Humanity's Hero Of Despair

It's been three weeks since our first meeting in the Revolutionary Room.

The HRC, Humanity's Revolutionary Committee, has grown beyond anything I could've imagined. Three weeks ago we were fifty students strong. These people mainly were recruited by Ignis. After the first two weeks, recruitment among trusted individuals expanded like wildfire.

When classes started back up because of the HLH not attacking the academy, our forces numbered over one hundred and fifty.

Every day in secret, we met up in the Revolutionary Room, trained to our heart's content, and absorbed knowledge like a sponge from the guidance of Justus. Classes started up again, and the Keepers did their best to pretend like nothing happened.

Many students who aren't involved with the HRC are distracted by their studies and the upcoming Glozaria Keeper Cup event. The Glozaria Keeper Cup is the real challenge for me.

Zephyr, Estes, and I started training right away under the guidance of Ignis. The results of our training make us undeniably stronger. Zephyr's wind magic is quick. Estes's earth magic is rock solid. My dark magic is improving by leaps and bounds. We just don't know if it is still enough to defeat the squads from the other Keeper Academies.

As the first day of the Glozaria Keeper Cup arrives, the West Arena is almost unrecognizable.

The Keepers expanded the arena to fit in more people, as the event attracts many viewers from around the three Keeper Academies. Students and teachers from all the Keeper Academies fill all the seats. The energy in the air is truly electric, even making me excited.

Zephyr, Estes, and I stand in our small room, which opens up into the arena. The crowd is roaring in anticipation.

"Are you ready for this?" Zephyr says, with a hint of nervousness in his voice.

"As much as I can be," I reply to him while trying to stay composed.

All three of the schools sent powerful students out onto the field. I know it will not be easy.

"Stay close to me, you two. I will step in more if it gets too tough. Our training has gotten us to this point," Estes says calmly.

The doors swing open. As the squads walk towards the center of the Arena, the crowd of people stands and cheers. The other students from the other schools look very tough, I think to myself as I study them. The crowd dies down as our Keeper Principal holds up his hands.

"Let the first event begin!" he shouts, his voice booming across the arena.

The crowd roars, signaling the start of the fight. Zephyr is the first to move, launching himself forward toward the opponents with the speed of a hurricane. His figure moves like a blur across the battlefield. His wand bursts into an explosion of green light as he manages to knock back two squad members from the Ryndoria team into the wall from sheer surprise.

"Zephyr from team Tarondar knocks back two members from squad Ryndoria!" the commentator announces to the crowd.

I follow Zephyr's motion of attack to keep up the momentum. Dark energy is surging around my body as I envision condensing my wand into my scythe.

BOOM! CRASH!

A large rock crashes nearby, causing a miniature earthquake. I jump to the side as an arrow made of ice almost impales me at the same time. The arrow still somehow makes contact with me, drawing blood as it skims me. I look in the direction from which the arrow is shot. Two members from the Oriventh squad are launching large rocks and ice arrows in our direction.

We don't have any time to waste for our follow-up attack if we want to keep the Ryndoria squad backed into the corner.

"Go!" Estes shouts at us as he points his wand at the ground, causing several gigantic walls made of stone to protect us from the long-range attacks. Observing how he grits his teeth, he holds his own against the onslaught. I don't need to be told twice. I use the cover from the wall to rush over to Zephyr.

The two squad members Zephyr had knocked into the wall are recovering. I quickly form my dark scythe of dark energy and swing it toward one of the Ryndoria members. Dark energy shoots out of the tip of my scythe straight into one of the Ryndoria member's chest causing him to be knocked back a dozen feet falling onto the ground and not being able to get back up.

The ray of dark energy I just used has a status effect of paralysis on it as I encase it with a sense of despair, which only strengthens me. I have grown, haven't I?

The other member of Ryndoria gets back up and gets back to his senses. The Ryndoria member starts pushing Zephyr back with intense water magic. Flashed of blue and green light up the arena as Zephyr struggles to defend himself. Zephyr looks like he is in trouble as the burst of water overwhelms him.

Our initial leverage and quick attack are fading.

We need to end this quickly. While Zephyr is holding his own, I take a glance at Estes. He is a force of nature, wielding his earth magic with such precision he is holding off three members of Oriventh. Someone is missing, I think to myself as I look around the arena.

"AH!" I hear a voice coming up from behind me.

A sneak attack is an excellent strategy unless you make noise while doing it. I sidestep the sword swing from the last Ryndoria member and spin around quickly, my scythe of darkness creating a massive arc to slash his chest.

CLING!

The Ryndoria member deflects my scythe for a moment by turning his wand into a sword.

He isn't able to deflect my hand though as I grab his face by surprise and slam it into the ground with enough force to knock him out using my dark magic to increase the force of the attack. I have no time for games. Though I hope I didn't hurt him too badly.

As I look up, I notice Zephyr's wind magic is not holding up as a good defense against the water mage from Ryndoria.

Ryndoria summons all of his mana into one more huge attack, which ends up knocking Zephyr out cold as waves with the power of the seven seas crash into him. The Ryndoria water mage ends up passing out due to using too much energy. In their specific fight, it ends up a draw.

The only people left are Estes and me, as well as the three Oriventh members.

Estes is running out of stamina as the Oriventh squad keeps up their onslaught of ice arrows and large rocks. Their water and earth spells start chipping at Estes. Their third member is protecting them from any close-range surprise attacks. I know we are going to lose if we can't put a stop to their onslaught.

Time to show what I learned in these past couple of weeks. I turn my scythe back into my wand and shout while pointing at the sky, "Seventh affinity dark magic, King of Fears!"

My wand radiates more dark energy. Large amounts of dark magic flow from the tip of my wand all around the arena. Right above the tip of my wand the dark magic forms a scary looking eye of energy. The dark magic expands across the entire arena, causing the Oriventh members to pause their attacks.

Estes feels confused as he watches the Oriventh members being cautious of me. Dark energy surrounds me, quickly drawing energy into my wand and around my body. The secret to this technique is the red eye of terror draws energy from people feeling afraid. The more afraid you are, the more powerful and scary it gets. Then it just keeps going on and on in a cycle, increasing in power until the victims of it are knocked out or killed.

I don't want this technique to kill them though.

Estes takes the chance of seeing the confused Oriventh mages and summons a large rock from the ground chucking it quickly at them before they could react.