Unsealing Emptiness

“uh..a- Are you seeing that?”

“I sure am...”

“Stop blabbering, I would be surprised if you could even understand what was happening,” spat the impatient Kure.

Something not even in his wildest imaginations was happening right in front of him, these nobodies interrupting with their chatter ticked him off. He himself was barely able to keep track of those movements, much less these mere Rank-8 Mages.

The Rank-8 Mages near him immediately shut their chatter, but they, just like everyone else around them, including all three Rank-10 Mages, couldn’t believe their own eyes.

Yet... it was happening.

.....

That small shadow they had already thought to be a dead man standing was actually fighting the Rank-10 Beast on equal grounds!

It was only the initial exchange, but it had already proved that man’s strength.

There wasn’t enough time for the initial shock to fade away when everyone noticed the two parties separating after a round of what seemed to be blurry attacks in their eyes.

With curiosity rising, everyone focused on that man. Those who somewhat knew how powerful the Sovereign felt their hearts pounding. In their experience, there wasn’t any man on the continent who could be this powerful except for the old man who was hosting this competition in the first place!

Squinting their eyes as much as they could to see through the barrier, only the Rank-9 Mages and above were able to make out the features of that man now having a conversation with the giant Beast.

“Isn’t he...”

“No way...”

“Why was he chosen to participate!? And since when was he so powerful?!?!”

The one shout which overshadowed all others among these spectators belonged to the Archbishop of the Church of Light, Lammert.

It wasn’t just him who had these concerns. Everyone was as perplexed as he was.

The Ashin Family, on the other hand, were the ones who were most surprised.

‘Che... no wonder he didn’t want to join the family...’ Kure considered this while clicking his tongue. He knew his grandson was mysterious, but he never expected him to hold such a big surprise.

His expressions changed into a gleaming bright smile that didn’t fit the situation as the blood smudged on his teeth gave him a terrifying look instead.

It wasn’t only him, two more men inside the crowd had similar reactions. Raymond and Alver both had their chests puffing up as if it was them everyone was staring at with awe.

Their nephew had long surpassed their own father. It only brought them both indescribable joy.

Fortunately, though, everyone was too immersed in the scene down below to spare them a glance.

. . .

Back to the fight, Ozul withstood the attack without getting any burns.

The blasting flames had thrown him quite far from the Sovereign. There was some distance between them, but this time the situation was reversed.

Before he had the chance to gather himself up, the ground under him suddenly started burning and in the blink of an eye, the ground melted before a pillar of fire rose up, engulfing him whole!

Like a raging dragon, the fire tore through the air and only stopped after hitting the barrier!

Gasps followed throughout the area, be it inside the barrier or outside.

Although the onlookers weren’t really on Ozul’s side, they still couldn’t help but be against the Sovereign.

Almost everyone gathered at different spots on the hill as it seemed the safest place. It was the same hill Raven and Blaze had chosen to watch the battle from.

Zier, suddenly seeing the massive pillar of fire engulfing the whole area around Ozul was stunned and anxiously tried to look for him on the field.

The heat from the pillar could even be felt by him from miles away, he could only imagine what must Ozul have faced just now.

“Hey, he avoided it, right? Tell me he avoided it...” he worriedly asked, hoping for a reply. He himself wasn’t able to understand anything of what was going on since has merely a Rank-5 Fighter.

Even the fact that he could see them was because they were on a high hill.

The reply he got was only the clenched fists of Blaze and a wave of cold air that passed by the hill like an ocean breeze.

Everyone held their breaths for the pillar of fire to disperse.

The Sovereign didn’t have any intentions of making it disappear anytime sooner, though.

“Khe! Is that all you amounted to, vermin?”

As she expected, there was no reply.

She was about to laugh and proudly declare her victory with a victory roar when her eyes blinked.

It was only the blink of an eye and there was something hammering down on her from the above!

A direct hit straight into her previous wound!

“GHAA! ”

She shouted to the top of her lungs which made many inside the barrier shiver in fear, they all had goosebumps just from watching these scenes.

The fire pillar dispersed and out of it appeared Ozul with tattered clothes and a disheveled appearance. Although he had protected himself with the Ball of Purity immediately, some of the flames still managed to get past it before he could cover himself completely.

“I’m not the one bleeding here,” Ozul replied to her previous taunt.

Unknown to the Sovereign, that was a bluff. He was certain that if he had any blood to begin with, he would have been bleeding by now, just as much, if not more, than she was.

His main advantage over the Sovereign was that the Ball of Purity couldn’t be detected.

Because of their greater affinity for Mana, Magical Beasts have always had an advantage in detecting threats over humans. But that was not the case right now.

Not only was Ozul not like the humans she had ever fought before, he even had superior senses and instincts!

On the other hand, in terms of raw power, Ozul lost by a small margin.

The quantity of the Ball of Purity against her size wasn’t enough for him to do anything other than direct attacks.

In anger, the Sovereign leaped in the air and brought down her claws on Ozul.

Narrowly dodging it, Ozul quickly counter-attacked by targeting her wound again. It was easier to pierce.

As if she had already expected it, the attack failed as it came into contact with another claw with a raging fire.

“This won’t work thrice, you vermin!” snarled the fiery Beast as she spat fire at him.

This sparked another round of attacks which didn’t seem to favor either of the two.

While at first, everyone was surprised. The surprise quickly turned into excitement and the excitement was, sadly, very short-lived.

No one exceeded the ranks of a Rank-8 Mage inside the barrier and even they could barely follow the blurry figures without making much sense of it. It was hard to tell just who had the upper hand.

Ozul and the Sovereign didn’t say much after the first few rounds. They kept attacking each other in the hopes of landing a successful hit. Because they didn’t stop, even the three Rank-10 Mages outside the barrier couldn’t tell who was winning.

Overall, this caused many people to lose interest in their battle. But that didn’t mean their battle wasn’t important to them. It most emphatically did. No one knew who would be the Sovereign’s next target if she won.

However, if the Human prevailed, they might have a chance of survival. After all, wasn’t he in the competition from the beginning and didn’t bother to find everyone right away?

With these thoughts in mind, everyone prayed in their hearts for Ozul’s victory.

At the same time, they braced themselves for what was to come. Even if Ozul won by some miracle, they’d still have to fight among themselves and kill enough people before the competition was over.

They all looked at each other nervously, making no visible movements. However, no one wanted to get into a fight right now.

As the tension in the air slowly dispersed, a sudden humming sound caught them off guard.

*Zmhm!*

Zier turned his head quickly, his eyes widening. This sound was not only familiar to him, but to everyone else in the competition!

The barrier was shrinking once more!

With that unfortunate news came an old man’s hearty laugh.

“Gahaha! Everyone seemed to be too bored. Please accept my heartfelt apologies. To revive the excitement, the barrier will continue to shrink, as it appears that these two will take a long time to settle their dispute, huhu...”

“Now let’s see if enough of you die or if their fight ends first, best of luck!”

Many were irritated by the cheerful tone he used to announce the possibility of their deaths, but they were powerless against Old Gu.

“... OH! And I forgot to mention that the barrier will close in on those two.”

This had the exact effect he desired on the crowd.

While the barrier was shrinking at a snail’s pace, the situation they were in had completely changed.

Previously, they only had to hold out until the battle between Ozul and the Sovereign was over. Meanwhile, they could strategize and assess everyone’s strength around them.

With the addition of this new factor, they would all be gradually pushed towards those ‘monsters’!

.....

Even coming close to them meant certain death!

It didn’t matter if it was someone who had already started making plans or those who were still thinking, everyone had realized the situation they were in.

The heavy atmosphere which seemed to be at bay just a moment ago exploded again...