"Hu Bai, please teach me." A young man from Demeter's Blessing said with a graceful bow.
"Feng Jiao, please go easy on me." A cheerful girl from Prometheus's Suffering said as she posed like a cute little girl.
"Go." The knight gave the signal as Hu Bai jumped back to the edge of the stage. He raised his arms and the stage started to morph. Two phantoms appeared on top of him. One was a mountain with rocks falling off it. The second was a monkey holding a rock staff. Both had green hues around them. Fourth Curtain!
With this, solid walls started to rise around him. The closest to him was the highest, and there was another at each meter. The walls were covering him like a semi-circle and there were little to no gaps between each line of walls. And these gaps weren't a straight line, so from where Feng Jiao was looking, she couldn't see where Hu Bai was.
All of these took about a minute and in the meantime, Feng Jiao was watching without doing anything. She had a curious gaze on her face, but from outside it looked like she was a mooner.
"Are you ready, Hu Bai Big Brother?" She shouted to the other end of the stage.
"Thank you for letting me." Hu Bai also said. Nodding, Feng Jiao took the crouching stance with her hands at each side, facing opposite directions. Above her, two signiums appeared. Both of them had green hues. The first one was a tiger with blazing mane and the second one was an arrow with Sun on it.
"Yang Element?" Ezio looked at the Signium in disbelief.
The girl's hands started to burn with fire, but even from the side, Ezio could feel the heat. They were burning at unbelievable temperatures.
"Be careful, Big Bro, this will burn." Feng Jiao said as she dashed towards the rock formation. When she arrived at the outer wall, her hand cut the wall like a hot knife through butter, and even the wall started to melt like magma. The heat was even consuming parts she had no contact with.
Hu Bai noticed things weren't looking good, so started to attack as well. He didn't want to hurt the cute-looking little girl, but it seemed like he had no other option. He kicked the ground and a pillar of earth rose beneath Feng Jiao's feet.
Hurling herself towards her opponent thanks to the elevated ground, Feng Jiao floated in the air like a swan as she landed where Hu Bai was a second ago. She looked around foolishly as he realized her target was lost, but in the next second the floor opened and a hand grabbed her ankle to force her to the ground.
Caught by a surprise attack, she failed to escape, but the heat around her body reached the point of cracking the air. Hu Bai, who was firmly holding the little girl's leg, let it go in pain and escaped back into the earth. The girl was about to jump out of the hole but in the next second, something amazing happened. She felt many times heavier and failed to raise even her arm. While the gravity on her was increasing, Hu Bai left the ground and created a stone staff from the rock on the stage.
He raised the staff into the air to aim at the little girl, but when he was hesitant to deal the finishing blow, the Arrow Signium on top of her head shone brightly and an arrow blazing with flames of Sun, shot towards Hu Bai.
"Signium Skill: Sun Arrow!"
"Signium Skill: Mountain Crash!"
Hu Bai's Signium also came to life and a formation of rocks appeared in front of him. Anything close to the mountain started to plummet towards the ground. Although the arrow was flying true, it started to lower its head and when it arrived at Hu Bai, it was on the ground.
"Hmmph!" Feng Jiao snorted as her first Signium activated too.
"Signium Skill: Flame Tiger!"
Her hands turned into claws and sun flames at the tip of her nails cut open the earth. She dug her way out but as soon as she did, Hu Bai appeared in front of her and swung the staff he was holding.
"Signium Skill: Earth Staff Descends!"
The air bent around the staff, as it landed on top of Feng Jiao's shoulder. It would be pretty painful if Hu Bai attacked, but he stopped when the staff contacted her shoulder.
"I forfeit." Feng Jiao said with a smile as she bowed.
"You let me win." Hu Bai too, gracefully bowed.
'Using Earth to stop my speed, huh, Xiao Chen. Is that your plan? At first, it was that idiot flaunting his speed in front of me. Now that he has failed, you instead want to stop my attacks because you think that is all I have.' Ezio smirked.
Fights continued one after another. Some of them were interesting, and some weren't so much. Although these disciples were all handpicked by the sects and champions were the best of the best, there were still qualitative differences.
When he finally saw the bloody flames Alein Hervi used, he was really impressed. He wanted to get his hands on that flame, but he wasn't sure if it was possible.
The young knight's fighting style was also a lot different. He was using a cauldron like a steel wrecking ball, shield, and mace. At one point, he would defend with it, and at another, he would swing it by holding its handle. The bloody flames appearing out of nowhere were also helping his style.
Soon the second round began, and Ezio stepped onto the stage. Hu Bai too came and bowed without any malice in his voice. "Hu Bai, please teach me."
"Ezio, please go easy on me." Ezio answered with a smile. Since his opponent was from Grandma's Sect, he would not kill him, nor would hurt him heavily. After all, Grandma was kind to his master.