The next morning Lupos awoke and started to make preparations for the days duel. In order to save time all competitors had been mailed a letter the day before warning them about the rules of the upcoming duels as well as the consequences should they choose to not abide by these rules.

To all competitors reading this, congratulations on making it this far. Starting from tomorrow on wards you will be competing in the duels to determine an overall champion of the inter-schools competition. To save time in explaining the rules tomorrow it has been decided that we will send out a notice to every competitor informing them of the rules.

Rule number 1. All weapons and types of magic is allowed

Rule number 2. A competitor may only bring one spirit with them even if they possess more to keep the fight fair

Rule number 3. A fight is ended when a participant yields, is rendered unconscious, is pushed out the ring or is physically unable to move

Rule number 4. A competitor is not allowed to continue attacking once their opponent has yielded

Rule number 5. You may not set up traps in the arena before the competition begins but you are allowed to do so during your match

Rule number 6. You may not inflict permanent damage

Any failure to comply with the rules will lead to automatic disqualification, the only exception to these rules will be if the participants life is in danger. Once again good luck to all competitors and we will see you tomorrow.

Lupos smiled having read the notice. "This is great I can still make traps during the duel," he then sighed "unfortunately most of the competitors have been warned about my traps beforehand, so better come up with some counter measures." Lupos finished muttering under his breath and looked around his room at his four sleeping spirits before he, without mercy, decided to wake them up.

"WAKE UP." conveyed Lupos in the mindspeak equivalent of yelling. Immediately all four spirits were awake and on guard looking around for potential enemies while Lupos just laughed. "Right now that you're all awake," he started as the four spirits glared at him and mumbled threats under their breaths about what should happen should he disturb their sleep again "I've decided on your roles during the duels."

The spirits nodded once again looking alert and focused, all traces of tiredness gone from their eyes. "Ok first of all Fenrir, obviously, you'll be competing with me being my only known spirit. Secondly Jormugand I want you to stay here and make sure no one else enters my room. If they do poison them. Now that the first spy is dead the others know something is wrong and I want to make sure they don't get too close to realising I was the one who killed him and am possibly the boy they're looking for."

Jormugand nodded his head. "Should I poisssson to kill or to incapacitate?" Lupos considered that a minute, there were obvious dangers to leaving such men alive, but, there was also equal benefit to obtaining the information they possessed. "Kill them, the spies only seem to know basic information and rumors and the spies won't be so careless this time as to be caught a second time. There'll be time enough for an investigation into it once I've killed Mervyn."

Jormugand nodded. "Ok next, Hugin I want you to spend your time watching Lucio's matches and if necessary interfering to make sure he wins." Hugin nodded reluctantly "sure but why do I have to make sure the annoying noble kid wins?" Lupos sighed "because if I appear too strong then more attention will be on me which would be bad for my revenge on Mervyn as well as possibly drawing the attention of the Emperor, who seems to have an interest in me."

Lupos paused for a minute. "If I had a choice I'd rather let Wing win, but it's easier to hide in the Shadow of a noble who most people automatically assume to be superior anyway." Hugin nodded accepting the logic behind it. "Anyway Munin I want you to keep an eye out for any more spies in the audience. Any questions?"

All the spirits shook their heads. "Good," smiled Lupos "let's head to the arena then." Arriving at the arena, Lupos could see that the thirty two competitors left were spaced out around the arena glaring at each other. Smiling cheerfully Lupos walked up to where Wing was waiting with a large white owl on his shoulder "Hey Wing, what's with the owl?"

Wing smiled nervously. "Hey Gale, the owls Athena she's my summoned spirit. I'd say more but I'd hate to give you an advantage just in case we end up as opponents." Lupos laughed "oh well, I appreciate the sentiment. Any sign of Lucio?" Wing shook his head and sighed "of course not. I really hope he doesn't end up as my opponent, I can't really afford to throw another match my family needs the reward money."

Lupos nodded solemnly "if you don't mind the dirty looks, you can make it look like you used dirty tricks and later claim it was because your magic or battle prowess was lacking." Wing laughed "Well that's one method of doing it I suppose."

Lupos was about to say more when Lucio hurried up to them. "Wing, Gale have either of you been checking out the competitors for me?" Wing looked towards Lupos confused then looked back at Lucio. "No, why would we do that." Lucio scowled "obviously to give me an advantage, if it wasn't for me then you'd never have even made it this far!"

Wing grit his teeth to avoid saying too much and simply glared at Lucio while his attention was directed at Lupos. "Who cares about information, if you're the most powerful you'll win." Lucio smiled smugly "of course I'm the most powerful." Lupos rolled his eyes, anyone who really didn't think information was important was a complete idiot, the fact Lucio bought this idea that you could rely on power alone was stupid, you also needed tactics and a healthy amount of luck to win a fight.

Suddenly the announcers voice rang out throughout the stadium. "Welcome everyone to the last round of the competition, this last section will spread out over two days and the winner of the third round as well as the overall winner will be determined then. The way the duels will be structured is that first we shall have sixteen duels of two, where the winner will advance to the next round and the loser will be eliminated."

The announcer paused a minute to catch his breath. "We will then move on to eight duels of two made up of the remaining winners from the first round until only eight competitors are left, which will be where we get up to by the end of the day. Tomorrow we shall advance to have four duels of two, then two duels of two before finally facing off in the last duel. Now anyone who captured the flag in the last challenge please raise your hand."

Lucio as well as eight others raised their hands "Ok your advantage is that you have the power to choose your first opponent. You have five minutes to decide." Lupos looked at Lucio. "Obviously you'll go for a match against one of the others with an advantage so that the most powerful competitors can duel each other showing your noble prowess."

Lucio nodded "Of course." Lupos sighed in relief, if Lucio had chosen him, he would have had to win otherwise he wouldn't be able to get in the top ten and couldn't become Mervyn's apprentice. Wing also let out a sigh of relief that he didn't have to throw the first duel.

Very quickly five minutes were up and the competitors with an advantage were asked to pick their opponents.

Most of them chose one another to show off their power. However one of the winners chose "Gale Foryst." Lupos looked at the tall noble boy with red hair in surprise "Why?" the boy scoffed "too late to regret it now. I'll get you for what you did to my cousin." suddenly Lupos made the connection, the boy had a very similar face to one of the ones he'd watched falling down a pit trap in the second round.

Lupos let out an evil grin "if you think you can." The boy shuddered a bit but tried to stand up confidently "Ok," called out the announcer "We'll do the matches that have been decided on first so first duel Alex Reim vs Gale Foryst." A lot of cheering came from the audience at the sound of Alex's name and a lot of boos at Lupos's fake name, not that he minded.

Stepping into the centre of the arena the ground rose up creating a circle shaped stage for their duel. By Lupos's side was Fenrir and by the other boy, Alex's side was a bright red salamander "Let the match begin!" As soon as the announcers voice rang out Alex rushed forward towards Lupos, and straight into a puddle of sinking sand.

Unfortunately, Alex had been warned beforehand about Lupos' ability. "Fireball" Alex quickly hardened the Sinking sand using fireball and using his salamanders claws broke free of the restraining sand. "Earth bullet." Only to fall out of the stage as the power behind Lupos's earth bullet shoved Alex off the stage, while Fenrir pushed his fire spirit out of the ring.

"Well that went well." said Lupos smiling to Fenrir as he exited the stage. "W..winner Gale Foryst." The announcer rattled off as the crowd stared at Lupos, because of his lack of sportsmanship and morals in all the previous matches the spectators had somehow convinced themselves that Lupos must have no access to powerful spells. Yet he had just easily used one to win a match. "If they're all as weak as this, this will be an easy win." Laughed Lupos as he spoke to Fenrir who nodded, after all how hard could it be?

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PLEASE READ

Hope everyone enjoyed the chapter, in truth because if exams I probably won't be able to post another chapter for this week so it might take a little while thanks for reading