This Beast-Tamer is a Little Strange

The strategy for Phase Two of the competition was similar to that of Phase One for most teams—unless it couldn't be avoided, the strongest individuals on each team would not appear.

Therefore, even after several matches, neither Ezra nor Ravi had made a move yet.

In fact, Dark Moon actually probably had one of the easiest times advancing through the competition. For those teams lower in the ranking, Edward was able to handle three or four of the opponents without getting too tired. Occasionally, managing to get rid of whole teams on his own.

However, the true key to the ease with which they advanced was probably Venessa.

One match.

It only took

one match

for Venessa and her contracts to build an infamous reputation as living toxins.

After one of her opponents had had all of his contracts poisoned, and the antidote administered, it was found that all of them were still not in a good enough condition to continue competing. No amount of elixirs and healing skills would improve their condition in time before the tournament ended—forcing the rest of his team to continue with only four, since substitutions are not allowed.

That student was forced out of the competition after just meeting Venessa once, so from that moment on, an interesting phenomenon was seen whenever Venessa took to the stage.

"We abstain!"

"We give up!"

"We would like to concede the remaining matches…"

Venessa, despite only really fighting once, managed to be in the top ranks for the most amount of wins within the tournament since all of the remaining opponents she would have to face always gave up without a fight.

Of course, this was only possible because the opponents were outside of the top 5, they had no hope of actually defeating Dark Moon or ranking within the top 5. Their priorities were to secure a ranking outside of the top 5 as high as possible.

But if they fought with her and she ended up removing some of the contestants completely from the tournament, they would have to face the remaining matches at a huge disadvantage.

Why would they fight with her and cripple themselves over a match they hadn't planned to win in the first place? For pride? What use is pride when your entire college's funds and resources are cut for a year due to a lower ranking.

Just look at the school that had one boy unable to continue due to her! They were originally ranked 11th and had high hopes of being able to increase their ranking this year due to a talented lineup.

After defeating the higher-ranked 9th and 7th-place teams, it did seem like this dream could be realized…

However, all of these dreams were brought to a screeching halt by that damn woman!

Since only being able to continue with four members they'd even lost to the lowest ranked 16th placed team!

If they are lucky, their earlier wins against stronger schools still might help them to preserve a relatively decent ranking and not drop too far beneath their current 11th placed ranking, but if not…

The lead professor of the 11th ranked college shuddered at the thought of what awaited him once he went back to face their iron-blooded Chancellor. The same Chancellor that tied up all staff and students who represented the school in the one year they had dropped outside of the top 20, and hung them outside of the school gates to shame them for a week…

Watching the other colleges learn from their miserable defeat and resolutely giving up whenever Venessa took the stage, he couldn't help his face turning red with hatred.

Cowards!

But he knew that he was just upset that nobody was taking the initiative to jump down to join him in the pit he'd already sunk into.

Therefore, by the time only 4 matches were left in Phase Two (all against the other top 5 colleges), Dark Moon hadn't had to reveal much of any of its strength.

Jade, Ravi, and Ezra hadn't had to fight even once, and Venessa after one relatively easy battle, won by just climbing the stage…

That was until the match against Frozen Sun.

The difference between students in and outside of the top 5 colleges was apparent from the first match.

Frozen Sun had invested much of their resources into the younger generation, preferring to invest in the future and achieve a ranking within the top 3 in two to three years, instead of right now.

However, even despite their third and fourth years being considered as the weakest within the top 5 colleges, not one of their students shied away from Venessa…nor did they need to.

It just so happens that ice-attribute spiritual creatures are among the least susceptible to poisons, and with the college's rich heritage and resources, the top 5 students of Frozen Sun would naturally have multiple means of dealing with Venessa.

Bam!

A giant fist made of ice landed heavily on the body of a neon-green serpent— one of Venessa's contracts.

Naturally, the surrounding spiritual creatures attempted to retaliate, but even with the various effects of their poisons—not only capable of causing illness, but capable of corrosion and intense heat as well—barely any damage was done to the fist. Clearly, the black ice composing the opponent's ice golem was exceptional in hardiness.

Similarly, one of the few of the opponent's spiritual creatures that was squishy enough to be bit or scratched by Venessa's simply froze the infected area and continued on as if nothing had happened. But despite the ease with which this was done, very few creatures at the blue-grade level could create ice at a low enough temperature to achieve this effect—not that everyone watching realized how difficult this feat was.

Those watching from other teams couldn't help but be stunned. Their faces then began to blush at the stinging and disdainful eyes of the audience. If that inhumane combination of poisons could be so easily frozen, wouldn't they have done that?!

Frozen Sun so easily handling her was making them all look bad, dammit!