Ande hurriedly walked in and asked straight away: "Have you seen that old guy Pudra?"

Phales then shifted his gaze from the competition arena, looked at the latter, smoothed his pointy mustache, and replied, "Why should I pay attention to him? And where did you go just now? One match is already over."

There was a slight look of concern on Ande's face, "I haven't seen any trace of him anywhere."

Phales looked puzzled, "Why are you looking for him?"

"Nothing," Ande sighed, "that old thing is acting a bit odd."

Human affairs again. Phales shook his head. He was somewhat aware of the issue concerning Sir Mawei's daughter, but had no intention to get involved, merely stating, "You've put too much energy into this, old buddy."

He meant that the other party had neglected the development in Alchemy over the years.

Ande raised his snow-white eyebrows at him, a mischievous look in his eyes: "Dwarves aren't all peaceful and quiet either. I heard 'Short Bay' and 'Rusty Boot' are at each other's throats."

Phales snorted lightly, extremely disdainful, "Two shortsighted families tricked by the petty profits from the Elpaxin Artisan Association. It's a pity I'm not the Speaker, otherwise, I'd have them reflect behind closed doors."

All the dwarves of Eteliria come from seven families, namely Short Bay, Tongwan, Rusty Boot, Ironhide, Tendril, Crooked Staff, and Long Hat. The seven families have an internal council responsible for adjudicating internal dwarf affairs, led by the Speaker of the Council.

For several centuries, this Speaker has always been from the Crooked Staff family, but the mere existence of this council suggests that the dwarves are not as peaceful as imagined.

Ande chuckled lightly after hearing this: "Unfortunately, Colin Ishurian only needs one Artisan Association. I heard you have a brother."

"Just a fool."

Beside the two, the scene from the Projection Crystal on the table just happened to be of Fang Hong and his team entering the arena. Phales frowned slightly, suddenly finding the young man in front of him somewhat familiar.

He turned back and asked, "This young man, I think I've seen him at your estate once, is he your student?"

Ande, seeing Fang Hong, also paused for a moment. He didn't expect his rather clumsy student to actually lead the Ragnarok team to the semifinals. He didn't doubt Fang Hong's own capabilities, but having investigated the team Ragnarok, the situation was really hard to describe.

To put it mildly, it could be called mediocre.

A mediocre team doesn't deserve to win in this kind of competition.

Or maybe his student just has some silly luck?

Phales, observing his expression, realized the answer. Recalling how the other had bragged about this student all the way, coupled with the previous incident, he couldn't help but feel curious. He picked up the previous match schedule to take a look and immediately frowned deeply:

They narrowly won against Silver Weslan by 0.1 points—he knew Silver Weslan's level, which was far inferior compared to Elite.

Phales casually tossed the parchment aside, saying: "It seems he is likely to stop here."

Ande also stroked his snow-white beard: "It's a pity. If they could reach the finals, there might still be a chance."

"What did you say?"

"I'm just regretting that lad's bad luck."

"It's capability, what has it to do with luck?" Phales disregarded such statements.

Ande smiled, but did not refute.

...

The first match was decided to be Flexible Construct.

The theme chosen by the Elite side was the Banshee II model, an extended model of the Screeching Banshee, approximately at Level 18. Since the topic was drawn from a list, this list practically confirmed Fang Hong's suspicions:

The competition increases in difficulty progressively, hence the creations for the finals should range between Level 22 to 23.

The arena was still being set up—

And as Fang Hong and the others approached, Soul Fingerprint got straight to the point, saying to them: "There's not much time, let me brief you on each Elite contestant's situation."

Fang Hong nodded. Though his given strategy didn't particularly require knowing the opponents' strengths, getting some insight couldn't hurt.

Soul Fingerprint, as always, had prepared quite meticulously, and this time was no exception. She pointed to one of the four Elite contestants: "That person is known as Past Years, a craftsman who transitioned from being a Combat Artisan. He's skilled in flexible constructs, plugins, and Magic Guided Conductors, especially some unconventional flexible constructs. Therefore, he is most likely to be the one to enter the first match."

The term combat artisan transitioning to craftsman sounded novel to Fang Hong. He'd heard of craftsmen who became combat artisans, a situation not uncommon among Alchemists, like Hudi, or even himself for instance.

But transitioning from a combat artisan back to a craftsman was quite peculiar.

He then turned to Liuli and said: "Liuli, maybe you should go first in the first match, keep an eye on that person."

Liuli Yue simply snorted: "My name is Liuli Yue."

Fang Hong, seeing the look in his eyes, couldn't help but feel surprised: "Wait, you know the opponent?"

"What's it to you?" Liuli Yue retorted in a bad-tempered manner.

Fang Hong's face darkened, wondering where this guy, who hadn't won a single match, got his confidence from.

But for now, he relied on this external helper, so he just pretended not to have heard.

Soul Fingerprint then pointed to the next one: "That is the commander of Elite."

Fang Hong glanced at the person, and couldn't help but be stunned. Elite's commander was actually a woman, although female battle artisans like Nether, Loofah, or even Red Leaf with talent were not uncommon, in the craftsman domain, female Alchemists like Dill or the little girl from previous Silver Weslan were actually rare, and even rarer were those who served as commanders.

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