Chapter 182: 182 Outplayed, Outdone, Outclassed

Marek and Al rushed towards the combat amphitheatre in the Outer Division hastily. Marek was embarrassed and outraged at the effrontery of the Sect Leader's contemptuous "little princess". He was also extremely apologetic towards Al and his guests, as the Sect's internal matters had bled over and affected them as well.

'If anything happens to my guests, Korr, let the Sect Leader know that the price will be paid in blood. I will inflict the same hurt upon his precious little girl that she causes on the boy,' Marek warned Korr through Mana Transmission. The man did not flinch at the sudden threat and maintained his facade of concern and exhaustion.

Al was also worried. He knew that Markus had little experience in actual combat, and he also knew that his public loss against Gaige weighed heavily on him. Al was aware that sometimes, such experiences could turn into shadows that haunted a mage's heart turning into inner demons. He feared that another such public loss would worsen Markus' complex.

Within seconds, they had arrived at the stadium, but even before they got there, their mana sense had painted an awkward scene which caused them to slow their approach incrementally.

Their initial estimates and expectations were wholly shattered.

"What in the world?" Marek muttered as he observed Markus shower his opponent with a highly pressurised assault of sewage water which threatened to destroy the highly coveted Azurium Blade in his opponent's hands. Although the metal was known to be relatively brittle, it couldn't be so easily damaged. Which could only mean that the water jet had an extraordinary level of lethality.

Once Markus ceased the pressurised jet attack, his opponent, who looked nothing like Cleo Loras given her dishevelled appearance and soiled and torn rags, was propelled outwards unceremoniously and came to a sliding halt a short distance away from the stage's borders.

Since Korr was the last to arrive, his internal snigger was shattered in its nascency and his usually unmoving face revealed a crack of surprise and horror. This wasn't what was planned. For a moment, he was even convinced that the other person on stage was probably not the Young Mistress. However, a scan around the amphitheatre confirmed that it WAS her!

"Elder Glista," Korr acted immediately. His mind ran the scenarios and he realised that the sequence hadn't changed. Elder Glista still had to lower the formation, albeit it was more important than ever now!

"No, no," Marek said with a light chuckle. "I'm interested in seeing how this goes."

"But Elder-"

"She was the one who wanted it activated, aren't I right?" Marek jabbed. "Actions have consequences. She's been skirting around those consequences for a while now. I believe this will be a valuable experience for the little princess."

"Elder, please," Korr begged with sweat dripping down his forehead. It was real this time, not an act, and Marek was enjoying every minute of it.

"Something's wrong," Al interjected. "Markus isn't usually this aggressive."

"That's because that little miscreant went ahead and activated the Irrationality Formation in her favour," Marek answered.

"Elder!" Korr immediately called out, only to receive a forceful glare and a suppressed growl from Marek. The reason for his reminder was because technically, the Irrationality Formation hidden in the bundle was a cheat. The formation tilted the duels in favour of one side, which was against the fairness expected from a duel in the first place. If others heard of this, it would dent the Sect's reputation greatly.

At that instant, Marek and everyone else felt a fluctuation around them. The mana in the region undulated and started to collapse rapidly. For others, it was a momentary lapse. However, for those with more advanced cultivations like Marek, Al and Korr, the effect was wholly amplified. They were more sensitive to, as the other Guy would put it, the "truths" of the world even if they themselves didn't know it in its entirety. And the feeling they were experiencing right now harkened back to one of the more fundamental truths that prevailed - spacetime and gravity. In truth, Markus' expertise in spacetime was rudimentary at best. The spell he was conjuring on the field was a hodge-podge of surface knowledge he had gleaned through trial-and-error. However, it was much rawer than anything, anyone else had achieved in this world.

"Hahahahaha!" Marek bellowed heartily. "This boy's got vigour. I like him!"

"Marek we need to stop him," Al interjected with a stern and anxious expression on his face. "My goodness, he's improved it!"

"What are you so worried about? This spell? It doesn't seem that bad," Marek waved away.

"You don't understand," Al scratched his forehead before remembering something. "Do you remember the Abyssal Wyrm of the Narue region?"

"That old hag?" Marek grumbled with disgust in his eyes. It was clear through that insult that Marek held no positive emotion towards that woman.

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Al ignored the incorrect description of the otherworldly beauty in her human form and said, "Do you remember her ultimate attack? |Eye of the Abyss|?"

Marek shivered as he recollected that unpleasant confrontation. He hated to admit it but that "old hag", as he put it, was someone he had suffered a heavy defeat against. He barely made it out of there alive, partly due to his stupidity in confronting her recklessly and without backup. But in the middle of his unpleasant retrospection, his mind jolted in place. Suddenly, two images started to convalesce in his mind, one from his past and one that was occurring right in front of him.

"H-How?" Marek's jaw dropped in shock. "Is he- No, I mean- Abyssal Wyrm bloodline?"

'No time to explain. Just know that what he is about to cast right now has the potential to be equally devastating as the |Eye of the Abyss| albeit at a much, much smaller scale. But the problem is that his attack will be pure, with no flashiness. Just unadulterated and voracious annihilation!'

Marek jolted, and without wasting a second longer he got to work dissipating the formation. With a wave of his hand, the Life-and-Death Formation was deactivated. With his position as an Elder, he had the authority to do so. However, the Irrationality Formation was not within his control. It could only be controlled by those expressly allowed by the Sect Leader. In this case, the girl who was in the process of ceasing to exist had the key. However, she was barely in any condition to do so.

Hence, Marek deferred to Al, since he acknowledged the man's prowess with anything intellectual in nature. Al didn't need to see or hear Marek's go-ahead as he immediately got to work. The ritual formation in question was subtle, in that it was bundled amidst a series of other formations concentrated on the field. For any other mage, it would have been a chore that would take a few hours to decipher. However, the convoluted bundle unravelled like a loosely tied knot in Al's mind. He could immediately pinpoint the weakness of the formation and attacked it with distributed |Magic Missles| that were modified to transfer a disrupting mana pulse to their targets in a specific order.

Destroying formations was an intricate task. If it was interrupted incorrectly while in operation, the backlash would be immense for the disruptor. To interrupt them, a mage needs to disrupt ritual anchors, which are tangible objects designated as tethers for a ritual based on the ritual's diagram. The diagram may fade over time, but as long as the ritual remains active, the anchors can propagate its effect till the ritual is turned off. Al had witnessed an Irrationality Formation before, and even if it was entangled with others and one anchor was used to sustain multiple formations simultaneously, he was experienced enough to disrupt the formation without affecting others in its bundle.

Right as the last missile hit one of the strategic anchors of the formation, a single foreign word escaped from Markus' lips. The name pierced through the inhuman shriek emanating from the void-black ball in front of him, which was flanked by revolving debris.

|Singularity|

____

It was like a fuse tripped in Markus' mind. A bunch of voices convincing him to do something suddenly just stopped speaking. His mental faculties defogged immediately, and he was confronted by his most recent and most powerful creation.

The |Singularity|.

A rather grand name, he admitted, for a piddly recreation of the black hole from his vision. But the question remained, why was it out here? And why was he casting it?

Then, like a ton of bricks crashing into him from a dangerous height, his memories gained clarity and he remembered everything that led up to this moment. He also understood that somehow, he was not in control of his actions for a while. Or maybe he was. Maybe... it was his subconscious that was controlling him?

'What am I thinking?!' Markus reprimanded himself as he observed the |Singularity| falter in front of him. His momentary lapse of concentration would have cost him dearly if it collapsed right now. But that was the only way to dissipate this attack!

'Markus!' Al's voice resounded in Markus' mind. 'The person you are fighting is the Sect Leader's daughter.'

Markus's eyes widened in shock. Now, he was definitely screwed. Forget about lying low and under the radar, he had just debased and was about to kill the VVIP of this Sect! Markus shot Al a desperate gaze which conveyed everything Al needed to know.

"He can't stop the attack without hurting himself and everyone around him," Al concluded.

He then immediately rushed on stage and activated a multitude of protective spells, as well as a spell he was working on - using Guy's method of course - to counter that dastardly compressive spell that rerouted a river back at the village. Al dialled the spell up to its maximum possible level and thrust it against the |Singularity|.

Evidently, the defensive spell was not enough. His thought process during its conception did not account for the interweaving of spacetime elements, so the spell could only counter the compressive aspects by overloading it with a lot of mana. As more and more of Al's mana got sucked into the |Singularity| the spell's voraciousness was satiated. Al got a little concerned as more mana than he expected rushed in. It wasn't much in the grand scheme of things, but for a perfectionist who preferred to be efficient with his mana, this discrepancy irked him slightly. He would explore this at a later date.

Then, as anticipated, he cast a much thicker ward spell around the dissipated spell for the upcoming blast. The attack collided against the wall of mana and burst through a few preliminary layers before shutting off.

As the dust settled, Marek walked over and said, "Due to external interference, the match goes in favour of Cleo Loras. Congratulations."

It took some time for Markus to register the outcome, but he joined the dots and recognised what Al and Marek were cooking. He then bowed at the shivering girl bathed in filth and said sincerely, "I have lost. Thank you for broadening my horizons, Mage Loras."

He then quickly jumped off the stage and sprinted away without a moment of hesitance.

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