Free Web NovelChapter 121: Chapter 120: One Arrow, and the Exam Ends
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The special ability that, in Digimon Adventure, had let Rookie-tier Digimon warp-evolve all the way to Mega tier had, in card form, retained its original function and gained a new one. It could be used on other card spirits as well. The tier increase was limited to a single level when applied externally, but even at that scale, it was comparable to the Eye of Timaeus.
"No," Luke corrected himself, thinking it through. "If Arrow of Light strikes a Digimon card specifically, the effect exceeds the Eye of Timaeus."
He recalled the warp evolutions of the first-generation protagonist Digimon, and an idea began to form.
"If I craft a second Digimon card, could I use Arrow of Light to give it Mega-tier power directly?"
The thought spiraled outward.
"Or, for that matter, could Angewomon absorb her own Arrow of Light to warp-evolve herself? Nothing in the skill description says she can’t target herself."
A self-contained evolution loop. Produce the catalyst and consume it within the same card lineage. The possibilities Arrow of Light opened up were genuinely substantial.
Luke set the speculation aside. Those ideas were for later testing. Right now, he had a final opponent to deal with.
"Angewomon, end this battle."
He gave the command, his gaze settling back on the arena. Angewomon and the Polaris Whale were both Seven-Star, but Angewomon’s quality grade had reached Legendary, a tier above Perfect. On the quality axis, she comprehensively outclassed the Polaris Whale.
Size was the whale’s advantage. Size was not the same thing as strength.
"Understood!"
Angewomon’s eight wings swept once, and she shot toward the Polaris Whale’s position at high speed.
"Intercept!" Iris Dawnford commanded.
"Hmmmm."
The Polaris Whale’s whale-song rolled through the arena, and an even more spectacular array of waterspouts twisted into being, connecting ground to sky in a surrounding formation. Beyond that, a sea of stars came pouring inward from the void overhead, like a galaxy cascading down from the ninth heaven, the entire display radiating an intent to erase everything in its path.
"This is the Polaris Whale’s signature combination technique. Whalefall, All Things End." Iris’s face was full of confidence and pride. "However strong your card spirit is, there’s no escaping it."
The opening waterspout had failed to crack the Digital Egg’s defense, but that had not been the Polaris Whale’s true strength. Whalefall, All Things End operated at a tier of attack power and destructive radius that the earlier waterspout couldn’t begin to match.
"That’s not necessarily true," Luke said, shaking his head.
Angewomon’s wings beat, and she slipped through the maze of waterspouts and inward-pouring star-sea with motions of impossible grace. Even in an environment that chaotic and shifting, she moved with complete composure.
"Good grief, that agility and flight control are maxed out!"
"The visuals on this. If it weren’t a combat feed, I’d genuinely believe an angel had descended into the mortal world!"
"Obviously. That card spirit is an angel."
"Why are you all just standing there? Screenshot it! Every single frame could be printed and framed as wall art."
In the eliminated candidates’ plaza, every spectator was captivated by the sight of the angelic card spirit gracefully threading the Polaris Whale’s attack. The discussion surged. But where there was excitement, there were also discordant voices. freewēbnoveℓ.com
"Hmph. A perpetual defense always fails eventually. So she dodged this round. She’ll get hit sooner or later."
"Right. One glancing hit from the Polaris Whale’s attacks and she’s crippled." The discordant voices were, predictably, mostly from Stormvale candidates.
They’d been eliminated, and they’d been dazzled by the angelic card spirit like everyone else, but they weren’t about to stand on the opposite side of Iris Dawnford. The exam had come down to two combatants. Whoever won was the year’s first-place finisher. Of course they supported Iris.
"However strong an attack is, if it can’t connect, it’s meaningless," a Capital candidate retorted on the spot. "And don’t forget, Luke’s card spirit is an angel-type. Angel-types have combat capability that holds its own against demon-types and dragon-types. You should be worrying about Iris Dawnford instead."
The Stormvale candidates backed Iris; the Capital candidates naturally lined up behind Luke. The remaining Mistvale candidates watched with relish, hoping the two combatants would eliminate each other, which would throw the question of which capital claimed first place wide open again.
Inside the churning interior of Whalefall, All Things End, Angewomon slipped past another waterspout and pressed her lips together thoughtfully. The combination technique didn’t only fill the space with roaming attacks. It also carried a peculiar heaviness, a downward weight that continuously eroded the speed of every enemy caught inside it.
Because light-element energy carried a purifying property, Angewomon wasn’t being controlled by the heaviness outright. But it was still affecting her, dragging at her movements at the margins.
"In that case, I’ll finish this all at once."
Unwilling to keep Luke waiting, Angewomon’s flying figure abruptly halted. She raised both hands high above her head.
"Saint Bubble!"
A burst of seven-colored light erupted outward, flooding the entire combat space. The rampaging Whalefall, All Things End was, in a single instant, completely arrested. The waterspouts froze. The pouring star-sea froze. The entire apocalyptic technique hung suspended in the air, a spectacle of surreal, world-class beauty.
"How is that possible!" Iris’s eyes filled with alarm. She quickly ordered the Polaris Whale into an even more violent assault.
Then came the detail that made Iris’s disbelief deepen further. It wasn’t only Whalefall, All Things End that had been frozen. The Polaris Whale itself had been arrested in place.
The whale strained against the suspension with its full strength and couldn’t break free. Iris nearly swore aloud. Even a card spirit as colossal as the Polaris Whale could be locked down by this skill. How absurdly broken was it? freeweɓnøvel.com
The scene that followed made Iris understand that she’d been seeing far too little.
The collapsing star-sea, the waterspouts connecting heaven and earth, all of it was drawn inward, absorbed into the Saint Bubble. The combat space, which had been crowded to the point of suffocation moments earlier, abruptly opened up, vast and empty.
The pure white glove on Angewomon’s left hand transformed into a feathered bow. Her right hand reached into the Saint Bubble and drew out a single arrow of light, an arrow radiating a heavy, oppressive pressure. Even across the enormous distance, Iris felt a genuine threat of death.
And from that arrow, Iris sensed something intimately familiar. It carried the aura of Whalefall, All Things End itself.
The Polaris Whale’s attack got absorbed?
Angewomon nocked the arrow, drew the feathered bow, and loosed the Holy Arrow with a posture of supreme elegance. The arrow crossed the arena in an instant and struck the immobilized Polaris Whale.
Under the gaze of every watching spectator, the Polaris Whale began to dissolve into drifting particles, the disintegration spreading outward from the point where the Holy Arrow had struck.
"Hssss." Across the eliminated candidates’ plaza, the spectators drew a collective sharp breath.
"Good grief. I finally understand what ’reduced to dust’ actually means. There is genuinely nothing left."
"A curbstomp. An absolute curbstomp. I told you Luke would win. Stormvale trash, are you watching? This is the Capital’s real strength!"
"Where are all the people who kept insisting Iris Dawnford would win? Faces a little swollen now?"
"Our Luke could hand you a one-handed handicap and still erase you."
The Capital candidates were, predictably, the most exuberant. Luke’s victory meant the Eastern Region’s first-place finish belonged to the Capital, a result that comprehensively outranked Stormvale and Mistvale.
