again and smashed it into the group in front of him, Luminus giving him some support and increasing the speed of the attack by giving a boost with telekinesis. Moon quickly formed a strange spell that shot a wave of darkness in front of him that moved forward towards the enemy group, blocking their view of him and Klaws.
Using the darkness wave as a smokescreen Klaws dashed forward without hesitation and like a bull he impaled anything in his way, just with his hand stead of horns. One of the men there tried to counter attack but Klaws dashed backwards, the dark wave hiding him again. Moon then used another spell, a light one this time, and threw a projectile with no actual permanent form at the wave. The wave washed over a few people and in an instant they were eliminated as shards of light glass stabbed them from the inside. Mathias smashed his sword on the remaining people while Kaki watched their backs.
The remaining fighters looked at the boys, stunned at what they saw. The ones left were not the best or the strongest but they had their pride. 5 vs 15, their final clash approached, both sides finally stopping holding back and letting all their mana flow. The people in the arena got rowdier as they felt the pressure increase. The next few minutes were going to be something that a fight of that level shouldn’t have the right to be.