Bad Luck

Sonia was competing in a match. It was not the Shooting Star Tribulation, however, but the Star Palace Tribulation—a five-person team tournament between schools. The positions were divided into vanguard, forward, center, second seat, and chief seat, with each contestant appearing only once. The order of competitors had to be submitted before the league began and could not be altered midway through. To prevent unfair matchups like pitting superior horses against inferior ones that harmed sportsmanship and spectator appeal, the Star Palace Tribulation did not simply tally win-loss records. The bouts were worth one, two, three, four, and five points respectively. Thus, even if a team lost all three opening matches, the second seat and chief seat's four plus five—nine points in total—were enough to reverse the situation. This required schools to arrange their contenders in order from weakest to strongest, or else risk being overturned. Since each bout was an individual duel, factional counters were particularly pronounced. With bad luck, a fire sorcerer could genuinely end up getting thoroughly dismantled by a water sorcerer. Therefore, although Sonia had fought as the chief seat during the exhibition matches, in the official tournament, she could only take the third slot as the center. The second seat went to her acquaintance, Senior Leonie, while the chief seat was a fourth-year student once hailed as the Sword Grass, Negs Balfour. Like Sonia and Leonie, Negs was the student of a Sanctuary Sorcerer—specifically, "Storm Singer" Valentin. His relative obscurity at Sword Flower University over the past year was because he had been adventuring in the third and fourth layers of the Abyss all that time. If not for the Intercollegiate League, he certainly would not have returned to the surface—a battle mage through and through. It was only natural that Negs was the chief seat for the Star Palace Tribulation. He had stepped onto the Time Continent back in his third year, spent a year and a half fully condensing his Golden Wings, and possessed extensive Abyssal adventuring experience. In terms of both seniority and combat prowess, Sonia could not compare to him at all. Rumor had it that Negs had already been reserved by the royal Starflick Guard; upon graduation, he would become a Sword Baron—the lowest rank in the House of Nobles, the entry point into the Star country's ruling class, and truly a future of boundless prospects. As for whether Sonia or Leonie should take the second seat, Professor Trozan had mentioned that the university administration had debated it. Both had become Two Wings sorcerers around the same time, and Sonia had even defeated Leonie head-on, but in the end, they chose the safer option in Leonie. After all, roster orders could not be changed in the Star Palace Tribulation. If one ran into a bad matchup, there was virtually no way to fight back. While Sonia was indeed stronger, Leonie had three years of experience as a sorcerer, far more seasoned combat sense, and a much more complete sorcery spirit system. The probability of her being countered by an opponent was therefore lower. To name just one example, even now Sonia had no good way of dealing with gun sorcerers, whereas Leonie was an outlier—known as the Orange Dancer, she could use sheer speed to dodge the targeting of gun sorcerers. Or rather, through speed alone, she could hold her own against the vast majority of sorcerers. Sonia had simply been a sorcerer for too short a time, and her excursions in the Void Realm were far too comfortable. After all, she only had to hone her burst damage while the Observer and the Witch handled everything else. Developing weaknesses was unavoidable. In the free-for-all of the Shooting Star Tribulation, she could still rely on her combat genius to seize opportunities, but in one-on-one sorcery duels, her shortcomings would be amplified exponentially. Sword Flower's decision not to choose her for the second seat was reasonable. In this year's Star Palace Tribulation, apart from the vanguard being a Silver Sorcerer, all of Sword Flower's representatives were Gold Sorcerers, making this Sword Flower's best roster in five years. Even so, anyone could see that although Sword Flower University had good faculty and high rankings, its rate of producing elite talent lagged far behind peers of the same tier; for a Star Palace Tribulation, they could not even assemble five Two Wings sorcerers. The reason was that Sword Flower University was the top fallback choice for wealthy merchants and noble scions who could not get into Truth University. Put simply, the student intake was too poor. It was not that the students lacked talent, but rather that their college lives were filled to the brim with balls, social networking, and entertainment; they had no energy left to study sorcery. In Sonia's former dormitory, a student like Ingrid, who practiced swordsmanship with single-minded devotion, was the odd one out. When Sonia originally chose Sword Flower University, she had also done so for its geographic and social advantage of easily mingling with noble offspring. Over the past five years, Sword Flower had not even managed to reach the top sixteen in the Star Palace Tribulation. That they could charge into the quarterfinals this year was entirely thanks to the sudden rise of Sonia and Leonie. Setting aside Sonia the anomaly, Leonie had swiftly elevated her sorcery spirit system to the Two Wings tier upon reaching the Time Continent, and with her rhythm swordsmanship hitting its power spike during the Gold stage, her combat prowess instantly eclipsed the fourth-years of other universities. With this lineup, Sword Flower University could go toe-to-toe with other academies. It did not matter if the vanguard and forward lost; the remaining three bouts could almost certainly be won back. Securing a spot in the top four and contending for second was no pipe dream. Yet when the draw results came out, all of Sword Flower fell silent. Boom! As the crescent of crimson sword light fell, the thick concrete wall shattered with a roar. The green-haired young man hiding inside immediately threw up his hands. "I surrender." "Sigh, just my bad luck," he lamented. "If it had been the Orange Dancer or the Water Walker, I definitely would've won. Out of everyone, I had to run into the Red-Haired Sword Princess... I'm actually the only one who lost. They're going to mock me for ages back home..." Though blunt, Sonia knew he was telling the truth. As a sorcerer dual-cultivating earth and wood arts, he not only possessed the earth defense miracle Concrete, sturdy enough to withstand gunfire, but also commanded an exceptionally potent Senluo miracle: Spirit-Draining Vines! The entire arena was covered in Spirit-Draining Vines right now. Its effect was simple: seize the sorcery power of other sorcerers and turn it to its own use! In his earlier fights, he had worn down every opponent with this combination of Spirit-Draining Vines and Concrete! Worst of all, the Spirit-Draining Vines were not weak to fire, but rather to corrosive sorceries like poison and dark. It was exceedingly rare for him to face a direct counter! Had it been Leonie or Negs, they might well have been ground down by him; the defensive power of his Concrete wall was utterly terrifying. Unfortunately for him, his opponent was Sonia, whose burst damage was unmatched. Once Sonia smashed through his defenses with three consecutive strikes of Blood Moon Shatters Lake, all he could do was bow out gracefully. Cheers rang out from the stands, but they were far from enthusiastic. When Sonia returned to the bench, the rest of the team showed little joy either; only Professor Trozan and Leonie gave her a nod. She walked over and patted Leonie's shoulder. "Senior, want to go have a drink when we head back later?" "No. You used to turn down my invitations because you were rushing off to the Void Realm, so tonight I'm using that same excuse to turn yours down." Leonie stood up with a grin. "After this match, I'll definitely be bursting with motivation for the Void Realm. Thank you, junior—at least you kept us from losing too embarrassingly." The village girl watched her senior walk out onto the arena. The announcer's voice rang out: "Next is the Second Seat Bout! Sword Flower University's Leonie Victor versus—" "—Truth University's Aisha Martz!" Sword Flower University's quarterfinal opponent in the Star Palace Tribulation was Truth University! The pinnacle of all universities, a nightmare that had dominated the Intercollegiate League for decades! No matter how indignant Sword Flower felt about the draw, there was nothing to be done. Some school had to get crushed by Truth University; why not them? The vanguard and forward bouts had been practically instantaneous defeats. Even though Sonia had pulled one game back, no one believed Sword Flower stood a chance. Truth University's second seat and chief seat were despair-inducingly powerful. On the arena floor, Aisha called out to Leonie from afar: "Pleasure to meet you. I've long wanted to see the Rhythm Sword Saint's signature technique, Rhythm Melody. I hear Rhythm Melody requires three strikes to unleash its full burst?" "That's right." "Then I'll let you strike three times. I hope you won't disappoint me." Faced with such slighting words from Aisha, Leonie merely nodded gravely. "I won't disappoint you." "Very good." Aisha smiled, raising a shield with her left hand and drawing a handgun with her right. As the announcer called out "Begin," Leonie vanished in a flash, leaving only the faintest blur of orange flitting by. Aisha, however, remained leisurely in place. Not only did she refrain from casting any defensive miracles, she even daydreamed, gazing up at tonight's starry sky. Clang! Aisha suddenly slapped her shield backward, catching Leonie's strike just in time. Thwarted on her first hit, Leonie did not retreat, instead swiftly shifting angles to attack from the flank— Slash! Though there was no time to swing the shield, Aisha shifted her body outward with light grace, cleanly dodging Leonie's slash as the longsword merely sheared away the tips of Aisha's hair! Leonie vanished again. After a momentary reset, the third strike of Rhythm Melody plummeted from above, golden sword light crashing down like a falling meteor! Clang! Aisha's block rang out with ear-piercing sharpness. Not only was she completely unharmed, but Leonie was sent flying, tumbling across the ground several times. The Orange Dancer tried to stand, but her legs buckled beneath her and she dropped to her knees, coughing twice and spitting up bloody froth. When Leonie looked up, she saw Aisha aiming the gun straight at her head. She gave a bitter laugh. "I lose." In the stands, there were neither cheers nor jeers, only a matter-of-fact silence. Aisha: an expert in the prophecy faction and the shield defense faction. Shields were actually quite common among sorcerers. Almost everyone condensed a shield in their early days in the Void Realm, which could at least block a strike from a Fishcleaver Dragon. However, the shield defense faction was exceptionally niche. Because its primary focus was defense, and other factions could achieve defensive results through miracles anyway, there was little demand for shield defense. The greatest advantage of shield defense lay in its miracles of perfect block and perfect parry—meaning that with precise timing, one could completely nullify an enemy's attack or even deflect it right back. Yet mastering this timing was extraordinarily arduous. The window was a fleeting split second, and opponents followed no set routine, every strike presenting a brand-new pattern. Normal shield sorcerers could manage standard blocks and standard parries at best, which were inferior to other defensive miracles, making shield defense's obscurity inevitable. Yet Aisha, the Undefeated Star, showed everyone the terrifying power shield defense could unleash once paired with the prophecy faction. Fire, water, wind, earth, sword, gun, tonfa, unarmed combat... She could perfectly block any attack. Since her debut, let alone losing, she had not suffered a single injury! Furthermore, whenever an opponent launched a heavy blow, she would use a perfect parry, reflecting the attack in its entirety right back at them and even stunning them! It was precisely because the third strike of Leonie's Rhythm Melody had been perfectly parried that Leonie absorbed one hundred percent of the miracle's might herself. Even without Aisha pointing a gun at her, she had no strength left to fight! Of course, Aisha was not invincible. For instance, Sonia's previous opponent, with his combination of Concrete and Spirit-Draining Vines for defense and wide-area control, seemed like he could easily grind Aisha down. But that was where her handgun came in—not an ordinary standard-issue handgun, but a Starcast Type 85 Tool Spirit Firearm. It required sorcery power to activate, and its power scaled with the amount injected. Because it did not seal miracles within and required the sorcerer to expend their own sorcery power, the Intercollegiate League permitted such items. The handgun naturally could not rival the destructive power of a dedicated gun sorcerer, but if Aisha channeled all her golden sorcery power into a single bullet, punching a hole through a Concrete wall was no problem. And while that hole would quickly mend itself, and while dodging it would render it harmless, the real question was: who could guarantee dodging an attack from a prophecy sorcerer? If you did not attack her, she would blast you to pieces with her gun; if you did attack her, she would deflect you to death. Fortunately, Aisha struggled in chaotic multiplayer brawls; otherwise, she would surely have torn through the Shooting Star Tribulation! Watching Leonie carried off for medical treatment, Sonia turned her attention back to the ring. Compared to the prophecy sorcerer Aisha, the upcoming match was the one Sonia cared about most. Because both sorcerers facing each other were quarterfinalists in the Shooting Star Tribulation! If Sonia wanted to claim a shooting star, she would inevitably have to fight them sooner or later! "Next is the much-anticipated Chief Bout! Sword Flower University's Negs Balfour versus—" "—Truth University's Dimi Vosloda!"