On every broadcasting screen, stood a six-ter Elephantos known for its incredible body strength. Yet, standing before Moon and Selene, it was riddle with injuries, missing an eye, its hide scorched.
A Fourth Star beast.
The Evolver who had been shouting monts earlier stood frozen, his mouth still open, the next insult dying on his tongue. His eyes stared at the screen without blinking.
"That's a Fourth Star..." Soone in the back whispered.
"How long have they been fighting it?"
"Why are they fighting it?"
"They've been at the starting site this whole ti. Where did it co from?"
The spectator section fell into a stunned, electric silence. Hundreds of thousands of people watching, none of them daring to speak.
On the screens, Moon raised his staff. Blue fire began to gather once again.
Yara watched from the stands, a wide grin spreading across her face. The sa spectators who had been booing minutes ago were now silent, their eyes glued to the screens.
'Show these idiots.' She thought. 'Show them all what you can do.'
Across the various zones of New Avalon, classmates of Moon began to recognize the face on their screens.
Among them was Aaron Wells, one of the school's standout students after the class awakening. He had t Moon recently when they both registered to beco Evolvers. Unlike Moon, Aaron's circumstances hadn't allowed him to grow at an optimal rate, and he had chosen to sit this tournant out, waiting for the next one.
He watched the broadcast from a small gathering, his eyes fixed on Moon working with Selene against the towering beast.
'He's grown so much.' Aaron thought, a subtle smile forming. 'Moon, you've defied every expectation anyone ever had of you.'
Aaron still rembered the day Moon was labeled a Null. Soone with no talent, no potential, no future. The boy everyone had quietly written off.
That boy was now fighting a Fourth Star beast on the largest stage in the kingdom.
In the main spectator stands, three figures watched with expressions that couldn't have been more different from Aaron's.
Adrian, Lena, and Mark. mbers of the sa team Marcus and Sarah belonged to. Their faces were grim, their eyes dark with sothing between disbelief and hatred.
"This..." Lena spoke first, voicing what the others couldn't. "This is the sa Moon we know. Isn't it?"
Mark stared at the screen, his jaw clenched. "He looks similar. But this kind of power gain doesn't make sense. How is he fighting a Fourth Star Elephantos alongside that woman? It's only been a month."
"Damn it." Adrian gritted his teeth, his fists clenched at his sides.
There was no denying it. The person on the screen, calm and collected, raining elental destruction onto a beast that most Evolvers couldn't even flee from, was the sa Moon they had mocked.
The sa Moon who had failed his awakening and been branded worthless. The sa Moon who had then walked out of an S-Rank gate alongside real prodigies a month ago.
The contrast was almost impossible to reconcile.
"He's stronger than all of us now." Lena said quietly, her eyes not leaving the screen. "Do you think... he's stronger than Marcus and Sarah?"
"Impossible!" Adrian's voice cracked out louder than he intended, drawing glances from several spectators nearby. "This weakling could never reach their level! Never!"
Lena turned to look at him for a long mont. His face was red, his teeth bared, his entire body radiating frustration.
Then she turned back to the screen, where Moon's blue fire was carving through the Elephantos's defenses like they were made of paper.
'Is he really a weakling though?' Lena thought, but she kept the words to herself.
Back at the starting site, the fight intensified.
The Elephantos charged again, faster this ti. After taking the massive beating from Moon and Selene, it realised that caution would not help it.
The closest it got to ever hitting one of them, was when it got reckless. So, the colossal beast decided to trade its health for damage on its enemies.
Moon and Selene split apart, and the beast committed to chasing Selene.
Moon raised his staff. "Selene, water!"
Selene spun mid-retreat and unleashed a high-pressure jet of water at the ground in front of the charging beast. The earth turned to mud and slick wetness in an instant.
Blue fire ford at Moon's staff and shot forward, but at the body of water Selene had laid down. [Explode] detonated on contact, and the combination of blue fla and water erupted into a screaming wall of scalding steam that engulfed the Elephantos's head.
~SCREEEE~
The beast thrashed blindly, its eyes seared, its trunk flailing through the steam.
"Did you see that? They used the water as a conductor for the steam blast!" a spectator shouted from the stands.
Selene didn't waste the opening. Dragon's Breath roared from her staff, the massive inferno sweeping across the beast's left side. Moon followed with wind attacks, and the spinning gust caught the flas, twisting them into a rotating spiral of fire that drilled into the Elephantos's flesh.
Fire and wind. The wind fed the flas, intensifying the burn while extending its reach. The spiral of fire bored through the beast's left ear and tore it clean off.
~ROAARR~
Blood sprayed across the ground. The Elephantos staggered, half-blind and missing an ear, its colossal body swaying.
"That combo was insane! The wind made her fire countless tis stronger!"
Moon pressed their advantage. He slamd his palm into the ground and magma erupted beneath the beast, four pillars shooting up to pin its legs. The Elephantos roared and began tearing free, but the split second it bought was enough.
"Now!" Moon shouted.
Both of them cast at once.
Selene laid a wide wall of earth in front of the beast. Moon launched a concentrated blast of blue fire at the wall's base. The earth wall trapped the flas, focusing them, concentrating the heat into a single point that built and built until it released all at once in a directed explosion straight into the beast's chest.
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