The contestants were given some time to recenter themselves after the banquet. Most of them ate lightly if not nothing. It did not make sense to eat a hearty meal before a contest. They spent the time after the contest focusing on themselves. The banquet certainly was important to most of them, but it was over and it didn't make sense to linger on it before the contest was to begin.
There was another banquet after the contest that would segregate them into different levels of losers, and a single winner.
The final eight who qualified to be in the tournament that was to be held tomorrow were going to earn the most amount of solicitation and scouting from the various third parties involved with the Martial Contest in some fashion or the other. The top forty were also hot commodities and targets. While the remaining round-two and round-three winners would receive the least amount of solicitation.
