Fae had grown immensely in power in the time that she had joined the Academy. Rui did not forget that even two years ago she was able to compete with Nel on roughly equal footing. She had grown vastly stronger than she was two years ago. That fact along with the ridiculous power she had demonstrated just then truly made Rui excited to fight her once more.
Part of the reason was that he had never actually beaten her in a fight yet. Thought that was also further because they hadn't had a serious proper spar in recent times. After Rui's third training stage, where he had mastered Outer Convergence, he had immediately begun under taking missions and when he returned, he had immediately jumped back into training for the Kandrian Martial Festival and the Martial Contest.
He simply didn't have an opportunity to spar against her.
('I'll get my first win against her this time.') Rui was determined to win whenever they fought against each other in the preliminary contest, whenever that happened.
"Let's watch Dalen's fight with Milliana." Kane said, drawing his attention.
"Oh?" Rui raised an eyebrow. "They got paired against each other? What odds."
Dalen was a heavy defensive type, he was capable of enduring an immense amount of onslaught, and was one of the very few Martial Apprentices in the Academy that could endure Fae's onslaught head-on.
In comparison, Milliana was a stamina-oriented Martial Artist, whose fighting style was centered around outlasting her opponent.
('Not a good matchup.') Rui mused to himself.
They were both passive fighters for the most part, this would usually lead to a slow long fight.
As they reached the ring, what Rui had predicted came to pass. The two of tehm were having a staring contest instead of an actual fight.
"As expected." Rui sighed.
He couldn't blame them for this, they were only being true to their Martial Art. And neither of them launched belligerent attacks.
Eventually Dalen shuffled and began throwing a few jabs. The problem was, he needed to take initiative because if they just kept staring at each other, she would win simply by outlasting him, even when standing.
Someone who dedicated themselves to stamina would be able to complete every action with the least amount of energy needed.
This is why Dalen had to break character and attack. Even if he was a defensive Martial Artist, he needed to attack. With his sheer size, it was guaranteed he would tire faster than she did, he needed to exercise some flexibility. Even if he didn't launch a belligerent offensive attack like Fae did, he at the very least could not allow a standstill stalemate.
He constantly engaged in an exchange of blows, forcing Milliana to atleast engage with him, giving him an opportunity to potentially win the fight.
"This is going to take a long time." Rui sighed. The matches of the preliminary contest didn't have a time limit. This was because time limits affected certain Martial Art more than others, and negatively affected several Martial Artists.
Milliana alone was a good example.
Victory would be nigh-impossible for her in a tournament with a half-an-hour time limit. She would be able to beat no one asides from the weakest of Martial Apprentices. This was extremely unfair towards her, and thus the rules would not restrict the time period of fights.
Rui estimated that Dalen's fight against her would take at the very least quarter of a day to end. As for who would win, he found it hard to say. They were both close enough that the probability for either side winning wasn't extremely high or low. It would come down to the specifics and how the fight actually unfolded.
As he observed them clash, he could see both of them had improved.
Dalen had diversified his Martial Art a little, he had always been exclusive defense. Up until recently, he had had only one foundational technique for the other fields such as offense, maneuvering, supplementary and grappling etc.
His offense being the weakest, up until very recently he had nothing going for offense asides from Vital Pressure. The most foundational striking technique in the entire library
This wasn't particularly his fault. Only Rui was a freak who could master a whopping seventeen techniques in eighteen months. Everyone else would only be able be able to master four-to-five mid-grade techniques on average in that same timeframe.
It had taken him a few years build his foundation, to have a defense technique for a large variety of attacks, to ensure that he would be able to defend against as many possible types of attacks and increase the probability he would be able to cope with them just fine.
Only after he built this foundation had he decided to dedicate some time and energy mastering techniques of other fields and classes.
Milliana on the hand was the exact opposite. She was already diverse from the very beginning, as far as her weightage on the different aspects of combat. She did not place any extra weight on offense, defense or maneuvering. She placed all her weight on supplementary techniques, specifically; stamina supplementary techniques.
While Rui only had one stamina supplementary technique in Helical Breathing, she had seven. Seven techniques that all boosted her energy reserves, efficiency and longevity as much as possible. When it came to stamina, she was utter unmatched by any other Martial Apprentice in the Academy, probably even Nel, at this point in time.
Nel did not have a single stamina-oriented Apprentice-level technique, and even though his stamina was initially superior and had likely grown due to age, the astronomical boost that Apprentice-level techniques caused could not be underestimated.
Her energy reserves, efficiency and minimalization had long caused her overall stamina to surpass the human limit by leaps and bounds.
Ultimately, whichever one was able to leverage their strengths to the best of their abilities, while mitigating their shortcomings to the best of their abilities would win the fight.