The most watched match of the second arena belonged to Evan Clarke.
Everyone knew why.
He was the inheritor of a rare and highly coveted system, and rumors said he also wielded multiple advanced techniques normally seen only in long-established schools. Whether or not those rumors were exaggerated didn't matter. The event itself had clearly been designed with him in mind.
Naturally, the crowd was thick around his arena.
Rowan Mercer and Marcus Hale stood among them.
Rowan had spoken briefly with Evan earlier. On the surface, Evan looked like an awkward, underprepared shut-in who'd somehow wandered into the wrong place. But that impression didn't survive more than a minute of conversation. His answers were careful. His reactions were measured. Every word landed exactly where he intended.
More importantly, Rowan could feel it.
Evan's internal reserves were substantial. Not refined yet, but deep. Among the competitors present, he was comfortably near the top.
"This one won't last long," Rowan said quietly.
He glanced at Evan's three opponents. Their pressure signatures were thin and uneven, the kind that showed effort without foundation.
Marcus nodded. "Yeah. Doesn't look promising for them."
Half an hour later, the stands erupted.
Bottles, curses, and insults rained down toward the arena as Evan calmly waved to the crowd and walked off, humming to himself.
The referee announced the result through clenched teeth.
"Second Arena, White Division. Winner: Evan Clarke."
Marcus stared, stunned. "He… he really did that?"
Rowan raised an eyebrow. "Effective."
Evan had played the entire match like a farce. He let his opponents fight each other first, encouraged them to recover afterward, then struck while they were distracted and unguarded. It was shameless, infuriating, and tactically sound.
More importantly, he never revealed his real strength.
That alone made him dangerous.
"He's the kind of person who survives," Rowan said. "And thrives."
The matches rolled on.
In the next bracket, Rowan's interest was caught by a tactician who manipulated space through structured positioning, turning the battlefield itself into a controlled domain. The method wasn't about raw force but efficiency, amplification, and probability. Rowan immediately flagged it as worth further study.
Another competitor relied on fluid, circular close-combat techniques. Rowan barely spared it a glance. He had better answers for physical exchanges.
By the time the rotations reached the final bracket of the day, the sky had begun to darken.
"Final match. Blue Division. Contestant, Rowan Mercer. Enter the arena."
The stands were noticeably thinner now. None of the four competitors were famous. No legendary schools. No famous bloodlines.
That suited Rowan just fine.
As the signal sounded, the other three moved immediately, attacking one another rather than focusing on him. That was standard behavior. Unless someone carried an obvious reputation, four-way matches usually started as chaos.
Rowan waited a heartbeat.
Then he raised his wand.
A single detonation rippled across the arena.
The blast was controlled, tuned precisely to the level required. When the dust settled, all three opponents lay unconscious on the ground, unharmed but thoroughly incapacitated.
Silence followed.
Then the referee cleared his throat.
"Match concluded. Winner: Rowan Mercer."
The remaining spectators stared, then broke into scattered applause and murmurs. No one had expected much from this arena. No one had expected that.
Across the stands, Evan Clarke leaned toward his teammate.
"I knew it," he said quietly. "That guy's not ordinary."
His companion frowned. "Couldn't tell what he used."
Evan smiled thinly. "That's the problem."
Rowan stepped off the arena floor, expression calm, as if nothing noteworthy had happened.
For him, it hadn't.
This was just the beginning.
...
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