"Hey, follow me.," a lady gestured for Tobi and Chioma. She was the Saikyu District representative. She led me to a corner where the other five that were selected stayed. "Okay, we are complete now. Make sure you hold on to a part of me. Okay?" she instructed. "Yes, ma.," they all replied. After ensuring that they had all complied with the instruction, she teleported in a blink to a place unfamiliar to the students.
"Welcome to the Saikyu District Military Base.," she announced. The base was situated at the southern border of the district, kilometres away from Tobi's home. Pine trees surrounded the base, with only a ten-metre space between each pine tree. From the base, a path leads to a mountain forest. This forest is used as a testing and training area. The base has ornamentals carefully arranged around its corridors, adding to the aesthetics of the base.
"You are all here! Good job, Ebun!" a fair lady in her thirties declared, smiling. "You are all welcome.," she continued. A big smile formed on Tobi's face as she saw the woman. He ran towards the woman and hugged her tight. "Big sister Jumoke! So happy to see you.," Tobi said, still hugging. Jumoke, flustered at Tobi's, held his head and released herself from the hug. "That's enough. Good to see you too."
"Again, welcome to the Saikyu District Military Base. For the past ten years, not one prospective warrior has been selected by this district. You are the first in ten years. Fifteen years up to eleven years ago, only 2% of those selected got accepted later on. She paused. "The Saikyu district has always boasted of strong warriors. We have the lowest number of warriors in our districts, but the lowest rank in Saikyu as of now is B-rank. Your potential to grow and your determination to grow is what matters in this district. Now, introduce yourself."
"Hi, I'm Chioma Raiki."
"Andrew Akaze is my name."
"My name is Matthew Anto."
"Hello, I'm Deji Arowolo."
"I am Usman Fodio."
"My name is Emeka Eme."
"I am Tobi Shirin. Good to meet you."
"Good. Now that you have introduced yourself, it is time for the final test of Saikyu.," Jumoke declared. "Final test? I thought that we did that before?" Usman asked. "Hehehe. This test is different. Pass the test, and you become an official member of the Saikyu District Military. Fail it, and you get sent back to the headquarters for a final decision. I'm sure they would be expectant.," she said as she smirked.
"It is going to be a seven against one—the seven of you against me. Touch me, and you win. It is that simple." She announced.
"What? Is this not outrageous? How could we possibly touch a district commander?!" Emeka asked. "Do not fret. I will use only five per cent of my strength. Haha."
This time Tobi was not elated about fighting. He knew that the next in line after the Grand Commanders were the District Commanders. They are the possible successors of the Grand title. They are the S-rank warriors. Moreso, it was Jumoke.
Jumoke led them into the mountain forest. As the name suggests, it has a lot of trees and large mountains. The forest alone was as large as a city. It was the largest mountain forest in the whole of Sanemi. The mountain forest had mountains of about 700 metres to 1700 metres tall. There were green grasses surrounding short trees and thorns, but the most obvious view is the flat top mountain with a height of 700 metres, a width of 800 metres and a depth of 600 metres.
"Now, shall we?" Jumoke signalled. The seven took their stances and positioned themselves to attack. Andrew was the first to attack. He rotated his spear above his head and swung it laterally. "Swush," Andrew said. Jumoke, on the other end, casually tossed the attack away. Andrew was taken aback as he saw his attack casually tossed away. "Tch, district commanders are no joke.," he said.
Usman was a hand-to-hand combatant. He closed in on Jumoke, who had not moved from her position. "Oh, oh. A hand-to-hand combatant.," Jumoke expressed. Usman threw a right-hand punch aiming at Jumoke's face and readied a follow-up left-hand punch aiming at her belly. Jumoke dodged the right-hand punch, which rendered the left-hand punch impossible to throw. This put Usman in an unfavourable position. "Tch.," he said and repositioned himself.
Usman, this time threw a series of punches at Jumoke, aiming at different parts of her body. "Hit, hit, hit, hit, hit, hit," he said. Jumoke dodged all the with zero effort and pushed Usman back as far as 30 metres away with a finger flick. "Ahh! So fast and strong." Usman said.
"Target Lock, lightning strike," Chioma said, shooting her arrow aiming toward the neck of Jumoke. "Everybody, attack at once., Chioma shouted. Target Lock guarantees 100% accuracy to its users. The user targets a specific point and locks the arrow to that particular point. The arrow will move to the locked point till it hits that point, even if dodged, but...
"A target lock? Interesting!" she proclaimed. She casually dodged the arrow aiming at her twice before breaking it with her bare palm. The target lock loses its function when the arrow is broken.
"Tremor!" Emeka shouted, placing his two hands on the ground. Everywhere trembled, including the flat top position where Jumoke was standing. Jumoke had focused her energy on her limbs. "Tobi, now!" Chioma shouted. Tobi, who was trembling from the tremor, focused his energy on his limbs and jumped up. He raised his sword above his head and coated the sword with fire. He swung his sword with full force and shouted. "Mountain Slash!"
Jumoke saw the attack and evaded it. "Such level of power from a young boy. Not bad." Tobi's Mountain Slash had cut two mountains into two, including the flat top mountain where Jumoke stood. "She evaded it? Arrghh!" Tobi said.
"How do we defeat her now?" Emeka asked. "It's even hard to just get a touch on her."
"Well, I say we attack her at once," Deji said. "I agree.," Matthew retorted.
"Ehhh? What have we been doing? The two of you have been ghosting. You haven't made a single attack." Usman said, frowning at the two.
"Well, disagreeing won't do anything for us here. Let's all attack at the same time. Same time. She'll have to dodge all of our attacks. Sooner, she'll start to block them, and that will be our cue. Chioma, shoot more of your target lock. Tobi, Andrew and Usman use a close close-range Emeka, use another attack that does not affect all of us. Let's go."
They all launched at Jumoke as planned and released their attacks. "Hit! Lightning Strike! Fire Whips! Crystal Blast!" they shouted. They fought with all their energies. Jumoke kept dodging their attacks. Then, she stomped her feet on the ground. A wild mass of flames pushed them back as far as 60 metres. "Now, let me show you real power." She smirked
Jumoke activated Kuroringan – a low-grade Shingan. It changes the eye colour to a small black pupil. She activated Kuroringan in only one of her eyes. With this low-grade Shingan, the air in the area changed. It grew cold. Jumoke a low-grade hand above her head and released a mass of flames into the atmosphere. The flames covered about one-third of the cloud above them. Then, she absorbed the flames back into her palms.
Jumoke smiled at the seven, which sent shivers down their spines. "Destructive Ability, Blink Destruction.," she said, throwing her arms forward. The attack moved faster than the speed of light, destroying everything it touched. Among the three Destructive Abilities, only Blink Destruction gives the user to select specific points to "not destroy".
The seven were oblivious to what had happened. They could not find Jumoke where she stood anymore. What they saw was the mountain forest ravaged by flames. They were the only ones unscarred. All of a sudden, Jumoke appeared before them. She looked down on them with the Kuroringan eye.
The aura that emanated from Jumoke was intimidating. They could neither move nor say a word. All of their muscles lost function when she stood before them with the Kuroringan. "If she could release such an aura with the lowest form of Shingan, how strong is she?" Tobi thought to himself. They were all shivering and also covered in sweat. "This is real power," Matthew said.
"You all have failed, but you have a second chance. Run back to the base in 1 minute.," she said and disappeared.
As she vanished from their sight, they picked themselves up and ran towards the base. The base was 783 metres away from where they were. They ran as fast as they could. Chioma coated herself with lightning and was leading the pack till Deji sped past her. He was running at five times her speed. "Unbelievable. Such speed!" Chioma exclaimed.
They all arrived at the base with Deji first under, Chioma second with two seconds faster than Matthew, Tobi fourth, Usman fifth, Emeka sixth and Andrew the last to arrive. They all held their knees, panting.
"Welcome back. Ahem. You all have tried. You are still very much weak, and I am not in any way impressed." she paused and shook her head. "I have decided to groom you and watch you grow into fine warriors. I welcome you officially to the Saikyu District Military Base.," she said and smiled.
"We made it. We made it. Yes. Finally.," they all shouted together.
"Silence. Listen attentively. In this district, we have five captains and two vice-captains. Two of the captains are not around. They are on a classified mission. You all will be under a captain, and you shall carry out your mission as a squad. The captain is the head of the squad. Obey them.," Jumoke announced. "Listen to your squads. Joining Vice-captain Amanda, Deji, and Emeka will be under Captain Harry."
"Captain Chijoke will be in charge of vice-captain Barakat, Matthew and Usman."
"Captain Ebun will be in charge of Chioma, Andrew and Tobi. I wish you all the best. Congratulations., She said before entering the base building.
The captains signalled to their members and gave them some instructions before dismissing them.
"Do not slack off. The real work starts now." Ebun advised.
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In the Uti area of Saikyu, two men approached a man drinking inside a bar. They got closer to him. "Sir, the ship will be arriving in two days. What are your instructions, sir?" one of the men said.
"What type of ship is it?" the man drinking asked.
"It is a warship, sir.," the men answered.
"Warship? Kekeke. Then, gather the boys and double-cross the ship before it reaches the shore. Make it seem as if they were attacked by pirates." the man instructed and gulped a good amount of liquor.
"Yes sir.," they answered and left.
"A warship. This would fetch some money to complete the mission. Hahaha."