There weren't any threatening opponents except Lore left and Jason hoped that the last fight he had to attend would turn out as an adrenaline rush.
His fight against York was already slightly intense and beneficial, but there was no need for him to use all affinities, whether it was one after another, at once or even overlapping, like the blazing icicles he started to experiment with months ago.
After defeating York, his other opponents were scared of him, which led them to fight halfheartedly, allowing Jason to save much trouble, even though it caused him to feel disappointed in his opponent's willpower.
He already entered the top 400 and it was not even necessary for Jason or Lore to fight against each other, but Lore's fighting spirit was almost impossible to overlook as he glared dagger at him every once in a while.
It was annoying and there was not even a good reason to do so, and in the end, Jason just decided to ignore it because there was no better way to handle this, except to beat the crap out of him.
Knowing what elemental affinity Lore had was already advantageous for him because he could prepare a few plans against him, if necessary.
Unfortunately or maybe even fortunately enough, Jason was sure that he would need a few plans against Lore because he had an earth affinity that was most likely at the unblemished rank.
Lore's defenses would be much sturdier than his, while his fire affinity would hardly be efficient against an earth affinity, while the same applied to his ice affinity.
There were only a few things he could try out with these two affinities and Jason couldn't help but feel gratitude towards his superior eyes' ability to tell him almost everything about his opponents, which allowed him to enter the arena with ease.
Standing opposite Lore, he felt his anger, and he could only sigh deeply, lamenting about every student's useless pride, once someone said anything bad against them.
In the end, Jason didn't think that he said anything wrong, because York almost permanently damaged his mana core which would turn him into a cripple.
Nobody wanted to end up as a cripple in the current era, where one would be thrown away like garbage or even worse.
As such, he only wanted to help out, but if the other side didn't accept his sincerity, it was also fine with Jason.
Nevertheless, Jason somehow wanted to demonstrate to Lore what despair was and how valuable their pride, dignity, or whatever was.
Staring into each other's eyes, Jason wanted to beat his opponent up but also fight a magnificent fight, but after pondering what was more important to him, he could only chuckle lightly.
'I'll crush him for good!' Grasping his final decision firmly, he would give his everything.
Seeing Jason chuckling to himself, ignited Lore's unfounded rage as his words stung deep in his heart as he knew the truth deep within him.
However, in the end, he didn't want to accept the truth simply because his pride was the only thing Lore could maintain in the Miral academy by avoiding fighting the students that were stronger than him.
With the Big-Three tournament, he wanted to change the tides and show everyone that he was also strong which, however, didn't bother Jason at all as he defeated his opponents one after another in a simple manner without any elegant techniques.
He just fought straightforwardly and somehow, in Lore's perspective, in an overbearing manner which was unbearable for him.
When the AI finally initiated the start of their fight Lore immediately summoned a broadsword and was about to charge at Jason while shooting earth spikes towards him, as he suddenly noticed an extremely large ice mountain emerging in front of him.
Jason who stood on top of the mountain of ice smiled faintly towards the ground, as he released his mana while utilizing his affinities.
Thick mist enveloped Jason's whole body, slowly descending towards the ground where Lore stood.
Jumping towards Jason, Lore pushed himself from the ground, while constructing an earth pillar below him, throwing him into the air to accelerate his speed.
In the air, he immediately sensed several strong mana fluctuations in front of him with dozens of fireballs shooting towards him.
Within a moment, Lore manifested a thick earth shield in front of him before he noticed something heavy falling on the shield, as he was flung into the arena grounds, where he had to take a deep breath in order to realize what happened.
'Did he just jump in my earth shield?' He wondered, but seeing Jason standing at the exact same position for the whole fight that began merely ten seconds ago, this couldn't be the answer, as he noticed a large block of ice next to him.
"Did you like my present?" Jason teased from above, as he accelerated the pace with which he released the mist, only to see Lore fuming in anger, as he rushed towards the mountain of ice, where he used his longsword to slash at it while releasing his earth affinity to protect himself.
'He can't fight in the air?' Jason asked himself, and considering that an unblemished ranked affinity would evidently require more mana to be utilized, he could think that his opponent used his affinity too careless, without considering his expenses.
In the end, Lore's tactic was not stupid, because the mountain of ice was rather shallow constructed and not strong enough to hold out his several dozen slashes.
There was only one thing he didn't seem to care about, which caused Jason to smile, as he said apologetically.
"I'm sorry to interrupt you, but this fight is over" Snapping with his finger, one could only see Lore staggering as he looked at Jason with widened eyes.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME?!?"
However, instead of an answer, Jason just shrugged his shoulders, before his golden eyes gleamed in a faint green light.
Barely being able to see through the mist, that continued to thicken, Lore was unable to find Jason's outlines, while his golden shining eyes were the only thing he perceived.
Seeing his golden eyes gleaming in a green light for a quarter of a second, his heart seemed to stop beating, as his sight blurred.
Gritting his teeth, Lore circulated mana through his body only to notice that his blurred sight became even worse, while his mind turned fuzzy.
'What?!?' He asked himself in shock, and with every earth spike and spear he forcefully manifested and shot towards Jason's presumed location, breathing became more difficult and it was hardly possible for him to even stand on the ground.
Without the ice mountain next to him, he used to support himself, Lore would have already collapsed and Jason couldn't help but praise his opponent inwardly.
'He endures it much longer than I estimated...not bad, even if it's completely useless.'
Smiling brightly, his experiment worked out perfectly fine and this was only thanks to Scorpio, who digested the poison elemental crystals he mined inside the four-star rift.
These crystals were the reason for his near-death experience inside the elemental crystal cave due to the maneless poison in the air that became even stronger, once he circulated mana through his body.
Thanks to Scorpio absorbing, digesting, and comprehending everything about the poison elemental crystals which were extremely rare, it was able to allow Jason to reproduce almost the same poison for his affinity, which was extremely beneficial.
By intertwining his poison affinity inside the mist he released, Lore couldn't detect anything at all, while his snap was just for show as if he activated something, which was however not the case.
In the end, his finger snap was just a trick and nothing more than that.
Time passed slowly, and when Lore seemed to be close to collapsing on the ground, barely hanging on his consciousness, Jason stopped releasing his poisonous mist, before he jumped down to the ground.
Approaching his opponent who kneeled on the ground barely being able to sense anything around him, Jason couldn't help but shake his head, as he called for the medic team.
Leaning down towards Lore, he only whispered "If that's how much your pride is worth, I don't need it!"
It would be a lie if Jason said that he didn't feel slightly bad to have crushed his opponent but he was sure that if someone else were to do the same to him, he would rethink a lot and try to learn out of his mistakes to become stronger.
Giving up was not something in his own vocabulary and he would overcome everything if necessary!
Updat𝓮d from freew𝒆bnov𝒆l.co(m)