“Welcome everyone, to the tournament room. There have been more of you who made it to this stage of the trials than expected, and that’s why I enforced this room, a 16 man tournament. Only one of you can win, only one of you can take the ultimate prize. My soul sliver may stop the fights, to preserve the life of a yin cultivator who has great potential. I don’t want these trials to be a bane to our sect, rather than helping it. Each of you can take one ball from the stone bowl in the middle. Inside there are blue and red numbered balls. You will fight the person who matches your number with the opposite color. May the best man win.”
Another dark tunnel was done. Uttered was another message from the disembodied voice of Scorn. After becoming an undead cultivator, something switched in my mind. I can’t be a pacifist anymore. The people who did this to me are going to pay. That's why I have made it this far, gaining great powers; able now to unleash destruction and violence I never thought was in me. I will win these trials. Nobody can stop Gabalawi now, nobody.
Everyone headed to the middle of the room, each taking out a numbered ball. Gabalawi got a red one with number one on it.
He lifted it up for everyone to see, and they saw the man was huge after all!
The owner of the blue number one ball gulped, looking at Gabalawi.
“Shall we?” Gabalawi said that strictly to his opponent, and they both headed to the stone arena in the middle of the room to fight.
Gabalawi was wearing a pair of great light brown gloves, matched with a pair of light brown boots. His robes were the green robes of outer sect disciples since he had already made it to the sect. They didn’t match his weapons, but this was an issue that he can fix another day. Right now, it was time to fight.
His opponent was a 5 foot 5 inches guy, with short black spiky hair. He had a red ring on each finger and wore a red robe.
“My name is Rong Sha. May the best man win this fight,” the short man said and bowed, while Gabalawi’s size shocked him at first. He didn’t look scared now that the fight was about to begin.
“My Name is Gabalawi. Let the fight begin.”
The short man acted first, and the red gemmed ring on his finger glowed, a fireball unleashed from his hand towards Gabalawi.
Gabalawi raised both hands, close together as a shield in front of the fireball, which dissipated after hitting them, leaving no scratch on him.
Which surprised the short man, because his rings allowed him to fire these fireballs, while his robe made any fire magic even stronger. Gabalawi’s ability to block his enhanced fireballs easily surprised him, but all was not lost, he thought. He had more tricks up his sleeves.
He unleashed four fireballs, two from each hand, back-to-back, and Gabalawi just looked at them with impunity, and started punching each fireball with his gloved hands, each one dissipating after exploding in contact.
He followed the four punch sequence, with a stomp to the ground with one foot, which unleashed an earth shattering reverberation in the ground headed for Rong Sha, who jumped back three times in a row escaping the attack.
He thought, desperate times call for desperate measures, and took out two magic swords from his spatial sack, launching them at Gabalawi.
The swords zipped fast through the air, headed for his opponent.
Gabalawi caught the first sword with his left hand, and squeezed. Rong could hear the sword cracking! And then he punched the second sword with his other fist, which launched it back towards its owner, who wasn’t ready for its speed or such a reckless move in the first place, Scorn’s soul sliver just appeared and stopped the sword in its tracks, declaring Gabalawi the winner, because the sword was going to hit Rong fatally.
Rong bowed down deeply to Gabalawi, who bowed to him in return.
*****
image [https://imgur.com/XfBSXXC.jpg]
Seph watched the fight between Rong and Gabalawi and gulped down heavily, Gabalawi was scary, even Seph had to weaken the sword with two hits before he trusted to block the attack with his gourd, but Gabalawi just blocked them with impunity he doesn’t care for their power at all, he prayed he wouldn’t face that guy in his bracket!
Something else major had happened though, everyone in the arena finally saw what Scorn looked like, he was 6 foot 4 inches, even though the soul sliver looked to be ghostly blue, Seph guessed he might have been pale in reality, he was a tower of a human being, had quite the wide shoulders and chest, and a strong lower body as well, he also wore a dark-colored robe, with some insignia on the back.
The appearance of their benefactor amazed everyone. Finally, they all heard his voice, but none of them had seen him so far.
Seph had pulled number 7 in the bowl, and was waiting for his match to see who his opponent was.
Suddenly he saw a little girl skipping towards the arena, she had pink hair that was made into a twin ponytails, and had the palest white skin of any yin cultivator Seph had seen so far, she didn’t have any weapon in her hands, Seph raised an eyebrow at that, and looked around to check if anyone else saw the same thing as him.
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Everyone was looking at the little girl, who was skipping to the stage.
She was even giggling cheerfully, which puzzled everyone even more!
At this time, a very handsome guy who wore a white robe headed to the arena as well. His skin looked almost like a living human. He made his hair in a semi-bun with long hair flowing on his shoulders.
He walked towards the arena with sure footsteps.
He must be really sure of his skills! Seph thought.
Once the girl and the guy were on the platform, they both held opposing balls with number 2 on them.
“Will we really have to fight, mister?” the little girl asked him.
“You can give up now and we won’t have to!”
“Aww, I just didn’t want to beat you up so bad!”
“I don’t know what your story is or how you made it here, but I’ll give you this one chance to relinquish the fight. I won’t be able to pull back against you, little girl.”
The girl giggled for quite a bit before saying, “Oh, please don’t pull back against me. Fight as strong as you can, old man. My name is Divinity, by the way, thank you for fighting against me.”
The girl giggled, then gave him her best mischievous cat smile. Everyone thought she must be onto something to be that confident against such a bigger opponent!
Shocked was the handsome guy after she called him an old man. I am not that old; He thought!
But it only helped to make him a little pissed off at the girl.
“My name is Qui Ma, Good luck you little brat, you will need it.”
He readied himself to attack.
He flicked the wide sleeve of his robe dramatically, spinning it around his hand, before pointing his finger at the girl and launching a full finger made of light out towards the girl at an amazing speed.
The girl smiled at that, and she summoned her weapon out of her spatial sack, which was a huge hammer that was as big as the girl at 4 foot and 8 inches!
She swung the hammer in an overhead blow, and smashed the light finger headed her way. Her blow was so strong that she made a small crater in the ground when her hammer continued its path downwards.
“Oopsie, it seems like I overdid it!” she giggled cheerfully after saying that.
Taken aback was her opponent, as was everyone present, her power was terrifying, everyone thought Gabalawi was the most terrifying opponent they saw, but now they weren’t so sure anymore, they prayed she wouldn’t win because that would set a trend, that power beats finesse and skill!
Qui got over his surprise, and launched three finger attacks at her, which was the maximum he was capable of for now.
She just smirked at that, and began swinging her big hammer around, her little body spinning with it. In no time at all, they both picked up great speed, making her and her hammer a blur at this point!
She was inching closer to her opponent while spinning, his three attacks dissipated against her hammer whirlwind, the guy froze not knowing what to do, till she hit him once, a brilliant light shone from a necklace he wore, that seemed to have negated her attack, and Scorn’s soul appeared again stopping the fight and declaring her a winner.
She just jumped in place screaming “Yay!” and kept on jumping and laughing, happily flailing her arms in the air, returning to the persona of a little kid again!
Everyone’s mouths were on the floor at this point. They all prayed that this kid didn’t end up fighting them in the next round!
Next up to the stage was a bleak-looking guy, dressed all in black, that had two vultures on his shoulders. He looked emaciated and depressed, his black hair all messed up.
The vultures, though, looked cautiously around them. They were constantly alert.
image [https://imgur.com/NbG2IHN.jpg]
A familiar face headed to the stage in Lao Wencheng, who seemed to have survived the challenge when he ran into Seph, and had cured his leg too, by the look of things!
After reaching the stage, both of them held up their number 3 balls for everyone to see.
“Thank you for the fight, good sir. My name is Lao Wencheng. May the best man win,” Lao said, bowing down deeply.
The vulture owner looked at him dismissively. Or maybe he wasn’t feeling like talking to him. It was a mystery.
He just gave a signal to his vultures to attack the other man, and they flew from his shoulder, one heading to the right, while the other went to the left side, intending to flank Lao.
Lao took out a 4 foot Sumpit. He must have gotten it recently, because he didn’t use it in the chase against Seph, and he blew two steel arrows in fast succession against the two vultures.
Both vultures dropped from the sky after getting hit. The depressed-looking guy went insane!
“YOU HURT MY FRIENDS! HOW DARE YOU!! I’LL TAKE YOUR LIFE FOR THIS, I’LL FUCKING KILL YOUUUUU!”
After screaming his last threat, the guy exploded into a storm of black bugs, thousands of flying and crawling bugs all headed for the same target!
Lao Wencheng thought, Not again… this one is even more of a monster than the guy from the chase.
He thought fast, and got a smoke bomb out of his spatial sack, threw it in front of him, trying to conceal himself in the smoke cloud, but to no avail, the bugs knew exactly where he was, there was nowhere to run!
Scorn felt that the fight was already over and stepped in to end it, declaring Black Crow the winner!
Black Crow materialized again out of his congealing bugs, everyone wondering how advanced that his skill was and how he got it. Did time flow differently for each contestant and some of these disciples had spent more time honing their skills than others, perhaps?
Scorn dropped two health concoctions in two bottles in front of Black Crow, who calmed down once he got them, and headed towards his vultures fast to heal both of them.
Seph was thinking, there is no way he can beat those monsters. They were just way too powerful. Hopefully in the next round they take each other out, or hurt one another so that he can get an easier fight against one of them.
The tournament has just begun; we saw only three fights, and it’s already wilder than my wildest imaginations, but I need to win this. I can’t lose now whatever the prize is. Seph thought and steeled his resolve to give it his all to win this tournament.