The first person who reached the top eight was of a huge built and wielded a large club. Normally he had an axe, but any wooden axe like weapons that were available seemed too small for him and thus he used something that resembled a large log. His name was Rifat and he would be the first and only Nick's opponent in the top eight. In fact he managed to advance through the last three fights much easier compared to the rounds when contestants were fighting with real weapons, because now he only had to land one hit while his opponents constantly hammered him with their wooden sticks without any result.
Nick, of course, noticed the guy, but before loosing to him, he still had to fight the opponent who was currently standing in the arena. Faiz was swinging his almost two and a half meter long wooden pole leisurely and grinned towards Nick. He wasn't a fool and also knew he had a huge advantage in this fight. Maybe the only one who was a real threat to him was the huge Rifat.
When the fight started, Faiz immediately attacked and Nick couldn't do anything else, but evade his pokes and swings. Even without his previous resolve to not care about the dirty ground, Nick still would've been completely covered in filth within the first minute of the match.
In the spectator seats there were big crowds around the gambling booth's since the result was already decided. There was no way the kid who was jumping and rolling around like a monkey could win and it was only a matter of time for Faiz to hit him on the head with the long stick. In addition, they still had a grudge against Nick for killing the young duke yesterday and wished for him to fall even more.
Of course, there was a person who made a huge bet in favor of Nick despite the incredibly poor odds and currently even he was slowly getting nervous. Nazir watched the fight attentively and understood Nick's predicament – even if he had good Qi manipulation skills, what's the use if he couldn't get close to his opponent? And the Faiz guy was skilled and experienced as well, and fully realized that Nick couldn't be allowed to come close.
After two minutes of dodging and rolling around, Nick was deeply flustered, but after two more his eyes to burned with passion – this was a unique training! So what if the opponent was trying to play the whack-a-mole with him? All he had to do was to dodge until he'll find an opportunity. Faiz should get tired at one point, but Nick, while performing his Qi technique during jumps and rolls, could last for half a day!
After fifteen minutes the initially excited crowd was long bored and most of the other competitors as well. They missed the time when the fight was decided in a minute or even few seconds.
'That little bastard!' Suddenly Nazir understood, 'He's practicing! That son of the b*tch is clearly practicing! If the emperor realizes this, the kid might be in deep trouble!'
And some other experts in the spectator seats began to notice Nick's weird behavior as well, at least they had suspicions something was off.
It continued until suddenly Nick almost tripped backwards while dodging a horizontal pole swing and the next swing came right from the above at the center of his forehead. Similar simple but heavy slash won Faiz the previous round and, even if the move was sudden, the spectators instantly woke up and gasped in expectation.
Nick clumsily staggered back and somehow the pole missed him by few millimeters, hitting the ground and raising a big could of dust.
But what happened next left everyone flabbergasted. Nick, who was staggering back suddenly accelerated forward and stepped on the pole that was still vibrating a little and, after taking two more lightning quick steps on it, kicked Faiz in the jaw with full strength while performing a back flip. In the silent arena a loud crack of bones breaking was heard and Nick landed on his feet while Faiz flew six or seven meters backwards and landed lifelessly on the bloodied sand that was the arena floor.
'Did I kill him? Probably not.' Nick pondered, 'Most importantly – I'm almost in the castle!'
After bowing to the emperor, he returned to his spot while patting the dirty clothes without any particular expression. Arena was still silent as the spectators couldn't believe their eyes and the emperor missed the kick or didn't care about the fights without bloodshed and didn't react at all. Nazir, who was worried a moment ago, barely managed to keep his calm. The next bet will definitely multiply his winnings as well, the only problem was he couldn't win too much to not raise suspicions to call upon the emperor's wrath. Good thing was his own people were making bets along with him, just in different parts of the arena.
While the next fight started, Nick already sat there with closed eyes and visualized the plan of the castle grounds, trying to map out his potential sneaking routes.
'The horses and boats should be long ready. I refined the 'stealth powder' and Clayton already bought the clothes as well. All that's left is to find the girls and sneak them out.' Nick thought while the other youths in arena were battling for their future.
The next six fights took a bit less than an hour and the lucky, or rather, the powerful and skillful top eight was decided. The other contestants watched them with dejection and envy, but they had their chance and none of the top eight got there with pure luck or the power of money – each was more impressive than the other. Few who didn't make it, Faiz for example, also could've been easily between them, but unfortunately had bad luck and met extremely strong opponents.
While the gambling booths got busy again, the emperor impatiently waved for the next round to start and Nick with his huge opponent Rifat entered the center of the arena.
'He's even bigger than king White! Did he eat some special vitamins during the childhood?' Nick was astonished at the young giant in front of him.
If he had to win this fight, it wouldn't be easy at all and suddenly he understood another serious problem – he had to take a head-on hit from the log in Rifat's hand and then fake-pass out without getting heavily injured.
Three minutes after the fight started, Rifat was still energetically waving his weapon around. He already learned from Faiz's experience that Nick was a terrifying and cheeky opponent. It was fine to take few hits from him on the torso, but his jaw could break from a kick just like Faiz's, therefore even if he had to wave his log till the late evening, there was no way Rifat would allow Nick to come close.
Nick also continued to nimbly dodge all hits and from time to time even managed to hit Rifat on his thigh and back, but those hits produced no reaction. On the contrary, it looked like he was running out of breath himself. Nick's breathing slowly became irregular and shallow until, after barely dodging few swings in an ugly manner, he finally got hit and passed out after landing on the ground face down.
Rifat was as surprised as the spectators, but soon everyone understood – the kid was only a kid after all and couldn't have had the tenacity of a twenty or twenty five year old young man.
Nick 'woke up' few minutes later and murmuring something about being exhausted under his nose, went back to the others to wait for the finals. While pretending to pay attention to the rest of the fights, he went over the information he had and checked the equipment in the wristband. After half an hour the semi finals started and after two more fights, the finals.
The winner surprisingly became Rifat, who got his right arm broken in semis, but insisted on continuing and after taking a serious beating from his opponent, still managed to knock him out with the log in his left hand.
Although this was quite a feat, the audience was disappointed with this win since they all made the obvious bets against him. Still, Rifat got his fair share of applause and cheers, and the emperor himself jumped down in the arena to present a dark belt with golden embroilments that symbolized Rifat's newly earned status. The youth was ecstatic, others envious and the audience continued to clap reluctantly since this event brought big losses to many of them.
This was the first time Nick could observe the emperor so close. While it was not allowed to directly look at him, with few side glances Nick confirmed that the old zombie looked exactly like his brother, only was dressed in black clothes and not a robe, without any fancy jewelry or extravagant pieces. He had no weapon as well, but Nick knew where all the treasures, including weaponry, were.
After the crowd calmed down, the emperor held a short speech congratulating the winner and all the 'future pillars of the nation' and ordered every alive participant except for top eight to report to general Qubaisi for their future assignments and training.
This was different from the previous rule of top sixty four becoming officers and Nick believed it was a political move that could gladden aristocrats who suffered monetary and even human losses during the tournament. In addition, the youths who managed to survive four rounds of the bloodshed could be considered experienced and with decent future prospects.
'Hmm, turns out initial registering was not for naught after all.' Nick thought while the emperor continued the speech.
"The top eight will follow me to the castle and each one of them will have a special assignment according to their talents!" The emperor shouted in a proud voice. This was also a tradition from the previous tournaments, so the audience continued to politely clap while the eight 'lucky' participants dropped in one knee symbolizing their status as direct underlings of His Imperial Majesty.
Thus the event ended and the emperor's entourage returned back to the castle accompanied by eight new employees. At this point Nick was already paying maximum attention to his surroundings, watching the guards on the bridge as well as the entrance to the castle. There were some people on the streets who were cheering at them from sides and Rifat excitedly showed off his prize waving it over the head. Others didn't seem to care too much and were more looking forward to their new carrier.
'Steven and Clayton must be somewhere in the crowd to make sure I got in. Later I have to find a way to get out and debrief them on the situation. But first, let's investigate.' Nick thought to himself.
After crossing the bridge, the castle guards greeted the emperor and the procession entered a large plaza that was surrounded by several buildings. Nick was already familiar with the layout from the map Nazir provided, but still needed to learn the purpose of each structure and the positions of the sentries guarding those.
The emperor's carriage stopped at the far end of the plaza, close to the largest building which had a high tower with one side attached directly to the castle wall. The other tower was of similar height to the first and just like its twin it could be seen almost from the city borders. It was built on the opposite side of the plaza, also with a building at it's base and directly at the wall as well. The second building was smaller than the first which probably was the emperor's residence.
Every structure, including walls, buildings and towers, was built in the same dark stone and thus the whole castle gave off intimidating, oppressing and gloomy feeling. Nobody knew if the emperor had designed it himself or it was here before his time, because officially the emperor was immortal and had lived for eternity.