Chapter 63: Another One?!

After several more rounds of matches, each one steadily thinning the field and pulling the competition closer to its final stretch, it was finally Mark’s turn to step forward again.

He glanced toward Hermione, who offered a reassuring nod before landing a hard, encouraging nudge against his ribs. With that, Mark rose from the stands and made his way down onto the platform.

In his own mind, he was still weighing exactly which summon to bring out for this particular match. The choice hadn’t come easily at first, but the moment he laid eyes on whatever his opponent intended to summon, the decision clicked firmly into place.

He took his position on the northern side of the arena, Victor already waiting across from him on the opposite end. A brief, heavy silence stretched between them before Victor broke it with a long, drawn out chuckle.

"Bet you’re riding pretty high on all that pride after beating Kai’s crew, huh? Purely on luck, mind you. Honestly, you’re kind of hilarious, how gullible you actually are."

Mark said nothing in response, his unnerving, unblinking gaze remaining fixed squarely on Victor. Victor shook his head with mock disappointment before shrugging it off entirely.

"Fine, guess you wanted this started fast anyway. So say hello to my prized weapon, undefeated so far by anyone who’s faced it. Meet..."

As his words trailed off, a portal flared to life beside him. A massive bear stepped through, standing well over six feet tall, a jagged row of crest like spikes running the length of its spine.

Thick brown fur covered a frame packed with brutal, coiled muscle. Faint green veins pulsed visibly beneath its coat, snaking across its body and up over its skull. Four wooden horns jutted outward around its ears, its glowing green eyes carrying an unmistakable edge of menace.

"...the RootBear!" he finished with a flourish.

The bear let out a booming roar before slamming one paw down against the platform, cracks spreading instantly outward across the stone beneath it. Victor shook his head again, mildly irritated that Mark’s expression still hadn’t shifted an inch.

The summon sat at roughly 5.6 High Tier. Its presence alone radiated raw, untamed wildness, though its real strength lay in something far more dangerous, the ability to call upon nature itself and bend surrounding greenery to its will. It read almost like some living force of nature squeezed into the shape of a beast, its danger never limited purely to claws and teeth. Its true threat came from the traits woven directly into its very nature.

Across from it, Mark’s eyes swept carefully over the creature, and the right answer finally settled firmly into place. He lingered a moment longer before closing his eyes, letting his mind drift back toward something he’d once witnessed deep within the Amazon chamber.

His thoughts settled on the ivory sculpture, a female warrior carved with a powerful frame and thick, sturdy thighs, one arm raised high overhead, mouth frozen open in a silent, eternal battle cry. Even rendered in stone, her presence carried the same imposing, unmistakable weight.

He could feel that same ancient force reconnecting with him now, carrying real authority through his veins. It was time to bring out his second summon.

His eyes snapped open, bright as a rising sun, as he released a sharp, focused mental command.

’Penthia, come forth. It’s your time to shine.’

A swirling, magical whirlpool flared to life beside him, coalescing quickly into a towering, humanoid figure, broad shouldered, long legged. This time, the sound accompanying her arrival wasn’t the familiar click of heels, but the heavy, deliberate crunch of sturdy boots as the barbarian Amazon stepped fully into view.

Victor’s composed expression cracked instantly, pupils dilating as an entirely different Amazon materialized before him. She towered even taller than Cassandra, standing well past eight feet three inches. The same stunned reaction rippled outward through the stands as everyone below caught sight of what had just appeared.

"Wait, what is that?! Did he seriously just summon another one? Is this guy planning on leveling every grand building on campus one at a time? Someone needs to do something about this!" a freshman girl shrieked, the memory of the Great Hall’s destruction clearly resurfacing hard behind her wide, panicked eyes.

Hermione sucked in a sharp breath before quickly pulling out a folded sheet of paper, a drawing sketched across its surface. Her eyes went wide the moment she looked at it, one hand pressing the paper hard against her mouth to muffle an instinctive gasp.

Over on a distant rooftop, Carlo’s expression shifted the instant his handheld gauging device let out a soft beep, displaying its fresh reading across the screen.

"A summon sitting at 5.0, with 7.5 potential behind it? This kid really is something else entirely."

He leaned back slightly, a faint, knowing smile tugging at his lips.

"Strange thing is, I’m honestly not all that surprised."

Back inside the headmaster’s office, both Williams and Mary leaned forward sharply, eyes locked on the new summon now standing in the arena below, shock plain across both their faces.

Mary’s face drained of color entirely at the sight. Without thinking, she dropped the gauging device straight to the floor, where it struck the tile with a sharp, cracking impact. A heavy gasp tore free from her as she clamped both hands over her mouth.

Williams startled at the sudden movement, glancing down first at the now shattered device before his eyes hardened with genuine concern.

"Damn it, I told you I should’ve been the one holding onto that thing, and yet you insisted on keeping it yourself the whole time."

His eyes flashed sharper still.

"What exactly made you react like that? Tell me, right now."

Mary took a few steadying breaths, working to pull herself back from the edge of outright hyperventilating.

"That’s, that’s a High Tier summon carrying top level potential! This confirms it completely. It explains everything we’ve been seeing."

Williams nodded slowly.

"So this really is Monarch Tier, then. I suspected as much already. This boy really is something unpredictable, genuinely one of a kind. This only further confirms his classification, backed now by hard numbers. We’ve never seen anything like this before at this school. We’ve recorded a Champion Tier student in the past, sure, but never, not once, a genuine multi summoner."

"He’ll almost certainly have more than just these two, eventually," Mary said warily. "Let’s just hope whatever comes next doesn’t bring quite as much collateral wreckage along with it."

"Obviously not. The boy’s had more than enough time by now to learn proper control," Williams said, still watching the unfolding scene below closely. "We need to get this logged immediately with the documentation department, no delays."

What everyone was witnessing clearly ran far beyond anything they’d originally expected, though it seemed every new match somehow found a way to deliver yet another fresh surprise regardless.

Standing beside Mark now was a crude, battle hardened barbarian Amazon, nothing at all like the familiar warrior they’d already grown accustomed to seeing.

Her presence alone carried a brutal, unyielding weight, hard as solid stone, dragging the stands into stunned silence for a long moment. She radiated boisterous, coiled readiness, every inch of her clearly primed and eager for real combat.

Victor’s eyes narrowed as he studied the new arrival before finally giving a slow nod.

"Oh, hiding behind yet another lady’s skirt now, huh? Fine by me, works just as well. My RootBear would honestly love the chance to play with something a little more dangerous for once. Go ahead, bring out the other one too, if you’ve really got the nerve."

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A/N: The only problem about discord arrangements is the RSS feed Chapter release connection stuff that I have to authorize with my server, so please be patient with me and we’ll be there real soon.