Ning lay down on the bed as the dizziness finally started to wear off after drinking the medicine that he was given. His pain reduced a bit as well, and the doctors started checking him on what was wrong.
"You have a cut to the head, not a severe one, but you might want to keep the bandage on it for a few days. Your third and fifth ribs on your right chest are snapped in half. That will require a few months to heal entirely."
"As for the rest of your injuries, we have applied some ointments. Those should heal within a day or two," the doctor said.
"Thank you, doctor," Ning said.
"Alright, now… do you wish to concede from your upcoming matches or will you want to fight?" the doctor asked.
The question made Ning scratch his head as he couldn't choose anything. He hadn't thought of the upcoming matches, but now that he did, he didn't know what it was that he wanted.
"Can I… let you guys know later?" he asked.
The doctor chuckled a bit. "Sure," he said. "You can just not show up when the match begins, that works too."
"Thank you," Ning said.
"Oh yeah, for your information, the matches have been moved back at least 2 hours, so you have plenty of time to rest too," the doctor said before walking away.
"2 hours huh?" Ning thought.
He sat alone on his bed with his ripped clothes. He looked around, but every bed but one in this place was empty. And that one was to the young man that he had knocked out.
He could basically not be counted as being there at all.
It was the medical section of the arena where only the wounded came to visit. While the competition was going on, not even the teachers were allowed to visit here unless in extreme cases.
Which meant, he was going to be alone for quite a while longer.
He sighed, and leaned against the bed, thinking about the upcoming matches. He thought of the brackets.
The next fight was going to be the Prince versus his guard. Since Hyandus had already mentioned that he was going to give up, the prince was going to win. Which meant, he was going to have to fight the prince next match.
"Do I want to fight against the prince?" Ning thought. Unless he wanted to create a spectacle as he had just done once again, he doubted he had any way of winning the match.
Besides, he didn't want to win against the prince. He liked the prince.
"If I lose there…" he would end up in a match for 3rd place. The person he fought was going to be someone that lost to the princess in the Semi-finals.
"Huh, the twins are going to fight in the finals? Ice versus Magma. For that alone I will have to give up," Ning thought. "But not all. I will need to come third."
He cracked his fingers. "I guess I know who I'm going to have to win against."
Ning reached into his storage ring and brought out a pure crystal. As he did, he saw the sword that was in there.
"Just what are you?" he couldn't help but ask.
The sword was something that he had fought when he had come to this world on the very first day. Once he had bonded with it, it had been with him at every moment.
It had shown some impressive stuff even when he was weak, but what it had done today was simply preposterous. Creating that much land with barely half of his Essence was not something Ning had expected it could do.
"Did you swallow an entire mountain range or what?" he couldn't help but ask. When he was ready to use the system again, he would ask it about the sword.
For now, he took the Pure Crystal and started absorbing the Essence inside of it. He had lost quite a bit of it creating that massive rock pillar, so the best he could do right now was get it all back.
As he absorbed, Ning started getting a peculiar feeling. "Hmm?" he thought. "Isn't this… a bit too soon?"
* * * * * *
2 hours passed very quickly. At that time, another arena was created in the barren land beyond them. Once it was made, everyone was instructed to move over to it as the next set of fights would take place there.
For the nobles and rulers in the tower, another window had been created on the other side, through which they could directly view the new arena. From the ease of view, anyone could tell that the arena was made with them in mind.
Only the most important arrays were transported over to the new arena, ignoring the other arrays that were more for quality of life than anything.
Both the school's members and audience sat wherever they could find a seat. Since this arena was much larger, there were plenty of seats to go around. The prince and the rest walked together with their academy members and sat in a large, open seating area that someone had reserved for them.
They all looked at the newly built stage and were excited now that the competition was going to continue.
It was already close to 3 pm, so most wanted the competition to end as quickly as possible. At the very least, they did not want the competition to go on until evening.
Due to the lack of lights, it could result in some problems that the new arena wasn't ready to deal with.
As soon as most audience members were seated, the host arrived on the stage and quickly asked them for their understanding while telling them that the matches would now continue.
The 2nd of the Quarterfinal matches began… and then ended as Hyandus notified that he conceded the match. The prince was still a little sour about the situation, but he said nothing.
Since the 2nd match was over with the Prince's victory, he was announced to move on to the next round.
