I walked into the arena with all the stuff that I bought at the market and looked around to see if my name was up there on the upcoming matches and fair enough, there was my name against..

Postini Krel.. the noble guy who challenged me out of nowhere.

Looking at me entering the arena, a few familiar faces came into my view. There was Pleo, who was already there, and then there was Zuriel, Dion along with Nyx too.

'Looks like Zuriel informed Nyx,' I thought as I saw them standing and conversing with each other. Thyle was also there, looking much better than when I first met him. Well, I have been healing him every day till now; even though I had healed his disease within the first week, I thought it would be better to regularly keep checking up on his health and help him gain back his health.

'I heard that he was training somewhere as exercise. To think it would be this place,' I thought before my eyes reached another man who was sitting there silently drinking on his own.

'Favian Black, the leader of the resistance army or something. From what Zuriel told me, he is planning to attack Asul sooner or later.. However, nobody knows when that will be. Well, I don't want to believe it.. but this scenario reminds of something similar that happened in the previous timeline,' I thought as I sighed a little before moving towards them.

Well, actually in the previous timeline, the enemy we thought to be the leader always said that he would attack us, but never really did. At first we believed that he was just a coward or just bluffing, but honestly it was just that he wasn't the actual leader, and because of the actual leader he never attacked us.. Kinda trippy if you ask me..

"You really showed up, huh? You have guts, that's for sure," I heard an annoying yet familiar voice coming from the back and saw the same noble guy standing there with a smug face. He saw the shopping bags in my hands filled with metals and foods, and ended up chuckling with a mocking expression on his face.

This time he wasn't alone but there were two similarly built men standing behind him, who looked like they were trying to curry favour of the noble guy. I could only smile on the inside at the situation in front of me as I spoke.

"I do not have many options, do I?"

He observed my face with the same mocking expression. Now I want to punch him so badly, and chuckled again before speaking,"Let's see how long you can maintain that smug look of yours. I hope you don't chicken out at the last moment."

I saw him then walking away from there and decided I should 'make an example' out of him this time. While I don't want attention, I would rather not have any more people foolishly trying to disturb me because they think they can.

"ZERO!!! COME HERE!!!" I heard Zuriel shouting from far away and began walking towards her. When I reached there, Dion and the others wished me luck while Nyx just kept looking at me with a narrowed gaze before asking,"what is it that you are trying to do here?"

Favian didn't seem interested in me, but still he was listening to our conversation anyway.. more like he had nothing else to do.

'Isn't he the leader? Why not get busy doing some leader work?' I thought as I answered Nyx,"I just want to step up a bit."

Nyx, for the next moments, looked at me with a concentrated gaze and then making an understanding expression she finally replied,"okay. Just don't end up killing that noble guy, he is still important to us."

Hearing Nyx's words, Favian turned to me, scanning me carefully again before looking at Nyx, wondering whether what he heard was real. Feeling Favian's gaze, Nyx turned to him and said,"well.. I guess you will understand in a few moments anyway, so why not just watch the match?"

Favian looks at me with his dark eyes and I smile at him, but even after analysing me for a few moments, he still found nothing, so he was really confused. Well, my artifact that hides my real energy is really helpful, to be honest. After I came here, I also kept on exercising and training hard whenever I could. Though there wasn't any enormous boost, my power did rise quite a bit from what I had when I entered this world.

I then talked a bit more with everyone as I passed the time asking how everyone was doing. Before I knew it, the time for the battle finally arrived, and I moved towards the centre of the arena.

Under the gazes of thousands of people, I entered the arena where the noble guy was waiting with a smug expression. I looked at him as I entered the arena and noticed all the people cheering for that guy while Nyx and the others were sitting near the VIP seats.

He looked at me for a few moments and then glanced at the VIP seats as if he was trying to prove himself? Looks like there is more to the challenge that I thought.

I too turned towards the VIP area and observing carefully I found a guy looking similar to the noble guy and finally I understood a few things about this stupid situation.

'Something along the lines of, someone in his family probably thrashed the poor guy saying that I was at least useful despite not having money or power compared to him and that brought us here to him challenging me in front of everyone,' I sighed at this really really stupid situation.historical

"I guess wealth can't bring you intellect," I muttered as I rolled my eyes in annoyance before moving towards him one step at a time.

"It is about time I put you in your place," that guy spoke as he looked at me in all seriousness. I wanted to say a few words, but then I decided to not waste time and just start the fight already.

'Since he uses water magic, I could use Light magic to heat things up,' I thought as I took out a few white coloured small tennis ball shaped artefacts from my space storage.

He observed those balls before moving towards me to create water balls in the air. The waiting time began ticking as soon as we both reached a certain distance from each other and I looked at it, counting down..

10

9

8

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

-Boom!!

I heard a loud voice as he attacked me, throwing those water balls at me at an insane speed.. However, all of them missed me as I stood there carefreely with both my arms in my pockets. Looking at what just happened, the crowd turned silent for a few moments. The noble guy looked at me and then at his hands before creating and throwing another dozen water balls at me.

-BOOM!!!

-BOOM!!!

-BOOM!!!

This time they were more fierce than before as I observed the water balls almost reaching me, missing me and then hitting the wall behind me. I sighed at his naivety as I began walking towards him slowly and slowly as he kept using his water attacks at me.

What happened was, I used light magic, both my own and also the artefacts, to create a mirage that would look exactly like me. Simultaneously I hid myself using the same magic but I cannot go over 2 metres away from where my mirage was created or the artefact's presence would give away my location.

I also used some air magic to make the air denser, changing the direction of those water balls away from me. In the end, what you get is the phenomenal result of me walking through the attacks without getting scratched at all.

I could see the tension rising on the face of that guy and not long after, he raised both his hands towards me before shouting out loud. The weather slowly began changing, and I looked above to see clouds surrounding everything before a heavy downpour began.

-Swish

I saw him vanishing from there without leaving a trace and I then stopped moving as I observed my surroundings. All this raining.. kind of.. were surfacing some terrible memories..

"Let's just.. get it over with," I thought as I sensed his attack coming from the right.

'It's a mirage,' I thought as I let his attack hit me. Despite being a water mirage, it still hurt a little.. which I healed within seconds. Not even a moment later, another attack came from the left.. this too was a mirage.. I let him be this time too..

All the experience I had fighting in the previous timeline.. My body knows when a real attack will come..

"If you want to confuse me... Try using at least a dozen mirages simultaneously.. things like this won't even tickle me," I spoke before I saw a direct attack coming from the front.

'This one is real,' I thought as I swiftly dodged his attack and then touched his shoulders with my hand as I applied some Life magic on it that would partially increase the power of his right hand muscles at uneven places.

Then I saw him jumping away from me as he tried to raise his hands before-

"AAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" I saw him screaming like a madman. His weaker muscles and bones might have been crushed by the powered up muscles. The Life magic power was temporary, just one time use, so it too has vanished, leaving a broken arm behind.

I just saw him screaming and crying like a baby as he tried to heal his hands, but it was badly crushed, so it would take some time to heal fully.

-BAAM!!!

I saw someone landing in the arena from the spectators. It was the brother of the noble guy..

'Looks like it is going to escalate from here,'' I thought as I saw his face, which didn't look pleased at all.