Chapter 80 - Cecil vs. Lucia

With the arena finally repaired, Cecil and Lucia made their way up and stood about 30 meters away from each other.

Cecil sported his usual dazed and leisurely look and Lucia was concentrating, glaring hard at the seemingly impassive Cecil.

"Alright, the last match for our assessment. Rank 1 Lucia vs. Rank 2 Cecil!"

A roaring applause erupted in the arena, and there seemed to be one to many people in the arena now.

It was unknown when the other upper year classmen came to spectate, but it seems that they were already there when the first match of S class had started.

The first year students were just so entranced with watching their fellow S class students' matches that it slipped their mind when the audience had suddenly grew to an unbelievable size.

Cecil and Lucia had tuned out everything else and were only focused on each other. The roaring applause was muffled out in their ears.

Lucia finally opened her mouth after the long silence, "I'm taking you down Cel..."

Cecil only smiled in response.

Lucia pulled out her katana, Shirayuki, and positioned it in front of her. She then reached for her Butterfly and held it in her other hand. She was dual wielding and this caused the audience to look at her peculiarly

"!"

"Woah..."

Then small exclamations rang through the audience. Lucia's two weapons were not only unique, but they were also aesthetically pleasing and were the definition of beautiful.

Fina, for one, was very surprised seeing Lucia's main weapon. The slender long blade was different than what she imagined. It wasn't a rapier, but a long, extremely thin and curved sword that only had one edge. It had a beautiful silver color with dark silver 'clouds' or 'waves' imprinted on the blade. There were also light azure colored runes flashing lightly on it. It was a beautiful weapon that had excellent and meticulous craftsmanship.

"That sword... it was different than what I thought."

"...I've never seen something like that before." Eli added.

"Yeah, judging by her sheath, I thought it was a rapier at first."

"Me too! But I have to say... that sword really is beautiful." Eli added wistfully.

"That small dagger too, it's like the smaller version of Lucia's sword."

The kodachi that Lucia held in her off-hand was designed just like her main weapon, the patterns were somewhat similar and so were the runes. The only difference was that the blade was not curved, but straight with one edge and it was entirely light green in color.

Ainz was observing the two in the ring, then he said to the girls beside him, "Hey look. Cecil's taking out his sword!"

When they turned to look at Cecil, he was in the motion of unsheathing his weapon. When he pulled out his weapon, the sword's sleek and sturdy, azure tinted blade that had light gold runes running along it, shone brightly.

The meticulous craftsmanship shone completely and although it only looked like a plain broadsword with runes on it, the sharpness and mana that exuded from the weapon caused everyone to acknowledge that it wasn't just any ordinary broadsword.

Lucia smiled seeing Cecil pull out his weapon. "No warm up?"

"I already had my warm up earlier."

"...that's mean."

"Hehe, well..."

"Never mind, let's get this over with."

It was a good thing that no one could hear what they were saying, because if Eli heard Cecil's nonchalant and insensitive comment she would have broken down in tears. Her intense and serious fight that she put 100 percent of her effort into was only akin to a warm up for Cecil.

"...I'm going full power from the start Lulu."

"So am I!"

"Good, then show me your progress." Cecil smiled and activated Mana Burst in full power.

WOOOSSHH

The air around Cecil immediately changed after he activated Mana Burst in Full Power. A faint golden aura had begun exuding from his body.

Lucia herself also activated an original body enhancing spell that she created in imitation of Cecil's mana burst. A faint dark red aura wrapped around her body.

Cecil smiled seeing this, "So, you've perfected Elemental Burst?"

"Almost, but for a serious fight with you Cel, I can't afford to not use it."

"Oh? Then, come!"

Cecil got into his stance and waved a hand at Lucia, beckoning her to make her move.

Immediately, the two fighters disappeared from their spots.

CLANG!

They appeared an instant later in the middle of the arena, blades clashing. Lucia was constantly slashing and stabbing at Cecil. She had incorporated all the martial arts that Cecil had taught her in her sword play.

The beautiful strokes were aesthetically pleasing if she was showing off, but at her current speed the spectators only saw multiple flashes of light coming from Lucia that were accompanied with the sounds of blades clashing.

For a moment, the two kept on flashing around the arena, trading blows with each other. However, neither of them was able to effectively hit their opponent.

Lucia was the first to break away.

She waved her kodachi and summoned multiple scarlet magic formations. She kept them levitating in the air and flashed in front of Cecil again. She kept on slashing and stabbing with her katana, and then she began using her kodachi in coordination with her katana.

Cecil's brow raised little in surprise. 'So she can dual wield more proficiently now.'

Cecil was unintentionally smiling and this also caused Lucia to smirk as well.

After Cecil parried a blow from Lucia he was just about to begin his counter attack, but then was forced to duck sensing a lava bolt heading his way.

He had already paid mind to the magic formations that were idling around in the air and was already wary of when Lucia was going to fire it. He had planned to use that moment when Lucia jumped back to get out of range from her spells' bombardment to commence his attack and end put her on the back foot, but he was forced to dodge out of the way.

Seeing him dodge, Lucia sent a sweeping kick his way while slashing her kodachi at his face, along with the slash another lava bolt was fired at Cecil.

"!"

'This girl! AHAHA!'

For the first time in a while, Cecil's expression had changed from his dull gaze to an astonished and cheerful one.

He parried Lucia's Butterfly that was aimed at his face and twisted his body and cut apart the 2 lava bolts that were aimed at his back. His twist put his body in a rotation and he sent a fist towards Lucia's face, but was forced to retract his hand when he saw a lava bolt heading towards his own face.

"HAHA!" Cecil fired his own mana bolt at the lava bolt and dispersed Lucia's magic.

Lucia didn't let up and followed up with an underhand cut with her katana towards Cecil's body. Cecil reacted quickly to this and quickly slapped his hand on Lucia's shoulder. He used the momentum to push his body forward.

The slap on her shoulder caused Lucia's body to tilt which resulted in her missing her slash. If she didn't falter earlier, then it would have at least resulted in Cecil's leg being cut.

Lucia clicked her tongue and waved her Butterfly.

Cecil was just about to turn around when he saw from the corner of his eyes the multiple lava bolts flying towards him.

Cecil jumped back, twisted his body and somersaulted his way out of the bombardment.

Seeing him come out unscathed from the array of lava bolts caused the audience the gasp in awe and cheer loudly.

Just when he landed and balanced himself, Cecil was surprised to see Lucia's Shirayuki slashing down at his face. Cecil raised his sword and blocked the katana, but suddenly felt an impact on his stomach.

Lucia had followed up with a kick to his stomach, launching him away. She immediately fired more lava bolts at Cecil.

Cecil was in the air and he was smiling. He twisted his body in the air and began cutting up the lava bolts flying towards. He quickly landed back on his feet and raised a hand towards Lucia.

He saw that Lucia was already dashing towards him so Cecil jumped back and sent a mana volley towards Lucia.

"HYAAAAAHHHHHH!!!" With a spirited cry Lucia started quickly cutting up the bolts of mana flying towards her.

She knew that they had a homing function and didn't bother to evade, she had 3 weapons at her disposal so she made good use of them.

She had the katana in her right hand, the kodachi in her left, and the array of magic spells that were floating behind her.

With her coordination of spells and attacks she had successfully nullified Cecil's mana volley, but right when she was about to dash towards him again, she found that her target was no longer in the distance ahead of her.

Cecil had already flashed in front of Lucia and was already sending a slash towards her body. Lucia smirked seeing this and raised her tails in front of her.

CLANG!

"WHAT?!" Cecil exclaimed, but that was all he could do, he couldn't do a follow up attack since Lucia used the momentum from his attack to back off.

Cecil couldn't pursue her and had to evade since the lava bolts surrounding Lucia were already heading his way.

"Tsk"

"BLOOM!"

With Lucia's shout a crimson magic formation formed under Cecil's feet and immediately, a lotus-shaped flame blossomed into existence.

It was Lucia's original magic, Erupting Lotus.

The audience was already on the edge of their seats seeing this high-end fight. The Headmaster was also smiling brightly seeing the fight. From the blossoming lotus he tried to look for the silhouette that was supposed to be enduring the searing flames, but then he looked towards the air a couple of meters above the blossoming flower of flames.

"LAVA STORM!"

In the air above the flaming lotus, another large magic formation had formed and then waves and waves of lava bolts rained down towards the ground.

Lucia had predicted that Cecil would dodge upwards and had prepared a Lava Storm just above the Erupting Lotus.

Sure enough, she could finally see Cecil's body dodging in between the storm of Lava bolts.

"HYA!"

Lucia kicked off the ground and sent her body flying into the air towards Cecil and her lava storm.

She waved her kodachi and immediately the lava bolts halted in mid-air and started aiming towards Cecil.

"..." Cecil was quiet, seeing the determined girl flying towards him. The girl's katana was already blossoming in flames and she was directing a slash towards him who was in the air.

Cecil smiled gently. He was thoroughly pleased with Lucia's progress. This was the first time that she went all out in a fight with him and he was both happy and in shock.

It surprised him at how fast Lucia's battle sense and combat prowess had progressed when they had only trained for a little less than half a year.

She was a genius, not only in magic, but also in martial arts and combat.

He chuckled softly and directed a sharp gaze at Lucia who was flying towards him and mumbled, "Come at me, Lulu."