"Point, winner Lucía from Sakura Bushido!"
"Point, winner Miguel Díaz from Cobra Kai!"
"Point, Sophia Gonzales from Sakura Bushido!"
"Point, Robby Keene unaffiliated!"
...
The fights progressed one by one without stopping for some time.
"It's not going as well as we expected..." Devon Lee was looking at the results of the latest Sakura Bushido roster and felt a bit disappointed to learn that many hadn't been able to pass the preliminaries.
Sophia walked towards her friend and said, "Well, I thought the fights would be much more exciting, but so far, I haven't had any problems."
"But the expected results are varying a lot in the men's competition..." Devon thought this was due to Dash's absence, who was one of the figures that inspired many just with his presence.
After Devon's next preliminaries fights, the tournament continued. The sixteen finalists, half men and half women, were all quite skilled among the new fighters from the dojos that had been participating in this tournament for many years.
Most had received positive feedback, which caught the interest of the audience. Furthermore, their backgrounds were quite diverse, so the crowd occasionally didn't pay much attention.
In a few more minutes, the last five rounds of the preliminaries concluded. As expected, four of the male finalists were from Sakura Bushido, two from Topanga Karate, two from Cobra Kai, and one unaffiliated.
On the other hand, the female division of Sakura Bushido had only three finalists out of the eight women in total, most of whom were from other more varied dojos.
As the finalists were announced, the atmosphere of the crowd lit up. Everyone knew that the next fights were the true highlights of the competition.
After the draw, all competitors were placed on the leaderboard for the quarterfinals, and everyone waited in silence for the venue to be cleared for the featured matches.
This time, Devon's opponent was a girl named Emma Miller from Topanga Karate. According to Mr. Kim's instructions, she knew perfectly well that Emma handled kicks excellently, just like her, and she couldn't wait to face her.
The two proceeded to fight after taking their positions, and in the end, the result was quite surprising.
Emma's kicks couldn't withstand Devon's brutal kicks, which ended up injuring her, but surprisingly, didn't break any bones. Because of this, Devon easily became one of the first semifinalists. As for the other Sakura Bushido girls, only Sophia advanced to the semifinal, and her opponent was a girl named Aisha from Cobra Kai.
As for the boys, only Liam James from Sakura Bushido managed to reach the semifinal. The others belonged to different affiliations, except for Robby, who had no affiliation.
Nothing special happened during the duels; Eli, known as Hawk, had a good fight but ultimately lost to Xander Stone, who came on strong this year.
The next match was of interest to the entire audience; even Devon was interested because it featured the only boy from Sakura Bushido, Liam James, facing Miguel Díaz from Cobra Kai. The two in this tournament were considered the best fighters due to their impressive fights so far.
Nevertheless, now the two were about to face each other in the semifinals to secure a spot in the final.
"May the best win, Cobra boy!" Liam smiled weakly as he saw Miguel step onto the mat.
Miguel didn't respond; his attitude was a bit frowned upon by James, but as he understood, there were all kinds of fighters in the tournaments, so he speculated that Miguel was the bad guy he would try to beat.
"Ready? Ready, Bow, look at each other, Bow!"
"Fight!"
Just as Miguel finished hearing the referee's announcement, he quickly started the fight, demonstrating his great speed.
"Be careful, Liam!" Devon encouraged the only boy, who, though not very outstanding in combat, was very calculated, and this had brought him to the semifinals.
As Miguel advanced, Liam's expression became serious, and he let out a fierce scream not in line with his calm exterior.