Chapter 489: The Grand First-Year Combat Festival: The Clash of the Flower and Non-Flower III

After the Flowers of Britannia had finally been named, Stella couldn’t stop thinking about how she hadn’t been picked among them.

She had stood there watching every name being called.

One after another.

Diane Bergwyn.

Sasha Burnwick.

Willow Derlis.

Selena Galehart.

And finally...

Vera Ashenlocke.

Stella had expected her own name to come at some point.

She had believed it so strongly that when the ceremony ended without her being called, she had not known what to think.

And now...

She had to leave knowing that these five girls would always be ahead of her.

That feeling didn’t disappear after the ceremony.

Instead, her desire for the title of Flower made her begin quietly watching the Noble girls who had taken the title she wanted so badly.

She observed them.

She listened to what people said about them.

She paid attention to how they behaved around other Nobles, how they spoke to Scholars, how they handled Alchemy, and how people reacted whenever they entered a room.

As time passed, Stella continued observing and learning about the five Flowers.

The more she learned, the more she realized how far the girls were from her.

In beauty.

In talent in other aspects.

In Alchemy.

In Combat-Based Alchemy.

In Social Skills.

In intelligence.

There were just so many things that they had above Stella.

And their personalities made her begin to feel inferior whenever she was in the same space as them.

Diane Bergwyn was always hard to converse with because she would close her eyes in the middle of conversations, which normally made the people around her feel awkward while speaking to her.

Stella had been annoyed when she first found out that a girl with a personality like that could become a Flower.

But Diane’s massive talent in Alchemy had canceled out those thoughts.

There was no way Stella could simply dismiss her.

Willow Derlis, from the very beginning, was someone Stella couldn’t deny as a true Flower with how composed and mature she portrayed herself.

For a young girl her age, she usually spoke calmly and intelligently with high-ranking Scholars and Professors.

She never seemed lost when standing among adults.

There was no obvious fault Stella could find in Willow.

And after speaking to her quite a few times, Stella came to see Willow as someone she respected.

And someone she also feared.

Sasha, being vibrant and cheerful but also packing venom, was someone Stella knew she could not compare with after observing her.

Sasha quickly became the face of one of the biggest vehicle-producing companies as well as the biggest fashion industry.

Not to even add her talent in her Alchemy Path.

There was nothing Stella could find that made her better than Sasha in the slightest.

And there is Vera Ashenlocke...

Stella really did think she had hope against Vera since the Ashenlockes were in troubled times and were treated as the weakest Duke House.

She had believed Vera could never compare to the others.

She had believed that she herself was miles better than Vera in other things, even if she couldn’t compete with her in beauty.

But...

That was just wishful thinking.

Even before the King himself made the order that Vera must marry into the Royal Family, Stella had already begun realizing how wrong she had been.

Vera’s talent in Alchemy.

Matching Diane’s level of talent.

The fact that she was also socially fluid like Willow and could be cheerful like Sasha.

Elegant as well.

Vera, to Stella, was the full package of all the Flowers together.

She had the things Stella admired in Diane.

The calmness Stella saw in Willow.

The social confidence she saw in Sasha.

And the beauty that Stella had wanted to believe was the one thing she could use to stand above them.

Stella didn’t even know when she began to wish she could be like Vera herself.

That thought had been difficult for her to accept.

How could she admire someone she was supposed to surpass?

How could someone she had initially considered an easy target become the person she secretly wished she could resemble?

Stella never found a good answer.

And with all that observation in check...

Only one Flower remained who Stella finally found a crack in.

Selena Galehart.

Stella’s golden eyes remained on Selena as her kick was closing in to connect with Selena who she dragged towards her with her Light whip.

Although Selena was considered the most elegant and graceful among all the Flowers, her talent in her Alchemy Path wasn’t comparable to the other Flowers.

And because Selena prioritized elegance in Combat Alchemy more than going hard with her Combat Style of Alchemy, her combat abilities made it impossible for Selena to match any of the Flowers.

At least, that was what Stella believed.

She believed she was better than Selena in terms of this.

The difference was something Stella had convinced herself she could exploit.

Plus, the two were known to display the elegance and grace of a Noble Lady properly.

The chances to finally take what she believed was rightfully deserved could only be achieved if Stella could show the Queen, as well as the former Flowers, why she should take Selena’s place.

Why she should be the one sitting among the Flowers.

And this match between them...

Where almost all of Britannia was watching her now...

This is my moment!!

And I’m not going to lose it!!

Stella shouted in her mind.

Her golden eyes sharpened.

Her leg was already moving.

Then her foot connected with Selena’s Wind Barrier hard.

Boom!

The impact shook the air around them.

Stella immediately moved a good portion of her Cognis through her veins and into the leg that had collided with Selena’s Wind Barrier.

The energy surged into her muscles.

The reinforcement doubled the enhancement behind her kick, turning the strike into something much stronger than the movement of her body alone could produce.

The Wind Barrier around Selena shook hard.

The force of the kick pushed her backward.

Her body was sent flying across the platform, tumbling like a ball thrown along the ground.

The wind around her body twisted wildly as her barrier struggled to absorb the impact.

Selena’s Wind Barrier protected her from directly slamming into the stone platform, but the force it was absorbing still traveled through the barrier and into her body.

At the same time, she had to keep feeding Cognis into the barrier to prevent it from breaking.

Doing both at once wasn’t easy.

Selena continued moving violently toward the end of the fight platform.

The distance between her and the edge rapidly disappeared.

The crowd reacted immediately.

A wave of voices rose from the Arena as spectators realized that Stella had managed to send Selena flying with a single kick.

Some of Stella’s supporters shouted her name.

Others watched Selena carefully while some watched anxiously, waiting to see whether she would recover before reaching the edge.

"Tsk."

Selena clicked her tongue.

Her body was still moving backward.

She forced her hands together.

Clap!

Even while being thrown away, Selena managed to execute another Alchemy.

Binder Wind Alchemy.

The Cognis inside her body surged toward her hands and entered the forming Alchemy Circle.

The wind around her responded.

It began moving toward her Wind Barrier while she was still traveling backward.

Selena didn’t try to stop her movement through physical strength.

Instead, she changed the direction of the force acting on her.

Once the wind gathered properly within the Wind Alchemy Circle, the Binder Wind Alchemy ignited.

A wind tornado erupted from beneath the Wind Barrier.

The spinning air caught her body from below.

The force redirected her violent backward movement upward.

Selena threw herself into the air.

Her body rose instead of continuing toward the edge of the platform.

Her training clothes moved in the strong current of air while her hair was swept backward.

The crowd immediately realized what had happened.

She had avoided being thrown from the stage.

Stella looked up at Selena.

For the first time since landing her kick, disappointment appeared in her eyes.

Her attack hadn’t been enough to throw Selena off the fight platform.

But she was still in control of the battlefield.

And she wasn’t going to let Selena get back any control.

Because in front of everyone, she was going to prove why she deserved to be a Flower.

The thought of the title burned inside her.

It wasn’t simply admiration anymore.

A hate had stemmed from jealousy.

And beneath that jealousy was a desire to always be among the well-regarded people of Britannia.

Stella wanted people to look at her.

She wanted her name included whenever people discussed the most beautiful, talented, and promising young women in the kingdom.

She displayed her elegance to show why she should always be part of that conversation.

Even now, in the Combat Festival, where only three students had been noted especially as possible winners, Stella still dreamed of being among those conversations.

She didn’t want to watch other people stand at the top while she remained behind them.

A life of being a step behind everyone else was never her wish.

A life of being in the same line, if not a step ahead...

That was what the Third Princess of Britannia wished for.

Stella’s golden eyes followed Selena as the other girl began descending.

She knew she had to keep attacking.

If Selena regained control, the advantage she had built would disappear.

Stella let go of her light whip.

The weapon slipped from her hand and dropped toward the stone platform.

Clap!

Her hands came together hard.

The sound echoed slightly across the battlefield.

The spectators immediately noticed the change.

Stella’s previous weapon had been released.

Now her hands were together.

Cognis surged through her body rapidly.

The flow was stronger than before.

Yellow Cognis began leaking visibly from the Princess’s body, moving around her like small flashes of lightning.

The energy traveled through her veins and gathered around her limbs before spreading outward.

Cracks appeared beneath her boots.

The stone couldn’t fully withstand the amount of force being pushed through her body.

The cracks spread a short distance across the platform as Stella continued feeding Cognis into her Alchemy.

Her Light Alchemy Circle began to form.

The yellow glow appeared around her, slowly taking shape in the air.

The light reflected across the nearby snow and the damaged stone beneath her feet.

In the air...

Selena looked down as she descended toward the ground.

Her eyes immediately noticed the fluctuation of Cognis coming from Stella.

She could sense it.

She could see it.

The amount was far greater than what Stella had used earlier.

Selena’s expression became more focused.

She had seen Stella’s previous attacks.

She knew the Princess had more Cognis remaining.

But this level of fluctuation was different.

And with this much Cognis fluctuation...

It could mean only one thing.