Chapter 161: End of the Preliminary Round

Since we have to fight, we have to strike first!

Gray yelled, clenched a giant sword as big as a man in both hands, jumped up and slashed down fiercely. The silver necklace on his neck kept hitting his naked chest, making a tinkling sound.

Before the heavy blow hit the target, two sword lights flashed, Erza spun around and danced with the sword, cutting the huge ice sword into three pieces.

Just as the pose is set, Gray attacks again!

"Hammer Soldier!"

The ice hammer fell from the sky. Kira had said that the best opportunity to attack is when the opponent is in the air! But Erza was not lacking in the means of flying. She flapped her wings of the Black Feather Armor and dodged backwards.

"War God Spear!"

A huge crystal-shaped ice pillar rose from the ground, as if it was going to pierce through the sky and stab towards Erza.

Erza twisted her body and changed direction in the air, changed her clothes, stepped on the ice crystal, jumped on it, drew her sword, and rushed down along the icicle, chopping it down with all her might, without wasting any movement.

Gray had expected this, and before the attack came, he immediately used a range-covering attack: "Lancer!"

Hundreds of ice spears shot out in a spiral attack. The twisted wind squeezed the ice spears, which hit the icicles with a squeak, causing large pieces of fine ice to fall off. The scattered cold air caused the temperature around to drop slightly.

The crystal icicles that reached the sky were motionless, but they were riddled with holes and emitted a hint of cold air. Erza rushed down in the hail of bullets as if she was strolling in a garden, like a dancing red fairy.

"Heavenly Wheel, the Sword of Cycles!"

Hundreds of swords were wielded like arms, with such great power and speed that it was dizzying.

"Ice creation, ice wall!"

Knowing that an ordinary shield could not defend against such intensive attacks, Gray expended a large amount of magic power to create an ice wall to protect himself. The thick ice blocked the rain of swords coming from all directions. The sharp swords swept through with crackling sounds, and each attack would leave a thin layer of ice.

"Erusa is so cruel!"

Inside the ice wall, Gray was sweating profusely, fortunately he reacted in time.

After a while, the rain of swords stopped, and smoke and ice fog mixed together. Erza's sharp eyes saw at a glance that a large broken hole was smashed on the ice wall. Just as she was about to take advantage of the victory and pursue, she saw a cannon muzzle sticking out of the hole.

"Ice Cannon!"

Using giant hailstones as bullets and biting snowflakes as gunpowder, Gray built a cannon that mixed ice and snow together to form an avalanche-like attack that shot towards Erza.

Seeing the white frost approaching, Erza's pupils shrank and she braked: "Vajra Armor!"

The Diamond Armor is her strongest defensive armor, extremely hard, and more than enough to defend against the ice and snow cannon, but...

Before Erza could recover from the shock, she felt the ground beneath her feet crack, as if something was breaking out of the ground!

"Ice spring!"

The effect of the illusion was not as expected, but the brief distraction was enough. Gray seized the opportunity created before Mistgang's defeat and pressed his hands on the ground. A large amount of ice spikes burst out from the ground under Erza like a fountain, completely engulfing her body.

“Success!”

Gray exclaimed, but he was dumbfounded the next second.

"Armor of the Ice Emperor!" Erza changed her clothes again in the air and escaped from the ice and snow unharmed.

Familiar armor, Gray remembered that this armor could greatly resist ice magic attacks.

"Damn it! Another one made by Kira!" He pounded his fist on the ground, and then Gray ruthlessly shouted, using up all his remaining magic power to launch his ultimate move again, "Ice Creation, Cavalry Dance!"

The crisp sounds of ping-pong

Erza stared at this scene with wide eyes. Even though she had always been confident in her companions' abilities, she couldn't help but admire: "What a fast styling speed! It's really surprising. Is this Gray's current ability?"

Even she, the person she was most familiar with, was so out of control, not to mention others.

Mistgang next to him, as well as all his teammates and spectators watching this scene on the field, were stunned by Gray's amazing move. Shouts and cheers resounded throughout the audience seats!

On the judges' panel, Markov was delighted, his old face smiling like a flower; the reporters who came to report were recording the scene with their cameras; even the mayor was very happy, he didn't care about the strength, but it would be beneficial to Magnolia that Fairy Tail had such a high popularity.

Erza put on the Heavenly Wheel Armor again, activated her magic power, and created countless sword blades: "Heavenly Wheel·Dazzling Sword!"

Using more to fight more, using speed to fight speed, the two men controlled their respective weapons and smashed at each other!

Pa pa pa... Ping pong pong...

Ice weapons and iron weapons collided with each other, making a loud noise. Chopping, slashing, stabbing, and poking... all kinds of attack methods were performed one after another, chaotic yet orderly, and too fast to keep up. The onlookers could only see the flash of swords, knives, and refracted light from ice crystals, which finally fell to the ground together, raising a cloud of dust that covered the entire field.

Even though Gray had created so many weapons, the number of weapons made of ice was ultimately insufficient. Amid the sound of metal clashing, the number rapidly decreased until the sound completely subsided and the smoke and dust cleared. All that was left on the field was Gray, who was sitting powerlessly on the ground, and Erza, who was standing in front of him with a sword pointed at his head.

The winner is decided!

Without any obstruction, Erza flew towards the blue team's crystal tower with her sword and directly shattered the crystal ball placed inside, bringing the last game of the preliminary round to an end!

A familiar voice sounded: "The winner between the red and blue teams has been decided. Congratulations to the red team for winning!"

"Are you okay?" Erza extended her right hand to Gray who was sitting on the ground.

Gray smiled and stood up, using the force to push himself up: "Of course!"

The creed of competition first, friendship second is fully demonstrated in them.

"Really, it's really not easy to beat you!"

"You've done a great job!"

Erza was very happy because she won the game; Gray was very happy because he had a great fight with Erza, and although he didn't win, he had made a breakthrough in strength; only Juvia was very unhappy, because not only did she lose the game, but she also saw Gray and Erza holding hands.

[Because Juvia didn't win and failed to live up to Gray-sama's help, he chose to be with Erza? ]

The game ended, and the last ten contestants teleported back to cheers all around.

Amidst the cheers, only Juvia hugged Gray's thighs, crying and begging him not to leave her, making Gray very embarrassed.

On the judges' stand, Disper held the microphone and announced to everyone: "The Fairy Tail Magic Tournament preliminary round has officially ended. The winners are the White Team, the Green Team, and the Red Team. Please look at the big screen for everyone's score!"

The voice attracted everyone's attention. Kira looked up and saw the scores of 30 people from six teams displayed on the screen.

According to each team's contribution, a score of 2 to 10 is awarded. Each person on the winning team gets 2 points. Depending on the game time, 0 to 2 points are added or subtracted. The total score is:

White Team (win): Kira 14 points, Bisca 12 points, Bigusro 10 points, Marcus 8 points, Nob 6 points;

Green Team (win): Mira 13 points, Filid 1 1 points, Kana 9 points, Wakaba 7 points, Jeter 5 points;

Red Team (win): Erza 12 points, Elfman 10 points, Alba Green 8 points, Dolor 6 points, Tono 4 points;

Blue Team (lost): Gray 10 points, Mistgang 8 points, Lucy 6 points, Macao 4 points, Wallian 2 points;

Yellow Team (lost): Rocky 9 points, Rebecca 7 points; Ridasu 5 points, Laxus 3 points, Chico 1 point;

Black Team (lost): Natsu 8 points, Gajeel 6 points, Juvia 4 points, Alzac 2 points, Pikiita 0 points.

"Everyone is ranked according to their scores. If they have the same scores, the winner will be ranked before the loser. If they are all winning teams, they will be ranked according to the time of their victory."

Following Disper's finger, everyone looked at the big screen on the other side, which showed the list of sixteen people who had passed the preliminary round:

First place: Kira, 14 points

Second place: Mira, 13 points

Third place: Bisca, 12 points

Fourth place: Erza, 12 points

Fifth place: Filid, 11 points

Sixth place: Bigusro, 10 points

Seventh place: Elfman, 10 points

Eighth place: Gray, 10 points

Ninth place: Kana, 9 points

10th place: Rocky, 9 points

11th place: Marcus: 8 points

12th place: Alba Green, 8 points