"Don't waste my time."
The words repeat inside the mohawk boy's head, which angered him. He saw this as a waste of time? How dare he! He would show him. He would show him that he was not to be underestimated. Who was Sean? A lucky guy who happened to be in the same group as Nitefall's young master. The only thing he had over him was the count of strings, making him physically stronger. With him limiting himself, what else did he have? He only knew how to throw punches, while he had been going to martial arts dojos since he was a child. He learned a variety of weapons before deciding the sword was the one for him.
"I'm going to make you eat your words." He said and stepped up. Before he could start, however, he was stopped.
"Dude, you have to go the arena to duel…"
The mohawk boy choked at that.
"Cough! Right, I was just leading the way."
—
Making their way into the arena, they drew quite a bit of attention from those that were around.
-"Look, they have infighting from day 1. We surely will win this time!"
-"Who is that mohawk guy, I pity him. Did he never see Sean fight?"
Sean and the mohawk boy positioned themselves at the opposite sides. Sean wore his gauntlets while the boy picked up a Jian from the rack.
"Didn't expect you to be a gentleman," Sean exclaimed.
"The name is Joel Torres, please instruct me," and he dashed forward for a stab. His posture could only be described as proper, and nothing else. He had the elegance of a gentleman in his strike.
Sean saw the incoming stab but did not move. He waited for him to get dangerously close and when he did, he slapped the sword to the left, made a step to the front and tripped Joel by pushing his feet to the side. Now Joel, lost his balance and chance strike, was falling to the ground with his chest exposed to Sean. He quickly served the exposed chest as he covered it with his right fist, draining all air inside Joel's lungs. He follows with his left fist to Joel's right ear, with the impact making him drop his sword. Before the sword could fall to the ground, Sean completed his counterattack with a roundhouse kick and sent Joel flying across the arena, hitting the walls. The fight was over in an instant, not even five seconds transpired from the moment Joel had started his strike.
"Someone, pick this guy up. If you still want to duel, just come forward, and I will take on you all. Don't worry, I will be gentle like now. I don't want to injure my teammates before the flag siege even began."
'Is this still considered gentle? He has foam dropping from his mouth, just how hard did you kick? Is it still two strings?
What they didn't know was that despite not forming his fourth string yet, Sean had already capped the limits of his body with his insane training regiment. Of course, when he limited himself to two strings, he had limited himself to the limit of two strings.
"Let's vacate the arena. We still have to talk about our strategies." A team leader didn't understand why they had to move locations again, it was perfectly fine here, was it not? So he asked.
"Um… Wouldn't it be better if we just discussed it here?" Sean couldn't help but face-palm. Were there still this naive trainees in the camp? He then calmly explained why they should leave the arena.
"Look, we are considerably a top-heavy group, it only makes sense the heavy hitters have more say or outright are leaders. Even then, we had someone not happy with the arrangement to the point of taking it to the arena. Now think, instead of a measly 3000, your side is made of 20000, and the strengths are much closer. This place soon will be filled to the brim by the other side, and they will probably go on till theoretical lessons. If you want to discuss your tactics next to the enemy, be my guest."
After saying his piece, Sean left the arena and the majority followed directly. Seeing that other leaders were also going back such as Sherryl, Latoya and Hughie Lennis, who were also in the top 15 in the E.V.R. battles, those who did not initially also followed. When they were going back, they saw a huge crowd coming towards the arena. From their vibes', they could tell things were tense for them. While the two groups passed by each other, Hughie slowly blended in, leaving his group.
—
"I can't believe you dragged me to the meeting."
Group A-2 was having their dinner in the cafeteria. Sean was mad at Tyson and Latoya for dragging him. That meant no meals were shared with her. Seeing her wronged expression, Samantha gave her a little bit more than usual.
"I think it turned out well. Didn't you see their obedience after the duel?"
"You or any other there could've done the same easily. Seriously, what was going on inside his head? Did he think he would win against me just because I limited myself to two strings? Anyway, at least we are done with the roll call."
"Any other sharpshooters?" Jayden asked with enthusiasm.
"Only two more, mostly bowmen," Tyson answered. "We are still thinking about how to utilise sharpshooters, but the general consensus is to send you guys for assasination."
"So cool, will I have hay bales to jump to?" Not understanding what Jayden meant, Tyson continued.
"Why would we have hay bales here? No. What you will have is war paint and camouflage. When we are clear about who the enemy side's leading figures are, I will give you the names. Just make sure to not spill the beans for now, can you do that?"
"Of course, I can." Jayden took on a wronged tone. "What do you take me as?"