Red's rapid rise in the rankings had buzzed through the freshman class. Many knew that he was the champion of the freshmen, but since the competition, he hadn't been appearing for any classes at all. He was frequently seen taking missions one after the other in the mission hall and then challenging the rankers on the board.
Freshmen also knew they couldn't challenge others in the first six months, but clearly Red had been given an exception. Today Red had challenged the 30th ranked student. He was an older senior who was at the peak of Foundation Establishment and a powerful sword user. When news broke out, people flocked to see the challenge.
A ranker could not deny a challenge, because the challenger was paying points to challenge them, if they did not appear they would be declared the loser and lose a rank.
Red and the senior fought. Although the senior used a sword, Red continued to fight bare handed. Till now he had been able to one hit knock out everyone he challenged. His combat capabilities with his instinct developed from real life and death situations as well as the terrifying martial art he practiced now made him practically unbeatable. He even wondered why he was made to challenge these students by the old beggar, in front of him they were like protected chicks who hadn't stared at death in the face. The only major disadvantage he had was that his cultivation was low because of the difficulty of practicing the Profound Asura Scripture.
However this match was different. This senior Adam wasn't as simple as the ones he had faced before. As the battle began Red rushed in to finish matters quickly, but Adam evaded the blow and retaliated with his own blow of the sword.
Red easily dodged and tried to trip Adam off balance however Adam used a movement art of his own which allowed him to quickly transfer behind Red and attack again which Red kept dodging again. This stalemate surprised the teachers who were watching.
At Red's rate of rise, they had expected him to win easily, but they realized that Adam was actually very talented at combat. A teacher commented. "Adam is so powerful, he can easily be in the top 10 with this ability!"
The fight continued and Red who was enjoying putting some pressure on himself, he decided to use a profound fist from the exercise. The fist had a mysterious intent. Adam felt something was wrong with the fist, but decided to meet it with his own fist. His fist was extremely powerful, much more than any ordinary peak foundation establishment practitioner.
However, Adam's punch hit air and behind that punch another punch appeared that hit the Adam in the chest and threw him back to the ground. The teachers who saw that were surprised.
"What a profound fist art!" a teacher spoke out, shocked.
After this battle with Adam, the remaining of the fights until the top 10 were simple. It put into focus Adam's performance.
Within the top 10 too Red didn't face much of a challenge. When it was time to challenge the top 5, almost the month had come to an end and Red managed to finally unlock the final Chakra point.
Now he had finally unlocked two exercises a kiting dodging skill and a high speed running art and finally was able to merge all these exercises into one single martial art which was called Fundamental Combat Techniques. On the surface this set of techniques seemed very simple, but each exercise at the level of the Asura was incredibly profound and combined formed a mystical martial arts.
Now having completely opened his Chakra points Red had finally completed tempering his body. His body was emanating a powerful domineering aura but after opening all seven points the energy they absorbed began transforming into extremely calm and peaceful energy that permeated his body and hid the domineering aura. Red's body had become extremely strong and he was yet to cultivate qi.
The next four on the rankings were easy after that. It was time for the final battle against the top ranker. Surprisingly when he found out about who the first ranker he was surprised, because the student who ranked first was only in qi condensation stage. This shocked him because others were almost at the point of forming their cores. The first ranker's name was Kim-Soo. He was a disciple of the principal.
The principal came to watch the the match, but the old beggar was nowhere to be found. Kim-Soo was actually younger than most students, he looked like a 15 year old boy. Red was surprised, but beyond that he remained alert.
Both immediately moved at the signal and clashed. Both were fighting bare handed. When Red encountered Kim-Soo's power he was surprised, because he was stronger than most of the others who were at the peak of Foundation Establishment.
The two kept throwing punches and Red used various slight manipulations in his punches to disorient his opponent but they failed. After a few punches both got pushed back and Red smiled.
"Punching you feels like I am punching into water." Red said with a smile. Kim-Dpo continued to attack. Red then used his jump technique to fall into Kim-Soo and his suspicions were confirmed even more. He performed a lariat and tackled Kim-Soo but his opponent fell very gently to the ground.
Kim-Soo was taking the attack towards Red, while Red decided to now purely play defensive. He was very interested in this water like flow displayed by his opponent and defended himself while using his perception to carefully analyze Kim-Soo.
After a few moves, he retaliated and pushed Kim-Soo back with a punch. However, this time Kim-Soo actually felt a pain in his own palm which he used to defend. Red continued attacking without stopping ato give his opponent a chance before hitting him down to the floor. Each punch he hit kept on increasing the pain that Kim-Soo felt until he finally conceded.
Kim-Soo's movement had the trait of water floe to them. Red carefully observed the traits and introduced an opposing spiral intent into his punches and once he verified that this mixed up Kim-Soo's motions and hurt him, became more proficient at it with every new punch.
With the conclusion of this battle, he had finally succeeded in becoming the top ranked student in the rankings within two months.