As he got one hour, he decided to take a tour around the battlegrounds and check on the ongoing fights.
"Interesting team…" As he just walked for ten minutes, he finally stopped while his eyes shone brightly over a certain battleground.
There were two teams fighting as usual, one side was acting just like how the red falcon and their foes behaved, releasing all of their strongest techniques from the start.
But the other team acted differently this time. William saw that team members lean more on using the common techniques, evading, running, and even defending the incoming attacks from their foes without risking harming themselves.
During the past ten minutes, William witnessed at least twenty battles. He never stayed at one battleground for more than half a minute before leaving for another one.
All the teams he saw were fighting using the same useless way, exploding early on while using their strongest techniques. But this team looked different.
William recognised their lineup, two fire spirit masters, three earth spirit masters, two wind spirit masters, one ice spirit master, and the last two were one rock spirit master and the other was a fog spirit master.
"They have three unique elements in their roster… That's a good line up," William saw how experienced and well prepared this team was than others he saw this far.
After the first minute passed, the other team members started to lose out in terms of their spirit power. And that was when the team that attracted William's eyes started to go on full offence.
"They are doing this based on strategy and training, not just out of fluke…" William became much surer about this point the more he watched the team members fight and take down their enemies.
In his eyes, they didn't use too scary techniques, just using the right technique to take down the opponent without wasting too much spirit power.
To William, that was an admirable spirit control ability, one he dreamt for his team to have.
William was aware that having such good control over the battle rhythm, controlling the opposite team actions and then attacking using the right techniques, didn't come without a long time of training.
That made William quite curious about this team. And finally, he got to learn about their name when the judge announced their victory.
"The Overpowers win this round!"
"Overpowers… What a weird and fitting name it is…" William crossed his arms while watching the silver grade spirit masters descend the stage.
"It's just a name we picked on a whim," and when William was watching them leave the battleground, a weird voice came from his side, attracting his attention away from the team to that refined looking young girl standing near him.
He was totally absorbed in watching this battle and didn't feel her getting closer to him. They were in the middle of the Grand Arena, where many teams came and went, while judges and other assistants were wandering the place all the time.
"You are…?" William could tell she was a gold grade spirit master, and she wasn't older than sixteen years old.
"You can call me Ro, and I'm the leader of the team you kept glaring at for the past couple minutes."
William got the feeling that this wasn't her true name. And just from such feeling, he realised how mysterious she and this team truly was.
"I'm William," he wouldn't lie about his name. After all, he wore the uniform of the academy, while Ro and her team didn't wear anything that was related to the academy.
"Are you taking part in the competition?" She looked quite curious about his purpose of being here, "from your looks, you are a bronze spirit master. That means you are the tenth member in one team, right?"
"I just got admitted by coincidence to a team," William shrugged, "and I didn't know anything about this grand competition, so figured out to come and watch."
"Did you like what you saw about my team then?" Just as she said that the other team members came and stood by her side.
From the looks on their faces, William could tell they were deeply respecting her as if she was their true master or something.
"You got a nice team there," William didn't hide his good impression about the team, "one that got trained for a long time already."
"We have been together for a few years, so it's expected to be this good," she shrugged, missing the real point behind William's words on purpose.
"And they got a good master as well," William didn't drop his attempts in preying over the identity of this team.
"I'm flattered," Ro shortly laughed, "let's meet on the stage next. What's the name of your team?"
"Oh, it's a low team, one you won't recognise," William waved his hand as if he was part of a bad team.
"A team that has their tenth member like you isn't a nameless team," Ro could tell how special William was, just like how the latter could read through them as well.
"Miss Ro is overestimating my abilities," William laughed, and refused to give in to anything related to his team's identity to her, "I'm just a bronze spirit master."
"I'd like to meet you on a battleground today," Ro laughed, saying it as if she was just giving some face to William. But the latter could tell she was serious about such a statement.
"We are a regular visitor to the top twenty list," and just as William was thinking about how to follow this team's performance later without getting busted by Ro again like this time, one of the team members spoke up, "what's the general ranking of your team?"
"Much lower than yours," William didn't lie, "we are always part of the top hundred."
"I don't think you are going to end up this low this time," Ro gave the one who spoke from his team a stern glance, as if she was silently reprimanding him for giving William such intel for free, "I hope we meet at the sixth round or beyond."