Chapter 517: Partners and Brothers, the Competition Begins

Soon everyone was seated. The three main seats were occupied by Princess Xiya and representatives from Yierlan and Keman, while the several secondary seats on both sides were occupied by seven Great Arcanists, including Iolum, as well as one Dwarf and two Elves.

As superiors, there was naturally no need for them to say much; just showing their faces was already quite good. This Arcane Competition was hosted by a Senior Arcanist named Elkamon.

After this Elkamon, who looked like a kind old man, finished introducing himself, he began the official opening of this Snow Melting Competition:

"Mages of Netheril! Friends from afar, Elves and Dwarves, in response to the strong request from the Keman side, this Snow Melting Competition will add participants from the Keman side, and the competition format will also be adjusted."

As soon as the words fell, there was silence. These situations were likely known to all the Mages who should know, except for the only twenty or thirty ordinary people who did not.

However, because a Great Arcanist was present, and the speaker was also a Senior Arcanist, no one heckled. Xia Duo always felt that the atmosphere inside this Arena was a bit strange.

He hadn't found the reason before, but now, he realized that it was because it was too quiet here.

When Xia Duo was on Earth, he had also watched competitions. Whether it was basketball or games, the scene was always very lively. Even at the quietest times, there would be a "buzzing" background sound.

That was the sound of the audience whispering. Although one person's voice was very small, when there were many people in the whole venue, the sounds overlapped and became lively.

But here, the ordinary people who managed to sneak in hardly dared to breathe, and the Spellcasters were wary of the Great Arcanists above. Even if they wanted to talk, they would use Sending or cast a one-way Soundproof Barrier.

This resulted in the venue being very quiet, with only some breathing sounds and the sound of clothes rustling. Even though Xia Duo's hearing had improved significantly after his Bloodline Awakening, he did not find it noisy.

It is no exaggeration to say that it was even quieter than writing alone in the Study.

Of course, this did not include the voice of the competition host—Arcanist Elkamon.

"The friendship between Netherese and Elves is long-standing, and the Snow Melting Competition has been held hundreds of times." Standing next to the battle platform, Elkamon spoke eloquently, recounting the history of the Netherese and the Elves.

Many books contain the history of Netheril, but Xia Duo listened quite carefully. It was not to show off in front of the Great Arcanists, but because Elkamon told many details about the interactions between the Netherese and the Elves.

These were things Xia Duo did not know before, such as Elves sacrificing themselves to save Netherese villages, Netherese Mages and Elves falling in love and marrying, and Netherese people defending Yierlan against the invasion of the eastern Orcs, and so on.

The official statement certainly had some processing, but generally, it could be seen that the initial friendship between Netheril and Yierlan was quite good.

Yes, the friendship between the Netherese and the Elves here specifically refers to the Netherese and the Yierlan Elves, not Keman. For Keman, the description given by Elkamon was—a friendly cooperative partner of Netheril.

But for Yierlan, it was—Netheril's enlightening mentor and blood brothers.

As for the Dwarves, because there were indeed Dwarves present, Elkamon also mentioned them in passing—a friendly neighbor whose friendship is as solid as rock.

In the audience, Xia Duo, who had received political education, could roughly hear the deep meaning in Elkamon's words, while Niya and most other human Spellcasters were mostly immersed in this beautiful diplomatic relationship.

It was the Elves, perhaps due to the depth of thought brought by their language, who could understand it better than humans. Xia Duo couldn't help but sigh that, apart from systematic education, this kind of thing can probably only be slowly improved with time.

Casting a Soundproof Barrier, Xia Duo asked Niya, "Elves from Yierfalan are also present, but Elkamon did not mention them. Have you heard any rumors about Yierfalan at Giles Tower?"

Niya tilted her head and thought for a while, then finally shook her head, "No, if there was any real news, it would have spread long ago."

That was true. There was nothing to keep secret about this. If there was any news, it should have spread. If not, it should be a problem on Yierfalan's side.

While the two were talking, Elkamon had already finished introducing the thirteen superiors sitting in the first and secondary seats.

In the first seat, besides Princess Xiya, the two Elves were representatives of the Crown Kings of Yierlan and Keman, both of whom were High Mages.

As for the secondary seats, Xia Duo already knew the seven from the Netheril side. The remaining three, besides the two Elf High Mages, included a Dwarf wearing armor and carrying a hammer.

Elkamon's introduction for him was—a Holy Hammer Warrior of the Danzuo Kingdom.

"Niya, have you heard of Holy Hammer Warriors? Are there no Mages among the Dwarves?"

The records about Dwarves in the Tower of Time were very scarce. Perhaps Xia Duo hadn't flipped to them, but it was indeed the first time he had heard of a Holy Hammer Warrior. If there were Holy Hammer Warriors, would there be Gold Hammer Warriors, Mithril Hammer Warriors, and the like?

"Of course Dwarves have Mages. That Holy Hammer Warrior is actually a Mage. Holy Hammer Warrior is a special title used to refer to figures among the Dwarves who are comparable to Great Arcanists."

Seeming to feel that this explanation was a bit inappropriate, Niya continued, "There are also Mages who specialize in spells among the Dwarves, but they are very few. Most of them also practice martial arts, similar to the Sword Singers among the Elves."

So that's how it is. Xia Duo nodded subconsciously. Looking at it this way, currently only Netheril does not have this kind of combat profession that uses Magic as an auxiliary.

Anyone with a little Magic talent went to be a Mage. Xia Duo couldn't figure out the necessity of this profession for a moment, but adhering to the principle of "if others have it, I must have it too," Magic Warriors or something could still be made.

In fact, Ximeng and others in Xia Duo's Territory had the potential to become Magic Warriors, but their auxiliary Magic was not cast by themselves, but provided by Magic Scrolls from Xia Duo.

Xia Duo's original intention was to arm a group of ordinary people with Magic to reach the level of resisting Spellcasters. The future vision was probably the Spell Breaker that was very popular in a game once.

Seriously speaking, shouldn't the so-called Magic Warrior theoretically become a Spell Breaker?

Various thoughts flashed through his mind, and the prelude to the Snow Melting Competition also ended. The competition officially began—

The first to start was the traditional event 【Spell Duel】. There were 10 contestants from each of the three sides. In the past, when there were only Netheril and Yierlan, there were also 10 people, but everyone had to fight everyone else from the other side.

After all, the origin of the Snow Melting Competition was the guidance of Yierlan Mages to Netherese Mages. Of course, they had to compete as much as possible.

However, this year, with the addition of Keman, the format changed.

For the Netheril side, it meant first challenging an Elf Mage from the Yierlan side, then Yierlan challenging Keman, and finally Keman challenging Netheril, cycling in order.

Each Spellcaster only needed to compete in two matches: one challenge and one accepted challenge.

As for the rankings, it was also different from the past. In the past, it was a round-robin tournament, and one just compared the number of wins to calculate the individual ranking of the Spellcaster.

But this year, individual rankings of Spellcasters were no longer compared; only national rankings were counted. In the 【Spell Duel】, only those who won both matches could count as a win, and the one with the most wins was, of course, the first place.

The lowest was third place.

It looked much friendlier, but the competitive nature was even stronger.