To the side of the four combat stages, there was a seating area for the 32 contestants.

Jude sat proudly with the prized rake in one hand like a king sitting on a throne with his ruling scepter.  The other participants whispered amongst themselves at the strange sight, but the crowds above did not keep their comments quiet.

The rewards given to Jude had been clearly manipulated from behind the scenes as a way to mock Jude.  Many of the elite who were in the coliseum stands felt that the rewards were justified, as Jude was not one of them, but a commoner from the country side.  They did not hide their crude comments, making it so that Jude could hear their words.

Jude wouldn’t have cared even if he had heard their words, but while everyone thought he was trying to act stoic, Jude was actually working hard.  He was trying to change this pathetic rake into something formidable that would shock the crowds and creator of this attempted humiliation.  Then he would throw it all back to them.

First, he thoroughly inspected the rake with .  This inspection seemed to show new properties that Jude had not yet seen before.  The shaft of the rake was made with Crystal Core Wood.  Before he would have only received the name, but now he had a description of most of the items. 

Crystal Core Wood was a practice material used by Wizards who are training or experimenting with runes.  It had excellent mana retention and flow rate but suffered from poor durability.  For some items, this was all right, but for most, especially battle related items it was not suitable.  Etched into the side of the staff were one wind glyph and a long series of runes.  The glyph was carved in right after the rack end, and after that, the runes flowed all the way to the other end of the rod.

Jude had researched runes extensively and was quickly able to determine the purpose and flaws in the line of runes.  Not that he needed to do that himself as the skill now seemed to encompass that as well.  That was when Jude noticed that his skill was now Rank VI.  It must have gone up without him noticing when he was working on his staff and in the gate trails leading up to this competition.  But he didn’t ponder this long as he kept searching through the item properties.  That was when he found the property that nearly made him laugh out loud.

Runes Inscribed by: Serena Ganish

He had a feeling that Serena had something to do with the awards, but to think that she actually created this trash item was astounding.

What would she think after he got done modifying it?

Inscription Magic was all external to an item and was done by writing runes.  This left the internal structure completely bare for Jude to write circuitry and nodes.  Because Crystal Core Wood was an excellent conductor of mana, it had a vast internal area for spell circuitry.  Unfortunately, the person who crafted the rake was nowhere near as skilled as Ellie.  But the craftsmanship couldn't be called bad either.  The wind glyph etched out a small internal space, and since neutral magic alone produced inferior items skills, Jude would have to work only in the small area created by the wind glyph.  This small area was already attuned to wind magic, making any wind type spell much more potent than any of the neutral areas.

While Jude was performing his modifications, the tournament continued.  Out of the thirty-two contestants, there would be sixteen first matches.  The top scorers from the preliminaries were then seeded across the matches.  Jude, being first place, was set to be in the last match for the first round.

The arena had four stages setup made with the same white stone blocks that they fought on previously.  This time, however, the stages were official dueling platforms and would initiate the dueling sequence for the contestants.  This type of duel was different than the typical kind.

A standard duel would only affect the HP of a person.  But an official duel, on the dueling platform, held certain risks.  Being maimed was very possible, permanent scars were obvious signs of both the victors and defeated, but even death was possible, although rarely happened.   Normal duels just didn’t carry the weight of importance that regular duels did.

Of course, the crowds loved these duels where the lives of the contestants were at stake.  The colosseum could hold tens of thousands of people, and it was filled to capacity.  The audience cheered as the first four combats started, but Jude paid little attention as he was busy with his modifications.

The first round continued as the first set of fights ended, and the next began.  Jude would only pay a little attention to the more domineering wizards and listen to the occasional comment from Jorgan.  The one he paid the most attention to was the fight Valice took place in.

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The shaman, Valice, displayed her extraordinary skills at weather control.  But in the end, this magic wasn’t enough for those who could compete all the way up to the top thirty-two.  The weather magic she used wasn’t suited for single combat.  It wasn’t until she transformed into a bobcat like form that she was able to overtake her opponent, winning the match.

“Shamans sure are scary,” Jorgan said. “Their magic might not be a match for ours, but our greatest weakness is close combat.  Her cat form is so fast that even I would have trouble against it.”

Jude only grunted a reply, but Jorgan wasn’t upset by it.  He realized that Jude was up to something and was trying his best not to distract him, even if he did keep commenting on the fights.

Serena happened to be close enough and decided to interject her opinion at this moment, “You call yourself a wizard and you are afraid of that woman?  Jorgan, if you were a real wizard, you would always be prepared for whatever situation that occurred.  I can see why Morcheron beat you in the preliminaries.”

Jorgan laughed, “Like you’re much better?  You scored the lowest out of all those who hailed from the Core City.  Besides, I didn’t say I wasn’t prepared for someone like that shaman. I just said it would be a tough fight.  If you don’t learn to respect your opponents, you are going to fail miserably at the hands of someone you underestimated.”

Serena harrumphed and turned away.  This brought a smile to both Jorgan and Jude.

The matches continued, and Jude made sure to watch the fights of Jorgan, Morcheron, and Serena as well.  Then it finally came to Jude’s turn.

A young man with a lot of charisma had announced the contestants for each fight so far, and it was no different for Jude.

The announcer stated, “Next we have on Court 1, Jude, no last name, who holds the titles of Dungeon Expert, Dungeon Master, Small Party Expert, Lifter of Curses, Crafters Friend, Heroic Wizard, Skill Master, Demon Slayer, and Heroes of Longdale.”

The crowd buzzed yet again. They were surprised at not only the titles Jude held but the amount as well.

The announcer continued, “His opponent is Lark Markell, who holds the title of Skill Sage.”

Jude remembered that title.  It was the first one he got as well, but it turned into Skill Master once he met the same requirements over three times.

The announcer continued to call out the other contestants, but Jude ignored him and proceeded to his stage.  The Lark fellow did the same.

They both climbed up upon the stage and faced each other on opposite ends.

Lark saw that Jude was still carrying the rake and laughed at him, “Are you planning to use that in actual combat or are you just going to sweep the lawn?”

Jude smiled back and said, “I just received this, and I would feel remiss if I didn’t try it out.  Besides, it feels well crafted, even if the runes are full of errors.”

Jude made sure not to insult the actual crafter who made the item.  He liked crafters after all.  Even if it wasn't the same quality that Ellie could make, it was still decent.

Serena heard Jude’s remark and turned red in fury.  She didn’t think that Jude knew that it was her who inscribed the runes on the item, but it still stung to hear the words.

The referee on the side called out, “Ready?”

After they both nodded, he said, “Begin!”

Jude ignored the notifications and wrapped his arm around the handle, placing his hand right below the head of the rake.

Lark started quickly chanting out a spell, but Jude used the simplest of actions and swung the rake as if he was sweeping a leaf out of the air.

This rake was a standard practice item for beginner Inscriptionist.  A well-crafted one would at most cause a stiff breeze to blow away leaves and debris.  But the majority that was produced would have a range or random wind effects.  No one expected that this rake would cause any harm and they thought Jude an idiot for even playing around with it turning one of the most prestigious tournaments.

“Doesn’t he know that this competition only comes every ten years?  What is he playing at?” many asked.

Even Lark laughed to himself.  He had been worried that facing the top scorer from the preliminaries would prove to be a troublesome challenge, but now he had hope.  He couldn’t believe his luck.

But then an unexpected thing happened.  Without a chant or even a command word, a spell formed from the rake.  Lark himself was only halfway through his own chant when he felt all his hair follicles rose up.

A gentle wind on the outside and a raging torrent inside, the spell formed into a shape of a bullet.  The green wind magic was condensed to the point where you could only barely see through it.  And this bullet wasn’t some pea size object; rather it was the size of a wooden barrel.

In his head, Jude called it the Mario Bullet, after one of his favorite child hood games.  Even the ‘ku-thunk’ sound it made sounded similar.  The only difference was the speed, Mario wouldn’t have been able to dodge this one, and neither did Lark.

Jude made sure that his modification wouldn’t kill anyone, so when the bullet impacted Lark, all the compressed air was released.  However, Jude hadn’t had any experience with the wind element before.  The spell didn’t compress air before it launched, as the magic was already highly compressed air.  The explosion of air went off like a bomb sending out gusts of wind that nearly knocked Jude off the stage. 

Lark was no where to be seen.

The referee seemed to blank out; the crowd turned silent, even the other matches stopped to stare.

Jude should have felt some triumph, having used the useless item given him and made it seem godly.  But all he felt was sorry that he killed Lark.

But then he saw it.  Up in the stands, people pulled out a battered person who still seemed alive.  Luckily, the dueling arena wouldn’t allow anything the contestants did to harm the audience, so the only person hurt was Lark.  And he was still alive.

Realizing all of this Jude put on a smile and turned towards the referee. 

The referee woke up from his shock and announced, “The winner: Jude!”