170 Team Battle Part 3

Looking up at the stage, Greyson let out a sigh of relief before sitting on the ground. Actually, the Tatyana's poison was pretty vicious and most of his body was starting to numb. He was also glad that Keaton used his strongest move. No real damage was done to him and the rest of the aftermath was blocked by the shield. In the end, he managed to get Keaton to waste all that mana for his last move. Smirking to himself, Greyson could imagine how frustrated the young noble probably was for wasting a move like that. Although there were still some deviations, the major points of their plan were still working and moving along...

Eris did not waste thoughts for Greyson's state and instead jumped right back into the fight. With Efren knocked out, the main target would be Keaton. Combined with Aphina's healing, she felt that she would be able to knock out Tatyana fairly easily later.

Keaton's face looked pale and dark. At first, he was still smiling maniacally over his win, but then he felt the drain on his mana and witness the protection from the stage activate. Once the acid water faded away, he could see Greyson sitting calmly outside the stage with no harm to speak of. His expression quickly distorted and slammed the whip into the ground showing his frustration. Now, even his legs felt weak, yet he did not manage to damage his opponent only removing him from the rest of the battle. In his distraction, he did not notice the approaching bloodlust coming his way.

Tatyana watched in frustration as her one group member was also eliminated and the other was distracted like an idiot. Looking towards the remaining Keaton, she felt her will to fight dropping. However, this had to do with the nobles' honor and she could not just stand and watch. Rushing over in the matter of seconds, Tatyana pulled out her rarely used dagger. Her lithe body moved with the wind and managed to redirect the powerful spear thrust to the side with her dagger. The tip of the spear only nicked Keaton's side in the end. Letting out a sigh of relief, she glared behind her and quickly snapped at her pig of a teammate.

"Will you pull yourself together? The battle is not over. Even if you do not care about losing face, I surely do not want to humiliate myself along with you." Although she does not speak much, Tatyana was not the type to mince words with others. 

"Oh? Well, I can always appreciate an intelligent and tough woman, however, I can only continue to offend." Eris winked a little flirtatiously before her expression immediately became serious. Tatyana's face changed after she felt the power behind the spear she blocked. With a strong horizontal swing, Tatyana's whole body was pushed flying by Eris's spear. Not wasting a second look, Eris swiftly went in for the kill. However, it was already too late as Keaton regained his bearings after getting scolded by Tatyana. He dodged away and rapidly retreated to create space between the two.

"...If I was to say that before I had nothing against you other than just general disdain, then now I am truly unable to look at that ugly face for much longer. It really stings the eyes. Maybe it would be more manageable if I beat you until I can no longer recognize your features?" Still keeping that same casual smile, Eris seemed to be casually joking. But if one looked closely, they could see her hand gripping the spear a little tighter. Aphina was busy recovering her energy, but even she looked up with a glare. Tatyana also looked at her own teammate with disgust. Of course, she caught the small glance he sent her way when he was speaking. 

In the Snow Country, misogyny was actually not that widely accepted. Before the Moon Empire came into power, there were still some old kingdoms who practiced more traditional inheritance. Although the law that women can also inherit had spread due to the First Emperor's decree, some of the people who descended from the past powers still held inherent disdain towards women. In the beginning, they could still make up for half the population, but, as new citizens were continually born, respecting women became the norm for those growing up. Therefore, belittling women like Keaton just did does not occur much in public. It was an easy way to create enemies. Some of the noble families in the Moon Empire were matriarchies. Let alone the fact that the Moon Empire's First Emperor deeply loved and respected his wife. His inheritor was also one of their daughters.

"Duke Mendenhall's parenting still requires a lot of work. It's shocking someone like Her Majesty could descend from him, as well. Maybe she received most of her personality from her mother." Duke Zaire commented plainly while watching the scene with humor in his eyes like he was witnessing a joke.

Trevion also shook his head and he could see Tatyana was extremely displeased. 

Why must I help this half-wit? Did he never learn that controlling your tongue is of the first and foremost importance to nobles? Even if you have those feelings, could it not wait until the match is over?! Why are you making your own teammate hate you, too? Feeling distressed, Trevion almost resented his father for getting him involved. He should have just ignored the situation. Although he did not particularly love fraternising with commoners, he did not look down on Greyson who was clearly talented and powerful. If anything, he was hoping that Greyson would gain face for the Snow Country and their team. Otherwise, he would have to resign himself to the fact that he was going to the competition to get humiliated. 

While he was stupid enough to say it, Keaton was not dull enough to not notice the change in atmosphere. Biting his lip almost imperceptibly, he already started to regret acting so impulsively. Normally, he had better control of himself...

Before he could address his own doubts, Eris once again began attacking. In his weakened state, Eris's powerful attacks kept Keaton on the defensive. At the same time, though, Eris also could not approach too carelessly due to his acid water that was constantly circulating.

This time, Tatyana did not rush over right away to help. She took a step and paused feeling conflicted. 

"Tatyana!" A warning was shouted. Looking in the direction of the voice, Tatyana made eye contact with Trevion outside the stage. She could tell what he meant right away. Taking a deep breath, she held in her personal standpoints and ran over to give assistance. Keeping an appropriate distance, she pulled out her needles and waited for the right timing. Every time she saw an opening, she would throw in a needle to cut off Eris's rhythm. As a veteran fighter, Eris was definitely able to divide her attention to dodge the needles while attacking, however it would make her weary mentally. Inwardly, she was going back and forth between continuing to attack Keaton or to try to take out Tatyana first. Just because she was slightly angered did not mean she did not know how to keep a calm head.

Contrary to expectation, Keaton was actually dodging towards Tatyana instead of away to help keep a distance. Eris looked confused for a moment before a small grin appeared on the corner of her lips.

...

"Trevion, what is that idiot doing? Does he not even understand the basics? Why is he moving towards, Taty? She is more useful in causing a disturbance from a distance than helping in close quarters." Efren was completely baffled about the current proceedings of the battle.

"I'm not sure..." Trevion also felt that this amount of stupidity was out-of-character, even for Keaton. He was arrogant, but not foolish. When it came to fighting, he was not that useless. He thought for a moment before realizing that everyone forgot about a participant.

"Princess Aphina..." He muttered while looking at the girl who was still recovering without participating. Although he could not prove it, he felt that there was something going on and the cause was her. After all, she was the one fighting with Keaton for a while earlier. Everyone else did not make contact until later. 

"Your Grace, has Aphina learned the Moon Empress's - " Trevion began to ask.

"Yes, it's as you thought." Zaire interrupted and seemingly gave a warning glance. It was already against the rules for Trevion to try to influence the battle earlier after being defeated, but he let it slide as he only said one word. However, if he tried to ruin things again from the sidelines, then the Duke surely would not let it slide.

"..." Not speaking any more, Trevion just looked down with no one able to see his thoughts.

...

Back on stage, Tatyana's expression grew ugly as she kept backing away to create space.

"Keaton! What are you doing?!" She scolded angrily. However, Keaton just looked back seemingly without comprehending her. No matter what she said or how she ran away, he would keep closing the distance with her.

Eris obviously had no plans to continue this game of cat-and-mouse, so she started attacking more aggressively as Tatyana's needles stopped coming as frequently. Feeling the pressure, Keaton started to frown and moved even faster towards Tatyana. Without warning, he swung his whip and wrapped it around Tatyana's foot. Since it was too sudden, she had no way of dodging. Keaton yanked her body right in front of his. Eris was not able to stop attacking in time and accidentally stabbed the shocked Tatyana. Both girls stared in disbelief for a moment. It was in the moment where time seemed to slow that Keaton went all out with another attack and sent both of the girls straight off the stage.

There was overwhelming silence. The other nobles looked towards Keaton as if they could no longer understand what their eyes were seeing. Who are we? Where is this? What is reality? Greyson, Braiden, Aphina, Eris, Zaire, and Trevion were shocked for a moment before regaining their calm. Especially, Greyson's group looked on with joy and schadenfreude. 

"HAHAHAHA! How is it? You ended up knocking yourself out and injuring your teammate! It seems the final winner is still me! Do you now know your place? I couldn't believe how easily you let me approach Aphina. Are you sure you are a genius like the rumors say? I would lean towards thinking that you are barely passing for average intelligence." Keaton's face looked incomparably joyful as he looked over to where Eris was standing. 

"And you, commoner, do you see the difference between us now?" Keaton looked towards Greyson. "You have lost!"

It was only at this moment that the others' souls returned and started to figure out what was happening.

"Water Illusion Magic... the mist element..." Efren spoke to himself. 

"She has a similar talent as the Moon Empress?!" Cherell and Colin both spoke at the same time. 

They all grimaced while watching Aphina approach Keaton calmly from behind. Even with the tears in her clothes, she looked graceful with bearing that matched her status as a princess. Keaton seemed to be completely oblivious as he kept going on and on feeling happy with himself. Only when she was a couple feet away did Aphina raise the wooden staff in her hands. Winding up slowly, she made a brutal swing straight towards Keaton's head. The others winced and looked away knowing exactly what was in store for the Mendenhall heir. 

A loud, dull thud echoed as Keaton screamed out.

"Who's there? Which motherf***er sneak attacked me? Don't you know the common etiquette in battle?" He kept yelling while looking around in confusion.

Aphina completely ignored him and stomped hard right between his legs. She kept kicking a few more times on his face to feel refreshed.

"Alright, that's enough. Release the spell, Aphina." At this time, the Duke had to speak up and stop this one-sided beating. However, he could not control the small smirk peeking out the corner of his lips. Greyson and Braiden were also holding their mouths and struggling to keep the laughter in. Unlike them, Eris did not show any reservations and started laughing so hard she started to tear up. 

Shrugging, Aphina made sure to kick Keaton off the stage before releasing the spell. If one looking closely, an almost clear fog seemed to clear within Keaton's eyes. It was only now that he looked up with his bruised face in confusion. He saw himself on the ground and Aphina on the stage. 

"Was it you, then? You attacked me, you b*tch?!" He yelled before pausing and staring at Aphina's torso. Was she not stabbed just a moment ago? How was she perfectly fine now? He glanced over at Eris, only to see Tatyana next to her receiving first aid from the healers standing by. 

"Stop embarrassing yourself, Keaton. Aphina used Her Majesty, the Moon Empress's magic spells. You should know what she specialized in."

"Illusions..." Keaton just stared out into space not completely processing everything.

The Moon Empress that everyone kept mentioning was the First Emperor's successor. She was the first ruling Empress, Hestia Yce. Hestia was born with a unique talent in using mist which, like ice, was a variation of water. She was extremely talented and intelligent from a young age. The First Emperor used a lot of money and connections to help her buy rare mist spells and as she grew more powerful she started to make some spells of her own. Making spells was extremely difficult and did not depend on power, but on intelligence and the ability to connect with the element spirits well. They were not powerful attack or defense spells, but instead intricate illusion spells that frightened the Empress's opponents. Legend was that she only needed to meet a person's eyes to throw them into endless illusions. During training, Aphina had told her team about recently learning the spells because she has a similar talent. However, she needed time, extended contact with the opponent, and even needed them to be psychologically susceptible. Therefore, her talent was still normally useless until she can train more. This time, they decided that they would use it against Keaton because he was the easiest to influence. Although it was not expected to be the cause for them to win, it was still a rather fun way to get back at Keaton for his arrogance. After all, he was beaten out of the ring by a healer magician!

Aphina did not pay attention to Keaton's feelings and quickly ran over to Greyson and her brother. Jumping up to hug them, she giggled happily.

"We won!" She shouted.