There was a smile at the corner of Nicola's mouth as he was thrown back for ten meters. At the same time, the contorted faces of the elders of the Bat Ape clan were visible to everyone.
A skill of this type could let a lot of damage, but there would also be some cons, the recoil of the attack could not be avoided unless one was a cultivator of gold level or higher. The few centimeters that took the Bat Ape away from the edge of the arena were not enough for him to be able to resist the backpull caused by the technique he performed, causing him to be thrown out of the arena and falling on his ass to the ground, like a child with no reaction to the fall on the floor.
Even the match referee was careful not to laugh and remain professional in that moment before announcing the winner. "The winner is Nicola Kanata!"
The previous silence was replaced by laughter around the defeated opponent who remained on the ground mourning his loss like a spoiled child. Nicola got up and left the arena, waiting for his next fight, it would be the semi final. The quick battle allowed him to keep up with the other battles.
His next opponent would be the competition's real black horse, a total stranger who made it to the semi-finals just by luck in facing only weak opponents. It was a magical hyena beast that wouldn't stop laughing and launching attacks of thunder and fire around the field without any skill, bringing only chaos. Nicola remembered the Earth maniacs, something between the joker and terrorists.
That fight was soon put aside to watch the person Nicola was sure he would play in the finals against. They were the champions of the Nimbus Owl clans and the Raiju clan. The owl man flew in the field hiding in a cloud of darkness that threw great rays towards the viking girl who was just standing there with her battle hammers resting on the ground, acting as a lightning rod and directing those currents to the ground.
Nicola could see something else in those hammers, his elemental irises picking up that in addition to discharging the lightning's power into the ground, the hammers accumulated a small amount of electricity inside a kind of pseudo-core that he didn't quite understand.
Well, he would just use the fighting opportunity to better understand how it worked, maybe he could use this skill in his artifact production and further increase his skill, he felt he was close to creating his own blacksmithing technique and it just lacked a little to be able to merge his knowledge in a single area, creating a personalized profession for himself.
The owl man sent dangerous blasts of lightning at the Raiju woman, but she didn't seem to mind as she looked up. The fur on her neck bristled in response to an attack and seemed to be about to react sometime soon, and that's what she did. A roar emanated a beastly aura of lightning in the area that destroyed part of the cloud of darkness in the air, showing the owl man's body, which was soon followed by one of the twin hammers flying towards the opponent.
The owl man still tried to dodge but could not fully evade the hammer, hitting one of its wings and making it fall helplessly to the ground. The Viking woman soon approached him, hammering him into the ground and knocking him unconscious. The referee announced the end of the match, declaring the victory for the champion of the Raiju clan.
That day of competitions was over and the next day the semi-finals and grand final of the tournament would be played. Nicola took the time to redeem his bet on the previous match. As he hadn't reached the finals of the tournament yet he only got five hundred thousand high quality mana crystals, he needed a lot more than that to build a force powerful enough to sustain himself, any amount was useful, but he was looking for quantities that only gold-level cultivators possessed.
The Bat Ape clan was very indignant at the defeat suffered by their clan member, however, the turner was assisted by the near gold level powers of the three clans, the branch master of the mercenary guild and the bookmaker was managed by the Bank Pluto, they wouldn't dare offend so many powers over a stupid tournament, but they wouldn't let it go either, and they had plans against Nicola when he left town.