The next two matches were both exciting affairs. Astrid used her incredible archery skills to eliminate a fighter using a fairly standard sword and shield setup, while Tamira used her spear skills to come out on top of a fight between herself and another spear user.
As Tamira left the stage, Eric rose from the couch, making his way through the tunnel for his first fight of the round of thirty-two. Emerging into the sunlight, Eric smiled at his opponent, the dual wielder from Ryan"s sword group.
"For our fifth fight of the round of thirty-two, we have Erick "Kyp" Kystfyr, representing Riptide! And his opponent, Mikasa Zweischwert, representing herself! Fighters, to your places!" Halfthur yelled, his voice echoing through the stadium.
Taking up his position, Eric stared at his opponent. Mikasa was a dual wielder, using a pair of slim swords to overwhelm her opponent with fast, agile attacks. She was also one of the few fighters from group B that Eric was wary of, along with Rob and Grott.
Considering his options, Eric nodded slightly to himself. It would do him no good to be eliminated before fighting Hydrus, and his opponent next round was likely to be Rob, which meant that his magic would be revealed anyways as Rob was not someone he could take lightly.
Hearing Halfthur ask if they were ready, Eric nodded. Gripping his falchion, the fingers of his other hand resting gently against the handle of his athame, as he stared unwaveringly towards Mikasa.
"Begin!" Halfthur shouted, raising the curtain on the match.
Drawing his athame with his left hand, Eric prepared a Wind Dart as he rushed forward to meet Mikasa"s charge. Activating Dashing Cut, he darted forwards, his blade swinging savagely towards Mikasa"s shoulder.
Bringing up her left hand, Mikasa parried Eric"s strike, the sword in her right hand stabbing towards him as her other blade tangled up his sword.
Twisting slightly, Eric blocked the strike with his athame. Sliding the blade along the length of her sword towards her hand, he forced her sword away as his dagger slid towards her chest. Sensing this, Mikasa jumped backwards, disengaging her swords from Eric"s own.
Grinning, Eric fired the prepared Wind Dart, the spell crossing the short distance between the two fighters almost instantly and slamming into Mikasa"s unprotected chest.
Groaning slightly, Mikasa took a step backward, attempting to process what had just happened. She"d watched Eric"s fights in the earlier rounds, and had categorized him as a simple sword user, using a single sword and his speed to overwhelm his opponents.
She"d thought that all she had to do in order to win was to tie up his sword with one of her own and strike at him with her second blade. So long as she didn"t give him room to use his bow, she judged that she would win thanks to her superior swordsmanship. He wasn"t supposed to have magic, or a parrying dagger for that matter.
As these thoughts whirled through Mikasa"s mind, Eric advanced, activating Dashing Cut once more to close the distance nearly instantly, not giving his opponent time to react to this unexpected development.
Casting an Arcane Strike that he"d prepared mid-dash, Eric aimed it at her face. Reacting quickly, Mikasa leaned backwards, the spell blinding her slightly as the violet bolt pa.s.sed just overhead.
Taking advantage of her awkward stance, Eric thrust his sword forward, stabbing directly at her chest and forcing Mikasa to parry with both swords. As she did so, Eric used his momentum to continue forward, bullrushing into her and knocking her down.
As Mikasa struggled to rise, Eric thrust his sword downwards, causing her to roll to one side. Preparing a Wind Dart, Eric strode forwards, following her roll with a kick that lifted her bodily, throwing her several feet across the stage.
Groaning slightly, Mikasa jumped to her feet, but Eric was already in front of her, his athame plunging deeply into her stomach before she could react. As she watched, the athame glowed slightly, as Eric fired the prepared Wind Dart directly into her ribcage.
Stumbling backwards from the impact, Mikasa was powerless to defend herself as Eric used his falchion to end the fight, the blade slashing at her repeatedly as she desperately attempted to raise her swords in defense.
As the blue light enveloped her, Mikasa stared unwillingly towards Eric who offered her an apologetic glance. This was the power of hiding one"s true abilities. Had Mikasa known about Eric"s magic, it was likely that she would have been able to devise a countermeasure, or at least have been prepared for him to cast a spell after she parried his first strike.
Unfortunately, there was no room for regrets in battle. Eric had won, and Mikasa was eliminated. Watching the blue light fade, Halfthur announced Eric"s victory to the crowd.
"And Kyp wins! That was an excellent fight! It"s a shame that such a beauty had to be eliminated this early on though," Halfthur commented, causing Eric to glance up at the announcer"s booth and roll his eyes.
Whose side is Halfthur on? Eric wondered with annoyance as he entered the tunnel to rejoin his friends. Pa.s.sing Rob, Eric gave his friend a pat of encouragement before continuing back to the viewing lounge.
The rest of the matches in the top thirty-two pa.s.sed fairly uneventfully. Rob, Jun, Ryan, and Mark all won their matches, as did Grott, and Barns. However, the final match of the top thirty-two was set to be quite the eventful one.
"Why do I have to face Seryllia?" Griffin groaned, staring at the pairings list for what must have been the thousandth time since it had appeared.
"At least you get to fight her now. Imagine if you"d fought her last round," Eric advised, attempting to cheer up his friend.
"Yeah, but imagine if I didn"t have to fight her for another two rounds like Jun gets to?" Griffin retorted.
"What do you mean? Jun"s going to have to fight you not her, don"t give up before you even start," Eric replied with a laugh.
"Yeah. And it"s not like she"s got some unbeatable super skill like you do. You"ve got Wild Strike, what does she have?" said Rob, attempting to console Griffin.
"Ugh."
"Anyways, you should get going. Ryan just won his match, and you don"t want to forfeit," Eric advised.
"It might end better for me if I do," Griffin replied darkly.
Jun rolled his eyes, "Just get out there you p.u.s.s.y," he said, pushing Griffin off the couch.
Rising to his feet, Griffin glared at Jun, before sighing and heading for the tunnel. Watching as he appeared on stage through the projector, the group began to discuss his chances as Halfthur introduced Griffin and Seryllia to the crowd.
"Since when were you able to dual wield Eric?" Ryan asked curiously as Griffin"s nervous face filled the projection.
Eric laughed, "That was actually a risk. I have no clue how to dual wield, so I just blocked like I would in Tae Kwon Do, and used the dagger as an armguard. It worked surprisingly well."
"lol poor Mikasa," Ryan laughed.
Hushing them, Mark pointed to the projection.
"It"s starting."
.
.
***IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT BELOW***
So, important announcement. As many of you know, writing is now my job. While I love WN, not being contracted means that I earn no money here. All chapters are posted because I like you guys and enjoy having readers who give feedback and like the story. In the past, I toyed with the idea of taking the story down and putting it all on Kindle Unlimited, or some other site with exclusivity. But I decided against that because I don"t want to do that to you guys.
However, bills are bills, and I feel like I might have reached a decent compromise. I plan to remove part of vol1 from WN (ch6-36) in order to put it on Kindle Unlimited. New chapters will still be posted here on WN though. The downside to this is that it means that new readers will most likely be unable to get into the story without buying either the book on Amazon (2.99 USD) or having Kindle Unlimited. I will most likely get more bad reviews, and the rankings will definitely fall as new readers will not discover eFate.
The only other option for me would be to get more patrons. I am steadily increasing the bonus chapters available, and plan to make more tiers soon, hopefully with a better chapter to dollars spent ratio. But at the moment I only have 3 patrons, so that route doesn"t seem to be working too well.
Anyone have any thoughts on this? I"m making okay money from amazon without KU, but that number will drop heavily after the first month is up. Ideally, I can just leave the entire story up, but I"m not sure if the minor influx of new readers that WN provides non-contracted works is worth it.
Worst Case Scenario: I can always put it up on KU, and take it down later if I find it"s not worth it.