A/N: Merry Christmas/happy Christmas eve depending on whether you celebrate it on the 24th/25th.
***
A single blow at full power, one where I abandoned everything but offense. If I landed a blow like that, I would deal an immense amount of damage. I knew I couldn't actually defeat him with this single blow, assuming he properly defended. But if it landed, regaress of whether he blocked it or not, this battle which had been fairly even would shift in my favour.
As I began to throw my punch, Arthur turned around, making eye contact with me as my fist travelled towards him. But, it was too late and I was too fast. There was nothing he could do at stage to stop my blow.
But he didn't intend to stop my blow. No. The regressor had decided to take the full brunt of my blow and forgo his defence, soon lightning began to crackle around his hand. Sparks flew as his hand approached my face. The output of his attack was high, it was insanely high.
In that instant, I thought I was going to die. Lighting being sent right to my face while I wasn't properly defending myself sounded like something pretty damn lethal, but... wouldn't he die if he too didn't bother to defend against my blow? If my punch gutted him, then he was sure to die. Right?
But, if he fried my brains when I wasn't defending myself properly, then I would probably die too.
'Aren't we... gonna kill each other?'
Despite these thoughts running through my head, I didn't bother stopping my attack. In this moment, my only goal was to win after all.
As my fist approached his stomach, and his hand approached my face I felt several different presences appear. Each person had power that dwarfed both mine and Arthur's by a large margin.
I felt a person grab the arm that was going to slam into Arthur's stomach, I felt another restrain my free arm. Then, there was a third person who stood between me and Arthur, his palm had stopped my attack and he had stopped Arthur's attack too.
When I looked at Arthur, he was also being restrained. These guys weren't playing around either, I could feel it. If I took it any further, they wouldn't hesitate to use force to restrain me.
"Easy there kiddos. This is an entrance exam, it was never meant to go this far. We were going to stop it earlier, but I... or rather... we were entranced by your fight. It was a good fight, too good to stop, but you lot need to learn to hold back. Reinhardt, in what world is it acceptable for you to just go around trying to gut your fellow examinee? And Arthur, were you trying to fry his brains by channeling a highly concentrated amount of lightning into his face? Honestly. But, that's all the berating you'll get from me."
The man who blocked our attacks ranted about our fight, and honestly I couldn't really blame him for being mad. Arthur tried to electrocute my face with a huge amount of lightning Magic while I tried to show everyone in the stadium what Arthur's guts looked like.
And with that, I deactivated my Enhancements and Arthur did the same and we were promptly let go.
***
'Now then, who the hell told them that I was taken in as a disciple of Caelus? I don't really mind, but who told them and why?'
Then, while I was receiving a check up by an Awakened who specialised in healing Magic, someone opened the door. It was the Imperial Princess, Charlotte Von Erebus.
She ran a hand through her hair, and smiled a little.
"Oh... you told them didn't you? You told them all that about me? I don't really mind, but why?"
Her look darkened a little.
"See, a lot of people here are nobles. Commoners typically get harassed by them, even if the school tries to enforce equality. So, I thought that if I told them about you, you'd seem more intimidating and people would leave you... alone."
I then remembered how this Academy worked, the Awakened from the noble families often made attempts at bullying the commoners. The reasons didn't really matter to me but what did matter was that because of the superior resources they naturally had access to, they typically were stronger than their commoner counterparts.
But, in this place if you were strong people were more likely to leave you alone. And, if you had backing they were even more likely to leave you alone.
"Anyways, my match is next."
Although she didn't say anything else, it was obvious she wanted me to watch.
And so, thanking the doctor, I got up and followed her.