Several days had gone by since Marcus and Mrazivý enjoyed drinks with Zilre and Igna and learned more about them.
The two of them had continued fighting their ways through the duo tournament and without too much difficulty made it to the final round.
Of course, their opponents were going to be the Sulb Clan's strongest fighters. Ghazi's the Grand elder of the clan and Aziz his brother.
Marcus and Mrazivý had watched most of their upcoming opponents' matches, but it was clear that they had never gotten serious in any of them. They still were not a hundred percent sure what they were capable of even after Mrazivý appraised them with her dragon eyes. Just seeing their skills and stats did not give any insight into their fighting styles or what kind of strategies they might come up with.
At the very least they did know that Aziz was level eighty-six and Ghazi was level eighty-eight. Truly they were both at incredibly high levels, and in terms of their overall abilities they were certainly above average. Though not as strong as mythic grade beasts like Gwyneira and Retharin who were around the same level as them, both Ghazi and Aziz were likely equivalent to legendary grade beasts in terms of power.
"Were certainly going to be in for one hell of a fight." Marcus said as they sat in a waiting room before their match.
Now that it was down to the finals there was only going to be one fight each day and yesterday the battle for the top individual fighter had taken place.
Bashir, the Eazim Clan's strongest fighter had managed to make it to the finals, but he unfortunately lost to one of the other major clan's strongest warrior.
Today though was Marcus and Mrazivý's time to shine and fight against the almost undisputedly strongest fighters in the entire country.
"Are you sure that you can keep all this up? Even you do not have an unlimited amount of mana."
Mrazivý was worried about the plan that Marcus had detailed since it was going to put a huge strain on his mana.
"Don't worry, it should not be a problem. If I get low, I can just steal the mana from our opponents or use Ultimate Refresh to fully restore it. Ghazi and Aziz are not opponents we can hold back against if we want to win." Marcus responded.
Mrazivý only sighed and shook her head, before saying, "Please don't waste your Supreme Skill on something so trivial. Just lower your mana expenditure when you need to. When we go all out with our most powerful abilities, we burn out far too quickly. I am going to be counting on you to keep us going throughout this fight. We are not going to last a prolonged battle without your Ultimate Refresh."
"Don't worry, it was only a joke. I have no intention of wasting one of my strongest powers. I am sure that with mana regeneration and mana thief I will be able to get by. Probably."
Once they had solidified their final plan and there were only five minutes before their match began, both Marcus and Mrazivý began casting spells in preparation for the battle.
Certainly magic was not allowed to be used during the match, but they were going to maliciously exploit the loophole that allowed them to cast spells with long lasting effects before the fight.
"Sir Marcus and Lady Mrazivý, I have come to escort you to-"
One of the upper ranking officials running the tournament had come into the waiting room to bring Marcus and Mrazivý out to the stage as it was almost time for the match to start, but the poor man frozen in shock and fear when he entered the room.
For a few seconds he just stood there completely still before turning around and running away screaming. His survival instincts were telling him that he was in terrible danger.
"I told you that using those two would leave a bad impression. They give off oppressive and dangerous auras. Any normal person would react just like that, or even just pass out." Mrazivý said, pointing to one of Marcus' spells.
"We want to win don't we. I get that these are not the friendliest spells, but we are not fighting average opponents here. We need every card we can play."
Mrazivý shrugged her shoulder and gave up on trying to get Marcus to end the spells that made her skin crawl. She could tell he was truly determined to go all out in this battle and sue everything at his disposal.
With their guide now having fled in terror, the two of them simply walked down the corridors of the arena on their own and headed towards the stage. They had done this more than enough time to know the way on their own.
Along the path to the stage, they came across several other members of the tournament staff, but even the seasoned warriors that passed by them gave them a wide berth. Right now, Marcus and Mrazivý were as imposing as an invading army.
"And now, entering from the left, this years unexpected powerhouses that have crushed their coemption to make it here to the finals, the guest of the Eazim Clan, Marcus and Mrazivý!"
After the announcer called for them to enter Mrazivý led the way with Marcus standing well behind her for good reason.
The moment she came out the crowd began exchanging confused whispers, but by the time Marcus had shown himself the entire audience had gone quite and many looked spooked and ready to bolt. This was because Marcus and Mrazivý had not entered the ring alone.
Along with them were several creatures created by their magic.
Mrazivý had half a dozen ice warriors surrounding her like a royal guard and a giant dragon made of ice flying above her head.
Marcus on the other hand had come in with a giant golem made out of iron along with two entries that were unnatural and would make any living being shudder.
One was created from the tier five darkness magic spell, ravenous abyss. This was a spell Marcus had not used in a long time, but it had become far more powerful since the last time he used it.
The giant mass of darkness was much denser now, and several more of its creepy writhing hands spread out from its body.
However, the other creature of darkness that Marcus had created was even more oppressive.
This was an entity created by the tier eight darkness magic spell, aptly named gloom titan.
It was a large four armed vaguely humanoid creature that stood nearly four meters tall and wielded four long wispy whips.
Its face was ever shifting between one horrific visage after another, and its very presence dropped the light within the entire arena by a degree. Despite it being midday, the light level felt more like late into evening.
Along with these creatures created by their magic, Marcus and Mrazivý also had many noticeable spells cast on themselves or hovering around them.
Mrazivý's entire body was covered in a royal blue ice that took the shape of a dragon thanks to the tier eight spell, Emperor Ice Dragon's Armor. A powerful magic Mrazivý had picked up from the special dungeon.
She also had two massive spinning circular saw blades made of ice floating above her curtesy of a tier seven spell Gwyneira had taught her.
For Marcus, he had cast several buff spells on himself, such as lighting warrior and heart of the forge. But the ones that had the most impact were certainly his iron magic spells.
He had his iron sphere floating next to him and his cataclysmic iron sword shrunk down to only around a tenth of its full size, but still quite large hovering far above him.
Then there were the spells that affected his body, such as iron skin, the first spell Marcus had ever used, and iron wings of the archangel. Which caused six gleaming metal wings to sprout out of his back.
Yet for the most perceptive, they would notice that the small iron chain spinning above Marcus' head like a halo was the most dangerous of the spells surrounding him.
"It seems that you two are really going all out for this. I don't believe there has ever been a display like this in any past Muharib Festivals. I know that magic is only disallowed once the match has begun, but this is a bit extreme. It is almost against the spirit of the competition." Ghazi said as he walked out onto the stage with Aziz by his side.
The announcer had not yet called them in yet, but Ghazi realized that if he did not appear soon, that there was going to be a panic in the crowd. That was simply how terrifying Marcus and Mrazivý's display was to the average person.
Thankfully once two of the heroes of the nation had entered the ring, the people felt a sense of safety.
Ghazi and Aziz were among the absolute strongest fighters in Aezam, and few would argue that they were not one and two. With them here, most of the audience felt a sense of security. In their minds there was nothing these two could not handle.
"We're not breaking any rules, right? We cast all of these spells before entering the ring." Marcus said.
"Yes, well that is normally only to allow for magic warriors to cast enchantment spells before the battle. Not all of this." Aziz said, waving his hand at the several creatures and creations that Marcus and Mrazivý had made using magic.
"You should take this as a show of respect for your prowess. We did not use any of these spells against our previous opponents, but against the two of you, we determined that they are necessary if we want to win. Of course, if you absolutely object and want us to limit ourselves, we would be fine with canceling all of our spells." Mrazivý said, making it seem like she was leaving the decision up to Ghazi and Aziz.
Of course, there was no way that they could tell them to end their spells now. Doing so would seem a sign of weakness. As if they needed a handicap from their opponents in order to win.
"No, you can keep the spells you have already cast. Rules may need to be revised in the future to prevent this from happening again, but for now, you have not done anything wrong. So long as you do not cast anymore spells during the match, there will be no problems." Ghazi said, wearing a determined expression.
Even in the face of all of Marcus and Mrazivý's powerful spells, neither he nor Aziz faltered in the slightest.