Merlin was still in his thoughts, beating himself up for not realizing sooner the retionship between Professor Dmitri and Nikoi, when Nikoi grabbed his arm. His attention drew back to the boy who was now feigning a smile as he lifted himself to his feet.

  “Thank you,” Nikoi said, one arm still around his stomach. “That was a good fight. I learnt a lot. You’re really strong.”

  Merlin was lost as to what to reply to that statement with, so he simply nodded as he watched Nikoi take his leave from the stage, his head slightly lowered.

  I really need to work on my social skills…

  His current train of thoughts was forced to take back stage in his mind when he saw Choi Sangook approaching with a grin on his face. The bastard already had his Grimoire floating before he had even gotten into the arena. Merlin wondered if the d was so eager to fight him because of the bad blood that had erupted between them, or if there was something else he had missed.

  At the end of the day, though, it didn’t matter. He was not pnning to lose, especially not to someone like Choi Sangook.

  “Who do you think will win?” a spectating student asked as Choi Sangook walked into the arena. “I know Nikoi’s a D-Css Mage, but Merlin had still toyed with him. Doesn’t that mean he’s like at the level of a C-Css Mage?”

  “Can a C-Css Mage fight C-Rank Ice Wyverns alone?” another replied. “I’d say he’s a bit stronger. Maybe B-Css. Which would honestly be absurd, considering he’s a Deficient Mage.”

  One snorted. “B-Css, my foot. There’s no way a Deficient Mage is on par with a B-Css Mage. You’re just giving him undeserved credit. A Deficient Mage is a Deficient Mage, anti-magic or not.”

  Merlin’s lips twitched. Some people would never see him as more than trash no matter what he did, it seemed. He sighed. He didn’t care what that person thought, though. They could despise him for all he cared, he had more lofty goals than receiving acknowledgements from teenagers.

  “Then why didn’t you put your hand up?” Park Yuri asked, her question directed at the boy who had taken it upon himself to undermine Merlin’s achievements. Merlin’s attention was drawn to her with his brows arched. “I’d gdly trade my spot for you if you want to test the ‘Deficient Mage’s’ range of abilities. You’d like that, won’t you?”

  The d grimaced. He gred at Park Yuri, but he dared not say anything sensitive to her. He knew who she was—everyone knew. A single say from her could stop him from getting into a guild that was amongst the top five guilds in South Korea—if he got to the point where he was shortlisted, that was.

  Keeping his mouth shut on her interference was the best course of action.

  He scoffed and turned back to the stage with his arms folded. “Heh… There’s no need for me to fight him. If he’s on par with a B-Css Mage, then we’ll find that out soon enough. Sangook’s an A-Css Mage. A B-Css Mage should be able to hold his ground for at least a while, right?”

  “Isn’t he just scared of fighting him?” one scoffed, and the boy reddened.

  Merlin, on the other hand, was taken aback that Park Yuri had sort of come to his aid. But he recalled that she had been that sort of way with Kim Yiseo as well.

  Well, of course he and Kim Yiseo differed in more ways than one, a few none other than the fact that she was roommates with Park Yuri and the daughter of a well renowned individual. However, it seemed Park Yuri was just that type of character.

  Not all golden spoons are bad, huh? Merlin recalled Chima’s statement to Lee Jaehyun and smiled.

  “Don’t focus on them, Deficient Mage,” Choi Sangook said, making Merlin’s smile rather short-lived. He pointed a finger at Merlin and back at himself, his lips still pushed to the side. “Eyes on me.”

  Merlin sighed. If only the d could be as peaceful as the rest of his peers.

  “Don’t worry, Choi Sangook,” Merlin replied, channeling his mana to his fingertips immediately. “My eyes are on you.”

  Choi Sangook tilted his head as he perused Merlin, words dancing at the tip of his tongue. But he didn’t get the chance to let them loose, as Professor Dmitri instantly signaled for them to start.

  “Begin!”

  The curiosity on Choi Sangook’s face made way for something akin to mad ecstasy. The air around him bubbled, and instantly the arena turned cold—far too cold. Merlin clenched his chin. It was almost like winter had come.

  “I’m freezing!” the rest of the students cried out, rubbing their arms together. But Choi Sangook didn’t spare them even a whiff of his attention.

  However, the cold paled in comparison to what Merlin had felt against the Ice Wyverns. He was not going to delude himself that this was the full extent of Choi Sangook’s abilities, and that was why he was going to end things before the boy could do anything else.

  “Do you know what I thought after I watched that video of yours against the Ice Wyverns? Ah… That was what happened to my magic,” said Choi Sangook as frozen white petals manifested out of thin air like raindrops. Merlin recalled the spell. It was the same one that had rid him of almost all his body heat. Choi Sangook’s smile widened. “You’re the perfect dummy for me to practice on, Deficient Mage! And I’m going to milk every ounce of that anti-magic out of you!”

  Merlin chuckled and clenched his fists, reddening his mana slightly with his body heat, as he took his stance, his feet shoulder width apart. “Funny. I thought the same.”

  “Fantastic!” Choi Sangook ughed, stretched forth a hand in Merlin’s direction, and the snow fkes he had conjured flew forward at a frightening pace.

  Merlin activated [Fsh Step] and dashed forward, heading straight for the barrage. There was no time to dawdle. This match was where his points would come from, and he had to win.

  He danced around Choi Sangook’s spell, but they kept coming and coming. Whenever his speed wasn’t enough to get past, he would strike the air in front of him in quick succession, causing it to burn with an ethereal heat that vaporized Choi Sangook’s spell.

  “Woah! That’s anti-magic?!” the crowd excimed. “It’s superb.”

  “I wonder if its form changes for every spell. It feels like he’s burning the air itself now so that Choi Sangook’s spell doesn’t make it through.”

  Merlin appreciated the dissecting of his abilities, but they were distracting and so he tuned out the ramblings from his head.

  On the other hand, he was finding it rather hard to get past the shield of snowfkes Choi Sangook had put up around himself, while sending the rest to attack. He had tried just bulldozing his way through, but when a snowfke made contact with him, it froze upon impact and reduced the body heat he was trying so hard to generate with his movements. Not only that, it burned.

  Merlin gritted his teeth as he pounced back, nimbly moving in a zig-zag manner to avoid the stream of snowfkes that rushed at him like petals of flowers carried in a torrent. He disliked Choi Sangook, but his fight with the boy was showing him what he really loved about Mages. They could stay a safe distance away and just cast their spells. In other words, they were the peak form of attacking and defending.

  However, every defense could be broken. And, so far, Merlin hadn’t gotten any inclination from Choi Sangook that he was the kind of Mage Chima was—a Mage who could switch between ranged attacks and melee attacks.

  It’s going to be risky, but the only way I’ll be able to nd an attack on him is if I rush in despite his attacks. I should be able to do it, but I wonder if that’ll count as a critical hit for him to Professor Dmitri… Tsk… It doesn’t matter. No hesitance. Build that into your mindset now.

  However, for what he wanted to do…[Fsh Step] wouldn’t be enough.

  Merlin swerved out of the way, avoiding a torrent of snowfkes, and immediately activated his second Bookmark: [Mana Spring].

  He channeled mana to his feet, blue unlike the one wrapping his hands, and formed a spring. Choi Sangook smiled, and he too smiled. It was contagious.

  “I thought you were going to keep dancing around. It would have been disappointing!” Choi Sangook bellowed. “What do you have in store for me?! Entertain me, Deficient Mage!”

  The d was out of his mind. Merlin, although, didn’t care. He put pressure on his heels, and pushed himself forward. The mana spring releasing caused him to burst forward in a blur. Choi Sangook reacted by immediately putting a wall of snowfkes before himself. Merlin didn’t derail from his path. He jumped straight into Choi Sangook’s defense. His body creaked, burned with a stinging sensation that almost completely numbed him. But he didn’t stop. Instead, he increased the output of his body heat and pushed through.

  Choi Sangook’s smile vanished as Merlin bobbed up before him. However, the boy was still unfazed. After all, it came back immediately, this time, even wider.

  Merlin didn’t let that stop him. He tightened his fist, ready to deliver a solid blow to Choi Sangook’s midsection when something suddenly felt strange, his perception reacting wildly.

  “Jackpot…” Choi Sangook muttered.

  Merlin narrowed his brows as the floor beneath him turned even far colder than it already was. He clenched his chin, immediately halted his dash, and, with [Fsh Step], jumped back like an invisible force had reached in and pulled him away by the colr.

  But he was not left unscathed. He nded on one knee a considerable distance away, breathing out cold air from his lungs.

  He gnced at his left foot and found it frozen just at its toes. Had he not pulled himself back quickly, he would have been completely frozen right then and there.

  Had the bastard been pnning to kill him?

  Merlin looked towards Choi Sangook amidst the murmurs of the crowd and found two swirling tornadoes of ice at his sides. Those things were dangerous. His current mode of action would be unable to destroy them. Unless, he used Reader Mage in its completeness. But for that he would need a couple of seconds, maybe even half a minute considering the pressure he could feel coming from Choi Sangook’s spells.

  The boy was not as strong or threatening as the Ice Wyverns, but there was a difference between the conditions of battle. Merlin had had a wider space to exploit while battling the Ice Wyverns. And, unlike the beasts, which he could cssify as parochial, humans were quite creative with their abilities. Just now, Choi Sangook had lured him in just to deliver that attack. Had he not had a good enough level in his Perception and reaction speed, he would have lost.

  Then… How could he defeat the boy? Merlin’s eyes fyed around the scenery, rundown with ice as it was, and it only took a moment for him to figure out how he could win.

  He grabbed his feet, broke off the ice that had frozen his toes by channeling his mana into it, and stood up.

  “You’re fun, Deficient Mage,” Choi Sangook crooned. “Let’s keep going!”

  Merlin took a deep breath and sighed. Then he stopped channeling his mana, surprising everyone, including his opponent, as he took a simple stance unenhanced by anything magical.

  Choi Sangook’s forehead creased. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Merlin raised a brow. “I didn’t take you for someone concerned about my wellbeing. Are you going to fight or chat? We don’t have the time.”

  Choi Sangook tilted his head slightly. “It would be sad if I broke my toy so quickly. But if that's what it takes to beat even a modicum of survival instinct into you, then I’ll gdly break you three times over. Come at me.”

  “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

  Merlin fshed forward. Choi Sangook’s tornadoes danced around the arena, swirling violently as they rushed towards Merlin.

  However, Merlin had no intention to engage the boy’s magic head on. He activated [Fsh Step] and exploited the small gaps they had between them, bringing himself before Choi Sangook. The boy smiled in his face as another tornado erupted from the floor. Merlin nimbly swerved out of the way, well prepared for that attempt, and went round Choi Sangook to his back.

  “You’re predictable, Deficient Mage,” Choi Sangook noted smugly as another tornado fred-up behind him. Merlin, however, was nowhere to be found by then. Choi Sangook’s brows narrowed, caught by surprise.

  “Predictable?” Merlin’s voice came from above. He had propelled himself upward using [Mana Spring]. “Am I?”

  Choi Sangook’s breath caught in his throat as he noticed what Merlin’s pn was. After all, far away from the scene of the fight, was a certain Grimoire floating overhead, and Merlin was just beside it. He clenched his chin and gathered as much of his tornado as he could into one singur hurricane.

  “You darn Deficient Mage!”

  It was a race. What would hit first? Merlin’s mana-cloaked fist to Choi Sangook’s Grimoire, or Choi Sangook’s ice hurricane to Merlin?

  The answer had never been in doubt.

  Merlin tightened his fist, angled his body in the air, and struck the dark-red ancient-looking book with all his might, sending it crashing into the ice hurricane that was heading his way. The Grimoire ruptured, and Choi Sangook’s spell vanished like the st traces of morning mist.

  Choi Sangook’s eyes widened in disbelief where he stood, visibly processing what had just happened and what the next action he could take was.

  Merlin, unlike the boy, had long made his decision.

  He fshed into view behind Choi Sangook, swept the boy off his feet and caught him by his arm just before his back could reach the floor.

  “Anything can happen to your Grimoire within a Dungeon,” said Merlin. “I believe those were Professor Jung’s words. Next time, think quickly. Monsters won’t wait for you to rein in your thoughts.”

  Choi Sangook’s nose fred and quivered. Merlin let go of his arm then, dropping him to the floor.

  “I guess this counts as a critical hit, doesn’t it, Professor Dmitri?” Merlin asked.

  Professor Dmitri took a second to survey the scene, then tapped on his smartwatch. “The second duel has ended. Winner: Merlin Tyrrell. Cohort points assigned, ten. Academic points assigned, ten. Choi Sangook, leave the stage.”