"I… I admit defeat…" Lars muttered.
Alphonse's friends joined them in the center of the gymnasium as Alphonse stabbed the sword in the ground. He had contemplated returning the sword to Lars but he didn't want to risk the potential for Lars to act recklessly. Alphonse wasn't too fond of being stabbed in the back, after all.
"Alphonse, that was incredible!" Sasha remarked, "You were right, it didn't even take five minutes!"
Ethan tried to hold Sasha back from saying too much, as the losers of the duel were still present. "Hey, Sasha!" he shushed, "You shouldn't be rude!. But yeah, it's clear they had physical combat training before, but you still won. That was amazing!"
"Now will you leave him alone?" While Sasha and Ethan were both focused on congratulating Alphonse, Jessica was more concerned with the Halstein brothers ceasing their harassment of her friend. "Now he's beaten both of you, even when you cheated, so leave him alone now, alright?"
"... I didn't cheat..." Lars responded quietly.
Unable to accept that Lars's denial, Jessica lashed out, "What do you mean you didn't cheat?! You brought real swords and armor to a duel!"
Alphonse stated from behind her, "I don't think they cheated either."
"What?" his three friends asked at the same time. They thought that they had heard him wrong.
"They didn't cheat." Alphonse declared again, "We agreed on these rules ahead of time."
"That's right!" Lars shouted, "He agreed to this!"
He was about to get up and start shouting more, but Alphonse shut down that attempt with a glare.
"Jessica, look, Lars and his brother are nobles. As Ethan said, they've grown up with some combat training. With their wealth, it's no surprise that they have their own personal swords or armor." Alphonse continued, "What they DID have was an advantage."
"But that's why it's unfair, right?" Jessica thought aloud, "Aren't duels supposed to be about finding out who's more skilled where's the skill if the match is unfair from the get-go?"
"But that was part of their skills. Their prior training, their weapons, their equipment, and their teamwork today, that was all part of their skills." Alphonse explained, "If I were to happen upon a battle in the future, whether it be against a ruffian or another mage or even a knight, there's no way to make the other party give up whatever advantages they have and come down to your level just to have a 'fair match'. That's not how it works."
Alphonse paused for a moment to see if his friends could understand what he was saying.
"And even if that was how it would work, I would never want that to happen." Alphonse became bolder, "No matter what, it is best to resolve conflicts like this with both parties expressing all of their capabilities. The last thing I would want is for them to leave this battle today and think that they would have won 'If only they had their swords' or 'If only they had worn armor' or 'If only they could have worked together'. If they left with thoughts like that, the only thing they would do is continue scheming and trying to duel me again with thoughts of revenge."
"But with the way we fought today, they can only blame their own incompetence. If they wanted to defeat me, the only thing they can do is improve themselves. If they duel me again, it won't be for revenge, but for redemption." Alphonse kept explaining as he walked towards Lars.
"Now they should understand that before we are commoners or nobility, we are here as students. We are here to learn and improve our abilities through the study of magic. Regardless of our standing prior to joining this Academy, we are all just first-year students now." Alphonse reached his hand out to Lars to help him up to his feet before addressing him directly, "And now, I hope that you will understand that I was not intending on offending you by offering you help, to begin with. If anything, I wouldn't have helped someone who beat me to half-death the day before. But we're all students now, so we should all help one another, right?"
Lars couldn't respond. He felt the words stuck in his throat. He shakily took Alphonse's hands and pulled himself up. He didn't know that this was simply a quote stolen by Alphonse from his previous world from a niche An*me
"Sorry…" Lars muttered, averting his eyes.
"Hahah! You should also apologize to that girl you were harassing too!" Alphonse laughed light-heartedly, "We should take your brother to the dorm for now. He's been knocked out for a while, so he'll wake up anytime now."
Lars went and tried to pick up his brother, but turned around to ask Alphonse something first.
"Hey y- Alphonse. My brother and I are trained in the combat style of the Silver Lions, the official combat style of the Royal Knights of Aaro. What do you call your fighting style? You were able to use that rod, kicks, and even magic. Were you part of some Combat School?"
"My parents are merchants. They run the Silverwing Merchants group. But my mother was an adventurer previously and practiced both swordsmanship and brawling, basically what the average Warrior would do. I tried to make that my own and ended up with this theoretical style." Alphonse explained enthusiastically, "A Mage that can engage in physical combat; I call it a Battlemage."
"Pfft-! A 'Battlemage', huh…" Lars said as he put Otto's arm around his shoulder and lifted him, "I guess you have your weaknesses too." He then carried his brother out of the Gymnasium without saying goodbye.
"What does he mean by that?" Alphonse asked Ethan who had just joined him with Sasha and Jessica.
"Your naming sense…" Ethan sighed, "You call your fighting style a Battlemage? Aren't all mages that go into battle basically Battlemages?"
"He's never been good at naming things, though," Jessica laughed.
Alphonse could only smile and wonder what was wrong with that name. In his previous world, it was the name of a pretty popular role in an MMORPG! Even one of the most famous esports pros, YeQ*u played it!
---
The professors waited for the students to leave the gymnasium before undoing their invisibility spells. They had come to spectate the duel in secret.
Although not an act befitting that of a Professor, they still wanted to see what types of magic would be used and the aptitude of their students.
After all, the Autumn Duel was to be held this year in conjunction with the Aaro Academy of Knights, so they had a strong determination to find talented students to polish and show off.
However, this duel between Alphonse and the Halstein twins stole their breath and their hearts. They were captivated by the speed at which Alphonse had been able to adapt to the antimagic amulet as well as his ability to fight two opponents at the same time.
"Headmaster…" Professor Caebo was still filled with adrenaline from watching that match, "We should recommend student Alphonse as one of the representatives for the Autumn duel."
"I agree!" Professor Veronica chimed in, "His spellcasting is both fast and accurate, and he is completely unfazed by opponents that may be wielding swords!"
"Not only that, student Alphonse also has impeccable reaction speed and is capable of physical combat in addition to his spellcasting. And more than anything, I am most impressed by his sportsmanship and mindset when it came to dealing with this matter," Headmaster Flicker was truly bewildered by Alphonse's maturity in this whole situation, "Very well, we will recommend him as a representative for the upcoming Autumn Duel."
"Should we also promote him to the next Combat Magic class?" Professor Caebo asked, "As much as I'd love to personally teach him, if he were kept at the pace of the first year's class, he'd be held back too much."
"Let's bring this up again tomorrow. We can discuss this with Jax, Hans, and Grani as well. Maybe they'd be interested in picking him up." Headmaster Flicker considered.
"We should also ask student Alphonse if he would want to be promoted as well. If I recall correctly, didn't he have a friend in Professor Caebo's class? He might want to stay with his peers, after all…" Professor Veronica thought.
"Very well, we shall put these forth at the next staff meeting. If the other Combat Magic professors are willing to pick him up, then we can ask student Alphonse if he would like to take the promotion." Headmaster Flicker concluded.
---
Alphonse finally managed to get to his dorm after ensuring that his friends returned to their own dorms. As he expected, they wanted to stay longer to talk about the match and such. However, Alphonse had already planned to exercise tonight as well.
Having an exhausting duel wasn't an excuse to miss out on his daily practice!
Tonight, he planned to do running exercises and stretching in addition to what he had done previously.
He was currently a little worn out, as he had done a light jog on the way back to the dorm as well as twice around the dorm before coming in. It was already dark out, so by the time he came in, the lanterns at the entrance were already dimming.
"What are you doing out so late?" a girl's voice behind him asked.
Alphonse spun around to find an extremely attractive girl staring right at him. However, she also seemed quite familiar, but he couldn't quite remember if he had met her before.
"I just came back from running," Alphonse answered, still wondering where he had seen her before.
"Running? From what?" she asked, tilting her head slightly in confusion.
"Ah, not from anything in particular," Alphonse didn't know how to explain working out and cardiovascular exercise, "I just felt like running was the right thing to do."
The girl looked at him in astonishment for a second before giggling.
"What? What's that supposed to mean?" she laughed, "Are you always this weird?"
'Always?' Alphonse thought. 'So she does know Alphonse?'
But no matter how hard he searched through Alphonse's original memories, he couldn't remember who she was.
"Well, anyway, I was on my way back to my room. I'm glad to see you out of the infirmary though. I also heard what you did today!" She continued, "You got your revenge for them beating you up today, right!"
"Huh?" Alphonse looked at her. The only ones who knew about him getting beat up the day of orientation were his friends, the nurse, and…
"Thank you for protecting me that day, even though it ended up in you getting beat up. It was kinda cute, to be honest."