"How do we go about managing Descent? We can only use it for ten minutes a day, which we can maybe stretch out across two matches, but it'll be tough to make ten minutes last across three matches.

And we'll definitely need a good chunk of time with it when we fight Jaden, it was far from easy beating him together, we won't stand a chance solo if we aren't at full power," Pointed out Aria with a frown.

"Well, at least you can use Blaze Ignition: Flare as much as you want so long as you have Mana, and since the Chairwoman's going to have an Enchanter on standby, you should be able to go into all three of your matches with a full tank of MP.

You should be able to get through your first match without using Descent, so I don't think you'll have too much trouble managing your power boosts," I surmised thoughtfully.

"Yeah, I guess you've got a point...what about you, though? Enrage lasts ten minutes too, just like Descent, but unlike Descent, once you activate Enrage, you can't deactivate it until the time limit runs out. The cooldown is one hour, right?" She asked me.

"Mhm, that's right. Based on the order of the matches, it's pretty unlikely that I'll be able to use Enrage in my second match, but I definitely can in my third match," I responded, after mulling it over for a moment.

It was later in the day, around 10 PM, and I was currently at Aria's place. We were snuggling in bed, discussing tomorrow's event. All the match-ups were settled, and the order had also been decided.

I had my I-Watch display open, on a news site. I'd muted the stream, Charlotte should be announcing the event any second now.

"I'm really looking forward to this, and even though we won't get to fight all the other X-Aces, we'll at least get to see all of them in action. And besides, between the two of us, we will be fighting all five of the others," Smiled Aria, before adding as she rubbed my cheek, "I'm liking the scruff, by the way, the roughness feels nice."

As she'd requested, I'd stopped shaving for a bit.

My facial hair was pretty minimal, but I definitely have a bit of a five o'clock shadow. I think it's alright, I'm kinda indifferent to it, but Aria seems to like it, so I'll keep it up a bit longer and see how I feel about it.

"Yeah, I-...oh, looks like it's starting," I remarked, before unmuting the stream as Charlotte appeared on screen.

"Good evening, everyone, I'm Charlotte Bryns, the Chair of the Sanctuary Theta branch of the Hunters Union. And I have a very exciting announcement for you all.

We've had a rough year or so, and in these trying times, I believe a bit of excitement is in order. With that in mind, we'll be conducting a special event tomorrow, the X-Ace Clash! All seven X-Aces with face off in a total of ten exhibition matches, starting at 12 PM!

For safety reasons, we won't be having an audience in attendance, it will be difficult to guarantee safety, given the immense power of the participating Hunters.

But we'll be streaming the event worldwide, the stream will be free to view for all, so make sure to tune in, you don't want to miss a second of this!"

"She's really hyping it up, huh? Well, all things considered, fair enough," Remarked Aria, as Charlotte continued with the announcement.

That's true.

X-Aces don't participate in the Hunters Championship Clash, since they're just too powerful and everyone else would stand absolutely no chance of winning.

And also because, like Charlotte said, they wouldn't be able to guarantee the safety of the audience.

As it turned out, our battle against Jaiden ended up causing some structural damage to the Union building, despite the safety barrier.

While the barrier did prevent our clash from completely wrecking the building, it couldn't absorb all the force we were generating with our attacks.

"Mhm, this'll be the first time a fight between X-Aces will be televised, and there's going to be ten battles. Speaking of which...," I nodded at the screen, as the match-ups were put up on the stream:

Match 1: Kaivel Intrix vs Jaden Xeno

Match 2: Ariella Velle vs Jin Suzuki

Match 3: Aarav Gill vs Beatriz Oliviera

Match 4: Kaivel Intrix vs Iseul Park

Match 5: Ariella Velle vs Beatriz Oliviera

Match 6: Iseul Park vs Jin Suzuki

Match 7: Jaden Xeno vs Aarav Gill

Match 8: Beatriz Oliviera vs Iseul Park

Match 9: Kaivel Intrix vs Aarav Gill

Match 10: Ariella Velle vs Jaden Xeno

Looks like there'll be half hour intervals after the fourth and seventh matches. While no one will fight in back to back matches, a few of the participants only have one match between theirs, so the intervals should help ensure that everyone has enough time to rest up between matches.

Iseul in particular has it kinda rough, her matches are the fourth, sixth and eight, the intervals almost seemed timed with her in mind, since she'd have the least amount of respite between her matches otherwise.

"It's pretty cool that we'll be in both the first two and last two matches, your first match will kick off the event, and my last match will wrap it up," Noticed Aria with a smile.

"And in both those matches, our opponent will be Jaden. Makes sense, while we may have him beat in raw power, he's still got a pretty damn strong claim over the title of strongest Hunter in the world, so having him in both the first and last matches of the event is the logical choice," I mused objectively.

"Yeah, his mastery over his Magic is incredible, everything from his casting speed to reaction time, and the power of his Spells to his control, it was all so impressive.

Well, I guess we might have been getting a bit cocky with how high our Power Levels have gotten, so maybe today's sparring bout was a much-needed reality check for us," Grinned Aria sheepishly.

"Mhm, yeah...we could definitely stand to make much better use of our powers, that much was clear after seeing him in action. Our use of Negative Energy in particular needs to be at its best...my debuffs won't work on him, and neither will your flames, so we'll need to make up for that by making best use of our other abilities."

"He's super durable too, I landed several blows on him but that telekinetic cloak around his body absorbed a fair bit of the impact of my strikes. I did do a lot of damage, but it was far from enough.

Well, worrying about it isn't going to change anything...we should probably get some sleep now. We'll have time to plan things out in the morning, since the event starts at midday, so we should make sure we're well-rested and fresh," She suggested, before stifling a yawn.

"Yeah, sounds good, I'm starting to feel pretty sleepy myself, that fight was quite tiring. Goodnight, Aria, see you in the morning, princess," I grinned, as I patted her head.

"Mhm, goodnight, darling...I love you, Kai," She smiled warmly.

"I love you too, Aria," I responded, before giving her a soft peck on the lips as I wrapped my arms around her, the two of us snuggling up affectionately.

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