While the 2 were having an intense battle, the crowd was cheering at maximum volume. It was truly as though the stage had been created, just so that the two children could battle on it.
`Hmmm, judging by his red aura, he must be at the Red Mask stage just like me. This could end up being a tougher fight then I thought at first, Fortunately...´
"URGHH!!"
Followed by this grunt, Ryuu Sasaki's body began emanating a strong suppressive aura. This was the advanced Tactic, the Ocean Lock Tactic. This Tactic had 4 layers and was very powerful. although Ryuu Sasaki had only learned the first layer of this advanced Tactic, yet that alone was enough.
The Ocean Lock Tactic created the suppressive aura, and that aura had the total suppressive power of 10% of his total force. Ryuu Sasaki spoke calmly while staring straight into Ryuu Kiyoshi's azure blue eyes.
"This is the Ocean Lock Tactic. Against this, I'm afraid that you are helpless. Regardless, it was a good fight."
Ryuu Kiyoshi didn't answer. But despite this, Ryuu Sasaki knew he wasn't scared. A moment passed without anything being done by either party, then the battle continued.
Ryuu Kiyoshi jumped back, creating some distance between them, then he raised his saber above his head and began sending his Red-coloured Qi into his saber.
Seeing this, Ryuu Sasaki raised an eyebrow, and began furiously thinking, `I see, he's going to use his combat art now. Based on the way he is sending his Qi into the saber, it must be an Enhancer Art of some sort, probably increasing the explosive power.´
This was something unique done in the Ryuu clan. Every member of the Ryuu clan had to create their own combat art, which was unique to the person who made it and would only very rarely be passed on.
A combat was basically the name given to a self-made technique which involves the use of Qi. There were 3 different main types of combat art.
The first type was an Enhancer Art, This is the Qi is circulated to increase a part of the object where the Qi is circulated in. This includes speed, power, durability, and other such things.
Then there was the Transmuter Art. This involves altering aspects of the Qi. This ranged from turning the Qi into sharp Qi, warm Qi, cold Qi, thunder Qi, and more.
Finally, there was the Emitter Art. This was using your Qi as a projectile which could be used for many purposes. The Emitter Art usually had a lot of enhancer and transmuter aspects involved with it.
All combat arts had some parts of all three categories, but the one that Ryuu Kiyoshi was using was mainly an Enhancer Art.
Noticing that Ryuu Kiyoshi was using his Combat Art, Ryuu Sasaki decided to discreetly use his as well. Ryuu Sasaki pulled out a row of throwing knives from somewhere in his robe and instantly circulated his Qi through them.
Unlike with Ryuu Kiyoshi, it was extremely difficult to tell that he was doing this. This was because Ryuu Sasaki's combat art was a Transmuter Art. He called it Misdirect Knife Art.
This combat art didn't increase his offensive or defensive prowess at all, but it altered the property of his Qi in a way that encouraged people to look at something other than the Qi and anything that was shrouded in it. He could use this to either hide his weapons like he was doing now or even hide when escaping.
Although this takes a long time to explain, all of this happened in the blink of an eye. Suddenly, Ryuu
Kiyoshi swung his blade downward., yelling in the process,
"Feel the power of my Exploding Lotus Saber Art!!"
Noticing this, Ryuu Sasaki side-stepped as fast as he could, releasing his throwing knives at the same time.
*BANG!!!!!*
The moment Ryuu Kiyoshi's saber reached it's lowest point, all of the Qi stored in the saber began rotating outward, expanding to a gigantic size before reaching its limit and exploding.
The rotating Qi looked like a lotus, which must have been where it had gotten its name from. At this moment, none of the audience was able to see what happened on stage.
Finally, when all of the smoke from the explosion was cleared, the stage was once more revealed. On the stage stood a young boy wearing a white-blue robe.
He seemed unscathed, but his robes were tattered, with not a single part being undamaged. Shortly after, a shout from the referee revealed the results of the battle,
"Ryuu Sasaki is the winner!!!"
It was indeed Ryuu Sasaki who had won. When Ryuu Kiyoshi had released the power of his Exploding Lotus Saber Art, Ryuu Sasaki had thrown his hidden knives with the Misdirect Knife Art. Since Ryuu Kiyoshi was in a weakened state after having just used the Exploding Lotus Saber Art he had absolutely no chance of noticing the knives.
Not only that, but Ryuu Kiyoshi's attack was weakened by the Ocean Lock Tactic, resulting with Ryuu Sasaki being able to dodge it.
Ryuu Sasaki turned around and walked off the stage. At the same time, a group of people came up and helped Ryuu Kiyoshi up. It was only when they had arrived that they noticed the throwing knives stuck in various parts of Ryuu Kiyoshi's body.
In truth, although it seemed that the Misdirect Knife Art was superior to the Exploding Lotus Saber Art, they were actually very close to being the same. The Exploding Lotus Saber Art had not only much more power than the Misdirect Knife Art but was also an area of effect attack, attacking multiple enemies in an area.
The Misdirect Knife Art used up much less Qi then the Exploding Lotus Saber Art and also took less time to complete it. So all in all, the 2 were equally effective for their intended purposes.
It was only after this fight, that Ryuu Kiyoshi was acknowledged as the second greatest genius in the Ryuu clan. The tournament ended with Ryuu Sasaki winning the first place medal and Ryuu Kiyoshi getting the third-place medal, both winning by default due to their opponents' forfeit.
They had many battles after that, and although Ryuu Sasaki won most of the time, he did also lose his fair share of battles against Ryuu Kiyoshi.