He allowed himself to smile slightly as he saw an expression of surprise and shock on Lars' face as his body froze in the last split second before he was struck!

Obviously he did not have any chance to react even with his new powering up!

'Hmmph... Seems I thought too highly of him... Even if you have sealed your powers to prevent yourself from advancing... A fresh level up like that doesn't mean you can control those powers!'

However, the moment he was about to punch out, his expression grew stiff - and he pa.s.sed right through Lars body ineffectually!

'An illusion?!? Sh*t!'

Darius urgently resisted his blazing fast forward motion and slammed his feet into the ground to stop himself from flying straight off the stage. His feet cracked open the surface of the strengthened stone ground and he embedded his legs into the ground in an emergency brake - but he still failed to stop his upper body from hurtling forward, and ended up somersaulting forward a few times before he landed at the edge of the arena!

The moment he could muster his control and strength again, he dextrously pushed his arms against the ground and forcibly launched himself back into the air to avoid the array of flaming bolts bombarding him from behind.

A flood of blazing bolts threatening to swallow him up without leaving even ashes behind - the Level 3 spell, Flame Arrow!

Despite just moving from the Adept realm to the peak of the Elite level, Lars' newly released powers gave him far more options to choose from in his spells as he could now reliably use Level 3 spells.

He immediately put these to use as he unleashed a blazing repertoire of higher levelled and more potent offensive spells; a simple Lesser Invisibility that cloaked the caster until he acted offensively along with a Minor Illusion spell to mislead his hasty opponent!

Followed by his offence - one of the most efficient single-target magics - Flame Arrow!

As fast as Darius was, there was no way that he could completely elude the barrage of projectiles. Lars clearly had predicted his most likely dodging path and had limited his options, leaving him with either the choice of getting hit by 10 arrows and knocked out of the ring, or getting hit by 3-4 flame arrows and depleting his energy for defence!

Hence he could only steel his resolve and roar out with divine power to negate the fiery bolts!

"BREAK!!!" Rippling sound waves slammed into the Level 3: Flame Arrows that were launched at Darius and the projectiles seemed to freeze, suspended in mid-air before they wavered and started to dissipate into useless embers as they dropped out of the air.

The rest of the flame arrows similarly hit the protective s.h.i.+eld around the arena in bursts of fire before dissipating.

Lars watched as this happened, observing and preparing his next strategy - the result was pretty much as he expected.

What he DIDN'T expect, however, was that Darius' sonic burst this time was not a wide-area attack but a focused beam of sound - headed straight for him even as he stood 20 metres away!

Though he realised what was happening very early, his limited cultivation prevented him from responding to neutralise the sound waves - he could barely react at all!

With the scant time he had, Lars raised his arms and hurriedly used his mana to violently vibrate the air in front of him; using his impossibly fast mind to calculate just the right vibrations to create destructive interference and superposit the shockwave[1], aiming to create a wall of noise-cancelling vibrations and counter the divine roar!

But it was too slow and too little!

The first fifth of the sound attack was consumed by the Flame Arrows in order to block the high-velocity missiles.

The second fifth petered out as it had to travel through the air resistance for the entire 20 metres distance between the two boys.

And the third portion of the sound attack collided with the wall of negating vibrations and was dispelled.

Leaving a remaining 40% of the soundwaves to engulf Lars, causing his brain to shake in his skull, the synovial fluids in his cranium to vibrate violently and his vision to swim, turning black!

'Gotta... Pull through... Without... Releasing any more seals!!! BREAK!!!'

Lars struggled through the pain and disorientation as his highly developed mind and psyche pulled off an unimaginable move to even other Myth-realm experts - he channelled counter-vibrations within his every cell, blood vessel and even in the fluids of his body and alleviated the shockwave of sound, relieving his body of the pressure it was under!

And though at first the sonic scream threatened to rupture his eardrums and blood vessels, it was just for a brief half-second before he regained a state of clarity and calmness.

And after the one-second-long attack had finished, a confident albeit shaken-up Lars opened his lucid eyes and readied his next demonstration of spells even before Darius could even land!

Nevertheless, Lars still coughed out a thin stream of blood that trickled down the corner of his mouth as he pushed his body to its limits in order to win this battle.

"Magic Missile! Magic Missile! Magic Missile! 10x Magic Missile!!!"

Darius at first was prepared to raise his arms to block the onslaught of weak but numerous spells, but was even more dismayed when he realised that the target was not his descending body but...

The ground where he was about to land!

"WTF!!! This tactic again??? Blowing up public property just to win?!? How dirty can you be!!!" Darius cursed as he helplessly watched Lars fired an endless stream of spells to bombard the arena grounds on his side of the ring, just like he had earlier when Darius' eyes were covered to unbalance him.

"So??? Sue me! It's not against the rules, right...?! Magic Missile Magic Missile Magic Missile!!" Lars retorted bitingly as he continued to lay waste to the ground beneath Darius to unsettle his footing and control his opponent.

The first step in battle - once you know your enemy, take control, take over, take the initiative and you will grasp victory!

"b.a.s.t.a.r.d!!!" Darius sucked in a deep breath as he entered the rising cloud of dust and stone shrapnels, preparing himself to land solidly however poor the footing was underfoot. He also focused his divine

power and mana into a fusion divine-magical s.h.i.+eld in front of himself, one that crackled with G.o.dly blue lightning.

But to his shock, as he pa.s.sed through the mist of dust and stone fragments, he didn't land on solid ground at all...

*BOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!*

He was blown straight into the sky once more and out of the ring!

"Goodbye!!! Bon voyage!!! Sayonara, buddy!!! Unless you can fly, it's game over--Huh??" Lars smiled from ear to ear as he bid farewell to his supremely talented foe, looking relieved that the fight was over... Until his face turned taut as he saw Darius stop unnaturally mid-air, mid-flight!

And as he suddenly halted mid-air, the G.o.d's descendant looked grim and wrathful, as if he had been shamed greatly not by greater power or talent, but by more slick skills and control - cancelling out his entire abilities, power and speed advantage!

Due to the way the rules were crafted, Darius was still not out of the fight; no, he was still not considered as having lost until he hit the ground!

He cast a heavy gaze upon Lars as he spoke through gritted teeth.

"Lars... You... Have proven yourself a formidable opponent... One who I truly cannot look down upon, not one bit! Even with your far weaker capabilities... You've managed to make a fool of I, the G.o.d-blooded son of heaven who has every advantage!"

He ground his teeth together, unable to bear the humiliation of playing right into Lars' hands and being manipulated like a puppet on strings...!

And most of all, he cursed at the fact that he was forced to utilise his final trump card before even the Grand Finals!

Then his eyes narrowed in determination as he exclaimed, "But no more! I will finish it now! Consider it your honour to force my hand and use my final move..."

"G.o.d'S WRATH!! BLUE LIGHTNING DEVASTATION!!!"

In a flash of vision-enveloping blue radiance, an electrified cloud of sky-rending lightning bolts covered the entire ring as Darius' body disappeared and was replaced by a streaking lightning bolt that zapped straight at Lars!

And this time, Darius used the cloud of lightning to scout out ahead of his torpedoing body - he had already confirmed that there was no illusion, no deception, no light-bending effect. This was the real Lars he had locked on to, there was no escaping this time!

With his physics-defying breakneck speed, the audience did not even have the chance to cry out in awe, alarm or appreciation of his Grandmaster-cla.s.s powers that broke past the sound barrier with speed that could not be seen by the naked eye!

Only Vignis, Yusof and the other advanced cultivators could follow his movements, and even they were greatly astonished at the incredible level-crossing power shown by him! The various n.o.bles and powerhouses gathered shot to their feet or even nearly fell off their seats as Darius' move shocked them all!

It was simply too heaven-defying, too powerful... Too great, just too great!

A mere peak Elite cultivator with the power to defeat perhaps even peak Grandmaster fighters...? Ludicrous, impossible!

Yet it was happening right before their eyes, and the watchers could only sympathise for the poor boy Lars.

It was not a matter of being talented alone... Just as important were one's innate physique, bloodline, resources... And their luck!

Luck to not be born in the same generation as the transcendent geniuses like Darius!

In the short moments before the fight would end, the spectators collectively sighed both in appreciation of Darius' glorious future ahead and in pity towards Lars...

The person in mention, Lars, on the other hand, looked on calmly, smiling as if he had not a care in the world as he faced certain defeat and a crippling injury under Darius' finis.h.i.+ng move.

And just as Darius was certain he would smash the boy into a b.l.o.o.d.y pulp, Lars disappeared!

"IMPOSSIBLE!!!!!" Darius could only roar in disbelief as he once more pa.s.sed right through thin air before hitting the ground behind where Lars was standing in an explosion of stone and dirt.

And Lars popped out from the hole in the ground underneath him that he had formed earlier, his two hands blazing with orange-red flames - ready to blow an exhausted Darius out of the ring!

But Darius did not despair. Instead, he smiled as he thought, 'It's too bad... I win!'

...As the sonic boom that raced after him slammed into an unsuspecting Lars' back, arising as a product of his super-sonic speed - the second, sure-kill follow-up attack to end it all...!

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[1] Sound waves, vibrations and interference: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-physics/chapter/interactions-with-sound-waves/