Third Person POV
The next day, practical duels started. These were important as they decided the rank of a student within the academy, but these ranks were not determined until the 6th month after the start of the duels. Icarus stood with the same expression he had worn since yesterday, not bored, not anxious, just utterly unimpressed, as if the academy was beneath the weight of his attention. On the contrary, Selene was nervous, as she was not someone who liked to fight. Orin was excited to show off his skills. Nova walked in, his needle ready in his hand. He pulled the thread of silence, and immediately silenced the excited students. "Split up into teams of 2," he then looked straight at Icarus, "Veyn, come here. Observe first."
Icarus internally chuckled at the 'joke', "Observe? Fine. Let them pretend I need the lesson. It changes nothing." He nodded and acknowledged it, not politely, but dismissively.
To this, Orin scoffed and asked, "Why can't he practice with us, professor?"
"Orin Deyth, do you truly believe you can stop him if he misweaves?" This brought out some condescending giggles from the students. Icarus, on the other hand, to be smiling with amusement, one eyebrow raised.
"Of course not sir. Only you could stop him if he misweaves."
"Not really, even I probably can't stop his misweave…" he said quietly, fully aware many students would hear that. And many students did hear that, all of whom uttered a collective "Huh?"
"Anyways, even aside from him misweaving, none of you would learn anything from duelling him, because his weaving is very natural and it won't make any sense to any of us." This praise soured Orin's mood. He glared at Icarus, who glared right back, before breaking the staring competition, not out of embarrassment or fear, but because he didn't even consider him competition. All the students wanted to refute Nova, but nobody dared, as they knew he was right.
All of them split into groups of 2, but nobody wanted to fight against Orin, as it would make them lose automatically. He was getting frustrated, until Lynaeus walked upto him.
"Deyth, I will be your duelling partner." Orin looked at Lynaeus, whose eyes seemed confused, as if he couldn't decide on something. "Alright, get ready then." They waited until it was their turn to duel, then walked up to the arena. "Corvus, you also seem to hate that loser. What is your reason?"
"Is that what it seems like?" he paused for a second before continuing, "I don't hate Icarus. It is more akin to fear, and respect."
"Huh? Fear? Respect?" he scoffed, "For him? I see you're also still clinging onto his prodigy tag." He paused for a second, and spoke loud enough for Icarus to hear, "In this duel, I will show you what a real genius looks like." Lynaeus sighed in response, and they both got ready to duel.
"Start," yelled Nova. Orin immediately weaved fire and shot it towards Lynaeus, who weaved ground in response. He then weaved water not to attack, but to make the ground beneath Orin slippery, who ignored it, and instead wove lightning to shoot powerful strikes towards Lynaeus. He used the quick thread, first on himself to dodge the attacks, then on Orin to make him speed up randomly. As Orin lost his balance, Linnaeus piled on the attacks, weaving ice first, and then ground in the next pile. Just as Orin was about to be hit with the attacks, instantly wove lightning on himself to accompany the quick cast on him, and moved very quickly to dodge and approach Lynaeus. His speed was so fast that most students weren't even able to keep up with his movements. Linnaeus, however, had seen much worse situations on the battlefield, and calmed himself down, and used the barrier thread to block off the routes of Orin, as at that speed, he wouldn't be able to dodge. Orin, thinking quickly, wove wind and moved himself onto a new path and continued his charge. Lynaeus kept on weaving barrier until Orin reached him, then immediately wove ground to elevate the ground under Orin shooting him up. Orin was prepared for this and immediately counterwove wind to push him off the elevated ground and lightning to shoot himself towards Lynaeus. Just before impact, he also wove thunder to force Lynaeus to respond. Lynaeus was thinking of taking the hit and then countering, but as he saw that last minute weave of thunder, he was forced to dodge by moving the ground underneath him. Orin landed and took his distance. Frustrated and eager to prove himself, he pushed himself far beyond what was appropriate for a simple duel. He announced to Lynaeus, "This will be the last move."
He wove 2 threads, thunder and wind together, forming a thunderstorm and hurled it towards Lynaeus. "It's only a damn duel, there is no reason to weave 2 threads here, you idiot," Lynaeus spat at Orin, as he tried to dodge. He wasn't able to dodge it, as the winds from the thunderstorm pulled him in.
Just as it was becoming too dangerous for Lynaeus, Nova told Icarus to step in and stop this, as if he knew for sure that he could handle it, "Veyn, show them." Icarus smiled wider and said, "I was starting to get bored." He raised his hand to assess the storm. He then flicked two fingers through the air. Thunder and wind wrapped together, cleaner, sharper, more precise than Orin's attempt. His storm didn't clash, it overwrote the first one, unraveling it thread by thread. Like a king correcting a child's handwriting. This stopped the winds, but the area was still filled with the static. He moved towards the falling Lynaeus and caught him, effortlessly, almost in a bored manner. "I will not let a duel claim someone under my watch. That would be sloppy," he muttered to Lynaeus. then wove metal to create a lightning rod.
Eventually, the static subsided. Orin saw how incredibly Icarus wove and countered his best spell almost instantly and was in despair. He looked shattered, his confidence had cracked visibly. All the other students were in awe at the brilliant duel and then the genius weaving of Icarus, however everyone stepped away from him, fearing a misweave. Everyone except Selene, that is. She looked at Icarus in awe. It didn't come though. The misweave never came. Nova quietly maintained Life threads in the background, routine precaution, nothing more.