Living Life As A Game: Through And Through

Now, to begin her three selected Enchantments, Elizabeth first began by dipping her Inscriptions Pen in the blood of a Fire-type Beasts she had requested. Then, after charging her pen with a neutral-type monster core, her preparations for the first two inscriptions were complete. Elizabeth took the first talisman paper and began to lay down a hybrid inscription, the likes of which she had yet to actually attempt.

Of course, to play it safe, the first Enchantment would become the product of superimposing a Neutral Pressure Enchantment atop a Basic Combustion Enchantment; two Enchantments so easy, Elizabeth could probably inscribe them in her sleep. Two minutes later, Elizabeth cursed herself in retrospect as she certainly hadn"t the need to inscribe the two Enchantments so slowly; everything had gone perfectly as she imagined.

Setting aside the first completed Talisman, Elizabeth dipped her pen back into the beast blood and recharged her pen with another neutral monster core just to make sure her completed talisman became as powerful as it could be. In any other setting, this would be a total waste, but since the tournament organizers were so kind to let her waste materials, who was she to stop them?

Taking on the second talisman paper, Elizabeth chose to make another hybrid Enchantment; seeing how easily she had completed the first case. She laced down a perfect Storage Enchantment, then above that a Neutral Pulse Enchantment, and finally a Flameling Spark Enchantment to top it all off. This being the first time she tested her limits, Elizabeth wished she could add at least one more s.p.a.ce Enchantment above all the others, yet she was starting to go cross-eyed from looking at all the intersecting patterns on the small talisman paper; it was safe to say that three was her limit for now. Additionally, since she had let loose to increase inscribing speed, Elizabeth"s second completed Enchantment only took another two minutes to complete.

Moving on to the third and final Enchantment she would create for the purposes of the tournament, Elizabeth cleaned the remaining blood held within the cartridge chamber of her inscriptions pen and refilled it with neutral beast blood. No longer working in the realm of Fire Enchantments, but rather Time Enchantments, Elizabeth had no need to complicate her life when she wasn"t sure she could easily create a hybrid Enchantment.

Thus, with nothing but neutral beast blood and a final neutral beast core, Elizabeth only used her multipa.s.s technique with Time and Neutral Magic to create an "ordinary" Quicken Enchantment. Although the difficulty in creating a single Quicken Enchantment was much greater for Elizabeth to complete than the last amalgamation of Fire and Neutral Enchantments, because it was merely a single Enchantment and not a hybrid, she managed to complete the last Enchantment in about a minute and a half.

After completing her three Enchantments to perfection as she had hoped, Elizabeth turned in her completed talisman papers to her personal attendant and meditated the remaining time away. Proceeding with her meditation until the final results of the Event came out, she kept cultivating hidden potential until the runner up"s score was announced.

…

In the VIP area for judges, once again a meltdown was transpiring as Elizabeth"s Enchantments were too advanced for the judges to even probe. On one side there were two hybrid Enchantments one more ridiculous than the other and on the other side, there was an Enchantment which literally no one could recognize.

Hybrid Enchantments were already a beast of a problem to probe as even if the judges understood the fundamental components that made up the Enchantment, for perfect hybrids like the one Elizabeth turned in, even an iota of carelessness could cause an unwanted activation and tarnish the use of the Enchantment; at least if the Enchantments were single use, or limited use, as both Elizabeth"s hybrid Enchantments were.

Then that final Quicken Enchantment… it was utterly incomprehensible to all the standing judges and even Hybrid Enchantments paled in comparison to the dangers presented by unknown Enchantments. At least with the hybrids, they could piece together what the potential effects of the Enchantment would be, but for the unknown? Imagine not knowing if the item in your hand was a ticking time bomb or a lifesaving treasure. What judge would dare attempt the gamble of probing the unknown? At least for the context of the tournament, they would need to bide for time and move to a discreet location to test the effects of the talisman, so as to ensure nothing goes awry.

Alas, they didn"t have that kind of time and without a pract.i.tioner of Time by their side, it would be even harder to test for the effects of the Quicken Enchantment. Thus, the judges had to make due by calling for the best Enchanter nearby and have them judge the two Hybrid Enchantments.

Fortunately, the head Enchanter present for the Wushi Tournament had an affinity for Fire and could provide a relatively accurate judgment of Elizabeth Fire and Neutral Hybrid Enchantments. As he first came into the possession of the two Enchantment Hybrid, the head enchanter nodded his head and spoke with a tint of surprise in his voice. He said, "Very good! This is the most complete Searing Pressure Enchantment I"ve seen in my life! This nasty little Enchantment… I bet it could survive two or even three uses if the enemy didn"t get to tear it before dying."

Moving on to the next Hybrid Enchantment, the triple Hybrid Enchantment, the head Enchanter frowned as he stared at the talisman for well over a minute. Suddenly he had a look of enlightenment dawned on his face before a bitter terror for whoever was unlucky enough to face this hidden deathtrap briefly shook his senses. With a nervous shake of the head, the Head Enchanter said, "This… is an enhanced version of the Blazebomb Enchantment. Added to the regular Blazebomb"s Flameling Spark Enchantment and Storage Enchantment, there seems to also be a Pulse Enchantment to exponentially increase the size and degree of damage the explosion causes."

Listening to the Head of Enchanting, the original judges all drew cold breaths as they envisioned accidentally setting either Enchantment off by mistake. The Searing Pressure Enchantment would consume a target — a careless judge, for example… — in a blazing heavy pressure somewhat reminiscent to being chucked into a firestorm. The advanced Blazebomb Enchantment, however… Given Elizabeth"s Mage King Levels of Spiritual Parameters, it wouldn"t be difficult for the Enchantment to discharge with the force of a tenth of a kiloton of TNT.

As the Head Enchanter left the judges to deal with the two Hybrid Enchantments, he picked up the last Enchantment and similar to the other judges, he had no luck deciphering what the inscriptions would do; he couldn"t even understand the energy source lying within the talisman. However, based solely on his judged regarding Elizabeth two hybrid Enchantments, she was more than qualified to take first place.

…

With the judging concluding after the Head Enchanter gave insight to the judges of Elizabeth"s Hybrid Enchantments, the announcer soon took to the mic and began announcing the final results. When he got to the runner up, Elizabeth"s eyes shot open to hear what her the next best Enchanter in her division came up with and if she were honest, she couldn"t knock the runner up as they had made a relatively impressive Enchantments.

However, even if the runner up was relatively impressive, he could only make do with Two Neutral Hybrid Enchantments and one pure Fire-type Enchantment. Compared to the amazing cheers he received for making those "relatively" impressive Enchantments, the reveal of just Elizabeth"s Hybrid Enchantments quickly stole the spotlight as it usually did…

At this point, the crowd would only return a stark silence whenever Elizabeth"s results completely overshadowed the compet.i.tion as it seemed like she was on a completely different league. Being amazed by her at this point was like being impressed that a King Stage pract.i.tioner wiped the floor with a p.a.w.n Stage pract.i.tioner.

However still… the crowd though impressed felt an itch as the judges didn"t reveal Elizabeth"s third and final Enchantment. As was the case, one of the more brazen spectators yelled out, "What about her third enchantment?!" Slowly, that one comment bubble and boil on the everyone. The crowd, the compet.i.tors on the stage, even the judges and Head Enchanter wished to know what kind of ridiculousness lay behind the mystical third enchantment.

Thus, no one stopped the arena from increasing their fervor and with the world appearing to descend into chaos so long as the mystical third enchantment stay a mystery, the poor interviewer approached Elizabeth with a helpless smile on his face. Returning a shrug herself, Elizabeth nodded so as to get along with the days Events.

The interviewer asked her, "Seems like everyone wants to know what the magical third enchantment is… Care to enlighten us?"

"Uh, sure… My third enchantment is a Quicken Enchantment~"

"Wh-ok? What does a Quicken Enchantment do exactly?" Seeing Elizabeth stop after only decla.s.sifying her Enchantment"s name, the interviewer pressed on, not out of malice, but because he had simply never heard of a "Quicken Enchantment." A fact that would scare most people as the job of Interviewer would fall on one of the most knowledgeable people within the entire Martial Society. Having to know most advanced to ever master level knowledge of all secondary occupations and cultivation as well, one would have an easier time finding a Grandmaster than they would someone capable of becoming an interviewer for the Wushi Tournament.

"The Quicken Enchantment is an advanced Mortal Grade Time Enchantment that speeds up its target"s time relative to the world around them. It"s a single use enchantment that fuses with its target for a couple minutes and causes their bodies to experience time several times faster than usual." As if she were reading from a book, Elizabeth gave the textbook definition for the Quicken Enchantment.

"T-time Enchantment?" Utterly blown away by a term never before heard in his life, the interviewer simply couldn"t respond with anything other than asking for confirmation.

Of course, Elizabeth"s reaction was like she was confronting an amateur as she said, "Yeah… You know, like a Fire Enchantment uses Fire Qi? My Time Enchantment uses Time… Qi." It used Time Magic, but that didn"t discount the fact that Martial Pract.i.tioners who studied Time Qi could achieve the same results.

"I see… So you"re a pract.i.tioner of Time! How very rare..." Even rarer was the fact that she somehow came into contact with Time Enchantments, but now was probably not the best time for the interviewer to bring up that fact…