Lyra confidently walked off the platform after spending less than a minute on it. She was smiling as she twirled her rifle around in her hand.

I was incredibly happy at her victory, almost so happy to the point where I almost forgot to question myself about her quick victory. Her extremely fast win wasn't exactly something so unexpected, as her rifle is extremely powerful. However, it was how she even managed to draw the long rifle so quickly, one would think she had experience.

I reviewed the scene over and over again in my head with my 'perfect memorization' skill. She pulled the rifle up to her chest like a trained expert and fired without even looking through the scope.

She must have had an exponential amount of combat training with a sniper rifle, or more logically, she has an incredibly powerful weapon mastery skill.

A weapon mastery skill is extremely rare amongst this world's inhabitants, but not entirely impossible to gain.

Once every few hundred years, there is someone born with a weapon mastery skill to help their specific race during wartime. However, there is a drawback, and that is that once there is no war, the skill will not appear in any youths of that era.

For Lyra to have the weapon mastery skill, this 'new demon war' must have been cultivating for some time now. That Mitchell must have acted immediately after speaking to me, or even far before. This would explain the sudden appearance of Lyra in this year's top ten.

The entire locker room erupted into an uproar at the surprising defeat of the brunette, Allison. The people that were particularly outraged were a small group of boys with glasses and lab coats, not unlike Allison. They were shouting at the crystal screen in anger, speaking about unfairness and how Lyra's weapon shouldn't be allowed.

"That woman was clearly cheating! There's no way she should be allowed to use a weapon like that!" One of the nerd guys said.

"Yeah! He's right! That weapon has to be against regulations!" This time, a geek-looking dude spoke.

These guys were being rather illogical for men of science. For starters, there was never any mention of a regulation of weaponry for this tournament. For these guys to be speaking about regulations like this, they're probably just salty about the loss of one of their own.

Aaron beside me was getting increasingly angry at the words of the dweebs. The constant degrading of one of his teammates, or maybe the berating of another in general, was heating up his blood to the point of a boil.

"How about you shut that fuck up and accept this loss!" Aaron spoke up with anger in his voice, "You guys are whining like little pussies for the defeat of another! Get your shit together!"

"Indeed," I chimed in from beside him, "while I hate to agree with him, you guys are most certainly acting like sore losers."

The whiney geeks were startled at the sudden words of displeasure from Aaron and me and immediately stopped speaking about the matter. Aaron sighed and turned back to the crystal screen that was displaying the next combatants, Nerah Kingsley vs Killean Voss.

"Wait a minute," Aaron turned to me in confusion, "why did you hate to agree with me?"

"Ahem," I coughed and tried to change the subject, "Nathan, your sister is fighting next."

Nathan turned his head to the screen at my words and observed the choices of combatants that were fighting.

I completely ignored Aaron's attempts to ask why I hated to agree with him and turned my attention to Nathan. He smiled and confidently put his hands on his hips as the image of Nerah came onto the screen.

One of the guys in the back of the locker room grabbed his weapon and exited the locker room in a hurry. It was the tall elf from before, the one that was incredibly ungrateful to Aaron and I for solving his bullying problem.

So his name was Killean? That was a name that I had never heard before, but he must be reasonably strong to be chosen as one of his kingdom's top ten youths of this year.

Nerah had her emerald green hair tied back into a ponytail, leaving only her short bangs in front of her face. She was wearing a lightly armored suit, with metal plates covering her chest, shins, and her left arm. She was holding her long, double-bladed glaive as she walked onto the large platform in a nervous manner.

Nerah walked over to her starting position and got into a ready position.

On the opposite side of the arena, a tall blonde-haired elf guy wearing a long black cloak over dark leather armor appeared.

He was holding a large, like, really large white and golden hammer that was box-shaped with a small handle. He held the large hammer with one hand as he walked into his position, his mouth was covered by a cloth.

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He twirled the hammer around in the air before slamming it down beside himself, cracking the ground.

The guys that had been picking on him earlier, besides Nicholas, all gasped in shock and fear as they watched the scrawny-looking elf they had been bullying wield such a large weapon.

Nathan had been unfazed, even after the elf's display of immense strength. This confidence was due to his absolute certainty of Nerah's strength.

"Nathan," Reginald stood beside Nathan and asked, "are you not concerned for your sister? That guy seems pretty strong."

"Hmph," Nathan puffed out his chest confidently, "you might think that she's weak because of how she acts, but in truth, she's stronger than me."

"Really?" Reginald's eyes widened at Nathan's words.

"He's right," Aaron said from beside me, "I saw their strength, she's strong."

Reginald nodded lightly to himself and looked up at the battle displayed on the screen. The bell of the fight rang out, signaling the start of the fight.

The elf, Killean, kicked off the ground and ran toward Nerah with great speed. He stopped a short distance from in front of her and wound back his hammer to let out a wide swing from the left. Nerah casually backstepped and leaned back away from the wide swing, dodging it with relative ease.

"Yeah!" Nathan exclaimed while pumping his fist in the air.

I smiled at his enthusiasm and turned my attention back to the battle.

Killean had kept the hammer swing moving, spinning around using his centrifugal force and sending it back downward at Nerah. Nerah noticed the difference in power of his strike and jumped out of the way in a hurry.

The impact of the hammer hitting the ground caused the platform to shatter around him, sending shockwaves flying out. Pieces of stone from the shattered ground flew out toward Nerah, who weaved through all of the projectiles without effort.

Nerah kneeled down and kicked off the ground, making her first move, she moved up close to her opponent. Killean swung his hammer at her as she closed in, but she slid underneath the hammer strike and kept moving.

The hammer quickly rotated around back towards her, but she dodged the strike and moved behind Killean, slashing at his back with her double-sided glaive. Killean used the force from the hammer swing to propel himself upward while twisting his body to the right, allowing him to narrowly dodge Nerah's cut.

Killean flipped over his hammer and landed on the other side of it and tore his weapon out from within the ground. Nerah pressed her advance forward, using her knowledge of swordsmanship and utilizing the versatility of both blades on her glaive, she dished out a dangerous offensive.

She would slash with one side, then alternate between sides in quick succession. She spun the glaive around in the air to gain momentum in between swings. Killean used the sheer size and thickness of the hammer to block each strike from Nerah like a shield. Killean then used his hammer to push back at Nerah, who backed up further.

Killean, using the newfound range advantage that he had just created, wound up his hammer for a strike. He spun his hammer around, but instead of swinging the hammer, he threw it with full force like a frisbee. It flew with such incredible speed that it caught fire as it closed in on Nerah, who was observing the weapon. Nerah bent backward and dodged the flaming hammer, she then proceeded to accelerate forward toward the now-defenseless Killean.

However, something unexpected happened.

"Whoa! What the fuck is that?" Reginald spoke up while watching the fight.

"The hammer," Aaron replied, also shocked, "it's returning to him."

I watched the scene unfold with great interest. The hammer that Killean had just thrown at Nerah had changed direction and began spinning back at Killean. Nerah, who was running, was in the way of the hammer's trajectory and was almost hit by the large blunt weapon. She narrowly dodged the hammer by jumping over it before it hit her.

Killean caught the hammer by the handle and used the force of both the hammer's spin and his own strength to release a massively powerful swing toward Nerah.

The strike was far too quick to react to and dodge, so Nerah raised her glaive to her arm in order to block the blow. Nerah's eyes widened as the force of the hammer sent her flying back several meters away from Killean.

She spun her glaive around as she was sliding backward and bore it into the ground, cutting the platform as she moved. Nerah slid to a stop using her glaive, looking down at her right arm, she realized that it was badly damaged.

Killean threw his hammer at Nerah again, this time, with more force than before. Nerah looked up and moved to the right as the hammer flew past her, tearing through the sky. She used her glaive to stand herself back up and flip out of the way as the hammer spun around and flew back toward her.

Killean caught the hammer again and threw it by spinning himself around once he grabbed it.

Using this technique, Killean planned to dwindle down Nerah's stamina while also keeping her at a safe distance. Although at first glance, this plan seemed to be an excellent method to wear on Nerah's stamina, Killian makes one crucial error in judgment.

Killean threw his hammer once more, but this time, instead of dodging out of the way, Nerah grabbed the handle of the hammer and sent it flying back at Killean with twice the speed. Nerah then began running toward Killean beside the hammer.

She ran past the hammer, reaching him before it, and slashed at his chest. He attempted to dodge the strike, but she grappled onto his arm as he did and held him in front of the returning hammer. Killean struggled against Nerah's grip but was unable to break free in time and the hammer collided with his back.

The impact was loud enough to be heard through the crystal screen. A bright light followed by an explosion occurred at the spot where Killean had been held, making it nigh impossible for the outcome to be seen. However, using my 'Eye of Absolute Certainty', I was able to clearly see exactly what happened.

The large flaming hammer had collided with Killean's body, sending shockwaves rippling through his body and causing a massive combustion effect.

His body was strong, so the hammer didn't rip straight through his body. However, his flesh was ripped off of his body and cooked by the sheer heat of the explosion. Nerah had been completely covered with the blood of Killean as it exited his body from the front.

The smoke had finally cleared, leaving the image of an unscathed Nerah holding the charred corpse of Killean. His clothes had been mostly blown off in the back, leaving the front of his body covered.

The body of Killean had most of his flesh burned off, his right arm had been blown off and his left arm was still holding at Nerah's arm. Both of his legs had been completely charred and mangled beyond recognition. His face had partially melted off leaving dark burn marks on his exposed skull. His eyes had completely liquified and were oozing out of the sockets of his blackened skull.

Nerah was announced as the victor of the fight as the two were enveloped with white light and their wounds were healed. Nerah, who was previously covered in blood from Killean, promptly threw up whatever she ate last onto the ground as she walked off of the arena.

The reformed body of Killean was dragged away by two guys in black suits and quickly brought back to our locker room.

"Hell yeah!" Nathan exclaimed excitedly, "I told y'all she would win that shit!"

"I never doubted her," Aaron says casually.

"I'm not gonna lie," Reginald said with his hands behind his head, "I was a bit worried when she tried to block that swing."

"W-well, of course, there was that," Nathan replied, "but she made up for it by making that motherfucker eat his own weapon!"

I sighed at their loud ramblings on how excellent Nerah was. I am in no way dissatisfied with Nerah's performance, for she did an amazing job in defeating the opponent.

However, those guys were being so loud that they awoke Killean, who was slumped over and had been placed on a bench near the lockers. He looked over at me and immediately looked away in anger.

Um, what the hell did I do?

He got up from his seat and walked away toward a group of other elves.

Speaking of elves, where was Nyx? I looked around the room until I found Nyx sleeping on a bench, her arms under her head. It's not safe to fall asleep alone in a room full of people from different kingdoms, she could be at risk of harm from Azurans.

I sighed as I took a seat next to her and looked up at the screen that was further in the room. The next combatants had been announced, Nathan Kingsley vs Eres Gabby.

Hmm, he's going against the future Sword Saintess?

I was a bit concerned about Nathan losing the fight, considering Eres was known as one of the best combatants in the Azure Kingdom. She was also one of the three endgame heroines left alive. Despite that, I had full confidence in his victory.

However, I was concerned about who I was going to fight as it was nearing the end of the tournament. I wasn't counting, but I could tell that we have already gone through over 250 different students in the fights. If they're saving my fight for last, just who was going to be fighting against me?