While Ed’s score caused a large incident across the college, Ed didn’t really care too much and wanted to finish his application with the last Combat Test. With his score, as long as he could defeat a C-Class Manifestation, then he can skip all the way to the third year’s elite class. He didn’t care too much about living an eventful academic life, he only wanted to get stronger, fast.

Ed followed the signs and reached the coliseum which housed the combat tests. The coliseum was extremely large and housed 8 smaller stages and 1 large stage where he could see hundreds of people either spectating the fights or getting in line to fight. Even with hundreds of people he was able to get to the registration table after twenty minutes.

Assistant: Good afternoon, what level manifestation would you like to fight for your assessment?

Ed paused for a second, he knew he was going to fight a C-Class manifestation but he didn’t settle on level 1 or 2. On one hand, it would be beneficial to fight level 2 so that he could garner more attention but sometimes more attention is actually bad. In the end he decided on C1 since it was enough to get him to skip 2 years at school and he was still in the top 5 so there shouldn’t be too drastic of a difference between resources given.

Ed: C1 please.

Assistant: Are you sure sir? While there are proctors around the stage to protect you, a C-Class is extremely different from a D-Class. There is a chance the procter can’t react in time to save you.

Ed: I am fine with that.

Assistant: Alright sir, please sign this release form that will prevent you from suing the college for damages to yourself during the assessment. Please proceed to the main stage and a random procter and manifestation will be provided.

Ed arrived at the stage where he saw a protector waving at him.

Procter: This is your last chance to back off the fight without it counting against you, are you ready to fight a C1 Manifestation?

Ed: Please start.

AFter Ed’s confirmation, the procter triggered a device that let a manifestation enter the stage. With a loud screech an eagle flew out and began exploring the limited airspace of the main stage. The eagle was slightly larger then the world’s largest eagle with a wingspan of 2.6 meters. The main stage was extremely large at 30 meters by 30 meters but for a large eagle like itself, it didn’t like the cramped space too much.

When Ed saw the eagle, a surge of memories hit him like a tidal wave. At first, feelings of fear arose when he remembered his first encounter with an eagle, but this was quickly replaced by intense anger. Ed was just standing there as his aura fluctuated from his inner rage. The procter thought that this was because Ed was scared and began getting ready to rescue him if he was in fatal harm.

After the initial scouting of the stage, the eagle finally began to care about Ed’s existence. It didn’t think too much of him since it had fought a lot of applicants before. Still, the eagle was cautious and sent a strong burst of wind at Ed with several flaps of its wings.

It wasn’t too strong but still packed a punch. Ed didn’t react and simply let the wind hit him head on. This prompted the proctor to frown since he thought Ed was biting more than he could chew, but when the procter was looking more at Ed’s eyes, he didn’t sense fear which made him hesitate to rescue him.

After the first 30 seconds of interactions, Ed finally moved and summoned his dual hand cannons. He began frantically shooting his bolts at the eagle, but between a mixture of the eagle’s mobility and bursts of winds, none of Ed’s bolts hit the mark. Even for some of them that were able to touch the eagle, there was not enough power to actually hurt the eagle.

Dozens of bolts were now embedded at the ground after flying into the sky and falling back down to earth. This panic like behavior from Ed made the procter prepare himself again when the eagle would charge him.

After the initial test of Ed and Ed’s failed attack, the eagle began to transition the battle from a fight to a hunt since it considered Ed fairly weak. So it started to fly up in order to gain speed when it started diving at Ed.

The procter was aware of what the eagle was doing and knew that he would have to rescue Ed before the first dive. Ed, who seemed to know what the proctor was thinking, held out an open hand at the proctor to signal that he wanted the proctor to stay out. The procter was surprised and shrugged. It was his job to save the applicants who thought they could take on a C1 but if the applicant refused help, he would just let them be. It was their choice.

During this brief exchange between Ed and the proctor, the eagle began diving at Ed. However, Ed wasn’t just signaling the proctor to stay back, he began to shift his weapons to his close combat weapon, twin kodachis.

As the eagle dived down, Ed stepped onto one of the bolts that were now embedded on the ground. As the eagle got within a foot of Ed with a blinding speed and was just slightly below the peregrine falcon’s max speed of 240 mph, the bolt underneath Ed’s foot exploded and pushed him to the side.

Of course the explosions aren’t at the same level as the ones that tore up the snake but much weaker but still enough to cause instantaneous movement for a short distance. At the same moment, Ed swung his aura amplified kodachis at the eagle which caused two relatively long but shallow gashes on the eagle’s wing and torso.

This was Ed’s secondary movement technique called StarField since it involved having a field full of bolts that he could explode underneath him to have instantaneous movements. He wanted to save his 7 Star Steps for the final move or an emergency. He would normally try to use StarField whenever possible but it was a technique that took quite a bit of time to prepare.

The eagle was immediately enraged since it didn’t think Ed could hurt it at all so it immediately flew back up so it could dive at Ed again. This repeated over and over again until after the 6th confrontation and the eagle was now actually significantly injured. Ed did leave behind a dozen or so wounds on it at this point. The eagle began to hesitate and retreated to safety in the air. It knew that at least Ed isn’t that competent in long range as seen by his initial failed attacks.

Ed, finally in control of his seething anger decided that it was time to stop torturing the eagle and end the exam. As the eagle flew back up into the air, Ed used his Star Field to launch himself into the air. Ed stepped on one bolt before exploding but Ed also detonated all the other bolts to generate some more lift from the secondary explosions.

This surprised the eagle but it knew close to nothing can challenge it for supremacy in the air so it didn’t move. However, Ed used 3 bursts of his 7 Star Steps to approach the eagle. Surprised by this development, the eagle immediately tried to escape but it was surprised and injured so it wasn’t able to move as fast as before so Ed was able to get into range with another 3 bursts.

Ed was swinging his kodachis just as he got into range. Earlier, Ed didn’t use the full strength of his kodachis since he wanted to torture the eagle so his earlier performance was not indicative of the deadliness of his kodachis. At this point, Ed unleashed his fully empowered kodachi strikes at the eagle’s neck and decapitated the eagle in one clean slash.

The proctor was shocked by Ed’s entire performance. His ability to dodge full speed dives from the eagle was truly impressive considering the speed it was flying down, and Ed was able to dance around the eagle with his unique exploding field. It wasn’t up until the last moment when he saw his full power strike that made him realize that Ed was holding back from the start. He could have finished the eagle much sooner.

With that said, Ed was still able to finish the exam in record time for fighting a C1 at 6 minutes and 12 seconds. Ed would’ve been able to finish even sooner if he didn't just stand there in the first 30 seconds. More importantly, the ease and time it took Ed to finish the C1 made the proctor think Ed could’ve probably taken a C2 down. Withholding his theories, he ended the exam and provided Ed with his certification for a battle level of C1.

With that last examination, Ed’s information in the rankings list was now complete and he was solidly tied for 3rd place with Aleksander and Mei. However, if the list had one more column for how long it took to finish, they would’ve known that Ed might be able to contend for a spot in first. It had taken Aleksander and Mei over 10 minutes for their fights and Ed was nearly half their time.