Not only had an assassination been attempted during a match in the tournament, the attack had been unleashed after the outcome had already been decided, so this was a very serious incident. Fuller immediately announced the abolition of Brad's placing in the tournament, and he was detained by the tournament committee. Once the tournament concluded, he would be sent to the attorney general to be sentenced. After all, this incident involved the crime of attempted murder of a noble, so it would be up to the attorney general and the court of law to decide what punishment would be handed down to Brad.

Thus, the incident was promptly settled, and all of the spectators were very much looking forward to the three matches in the afternoon. After all, Onean, Lana, and Jeff were all going to feature in those matches. What was particularly exciting was Lana's match as her opponent was Gwen, the daughter of Governor Jenkins.

Prince Lazaar and Governor Jenkins were the leaders of two opposing factions in the royal court, so there had to be some sparks flying between their two daughters.

Speaking of Gwen, Erwin was quite surprised that she was powerful enough to make it so far in the tournament. In the past, he despised all of the students who were extremely conscientious in class. After she was defeated by Larwood in their first sparring match, Gwen began to work even harder in class and latched onto the lecturers' every word as if they were preaching the holy gospel, and as a result, Erwin's opinion of her had fallen even further. However, his assessment of her had then gradually changed over time as she was always taking the initiative to approach Larwood for sparring matches, and she took all of their sparring matches very seriously. As a result, Erwin discovered that she possessed very commendable determination and resilience.

Even so, Erwin still didn't think that she would be able to make it into the top eight. It seemed that she had held back against Larwood during their sparring matches in the offense and defense classes.

Then again, who could've anticipated that I would make it into the top four before the Pillow Sword Tournament began? I bet all of the pedants in the academy are shocked, but it's not like they can do anything, Erwin thought to himself with a self-deprecating expression.

Of course, Erwin had convinced himself that he had only come to participate in the Pillow Sword Tournament for Professor Hawk's sake. In reality, at this point, this had already become a personal pursuit of his, but he simply wasn't willing to admit it.

...

In a rare display of humility, Erwin snuck onto the spectator stands on the bottom level in order to not attract attention to himself, but by the time he arrived, Onean had already dealt with her opponent. A stunned look appeared on Erwin's face as he stared at the beverage that he was holding.

The match had concluded in the brief span of time that it had taken him to buy a mug of dark beer! It seemed that there really weren't any contestants in this tournament powerful enough to challenge her aside from the Lazaar siblings.

"Wow, I didn't think you'd be back on your feet so quickly." Larwood was rather surprised to see Erwin up and about so soon.

"Of course he's going to recover faster with such a beautiful carer," Chase said with a sly grin. "How was last night, Erwin?"

"Look at him! He took an arrow to the back, but he's making it look like the arrow was fired by Cupid! These minor injuries are nothing to Erwin, isn't that right?" Kaiba chuckled. "So how did things go last night?"

"Yeah, what happened last night?" Larwood was also very interested to hear Erwin's reply.

With so many people around, they naturally weren't going to mention the princess. Thus, they were only asking Erwin about "last night" in order to maintain some secrecy.

"What happened last night? Absolutely nothing! How come you guys don't care about my injury at all, but you're so interested in discussing these useless topics?" Erwin was quite disgruntled as he looked at his group of lewd friends.

"You know, there are rumors circulating that you've become addicted to sustaining injuries just so you can be treated by a certain someone," Larwood jeered. "If we could get the same treatment when we get injured, we'd gladly mutilate ourselves every day! Why should we be concerned for you when you're the luckiest man alive?"

"Don't try to change the subject!" Chase immediately caught on to Erwin's attempt to steer the conversation in another direction. "We want to know what happened last night! How did it feel? Hurry up and tell us!"

"I'm telling you, nothing happened!" Erwin said with a resigned expression. "When have I ever lied to you guys?"

Larwood and the others were still extremely skeptical, clearly unwilling to accept this as an answer. They were all looking at Erwin with menacing expressions, and it seemed that an interrogation was about to take place.

However, right at this moment, it came time for the most heavily anticipated match of the day. Governor Jenkins had come to the venue to spectate the match in person, so it seemed that he was quite confident in his own daughter. In contrast, Prince Lazaar still hadn't arrived yet, nor had King Cameron.

Lana and Gwen entered the venue, one from the east, and the other from the west.

Gwen had clearly made an effort to dress up for the occasion, wearing a tailor-made orange dress with beautiful silver runes embroidered around the collar. Looking at her voluptuous cleavage, her swan-like neck, and her snowy-white, delicate shoulders, Larwood wanted nothing more than to transform into the gray mink scarf that was wrapped around her neck.

"Hey, what's happening with all of you? It's not like you haven't seen her before," Erwin chuckled with an amused expression.

"I can understand Larwood drooling over her, but what's going on with you, Kaiba? You look like your eyes are about to pop out of their sockets!" Chase jeered.

"I'm not looking at Gwen, I'm looking at Prince Lazaar's daughter," Kaiba hurriedly explained.

"He's looking at your old lover," Chase said as he nudged Erwin with his elbow.

Erwin pursed his lips and offered no response, but he knew that Kaiba's gaze wasn't focused on Lana.

In contrast with Gwen, Lana was wearing a simple blue magician robe that was very conservative compared with what she normally wore. There was a sash around her waist that perfectly highlighted her exquisite figure, and she was wearing a violet sheep wool cape that was flapping incessantly in the frosty winter wind.

Looking at her calm and composed expression, Erwin knew that Lana wasn't taking Gwen seriously as an opponent at all. In her heart, there was only one person in this tournament who could truly compete with her.

To be fair, Gwen was already one of the most beautiful noble women in the entire city of Sarus. Otherwise, there was no way that someone as picky as Larwood would be so intent on pursuing her. Unfortunately for Gwen, Lana was like a goddess who didn't even appear to be from this world, so no matter how much effort Gwen spent to make herself look good, there was simply no comparison between the two.

...

Thus, the match commenced as everyone looked on with anticipation in their eyes.

Lana seized the initiative right away, unleashing an instant-release spell comprised of three different colors out of the tip of her long staff, which was giving off a faint blue glow. This was the same staff that she had used in her first battle against Erwin outside the Rosebud Pavilion, so it certainly didn't bring up any good memories in Erwin's mind. He could still vividly recall the scenes from that day, which was no surprise, considering he had almost perished to this very staff.

After the three-colored spell was released, it gradually transformed into three balls of fire, one red, one yellow, and one blue, all of which were hurtling directly toward Gwen's chest.

In response, Gwen conjured up a magic shield in front of herself in a well-rehearsed fashion, then began to chant the incantation for an advanced spell. However, what she failed to anticipate was that as the three balls of fire struck her magic shield, a part of their magic power was able to penetrate through the defenses of her magic shield. This burst of magic power then transformed into an intricate three-colored dagger that pierced directly toward Gwen's chest.

This was the most unique aspect of Lana's magic. It seemed to be magic, but it wasn't purely magic. During Erwin's first battle against her, he had been defeated by her signature Shadowgleam Sword Array. The sword array appeared to be filled with bursts of magical sword energy, but in reality, some of the bursts of sword energy had already been given substantial form by Lana's magic. As a result, even the most resolute of magic shields wouldn't be able to withstand such an attack. It was clear that the three-colored spell was also magic of the same nature, giving off the appearance of a normal spell, but in reality, there was a nasty surprise concealed within it.

The fact that Gwen had made it all the way into the top eight naturally meant that she was no pushover. While she was very much taken aback by this turn of events, she was extremely decisive as she immediately ceased her chanting, then raised her hands before her to instantly conjure up a wall of ice. The three-colored dagger pierced into the wall of ice with a crisp clang, and the wall of ice was instantly shattered into large chunks, while the three-colored dagger also shattered into countless magic crystal fragments.

It seemed that the two were evenly matched in this initial clash, but Lana had actually already ceased the upper hand as she had already completed the incantation for her advanced spell while Gwen was busy warding off the three-colored dagger.

"That's the same spell of the Arcane Inferno Black Dragon," Erwin murmured to himself as he looked on with tightly furrowed brows.

The emergence of the black wyrm brought with it a thunderous roar. On this occasion, Lana didn't split up the magic energy of her arcane spell into around a dozen black wyrms as she had done during her match against Byron. Instead, she focused all of the arcane energy that she absorbed into a single black wyrm.

The wyrm's eyes were giving off a faint azure sheen that was extremely cold and menacing to behold. The wyrm threw back its head and roared up into the heavens, then released a plume of azure flames directly toward Gwen.

In the face of the enormous wave of azure flames, Gwen remained calm and collected as she raised her staff and yelled, "Chaotic Forcefield!"

Fierce gusts of wind were instantly swept up all around her, causing dust and rocks to fly through the air. Meanwhile, she stood, as calm as ever, in the eye of the storm. As soon as the azure fire entered the Chaotic Forcefield, it was instantly split up into bursts of azure magic turbulence, which began to rapidly revolve within the ferocious vortex of wind.

Even so, the azure magic energy was still able to constantly lash out at Gwen from within the vortex. At the moment, she was having to expend a massive amount of magic energy just to maintain the enormous magic forcefield, so she didn't have any power to spare to defend herself. As a result, many wounds had already been inflicted onto her body.

"Looks like your old lover is still too powerful for Gwen to take on," Larwood sighed with a wistful expression.

Erwin could only give a wry smile in response.