"Ice Make: Rose Garden!"
"Requip: Ice Emperor Armor!"
The ice-made roses charged forward, but were blocked by the Ice Emperor Armor that suddenly appeared.
This was the fourth week of March in X777, the ranking tournament finals—and the final battle to determine the number-one rank for March!
The two fighters were Ultear and Erza. Since Jellal had unexpectedly lost to Erza, the gamblers led by Macao had suffered a huge financial loss.
Erza had improved at an incredible rate over the past few years and was already close to catching up with Ultear and Jellal. However, due to a slight gap in both luck and strength, she had never managed to take first place. This battle was Erza's greatest opportunity in years. During her previous ranking match against Ultear, she had not yet possessed the Ice Emperor Armor, so whenever Ultear chose to use Ice-Make Magic, Erza, whose ice resistance was too low, could not withstand her attacks. Now, after finally saving enough money to create the Ice Emperor Armor, Erza had gained enough ice resistance to stand against Ultear.
Seeing that the field magic, Rose Garden, had failed to take effect properly, Ultear was not surprised. Over the years, she had clearly seen how hard Erza worked in private—so hard that she sometimes felt sorry for her. But this was a battle for the honor of first place in the rankings. She would not hold back simply because they normally had a good relationship.
"Ice Make: Ice Spears!"
Several ice spears appeared above Ultear's head. With a wave of her hand, they shot straight toward Erza.
After equipping the Ice Emperor Armor, Erza did not rely entirely on its enhanced ice resistance to ignore the spears. As she dodged left and right, she rapidly closed the distance to Ultear.