30 Academy Bets (2/2)

It could be said that Yale's eyesight was quite good as the people he considered as his equals were really the ones who were in the same position as him in the bets.

However, Yale reached that position in the Magus bets only by his act of saving Aizu in the Fire Class; the fact that he had immunity to illusions remained secret.

After Yale showed his skills in the Water Class, he became the favorite to be the first to reach the 2-star, surpassing Zack.

Once the Water Elemental Class ended, it followed with the Earth Elemental Class.

Yale had only an average talent in the earth and didn't know any spell of that element, so he planned to do the same as in the Wind Class, only listening to the teacher's lecture and observing his classmates casting spells.

However, someone unexpected appeared while the students were showing their spells, it was George.

Yale never expected that George would also be dual practicing; moreover, George performance left the whole class unable to utter a word.

When George had to cast his spell, he first wielded a sword and then channeled the spell into the sword, then the sword increased in size until it was a greatsword.

Earth spells had a lot of reinforcement techniques to enhance items endurance, but George spell wasn't that simple, because he also used Inner Qi in the spell.

Unexpectedly even for Yale, George learned a Combined Skill, even if that skill was still imperfect as the greatsword crumbled after three seconds and returned to be a normal sword.

Initially, George didn't want to show that Combined Skill as it was still imperfect, but after he heard about Yale's performance in the previous classes George decided to go all out.

George performance was enough to let him tie with Yale in the favorite position in the bets. That was George's intention as he didn't want to fall behind Yale in any aspect because George considered Yale his rival.

George didn't speak with Yale at any moment; they only gazed at each other after George finished to execute his Combined Skill.

When the lesson finished, George quietly left the class like almost all the other students, that exchange of gazes he had with Yale was enough to say all he wanted to say.

The next class was the Thunder Elemental Class, and that element wasn't popular due to its difficulty.

However, that was the first element in which Yale obtained an Elemental Affinity and also the element of the first spell he learned.

As the Thunder element was the most practiced by Yale before, the lecture gave him few insights and then Yale thought about George's Combined Skill from earlier.

Initially, Yale had also decided to show Spark even if that spell wasn't as impressive as the modified Frost Claw he used before.

However, after Yale saw George's Combined Skill and heard the teacher's lecture, Yale had a new idea.

Yale wanted to fuse Spark with his sword and try to execute the Tri-sparkling Sword before he learned it from the system's sub-quest reward.

Yale also felt that George was his rival, and since George could develop a Combined Skill by himself, Yale wanted to do the same.

Fortunately, Yale had the custom of carrying his sword with him since he went into the Beast Trial, that was very usual among those who loved to train with the sword.

When Yale took his sword out before casting his spell, the few students who remained in the class were shocked. The ones who saw George earlier had a premonition about what Yale was about to do.

As Yale didn't have to fuse Inner Qi and Magic, the process to learn a Combined Skill was a lot easier for him; he was able to integrate the Spark spell into his sword without difficulty, the hard part to him would be executing a Battle Skill in that state.

Yale started to use Tri-sword while the sparks were still in the sword, but he failed before finish the second strike.

However, Yale's Combined Skill was more mature than George's one, even if the main reason was the Origin Qi which made it easier for Yale.

Even if Yale failed in the end, that was already enough shocking because George only managed to infuse the spell in his sword and then dissipated after three seconds.

Instead, Yale managed even to execute a strike from a Battle Skill while the sword was infused with the spell. Even if Yale couldn't complete all the blows from the skill, only one hit was enough to show that his mastery of the Combined Skill was superior to George's.