Chapter 141: Diamond Crystallier vs Diamond Crystallier

Chapter 141: Diamond Crystallier vs Diamond Crystallier

At first when the two Diamond Crystalliers met, Kai was taken aback. Instead of using the abilities he expected, they were fighting hand to hand, exchanging what looked like ordinary blows. Actually, as the melee went on, he felt their movements were too elaborate and acrobatic.

Was this entire fight a farce? Just a formality between merchants, or a scheme to manipulate the city? Kai came up with dozens of potential conspiracies as he watched the two women fighting at clearly less than their full potential.

Suddenly they both landed a blow simultaneously and they slid back across the arena in opposite directions. In that moment something shifted and Kai leaned forward unconsciously.

Both combatants had changed. Traelisia stopped dancing around and rooted herself in place near the center of the arena. A large piece of marble began to melt from the floor, the same as the stone of the Colosseum but brimming with mana. On the outside of the ring, Vyorrine drew her sword quickly and efficiently, with no more of her theatrical flipping.

The beginning had been building the crowd up, but now both sides were serious.

When Vyorrine attacked, she lunged across the arena with blinding speed. Her thrust would have impaled the vast majority of opponents, but somehow the marble block intercepted it. She dodged around it and struck from the side, but the stone moved with startling speed to deflect. Undeterred, Vyorrine began an aggressive assault, determined to break through her opponent's defenses.

Just when it seemed like they'd fallen into a pattern, Vyorrine seemed to flicker in two places at once. Many of the audience members might not have been able to understand what happened, but Kai followed the movement: she first emitted a vast fireball from one direction, then flashed to the other and attacked with her sword.

Traelisia automatically moved her marble defense to deflect the sword and realized the timing of the fireball a moment later. She raised her free arm, moving physically for the first time since the fight became serious, and seemed to take the explosion head on. Only when the smoke faded could Kai see that the side of her body was now covered in a thin layer of stone.

That conflict set the tone for the next stage of the battle. Vyorrine didn't try to use surprise anymore, just probed weaknesses with fire and blade.

"Are fights between high stage cultivators like this?" Kai asked quietly, without taking his eyes away.

"Not really," Zae Zin Nim breathed back. "We generally blast directly and let the superior technique or stronger qi win."

"What if someone has enough Physique to resist it?"

"Don't be absurd. Qi will still burn them."

"At E rank, maybe, but what about higher stages?"

Before she could answer, the combat took another sharp turn. In another dashing attack that looked just the same as every other, Vyorrine abruptly revealed a piece of liquid metal in her off-hand. It arced around the side of the marble block and shattered the layer of stone armor, cutting a bloody line across Traelisia's side.

"Irunian?" Zae Zin Nim asked.

"I thin-"

Kai was cut off by a rumble as stone exploded from the base of the arena, forming from nothing. Traelisia clasped her hands and it closed around the two of them, binding them both within a dome. He could feel a vicious fight going on within, but nothing was visible and the crowd began to boo.

Total Power: 406

Flamecaster Class: 40 (50)

Waterborn: Firstswept (89)

Path of Steel: Steel 2 (40)

Crystal Cultivation: 2551 (72)

Physique Level: E-2 (86)

Soul Level: 7 (49)

Golden Dragon Breath (+20)

>

His best guess was that she had used a partial shroud to hide her last ability, or perhaps the dragon breath operated differently, more like magical equipment. He had only seen similar symbols a few times, with Frontier elites and the foreign cultivator. Whatever those represented, they clearly had the power to tip the usual balance of abilities.

"Huh." Zae Zin Nim sat back with a slight frown. "I was wrong, but I must point out that she won while having a superior Power rating."

"Everybody will be calling her the winner, but it was a close thing," Kai said with a smile. "I'm just glad to have seen it. You're not going to tell me this wasn't one of the best fights you've seen?"

"One of the most elaborate, perhaps. But this is hardly the most powerful battle I have witnessed. Every single conflict between Earth Soul cultivators utilized more strength."

"Well, those wouldn't be the strongest either. That would be the fight we saw between everyone who fought over the abyss in the Frontier."

"That... is true." Zae Zin Nim paused like she was going to say something, then kept her mouth closed. She looked unusually contemplative and it didn't seem like the right time to point out that he'd won the bet.

On his way out, though, Kai managed to find one of the Yulthens Stadium officials and had his formal bet acknowledged. There was no con or trick this time, he was given prize money of 2200 Goralian Eagles. Judging from all the angry faces he saw around him, many had been betting in the other direction and the arena probably made plenty of money.

For his part, Kai didn't really care. Just watching such a good fight was exhilarating, but there was more to it than that. For most of those watching, a fight like that was a once in a lifetime experience.

For him, it was the level he intended to be fighting at in the future.