CHAPTER 175: UNIQUE UNDEFEATED

Elliot and his group quickly left the arena after this, while the members of Personifications took their time.

Despite being injured, they tried to understand what was happening or what had happened a few moments ago.

Meanwhile, their leaders came to find them, and soon they were all sitting in the dressing rooms, looking at each other.

"What happened?" asked one of them, the master of Personifications.

They frowned again.

"I don’t understand. I felt like I noticed something in the fight, but I didn’t see anything. But for a moment, we were trapped in an illusion," replied one of the players.

"An illusion?" The master frowned. "How could that be? Since when have they had an illusionist?"

"They were almost all swordsmen, except Player Andrew and Rich, correct?"

"Maybe Player Jenna? She has that black thing that can slow things down and do similar things. Another option would be a summoning by Player Elliot. He’s been the talk of the town lately," added the leader of the young people, while the second leader nodded.

"I felt something when that happened. But I can’t describe what it was. So maybe it has something to do with that."

"Yes." Another player nodded. "I also felt something strange, but it’s hard to describe. It appeared at some point, but it disappeared immediately."

The Master remained silent, trying to think of other possibilities, but he was outside the combat arena and couldn’t say anything for sure, as he hadn’t felt it like they had.

He hadn’t noticed anything unusual about the summons used by that boy, but what was curious was the way Jenna’s sword grew and covered much of the light shining on the arena.

That’s why he was inclined to believe that she was the one who had done something.

Now, that was a problem anyway.

The illusion had activated too quickly. Was it just to see Jenna’s sword? How could they defend themselves against that?

They frowned, all of them thinking for a long time about what the hell the Angelic Wave guild had done this time to beat them so easily.

Certainly, those guys were a tough nut to crack.

--

Meanwhile, at Angelic Wave, everyone was the same.

They didn’t understand what was supposed to have happened just now.

All they could say was that it had been Elliot’s doing.

When they returned to the dressing rooms, Steward was the first to grab him and ask him what was supposed to have just happened.

That’s when Elliot brought out his new, talkative summoning.

The raven appeared, flying through the air.

"Hey, humans." The raven spoke after flying for a moment. "I remember some of you, you annoying little things. Especially you two, tsk. Some of my feathers were lost back then."

The crow pointed at the Thoran Twins as it said this.

They looked at it in shock.

"The Shadow Crow? Can it talk?" They both looked at Elliot, stunned. "Since when?"

"Haha, since I made him my summon, he can talk. I don’t know why; most can’t."

Steward came closer to see. "You mean it’s because of this that you were able to do something like that?"

"Yes." Elliot nodded. "He can cast some illusions, and they’re quite powerful. The idea was to camouflage him with Jenna’s sword, so no one would notice him."

"I see." Steward nodded. "So an illusion spell was cast on them, and you just jumped in to finish them off."

"Yes. Although it’s simple, it’s quite effective."

"You just have to be careful when activating it? They don’t have to notice for it to take effect?"

"No. In fact, they have to notice it somehow for it to activate; there’s no way around that. It will activate either way when they perceive it in one way or another."

Steward looked up. "Then why do you need Jenna’s help?" he asked, frowning.

She had already been given expensive potions and medical treatment; she wasn’t in trouble. She had simply used up a lot of her power in one fell swoop.

But if that hadn’t been done, things would have turned out much better, wouldn’t they? They wouldn’t have lost one of their most important forces in such a short time.

"We did it to prevent them from seeing the kind of beast I have now. I don’t want to reveal the Raven and the Basilisk until we’ve made it through the group stage, so that we always have something to show in the face of adversity," he said, looking at Jenna.

"Her power helped me camouflage it."

"I see. That makes sense."

Steward then saw Elliot put the raven away before it got talkative. Although he wanted to talk to that raven, in the end, he knew his priorities.

"Well, I can only congratulate you on such a great achievement. You are the most dominant team in the Leveled Leagues. Even the Zargo Academy can’t compare," he said.

"Tomorrow we will face Aquatic Longing. Seeing what I saw today, I won’t worry about you anymore. I think you understand the strength of the team better than I do, so we will travel immediately to Galion to face them, as we will close out the week facing the Elemental Academy."

"So let’s go back to the hotel to get ready. We’ll leave after lunch," he said.

¬-

That day, Xhortz City was in chaos. There was a lot of money lost today due to betting. None of them expected Personifications to lose, let alone in such a short time.

That created chaos, but this city was much friendlier than Loen or any of the others.

In fact, it was known as the most welcoming city on the coast, perhaps because it had many families. Almost the entire city had roots in two families, which made them very close to each other.

So even though Angelic Wave won by a landslide, no one caused them any trouble. They were treated kindly, even though they had to travel again that day.

The hours passed quickly, night fell soon, and dawn broke just as quickly.

The match also began quickly, with Aquatic Longing wanting to discover what happened yesterday in Angelic Wave’s match against Personifications.

But... unfortunately, they couldn’t.

They had similar endings, and Angelic Wave ultimately won 4-0 in the group.

By nightfall, there were only two undefeated teams in the group.

Angelic Wave and Elemental Academy.

Both would face each other the next day in Loen City.

People from other cities and guilds even traveled to see that fight.

It was very important. Too important.

They spent enormous sums of money just to find out who would be the superior in this group full of dangerous guilds.

This time, the odds favored Angelic Wave, as the superiority they were demonstrating had not been shown by the Elemental Academy, even though they were performing very well.

And the bets this time were accurate.

Angelic Wave not only won but crushed their opponents because the Elemental Academy clearly underestimated them.

Although, to tell the truth, it was a complicated battle, even with the Illusion, they managed to defend themselves against their attack, being the first and only ones so far to do so.

But they had lost anyway.

There were no surprises.

But Elliot was not entirely satisfied at the end of that battle.

"You seem pensive," Jenna said, approaching him in the dressing room after the fight ended.

He nodded.

"We’re going to have a lot of trouble dealing with those guys when they get serious," he said.

"Haha, I noticed that too," she said, looking at the people leaving the stands and others celebrating. "Even though they were all Master Rank and there was a foreigner, the most dangerous one wasn’t there, right?"

"Yes. That guy, introduced as Dark Mantle, is the real soul of the team, but he hasn’t participated so far. That’s making the matches more difficult for the Academy."

"Well." Jenna stretched a little. "We still won. Along with Zargo Academy, we’re the only ones undefeated at the end of the first week. That almost guarantees we’ll move on to the next round, so you don’t need to worry."

She then smiled. "We’ll beat them again next week. Right?"

He sighed. He didn’t feel comfortable with himself. Lately, he felt like he wasn’t making any progress. And it wasn’t about progress in terms of statistics, but in his own fighting style or strategies.

He felt they were repetitive.

And he didn’t know if that was normal or if he was simply making mistakes.

That’s why he couldn’t feel satisfied, yet he smiled.

"Of course. Next week we’ll win more convincingly. They’re learning and improving, but so are we." He declared firmly, and they both left behind the rest of the team members.

The main screen in the arena revealed how the first week of the Group Stage had ended.

Angelic Wave was first in the group, with a 5-0 record.

The Elemental Academy followed closely behind with 4-1, having only lost to Angelic Wave.

House of Fire was far behind them with a 2-3 record, and since they won one of their matches more quickly, they were in third place on points.

Personifications was also 2-3, but was fourth on points.

Below them was Aquatic Longing with 1-4.

And Broken Leaf with 1-4.

In other groups, Clark was 4-1 and first in his group. And Zargo was 5-0 in his group as well.

That’s how the first week of competitions ended.

But things were just getting interesting for Elliot.