"Bang!!!!!"
"Booooooom!!!!"
Loud booming sounds rang out as heavy exchange of blows were traded on the stage.
Today was the third day of the competition and it was really getting intense, but either by luck or my chance, none of the top twenty that had been shared equally among the different stages had been chosen to fight yet.
Almost like they're being reserved for last, Even Vin felt like these random selections were actually being controlled as he still hadn't had his battle, he felt like Elder Ling was preserving his battle so he could clash with the top twenty member on his group as his first battle.
Frankly this was also in his favor, as if he could flauntly defeat him, he could use that to intimidate the rest of the contestants, besides he had a grudge to settle with someone that had been giving him a death glare from the other side of the cabin.
It had been two days since he had been fending attacks from assassins and the numbers had been doubled last night.
He knew just who had sent them after torturous sessions of interrogation, but he didn't say anything, just acting like nothing had happened, there was no point in doing so.
These assassins were only I'm the Body refining realm so they couldn't do anything him, with his current strength, he could confidently say he was unrivaled within the same realm.
In fact, even those at the earlier stages of the Spirit sea realm might not be his match. He just hoped Victor wouldn't be too weak though.
'Well, since he's part of the top twenty in my group, he should be able to entertain me a little, even though he's only ranked 20th, I think.' He thought casually, before refocusing on his book again.
By now he had read more than half of the pages he should be finished by the end of the competition, just in time for his battle.
It was only after he started reading the the booklet about the ancient Aramaic that he understood what his master had truly meant when he said, no one could learn Runic symbols without first knowledge of ancient language.
That was because Runic symbols could only be written in ancient language, reasons being that, they were derived from the combination of all ancient languages itself.
It's almost like when someone wanted to learn a powerful sword skill without even the slightest knowledge on the basics of sword mastery.
'No wonder I had felt Sword one was kinda strange, it didn't strike to me a kind of sword skill at all, that's because it wasn't in the first. It was only beginner sword mastery. Which means that Sword two would be intermediate sword mastery.' Vin thought. According to what he had read in the book about Eridoria.
And what he could conclude with the stages on the Wordless Sword manual. Sword mastery were divided into the following parts:
Sword one - Beginner/Basic sword mastery.
Sword two - Intermediate sword mastery.
Sword three - Advanced sword mastery.
Sword four - Sword aura.
Sword five - Sword intent.
Sword six - Sword heart.
Sword seven - Sword Mortal soul.
Sword eight - Sword Earth soul.
Sword nine - Sword Heaven soul.
Sword ten - Sword law.
Sword eleven - Sword king.
Sword twelve - Sword Saint.
Etc...
Although there were other stages, they would come later, for now he was going to focus on mastering Sword one, he wanted to learn Sword two before breaking through the Spirit sea realm.
Vin was well aware that he was close to breaking through and mastering Sword one but he felt that something was missing, like he was missing that last bit of inspiration, gaining first place in the competition came second.
***
Currently on the sub stage on one of the martial stage, two female combatants were currently engaged in a heavy battle, their skills creating an influx of fireworks in the sky as they duked it out.
The battle was quite intense as none wanted loose to the other. Their battle raged on for a while as they were both equally matched with each other but Sadly they couldn't let it go on for a long time, or else it would be termed as a tie netting them only half points.
Suddenly one of them made a feint and when the other had taken the bait "Flaming burst!!" she shouted as she used a small success stage Mortal rained skill to create a thick ball of Flames that blasted towards her opponent knocking her off the stage.
Currently, battles similar to this were currently being taken place on the other stages, the competition was already on its final stages as most of the weaker combatants were already dejected after loosing twice in a row without winning.
If they were to lose twice in a row without winning, the would be disqualified immediately, but if they were to win even once then they were allowed to continue battling the others, but the more they lost the more the loose points.
They were all ranked by how many battles they had won. The rest of them remaining were quite so it was getting more difficult to win the battles.
But that said there were only a few who hadn't fought yet so the Round-Robbins was set to last two or three days at most before coming to an official end.
The battles continued on in tandem until there were only two combatants remaining in one of the cabins, these two were naturally Vin and Victor Stoneworth.
Victor gave one final death glare before he was finally called on stage to combat the last winner and due to his strength, it didn't take long for him to win, but since it didn't take him much effort he decided not to rest, and so with that he was able to finish almost half of his battles that day before it came to an end for the day, and everyone retired for the night.
If nothing strange happened then the battles were going to be rounded up within the next two days.
***
Early the next day, the outer court deciples flocked to the martial stage as usual, there were no superficial words said before the combatants of the day were called to the stage.
They were all aware of the rules so there was no need to remind them. Victor can up on stage, and engaged his first opponent for the day, though he knew the battle wouldn't be as easy as it was yesterday.
That's because the combatants today was ranked better that yesterday, like his opponent right now who was ranked 27th on the list, and although she was ranked seven levels below his, that doesn't mean she was weak in any way. After all the ranks were only determined once a year.
Who knows how much one can grow in a year. If he was not careful he might not even be able to keep his rank talk more of even advancing it.
The moment they were given the signal to start they both unleashed their skills at each other.
"Heaven sun finger"
"Fire Dragon's rage"
"Booooooom!!!"
As the two skills met midair, they combusted and unleashed a booming sounds, they kept on sending skills at each other until...
"Heaven sun palm."
Victor said as he unleashed a palm technique on his opponent and knocked her off his stage.
Although the battle wasn't hard for him as he had also gotten stronger during the past year, it still took a considerable amount of strength from him so he decided to rest a few minutes.
Since it was getting harder to eliminate the others, it wasn't good to fight exhausted.
After five minutes of rest, he continued to his next opponent, and so he continued to fight, winning his battles in a tandem.
He knew his battles with these opponents were all appetizers as his real opponent had yet to fight yet at all, he would be a fool if he didn't know what was going on by now.
According to how it was always done he was supposed to be the last but he wasn't, that was because Vin was determined by the refree to be stronger than him.
Even he could testify to that event he hadn't fought him yet. He had been sending assassins to kill Vin for the past few days now but the guy was still alive and kicking, acting like nothing happened.
Those assassins weren't even able to injure him in the slightest for him to be a little incapacitated for the battle.
It could be known that to pay those assassins were quite the sum of money not even adding the points he used to bribe the deciples manning the gates of the sect to let them in.
He knew there was nothing to be done but to fight Vin himself, but even at that, he was still quite confident in himself as he too had something in his sleeve.
And although he was sent to deal with Vin by someone else, after those round of assassins it had become a personal fight for him too.
These were his thoughts as he rounded up his battles for the day.
'Tomorrow, it would be our clash' he thought as he stared at the cabin and as if in response to that, he could feel a gaze staring at him from the other side, like it was receiving his challenge.
And he wasn't wrong, even though Vin seemed to be reading with focus he still aware of the competition's progress, as some as he sensed that the battles were over for the day, he raised his head and stared towards the martial stage a brimming thought on his head.
'I hope you are ready?, because tomorrow, you would die!'
*************