"We have the first name!!" Gazil exclaimed.
"It's none other than Asher Von Greville!!!" he announced.
The crowd cheered loudly, as the majority were people from Somaria and supported the Greville family more than other Elite families.
"Wow, brother is already on the leaderboard," Lucas said with a happy face.
The screen showed other participants, but one of the cameras was now fixed on Asher.
"Let's see what our first place is doing," Gazil said, and the audience looked on, getting mesmerized by Asher's look. His crimson-red eyes and black hair added to his charm, and some of the girls in the audience were already cheering for him.
Asher ran towards what seemed like a cave, but he didn't encounter anyone else after his first encounter. He arrived in front of the cave, but it was not deep at all, and he could see a token lying around.
Asher went in, and as he crouched to pick up the token, a shadow with a dagger emerged beside him. A figure of a young boy who was blended in the shadows appeared and attacked Asher from his blind spot. The boy smiled, thinking how he had fooled one person already in his trap.
As the dagger approached Asher at a fast speed, he turned around and knocked the dagger out of his hand with his hand coated in mana. A broken bone sound could be heard as Asher attacked the boy.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH," the young boy screamed in the cave as he held onto his hand. His broken arm was also visible on the outside.
As the boy screamed in pain, he opened one of his eyes to see a pair of red eyes that were coming towards him. His heart rate went up, but Asher, who did not want to waste time, knocked him out cold with a kick, activating the barrier.
"Professor, this boy is a bit ruthless in his attacks," one of the test conductors said to the man who was wearing a white coat.
"Well, we can't interfere with their methods. Get that boy out and take him to the medical block after this guy leaves," he replied, but his eyes were still fixed on Asher.
"He seems like an experienced fighter," he said to himself.
Asher looked at the count of the token going +2, taking his total to 4. He went deeper into the forest, which was quite big, and it would take time and luck to have any encounters with others until another hour when the participants would be nearing the final location.
Asher had directional support in the bracelet which showed the direction of the final location. It looked like a compass, but it did not show any other directions.
In another tournament location, Elena was dueling another participant. Elena quickly arrived behind the girl as she dodged the water spell that was directed at her.
"Fireball," a ball of fire hovered over Elena's hand, and she threw it towards the girl.
As the terrain did not help the girl to efficiently dodge, she took the full brunt of the spell and activated the barrier.
"First one down," Elena did not even look back at the girl she had defeated and went ahead as she saw the count going up by one.
"We have our second name on the Girls Leaderboard!!" Gazil's voice was heard despite the loud cheers of the audience.
"We have Elena Rothschild taking the first spot!!" he spoke, and the cheers got even louder.
James smiled, looking at Elena's name, and Filia was also cheering for her daughter. But they knew that this was only the start, and maintaining that first spot would get more difficult as the time limit neared the end.
In another location, a white-haired boy was climbing up a huge tree, jumping around, and making sure that he would not fall.
"Nice!" Kevin smiled as he got his first token. He got down fairly easily and looked in the direction of the final location.
"Can't wait to see your face, Asher Greville," Kevin smirked as he ran towards the direction of the final location.
At the same time,
"What the hell? Those dumb old men at the World Academy thought that this was a good location to hold a tournament," Damian said as he was struggling to travel around with a sledgehammer on his back.
His primary weapon was a shield, as he had trained himself as a tank, but using it in an individual tournament was not feasible for him at the moment.
Bam
"Voila!" Damian's smile got bigger as he heard the sound of spells thrown around. He dashed forward and saw two mages fighting with each other.
"Wind Gla-" A boy was completing his chant, but he stopped as he saw another boy who had jumped towards him with a sledgehammer in his arms.
The boy wanted to dodge, but he had no time because of his attention to his ongoing duel. He put his hand forward to cover his head, but Damian's swing was pretty powerful.
Bam
Damian looked at the boy with broken arms and his activated barrier from his suit. He turned towards the other mage, who had a pale face seeing Damian's ruthless strike.
"Hehe, let's have some fun, shall we?" Damian said as he ran towards the other mage.
The boy conjured many water daggers and sent them towards Damian, who almost dodged all of them despite the weight of the sledgehammer. But some of the daggers still hit his face and arms, and small cuts started appearing. The suit was carefully designed to only activate when the force of the attack was fatal or manually by the test conductors who were watching every participant carefully.
If they deemed it necessary, they could activate the barrier if the strike was fatal to you, but they only did it if it was necessary. They would not activate the barrier if the wound or the injury could be treated at their medical blocks, and the students would be fine after a few days.
"HAH!" Damian swung his sledgehammer wide, but the mage dodged the strike, but Damian continued his attacks.
"FUCK-" The boy cursed as he saw his back against a tree trunk, and the sledgehammer struck his ribs, knocking him out of the tournament.
"Haha, now this is fun," Damian said.
"Wait till I meet you, my best friend," Damian smirked as he went ahead.
In the stadium,
"We have two new names on the leaderboard!" Gazil spoke.
"Damian Seymour on the 2nd place with three tokens,"
"And the third place with two tokens is none other than Kevin Whiteheart!" Gazil said as the cheers in the audience were loud.
Some of the girls were even chanting Kevin's name as he was quite a famous talent, and his name would always come up when somebody would talk about some of the prodigies of this generation.
"Look, Damian is on the leaderboard," Lucas said. He turned towards Nate, who was watching the tournament with a relaxed face.
"He's just lucky. Don't hype him up too much. Ouch-" Nate was saying, but Verina pinched his cheeks.
"Respect your big brother, Nate," Verina narrowed her eyes at Nate.
"Okay, sorry," Nate said with a grumpy voice as he held his hands on his cheeks, making sure Verina could not pinch him again.
David just laughed it off, while Sylvie could sympathize with Verina as she was in a similar position to hers, but she had no clue how to mend Asher and Amelia's relationship without upsetting one person or the other.
While everyone was chatting at the Girls tournament location, Alyssa was making her way towards the final location. She had not encountered anyone, and nor had she seen any tokens. The terrain also made it difficult for her to move around as she was consuming mana every second.
"Maybe I should reserve my mana," Alyssa made a decision.
She decided to rest on one of the branches of the tallest tree near her. She hovered up to the branch and sat on it.
"Ugh," Alyssa clenched her chest as she had a sharp pain when she hovered up to the branch. Tears formed around her eyes, and one of the tears flowed through the deep scar on her face.
She breathed in and out multiple times to calm herself down. Her pink hair fell down on her face and covered it. She was getting dizzy, but after a while, she relaxed and looked at the timer.
<01:48:23>
"Let's move in the last hour," Alyssa decided to gamble it as she now had a better chance with the potion she had received from Emmy.
Meanwhile, in another location, a blue-haired girl could be seen fighting with a girl with a sword.
"Let's see how you handle this," The girl did a wide strike with her sword.
*Ting*
The sword got rebounded as it hit a small barrier of some sorts.
"Let's finish this," Eva said with a calm look on her face.
Leaderboard
1. Asher Von Greville - 4
2. Damian Seymour - 3
3. Kevin Whiteheart - 2
Leaderboard
1. Elena Rothschild - 2
2. Empty
3. Empty
