As Alma and Elena were walking in the middle of the dark forest, Elena started to explain why suddenly Alma stopped growing even though it looked like he had a very bright future. This was not something normal and there was obviously a reason behind this. But Alma did not know about this reason.

To learn about the reason, one first needed to know why Alma was so talented. Was it his natural talent ? The answer to that was a no. Actually when Alma was still a very young child, he had found a miraculous fruit in the forest and had eaten it. It was a minor thing for him as he used to always eat forest fruit when he was young. He probably did not even remember that particular fruit.

But that fruit had a powerful effect to boost someone's talent by a high degree but in compensation, that person would not be able to grow past level 200. This was an extreme effect and only people who had no talent for magic were recommended to use this as in that case, they would just get a magic affinity without sacrificing anything. But obviously they would not be very talented as they started from nothing.

But as Alma already had a high talent for magic, this fruit was able to make him an absolute genius but at the same time, it also limited his potential. Alma was just unlucky that he ate a mysterious fruit with this kind of effect without even knowing about it.

...

After hearing this from Elena, Alma almost broke down. He was in a lot of regret and blamed himself over and over again for not being careful in his childhood. Seeing this Elena patted his head to calm him down. Then she told her in a very gentle voice -

"I was extremely impressed with how you performed in the competition and I want to give you an opportunity to get your natural potential back. Hmm, just giving it to you is also fine as your reward for good performance but I have something more interesting in mind. I have a mission for you, if you can complete that mission within a month then I will give you this fruit which would be able to give you back your potential. What do you say ? Are you willing ?"

Alma did not need to think about it for a second time and he nodded his head. He was ready to do anything to get his potential back. Elena told him about his task and went back to the inn room.

...

The next day, it was time for the fourth round and the S rankers would be participating from today onwards. So the excitement of everyone watching was through the roof. Very soon all three of the S rankers appeared before the audience and were greeted by extremely loud cheer.

First to enter the arena was a fair skinned elf with golden hair and green eyes. She had a cold and serious expression on her face and she was wearing a gorgeous robe that was covering all the parts of her body. She even had gloves on her hand. There was a large pendant with multiple gems of various colours attached to it and that pendant was her magic casting medium and a legendary artifact. She was the current leader of the city and a S rank mage, Hetharna Macconoviana.

Then from the opposite side, a dark elf came out wearing a violet witch dress including the oversized hat. Completely opposite to Hetharna's dress, her clothing was very revealing and she was giving off an excessive amount of sexual appeal. But still it was hard for anyone to have any erotic thoughts about her with her reputation for being very ruthless and with the power coming out from her. She was holding a large wooden staff in her hands, which was her magic casting tool. It was none other than the leader of the magic guild and also a S rank mage, Mastegethor Albriani.

Then from another gate, the last S ranker entered. He had a slight smile on his face and was dressed like a scholar. He also had glasses covering his eyes and he had a book on his hands which was his magic casting Medium. His long white hair was tied behind in a low ponytail. He was none other than the principle of the magic academy and also the S rank mage, Theorem Doumensky.

...

These were the three S rankers who would be facing off against one another for the ancient magic tome. And as soon as they entered the arena, they started giving each other death stares. It looked like the relationship between the S rankers of the city was not very harmonious.

But they did not do anything else and just started waiting for the tournament to start. The fifth round was going to be special where again anyone would be able to pass if they were able to perform the task that was given to them.

What they needed to do was simple. There was a special rock and a mage just needed to fill that rock with mana. It was a very simple thing to do and even a novice mage who had just started learning about magic was capable of doing it. But obviously it was a test for high ranking mages and it would not be so simple.

The stone that they needed to fill with magic was called a Steelestone. It had a property that resisted and pushed away mana. This stone was excellent material to create armours that would be capable of resisting magic to a high degree. The only reason that did not happen was because this stone was way too rare and extremely hard to find.

...

The three S rankers were the first to start the fifth round and as expected of them, they were able to almost immediately fill the stone with mana as if it was not a Steelestone but just a normal random rock. After they were done with the test in no time, the other mages also started doing it.

This was not an easy thing to do even for A rankers so the B rankers were having even more trouble. As for the only remaining C ranker, Benshui, she was able to finish the challenge way early even before writing a few A rankers. After seeing her making miracles so many times, the audience were not even surprised with this anymore.

As the person with the highest chance of winning the competition outside the S ranker, Archenite did extremely well and her speed of filling the stone with mana was almost equal to the S rankers. That made the audience quite excited as with this performance of hers, there was still a chance of her winning this competition and that would be very enjoyable for the audience.

With that the fifth round came to an end. The next round was going to be very exciting as here everyone would finally be able to see the S rankers using their magic. So everybody was hyped.

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