In the end, I ended up sleeping until the next day. As soon as I ate, I felt so tired that I almost passed out at the table. I think I only woke up one time, and that was when Sophie crawled into bed with me. You would think I would wake right up if I felt someone climbing into my bed out of nowhere, but I could smell Sophie’s scent, so I knew it was okay.

It was now early in the morning. The sun had yet to come up, but my inn room was lit up like a christmas tree. Annie and the other two maids were busy preparing for the long day packing all kinds of food that they had been cooking since last night, I guess. Thurul had come over an hour ago and was sitting in the living area talking with Runa and Sei, who seemed to have hit it off quite well. Why Runa was even here, though, was beyond me. I guess she must have stayed the night. And with how Sei and Runa were getting along, I guess she stayed in Sei’s room.

And currently, I am eating a large breakfast. There was plenty of meat and eggs to go around. Toast with jam and with what I call this world’s fried sweet potatoes. There were even a few desserts to make sure I had enough sugar in me as well. It might seem like I am overeating, but this was because I would probably not have much time between matches. Gesel had mentioned something before about how they make you wait on your battle stage after winning a match. I guess it was because they needed to keep track of all participants.

After a hearty meal, everyone got everything together and packed the carriage. Sei had gotten us a larger carriage this time around because there were so many people. It was kinda like the limousine of carriages. It had side sears instead of the normal front to back seating. With our items placed securely in an overhead compartment, we all headed off to the stadium.-.

It took about an hour to get to the stadium, then another ten minutes to get to the entrance so we could get our things and get off. Many people were doing the same as we were and had many things in their hands as they made their way into the stadium. Because the stadium was between an outer section and an inner section, one could set up tents and camp out during competitions like this.

A lot of people who came from out of town, whether they were a contestant or not, would take up a small spot in order to save on costs. There were never any issues about any bad things going on. The guards at the stadium were all very strong and patrolled day and night. The gates were even closed after a certain time at night unless the battles were still going on. So it was one of the safest places to be for those coming to the tournament.

As we made our way inside, I had to separate from Thurul, Sophie, and the other girls. I walked with Sei and Runa to the battle stage area. But before we could pass through the doors, we were met by two people. “Gesel! Sir Derek!”

“Geh! Sei!” Gesel wanted to run and hide but was quickly pulled back by Sei.

“Gesel, I was looking all over for you yesterday after the matches. I was wondering why you were having so much trouble with your battle stage… Let’s have a nice chat before the next portion of the tournament begins, shall we?” Gesel turned and looked at me for help, but I just so happened to have seen a spot on the stone ceiling that looked quite interesting. I guess it wasn’t only me who thought this was as well since Sir Derek and even Runa were staring at different spots as well.

I could hear Gesel’s pleas for help echoing down the hall. I felt bad, but I would rather not have to deal with Sei either. I turned and looked at Sit Derek and greeted him. “Good to see you this morning.”

“Yes, it is. Little girl, I came to give you a warning.” Sir Derek leaned over and whispered into my ear. “Some of the nobles have placed fighters in the tournament when they heard you had signed up. They plan to make an accident happen.”“Oh? Hehe…” Now, this was interesting information. So they decided to start with me before doing anything else. “It looks like I should show a bit more of my abilities during the tournament. Sir Derek, I do thank you for the information, but I thought you retired.”

“I did but passing some info on to you is a simple matter. It would have gone through Sei, but the timing of it all was not good. Too short of a notice to get someone trustworthy to pass her the news. It was found out earlier this morning. And since I was joining the fun here, the King asked me to relay the news.” Sir Derek explained. I guess that would be the best method. I am sure as someone who was one the top of the black knights, he was really close with the King and had the ability to contact him outside of the normal channels.

I kinda wish I had an easier way to contact Adel. Sei has to make trips back and forth to the floating island. Well, I am sure I will figure something out in the future. Now that I know how runic inscriptions work, I can maybe make a kind of telephone thing sometime in the future. A portable phone type device.

“Well, I still thank you, and I do apologize for you having to go out of your way to give me this information. But rest assured that no idiot in this place will be able to do much harm to me.” I really couldn’t wait to see just what these idiots have in store. Luckily they came for me first. But I know once they fail here, they will begin to do things in a more dirty manner.

“It’s no problem. Just remember to meet me in the finals. I want to fight the little lady who can destroy the world.” Sir Derek said with a loud laugh before turning and walking away.

“Why do I feel like my presence was completely ignored!?” Runa whined.

“Because you don’t stick out as much with that hood over your head. If you showed him your ears and wiggled them a bit, I am sure he would have seen you. After all, you are very cute.” I said in a teasing manner. This resulted in being punched in the shoulder.

With a laugh, I ran into the battle stage area before she could do another follow up attack. When I reached the battle stages, I stopped short because the fighters were all crowded around the center stage. Up in the air, the battle placements were in full view. I quickly found my name and saw that I was on stage number seven hundred seventy seven. I am not sure if this was supposed to be lucky or not or if this was some kind of bad omen. Either way, I did not plan to lose. I turned to Runa and patted her shoulder: “Don’t get ignored by your opponent, or you might end up having to sleep on the battle stage.”

“You! You better not lose either. I want to fight you!” Runa snorted before leaning in close. “Stay safe. I noticed quite a few powerful people here.”

I smiled and nodded my head: “You as well. Good luck!” I gave her a wave before running off. My stage was on the other side of the stadium, so it took almost five minutes to get here after having to push through the people. They spread everyone out in case of accidents, I guess. With all the stages, not many would be used at this time, but now these empty stages served as some kind of boundary between the fights. I guess I could understand this. Most during these one versus one matches, people will be going all out, which means larger attacks of all kinds.

As for me? I planned to eject as many people out of the stadium as possible. Well, maybe not out of the stadium, but close to it, at least across the battle area itself. I know I could use bigger spells but this spell just tickled my funny bone. I mean, how many people would use catapult magic to send people flying during a match? Not to mention to block it, you would need to negate the ground under your feet as well. or you would be sailing through the skies.

When I arrived at my battle stage, my opponent was already standing on one side. He was a tall man with a long skinny sword attached to his back. To be honest, it looked like it would break if I blew on it. Not that it matters since my sword will not cross paths with his…. Well, I at least hope so anyway.