"Yes, senior. I'll try my best." Max nodded and returned to the altar.
The crimson monarch waved his hand the crystal orb disappeared. He then looked at everyone and said, "You guys have more than enough affinity with the fire element, and some of you even exceeded my expectations. Now prepare yourself for the second trial, the trial of strength."
"In this trial, you will fight the earth golems. These golems do not possess any magic skills, but their bodies are very tough. Your rank will be decided by the number of the golems you destroy. Any questions?" He asked as he finished his explanation.
"Senior, I think this trial is not fair. I mean, our strength differs too much. Won't this favorable to strong ones since they will be able to kill more than others?" Aaron asked.
Max also nodded at this. He was the weakest of them and thus fated to lose.
"Hmm, you are right." The crimson monarch nodded and then smiled "Therefore to make it fair, your mana cores and the quality of your Mana would be sealed, you can only use power comparable to a two-star mage."
Hearing this, Max visibly relaxed. If everyone has the same level of strength, then he might have a chance to compete against others.
The crimson monarch threw some crystal beads toward them "Crush these when you think you will not be able to continue and you'll be teleported back here."
"Okay, I'll now send you guys to your battlefield. Remember, you have only two hours for this trial." The crimson monarch said and waved his hand. All the altars glowed with crimson light, and they disappeared before they could react.
After the cave was empty, The crimson monarch waved his hand once more, and a mana screen appeared in front of him. As he watched the five contenders on the different parts of the battlefield, he muttered, "I didn't expect to have five people whose talent isn't worse than mine to contend for my legacy. It seems this era has many geniuses. The world is fated to be stormy. Let's see who will get my legacy." He then focused on the battlefield.
...
Max suddenly found himself standing on the scorched ground. He looked around and saw no one. He could only see small red hills in the distance and many pitfalls on the ground. The temperature here was no less hot than in the cave. It was like a real battlefield.
'It seems we all were sent to different locations.' He thought and then checked his body to see if he had any side effects of sealing his mana core.
However, there wasn't any change to his core. 'Maybe this is because I'm already a two-star.' Max thought. He then opened his status window.
[ Name: Maxwell Garfield ]
[ Age: 18 ]
[ Strength: 10 ]
[ Agility: 10 ]
[ Stamina: 15 ]
[ Vitality: 13 ]
[ Intelligence: 15 ]
[ Mana: 1331/1331 ]
[ Element: Fire ]
[ Lust Points: 0 ]
"Yep!" He nodded in satisfaction when he saw his stamina and mana were full. He looked around to see if he could find any golem. But he couldn't spot any. 'Are we supposed to search around for them? Won't it waste too much time?'
Shua~
Just as this thought appeared in his mind, mana in his surroundings became agitated, and many golems made from earth element started coming out of the ground. With a rough glance, he spotted over a hundred of them.
"Let's see how many I can kill before my mana runs out." He stretched his body and closed his eyes to focus. Five fist-sized fireballs appeared above him. He had used ten mana points in each to conjure them.
He opened his eyes and hurled them toward the golems' head. With a bang, three of the five golems' heads were cracked, and they collapsed lifelessly while the remaining two used their hands to smash the fireballs away. He frowned at this.
'It's still not easy and takes a lot of mental energy to control several fireballs at the same time. On top of that, they have quite a good agility to defend themselves even though they are made of earth.'
"Let's try two then." Max conjured two fireballs and controlled them to the best of his ability as he sent them to the two golems who were nearest to him.
Bang!
Although the golems swung their arm to defend their heads, one of them was a second late while the other was a second fast, and fireballs struck them on their 'faces,' and exploded. Their stony heads cracked, and they fell to the ground.
"Two is good for me. I can control them to some extent simultaneously. This is fun. These golems are the perfect practice target for me. hehe." Max grinned.
He calculated that he should be able to kill around 70-80 golems if he only cast two ten mana point fireballs before his stamina ran out. He wanted to get better control over this skill as this was his only skill before he could learn more skills, and these golems provided him with the best opportunity.
He wanted to learn a few more skills, but there weren't any good skills in their library, and only the basic skills were available. There weren't any fire elemental skills, so he didn't pay any attention to them.
Magic spells were scarce everywhere, and only common spells that weren't powerful enough were available in the market. If anyone wanted better ones to increase their strength, they had to join either a magic academy or the kingdom's knight's force, etc.
Since he was a Viscount's son, he could just request his father, but the recent situation didn't allow him, and he himself almost forgot about it. Therefore, he decided to gain better control over his [Fireball]. As for more spells, he decided to join a magic Academy.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Max continuously spammed his fireballs and kept destroying earth golems. He wasn't able to hit with 100 percent accuracy since these golems weren't some immovable targets, and he had to fend off their attacks too.
After a while, almost half of the golems were destroyed. However, his breathing became a bit labored, and only one-fourth of his mana remained while his stamina almost bottomed out.