Two days passed,
The day of the third and final round had arrived. One stage was prepared, and it was made of hardwood. Four kids were standing on the stage and in front of them stood the elder Wang. There was only one stage this time around.
These four kids were Yang Zhai, Ci An, Hong Mi, and Ha Kun.
"I would try to make it short, so listen carefully. Last time, you kids paid the price for being careless and a certain kid took advantage of this. He toyed around with you in the previous round, and you kids, you did not even realize it until everything was done." Elder Wang mocked the three kids on the stage, except for Yang Zhai. After all, the kid who played with them was Yang Zhai. Forget about the kids, even the elders were rendered helpless by Yang Zhai to do anything.
After all, Yang Zhai had said everything in front of the whole audience. If elder Wang tried to prove Yang Zhai wrong without even considering his own reputation and words, then this foolishness would have been spread throughout the whole clan. People would have started the rumors that elders were left so helpless by a kid that they had to change the rules in the middle of the competition and went against their own words. So, elder Wang and elder Ren acted as if they had made these rules deliberately.
Therefore, the words that elder Wang spoke right now, were also for himself.
Around the wooden stage was a small audience as well. It was small because this was only a class competition and not a competition between two Academies. So, the people present here were class kids, their families, and four elders, not even all of this academy's elders.
"There will be two rounds today. In the first round, Yang Zhai would face Ha Kun and Ci An would face Hong Mi. In the final round, the winners of the third round would face each other. And, nobody is allowed to interfere during the fights, even the healing cultivators, as long as one of the competitors gives up or falls unconscious. Nobody is allowed to use any kind of weapons, and remember that you are not allowed to kill your opponent." Elder Wang indicated the words 'that nobody was allowed to interfere' because he himself had also learned the lesson from the previous round.
What the hell! Really, the person that I least wanted to go against is my opponent. I am lost even before the battle starts. If he wants to, he can scare me to death with just his eyes: Ha Kun thought, he was scared out of his wits.
Of course, he was overthinking. Yang Zhai was not so foolish as to release his killing intent or Aurora's aura in front of the elders. If he wanted to, he could control the range and the target of his killing intent and Aurora's aura, but he was a cautious person and would not take the chance. And then, won't the elders grow suspicious if Ha Kun fell unconscious all of a sudden during the fight for no reason?
Even to Hong Mi two days ago, he had only shown the fighting intent of Aurora through his eyes. He made sure that the aura was not released to the outside world, this was the reason Ha Kun and Ci An did not feel anything from him the day before yesterday.
"Ok, if there are any questions you want to ask, go ahead; otherwise, we can begin the third round." Elder Wang queried to see if someone else could find any loopholes in the rules. But nobody spoke.
"Ok, if there are no questions, we can start. Yang Zhai and Ha Kun get ready for the battle. As for you two, you should wait for your turn." Elder Wang looked at Hong Mi and Ci An, indicating for them to get down the stage.
"Yes, elder." Both Hong Mi and Ci An got down from the stage and waited for their turn.
On the other hand, both Yang Zhai and Ha Kun got to their positions, on two sides of the stage. Whereas, Ha Kun's legs were trembling; however, he did not refuse the fight.
We are not allowed to kill each other; so, at least, I won't die, and I can save my image in front of the others as well. If I give up the fight, I would surely be mocked by others, ha…ha…ha: Ha Kun thought to himself. He felt uncomfortable about the situation he was in and smiled awkwardly. He could not give up, nor did he want to fight Yang Zhai.
"Begin!" Elder Wang shouted and jumped down from the stage.
Everyone focused on the battle. Their eyes turned toward the arena. Especially, Ci An and Hong Mi focused on the battle with all their attention. After all, there was a chance that they might go against Yang Zhai in the final round.
On the other hand,
Yang Zhai took a step forward. He wanted to get close to Ha Kun. He did not have much choice, to begin with, because he was almost blinded; thus, he had to get close to his opponent and use his strengthened body's advantage. From close range, he could at least determine his opponent's body movements. He did have another strategy in mind, but he wanted to save it for the final round.
Because, during the second round, he felt something wrong with Ci An's aura. If he was not wrong, Ci An would surely win this round, except if something surprising did not happen.
When Ha Kun saw Yang Zhai running toward him, he activated the rank 1 earth technique and an earth ball appeared and floated in his hand.
Yang Zhai felt the fluctuations of a technique being activated and began to run in a zig-zag pattern, in this way, there was less chance of Ha Kun being able to hit Yang Zhai perfectly with his technique. Yang Zhai's strength had increased greatly after he used the Strength Ka for around three weeks. Therefore, his speed was a little fast. Yang Zhai's near blindness state was what was truly obstructing him from using his full advantage; Otherwise, he would have easily dodged Ha Kun's attacks and could have also defeated him without using any kind of technique.
But, he was not someone who would use flaws as excuses. This world did not work like that, if he did use his flaws as excuses, then he would only be giving his weak points to others. And in this way, he would only be exploited and nothing else. He could only depend on himself, and this was something that he knew very clearly. He had to make up for his flaws by himself.
Thus, he tried to close the distance between himself and Ha Kun. Of course, he was at least able to determine Ha Kun's position by the aura of the technique. He only needed to get within the range of four to five meters to look at Ha Kun, even then, he could only determine the body movements and could not examine a person's expressions.
Suddenly, Yang Zhai saw a dust sphere appear in front of him. If he could see the sphere, then it meant that the ball was within the range of five meters, which was close to him. This sphere was around six inches.
The power and the mass of a technique could be determined by the person using it. But the range and the power of a rank always mattered when using techniques. There were some techniques that were able to reach the power of the next ranks, but they were rare.
Yang Zhai dodged to the side, but the dust ball managed to hit his left elbow. His elbow began to get a little swelling on it and was hurting, but it was not heavily injured because Yang Zhai's body strength was more than a mortal's body. But, Yang Zhai discovered from the power and the aura of the technique that Ha Kun had already reached rank 1 mid-stage.
Yang Zhai did not stop and kept on running toward Ha Kun. This much pain was nothing to him, after all, he had even burned his body in the first round; so, could this much pain hinder him?
He wanted to get Ha Kun in his range of sight as quickly as possible.
When Ha Kun saw that Yang Zhai was getting close to him, he attacked Yang Zhai a few more times whilst running. However, Ha Kun did not know that these techniques were not benefitting him, but were only revealing his location to Yang Zhai.
Yang Zhai was also hit by the techniques of Ha Kun, two to three times. Ha Kun managed to learn three techniques during this month.
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