The ceremony then went on as originally planned, and Felt did her speech about hating nobles. That definitely agitated people, but I , like Reinhard, believe that among the nobles, there might've been a few who have been enlightened.
After a little while, the knights and us guests were escorted out of the throne room place, and we ended up in some lounge that I didn't recognize. That is, until I noticed Julius approaching Subaru.
"Why the hell are you here?" Subaru said, deeply annoyed at Julius' presence.
"I wish you wouldn't make such an unpleasant face." Julius said before continuing. "I didn't expect a warm welcome, but I did not expect this degree of attitude, either. Also, it'll be bad for your company and friends."
"Now," Julius continued as he looked towards a nearby arena. "You asked me why I came here, correct? I came here to see you since I have some business with you. Also, you too." He directed that last one at me, and I shot him an innocent look, since I actually don't know what he meant.
"I would like you guys to come with me for a bit."
"Why? Are you going to challenge us to a duel?" I asked him, trying to unveil his intentions. Julius can be a little weird about his methods, so I'm a little confused at what he's doing.
"Precisely. But the question is, do you two accept?" He asked.
"I accept the challenge!" Subaru yelled in confirmation, confidence or whatever it is springing him up to face the knight. I sighed.
"Well, I guess I'll go as well." I said as I took off my overcoat, and headed towards the arena with Felix, Reinhard, Subaru and Julius.
Timeskippu*
I was postponed to the second match, and so I sat near the arena field's wall, watching the event I expected to unfold. However, I definitely was not expecting myself to be dragged into this business as well.
Did I overdo it at the castle? Maybe that's why Julius felt a little bit annoyed at me... hmmmm...
"Julius, why are you doing this?" Reinhard asked him as Subaru was doing some warm-up exercises. "This isn't like you."
"He insulted us, the knights, in front of the candidates to become our future ruler." Julius stated simply. "And he mocked the chivalry that we practice."
"I admit that some things he said went too far." Reinhard argued. "But for such a matter, he should be reprimanded and corrected."
"No, that's not my only problem." Julius said, and I knew what he meant on this one. "I hereby administer the death penalty to the one who sullied the knighthood's honor!" A large cheer erupted from the onlooking knights, and I sighed at their stupidity. Cheering for someone just because they disagree with your views? And doing something like this to teach him a lesson? The intentions are fine, but your actions are a bit overboard.
"Normally, you would be slain for your insolence, but seeing that you're Emilia-sama's attendant, we'll fight using wooden swords." Julius said as he readied his sword. "Shall we begin?"
Subaru recklessly charged at him and slipped as he pretended he meant to do that, but Julius took no notice as he stabbed Subaru in the gut, sending him back. He then scored a few more hits on Subaru, and this one-sided fighting continued for a while, before Subaru was beaten bloody and only raising his sword in defence and trying to deflect some of Julius' blows.
"Bro, just give up, and stop for now. You obviously can't beat him, so-"
"Shut up, Y/N! I will make this bastard pay, and he hasn't seen my full power yet!" Subaru suddenly yelled at me, but I wasn't agitated. Fine, if he just wants to go, then let him have at it.
"Subaru!" Emilia's voice suddenly came from the balcony, and she looked in despair as she saw Subaru in that state. "Subaru, don't!"
Julius gaze turned towards Emilia, and Subaru took advantage of this moment as I sensed Yin mana. "SHAMAK!"
A giant cloud of black smoke came out of the ground, and Subaru ran towards Julius in confidence that at least he'll land one blow, but the knight parted his spell, unimpressed. "This level of spell power can only work on foul beasts." He said as he dealt the finishing blow, and Subaru landed onto the floor, unconscious.
After a series of events, Subaru was taken away by Felix to heal, and Emilia rushed off in their direction as I finally stood up, my legs slightly numb from all the sitting, and faced Julius.
"Do you still want to fight after seeing what I did to your acquaintance?"
"Well, I came here on my own terms and accepted your invitation, so it'll be a waste not to, right? Anyways, I've gauged myself against a mage recently, so I think a knight is a good opportunity to learn."
"Do you not resent me for what I did to your friend?" He asked, a little confused at my calm attitude.
"Well, I think I know what your intentions are, so I don't resent you at all. I'm more worried about my friend not getting your message than his wounds."
"I see. Thank you for understanding my intentions. You're a shrewd one, aren't you? Well, I suppose you know my intention for fighting you as well?"
"Sorry, I don't have a clue about that." I shrugged. "Mind explaining?"
"Two reasons. First, because you claimed to be an apprentice of the Court Mage Roswaal, but I never heard you say about you working for Lady Emilia, who he supports. Secondly, the fact that you interrupted the procedures in the throne room must mean that you should have the strength to back it up, and if you don't I'll put you in your place right here."
"Okay... but just so you know, I did indeed say that I'm Roswaal's apprentice, but that's only because he offered me training, so I was not making any bargains. I stayed at his manor as a guest for learning magic, not to support his candidate in the selection. That's my friend's job and wish." I said as I received a sword from a knight, which turned out to be an iron sword as I looked at Julius in surprise.
"Since you did say you have no ties with Emilia-sama, then we should duel using real swords." Julius said calmly as I felt one of my nerves drastically twitch in annoyance. What the actual hell...
"Can I use magic, then?" I asked him.
"Anything is allowed, except killing, of course. We stop when one yields or if I declare that the battle is over." He said as he readied his sword, and I sweatdropped a little before I told Alchemis and Cahya to rest for now, since I have to win this battle on my own.
"Begin!" A knight yelled, and I stood my ground as I spread thin layers of Hydrogen and Helium in front of myself, with them barely touching each other as Julius regarded me with concern, before charging at me with his sword outstretched.
Just as the moment he entered the field, I brought together my hands, forming a large clap as the atoms were forced to merge, forming molecules of helium hydride as the acid appeared out of nowhere. Julius, instead of sticking his sword at me, had his sword and his wrists stained by the acid, and he jumped back as he examined the damage. He tried healing magic, but it only numbed the pain a little as I smirked.
I dashed towards him with my sword, and he prepared for a block, but I turned and shot Ul Goa towards him, before throwing my sword like a dagger and forcing him to get hit by two of my fireballs, which he seemed angry at.
Julius dashed with me with another strike, but only got sent back several meters when I activated a Beryllium Mirror, reflecting his attack at full force upon himself, forcing him to feel the strain of his own attack.
"Clarista!" Julius suddenly summoned his spirit magic, and prepared to break my Beryllium Mirror before I made it vanish itself, and cast El Jiwald with both my hands, forcing him to dodge while running towards me, but that only minimally impeded his movement, and he charged at me like a beast ready to tear apart its prey.
I didn't want to use my trump cards yet, so I gathered hydrogen and oxygen, and had them merge together in a giant ball of water. Then, I condensed some water from the giant ball and started to have it shoot at Julius like homing missiles. He cut through the first beam as he used El Clarista on the ball, but the water only allowed itself to be slashed apart before it reformed near me, and consider Julius surprised that his soul-destroying attack failed to eliminate a simple ball of water.
"The soul-destroying slash, the Clarista series, cannot be used on dead things, especially ones which are generated by a mage." I remarked as he suddenly noticed something, and charged towards me at inhuman speeds as I noticed that he sped up, a thin mana layer coating his skin as he got closer and closer while I had no time to use my Authority to defend.
"Akra!" I yelled, and the Yang Magic manifested itself in the last possible moment as I zoomed away from my original position, while Julius still locked onto me as I dashed the arena, struggling to evade his pursuit. I picked up my blade that I threw a while ago, and formed a second one with a boron coating and a diamond base, before facing Julius' slash head on, and countered his Ul Clarista as the training sword broke, forcing me to pull out another quickly forged boron-carbon sword.
Although I wasn't very good at it back then, I was a somewhat chunibyo person back in middle school, and I definitely knew how to dual wield. There was a tournament for chunibyos that I attended for some dumb reasons, and I won the championship by using my Nitoryu on my opponents. Although that moment has long faded, the muscle memories were embedded in my mind and soul, and thanks to a little delusion, I broke through the last shell as I charged the knight, finally using a weapon instead of spells.
Coating the swords using helium hydride forced Julius to be careful while slashing, but myself as well. Although I have a certain amount of immunity to all Authorities, acids are still deadly. My onslaught of blades continued slashing at Julius' sword, and suddenly he decided to pull out his trump card as the blade began to gather light and particles that I registered as spirits, and the gathering knights looked in shock as I realized what he was trying to do.
"Julius! What are you doing?" A knight said in the crowd, shocked at his comrade's behaviour. However, the other onlooking people obviously had no interest in stopping this. Which, by the way, I have not noticed that there were other onlookers. Priscilla and Anastasia were watching with interest, while Felt was pumping her fist in the air, cheering me on. Even Al, who I assumed had Subaru explain my history and whatnot, waved at me.
"We should settle this with our respective strongest strikes, shouldn't we?" Julius said as his sword finished charging, and I nodded to his statement as the carbon atoms in my hand started arranging themselves into their pyramid structural form as the glittery substance known as diamond began to form in my hand at rapid speeds.
"AL CLARISTA!"
"Adamas Wave!" I yelled as the diamond turned from liquid into solid, forming a solid wall above my head while spreading out in a glorious manner as it served as a dome like defence against Julius' attack.
Eventually, his attack stopped and the crowd watched in surprise. Even Anastasia was shocked when Julius' Al Clarista, a spell capable of decimating the body of the Sin Archbishop of Sloth (not that they knew), was stopped by a commoner who possessed mysterious powers.
To finish the fight, I reshaped the diamond into a blade, and slashed clean through the training iron blade that Julius was wielding, and he smiled at my merit as he raised his hand.
"I hereby declared that this duel is over! I, Julius Juukulius, a knight of Lugnica, recognize individual Y/N L/N's efforts! He has shown courage, skill, and intelligence in battle which makes him a formidable fighter. He is befitting of a status like the rest of us. His maturity also goes past his age, despite being young." Julius concluded his statement as he turned to me with a smile.
"Y/N L/N, are you interested in becoming an official knight of Lugnica?"
Huh?
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Name: Y/N L/N
Authority(ies):
Authority of Deceit (Commonly known as Authority of Elements):
-Vacuum Trigger: An innate ability stored within the tesseract-shaped Deceit Witch Factor, allowing the user to spring themselves from unconsciousness when the mana fluctuations around them changes drastically, as a built-in self-defence mechanism of the body.
-Critical Overload: A mysterious ability that protects the user of the Deceit Witch Factor, causing them to unlock their true potential while their actions are coordinated by ?, helping them avoid certain death. This ability only triggers when the user is about to die and has a 15 minute cooldown.
- Haywire Warp: A variation of Critical Overload that allows the user to warp the attack that will kill them, creating a tear in space-time to absorb the attack. Meanwhile, the abilities of the elements are unleashed and they will defy the chemical laws before the user decides to cancel their existence.
Elemental Masteries:
Hydrogen Mastery: Stage 1, 1870/2000 complete. (Spells: Hydrogen Gas Formation, Hydrogen Gas Wall, Hydrogen Gas Mist)
Helium Mastery: Stage 1, 1840/2000 complete. (Spells: Helium Gas Formation, Helium Hydride Acid Creation)
Lithium Mastery: Stage 1, 1295/2000 complete. (Spells: Lithium Hydride Solid Formation, Lithium Pellet Bullets)
Beryllium Mastery: Stage 1, 1325/2000 complete. (Spells: Beryllium Solid Creation, Beryllium Mirror)
Boron Mastery: Stage 1, 950/2000 complete. (Spells: Boron Metalloid Creation, Boric Acid Creation)
Carbon Mastery: Stage 1, 845/2000 complete. (Spells: Carbon Creation, Coal Creation, Diamond Creation and Manufacturing, Adamas Wave)
Nitrogen Mastery: Stage 0, 570/1000 complete. (Spells: Ammonia Creation, Ammonium Creation, Nitric Acid Creation)
Oxygen Mastery: Stage 0, 750/1000 complete. (Spells: Oxygen Gas Creation, Ozone Creation, Oxide Creation, Water Creation)
Spirits: Alchemis- fire spirit (Elder Spirit, turquoise), Cahya- yang spirit (Great Spirit, white)
Magic Spells:
Goa- shoots a small ball of fire from the tip of the user's index finger when imbued with mana.
El Goa- manifests three fireballs around the user, and shoots them towards the opponent at high speeds.
Ul Goa- The user fires a large amount of powerful fire bullets. A powerful flame scatters when the bullets land.
Al Goa- The user lets loose a massive fireball, scorching away everything in its path. The bigger the caster's skill, the fireball hotter and bigger the fireball.
Akra- A yang magic spell that allows users to enhance their physical abilities as well as sharpen their senses.
Jiwald- fires heat rays from the user's fingers.
El Jiwald- The user fires several rays from their fingers which are then brought down in a claw-like motion.