The Greatest Sinner

After Roland destroyed the "Magic Missile" beam with his katana, he quickly cast the "Strike Lightning".

The snow-white lightning bolt flew swiftly towards Evan. Roland's counterattack was instantaneous, but Evan wasn't about to miss such a blow.

Whoosh.

He reacted easily and dodged the lightning and dashed toward Roland. At the same moment, he cast the "Ice Veil".

Ice quickly appeared on the crimson sprout of "Bloody Perversity" and covered the tip of the spear. Evan's "Ice Veil" was in the first stage of "Awareness," and this spell was also modified through the "Transforming of Spells".

Evan replaced the three Compression Runes with Explosion Runes, which greatly increased the power of the spell itself. Of course, he had to spend more mana than usual for this enhancement, but it was definitely worth it.

Whoosh.

Evan got to Roland and swung his spear. Roland was focused and watched his opponent's every move closely. It was no problem for him to block and strike back quickly.

Bam.

The tip of the spear met the razor-sharp blade of the katana. In the next moment, however, something strange began to happen to Roland's weapon. He dared not continue their exchange of blows and quickly bounced back.

Roland looked at his katana with surprise, <What the fuck? Why did this happen?">

Part of the blade, namely where Evan's blow had hit, was completely in ice and it was slowly spreading all over the weapon. On the one hand, there was nothing surprising about that, since his katana was covered in a layer of water and Evan's spear in a layer of ice.

It seemed as if the ice had simply frozen the water, but it wasn't really that simple. The water and ice on the two young men's weapons were impregnated with mana, and had differences from ordinary water and ice.

Roland was certain that Evan's ice could do nothing to his water. In the young man`s opinion, his spell was much stronger than Evan's, and so the ice on his spear should not have frozen the water coating on his katana.

For example, if a tree encounters fire, it is logical to assume that the flames will engulf the tree and leave nothing but ash. But on the other hand, if the bark of the tree is very strong and the flame is not strong enough, it can simply go out without hurting the tree.

That was the outcome Roland had hoped for. He was discouraged by the situation, for if his water was frozen by Evan's ice, it could only mean one thing.

<His... spell is stronger than mine...? This was a real shock to Roland.

His spell was at the first stage of "Awareness". He assumed that Evan's spell was as strong as his, but not stronger.

This realization left Roland at a loss. As for Evan, he wasn't going to wait for Roland to come to his senses.

Evan ran towards Roland and at the same time cast another "Magic Missile". Seeing the snow-white beam flying at him, Roland came to his senses and reflexively kicked the beam away with his katana.

The ice was gradually absorbing the water and Roland knew that this had to be fixed urgently. Hitting the ground with the katana was not an option, it was not strong enough to break such ice. But, Roland quickly found a solution.

Bam.

He ran up to the arena barrier and hit it with all his might. It wasn`t forbidden to use the barrier around the arena for one`s own purposes, so Roland took advantage of it. He obviously couldn't hurt the barrier, but the kickback was enough to shatter the ice into tiny crumbs.

Evan was close by then, and he swung his spear and unleashed a crushing blow on Roland. Roland blocked it with lightning speed and stepped forward to grab Evan's arm.

Roland was about to do the same thing he had done to Fien. However, when he wanted to throw Evan into the air, he suddenly met with an overwhelming pressure. It was as if Evan were stuck to the ground. No matter how hard Roland tried he could not move Evan.

"Looks like someone`s overestimated his abilities." Evan said with a smile as he looked at the puzzled look on Roland's face.

Whoosh.

The next second Evan twisted his wrist and grabbed his opponent's arm tightly in return.

Roland knew what was about to happen, but he just couldn't get out of this trap. Evan simply surpassed him in physical strength.

Whoosh.

Evan's muscles tensed and he threw the Roland sideways with all his might, right into the barrier. Evan had originally planned to toss the Roland in the air, but he quickly realized that this was pointless.

Sure, once in the air the Roland would be a perfect target for the "Magic Missile", but he would just destroy every of the beams with its katana. Using "Summon Thorny Ivy" was just as ineffective, with one easy swing of his katana and all the Ivy's would be cut into fibers.

So Evan decided to take advantage of the beautiful properties of the barrier, whose defensive reaction would be very painful for the Roland.

Evan threw Roland with great force, but Roland was not going to follow Evan's plan without resistance. He knew that it`s better not to fly into the barrier at that speed.

Whoosh.

Suddenly several magical circles appeared behind him, from which iron bars flew out in an instant. Roland controlled them and made them perfectly straight, like a lattice.

Bam.

Roland crashed into the bars, thereby saving himself from the arena barrier. He was about to counterattack, but suddenly his plans changed.

Whoosh.

Vines of thorny ivy appeared behind him, quickly wrapped around his neck and thus chained him to the iron bars.

Evan quickly sprinted toward his adversary. Seeing this Roland swung his katana with force, severing both the vines and his iron bars.

Bam.

Unfortunately for him, Evan was already too close. The young man swung his spear at his opponent's chest. Roland fought off the blow, but suddenly he felt a terrible pain. Evan punched Roland in the stomach with incredible force.

The young man flew back several meters, and Evan was calmly heading toward him.

At that moment, everyone in the arena was stunned by what was happening, and Gilbert was no exception. No one could not have imagined such a development.

Gilbert frowned at Roland's sad state, he wasn`t angry, but he feared something.

<Damn. This guy turned out to be surprisingly strong. It looks like Roland will be a long time coming to his senses after this fight.> Gilbert thought to himself.

He thought that Roland was extremely depressed and disappointed that he was weaker than the other man in some way. Tonight's fight was a great blow to him. Gilbert thought that Evan's superiority, would break Roland's confidence in himself.

It was only logical, when an overconfident person meets a harsh reality, he often breaks down, and quite possibly will never again have the confidence he had before.

Whoosh.

Nevertheless, even Gilbert was badly aware of how boundless and incomprehensible Roland's self-confidence was.