"I swear this is a bad idea, Vale", Thorne spoke. Even without looking, I could feel the quiver in his voice.

"I mean, skipping a class is one thing, but skipping the blood witch's lecture herself…"

"Would you quiet down already?" Listening to his constant whimpering, I couldn't help but snap back. "Weren't you the one complaining about not being able to see the final match?"

"I didn't know we would be skipping her class, though. What if she finds out?"

"Don't worry about it." I tried to assure him while peeking through the corner. "I asked Jadis to cover for us. He is reliable enough. We should be fine as long as no one mentions us in front of her."

Jadis is a coward, Thorne retorted while checking if anyone was following us. "Argh, whatever. These are my last few months in this world anyway; I am not spending them cowering in fear."

Hearing this, a frown appeared on my face before I suppressed it and pointed to a door.

"Let's go in there; even the blood witch would hesitate to enter the men's bathroom."

"I doubt that, but I suppose that's a good place as any."

Checking again that no one was watching us, we entered the bathroom.

"Let's use one of the stalls," Thorne suggested before locking the door from outside and scaling the cubicle's side wall.

That was a good idea. A stall locked from the inside was much more suspicious than one locked from the outside, so I, too, followed behind him.

Thankfully, being trained in the best World walker preparation academy, scaling a wall or two wasn't very difficult.

Jumping inside, Thorne began rummaging through his jacket's pockets and pulled out a small circular disc. He then attached the disc to a small neural device behind his earlobe.

"I am sending you the invite." He spoke, and a notification appeared in front of my eyes.

TecFanatic88 is inviting you for remote viewing.

Accept/ Decline.

I mentally focused on the Accept button, and my surroundings changed. The bathroom stall transformed into a theatre, and a giant floating screen appeared before me.

"Hold on a second," Thorne spoke again, fiddling through the settings. The surroundings returned to normal, and the giant screen shifted in size, becoming small enough to fit on the stall's door.

Looking at the screen, I joyously nodded. Although surfing the Internet or visiting the Association's websites wasn't easy on academy-issued HUDs, there were always certain workarounds.

"Crap, it already started forty minutes ago." Thorne cursed beside me as the screen changed to a live stream.

A giant stadium appeared in front of us with millions of humans sitting inside. Even with the low volume, one could feel their cheers and screams reverberating.

In the center of the stadium, where one would normally see the fighting pit, existed a horizontally placed giant dimensional rift, beyond which one could see a desert spanning hundreds of kilometers.

Inside the desert, the kneeling figure of a somewhat battered giant mech of harrowing proportions loomed large. Just across from the giant monstrosity stood a lone figure adorned in silver armor from head to toe, with a pair of ice wings sprouting from his back. The air shimmered around him, and just one look and one could feel the pure mana exuding from his body.

"Damn. There were rumors that the final match would be a duel between Titanforge and ArcticBlaze. But to pick that desert from Kaha? How is that even fair?

Even among the millions of uninhabitable worlds known to humans, the deserts of Kaha were considered among the worst. The place was famous for having a curse that would remove any moisture from its atmosphere. One doesn't need to explain how disastrous that is for an ice mage like ArcticBlaze."

"Humph. Fair or not, who cares?" Thornes snorted, not trying to hide the smirk climbing over his lips. "The association itself picks all the match details. You think Titanforge had anything to do with it?"

Looking at his face, I let out a small sigh and decided not to say anything. This guy was a major Titanforge fan. There was nothing I could say that could change his mind. So, there was no point in this conversation.

"Still... why are they just standing there staring at each other? Didn't you say the match started forty minutes ago?"

"Yeah, something is wrong," Thorne spoke while watching the frozen live chat. The live chat usually only froze when too many people were typing simultaneously. Couple that with the audience cheering like crazy dogs...

"Something must have happened just now." My eyebrows scrunched up a bit. "Seems like we missed it by a couple of seconds."

"This... This," the somewhat astonished voice of the MC prompted us both to shut up and focus. On the screen, the virtual avatar of a woman with tentacle-like arms stood beside ArcticBlaze, wearing a red suit with a white and black robe covering her head. The woman's eyes seemed like they were about to bulge out of their sockets.