My Joker System: From Low Mana Trash to the Mightiest Wizard!
Chapter 118: The Grand Magic Academy’s Top Sophomore

Chapter 118: The Grand Magic Academy’s Top Sophomore

"Competitor Donner annihilates his opponent with a thunderous outburst! Competitor Lewis falls short and exits the tournament with a top 32 finish!"

...

"Competitor Maeve proves why she’s the sixth seed, defeating her opponent with a sneaky Conjured Poison Dart!"

...

"Competitor Ennya burns bright!! She once again incinerates more than half the stage, along with her opponent, this with a vicious flame tornado!"

The matches proceeded as expected, and the weaker ones were being weeded out once more, leaving only the cream of the crop of this batch of youngsters.

There seemed to be no more upsets until...

"C-Competitor Fernan pulls through! What an upset! The ninth seed, Lilirun Galamari, has been eliminated! A sudden emergence of a dark horse!" roared Akari, her spittle once again flying everywhere.

The twenty-eighth seed, Fernan Fidomar—a young man of average height, average build, and shaggy brown hair—bares his fangs and shows his edge to the world by defeating the young miss of a prominent Wizardry Clan, who is also a disciple of a high-ranking Master Wizard.

A new dark horse had suddenly emerged.

Fernan was the young master of a not-so-prominent Wizardry Clan that was barely holding on to its status.

Their finances certainly could not match those of the Galamari Clan.

Yet here he was, quietly avoiding the eyes of the other competitors before revealing his true strength when it mattered most.

He would surely be studied now and no longer taken lightly by his opponents.

After all, he had defeated someone who was just one place short of the top eight—only two spots below Ennya.

The perceived top eight could no longer deny that he was a threat to their expected placements.

As for the midget, she was under even more mental pressure, knowing there was another dark horse who might be even more dangerous than Fernan: Hal.

Her master would lock her into closed-door training again if she failed to make the top eight!

’Argh! Why did this Fernan guy have to show off now?!’ Ennya erupted inwardly.

Hal also followed the young man seriously with his gaze before his attention was snatched by Akari’s voice:

"What a show from Competitor Ferran! Now, let’s move on to the next match. Please come up on the stage, Competitor Vyse, Competitor Gnox."

The two competitors’ information then appeared above the stage on separate holographic screens.

Clearly, the top sophomore of the Grand Magic Academy, Vyse of the Vandralis Wizardry Clan, had the edge.

The young man, who had a tall and lean physique, gray hair tied into a ponytail, and a black diamond earring on his left ear, and who was also a rare darkness-element wielder, was Hal’s next opponent if he won his current match.

So, he had to observe this battle closely and learn how Vyse fought.

While Hal was confident in his chances, he didn’t want to be defeated because he was caught off guard.

Soon, the two competitors, Vyse and Gnox, stood face to face at the center of the stage, the latter unusually calm and condescending.

The Vandralis Clan was a prominent and fairly affluent Wizardry Clan, but they were not part of the aristocracy.

Perhaps this was why Gnox, who was an aristocrat, looked down on Vyse, despite Vyse being seeded fifth overall.

In any case, Gnox seemed confident.

Soon, the holographic timer, now positioned right between them, ticked down to zero, signaling the start of the match without the referee needing to declare it.

The short yet slightly muscular Gnox immediately fired a Glacial Shard at Vyse, hoping to provoke a reaction.

But the latter was too eerily calm.

Vyse didn’t overreact with a spell of his own.

He simply shifted his body to the side to dodge, then fired back with five small wisps of darkness, which were easily stopped by a simple ice wall from Gnox.

It was a simple probing exchange that made the latter inwardly frustrated.

Vyse was as calm and collected as everyone said.

While his spells weren’t too powerful, as his mana affinity wasn’t insanely high, his combat IQ, calm heart, and insane comprehension made him the fifth seed of the tournament.

After a brief pause, Gnox resumed his assault, this time launching a fierce onslaught without holding back.

He fired Glacial Shards, summoned blizzards, and conjured ice spikes that stabbed up from the ground toward Vyse, but none of them worked.

The Glacial Shards were dodged, Vyse shrouded himself in darkness that somehow protected him from the blizzard, and he blocked the ice spikes with a jet-black plate that tilted to the side, stretching like rubber as it absorbed the impact.

"Then how about this?!" roared the frustrated Gnox.

In the next moment, a giant ice meteor came crashing down from the sky at horrifying speeds.

This was the strongest spell in his arsenal.

He had planned to set it up by luring Vyse into one of the Frost Traps he had secretly scattered across the stage during his onslaught, aiming to immobilize the top sophomore and destroy him with the meteor once caught.

However, Vyse consistently dodged the traps just before triggering them, which slowly chipped away at Gnox’s patience.

This was why he ended up using his trump card prematurely.

"Hahaha, a strong ice elemental spell, but sadly, I won’t be the one receiving it," Vyse chuckled.

Soon after, a huge black net shot skyward to meet the ice meteor, fully enveloping it and stopping its momentum in a mysterious way that seemed to defy the natural laws of physics.

Vyse then controlled the net containing the massive block of ice and positioned it in front of himself.

Meanwhile, Gnox, still in disbelief, failed to notice the black magic circle beneath him in time.

Before he realized it, dark hands emerged from the ground and latched onto him.

Gnox had already learned the Blink spell, being a talented young man in his second year of studying wizardry.

But to his horror, he couldn’t use it.

"Well then, better luck next time," Vyse said as he controlled the Dark Net to open, releasing the Glacier Drop spell back at its original caster, now rooted in place by the black, sticky hands.

He whispered the last part so nobody else could hear. "Dumbass..."

"No!!" roared Gnox in defiance.

Unfortunately, yelling wouldn’t save him.

He was hit by the glacier as if a Manatech Jeepney going full speed had crashed into a poor pedestrian.

The impact launched him into the border barriers set up by the organizers, and he collapsed, unconscious, onto his chest.

Gnox would have surely perished if not for the special protection cast on all participants before they stepped onto the stage.

"C-Competitor Vyse pulls off a calm and calculated counterattack to secure victory! Competitor Gnox has been eliminated from the tournament!"