The audience, Judge, the ten finalists were all staring at Zilan in wonder.
They all had the same thought in their minds, ‘You do know that if the tournament ends, you win right?’
No one could understand his reasoning however, this didn’t mean that they couldn’t guess.
“Hehehe, he probably wishes to get revenge for Fujo.” Said one person.
“No, I think, like us, he just isn’t satisfied with how things are ending.” Another one gave his opinion.
Watching from afar Wazimu broke out into laughter,
“I’m liking this kid more and more. Mm, only true warriors are able to gain enjoyment from battle.”
Fourth Elder by his side shook his head.
“I don’t think that’s the reason he wants to fight. There aren’t many in this world as crazy for war as you are.”
“Oh, so in your opinion why does the boy wish to challenge when he’s already won the whole thing?”
Fourth Elder sighed, “I don’t know. I cannot see through that child’s actions.”
‘A third ranked Alchemist and a champion rookie Fire guardian, not even sixteen years old. I never thought I would live to see such a supreme talent in my Alchemy Association.’
Zilan being a third ranked Alchemist had been kept under wraps due to various reasons. First of all was his age which would cause a commotion and may even spell danger if the news was leaked. Second of all, the Elders in charge of the second entrance test, were unable to definitively rank Zilan’s creation as it was a concept they had never come across. Thus, Zilan was scheduled to take the test for the third rank (three cauldrons) when the rookies would be doing their One star Kings tournament.
…………………………..
“You wish to challenge someone?” asked Judge. From the very beginning, the actions of this Half Breed had both confused him as well as astounded him therefore, he couldn’t say he was too surprised to see that yet again, it was him who was at the centre of everyone’s attention.
“Junior challenges Yasen Andriani.” Said Zilan.
As expected the crowd went ballistic, the feelings of disgust and hate they had for the Half Breed were nowhere to be seen at this moment as they were all excited to see him fight.
Yasen on the other hand narrowed his eyes. He had already indirectly announced that he no longer wished to participate in the tournament yet this Half Breed still chose to force him out.
He was about to directly forfeit when a pill of unknown origin dropped on his lap.
“That should heal your injuries.” Laughed Zilan. “Now you have no reason not to fight. That is unless you’re afraid of me.”
He specifically raised his voice, making sure everyone in attendance heard his words. This way, even if Yasen decided to forfeit, the narrative would still be in his favour. ‘Yasen Andriani, afraid to fight the Half Breed, directly forfeited.’ Or something along those lines.
Sniffing the pill, Yasen’s eyes glowed. He quickly ingested it and the results were astonishing. In not even five breaths worth of time, the internal injuries he had suffered were fully healed. He was stunned but not because the pill had healing capabilities, his injuries were after all light, if he wanted to he could slowly heal them using his Beast force. No, what truly shocked him was the fact that a pill he had never heard of, actually worked on a Beast of the soul-compression stage.
‘Did he concoct this? If he did then….’
Yasen quietly calmed himself. In terms of Alchemy, the Half Breed was ranked with two cauldrons meaning he was a step above him. He had never acknowledged this fact until today since only he knew the amount of time and effort he had put into studying his field.
‘Polee…I’ll work harder.’
With that thought, he jumped onto the platform coming face to face with Zilan.
‘Hmm, now that I’ve got him here what should I do?’
Zilan obviously had not expected for things to turn out this way therefore since he had challenged Yasen, his performance needed to be dominant.
Having said that, his options weren’t looking too good.
‘Rain Drizzle? I have only three attempts to outrun him however, even if I catch him off-guard my attacks won’t necessarily finish him.’
‘Rain Storm? If I use all of my Blood Force, I may draw blood but to beat him down? Not likely.’
‘I don’t want to use the glove and transforming is out of the question. What does that leave me with?’ thought Zilan.
“Begin!” Declared Judge. He was interested in seeing how the Half Breed would perform.
“I’ll go with that then.” Whispered Zilan somewhat unwillingly. He wanted to beat Yasen using only methods that a Tempering stage cultivator was capable of but unfortunately, doing so would not give him the eye-catching undebatable outcome that the he sought.
Yasen stared at the Half Breed, waiting for him to make his move.
‘What is he up to?’
“Before we begin, I’d like to ask you something.” Said Zilan, breaking the silence.
“What?”
“I may be wrong in thinking this but I feel like you held back when fighting Fujo. Your combat style, it didn’t suit your abilities. You possess a weapon, don’t you?”
Yasen’s eyebrows trembled as he heard Zilan’s question.
“So I’m right. Well, too bad you won’t get a chance to use it.”
As soon as he finished saying those words, the platform beneath their feet suddenly began glowing in an odd blue light.
“This…” Exclaimed Fourth Elder.
Yasen sensed danger but it was too late for him. Zilan’s words had done their job of keeping him busy and now all the preparations were in place.
“You’re wondering, what’s going on?” smiled Zilan.
“You see, I happen to be acquainted with the way of formations and it just so appears that this platform fits the requirements for the Cardinal Elements formation.”
Yasen understood the part about the formations but he was not familiar with the Cardinal Elements formation or whatever Zilan called it.
“With most of the elements being represented within the platform, it makes it easy for the formation to draw upon their power to suppress you.”
As soon as he said that, Yasen had already pounced an instant away from clawing Zilan’s face.
*Swish*
A raindrop suddenly appeared around the Half Breeds body, wrecking his surprise attack.
Zilan instantly ‘teleported’ ten meters away, smiling as he looked back at Yasen.
He threw a Blood force dan (pill) into his mouth like one would an insignificant snack. The energy he consumed quickly refilling.
He then tapped his right toe onto the platform and recited a few words. Almost immediately after, a red light mixed in with the blue light making the previously black stage even more eye-catching.
The feeling of danger increased within Yasen thus he used all of his Beast force to power his movement technique in order to catch Zilan.
A series of *Swish* sounds soon followed as the images of Yasen and Zilan were constantly blurry, their after images confusing the audience.
Each time Zilan would stop after evading Yasen. He would then ingest a Blood force dan before tapping his toe onto the platform. Another colour would join into the fray, causing the platform to appear ethereal.
Each colour represented an element and Zilan was going to exploit them all in order to suppress the soul-compression stage Yasen. Of course, every time he evaded Yasen, a price still needed to be paid. Even if his new creation the Blood force dan could refill his body with Universe energy to some degree, this still didn’t mean that exceeding the limit of three uses of the Rain Drizzle technique wouldn’t have its consequences. In this case, his body was slowly breaking down, moving at that speed for someone in the Tempering stage could be regarded as a form of suicide. That continuous stop-and-go pattern at the speeds he was travelling was hurting him on the inside even if it did not show on the outside. Now, if he were to transform, that would be a different matter altogether however, Zilan clearly had no plans of doing that.
“It’s time.” Said Zilan, his legs trembling.
Yasen was panting on the side, his uniquely pale face flushing red. He had never been part of anything as ludicrous as what he was currently doing.
‘Did you challenge me to a fight or to a game of cat of mouse?’
Waving his hand and whispering an incantation, chains of varying colours rose up from the stage and entrapped Yasen, bringing him to his knees.
“Phew~ ” Taking a deep breath, Zilan wiped the sweat from his forehead and smiled.
“I win.”
The crowd’s initial enthusiasm towards the fight was currently nowhere to be seen. They had been silent since the beginning of the fight not because of how exciting the fight was but rather because they couldn’t f**king see anything.
‘What fight are you even talking about?’ thought many of the spectators. All they experienced was a bunch of blurry images, a few *swish, swish* sounds, a light show, and then everything suddenly came to a stop with the Half Breed wiping off his sweat and proudly proclaiming himself winner.
‘What ‘I win?’. We didn’t see sh*t!” thought the crowd. Stunned by how, the tournament played out.
Only the strong people in attendance were able to tell that what Zilan had shown was a masterful display of resourcefulness and cunning.
If the crowd were to hear this analysis, they would probably react by shouting, “F**k your cunning. Resourcefulness? Bullsh*t!”
Zilan paid no mind to the silent crowd. He sneakily, commanded the chains that had bound Yasen to extract a few drops of his blood and some of his aura. Yasen could feel the sting in his back but he didn’t attribute it to the Half Breed stealing samples of his bloodline. Instead he just glared at Zilan.
“Good.” Done with the extraction, he commanded the chains to throw Yasen off of the stage.
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