*A few days before the battle, the members of Javan were in a room as Saber went going over the members of Shadow Eye*
(Saber): Amarti Cloudsfall. Nicknamed the Elf Merchant but recently people have started calling him the Elf Kingpin. Out of all of the members of Shadow Eye he is the one person who avoids fighting the most and records of his fights have been less than stellar. Next to their two new recruits, he is without a doubt the weakest member of the team.
***
*Back in the present, Indigo was in the middle of fighting against Amarti. The two came across each other by chance and started fighting. Indigo entered the fight very confidently remembering that Amarti was weak only to have it quickly snatched away as Amarti asserted his dominance and battle prowess. Indigo quickly found herself on defense barely able to keep up with Amarti*
(Indigo): *Inner Thoughts* Captain, we messed up! This guy is way stronger than we anticipated.
*Indigo thought this to herself as she was in the middle of getting hit in the stomach by Amarti’s blade disc that was pushing her back into a large tree. As Indigo was absorbing the pain she looked up to see three more discs flying towards her. Indigo quickly rolls out of the way and fires her crossbow at two more discs heading to her. Indigo then summons five of her shadow clones to attack Amarti. While she and two of them provide cover fire the other three charge at Amarti who was launching more blade discs at Indigo. Indigo and her two clones managed to fire off a number of arrows to destroy all of the discs Amarti fired at her while her other clones managed to reach Amarti who wasn’t worried in the least. Amarti managed to dodge the first attack of the shadow clones by jumping backwards. He then deflected the punches of the other two before jumping above them and reaching into his poncho to pull out two more blade discs. Amarti threw the blade discs which tore through the two shadow clones causing them to disappear. When Amarti landed, he picked up the two discs and ran toward the third shadow clone where he sliced right through her. As the shadow clone disappeared Amarti spoke in the Elfan tongue to reform the shattered pieces of his discs. The scattered parts began to glow yellow and floated into the air to form new discs shocking Indigo who took a deep breath and began creating more shadow clones realizing that this was going to be a tough and long fight*
***
*In another part of the forest, Jade was still lying on the ground still exhausted from her fight with Lola and sleeping. She was completely defenseless and wide open to attack which is what Lukas noticed as he came across her. Lukas had come across Jade’s body after hearing the sound of the tree falling. He had arrived to watch the ending of Jade and Lola’s fight and was quite shocked to see Lola lose, but saw no look of disappointment on her face as she was being carried off. At first, he wanted to interfere in the fight in order to save Lola, but knew that if he did she would have ripped him apart. Lukas knew a fierce battle when he saw one and knew that the honorable thing to do was to sit back, watch, and respect the outcome of the battle. However, now that the battle was over all bets were off the table and everything was fair game. Lukas was determined to win this Kragnarok and wasn’t about to let an opportunity like this escape his grasp. He slowly approached the sleeping Jade so as not to wake her up with his circular hammer in hand. Once he was over her, he slightly blushed as he almost had a clear view down Jade’s chest. He quickly regained his composure and concentrated his magic into the hammer to create lightning. While Lukas had no intention of harming her severely, he was going to send enough voltage through her body so that she would be rendered unable to battle. As Lukas prepares to strike, he gets anxious as he feels the presence of someone approaching from behind. Lukas quickly jumps out of the way barely avoiding a punch from none other than Morgan. Morgan takes out his wand and kicks Jade into the recovery position*
(Lukas): So, the Ice Scholar finally appears. It’s good to see you again, Morgan-senpai.
(Morgan): You really think I would miss a chance to take on the Peerless Cardinal? I’ve been looking forward to this moment all week.
(Lukas): I must say, I’m surprised you managed to get here. I was under the impression I was the only one who heard their battle.
(Morgan): *Chuckles* And you think they were being loud on purpose?
***
*Flashback*
*Sometime before Kragnorok began Morgan was walking with Jade where he noticed her stumbling a bit*
(Morgan): Are you alright, Jade?
(Jade): Yeah, I’m fine.
(Morgan): Don’t lie to me. You’re stumbling, your eyes are slightly red, and you got bags under them. Clear signs that you haven’t been sleeping much.
(Jade): Nothing gets past you, professor. Training those two along with my own training has left me little room to sleep all week. But don’t worry, I’m good to go and I’m sure a couple of stiff punches will keep me awake.
(Morgan): *Sigh* You fool. I told you not to overdo it. Alright, here’s what we’re doing. I want you to do one fight and once you finish, you’re going to sleep. Got it? I’ll be sure to protect your body while you rest.
(Jade): And how do you intend to find me in this forest?
(Morgan): It shouldn’t be that hard. All I have to do is listen for the loudest noise in the forest. Make sure that’s you.
*Flashback ends*
***
*It took a second as Lukas pieced everything together. The loud noise from the fight was entirely intentional. Jade was being loud to alert her teammates to her location. In doing so she would also be luring out members of the opposing team who would be drawn to the noise and setting up a potential ambush. This plan was risky. Lukas theorized that Jade must have had complete trust in Morgan and the rest of Shadow Eye to find her location and protect her body while she rested*
(Lukas): *Inner Thoughts* Astonishing. To put that level of trust into her teammates. The bond of Shadow Eye is not to be underestimated. Wait, if Morgan is protecting her, that means she only needs a little rest to regain her power. Which means if I don’t take Morgan or Jade down quickly, this’ll become a two on one situation.
*With his mindset, Lukas ran toward the unconscious body of Jade with his hammer shooting sparks*
(Morgan): The knight goes for the queen. Clearly, someone doesn’t understand the rules of chess.
*Morgan points his wand at Jade and it begins to glow. Just as Lukas was bringing the hammer to strike Jade it hits a wall of ice which completely surrounded Jade to keep her safe*
(Morgan): While I think your judgment in attacking her first is the right choice, I don’t like being ignored. If you want to get to her, you’ll have to go through me.
*Seeing no other option, Lukas focuses his attention on Morgan and charges at him. Swinging once again with his hammer, Lukas’s attack was once again blocked this time by an ice spirit carrying a shield. Lukas was surprised to see an ice spirit still standing after absorbing a lightning attack. It was well documented that water and ice spirits have difficulty handling lightning attacks. Lukas wanted to ask Morgan how he did this, but he would have to wait as he sensed two more spirits coming from the opposite sides of him. Lukas jumped backwards dodging the attacks of the two spirits who were ice ninja spirits with daggers. Once he landed he looked up to see an ice archer spirit in the tree who shot arrows at him. Lukas protected himself by spinning his hammer vertically to deflect the arrows. As the hammer was spinning, Lukas poured magic into the hammer to create a ball of lightning on top of the hammer. Once he stopped spinning his hammer, he bounced the ball of lightning into the air and hit it like a baseball with his hammer to Morgan and the ice spirits. Morgan and the ice spirits scattered and dodged the attack while the ice archer spirit in the tree jumped down to escape the blast and be caught by Morgan. Under the ground beneath Lukas, another ice spirit emerged and tried to hit Lukas with an uppercut only for him to dodge the attack at the last minute. The ice brawler spirit pursued Lukas who used his hammer to parry the punches of the spirt. As Lukas was distracted by the spirit, he didn’t sense the second ice brawler coming from behind him. The second brawler spirit punched Lukas from behind in his lower spine paralyzing his body with pain. This allowed the second brawler to kick the hammer out of Lukas’s hand and leave him defenseless. The two ninja spirits went to retrieve the hammer, but were unable to lift the hammer*
(Morgan): By the Gods, how much does that hammer weigh?
(Lukas): Approximately, 130 kilos.
*As Lukas was guarding himself against the attacks of the spirits, his hands began to glow yellow with lightning as three yellow summoning circles appeared around him. The lightning on Lukas’s hands flew into the summoning circles and out popped three hellhounds made entirely of lighting with red eyes. Two of the hellhounds snatch the two brawler spirits in their jaws and crush them while the third one went to retrieve Lukas’s hammer. The hellhound snatched it up with its jaw and returned to Lukas who took the hammer from its mouth*
(Lukas): Did you forget you’re not the only summoner out here? Fusion!
*The hellhounds combined with each other to form a large Cerberus creature with Lukas riding on its back. Lukas and the Cerberus turn their attention to the wall of ice protecting Jade and charged toward it. With the size of the Cerberus it could easily crush the ice and take out Jade in the process. Morgan chased after them where he fired off icicles from his wand while the archer spirit fired off arrows. Their attacks had no effect on the spirit. The ice ninja spirits used their speed to get ahead of the Cerberus and launched a frontal attack only for two of the heads to fire off lightning beams from their mouths which destroyed the spirits. The ice archer spirit jumped from Morgan’s shoulder and into the air aiming at Lukas. Before the spirit could fire off an arrow, Lukas threw his hammer at the spirit to destroy it with the built-up lightning stored within. A crow made of lightning emerged from the hammer, grabbed it, and flew it back to Lukas who caught the hammer just as the crow was disappearing. This momentary delay allowed Morgan and the ice shield spirit to get in front of Lukas and the Cerberus. Morgan closed his eyes and began concentrating to summon a giant servant. The ice shield spirit got in front of Morgan and charged at the Ceberus where its shield grew ten times larger than the spirit. The spirit used the shield to slow down the Cerberus planting its feet into the ground and bringing it to a standstill. However, Lukas poured more of his magic into the Cerberus who received a power boost and was able to break through the shield and trample over the ice shield spirit. Just when Lukas and the Cerberus were right above Morgan, Jade, and the ice wall, Morgan managed to summon his large ice knight spirit with a sword and shield to protect himself, Jade, and the ice wall. The ice knight managed to push back the Cerberus absorbing some of the lighting damage the Cerberus unleashed when it pounced on the body of the knight. The knight took a swing at the Cerberus but it’s too fast for the knight to hit. The Cerberus fires off lightning beams from all three of its mouths at the knight who manages to block the attack with its shield. As the knight was blocking the attack, it ran toward the Cerberus and managed to pin it and Lukas to a tree. Two of the heads managed to sink their teeth into the shoulder and neck of the knight. Lukas jumped off the back of the Cerberus and onto the ground below to avoid getting hurt. Seeing that his knight was losing, Morgan prepared one final attack.
(Morgan): Iceplosion!
*The knight began to glow blue and then exploded destroying itself and the Cerberus. Lukas was also caught in the blast and sent flying a few feet. Morgan fell to one knee all while grabbing his forehead and breathing heavily. He was reaching his limits. He had summoned a number of servants in quick succession and poured a lot of magic into them making himself exhausted from overusing his magic. As the dust was settling from the explosion, Lukas appeared with half of his shirt torn diagonally showing off his impressive physique. He was also breathing heavily but was still ready to fight. Dragging his hammer behind him with one hand he picked it up to lay it over his shoulders*
(Lukas): That was a brilliant attack senpai, but it’s over. You’re reaching your limits as am I. However, I’m still ready to fight physically and I know I can beat you there.
*Morgan smiles and stands back up leaning against the ice wall*
(Morgan): True. I have reached my limits. I admit I can’t beat you physically, but I can beat you mentally which is what I’ve been doing this whole time. This fight is over, Lukas.
(Lukas): I beg to differ.
*As Lukas prepares to charge at Morgan and strike him with his hammer, he falls to the ground feeling himself drained of energy and becoming cold*
(Lukas): What’s happening!? Why can’t I move!?
*Lukas looks back at his legs and sees a bunch of light blue insects crawling on them up his body*
(Lukas): What are these?
(Morgan): Spirits. Ice ants to be specific.
(Lukas): You. You planned all of this didn’t you? The explosion, the spirits, all of it.
(Morgan): All part of being a good strategist. This past week I’ve been experimenting with speasts. Whenever you destroyed one of my spirits their magic particles sank into the ground and summoned the ice ants that you see now.
(Lukas): But controlling this many ice ants should be impossible.
(Morgan): You’re right. So all I had to do was control the one who would control the others for me.
(Lukas): The queen!
*It suddenly flashes in Lukas’s mind. When Morgan tried to punch him at the beginning and missed, he dropped the queen on his body and the queen commanded the rest of the ice ants to attack him*
(Morgan): Keeping your attention on me and Jade was the hard part. I had to make sure you didn’t become suspicious of your own body and summoning all these ants really does take a toll on the body and mind. I will give you credit Lukas, you’re definitely stronger than me, but you forgot the first lesson we learned at the academy. It’s not the strongest who wins. It’s the smartest.
(Lukas): *Smiles weakly* Beautiful. . .game. . .senpai.
*Lukas passes out from having his body frozen and drained by the ice ants. He wasn’t in any danger of dying. At best, his legs would just need some ointment to treat all the bites of the insects*
(PA System): Lukas Travis and Indigo Lotus have been eliminated.
*Morgan smiles and takes a sigh of relief as he slides down to the ground*
(Morgan): You can come out now. It’s over.
*Jade comes bursting out of the ice feeling refreshed and offers a hand to Morgan who gladly accepts and gets pulled up*
(Jade): Good job out there professor. I thought I was going to have to spring into action when his spirit almost pounced on us.
(Morgan): *Chuckles* Pointless. I told you to leave your body to me. Don’t forget I’m a man. Sometimes I have to show off as well.
(Jade): Oh la la. Look at you. Well this wolf maiden is impressed. Unfortunately, it’s not heat season yet. So, you’ll just have to settle for this.
*Jade grabs Morgan’s shoulders and licks his right cheek making him blush before pulling away and snickering at him*
(Morgan): Whatever, let’s get a move on before others show up.
*Morgan begins walking away quickly followed by Jade*
(Jade): By the way, did the PA just say Indigo was eliminated? I wonder who took her out?
Author’s Notes: Hello everyone. Hope you’re having a good day and enjoyed this chapter. This battle was a lot different from the previous chapter. This fight was more of a strategic battle between two smart individuals. So while there’s not much physicality in this fight it’s still an exciting bout to see who can out-think the other and get the win. Fun fact, when writing this chapter I was listening to Shikamaru’s theme from Naruto. He’s one of my favorite characters from the series and his fight against Temari in the Chuuni exam arc served as a big inspiration for this chapter. The fights continue next week so look forward to more action. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time.