The sun hung high over the Royal Stadium, baking the white marble stands. The air shimmered with heat and suffocating anticipation. Fifty thousand citizens leaned forward, their eyes fixed on the arena floor, betting slips clutched in sweaty hands.
"It's a slaughter," a merchant in the VIP box muttered to his companion. "Lira is an A-Rank Saint. She has infinite mana. That creep Eren is a C-Rank with a staring problem. The odds are 100 to 1."
"I put five hundred on the Saint," the companion laughed. "Easy money. She'll wash him out of the arena in ten seconds."
On the eastern side of the sands stood Lira, the Overflowing Saint Elementalist. She looked like a goddess of war descended to earth. Her white robes fluttered in an unseen wind, and the air around her hummed with a visible, dense mana that made the space distort. She held the Staff of the World Tree, a weapon that pulsed with the four elements. She didn't look eager to fight; she looked sad, as if she were about to discipline a child.
On the western side stood Eren. The C-Rank Gaze Tyrant looked small in comparison. He wore light, flexible leather armor that offered almost no protection against magic. He had no sword, no staff, no shield. He stood hunched, his hands trembling slightly, adjusting the thick, magical monocle over his right eye.
"Begin!" the referee roared, his voice amplified by magic.
Eren moved instantly. He didn't charge; he looked up, his eyes widening, trying to lock gazes with Lira before she could cast.
[Skill: Paralysis Gaze]
Invisible mental energy shot across the arena.
But Lira was faster. Or rather, her mana was faster.
"I'm sorry, Eren," Lira whispered. She tapped her staff on the ground.
[Skill: Elemental Bastion — Earth & Wind]
RUMBLE.
Three massive walls of solid rock erupted from the sand, forming a triangle around Lira. Simultaneously, a vortex of howling wind surrounded the stone, kicking up a dust cloud that completely obscured her silhouette.
Eren's gaze hit the stone wall. The skill failed.
"He can't see her!" a spectator shouted. "It's over! A Gaze Tyrant without a line of sight is useless!"
"You cannot fight what you cannot see," Lira's voice echoed from inside the fortress, amplified by the wind.
The sky above the arena darkened. Lira wasn't just hiding; she was charging.
[Skill: Elemental Convergence — Firestorm]
Clouds of red and orange mana swirled above the stadium. Then, the rain started. It wasn't water; it was liquid fire.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
Fireballs the size of boulders rained down on the arena. They didn't target Eren specifically; they targeted everything. It was a carpet bombing designed to end the match instantly.
"Run, kid!" someone screamed from the stands.
Eren didn't just run. He moved with a speed that shocked the crowd.
Despite his class being purely mental, despite his "Frail" status, Eren had spent years compensating. He knew he couldn't take a hit, so he had trained his body to the absolute limit of a normal human.
He sprinted toward the stone walls Lira had created. A fireball exploded three meters to his left, the shockwave sending him stumbling, but he rolled, recovering his momentum instantly.
"What is he doing?" the merchant gasped. "He's running toward the fortress?"
Eren reached the wall of earth. He didn't stop. He leaped.
Using the momentum of his sprint, he planted a foot on the rough stone surface. He ran vertically up the wall—one step, two steps, three—defying gravity with pure athletic conditioning. He grabbed the top edge of the Elemental Bastion and vaulted over it.
The crowd erupted. "He's climbing the wall! That's not a skill! That's pure muscle!"
Eren landed inside the fortress, right in the eye of the storm.
Lira's eyes widened in genuine surprise. She hadn't expected him to physically breach her defense. She raised her staff, preparing a Water Cannon to blast him back out.
"Too close!" Eren shouted, his voice cracking with desperation.
He was inside. The dust was clearing. There were no walls between them now.
Lira hesitated. She was a Saint; she didn't want to hurt him at point-blank range with A-Rank magic.
That hesitation was all Eren needed.
He didn't attack her body. He attacked her mind.
Eren's face, covered in soot and sweat, twisted into a terrifying, manic grin. His monocle shattered under the pressure of his own mana.
[Ultimate Skill: Tyrant's Decree]
Eren didn't blink. His eyes glowed with a violet light so intense it pierced through the magical aura surrounding the Saint. He poured every ounce of his Level 40 mana, every drop of his S-Rank Willpower, into a single mental command.
He didn't tell her to surrender. He didn't tell her to sleep.
He spoke one word, projecting it directly into her cerebral cortex, bypassing her magical shields entirely.
"COLLAPSE."