Ning left the stage, returning back to the hall where everyone was waiting for him.

Tenn gave a big smile as he walked toward him. "Brother Ning, I knew you could do it. Haha, you made it look so simple," he said.

"Are you sure it wasn't simple?" Kaleb asked. "All he did was use an Essence attack or two and then kicked the guy. It really looked so easy."

"Yeah, but you should know that Brother Ning's physical strength is greater than any of ours. If we were in that situation, we wouldn't have been able to take part in the fight at all," Tenn explained.

"Good job, friend. You did well," Prince Allan said to him while patting his shoulder a few times.

Ning gave a simple nod in thanks and looked toward the teacher. "Do I stay around or will I have to leave?" he asked. "It feels like I should be done for the day."

The teacher looked at the chart and frowned a little. "Well, it's hard to say," he said. "Yours is one of the first matchups in the next round, so… if things progress quickly today, they will require you to stay. It's better to stay around anyway. There is no one but the headmaster and a few other teachers in the stand."

"That makes sense," Ning said. "I guess I can stay and watch the next fights then."

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"You do that," the teacher said, his eyes focused on the board which said that Ning's next opponent would in fact be one of the seeded individuals.

There were 56 seeded individuals with 72 moving on from this round. It was expected for a lot to have an opponent such as that. Still, as the teacher continued looking, he realized that of the 5 that had to fight in the first round, 4 of them directly went against one of the seeded individuals. Tenn was the only one that didn't have to fight someone else.

The matches progressed similarly to what had taken place until now. The female bodyguard of the Princess had her match around the 20s matches and went after Ning.

Tenn was next, then Yorsha, and finally Kaleb.

Kaleb was the final participant and he fought tooth and nail to win against his opponent who had an Earth Essence core that completely defended against most of Kaleb's wind-based attacks.

He only defeated the man by using his Wind skills along with his Earth armor to create a sandstorm that blinded the man and then used Water sword to send out attack after attack, at least one of which landed and defeated the man.

The first round of battles was over around 4 pm. Instead of ending the competition immediately, the staff members came together to make a small decision.

There were still 2 hours of time before it would be considered overkill on how long the competition lasted. They had originally planned for the competition to end around 6 pm. They had done so with the plan that with 5 mins of fighting time spread between each round, and some downtime, it would cost them 8 hours in total for 72 matches.

However, perhaps became many of the fights didn't last very long, and there were actually 12 matches that were simply skipped over because of absent fighters, the staff now had to make a decision on how to proceed.

They could stop and let the matches continue tomorrow as it had come to a satisfying conclusion for today, or they could continue the matches a bit longer and stop around 6 pm as originally intended.

It would stop the competition in an awkward moment, but there were 2 hours that they couldn't waste. If they made use of these 2 hours, they wouldn't have to use such a strict competition schedule the next day around.

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So, they made the decision. The competition would go on, just like before. So, the matches looped back around with the ones that went in first and second today having their official match.

Ning looked at the brackets that were presented on the light board. He frowned a bit after seeing his opponent, a seeded fighter from the Peace World Academy. He had seen the match-up before, but he hadn't expected the fight to take place today.

He wasn't worried about the fight. No one expected him to win anyway. Still, he couldn't help but think of the dissatisfaction he himself would face if he failed here.

He was somewhat special here when it came to being an Essence User. The Pure Essence that he had acquired from the Divine Beast's fruit was not something that an average person could ever hope to get.

As a result, he was better than his peers in most regard. As a result, he considered himself on the same level as those that were just one step above him.

However, one step above him was the Low Essence Soul rank. And Ning had little to no idea what one could accomplish with an Essence soul. After all, that wasn't something that he was ever taught, even in the academy.

The teachers mentioned it here and there, but nowhere was it relevant enough for them to openly explain everything about it.

He needed to know at least a few things before he went into the stage in the 4th round.

"Teacher," Ning quickly spoke. "I do not know anything about Essence Souls. Is there anything that I need to watch out for?"

The teacher looked at Ning and realized he was fully intent on fighting the person that was going to come up next.

"Do you plan on winning the next fight?" he asked. The teacher would've been absolutely fine if Ning simply conceded the next few battles. In fact, he would be fine if all 4 of the first-year students did so.

However, seeing the light in Ning's eyes made him feel a little hopeful.

"Alright, here's what you absolutely need to know."

The first 3 matches were over, and it was Ning's turn to fight. He walked away, drowning in the cheers of his peers who were all still in the match.

As he walked out, he saw another person walk out with him, a girl from the Peace World Academy. She had frisky hair and a pair of braids that fell down her chest. She was slightly taller than Ning, but quite thin.

And the aura that came from her, was definitely the Low Essence Soul rank. She was one step stronger than Ning when it came to Essence ranking.

Ning walked onto the side of the arena where he stood and looked toward the girl as he waited for the battle to begin. He took a deep breath, conditioning himself for the battle as he remembered what his teacher had told him just minutes ago.

Low Essence Soul rank was an improvement to one's rank certainly. Even ignoring the Essence soul itself, a person's physical capabilities, all 6 senses, and the amount of Essence in one's core all improved by a vast amount when one reached the Low Essence Soul.

And the Essence Soul itself made them a monster in its own right.

"Begin!"

The fight began before Ning could collect all of his thoughts.

He pulled the sword out with the sheath still in it. He was using the Wind sheath as a decoy for as long as he could so that his opponent didn't realize that he had an Earth sword hidden inside of it.

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The girl started with a simple fireball to test Ning out. She didn't even use any conduits when she threw it out.

Ning dodged the attack, sending a wind attack of his own at the girl. 'She didn't touch her weapons, could it be that she had a Fire Essence Core?' he wondered. 'No, she might be wearing a Fire armor underneath. I can't scratch out that possibility yet."

Ning wondered what his approach should be in this fight. Should he stay back and dish out attacks? But the girl was bound to have a stronger Essence than him. He might be closer in physical strength, but then getting in close combat against someone who had an Essence Soul didn't feel right.

The girl naturally dodged Ning's wind blade, rather easily as well. Then, she dashed forward coming into close combat herself, letting Ning no choice but to fight.

She pulled out a sword from her hip, a light sword, and struck at him. Ning used his own sword, with the shield to stop the attack.

The girl kicked at his stomach, which Ning took, and then grabbed her leg while he was at it. He was about to throw her away when the girl jumped, spinning with her caught foot as the axis and kicked Ning in the head.

Ning barely dodged the leg by ducking in time, but suddenly something hit him from the corner of his vision.

He was kicked away to the edge of the stage, barely managing to keep himself from getting kicked out. He quickly got up and saw the girl.

Her leg hadn't touched him, but rather her Essence soul and come out and kicked him. It was just receding back into her body, feet that was made up of fire, and almost looked like a human foot that had met up with a bird's talons.

She jumped back at him, her light sword ready to stab. Ning parried the sword easily and stabbed back himself.

The girl suddenly burst into flames, but Ning's sword still made contact as he hit her right in the stomach.

At the same time, air gathered around him and moved in a circle so that the fire that came out of her didn't touch him too much.

Ning jumped away and collected himself, while the girl looked in his direction in anger. Two brilliant red wings appeared from her back, each of which spread nearly 5 meters away from her back.

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The wings were many times larger than what a normal wing was supposed to be like, but Ning understood what was going on.

That was another property of an Essence Soul. Essence souls were usually many times larger than their physical bodies. As the Essence rank grew, their soul's size grew as well.

As such, one had control over how large one could make it. The only trouble was that the smaller the soul was, the more compact it was and had more offensive and defensive physical capabilities.

However, when it came to Defensive Essence capabilities, it was still better if the soul was small, considering you only had yourself to defend. However, when it came to Offensive Essence power, an Essence Soul had no problem in any form.

In fact, sometimes larger sizes even gave greater opportunities as it would hit a lot of things at once if that was what they were planning.

Ning looked at the fiery wing of the girl and was scared for a moment. He wasn't sure what she was going to do.

It was going to be a Fire skill for sure, as the Essence soul itself was of Fire Element, which took after the Essence core of a person.

The girl flapped her flaming wings just once and many fiery feathers fell in Ning's direction swiftly.

Ning couldn't play around right now. He used his Earth sword and suddenly created a massive rock in front of him that took all the damage.

He waited for a while for the explosions to end while constantly keeping track of where the girl was. When he sensed her move to the other side, he would move as well.

He circled around the massive rock, using it as a defense from anything the girl attacked. It went on for a dozen or so seconds before the girl realized what was happening.

Her wings came out once again and she flapped, suddenly taking to the air where she was high above the rock.

Ning look above with an absolute shock and frowned. What should he do now?

The moment the girl was in the sky, away from the massive rock, she could finally see Ning. Seeing him next to the rock with his sword and sheath in his hand, she was ready to attack.

This wouldn't just be a normal attack either. She was going to rain down hellfire on him so he had nowhere to go.

Her wings opened once more, the fires from within it erupting to the hottest they had ever been. The fire started falling from her wings like water, dripping to the ground and burning where it landed.

Ning moved away from the rock and put his sword back in its sheath. He used the wind sheath to create a small tornado around him to fling away any fire that fell on him.

It worked for a while, but soon the tornado itself turned into a fire tornado, slowly heating the inside. Ning started sweating a bit and thought of what to do.

He did have a few solutions, but he needed the quickest one. As he thought, the girl saw the fire tornado and decided to end it all at once.

A light attack fell straight from the eye of the tornado, which Ning could not stop with just Wind.

The attack fell on him, not enough to wound, just enough to hurt him, and definitely enough to make him lose focus on the Wind he was controlling.

The fire tornado disappeared, leaving Ning wide open for the girl in the sky to attack.

The girl's Essence soul emerged from her fully, a giant 3 headed entity, where each one of the heads was her own. The Essence soul had arms that looked more like talons and wings behind her from before that were flaming.

The Essence soul had no genitalia, and the feet were also somewhat talon-like. The entire thing was about 10 meters or so large, making it appear like a crimson god in the sky.

The soul used some sort of power, creating a spear that appeared more like a trident than anything. Then, it aimed for Ning and launched its attack.

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Ning could only imagine when he would get his own Essence Soul as well. If he could get a great one, he could think his adventure in this world was fulfilled.

The referee moved as he had to stop the attack from landing on Ning. He had nearly moved many times, but Ning had managed to come in clutch each time, defending himself against a person that was a rank above his own.

However, this was the clearest demonstration of how strong an Essence soul realm cultivator was, so there was no point in waiting for Ning to do anything. He wouldn't survive even with all his skills if the attack landed.

A blue arm came out of the referee where the arm looked like it was made up of some sort of wood, while the fingers were sharp blades like spearheads.

He was about to stop the trident when he noticed something. When he realized what was happening, his eyes went wide in absolute shock.

The flame trident landed on the stage, completely destroying and blowing it wide.

The girl saw the destruction, which she hadn't expected, and was very confused. Why did the referee not stop the attack? Why would the referee not stop the attack before it fell? Or did he get the young man out of the way?

Her Essence soul had already withdrawn, all except the wings which she was using to fly. Now that she was victorious, it was time to go back down.

'I hope he didn't die,' she thought as that would be extremely bad for her as she would be disqualified instantly.

Just as she thought that she sensed something, something… from above her.

Her head turned just in time to see Ning arrive next to her.

"How—"

She could barely speak up a single word when Ning's fist came crashing down on her face.

The girl was punched with every force Ning had in his body. Since this wasn't his usual body, he didn't have to hold back his strength and as such he could give it his all.

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The girl dropped from the sky with the force of a meteor. The referee had to jump in and grab her so she wasn't hurt by the crash.

He brought her down slowly, only to see that her left cheek was red, while her mouth was somewhat bleeding. The referee could imagine that Ning had used his everything to punch her and bring her down.

He looked up in the sky and saw Ning using wind skills to try and slow himself down as he fell. After a certain height, he let himself fall and landed on his leg.

He looked around to make sure he didn't land outside of the arena. It was hard to tell since everything had broken from the girl's trident attack.

"I'm still in the match right?" Ning asked the referee.

"Yes you are," the referee said. "In fact, you've won."

The referee turned around and called for a few people to come to take her to the medical section of the arena.

Then, he announced Ning's victory.

Ning walked away with a happy look on his face, while a few people came up to fix the stage in the meantime.

"What did that kid do?" one of those guys asked. "Did he use his wind skill to shoot himself up?"

"He only used Wind and Earth Essence, so I don't think how else he could go that high," another person said.

"No," the Referee said. "He did neither."

"Huh? What do you mean?" one of the men asked.

The referee wasn't sure if he should say it or not. If the information got out to the other schools, it could be his fault.

As it seemed, no one else had seen what he had seen. Since he was so close, he had even sensed it. He was absolutely sure that this young man had just used one of the rarest Essence in all of the world.

The Space Essence.

Ning walked back into the waiting room where many people stared at him as he entered.

He walked up to his group, who were all staring at him as if they had seen a monster.

"You actually did it," the teacher couldn't help but say. He had no hope in anyone other than the 3 seeded fighters winning, and somehow Ning had won against an Essence Soul realm cultivator.

"Thanks for the info, teacher," Ning said. "That helped quite a bit."

The teacher gave a wide smile. "Good," he said, happy to himself.

"Good job, friend," the princess spoke with a wide grin. "What is your name again? Ning? I shall remember it from now on."

Ning nodded slightly and thanked the princess. He sat beside Tenn and Kaleb who immediately started asking what he did at the end.

"It's simple really," Ning said. "I created a large volume of air between me and the ground and launched high in the air."

"Oh!" the two of them said, thinking to themselves if that was possible. In the first place, how much volume of air did one need to suddenly launch oneself that high up in the sky?

It had to be a very large amount. Did Ning have a sheath that was made from a large amount of Air? How did he even get that Wind was notoriously hard to convert into a conduit since if it wasn't contained inside a room or something, it was quite impossible to spread your Essence through a lot of Wind and have it stay there long enough for it to get converted?

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Not to mention, even if that did happen, how was he not struck by that huge trident that was right in between him and the girl?

While the two young men were focused on the answer, Ning secretly looked at the people from the other schools. He could already see the eyes and ears of everyone outside of his school focused on him, trying to gauge what he did.

He wasn't sure if the lie would be caught or not, but it would certainly help if his words confused them as to what happened.

If he could at least keep the people guessing, he would be happy.

The one named Shana, the princess's guard was up after 3 more matches. When the time came, she went up to the stage and fought against an enemy with an Essence soul.

As it turned out, the girl herself had an Essence soul as well. The Blackhawk Academy was a large academy after all, and almost everyone that was chosen to fight in the combat competition was someone in the Low Essence Soul realm.

Still, Shana was one of the weaker ones so she wasn't chosen to be in the 56-seeded spots and was instead forced to fight her way up. As such, unlike many other folks of her own rank, she had to fight another fighter with Essence's soul in the top 128.

The girl Shana was quite the fighter, as she had to be to become a princess's bodyguard. She wasn't that strong in terms of Essence, but she was trained enough to defeat the person she fought in just under 3 minutes.

Her water Essence Soul, which she had to use to win the fight, was a humanoid soul with snake-like arms that shot out water attacks that themselves flew like snakes.

Her opponent was also slightly unlucky as they had a Fire Essence Soul so the two souls contradicted each other, with neither winning outright. It all came down to a single attack in the end to finish the battle and the girl had a better one.

After she walked back, they all congratulated her, but the girl wasn't very talkative and kept quiet next to the princess.

The sun was about to set, so it was getting close to the time when it would all end for the day.

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The teacher kept looking at the board because someone was scheduled for the 23rd match, which was right at the end. Depending on how the next couple of fights went, it would be hard to tell.

Then, as the 22nd match ended, the 23rd match's fighters were called into the stage after announcing that it would be the final match of the day.

A man from the Essence Heart Academy stood up to walk to the stage. On Ning's side, a man stood up as well.

It was the Prince's turn to fight.

He stood up, his face cold with no emotion, wearing a complete set of black uniform, and started walking away.

He didn't speak as he walked away.

Ning looked forward to the Prince's fight. While he had already known that the Princess's essence was Moonlight Essence, he had yet to see what the prince could do.

All he had done since coming here was flirt with girls at almost every chance he got but hadn't yet taken part in a single competition.

So, it was quite the chance for him to show off, and for Ning to see what he could do.

The prince walked to the edge of the stage as instructed and looked toward his opponent. There was no fear in his eyes and no disgust.

He didn't fear his opponent, nor did he look down on him. He would treat him with the respect every man in the competition deserved.

"Start!"

As soon as the words flew out of the referee's mouth, the Prince moved. He moved with such swiftness that most people couldn't even see how fast he was.

His opponent could barely move in time as he tried to create an Earth wall in front of him. However, before he could do so, his body grew cold as ice formed around him, trapping him inside.

The prince arrived right next to him and punched him in the guts with a force that shattered the ice and flung his opponent to the wall on the other side of the stage.

He won the match in less than 2 seconds.

Chapter 1165 Reward

From the sudden ice that surrounded the prince's opponent's body, it was clear that the prince was an Ice Essence user. His Essence Soul was probably that of ice as well.

Since conduits were hard to control to create around a person, rather than just on them, there was no doubt in anyone's mind that he did in fact have an Ice core.

As for some that were quite keen on what they were looking for, they were aware of another thing that nearly everyone else had missed because of how easy it was to miss it.

The Prince was in the High Essence Soul realm.

The Essence Soul realms were divided into 3 realms, Low Essence Soul, High Essence Soul, and True Essence Soul.

It was said that until you were in the True Essence Soul realm, you hadn't truly reached the Essence Soul realm yet.

There wasn't much merit to why it was said, but people believed that it was because it was the realm where one could start to combine their body and soul to use it effortlessly, adding one strength to the other.

That was what made it possible for people to go into the fabled Stellar Harmony realm. No one truly knew if this realm was even a possibility or not in humans, but there have been many records of beasts in the wild reaching this realm, mostly in the ocean.

After all, it was only after this realm did one reach the realm of legends that only a few beasts could ever reach.

The Divine Realm.

After his victory was announced, Prince Allen returned to the hall where the others waited for him. They started speaking words of congratulations as soon as he entered and the prince simply waved his hands, telling them he didn't need any of that.

The announcement of the event today ending was made.

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There had been 95 separate combats today, 83 if the 12 missing from Blackhawk Academy were to be ignored. If the same amount was to be fought tomorrow as well, they would easily finish the Top 64 and even finish the Top 32.

If they dared to squeeze in the time, they could even finish Top 16, but everyone doubted they would do that.

Keeping 32 matches for the final day seemed like the right choice to everyone.

They left the hall, walking outside to meet up with the Headmaster and others.

"You all have no idea how proud you've made me," the old man said. "I would have been fine knowing that half of you dropped out of the competitions, but seeing that you all went through the first round, and 3 even already passed the 2nd round, I can only say that you have all done everything beyond my expectations."

The 8 students smiled, with Ning and a few others thanking the headmaster for his kind words.

They knew why the headmaster was so happy. The difference in points between the people that lost in the first round and those that were in the second round was huge.

To make it important to pass each round, the points were set up in a way that the better you did, the more points you got.

Meaning, in the first round, the 72 that failed all got simply 10 points each.

In the second round, of the 128 participating, each one that failed got 30 points. In the top 64, they would all get 60 points. In the top 32, it would jump to 100 points, then 150 for the top 16, and finally 200 for the top 8.

For the top 4, it was slightly different. The one that came 4th overall would get 250 points.

The one that came 3rd would get 300.

The one that came 2nd would get 350.

And finally, the one that came first against all odds, would get 400 points.

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That sort of point was enough to even make the school that was at the bottom of the rankings currently shoot up to the first if all things went right. That was why this 3-day long Combat Competition was considered equally as important as everything that had come before them.

The group started walking out of the arena and made their way back to the Light Dance Academy.

"Oh yeah, good job on defeating that Essence Heart Academy's student in a single attack. That was so satisfying to see," the headmaster said.

"He was a weak one anyway," the prince said. "Had he been strong, he would have been seeded and wouldn't have to go against me."

"Still, he seemed to have an Essence Soul so he wasn't that weak," the headmaster said.

"I suppose you're not wrong in that regard, headmaster," the prince said. "And I must say, it did feel good defeating him like that."

"Haha! Of course, you would," the headmaster said and then turned to Ning. "You did quite amazing today too."

"Thank you, Headmaster," Ning said quickly.

"I swear," the old man said. "The way it looked like you almost lost, only for you to appear all the way up there in the sky and defeat the girl. That was simply marvelous."

Ning smiled. "Thank you," he said once again.

The headmaster looked at Ning closely and shook his head in surprise. "When Hayan said all those months ago that there was a new kid in our school that had a very pure Essence that hadn't been seen before, I didn't trust much at that time. However, I can see that I should have instead paid more attention to you back then."

The headmaster thought for a bit and said, "Because of how well you did in the Combat competition, despite not having to do so makes me want to reward you. Hmm, how about 50 credits once you return to the academy."

"Just him, headmaster? What about us?" Tenn asked.

The headmaster chuckled. "Haha, if you can make it through the next battle, I'll give you all a reward as well," he said. "In fact, for every single round you pass from here on forward, I will give you all different kinds of rewards, all with increasing worth and importance."

Chapter 1166 The Burning Sun

The 8 students finally saw just how destroyed everyone looked with their faces that seemed like they hadn't eaten anything in days.

"Are you all okay now?" the prince asked.

"We are doing much better, your highness," one of the people answered with a weak voice. "I'm glad you were fine, your highness."

"I got lucky," the prince said. "Anyway, continue resting, and don't worry about the competition. The 8 of us made it through to the next round."

The few students that were gathered couldn't believe it. "What? You… you guys joined? How many?"

"8 of us," the prince answered. "4 of them are even the new students that joined just half a year ago."

"And you all made it past the first round? That's…"

All the students were surprised. They talked for a bit while the teachers went to complain to the Light Dance academy staff. Someone had poisoned them and as the host, it was their responsibility to make sure that didn't happen.

It had nothing to do with Ning though, so he went back to the room and started absorbing Essence. He had used a bit already, so he needed to catch up.

"You!" a voice called for him just as he was starting. He opened his eyes and saw the prince in front of him.

"Yes, prince?" he asked.

"I didn't see any storage artifacts on you. Have you not brought anything?" the prince asked.

"I only had some clothes to bring with me, and they're over there in that closet," Ning pointed.

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The prince frowned a bit. "And… how are you planning to restore the Essence you used today? Isn't Pure Essence notoriously hard to absorb?" he asked.

"Well, once the night falls and the moon comes out, I can start absorbing moonlight Essence," Ning said.

"That's still slow, isn't it?" the prince said. "You don't have a moonlight core. You have a Pure core."

"That… is true," Ning said. "But I can't help it."

"You may not, but I can," the prince said. He waved his hand and a white crystal with a slightly blue hue came out of his storage.

"Take this. It's about 90% pure," the prince said. "You did well today in the competition, so I'm giving this to you. I hope you'll continue doing well from here on out as well."

"Thank you, your Highness," Ning said with a great smile as he took the crystal. He wasn't going to refuse anything that was given to him for free after all.

He started absorbing the Essence once they were done with dinner. The group had special people test the food before eating it this time around after learning from past mistakes.

Once they were done, Ning finally started absorbing Essence until about midnight. Once his Core was full, he stopped, putting the remaining crystal into his closet and going to sleep.

There was absolutely no point in trying to absorb everything when he would most likely need it again the next day over as well.

The night passed and the sun came back up along with the other moon in the sky. After having their breakfast, the group left for the arena again. This time around, everyone could go.

Of course, not everyone could take part.

The eight split away from the group, taken away by the teacher to the hall where they waited for the competition to start again.

The competition started in the 24th match. After 5 matches, it was the Prince's bodyguard's turn to fight.

He easily won against an Essence Manifestation rank opponent without even using his Essence Soul. All he used was the fire sword on his waist, not letting anyone know what he was capable of.

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It was a long while before another person from their group had to fight. Their next match was Tenn against another Essence Manifestation realm participant. Due to how the competition was structured, there were only 6 such fights possible.

His was the 41st fight and he fought his damn hardest to win. Both fighters were equal in almost every regard, so the victor came down to the judges after the time was up.

The next one up was the Princess.

Ning wondered what the Princess was going to do as she only had Moonlight Essence. While quite pure, it was still an elemental She used her light sword and won against her enemy easily.

The next person to fight was Yorsha.

essence, a sub-type of light essence. As such, it certainly didn't have access to a lot of skills.

Ning got to see nothing from her fight, unfortunately. The princess just wasn't pushed far enough to use any skills that were notable in the fight.

She used her light sword and won against her enemy easily.

The next person to fight was Yorsha.

The red-haired girl went over to the stage and waited for her fight to start. Her enemy was another person with an Essence Soul, so from the very start, she had to bring out her all to win in this match.

Her opponent, a ma with long black hair was someone who was much older than her and looked strong as well.

The battle started and the man attacked. He laughed water attacks at her.

Suddenly, the water turned into steam, exploding as its volume expanded at once. Even through the thick steam, one could see a slightly red haze inside it.

A layer of fire had appeared around Yorsha's body, spreading a meter around her. While the fire itself didn't look strong, her opponent couldn't help but get terrified as the temperature of the arena increased sharply.

The temperature continued to soar even though the man poured as much water as he could to drop it. The girl simply increased it relentlessly.

Some people in the crowd recognized what she was doing. The legendary skill known as the Burning Sun that belonged to the Ulyrus family, the ruler of the Redraven region was something these people had not expected to see today.

So, when the young man gave up in the end instead of potentially getting burned, no one could blame him for it at all.

Kaleb lost, but that was expected by everyone. He returned, a little saddened and a little devastated that he lost.

After all, he was the only one of the 4 first-years that lost today.

"I'm sorry," he said to the others. "She was just too strong."

"It's alright," the teacher said. "You did your best. That's all that matters."

Kaleb nodded, but he still felt bad. He sat down next to Ning and Tenn. While Tenn consoled him on his loss, Ning was completely focused on the chart in front of him.

The top 32 matches were about to begin and he had the 2nd match on the list, going up against another Low Essence Soul realm fighter.

It wouldn't be so troublesome for him, had he not heard that the man he was fighting was one of the strongest, if not the strongest fighter of the Frolane Academy. And, he had apparently shown quite the unique Essence Core as well, which troubled Ning as he hadn't even known that such an Essence even existed.

Ning sighed and prepared for a difficult battle.

The first battle had one participant that was part of the lucky 6 pairs that didn't have to fight a Low Essence Soul realm opponent, so they were up against one on this round and were defeated easily.

So, Ning's match came up faster than he could expect it.

He stood up, ready to leave. Before he could go, the teacher grabbed him and whispered into his ears.

'They should have suspicions that you have access to a Space technique. Don't let them verify it too early,' the teacher said.

Ning nodded.

The space technique was his escape technique. He didn't necessarily have to use it in a battle, but since he had already shown it to a degree, he didn't want to use his other techniques just yet.

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Besides, his defensive technique, while amazing, used up a lot of Essence and was entirely defensive, so that was a bit annoying to use as well.

He walked up to the stage and looked at the man in front of him. He took a deep breath and pulled out his sword from the sheath, keeping them both in either of his fights.

The man opposite him took out a Light sword from his storage artifact. As for armor, he was most likely already wearing one, but Ning couldn't see it.

The battle began as the referee gave the command.

Immediately, Ning shot out a couple of medium-sized rocks at the man. The man did nothing but dodge with a smile on his face. He pointed his finger at Ning, wiggling it, asking him to go again.

'Bastard!' Ning thought and shot out a few more rocks, this time a little larger.

He couldn't start out sending chunks of rocks at the man. Using too much Essence at once took time and created openings for the opponent to exploit. Also, using large amounts of Essence at once could cause you some fatigue.

Do it long enough and you were bound to get tired very soon.

Ning's opponent dodged the attacks again and threw out some small light attacks, none of which were meant to hurt him.

Ning was starting to get a little angry at the man. He almost started pointing a finger at the man but stopped.

The man was definitely not being careless here. He was strong for sure and teasing him was a way to make him make a mistake.

'He must be ready for whatever attack I can throw at him,' Ning thought. He decided to test the theory.

A gust of wind started blowing across the stage. Strong winds, but not strong enough to harm anyone.

The man wondered what Ning was trying to do when dust appeared on the stage. The wind blew the dust, causing a dust storm that reduced the visibility of the surrounding by a lot.

Ning had willed dust into existence using his Earth sword and used his Wind sword to create the dust storm.

'Sand?' the man was surprised when he saw the glittering sand in the air. 'How?'

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He couldn't understand how this was happening. Did his opponent have a sand skill perhaps? He knew he was a Pure Essence user so any skill was possible.

'That must be it,' he thought. 'After all, Earth Swords can't make sands and he doesn't seem to be wearing any Sand armor.'

The man finally frowned as he needed to start relying upon his Essence sense to see what Ning was up to.

He sensed Ning using Earth Essence, so he had to dodge the attack. Except, he had to now guess where the attack had to be coming within a second.

He sensed the sudden appearance of Earth essence around him. He looked up and saw a massive rock falling on top of him that was moments away from smashing onto him.

Ning couldn't see what was happening as he had blinded himself due to the dust storm. He heard a loud crash, followed by smaller crashes as the massive boulder he had let loose rolled away.

Ning had already stopped using the dust storm, so he could only wait for the dust to settle. However, even without that, he was aware of the fact that he had not in fact just won.

The man had managed to use his Essence at the last moment to protect him.

When the dust settled, Ning, the referee, and the entire surrounding audience witnessed the white, translucent geometric spikes that had come out of the ground, all around the young man.

"So he really does have it," Ning thought. "A Crystal Core."

Crystal Essence was one of the rarest Essences to find to absorb on this planet. It was a very specific sub-type of Earth Essence that could only be found in crystal form.

Normal crystals that everyone absorbed had Crystal Essence but it was so heavily dominated by the Pure Essence that it was impossible to make use of that essence.

However, if you came across a crystal mine where very few parts of the entire mine had Pure Essence, you could collect Essence from that mine and form a Crstal core.

However, because of how difficult it was to find an Essence mine, let alone one that was filled with Crystal Essence, most people did not have that core at all.

This meant that from a very young age, the man in front of Ning could do nothing but only absorb Essence through Crystals. Any instance of absorbing other Essence would cause him trouble, so he had to be strict about it.

To cultivate up to the Low Essence Soul realm with Crystal Core meant that the young man's family had most likely stumbled upon a Crystal mine or something. Ning couldn't see how else he could get his hands on it to reach such a level.

The crystals broke, falling across the destroyed ground. The man walked out from inside the crystal enclosure, completely unharmed, and somewhat annoyed.

"To think you could push me to use my Essence against you as only an Essence Manifestation realm fighter," the man said. "I commend you on your accomplishment."

"Thank you," Ning said. "But this is just the beginning. If you continue looking down on me, this might as well become your last fight of the competition."

The man's eyes narrowed in anger as he seriously began fighting. He swung his sword, sending out light attacks as he did so.

The attacks landed on Ning, who did his best to block it.

Light Essence made the attacks faster than normal, but it also was generally weaker, after all, it followed the properties of light itself.

Ning blocked it as well as he could. While the attacks stung, they didn't hurt him. He protected his body while looking through his Essence Sense.

He could see from his entire body if he wanted to, but then… what fun was that?

Suddenly, the Essence he was sensing changed its aura. From Light, it changed to a more powerful Crystal Essence.

Ning quickly moved his arms away, looking at the crystal attacks that were flying toward him.

Crystals were generally harder, sharper, and less crumbly compared to rocks, so the shards that were flying toward Ning were far more dangerous.

Ning's sword moved, flickering in the sunlight as it cut through each of the flying shards of crystal as if he was cutting through the water. His sword sunk into the crystals with ease, carving in one in two as he accurately moved in between the attacks and destroyed all the crystals.

The man was surprised. The crystals he was chucking away were supposed to be quite strong, especially with the Essence he was putting into them. He couldn't understand how Ning was possibly cutting through them with so much ease.

"Too few, huh? I'll give you more to deal with," the man said as a white arm extended from his real arm, growing as it came out.

The young man was using his Essence soul now to fight against Ning.

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Ning saw the giant white Essence Soul come out and frowned. This was going to be problematic.

The giant Essence Soul was nearly 5 meters tall, with 2 legs and 4 arms. Two of its hands were normal hands made out of crystals, while the other two looked like sharp, amputated crystal limbs.

The soul had a head with no face. The front of the head was completely blank, while crystal spikes grew out of the back of its head.

It wasn't just the head either. The entirety of its back was the same, ridden with spikes that had grown on it as if it were a porcupine.

The Essence Soul turned around after it appeared, pointing its back with the million spikes toward Ning.

Ning's eyes went wide in surprise as he quickly poured his Essence into his sword, creating a massive pillar of rock in front of him. He created multiple layers of Earth barrier with his sword, while also attacking back at the same time.

The two clashed at the center at the most for two seconds when his opponent sprayed dozens if not hundreds of small Crystal essence shards in his direction.

The pillar that Ning had made had been torn to shred while some shards had made it into the inner walls as well.

The young man grinned when he saw that. "You lose now," he shouted and sprayed another set of crystals at Ning, all of which were meant to destroy the last remaining earth barriers.

The referee was ready to move to protect Ning, but at the last moment his eyes widened and his target changed.

The young man sensed it as well. He had been ready for it after all.

His teachers had told him what was most likely going to happen at the most crucial moment in battle. His opponent was going to use his Space technique and arrived behind him.

The moment he sensed the Space Essence, he turned around with a wide grin on his face.

"I knew you would come for my back just like you did with—" his words stuck in his mouth when he saw a spray of crystals come in his direction.

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They were simply so fast that he couldn't use any defensive skills in time. All he could do was put a hand in front of him to protect himself.

His Essence Soul's large palms fell in front of him as they took the brunt of the damage that he himself had sent out.

The arms had turned solid, but they were still torn by the barrage of crystals that landed on it.

He used the opportunity to create a wall of crystal pillars to protect himself from the rest of the crystals.

His Essence Soul was hurt. He had made it solid to protect himself, and in doing so it had taken damage.

Just as he was wondering, he sensed Space Essence being used behind him and turned around just in time to see Ning arrive next to him.

Ning swung his sword even as he went through the portal and slashed it down on the man in front of him.

The young man put up his hands out of instinct and even his Essence Soul put its broken hand in front.

However, Ning's sword easily sliced through the four solid arms, before stopping right in front of the man's skin.

The Referee had already arrived and used his water Essence Soul to try and stop, but even his soul's hand had been halfway cut into with Ning's sword.

If Ning had not stopped on his own, the young man would've died.

The young man's feet buckled in fear as he fell to the ground, terrified of what could have happened.

Ning moved back and looked at the surprised look of the referee that couldn't believe what had happened either. "If you are involved, then I have won, right?" he asked.

The referee nodded. He came out of his stupor and checked Ning's opponent to make sure he wasn't hurt.

After making sure that he was fine, he announced Ning as the victor.

The crowd from around the arena cheered loudly as something unbelievable had happened in their presence. Not once, but twice had a contestant that was only in the Essence Manifestation realm defeated an opponent in the Essence Soul realm.

Everyone in the arena saw the usage of Space Essence clear as day. Ning had used it twice in a row, once to send the crystals back at his opponent, and next to teleport right next him.

Each time, a small portal had opened in front of him through which he could go in and come out on another portal that had appeared close by.

At most, Ning could only use this technique at a 100-meter distance. Thankfully, that was plenty for a battle such as this.

He walked away amongst the cheers, a little sad in fact which he didn't show on his face.

He had his sword in his hand, but the sheathe was no longer anywhere. In the midst of chaos, one of the Crystal shards had hit his Wind sword, and given how little air was used to make it, it was completely destroyed with that one hit.

Now, Ning had no sheathe for his sword and would have to find another one, which most likely wouldn't be until after the competition was over.

He flipped the sword upward, hiding in between his arm and his body so that the blade wasn't out in the open and in a dangerous position.

Ning walked into the hall that was mostly silent as people stared at him as he walked in. He had after all defeated two people with Essence Souls without having one himself.

He could hear whispers amongst the people. Some mentioned the word 'space', and some mentioned 'pure'. One even mentioned 'cheating' which nearly made Ning laugh out loud.

He arrived at his group and was immediately slapped on the back by the prince as he gave a hearty laugh.

"Hahaha! My vision wasn't wrong yesterday. You really are capable of winning fights against those above your own caliber," he said loudly.

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Ning smiled slightly. "It was more luck than anything," he said. "My opponent wasn't ready for my space technique."

"Huh? It looked like he was plenty ready," the prince said.

"Well, he was ready for me to teleport, but not his own attacks," Ning said. "I was able to take advantage of the chaos."

"No need to act humble, young man," the teacher said with a wide grin. "You did well. I can almost hear the headmaster laughing from the stands right now."

Ning finally nodded and sat back down. The others proceeded to congratulate him while the princess's guard got ready for her own fight in a few matches.

They watched the next few matches on the screen while the teacher made notes of who fought and what attacks they used. The previous day he had left it for the people in the stands to do, but since they were going to fight multiple times today, he had to do it himself.

The princess's guard, Shana, walked out on her turn and entered the arena against another girl from the Crimson Wings school.

The girl in that school had a Fire Core and mostly used Fire Essence during her battle. Her Essence soul looked like a fiery human with spears for hands as she herself used spears.

Shana's Water Essence Soul with its snake-like arms whipped around in the battle against the girl with the Fire Essence. As the two powers contradicted each other quite a lot, neither was the outright victor.

"Shana got unlucky," the princess said. "Her opponent yesterday was a Fire Essence user as well, wasn't it?"

"It was," the teacher said. "But Shana had the better moves yesterday. Today, however…"

"Her opponent is quite skilled," the prince said. "Not only is she good at using her Fire Essence to cancel out Shana's Water Essence, but her Essence Soul also seems capable of attacking at quite the speed with those spear arms. Shana's snake arms can't whip out fast enough."

The fight continued for a while, but the more it progressed, the harder it got for either of the two fighters to do anything to the other.

They even used their strong techniques on each other, but none could get the upper hand.

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In the end, the 5 minutes available for the match were up with both parties gasping for breath as they were both extremely tired.

Everyone patiently waited for the results to the announced as the victor was in the judges' hands now.

Half a minute later, the answer came.

Shana lost the match. The other girl jumped in celebration at the fact that she had won and quickly ran back into the hall where her team celebrated with her.

Shana returned a moment later, dejected with a face that had nothing but disappointment in it.

"I'm sorry, teacher, princess," she said. "I really tried my best."

"Don't worry, it all came down to luck in the end," the princess said. The princess didn't blame her. After all, the main reason she hadn't been chosen as the victor was because she was using Water Essence, instead of Fire Essence, which was considered more destructive in general.

It was just a matter of luck, as she had said.

"You did as well as you could," the teacher said, trying to console her.

The male bodyguard, Hyandus patted her on her shoulder, telling her not to worry about it.

The others in the group consoled her as well, and only after a few minutes was she no longer sad about her loss.

Now, 2 of the 8 students had lost, one in the top 128, and another in the top 64.

"Well, it's my turn soon," the Prince said as he got up and started stretching a bit. "Teach, tell me, should I keep my energy? Will Top 32 be happening today by any chance?"

"Hmm," the teacher looked at the time. "Half of it will definitely be happening. Yours will most definitely be today after you win."

"Oh, then I better end this next match quickly and prepare for my next round then," the Prince said as he stood up. It was his match now.

"I'll be back in a second."

The prince walked up to the stage along with his opponent, a man in a gray uniform.

He stood on one side of the stage and looked at his opponent. "You might want to consider giving up right now," he said. "It is all going to end the same way for you."

The man frowned at the taunt and harrumphed between his breaths, not giving much thought to the prince's words

The prince shrugged. "Well, I do admire a man that doesn't back down from certain defeats," he said as he pulled out a weapon from his storage artifact.

An axe with a Fire essence head and a glowing blue handle that seemed to drop cold mist from where it was held.

The prince's opponent frowned. 'Fire and Ice axe? It's possible to have those two working together?' he thought.

The battle began and the prince dashed forward. His speed was quite fast, but as another man with an Essence Soul, his opponent had to fight back.

Giant earthen arms appeared from around the man, each of which was thick and looked incredibly strong. The arms slammed toward the Prince, but the prince used his powers at the last second.

Large ice spikes grew from the ground and struck the arms that were coming for the prince. The prince ran through without worry while his opponent prepared his next attack.

A nearly 2-meter-thick rock slab appeared out of nowhere in front of him, stopping his pathway, or so it seemed. The prince slammed his fist into the slab as he created ice out of nowhere.

The sudden expansion of ice inside of the rock slab not only cracked it, it also moved it towards his opponent.

At the same time, another large ice crystal grew from the ground, pushing the prince above the stone slab.

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His opponent was busy using his powers to stop the stone slab from getting close when he saw the prince appear above him.

Two limbs extended from the prince's body, both frost white as the grabbed the edge of the rock slab and pulled the prince forward.

The prince's body propelled itself toward his opponent who tried to stop him, but was ultimately too late.

The prince landed a clean punch on his face, sending the man flying to the edge of the stage where he only stopped when he hit the barrier that surrounded the stage.

"Phew!" the prince shook his fist a bit. "Are you okay, friend? I think I hit you a bit too hard."

The prince waited for an answer but got none. "Oh… did I knock him out?" the prince looked around.

The referee had arrived next to the young man and checked him. Realizing that the young man was out, he announced the prince as the victor.

The prince put the axe back into his storage artifact and left the stage. He went to his group and shrugged as they started congratulating him.

"I told you guys it would be easy for me, didn't I?" he asked.

The group nodded.

Ning nodded as well. He was starting to realize just how strong the prince was. He was definitely one of the few strong people amongst the entire 200 people that had taken part in this competition.

The next group member to fight was the prince's bodyguard, Hyandus. His was the 15th match, so he got ready to go as well.

Hyandus was strong, albeit not as strong as the strongest of the other schools. He did have a lot of Essences as most Low Essence Soul realm people did, but he had a Wind core, which needed a lot of Essence to have the same effect as other Essence cores, thus making his a little worse.

It was more of a complementary tool to how he fought. "It's my turn now," he said and left when he was called onto the stage.

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The group watched as the guard left the hall and went over to the stage. From what they all could see, Hyandus's opponent seemed to be a strong person.

"Is he going to be alright?" Yorsha asked. "He is strong, right?"

"Don't worry about Hyan," the prince said. "He can take care of himself."

"He's the prince's guard, so he must be strong," Tenn said. "Right, your highness?"

"He isn't necessarily strong, depending on what you consider to be strong in the first place," the prince said.

"Huh?" the group turned to look at him.

"Keep watching. It'll make sense soon," the prince said.

Hyandus stood in front of his opponent and brought out a long spear from inside his storage artifact. The spear was entirely made out of wind from the tip to the shaft.

His opponent brought out two daggers and held them in her hand. One of the daggers was made up of Explosion Essence, and the other was made up of Earth Essence.

Once both of them were prepared, the fight began.

The girl made the first attack, creating multiple fire arrows in the air above her and sending it in Hyandus's direction.

Hyandus took a deep breath and swung his spear, which instantly caused a small gust of wind to throw away the fire arrows to the side.

"Ho!" the girl said surprised. "Take this then."

Multiple rocks flew in the air, all of which suddenly started burning as she used the power of her core to burn the things close to her. Then, she shot those burning rocks toward Hyandus.

Hyandus looked at the flying projectiles and knew that he couldn't use his Wind core to deflect them easily. It would cost too much energy to do so. Instead, he used a technique as the wind moved around him, making him lighter and faster at the same time.

Then, he disappeared.

Hyandus moved fast, far faster than anyone had in the competition until now. He moved around the arena, closing in on his opponent.

"Hahaha! See?" the prince said as he watched his guard move on the screen. "Little Hyan is fast. He's so fast that even I can't deal with him if he truly gets serious."

:)