The arena is simple. Round with a flat, sandy floor. Everything to force a quick and direct confrontation. Brumus chooses a large two-handed axe while Pepper takes a scepter. Seeing their weapon choices, the professor starts to snicker as if she already knows the outcome of the fight. I hope Pepper doesn't get too badly hurt.
The two students position themselves and Tamaële gives the starting signal. Brumus wastes no time and sprints towards Pepper. She backs up a little, scared, while Brumus laughs. He swings his heavy axe horizontally and Pepper tries to block it with her scepter. The impact's force throws her to the ground and before she has time to get up, Brumus finishes her off on the ground with a second brutal attack. Pepper, who is vulnerable, is unable to dodge or block and has to take the blow full on. The runes on the axe light up and Pepper starts screaming in pain, curling up into a ball. She holds her chest with both hands and screams in agony.
After about a minute, the effect fades and Tamaële announces the winner. The two students then return to their seats. Brumus smiles after his victory while Pepper has a swollen face from crying. The teacher writes Brumus' name on the board and selects the next two duelists. After several fights, it's finally my turn.
"Heolstor versus Lucian," announces Tamaële in a loud voice.
I head towards the arena and select a musket and a dagger. Lucian takes a sword and a shield and says to me with a sneer, "I'll try to give you a chance, haha, you must not be thinking clearly to choose a musket in a duel," he says, pointing to his temple.
I position myself as far away as possible to maintain a distance between us. Tamaële looks at me with a bit of pity, but I don't pay attention, I'm rather confident in my abilities.
"Begin," declares Tamaële with her strong voice.
Lucian starts running towards me at a steady pace, not too quickly because he's trying to protect himself as much as possible. He protects his chest and arms well, but not his legs... So, I raise my musket, aim, and shoot. BAM! He raises his shield to protect his head, but the bullet hits his shin. My opponent collapses to the ground screaming, the effect lasting about a minute from what I observed during the other duels. I take advantage of this time to reload. Once done, I aim and shoot. BAM! A shot straight to the head, Lucian, who has risen, falls and loses consciousness. Tamaële declares me the winner and congratulates me.
The rest of the duels proceed normally, with Nicole even losing her fight against Rose Lancer and being rather upset, which makes me happy. Before leaving, the teacher asks the winners to join her and gives us each a basic weapon to congratulate us for fighting well. I received a novice musket with a mana infusion reload. If I understand the functioning correctly, instead of putting a bullet, I have to infuse my mana inside the chamber to be able to shoot afterwards. The infusion takes a little less than a minute to perform, so it's about the same as an ordinary musket. I'm happy to have my first weapon and jubilantly take it in my hands.
Now that classes are over, I decide to return to my room and prepare for tomorrow.