"That group is so powerful! Sis, do you know which guild they are from?" Mei Mei asked Alex.
"Yes. Yes." Alex nodded. Though everyone was wearing full cloaks that did not reveal many details, the players' faces were visible from time to time.
"That group is probably the one to watch for us. They are from 'Dragons of Justics', one of the three main guilds in the Gresh Kingdom. Also one of our main competitors for now."
"Alex, there is something else." Mia corrected her. "Look closely, I think I see some 'Devil's Advocate' players in this group too."
"Eh? That's not possible." Alex shook her head resolutely.
Among the various guilds in the Gresh Kingdom, Dragons of Justice, Devil's Advocate and War Brothers were currently the top three guilds.
And ever since, Crimson Abyss made an entry, threatening the position of these top guilds, the three of them had reached a delicate balance, some sort of a peace treaty.
Alex had been paying close attention to these three because today they had formed an alliance and tomorrow, this alliance could be against their guild.
She was monitoring all their moves and she knew firsthand that the three guilds really took a lot of effort to keep this treaty, settling several disputes internally.
So it did not make sense if suddenly two of the three guilds became closer, forming a stronger bond. That would mean that the landscape of the Gresh Kingdom was going to change again.
"This is impossible." She shook her head. "Are you sure Mia?"
Mia nodded. Then the two sisters became busy discussing amongst themselves about the various players fighting on the battleground.
Just like them, the others present in the arena also looked occupied with the same thing. Everyone was trying to figure out everyone else and find out information about the competition.
The second fight soon came to an end and the third one and the fourth also followed suit. Lastly, the fifth battleground was also announced when everyone received another huge shock.
For the last battleground, it was team 1 vs team 4 and shockingly, team 1 was an all star team!
Every single member of this team was a ranker on the Gresh Kingdom leaderboard and belonged to the guilds occupying the top five positions on the leaderboard at the moment.
This meant that not only two guilds had coordinated, but all top five guilds of the Gresh Kingdom had silently coordinated for this event!
"Fuck! Mia, you were right! These bastards are cooking up some new shit!" Alex gripped her pants. Similar expressions could be seen throughout the auditorium.
The other strong players from the smaller guilds and the few independent players suddenly felt cheated. If they created an All Star team from the top five guilds then what chance did they have?
Here they were trying to coordinate with new players whom they hadn't played with before but the top five guilds sneakily had everything prepared beforehand.
Just like everyone guessed, the fifth battleground barely lasted for a few seconds and the opposite team was completely decimated.
The battleground was over even before it began. This was the power of an All Star team. Everyone in the auditorium became silent.
This could mean several things but what it actually meant was that, these ten players were going to be in the finals!
If they coordinated for this one fight, then there was nothing stopping them from coordinating for the other fights too. So in a second, this entire tournament became imbalanced.
Everyone cursed loudly at their bad luck. There were simply no more chances for struggling players to come up. The top guilds again and again claimed all the opportunities.
While everyone in the auditorium was fuming about this sneaky move by the big shots, one person alone looked like he couldn't care less about it.
Liam simply sat with his eyes closed and meditating.
He was trying to get more control of his mana core by silently churning it and circulating mana through his body without letting anything leak outside.
This was one of the commonly available techniques for mana control and players would come to know about it from their class towers after reaching Level 50.
Since Liam was not a big shot in his previous life, he was only privy to information like this which was freely available. However, he knew better than to ignore the importance of doing all of this.
Even simple and commonly available techniques like this could become deadly especially when no one else other than him had begun to form their mana core in this crowd.
"Liam, what do you think? We have some information about these top players. Do you want to take a look? Should we make some sort of strategic plan beforehand?" Mia asked.
Liam, on the other hand, calmly shook his head. He knew about the PVP tower more than anyone else. So preparing beforehand was not going to be very useful.
"Let's wait until the next contest is announced. We can then discuss strategies."
"Right." Mia agreed with him. Everyone else anxiously looked at the arena stage as the last of the players walked down onto the tournament floor.
And just like that, the second round was also completed.
The strange new PVP contest that was dragging its feet all this while was suddenly on full steam and in the blink of an eye, two rounds were completed just like that.
More importantly, there were only 50 more players left now!
The tournament had finally heated up and the next couple of rounds could be the last rounds that would determine who would be getting all the unbelievable prizes.
Everyone couldn't contain their excitement. There was a legendary item on the line! Who wins here could determine everything from here onwards.
At this moment, the next announcement arrived, and the bells rang loudly.
[Ding. Round three will begin shortly. All the players are requested to prepare a suitable mount]
