Omen of a Bluebell

The runes flare with light, reflecting off the barrier in a dazzling display, signaling the start of our match.

At the same time, I activate All For One, dumping all of my available mana regen into the skill, and we charge each other.

Both our eyes widen when we see that we’re both equal in speed, at least for the moment.

Her face hardens after the realization, and her body begins to blur with each step. Step after step, her speed increases, her movements becoming less and less visible.

I’m not sure what ability that is, but it’s impressive and a bit… worrying.

While she didn’t have much time to plan around the conditions for beating me, I also didn’t get much time to plan around avoiding her achieving them. Still, I already know that healing won’t matter all that much in this particular duel.

She’d have to hit me first, and I don’t intend on letting that happen.

Now’s as good a time as any to make use of Scarlet Barrier…

With that in mind, I activate the Skill.

Scarlet Barrier

Active, Conjuration

Use wind and the blood around you to create a powerful barrier.

The barrier can withstand damage based on a fraction of the health and mana invested.

Conversion efficiency is reduced by 95%.

May invest up to 5% of your total health and mana.

Originally, it only takes up to 5% of my health and mana, for a total of 25,325, giving a total of 1,266 damage absorption potential—but that jumps up to 2,445 after overcharging it with my third Wisdom milestone.

Even after the obscene conversion loss, the barrier is tougher than most people’s entire health pool. At least, for my Tier.

While it doesn’t seem like a lot, Cari made sure to repeatedly batter me with that little fact.

Then she battered me even harder with the fact that Conjuration type Skills are further empowered by Intelligence, so with my boosts it’s closer to thrice as strong.

When I continued to whine, she put her all into beating me to death with a pillow.

Despite the situation, the memory makes my tail wiggle with delight for a moment before the barrier snaps into existence.

In a blink, I’m surrounded by nearly transparent crystallized shards of blood, swirling in a violent maelstrom around me, threatening to shred anything that gets too close.

Sarysha doesn’t hesitate.

She keeps charging, her outline blurring more and more with each step, the air cracking faintly as she pushes herself faster and faster.

I set off a Blood Burst near her legs.

I only invest half a percent of my health into it, as the Skill has the potential to deal more damage than I care to risk if I put mana into it. Even with the Academy assuring that healers are on standby.

She turns into a streak of green and black, appearing before me in a blur of motion so fast that I almost couldn’t track it at all. Blood burst explodes behind her, avoided and ignored, at the same time her claws scream against my barrier.

Several fragments shatter outright, and the impact of her strike rattles me through the shielding despite the fact that she didn’t actually hit me, the dull vibration of the attack settling into my bones.

Holy shit, her damage and speed is no joke.

She blurs again, this time to my side, claws lancing out in a precise strike that takes advantage of the barrier's rotation. More fragments shatter, dissipating into wisps of red-tinged mana.

Her face tightens as she pulls back, teeth clenched hard enough that I hear them grind.

Pain. Good.

I swing for her, Arcane Strike and Bloodmist Fist empowering my stike, but she bends around the blow in a way that makes me wonder if she even has bones. Her spine curves unnaturally, her body folding aside just enough for my fist to pass through empty air.

Her counter comes instantly.

Mana claws rake across the barrier again, another cluster shattering with sparks of red.

But her breathing is no longer silent.

Each time she moves, it ends with a sharp exhale, misting the air. Sweat beads on her brow, trailing down along the fine lines of her jaw as she pushes herself harder and harder, burning something to go beyond what she should be capable of.

The movements are still too fast, but they’re becoming less and less clean. Each motion ends with a momentary hitch, a half-step too deep, a claw strike that lingers just a moment longer than it should.

She blurs again, and again.

I let out a low growl, my frustration bubbling up as I fail to land a single meaningful hit. My tail lashes behind me as my claws swipe through air, my kicks lance out and meet nothing, my fists find no purchase.

Then I slip up.

One of her strikes punches through a gap in the barrier and her claws draw a burning line along the side of my neck. Blood beads instantly, a warm trickle sliding down to meet my collar.

Her eyes flash with triumph, then twist into a grimace as one of the few remaining shards of blood slams into her forearm, forcing her to tear away with a sharp cry.

She staggers half a step, fingers curling involuntarily.

That’s when I see what needs to be done to end this.

Trick.

A grin finds its way onto my face with the surge of power, even though I get the feeling it still won’t be quite enough to keep up with whatever it is she’s doing.

Her hands are shaking now, but from rage or exhaustion I can’t tell.

Either will work…

She resets her stance, chest heaving, and I finally see the cost of her ability. A trickle of blood leaks from her nose, trailing freely down and darkening her lips.

Then she moves.

With Fae Ferocity, I can nearly keep up with her now, but I force myself to keep to the same speed I was moving before.

To let her break more of the barrier. Let her think she can take the final leap and win this.

As I do, I watch her breathing. The tremor in her legs that grows stronger after each impossible burst of movement. The way her eyes flick to my chest, my throat, and places where a single decisive blow could end it.

I feel it before I see it, instinct warning me. The moment caution gives way to need.

The barrier collapses in a final shatter of crimson shards, and she commits fully.

Sense Danger flares to life as she appears before me, her claws elongated into spears of condensed mana. One arm drives straight through my stomach, the force of it lifting me off the ground. The other plunges down from above, angled perfectly toward the hollow between my neck and shoulder.

Her claws ignore my durability, shredding flesh and bone alike.

Even with my sense of pain reduced, a twinge of agony blooms, distant and muffled.

And I grin.

Play.

Her eyes widen the instant my hands clamp around the arm buried in my gut. The hesitation lasts less than a heartbeat, but I take it for what it is: an opening.

I surge forward and slam my forehead into her face.

Cartilage gives way with a wet crack. Her head snaps back, bone meeting bone with a sickening crunch, and the tension leaves her body all at once. She goes limp mid-motion, her remaining momentum carrying her weight into me.

For half a second, I stumble, completely unable to breathe. The world dims for a moment, but instinct carries me forward.

Both of her arms are still inside me, my lungs refusing to expand around the pressure and damage. I rip the arm in my chest free and dump all of my mana regen out of All For One and into Arcane Regulation.

Just as my vision began to fade completely, it snaps back into focus.

Flesh knits, bones pull together in clicks and snaps, and I let out a wet, hacking cough as air finally floods my chest.

I ignore the arm buried in my stomach for now, opting to push a bit of my healing into the elf instead.

What I feel from her blows my mind. While I can’t tell specifically what is wrong, I know where my healing travels to. What areas it focuses on first.

First it goes to her neck, where it must have been broken from my strike, telling me that she did not, in fact, have very much Constitution at all. Then her face, where I struck.

Then it goes everywhere at once, spreading throughout her body and repairing swathes of damage that seems spread just about as equally as it possibly could be.

Barriers flare into existence between us before I finish, the proctors arriving in a blur of authority and power.

At the same time, Fae Ferocity fades, and the loss of stats almost makes me slump in on myself.

Only then do I release her arm and let it slide from my stomach as she slumps to the ground, unconscious.

I spare her another glance as I step back, finding that she’s still breathing and her nose isn’t horribly mangled.

I let out a sigh of relief at the sight.

I might have gone a bit too hard at the end there…

Just as I put my arms up to signal that I’m not going to do anything else, a pair of healers arrive next to Sarysha, their hands already glowing with restorative magics.

“Emilia, can you hear me?” the older woman says, eying me cautiously.

I try to speak, only to cough up another chunk of flesh and blood trapped in my lungs after healing.

Instead, I make the infinitely more wise decision and just nod my head.

“Is the berserk Skill you mentioned earlier active right now?”

I shake my head, still trying to cough up the rest of the gunk.

Both proctors relax at that, their shoulders dropping ever so slightly as their hands—which were held up and facing both Sarysha and I—lower slowly to their sides.

The barriers slowly fade away then, just as Sarysha starts to cough, having been returned to consciousness by the healers.

“Please wait there until Sarysha recovers and for the results to be announced,” she says, her tone final.

I nod again, trying and failing to restrain another cough.

One of the healers peels away from Sarysha and approaches me instead. She’s middle-aged, with a round, calm face and the sort of expression that suggests she’s seen far worse than this and expects to see it again before long.

She glances once at the holes in my clothes, the wounds that were there now gone, leaving only smooth skin. Then she meets my eyes.

“Thank you,” she says simply. “For assisting with her stabilization.”

I blink, surprised.

Then she continues, her tone gentle but firm. “That said, I’m going to ask that you refrain from healing your opponents in future duels.”

My ears twitch, showing my confusion.

“I—sorry,” I say hoarsely, my chest and throat still feeling raw. “I just… I didn’t want to—”

She lifts a hand, stopping me before I can continue.

“I understand. Truly.” A faint smile touches her lips. “But your healing doesn’t seem capable of repairing significant traumas. That means we have to undo portions of your work to properly address the damage done.”

I feel the blood drain from my face at the sudden realization that I might have just made things worse rather than helped.

“Oh…” I say, my ears drooping.

She laughs softly, the sound warm and amused, then she reaches out and pats me on the head.

I freeze.

“There is nothing to apologize for,” she says, giving my hair a gentle ruffle. “Your heart is in the right place. Keep it that way.” Her expression broadens into a grin. “But for today, let us do the work. All right?”

I nod, mortified, my tail flicking about despite my attempts to suppress it.

She withdraws her hand and returns to Sarysha, leaving me to stew in my embarrassment.

At the same time, I realize that I no longer feel the need to cough, and my chest and throat no longer feel raw at all.

Glancing down, I find that my clothes have also been repaired, despite not having self repair enchantments.

Looking up, I find the healer woman peeking over one shoulder at me, apparently having waited for me to notice.

She winks at me, her smile broad and filled with satisfaction.

It’s decided. Next evolution, Arcane Regulation is getting the evolution point. That is way, way too useful.

I don’t know what she did to fix my uniform, but whatever healing magic nonsense she pulled to clear my lungs is my new goal.

By the time the barrier around the platform dims to its less active state, Sarysha is awake and sitting up, supported by one of the healers. She looks pale, dazed, and more than a little shaken…

But alive. And intact.

Her eyes meet mine briefly, and she winces before looking away quickly.

The female proctor steps forward then, joining me where I stand apart from the healers and Sarysha. At the same time, the male proctor approaches Sarysha, his own tablet in hand.

“Victory by incapacitation,” she says. “Congratulations.”

I hesitate. “Thanks?”

“Now then, I have your assessment notes here,” she starts, and I feel a chill creep down my spine and straight into my tail.

She holds the tablet out for me to read it.

—————————

Entrance Exam Assessment Results — Duel 1

Student: Emilia Ken

Tier: One

Level: 63

Evaluation Scale:

Liability - Lacking - Adequate - Exceptional - Overwhelming.

Results:

Damage Output - Exceptional.

Speed - Adequate.

Durability - Overwhelming.

Tactical Awareness - Adequate.

Efficiency - Overwhelming.

Control - Liability.

Overall Combat Ability - Adequate to Exceptional.

Notes:

Demonstrates disproportionate survivability relative to Tier norms.

Exhibits inadequate threat assessment and insufficient restraint when engaging peers of comparable Tier/level.

Relies excessively on self-recovery in lieu of defensive mitigation or disengagement.

Lacks formal combat training.

Presents elevated risk to opponents under standard examination conditions.

Close supervision recommended in all future evaluations.

—————————

I stare at it for a long moment.

“Huh,” I say finally. “Yeah. Uh… fair enough.”

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