an illusion of mind

Evelyn looked upwards and she saw it, a smile made it's way onto her face as she looked at the elimination announcement, looks like that Regina wasn't all talk after all... but she didn't have time to think as daggers flew towards her at high speeds.

she created a shield with her ability and stopped the dark daggers.

"damn it~ don't doze off like that when you're fighting me!!!" Hagred yelled at her clutching his head.

she scowled at the sight, it's about time she finished her fight too.

Hagred rushed towards her with a dark scythe in hand and slashed at her repeatedly, she dodged and blocked with her energy what she could, and after a while of dodging she'd had enough, her scowl deepened and she clicked her tongue.

she stepped to the side letting Hagred stumble forward and she grabbed his chest, she slammed him to the ground and the force caused him to bounce up, she kicked him to the sky and used her ability to create chains that wrapped around him tightly, he grunted and yelled as she pulled him back to the ground.

while he was bound with the chains she stretched a hand out and created several weapons with her ability and sent them at him cutting him and wounding him badly, several beams of the same pink mana also crashed and pierced into him, "and for the finale..." she spoke taking a stance, she gathered her mana in a deep breath creating a giant hammer in both her hands she swung it as hard as she could, she gritted her teeth from the force of the heavy object, the swing connect with Hagred and he was sent flying a bloody mess.

and once he fell to the ground, he burst into blue particles also eliminated from the match, the announcement flashed on the screen for all to see, and the audience cheered loudly at the display of power the archduke's daughter had shown, she quickly dusted herself off and walked forward with pride.

she met up with Regina and they both watched the rest of the fights, while sure, they could jump in to aid their comrades but Regina thought it would be too boring while Evelyn thought it would be dishonourable.

they stood in silence watching the fights.

"looks like Suzi is losing. should we back her up?" Regina asked Evelyn.

Suzi barely stopped a swing from Ettrian, after he started using mana blade he started overwhelming her, Suzi was barely hanging on, she didn't want to use that, but she will have to at this rate...

"no... let's just watch... also you're bleeding out." Evelyn pointed out, at Regina's arm and forehead.

"oh~ it's fine~ pshhh~ as if a little blood would kill someone~" she spoke waving her hand off, Evelyn just raised an eyebrow and nodded, Regina had fought the leader of the second years, it was natural to have that many injuries if you had triumphed.

Evelyn looked back at the ground where Suzi was getting overwhelmed, she considered helping her but it would hurt her pride to team up on someone.

after a long while an elimination announcement came up on the screen, Evelyn and Regina looked up to see that Adam was eliminated by Emmyth.

"huh~ I kind of expected that..." Regina said looking back down.

Emmyth slashed her way through rubble bleeding all over, "looks like he hurt her pretty well too." Evelyn said.

"oh~ is she gonna help her comrade?" Regina said as she readied herself for a fight.

Emmyth jumped in to help Ettrian, the two quickly overwhelmed Suzi and eliminated her.

"looks like it's just the two of us, huh~" Regina said as she turned to Evelyn.

"indeed, let's work together to eliminate these dishonourable fools." Evelyn squinted her eyes at them as they noticed the two girls up on the abandoned building.

"hey~ it's the one that eliminated the boss!" Ettrian said smiling as he pointed his sword at Regina.

"she must have used a trick, no way Veronika would lose to someone like her..." Emmyth said brandishing her twin blades as she got ready for a fight.

"you sure like to look down on people don't you~" Regina spoke up smiling wickedly.

"which one do you chose Evelyn?" Regina turned to look at Evelyn, but the enemies turned out to chose for themselves as Emmyth jumped up three stories to slash at Regina.

Regina with wide eyes leaned back as she saw the blade fly inches over her face, the slash was so strong a gust of air flew and blew some roof tiles off the roof.

Regina kicked with her legs and did a back flip to get on her feet, Evelyn seeing Emmyth next to her created a dagger and slashed at her, but before the knife could connect, a big broad sword smashed into the dagger breaking it as Ettrian made it on top too.

Emmyth charged at Regina, her eyes seemed to be angered, as she slashed several times with her twin short swords, Regina dodged and weaved through the attacks before she retaliated by lightly punching Emmyth's face before ducking under a slash and springing up with a punch to Emmyth's chin staggering her, Regina smirked and took the chance to punch Emmyth's wrist causing her to drop her weapon.

Regina took one of Emmyth's twin short swords for herself and distanced herself.

Emmyth scowled at her, "give back... my sword!" she said lunging forward with her blade slashing at Regina, however Regina was ready, she parried and blocked her slashes with her own short sword and retaliated with slashes of her own.

steel clashed against steel as Regina and Emmyth engaged in close range combat with weapons, Regina utilized her illusions to create copies of herself to disorient her opponent and slash at her, Emmyth utilized her large destructive swings to get rid of the copies along with hurting Regina herself.

Evelyn and Ettrian clashed swords as Evelyn created several weapons that she sent straight at Ettrian, he distanced himself jumping back and using his sword to parry the weapons.

"interesting so this is your ability, you're a sorcerer?" Ettrian asked holding one of the pink weapons that were thrown at him.

"precisely, I don't recommend holding them." Evelyn said, Ettrian raised an eyebrow about to ask 'why' but the weapon exploded in his hand, causing him to scream out in pain and rendering his left hand unusable.

"that is exactly why." Evelyn said as she charged back in for her opponent, she utilized her ability to create a javelin that she threw with all her might at Ettrian, Ettrian regained a small semblance of order as he tried to parry the rapidly accelerating javelin.

Ettrian lost his balance tripping on a rock and the javelin stabbed him in the stomach, Ettrian disappeared in a flash into blue particles as an elimination announcement was heard.

"your little friend is gone~ even if you beat me~ you won't win!" Regina smirked as she clashed blades with Emmyth.

"n-no... it doesn't matter! all I want to do now is to eliminate you!" Emmyth seemed really mad at Regina for some odd reason.

"you eliminated Viktoria, and I simply won't accept she lost to someone like you!" her eyes glowed in a light blue glow as she unleashed a wide slash at Regina who just stood there stupefied, however at the last moment before it his her she smirked.

the slash landed on Regina as she fell down a deep gash running across her stomach and chest, however for some reason... she wasn't being eliminated.

"what...?" Emmyth said panting heavily from the exertion.

suddenly she was stabbed right into the chest by her own sword, and behind her, an arm wrapped around Emmyth's neck, was Regina she smiled as she held the weapon in Emmyth.

"so much for that idiocy you spouted earlier huh~" she said smirking as she pulled out the short sword out of Emmyth's back and threw it to the ground while Emmyth fell to the floor bleeding out.

after a while she was eliminated and burst into blue particles.

Regina wasn't worried, all injuries would be gone even if the opponent was decapitated they will be put back together by the stadium, what the stadium truly was is a giant artifact that has the abilities to manipulate certain properties inside of it, and one of these is that it can reverse all injuries so it can serve it's purpose as a stadium for fights.

an announcement declaring Emmyth's elimination flashed across the screen and the announcer came back on, the crowd was silent, all shocked at the display the first years had shown, Evelyn was barely even injured, all she had was a deep gash on her shoulder.

"th-the winners are! the first yeaaaaars!" the announcer seemed a bit too excited as he announced their victory over the second years.

and the MVP was shown to be Evelyn, who was the one with the least wounds and the best performance, even though Regina took out the stronger ones she was still injured a lot.

"hahahaha! how funny is that! look at you second years! you came to our class trying to display your dominance now look at what happened!" Regina yelled laughing loudly as she was teleported out of the stadium along with Evelyn.

after her injuries were reversed she felt incredible relief, as she had several bad injuries like the punch she took, it shook up her brain pretty badly, it was most likely a concussion, and she took a bad hit to the stomach in the fight with Veronika, that was probably an internal bleeding, so after she left she felt incredible relief.

and she was met by her classmates celebrating their victory, Adam was standing there smiling, he was pretty happy, while Suzi was pouting, she was mad that she was ganged up on and we didn't even help her.

and surprisingly there was Arron and Amanda, Arron walked normally he was still mana deprived it usually takes three weeks to heal those but he healed it in two, he had incredible vigour to be able to heal mana deprivation that quickly.

"congrats." Arron said smiling, his dark blue hair fluttering in the wind as he smiled widely, next to him, Amanda also smiled.

"are you healed?" Regina asked punching him on the shoulder playfully as if to check if he's sturdy or not.

"ow! hey, stop that I'm still week!" he said slapping her hand away, Regina giggled and back off playfully.

Evelyn watched them bicker and she couldn't help but let a small smile slip on her usually stoic face.

this didn't go unnoticed by Adam as he leaned in closer to her, "good work for you too." he said smiling at her, she flinched and almost slapped him, but stopped herself last moment.

"thank you." she said with a slight blush bowing her head.

"Evelyn, I would like to work with you in future events as well if you would like..." Regina said putting a hand on her shoulder.

"I look forward to it too, I will be taking my leave now." Evelyn started walking away leaving Regina's smiling figure behind.

Regina had fun, a lot of fun, she was happy that she was surrounded by friends that she could trust and rely on, she hoped that this moment never ends.

but unfortunately... her smile faded as she grinded her teeth and clenched her fists so tight they turned white, she was glaring at particularly nothing, it was clear she was angry very angry, and Adam noticed this, "hey, are you okay?"

Regina quickly calmed down and turned to him cheerfully, "yeah~ I am let's get going~" Regina said smiling at him before she walked away calmly.

Adam stared at her back, his eyes narrowing at her, it was surprising how fast she could change her mood, frightening even...

but Adam ignored it for now and started walking after her along Arron and Amanda, with Rica tagging along too, Rica grumbled about something like they shouldn't be celebrating since Regina was the one to get them in this type of trouble in the first place, David just called out the idiocy in her words that Regina was doing this for her in the first place because she was the one being bothered by the second years.

"haa~ this is... life..." Adam let out a soft breath enjoying the moment of being surrounded by people he can trust.