The tournant pulsed with an almost feverish energy.
The duos matches had wrapped up, and now the singles rounds were beginning.
The air practically humd with anticipation, but for Arthur, it was a prelude to sothing far more sinister.
He knew Cinder's endga was drawing near, and today's match, featuring Yang Xiao Long against rcury Black, was a critical piece of her wicked plan.
Arthur had taken his usual spot, a quiet corner in the stands where he could observe without drawing undue attention.
His gaze was locked on the arena, but his mind was already a step ahead, ticulously planning his intervention.
He wasn't just watching a fight; he was watching a setup.
"Now, I am going to cut the strings,"
Arthur murmured.
He'd tinkered with Erald's mind and rcury's balance, small, almost playful jabs.
But now, the stakes were higher. He wasn't just distracting them; he was going to dismantle Cinder's carefully constructed narrative.
The announcer's voice bood, introducing Yang, the fiery brawler from Beacon, and then rcury, the agile, kick-focused fighter.
The crowd roared its approval, oblivious to the undercurrent of deception that was about to unfold.
As the match began, Yang, true to form, charged in with her gauntlets blazing.
rcury, sleek and agile, danced around her attacks, his tallic boots flashing as he delivered a flurry of rapid kicks.
Arthur watched, his eyes narrowed. He knew rcury wasn't fighting to win; he was fighting to set up a fall.
rcury was good, undeniably so. He parried Yang's powerful punches, his movents fluid and precise.
He landed a few solid blows of his own, driving Yang back.
It was a convincing performance, designed to make Yang seem like she was being pushed to her limits, making her eventual "outburst" seem more plausible.
Arthur waited for the precise mont.
He knew Cinder's plan hinged on Yang appearing to lose control, to unleash a devastating attack that would seemingly cripple rcury.
The "accident" had to look genuine, an unprovoked act of aggression.
As Yang wound up for a particularly powerful punch, rcury moved in.
This was it.
This was where he would fake the devastating blow, where he would sell the illusion of a broken leg.
Yang was truly getting angry. She hadn't used what Arthur taught her yet. And Arthur was thankful for that.
'If she were to use what I taught her now. He is going to end up crippled for real. Illusion or not.'
Just as Yang's fist connected, Arthur channeled a surge of mana, not at Yang, and not directly at rcury, but at the kinetic energy surrounding rcury's aura.
Instead of letting rcury absorb the blow and subtly manipulate his aura to feign a broken leg, Arthur subtly redirected a fraction of the impact.
It wasn't much, just a slight alteration in the energy flow.
But it was enough.
Instead of collapsing dramatically with a supposedly shattered limb, rcury actually stumbled.
His carefully practiced fall beca genuinely awkward, his leg twisting beneath him in a way that he hadn't intended.
The illusion of a broken leg was supposed to be instantaneous, a sudden, horrifying snap.
But with Arthur's subtle interference, rcury's aura didn't quite dampen the impact as planned.
rcury let out a genuine grunt of pain, a stark contrast to the controlled groan he had practiced.
His leg didn't break, but it buckled, sending a jolt of real discomfort through him.
He fell, not in a perfect, theatrical sprawl, but in an ungainly heap, his face contorted in a mix of surprise and genuine annoyance.
The crowd gasped.
It wasn't the clean, shocking break they had been led to expect.
It was ssy, a little clumsy, and didn't have the imdiate, visceral impact Cinder desired.
Yang, who had been expecting rcury to recoil in the usual way, blinked in confusion.
She had landed the hit, yes, but rcury's reaction was… off. He wasn't screaming, he was just… grumbling, clutching his leg with a look of genuine discomfort rather than agony.
From her private box, Cinder's eyes narrowed to slits.
She saw rcury fall, but it wasn't the fall she had choreographed. The theatricality was missing.
The exaggerated pain wasn't there. He was still holding his leg, but the sheer impact and perceived damage she wanted to convey weren't landing.
"What was that?"
Cinder hissed, her voice barely a whisper.
"He was supposed to sell it! Make it look devastating!"
rcury, anwhile, was scrambling. The pain in his leg wasn't excruciating, but it was enough to throw him off his ga.
He tried to quickly recover, to still feign the severity of the injury, but the initial stumble had already broken the perfect illusion.
He winced as he tried to put weight on his foot, the muscle protesting.
It wasn't broken, but it was definitely strained.
Arthur leaned back, a small, knowing smile playing on his lips.
"A little authenticity goes a long way, rcury,"
"Hard to fake a genuine wince, isn't it?"
The dics rushed in, and the crowd, instead of erupting in outrage, was now a mix of confusion and mild concern.
They had expected sothing dramatic, sothing scandalous. This was just… an injury.
A common occurrence in a fighting tournant.
rcury was carried off on a stretcher, still trying to project an image of severe pain, but the mont had passed.
The initial shock value was gone.
The crowd was debating what they had seen, so still believing it was a serious injury, others questioning the severity.
The clear-cut narrative of Yang's "unprovoked brutality" was already muddy.
Cinder slamd a fist on the armrest of her chair.
The "outburst" had been intended to be a viral mont, a clear act of aggression that would turn public opinion against the academies. Instead, it was a ssy, debatable incident.
The dramatic impact she craved, the fuel for widespread negative emotions and Grimm attraction, was significantly dampened.
"He compromised the mission!"
Cinder seethed, her frustration palpable.
She looked at Erald, who avoided her gaze.
Even Erald, with her keen eye for deception, could see the plan had gone awry.
The Vytal Festival continued, but a ripple of uncertainty had been introduced.
The public wasn't unified in its condemnation of Yang; instead, they were discussing the awkward fall, the slightly off-kilter reaction.
The seed of suspicion Cinder had intended to plant in the public's mind had sprouted into sothing far less potent.
As the day drew to a close, Arthur allowed himself a mont of quiet satisfaction.
He hadn't stopped the entire plan, but he had thrown a wrench into the most public and damaging part of it.
Cinder's ticulously crafted narrative was now full of holes.
Later that night, Arthur was back in his makeshift lab, the schematics for Penny spread across his desk.
The subtle manipulations he had perford today, the precise redirection of energy, solidified his understanding of mana and its delicate dance with aura.
It wasn't just about raw power; it was about finesse, about understanding the underlying currents of existence.
"Every little bit helps," he murmured, picking up a specialized crystal he was shaping for Penny's central resonance chamber.
"A misstep for them, a step forward."
The image of Penny, her eyes bright with true life, fueled his work.
He knew the world was about to plunge into chaos, that Cinder's true objective would soon reveal itself.
But he had struck a blow, a quiet victory in the unfolding war.
...
Craze: Only 2 chapters for today.
...
There are 60 more chapters on [email protected]/phelio 50% discount on going. FFVII Arc was going to end soon.
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