Before I knew what'd happened, Rick and I were swept up into the chaos. We were forced into a changing room, where we got out of our generic workout clothes and put on Gifted Academy gear. Sleek black pants that were enchanted to fit anyone perfectly, comfortable and good looking without hindering your ability to move and fight. A t-shirt style blue jersey with 'Gifted Academy' on the front and a design on the back that somehow changed to match your powers. On Rick's back, a massive shield glowing with holy light appeared. Meanwhile, on my back a dark-golden storm cloud appeared, constantly changing shape. One moment it was a gentle floating cloud, the next a hurricane, then a lightning storm with massive hail falling from it, then a tornado... I had to force myself to stop watching the designs and put my shoes back on so I could walk out of the changing room in time.
Walking into our normal body refining workout area, I watched in awe as Principal Hubert waved his hand and the massive formations on the floor undid themselves and shrunk down from several hundred feet wide to 5 or 6 feet as they flew towards him. With a look of concentration, he started altering the formation carefully.
Turning, I found Alaric holding a massive battleaxe that Beth would surely drool over. He swung it at the edge of the room and a dark red light covered it as it sliced through layer after layer of granite. Not ten swings later, the room had been expanded from several hundred feet to a couple thousand feet long and wide. Meanwhile, Carlos followed along behind him mumbling to himself and drawing symbols in the air with a brush shining with Elemental Energy. The walls, ceiling and floor started to glow within seconds, reinforcing them so that the school above our heads wouldn't fall through the ceiling and smash into our heads.
With that done, Alaric took the rock leftover from expanding the room and dumped it near the entrance to the room. Still mumbling to himself and waving his brush through the air, Carlos created another formation that heated all the rock within seconds and then formed it into a massive underground Colosseum made out of obsidian that faced the new formation that Principal Hubert had just put down in the newly opened area.
Looking around, the Principal nodded his head in satisfaction and said, "It's time! Any news on the others?"
"They accepted and are in the process of being teleported in as we speak." Master Nguyen walked into the room from the teachers lounge with a small smile on his face.
"Good!" Rubbing his hands together in excitement, the Principal turned to Rick and I and said, "All you need to do is survive as long as you can in the formation like usual. I increased the difficulty a bit, so be ready for a fight!"
We nodded in understanding, and waited in the wings off to the side as thousands of teenagers slowly made their way into the underground room. Looks of awe covered their faces as they found seats in the Colosseum and looked at the glowing symbols on the walls.
About 15 minutes later, everyone had a seat and were talking excitedly when a cough reverberated around the room. Once, Twice, Three times and the room fell into a complete silence.
Principal Hubert walked onto a stage directly in front of the benches. "As you should know, Gifted Academy has stood for excellence for several hundred years. Two former Presidents, over twenty senator's and three governor's have graduated from this school, while several of the most influential companies and executives across the United States are our alumni. Graduating from Gifted Academy has become a status symbol similar to graduating from an Ivy League school, it opens doors that otherwise would be impossible to open."
"What the general population doesn't know is that Gifted Academy is actually a cultivation school! For the last three hundred years, we've quietly searched for and trained potential geniuses of cultivation. However, with recent changes cultivation is becoming more and more important and now it is time for Gifted Academy to reveal it's true colors to the world. You are all here," The principal took a moment to look around the excited faces of the nearly two-thousand teenagers, "because when receiving your implant's you were put into a database as having the potential to become powerful cultivator's if you put in the work necessary. For the last couple of weeks, we've run a small program with some of your peers and a few of them will now demonstrate what they've learned over the last couple of weeks. If you work hard enough, then you too will be capable of doing these things."
With a flash of light, Bill Evans appeared in the middle of the fighting formation and the Principal continued talking. "This is Bill Evans, a dantian tool cultivator like most of you will likely become. He's been training with us for nearly two weeks and is considered to be in the top 10 of our class in strength."
The formation began, and massive transparent screens appeared showing the scene from all angles with a marker in the top left corner showing how high the gravity was set too. Another screen hanging at the top showed his name along with a graph of the number and types of monsters he'd killed.
Bill's knees buckled as the gravity shot up to 5 times earth standard and he pulled out dual longswords. With a grace that seemed impossible to all the new students watching, Bill slaughtered his way through a pack of wolves. Every 5 minutes, the gravity would shoot up and you could watch as the increase made him slow down, his breath coming out raggedly as he just barely managed to hold on. When the gravity finally reached 8 times earth standard, he fell to his knees unable to remain standing. However, he didn't give up as he pushed all of his remaining Elemental Energy into a final strike killing nearly 50 goblins in that instant of defiance before collapsing to the floor.
Cheering and clapping deafened my ears as a light covered Bill's body and he was brought to the corner of the stage where he sat down to rest and recover. Replay's of the best moments of the fight showed on the screens while a tally of kills flashed brightly.
"958 enemies killed, lasting 20 minutes and 15 seconds!" The Principal's voice boomed over the excited cheers. "Bill is a dantian cultivator like most of you will be after training for a while, which means that if you put in the work you too could fight like that in the near future!"
The cheering became even louder as everyone started to imagine their future, and the Principal continued on. "Now, we have Sarah Demitrov, an aspiring Elementalist who is ranked 6th currently!"
The crowd grew quiet as the fiery figure of Sarah appeared in the formation. Even as her cousin, I had to admit that between her figure and the special glow that all Elementalist's seem to give off she was incredibly gorgeous. The gravity increased, and she shifted both of her arm's to flame as she pulled out her spiritual daggers.
While she hadn't completely managed to turn into Fire Elemental Energy yet, she had obviously increased her cultivation over the week off as she allowed the monster's around her to hit her. Their blows would phase through her body as she sliced their throats and left a trail of flame behind her, burning the wolves chasing her. 5 minutes past, and Goblin Archers began to join the fray. I noticed that she would block any attack headed for her head, while dodging anything headed for her legs. Only attacks aimed at her torso phased through her, apparently she wasn't quite strong enough to ignore all physical blows yet.
She lasted longer than Bill, falling to the ground as her body phased back into it's normal form just seconds after the gravity shifted to 9 times Earth normal. "Lasting 25 minutes and 7 second, Sarah Demitrov killed 1321 enemies!" The Principal's voice once again echoed through the room as cheering and hollering was combined with whistles and I'm pretty sure I heard several boys yelling, "I'm in love!"
Appearing next to Bill, Sarah slowly sat up and smiled exhaustedly at everyone before she closed her eyes and started cultivating. "Next we have Richard Pattington. Currently ranked 3rd, he's a body cultivator training to be a Holy Knight!"
Rick appeared in the formation, and everyone gasped in shock as his shining armor appeared out of nowhere covering him from head to toe. Rick didn't even seem to notice the difference in gravity as he charged through the monsters with his mace, not even bothering to pull out his shield for these low-level mobs.
The crowed winced and gasped in awe as his mace tore the wolves to pieces in an instant, and for the first time the Goblins were summoned before the 5 minute mark. Rick didn't even seem to notice the increased gravity until it hit the 10 times mark, and he was forced to pull out his massive shield to block. The longer he lasted, the more enemies appeared and the higher level they were. With a last ditch effort, Rick charged through a group of nearly two-hundred Hobgoblins to slam his shield into the face of a minor Goblin Lord. Following up with a swipe from his mace, he fell to the ground in exhaustion just as it died.
"Richard Pattington, the Holy Knight!" The Principal roared over the crowd as they all stood up and slammed their feet into the ground, shaking the entire room while hollering. "Lasting 33 minutes and 28 seconds, killing an amazing 3,182 enemies including a minor Goblin Lord!" Rick appeared next to Sarah and his armor flashed in a blinding white light before disappearing and the crowd finally got a good luck at his rugged redneck face. Sitting up slowly, a can of chew appeared in his hands and he shoved a big chunk of it into his mouth as they watched.
I started laughing at the look of rage on the Principal's face, I could see it turning red as a deep, dark red color seemed to shoot from his eyes at Rick's Face. Paling, Rick quickly spit the dip into a bottle that appeared out of nowhere and closed his eyes to start cultivating.
I was still laughing as the Principal gathered himself together and said, "Ranked 2nd, Gunthar is a Barbarian Shaman! Shaman's are cultivator's who practice a special form of cultivation to become close with nature and the spirits of animals!"
Gunthar's massive form appeared in the formation. He'd put on the black pants, but forgone the top. His stunning, glowing tattoo's along with his rippling 12 pack had the girls drooling even as they tried to compare who they liked better, the redneck knight or the tattooed barbarian. Before they got the chance to really begin their debate, an image of a massive lion came from Gunthar's body and we all watched in fascination as his body transformed into a lion and started rampaging among the wolves. By the time the Goblin's appeared, he shifted into a sleek leopard and more and more images appeared from his body taking an illusory form and fighting alongside Gunthar as he leaped into the crowd of monsters.
Just after the 30 minute mark, Gunthar tried to repeat Connor's mad rush for the Goblin Lord but couldn't quite make it. Unlike Connor, Gunthar had taken many blows as his massive shape didn't allow him to dodge easily, and even with his toughness he found himself falling to the floor and turning back into a battered human just before he reached his target.
"Gunthar!" The Principal should seriously change his job, he'd make the perfect announcer at any sporting event. He can quiet down the crowd with nothing more than a cough, and his voice was powerful and compelling, forcing everyone to hang on his words. "Lasting 31 minutes and 59 seconds, he killed 3,342 enemies just falling short of finishing off the Goblin Lord!" Gunthar's battered form appeared next to Rick, and with an echoing roar, the image of the lion combined with him and we all watched in fascination as his injuries healed. Within a minute, he was sitting down and cultivating without a scratch on him.
"Finally, we have Sam Hughes! Currently ranked 1st in our class, he's a mindscape cultivator who can control the weather!"