The only thing Clarence could take advantage of was the fact that his mana reserves hadn't dropped to a critical level.
He reinforced his arms with mana and soon began replying to Maxillan's blows. Clarence knew that he needed just one critical blow to win the match as Maxillan was on his last legs as he was almost out of mana and was getting tired to continue physical fights.
Clarence put strength in his legs and … started running away.
It put all those audiences at loss and annoyed Maxillan. High up in the air, Marvin laughed when he saw this and said,
"Didn't think even a commander's son would run away in a battle."
Sienna rolled her eyes and replied,
"Trying to plot with emotions is pure stupidity."
Down below Clarence was thinking something along the same lines. He had never even considered pride or anything when in battle. If he had considered that, he wouldn't have used so many sneak attacks. His fighting style itself was filled with tricks, and he intended to develop along that path.
He suddenly ducked and rolled away to dodge the punch thrown by Maxillan who had almost caught up to him. It felt as if the dodge was a little early but no one paid attention to that as Clarence ended up rolling into a bunch of rubble. The stadium had turned into a mess due to the power level of the battle and mainly due to that spell of Maxillan.
Clarence quickly got up and ran into another direction but suddenly snapped his head to the left in the middle of running. He continued running and did a sharp turn again after jumping over rubble.
Maxillan was getting more and more annoyed as time went by. He knew that Clarence was trying to waste time as he was almost on the verge of passing out. He felt damn tired and was squeezing out the last of his strength to take down Clarence.
It was a despicable tactic sure, but it worked for Clarence. He just needed to hold on for a few minutes, and he would win.
There were no time rules in this tournament as the stakes were big, and it might not do justice to the losers. So everyone had to give their all and completely defeat the opponent if they wanted to win.
Maxillan once again attempted an attack which Clarence dodged and did a flip over a pile of rocks.
Seeing that Clarence had almost tripped himself over and was in the process of getting up, he rushed using the last bits of his strength.
But just when he bypassed the pile of rocks, an incredible thing happened which surprised nearly the entire audience except some really keen ones.
High up in the air, Sienna laughed out loud without holding back at all. Beside her Marvin had his mouth shut and didn't react to her at all.
Down on the stadium, as soon as Maxillan had crossed the pile of rock, as if something snapped all over the stadium, various strings flew over to where Maxillan was standing like a rock being shot out of a catapult.
The strings wrapped themselves around Maxillan, and held him in place. He couldn't react at all as his whole attention was on landing that hit on Clarence.
Even if he had been able to react, he wouldn't have been able to dodge as the strings had flung over to his position from all over the stadium, it didn't hit Clarence as he was laying down and had a smile of satisfaction on his face.
Earlier when he was running all over the place, he was placing strings along the way carefully using very little mana with the use of his exquisite control over it.
It also helped that he had used mana on his legs which he kept fluctuating, one, to mask his act of placing strings and two, to lower down his speed at times when he wanted to bait Maxillan to attack him.
As only then would he have the reason to fall over piles of rubbles and place something which will keep all those strings at place with high tension so when they are released, it would be quick so as to not give Maxillan any chance to dodge.
The final pile of rocks where he tried to flip over from but 'accidently' tripped was where the trigger was placed which would release the strings.
It was also, one, to give Maxillan a big enough chance, the act of getting up was all an act so that he would rush at him without thinking for long and two, so that he can lay down when the strings are flinged from all over the place to be safe from it.
Clarence got up and walked over to Maxillan who was struggling to break free from the strings. Too bad, although one string itself would have been snapped easily by him, Clarence had done enough preparation to take care of that.
Add onto that, Maxillan was drained of his energy, but he never lost his will to fight. You can deduce that from the fact that he was still struggling to break up.
When he reached near Maxillan, Clarence placed his dagger on his neck and said in an exhausted voice,
"You were amazing, Maxillan. I had never experienced such an amazing fight. Honestly I might have lost if not for me being lucky. I honestly hate fighting, but this, it was thrilling. Surrender."
Maxillan stopped struggling at that point to show that he surrendered.
"Participant 3 lost. Participant 9 won."
Marvin paused for a little and continued,
"It was a good match."
Both Clarence and Maxillan felt a little happy listening to this. It wasn't the fact that Marvin complimented them that they felt happy about, rather, it was about how their efforts were acknowledged.
Just then both of them heard resounding claps from everywhere. Clarence had torn apart the string by then and both of them turned around to see the majority of the audience had stood up and were feverishly clapping.
They felt warmth flowing through them and goosebumps forming all over their body.
Maxillan turned around to face Clarence, extended his hand and said,
"Maxillan, third son of the Dragon emperor. It was a nice battle, I hope to fight you soon."
Clarence accepted the handshake and replied,
"Clarence, heir to the Royal family of demons. I'll only fight if the stakes are high enough hehe."
"Sure, we'll see."
After saying so, both of them walked to the opposite direction and exited the disc.
*****
'Hah. These injuries are fucking terrible.'
Clarence was sitting in his tent while tending to his wounds. He didn't meet up with his friends as he was really tired, and his whole body was hurting, so he went straight to his tent after setting it up.
He brought up the system tab and exchanged for a few medicines for some items he bought from shops the previous month.
Although his parents didn't give him much allowance compared to other noble kids, but, whatever they gave, it was way above what the majority even got as their salary. So it wasn't a problem for him to buy some items.
He put these unique medicines on his skin but found that they had too little effect, or rather, the effect was too slow paced.
Clarence was a little disappointed as he was expecting that these unique medicines would also bring forth some miracles. He kept them in his spatial bracelet and returned to putting his medicines.
He opened his system tab and went to the shop/exchange list. He then exchanged some of the other items for some techniques and spells. The final was a whole day later to give some time to heal as both the finalists were injured badly.
As hoped by Clarence, Everett and Bernard both advanced to the semi finals. He didn't want them to fight each other but also wanted them to keep advancing, but sadly one doesn't get all his wishes fulfilled.
In the battle between Everett and Bernard, Bernard had come out on top, but not without injuries. Everett hadn't gone easy on Bernard for being his friend and had inflicted a lot of sword injuries on him.
So as a result of both participants being heavily injured, the final would be held a day later, one, to build up the pressure and suspense. Two, to let the finalists rest and third, *cough* so that more people can bet in the betting booth.
A good portion of the betting booths had set the odds in favor of Bernard. The reason was that unlike Clarence who had relied on tricks and such to defeat Maxillan. Bernard and Everett had fought it out in a straightforward manner.
On top of that both Everett and Bernard were rank three, so their fight also had more impact on the viewers.
Although Clarence had defeated Maxillan who was rank three despite being a rank two, the majority of the people didn't understand the sudden increase in his mana and he had also run away while fighting which didn't have much of an impact on the audience.
As for the applause they gave after their battle ….they did it for Everett and Bernard's match too.