The Observation RoomA little over two hours later

All of the professors stay silent as they watch the group of four Class III graduate students fight it out at the center of the forest, the leader of the demons infesting the forest having already long since been killed, along with the majority of the demons in the forest overall. Even with the demons periodically respawning throughout the round.

But Cipher just ignores them for the moment as he, along with some other first year professors, focus their sole attention on the current rankings for the tournament.

She’s really doing it… barely.

Cipher can’t help but think this as he stares at Scarlet’s name currently taking the ninety-first spot in the top one hundred students, her ranking having severely dropped since the start of the tournament thanks to the Class II and Class III students having gone around massacring the higher level demons without a care before turning on each other.

Although if they didn’t turn on each other, I don’t know if she would still be in the top one hundred or not.

The man lets out a sigh. When she first started just taking a nap on a tree, he felt like the stares of the other professors would burn a hole straight through him. And that was only made worse by the silence in the room, since not a single one of them had said a word about it. Just stared.

I mean, how does that even happen? It’s a room full of nearly a hundred people…

He lets out another sigh as he begins to wonder if Scarlet just enjoys putting him into these situations, knowingly or not.

After a few seconds, he turns his attention back to the current main screen, which takes up a large portion of the large room. And he quickly begins to watch the battle going on there between the Class III students.

One of them – a girl who goes by the title of Rift – is wearing a simple set of high-tech looking magi-tech armor with purple plating covering all of her important areas and cloth covering the rest, with a few items thrown into the mix such as a sword that must’ve cost them a fortune, along with a hairband to tie the girl’s hair back out of her face as she twirls the blade around, blocking fireball after fireball after fireball.

Astra’s eldest daughter is still doing well, by the looks of it.

Another of the Class IIIs has glowing red eyes that occasionally leak embers as he continuously chases Rift with dozens of fireballs constantly appearing around him, along with two red horns sticking out of his head, looking a little like the antlers of a deer. Although just a little shorter. And he’s wearing a set of magi-tech armor that appears to be made out of some sort of scales.

Eruption. Just as wild tempered as always.

Cipher turns his attention to the other two Class IIIs who are battling on the other side of the forest’s center which used to be filled with cobwebs. Cobwebs that are now burnt to a crisp by Eruption’s rampage.

“Tell me who I’m looking at,” he whispers out loud, and the earpiece in his ear immediately answers.

[Star Breaker. Class III graduate student at Lion’s Heart. Has participated in the Interschool Tournaments every year and made it to the quarter finals in the Class III solo competitions during their fourth year. Has never participated in the primary tournaments.]

The student in question has black hair glittering with what look like stars and is wearing magi-tech armor made from a similar material as Scarlet’s and Frost’s, but in a neon blue color. Meanwhile they’re currently spreading their arms out and creating a large wave of what appear to be tiny stars that are quickly sent towards the person opposite him.

[Hardlight. Class III graduate student at Lion’s Heart. Has participated in the Interschool Tournaments every year and made it to the semifinals in the Class III solo competitions during their fourth year. Has never participated in the primary tournaments.]

Hardlight raises his hand and clenches it into a fist, making half of the stars suddenly fall to the ground as he increases the gravity by several fold around him. Then he waves that very arm, the blackish purple cloak he’s wearing sweeping open to reveal leather armor beneath in the process as he sends a purple arc in the direction of Star Breaker that has everything around it moving inwards towards the arc as it flies through the air.

Not bad. Not bad at all.

The four students continue fighting for nearly fifteen minutes straight, turning the center of the forest into a hellscape that has any other student staying far away from it. And by the time each of them are finally closing in on their breaking points, one of them finally takes a hit that leaves him killed and teleported somewhere on the edge of the inner ring, close to the outer ring.

“Looks like Star Breaker is out,” Cipher hears one of his friends mutter, and he absentmindedly nods his head in response.

Then more time continues to pass by until the end of the tournament itself is almost upon them. And during this time, the three remaining students end up in a deadlock, without a single one of them giving an inch. Meanwhile, Star Breaker can be seen on the outer portion of the inner ring simply killing the remaining monsters there, already knowing that he has no chance of making it back to the center in time.

“Looks like things are finishing up,” Cipher mutters before briefly glancing at the leaderboard and noticing that Scarlet is no longer in the top one hundred. And Star Breaker moved down from fourth place to sixty-first as well.

That’s not too surprising.

He turns his gaze back to the screen again, only to hear whispered conversations begin to rise from around the room. So, when he finds what everyone is looking at, his jaw drops open in shock as he stands up from the seat he was on next to the wall, slamming his palm into the table next to him in the process and startling those around him.

Because what greets him is the sight of Scarlet slowly but surely making her way through a tunnel directly towards where the three are fighting.

What the fuck is she doing now?!