Chapter 730 A Heart of Flames
Chapter 730 A Heart of Flames
"Let\'s go. I want to see the fight as well."
"You\'re right." Merida jumped off his lap and looked back, "I\'ll wait, but don\'t keep me waiting for long."
The two walked upstairs and returned to their seats.
Tempo stood alone in the arena, looking at the massive cage with wide-open eyes and a smile.
"This is hard! How could I make it out of this!" He sighed, looking worried as a massive chimera walked out of the cage, and then burst laughing at himself. "I didn\'t expect the first hurdle to come so soon!"
The chimera was a typical species that consisted of the body and head of a lion, the back hooves of a goat, and the front talons of an eagle. Its tail was a massive black snake, and it had two extra pairs of heads, one for the goat and the other for the eagle.
"I hand-picked this one for him." A teacher giggled, "We gotta see what the Titan\'s prince is all about."
Tempo sat on the ground cross-legged with his sword sheathed. He stared forward at the monster. "I\'m not fighting it!"
"HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" All the students cried, unable to believe what they heard.
"Is he that weak?"
"Did he get scared? What\'s going on?!"
"This might be a prank!"
"Get up! Fraud prince!"
All of them started booking him. Some even threw what they had in hand at him. "Come on! Do something!"
"He isn\'t that weak, is he?" Mira looked at Arad.
"For a titan, even without magic, his raw strength should be enough for him to blast that chimera with a flick of his fingers," Arad replied, staring at Tempo, "He has another reason in mind."
"You\'ll get disqualified." A teacher shouted from the upper seats, "You came here to build political relationships. But keep in mind that we don\'t mind kicking you back,"
"I don\'t mind!" Tempo replied, "That only means I was too naive to think someone as young as myself could have the wisdom to manage this! It\'s my lack of experience and knowledge!"
"I don\'t understand a word of what you say," The teacher sighed, "But you fail, sorry, but it ends here for you. This spells the end of the selection exams, everyone who won their match including Aron and Mira should head to their assigned dorms and get ready for tomorrow. Those who didn\'t kill their monster, gather your stuff to head back home."
The students looked at each other, confused. "Wait, this isn\'t happening, is it?"
"How could they fail the volcanic prince? They won\'t come to invade us, would they?!".....
"You!" A teacher growled, "That\'s going over the line, we can\'t just fail him. We should talk to him again and understand why he didn\'t fight the chimera."
The students slowly started to move out, but Arad and the boys remained sitting, staring at Tempo.
"Speak," Arad called in a calm voice, glaring at Tempo with glowing purple eyes. "Why don\'t you fight?"
Tempo slowly turned his head toward Arad with a smile. "You\'re a hypocrite, do you know!" He yelled with a straight face.
"I asked why you refuse to fight that chimera." Arad smiled.
"They are the same!" Tempor replied, and the students slowed down to listen to the talk.
"What are they talking about?" A teacher asked. "I don\'t care, let\'s hurry and restrain that chimera. We don\'t want it rampaging around." They started flying down.
"Who?!" Arad asked.
Tempo turned and pointed to the chimera sitting calmly in front of him, and then pointed at the students. "I came here as a convoy of peace so I don\'t kill. Humans, animals, and monsters are all the same to us Titans! As insulting as this might seem! But to us, they are weak lives worth preserving!" He looked at the chimera with a smile.
"As long as he doesn\'t attack me or anyone else! I shall not lift a finger at him!" He said with a straight face, eyes wide open as he sat in front of the chimera.
"You sure?" Arad stared at him, "I bet he killed countless people, animals, and monsters before. And I\'m sure you watched us all kill each other, why not stop us, why not punish him?"
"Monsters kill to feed, and your kind fighting monsters is none of my business! I didn\'t come here to lecture you on your own culture! I do not dictate other people\'s morals, but I dictate my own!"
Gojo giggled, "We\'re hypocrites as you said." He looked at Arad, whispering, "Even though we speak with animals, monsters, and humanoids alike, we sway toward humans and abuse the rest,"
The teachers reached the chimera, staring at it in confusion as this was the first time they saw such a monster sitting calmly in place. It has recognized Tempo as someone it can\'t beat and decided to never engage him. A weak, fragile animal suddenly found himself facing a massive predator. Its natural response was, ^If I don\'t move, he might just leave me alone. Sitting down, heads and limbs to the ground, try to look as small and unworthy of being a meal as much as possible.^
The teacher landed around the chimera and one of them looked at Tempo, "It\'s a shame."
"Indeed it is!" Tempo replied as they chained the chimera.
"Is it safe now?" One of the teachers asked with sweat dripping across her head, "I can take it down."
"Yeah, good work." The other teachers looked at her with a smile. She was the one responsible for protecting the students watching the matches with a massive barrier that encased the whole arena. She kept it intact for hours now, and it was starting to get painful.
She sighed, and the barrier around the arena flashed and disappeared with a crack.
"Finally, I can relax." She sighed.
Tempo turned toward Arad, "Sorry, but I\'ll be taking my leave now," He stood and started walking away, giving his back to the teachers who dragged the chimera into its cage.
CRACK! The chains shattered as the chimera flexed its muscles, violently swinging its snake tail and smacking three of the teachers away.
"It broke free!" One of the teachers growled.
"I thought those chains sealed off its magic!" They scrambled to cast spells and pin it down as Tempo walked away, "So you managed to free yourself! Good on you!"
ROAR! The chimera roared, lunging into the sky as two eagle wings burst out of its back.
"Don\'t tell me! It can fly?!" The teachers pointed their staff at it, firing several spells but everything just bounced off the monster\'s thick hide.
Having just grown wings due to pressure and fear, the chimera still couldn\'t fly and fell between the students in the seats.
The students who were listening to Arad and Tempo\'s talk were now terrified, running away as fast as they could. This isn\'t a monster any of them could face, "Run! Don\'t try fighting it!"
The chimera looked around, seeing several students fall as they ran above the stairs. It swung its claw at them, roaring in rage.
CLINK! With his thumb, Tempo unsheathed his blade. ^Kill those teachers if you want, they are the ones chaining you down. The students did you no wrong, and I can feel it. You are swinging out of rage and malice.^
A flash of crimson light illuminated the arena as a spark of heat flew above the teachers at a blinding speed. Tempo landed between the chimera\'s claw and the student, fully unsheathing his sword in an upward slash. "SLASH!"
The sword burned bright right with scarlet flames, cutting the chimera\'s forearm in half and searing the wound, preventing it from bleeding.
"Hehe!" The students gasped seeing Tempo\'s back between them and the chimera, "You won\'t harm anyone while I\'m here!" Tempo said with a smile, lifting his sword up.
The chimera roared, jumping back with its body expanding alongside its magic.
Veins bulged on Tempo\'s forearms as his eyes burned with a blazing flame, and his sword started smoking as it burned white from the sheer heat. Scarlet flames burst from the blade as it extended in length.
The chimera charged forward, ready to bite Tempo and blast him alongside the students with a strange magic.
All the candles in the arena burned in a blazing flame as the sky turned red. Tempo lunged forward, swinging his sword down in a powerful slash.
[Burning Bones]
With a blinding speed, Tempo blasted through the chimera engulfed in a red flash, cutting it in half from head to groin. He landed in front of Arad, staring at him in the eyes.
"You were about to take it down, but it is my duty as the one who let it live!"
The chimera\'s bones burst into flame, disintegrating it into ash that instantly burned again in a blazing flame as Tempo sheathed his sword.
Arad smiled, sitting with one leg on the other as he looked at Tempo\'s face. "So this is a Titan. Nice,"