At the call to start the battle the sun crow took into the air and Kanan surveyed the field, his mind turning rapidly.
The arena was wide open with a dirt floor. It was clearly disadvantageous for Poppy, whose thread-based moves and ambush tactics flourished in areas with lots of cover.
Conversely, there was plenty of room for the sun crow to navigate in the air. The arena was roofed, but by his estimate it was about 15 meters tall. Not enough to escape Poppy's range completely, but enough to make dodging the attacks trivial. If Kanan wanted to win he would have to do so with strategy.
Kanan thought for a moment before making his decision. "Poppy, use Bubble and Light Curtain."
At his command, a spray of bubbles shot out of Poppy's mouth into the air, beaming straight for the crow. The bubbles were fast, but with a disdainful snort the sun crow casually flapped its wings and shot to the side, avoiding them by a significant margin. The bubbles floated by helplessly, drifting up into the stadium lights.
Taking advantage of the dodge, Light Curtain went up and Poppy disappeared into the air.
"Hmph. I don't believe you can hide forever" grumbled Ivan. "Sun Crow, use Flurry."
The sun crow stopped moving briefly and made several powerful flaps, stirring up the arena and sending a powerful gust of winds across the floor. Flurry wasn't capable of doing large amount of damage, but it was a powerful control move that could disrupt the opponent.
Poppy reflexively tethered itself to the ground with Weave, avoiding any real damage from being sent flying by the winds. However, the movement broke the effect of Light Curtain, revealing its position to the enemy.
Urgently, Kanan cried out. "Poppy, continue with Bubble and dodge!"
More bubbles were sent flying into the air, but the result was the same. The crow easily dodged the attack and continued its assault.
Ivan looked on at the scene with eyes full of contempt. He was slightly bewildered — a student that had gained the recognition of Aurelia couldn't possibly be this weak, unable to even put up a fight. Little did he know that Aurelia wasn't actually familiar with Kanan's battle capabilities, her appreciation of him was entirely based on his spirit beast breeding capabilities and personality.
Truthfully, if she had known Poppy's skillset, she never would have endorsed this fight in the first place. Sending up a beast specialized in ambushes against a flying opponent in this kind of arena was really too unfair.
Back on the field, the battle continued. The sun crow shot out a rain of flaming feathers, hurtling down towards Poppy from above. The latter continued to run around the field dodging, its stamina being rapidly depleted.
Poppy continued to shoot bubbles while dodging, but was unable to land any successful hits. Meanwhile it continued to accumulate damage as the winds and feathers pouring down grazed the spider and threw it around.
At this rate, the result was inevitable. Through the constant dodging and injuries, Poppy's stamina was draining at a rate incomparable to the sun crow's. It could last another minute or two at most.
Seeing that his time was running out, Kanan resolved himself. He would have to gamble everything on one attack. He would've liked more time to prepare, but Ivan really wasn't giving him any openings.
"Poppy, send it up into the air!"
Poppy understood his intentions without needing to be told. It released a jet of water, condensing it to increase the speed. The beam fired out at twice the speed of the previous bubbles, catching the crow off guard and blasting it towards the ceiling.
The sun crow tumbled through the air for a few meters before regaining its balance, flapping up to the top of the arena to escape the range of the water jet.
"Eh?" Ivan exclaimed. "If you had something like that you should've used it earlier. It's too late now!"
"Well, we'll see about that," Kanan replied.
In the arena, the sun crow had risen to just below the skylights, and it was startled by a cool sensation pressing against its back. Its surprise was transmitted to Ivan, who scanned the ceiling warily.
"Poppy, now's the time!" called out Kanan. "Dispel Light Screen!"
The glare of the ceiling lights flickered, and a shocking scene emerged. In the air, tens of bubbles hovered at the top of the arena, previously concealed by the light. The bubbles that Poppy had been firing throughout the battle had accumulated, blanketing the entire sky.
The spider tensed up, focusing, and the bubbles dropped, surrounding the sun crow in every direction. It flapped its wings in a panic, trying to blow away the bubbles, but there was too many.
"Sun Crow! Use Flurry!" Ivan called out desperately, but it was too late.
"Time for the finale, Poppy"
Kanan knew his victory was secured.
"Pop."
With one word, the tens of bubbles floating around the crow exploded, each packed with a devastating pressure. It was like a bomb went off in the sky as a torrent of water and air blasted the crow from every direction. Droplets of water rained down on Ivan and Kanan, causing the air to shimmer with prismatic light.
The sun crow was knocked out directly, and it was sent hurtling to the ground. Ivan ran forward, barely managing to catch it before it hit the floor of the arena.
He could've unsummoned it to prevent further injury, but between the unexpected situation and his own lack of experience there was no time.
"No way…" muttered Ivan, despairing. "I lost?"
On the side, Aurelia stepped forward. "Kanan is the winner!"
A few students who had been watching from outside the arena let out a small cheer. Some began discussing the match excitedly.
"That Ivan lost? He was one of the more promising new students, wasn't he? Who's the other guy?"
"No idea, I haven't seen him before. He shouldn't have been at the entrance exam, right? Is he a senior student?"
They gossipped animatedly, pondering over the identity of the mysterious new student who had defeated Ivan.
Kanan let out a sigh of relief. While it might look like he had everything in the palm of his hand, in truth the match had been a close one. The map was simply too disadvantageous. It made him think about Poppy's future training direction. Situations like this one would keep appearing as he moved forward as a tamer.
In the highest level matches, the impact of terrain was mitigated somewhat by the competition format. Tamers would bring several beasts and use them on a rotating set of terrains, so that each could show their strengths where they were appropriate. However, at the school level, the resources for that sort of arena simply weren't available, and tamers didn't have enough beasts for it to be viable.
He walked up to Ivan, who was dusting himself off in the middle of the arena, having unsummoned his beast.
"It was a good match" Kanan said, holding out his hand.
He was telling the truth. He was deeply impressed with Ivan's skill. Having trained with Argana for so long, a small part of him had considered himself far beyond others his age.
Ivan looked at his hand with mixed emotions, finally biting his lip and grabbing it.
"It was a good match. I'm sorry for what I said before, you and your spirit beast are strong."
Kanan's eyes widened. He hadn't expected the arrogant boy to apologize. Perhaps he wasn't as bad as his initial impression had suggested.
Aurelia looked surprised as well. She knew Ivan's personality better, having interacted with him somewhat often over the past week or two, but she still didn't expect the boy to put down his pride in front of her.
"You'll pass the exam for sure, so we'll be seeing each other at the Academy league. I won't lose next time" Ivan declared, his eyes blazing.
Having said his piece, he left the arena, heading to the medical center on the other side of the west wing.
Aurelia turned to Kanan, bowing down to pat Poppy's head.
"Well, that was quite the way to make your Academy debut," she teased. "Now you're going to be on everyone's radar. The competition here is quite intense, you know?"
"I can tell," replied Kanan, thinking about what he had just experienced. He barely set foot within the academy and already had such an intense battle. It was exhausting. Inwardly though, he was excited. This sort of environment was exactly the sort of stimulus he needed to improve as a tamer.
"Let's head back for today. But don't forget our promise! You're accompanying me wherever I want next time, OK?"
"Yeah yeah."
The pair headed back to the dorms, and Kanan saw Aurelia off before returning to the lab.
His obligations complete, it was time to begin training Twilight in earnest. There was more research to be done towards Poppy's evolution as well.
His life would keep being busy tomorrow too.