It had only taken the UN secretary a week to organize everything and now Maxine was waiting in a grassland somewhere in Germany while they prepared the fighting grounds. Apparently, they were making sure there were no civilians in the two square miles that they designated as the tournament grounds. This is boring as hell. It doesn't help that most of the people challenging me are men. Seriously, couldn't they find more women willing to compete? I count no more than fifteen out of the one hundred challengers. At least, the few that had old injuries will no longer be able to use them as an excuse. And I have to give my compliments to the UN secretary. He was able to hire an array master to harden the ground and blunt our weapons automatically.
"I apologize for the wait. The formation array master that we hired is taking a bit longer than anticipated, but he will be finished soon. In the mean time, I'll be going over the reason for your presence here and the rules for this event," the UN secretary said while holding a megaphone, "As you all know, Ms. Levings has issued a challenge to all of you, and through this challenge, she's going to show you why the Alliance has chosen her as Earth's representative. Now, onto the rules. First and foremost, intentionally killing each other is strictly prohibited. Any blows aimed below the waist or for the eyes are also strictly prohibited. Weapons are allowed, but be aware that the formation being set will render them quite blunt. We don't want any accidental deaths to occur. And Ms. Levings, I'm sorry, but transformations are prohibited in any shape or form. You should understand our reasons for this. Multiple challengers can face Ms. Levings at a time, but it will be limited to a maximum of ten. Her powerful bloodlines and her multiple cores grant her physical abilities well beyond the norm. Thus, facing multiple challengers shouldn't be too much for her. If a group manages to defeat Ms. Levings, the members will have to fight amongst themselves to determine who will represent Earth from now on. And finally, there will be no use of stimulants or poisons of any kind for the duration of this competition." These idiots have played right into my hands. They didn't even try to limit the use of constructs or elemental abilities. I'll just summon a few of the stronger ones to give my adversaries a beat down if they come at me as a group. But if shit really hits the fan, I've got a new trick up my sleeve.
"It'll be another ten minutes before we are ready, so please enjoy the provided refreshments," the UN secretary added after checking his phone.
After checking the provided drinks with her spiritual sense, Maxine avoided the provided drinks like the plague. There was a set of drinks set inside of a separate cooler and each of them were spiked with a variety of potent and tasteless drugs. The dosage of them alone would be enough to overwhelm her body's ability to process them and would leave her in a weakened state for at least an hour. I'm not really surprised, especially after daddy's warning. But who ordered it? Most of the european countries appear to like the fact that I'm the one representing Earth. That doesn't help too much to narrow down who wants to fucking drug me, though. Damn it, I hate having to constantly keep an eye out for shit like this!
However, she noticed that her challengers were pulling various snacks and drinks out of their dimensional pouches. She only briefly raised her eyebrow at that, before doing the same. It seems like it's standard to bring your own food and drink. Either that or their home countries told them to in order to avoid being drugged or poisoned.
While she ate, she noticed a couple of the women present had large facial scars. It was odd to see an injury like that since modern medicine could remove it, but if it happened after they reached iron stage, their flesh would be too tough for any normal surgeon to even attempt to remove the scarring. She knew that it would be heartbreaking for any woman to have their beauty permanently marred like that.
[You should really go to St. Louis, Missouri in America and see Emily Herst,] Maxine told them, [Her unique energies can restore scar tissue to healthy flesh.] All of them visibly jerked before looking around. Eventually, their gazes leveled on Maxine before giving her a nod of gratitude.
"You said any ability right?" Maxine asked the UN secretary in a loud voice, "Does that include summoned creatures and constructs?"
"Yes, it does," the UN secretary replied, "But you have to bring them into the arena with you."
"That's fine. I've already brought all the constructs that I will be using today in my shadow," Maxine replied. I wonder how he would react if he knew that I have my dragon and 100 of my shadow wolves within my shadow.
A few minutes later, the battlegrounds were finally ready for Maxine and the others to begin. Maxine wasted no time to get into position and waited for her first challenger. But her first challenger ended up being a group of ten. How did I know this was going to happen? Oh, well. Time to bring out my dragon.
Maxine expanded her shadow and with a thundering roar, her silver scaled, golden horned dragon flew out of it. The expression of her opponents were initially ones of surprise, but they quickly focused before scattering into some kind of formation. Thankfully, their eyes were only on her dragon and she used that small opportunity to activate her stealth technique. No point in tiring myself out this early on. Anyone who tries to gang up on me will either face my dragon or my wolves. In any case, the more skilled opponents should show up later.
Sadly, the fight ended quickly. Her dragon had landed beside the group of ten and ignored their attacks while it swatted them unconscious with it's tail one at a time. That's just sad. They only left a few shallow wounds on my dragon. Well, it is a dragon. Even if it's only a construct, dragon scales are known for their ability to resist damage. Hell, even the weakest dragon whelps at early bronze stage are practically bulletproof.
She could literately hear the others shouting that Maxine was cheating somehow. But the UN secretary unapologetically replied, "I'm afraid what she did is well within the rules that were set since her 'dragon's' claws and teeth are blunted. If any of you had brought a creature to assist you in battle, it would be equally allowed. It's just your misfortune that you didn't do proper research on your adversary." With that, a few of them cursed, but otherwise, made no further complaints. Okay, that practically confirms that the UN secretary is on my side. Still doesn't help me too much to narrow down who tried to drug me.
After her previous opponents were cleared out of the battlegrounds, she canceled her stealth technique and saw a single asian man approaching her with a katana sheathed at his hip. A samurai? I didn't expect one of them to show up so early.
With a thought, Maxine retrieved her twilight iron blades from her dimensional ring, but didn't get into a stance right away. He stopped twenty paces away from her and studied her with his eyes for a few moments. After seemingly confirming something to himself, he bowed his head slightly to her and she returned the gesture before both of them got into a fighting stance. They stared at each other for a few moments before charging at each other at the same time.
Maxine was eager to see how well her skill measured up to a japanese swordsman as she charged forward. It was just that there were not that many people that practiced swordsmanship outside of Japan.
She slashed at him several times, but he dodge or parried every attack masterfully. She smiled to herself and used her next attacks to set him up into a situation that forced him to block in order to destroy his weapon. However when she finally got him trapped and slashed out at him, she felt a pulse come off of his katana and she saw an image of a weeping woman in a kimono flash in her head. Without the slightest hesitation, she twisted her blade slightly and pulled the attack back slightly to make her strike deflect harmlessly off of his katana rather than destroy it.
Maxine retreated as he counter attacked with a horizontal slash, but she didn't care about that. Instead, she was furious with him for a different reason. He brought a freshly forged living weapon to a contest?! Doesn't he understand how fucking rare they are?! And how did something like that end up here on Earth in the first place?! But more importantly, why is she crying? That's a question for later. First, I need to get her away from that prick! He doesn't deserve to have such a companion. He's lucky that a dwarven forge master didn't see her like this. They would've beaten that idiot to death regardless of the consequences. To the dwarven forge masters, living weapons are the pinnacle of their craft and when one is successfully forged, they are treated as precious children to be protected until they are paired with their destined partner.
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Maxine decided at that moment to stop playing around by matching his speed and power. And without giving any warning, she burst into movement and blasted him with her killing intent. He froze for merely an instant, but that was all she needed as she delivered a powerful kick to the side of his head.
The force of the blow knocked him unconscious as he released his katana and Maxine placed on of her blades into her dimensional ring before grabbing it mid-air. As she landed, she could feel the surprised and terrified gazes of the other competitors, but she didn't care about that as she approached the unconscious man. She swiped the sheath from his waist and sheathed the katana into it.
"It's alright now. You're safe," Maxine said gently to the spirit within the katana.
[Thank you for getting me away from him,] the living katana answered timidly via spiritual sense, [Can... can you return me to my father?]
"I was going to anyways once I am done here," Maxine replied out loud, "Is it alright if I strap you to my back?"
[Yes, it is,] the living katana answered, [Just, please, do not wield me.]
"You don't have to worry about that. I'm happy with the weapons that I've got," Maxine stated as she used her energies to create a few straps to hold the living katana to her back. She spotted a few people giving her a disapproving look, but she didn't give a damn.
Her next opponent approached as soon as the japanese swordsman was removed. Even from afar, she could tell that he was over seven feet tall, and it made her somewhat nervous to see that he carried a battle ax that had been scaled up to match his considerable size.
Her instincts were warning her to be wary of him, but she had to deal with an additional problem. Because of how small this large man made her feel, memories of the abuse she received at the hands of Jonathan Levings resurfaced, but instead of feeling fear, she felt almost blinding rage. She hated being reminded of how powerless she used to be.
This giant of a man stopped nearly fifty feet away from her and as soon as he readied his weapon, she charged at him using her full speed. She felt, but didn't hear, sonic boom around her before leaping in the air to kick the giant in the face. She knew it was a stupid move, but didn't care. She wanted to completely crush him.
The giant of a man swung his ax at her and she kicked at the air above her to create a sonic boom to push her down while flying down at the same time to practically dive towards in order to avoid the strike. Without an ounce of hesitation, she punched the ground to launch herself back up towards this massive man's face to strike him in the face with her knee. Surprisingly, he managed to retract his ax and put the flat side of the ax head between her and this face. Unfortunately for him, it didn't stop her attack.
On impact, an imprint of her knee formed on the ax head and the force of her strike carried through to slam his ax into his face. Instantly, he was launched off of his feet and few through the air several hundred feet. He bounced a few times before skidding to a halt.
By this time, Maxine had already regained her calm and felt a little bad for hitting the man so hard. It wasn't his fault that he reminded her of a painful memory. So she waited for him to stand back up so that she could apologize for her conduct. But he remained unmoving. Is he even alive after that hit? Wait, he's still breathing. That's good, but when he wakes up, he'll have one hell of a headache and possibly a few missing teeth. I think I have a potion to help him regrow them.
Maxine looked at the other challengers, but saw that more than two thirds of them had taken to the skies. She knew that it meant that they had opted out of fighting her in any shape or form. She couldn't blame them for leaving either after she knocked out that massive man with a single blow.
Still, no one approached her to fight, and it seemed like they were discussing something. After a few minutes, everyone, aside from six people, decided to leave. However, they looked at each other for some reason. If those six are who I think they are, I will be in trouble if they decide to come at me together. Hopefully, that won't happen, but if they do, I need to make a plan now. For some reason, she thought of her grandmother and came to a sudden realization. There is no way grandma would do something like that during a sparring match. She's way to upright to pull such a rotten move, but I wonder how quickly these guys will catch on if I were to do that. If I can take out enough of them, I might be able to pull it off without using my dragon or the other constructs. This'll be fun.
Fortunately, she wasn't forced to fight all six at once and saw a voluptuous latina approaching her slowly with a machete on her hip and a spear in her hand. It's not the first time that I've seen someone carry two weapons like that. Although from the way she moves and the lightness of her steps, she seems to be the speed and agility fighter. The same as me.
The latina nodded towards Maxine and waited long enough for Maxine to return the gesture before taking up a fighting stance. They circled each other for a few moments before Maxine charged forward. She was met by a flurry of quick thrusts. Each thrust left an afterimage, but Maxine could tell which attack was the real one as she dodged them all while slowly advancing.
Maxine finally got close enough to use her blades, but before she could, the latina stopped the thrust attacks. Instead, she performed a sweeping attack. Maxine jumped to avoid it and in the next moment, she heard a faint draconic roar as the spear was lunged at her while she was still in the air.
Maxine swiftly pivoted mid air with her blades to parry the attack and rushed forward before the attack could be pulled back. Once she was in range, she gently tapped the latina on the side of her head with her free blade. That should let her know that I had more than enough time to end her. Still, she threw that nasty finishing move out at the last second. If I couldn't fly, I would've still won, but it would've been a lot more difficult.
"How did you resist being effected by my dragon thrust?" the latina asked.
"Oh, so that's what that roaring sound was," Maxine said, "You should know that mild form of dragon fear doesn't work very well on someone that has seen heavy combat and not at all on anyone with a draconic bloodline in their veins."
"I see. Thank you," the latina said before turning around and leaving. As soon as she left the battlegrounds, the latina got all sorts of angry glares. It was only a few moments before the remaining five began approaching Maxine.
When they were one hundred feet away, Maxine caught a strange scent and immediately felt a primal rage blossom within her. What the fuck?! It only took her a moment to realize that someone had sprinkled their clothing with beast incitement powder. It was used to lure large numbers of beasts into one spot to thin them out in one fell swoop. The only problem was it also triggered a primal rage that caused them to attack everything in sight and since it had a similar effect on beastkin and owners of beastly bloodlines, it was a highly restricted substance. She had no idea how those five had gotten their hands on it.
She never considered that she would be effected by it and had to concentrate to keep her fury in check. At least, I can still think clearly while I'm like this, but I don't know if I can keep myself from killing these pricks during our match. I need to defeat them quickly once I regain enough control of my emotions.
She hunched over and closed her eyes to make it easier to keep her fury in check. Unfortunately, it wasn't working as well as she hoped. Even while concentrating, she felt patches of her body momentarily shift to that of her battle form before shifting back to normal. Damn it. It's messing with me more than I thought.
Maxine opened her eyes and scanned each of them for the beast incitement powder with her spiritual sense. To her surprise and fury, all of them had it on their clothes.
"See I told you it would have some effect on her," a man with a thick arabic accent said with a smug grin in alliance common, "And when she attacks us like the beast she is, we will be forced to kill her." That simple statement made Maxine angrier, but for some reason, it was that anger that made it easier to control of herself. I would've liked to fight you fuckers fairly to preserve your pride, but after hearing that bullshit, no mercy.
Maxine used those few moments of greater control to create a blob at the end of her left blade that was a mixture of various shades of grey and threw it towards the sun. While she did that, the five challengers had surrounded her, but she didn't give a damn. If anything, it made it easier for her to do execute her plan.
She watched them while waiting for that blob to explode into a cloud and when it did, she performed several shadow steps in rapid succession. After appearing from each of her shadow steps, she slashed or stabbed each challenger with surgical precision to avoid killing them and didn't stop until each of them had a dozen wounds.
Next, she shadow stepped in front of the UN secretary. Whom stumbled backwards and landed on his ass in surprise at Maxine's sudden appearance. Just from the look on his face, she knew that he wasn't aware of why Maxine had just snapped.
"You should get them out of here as soon as possible. I'm surprised that the beast incitement powder that they put on their clothes hasn't lured every beast within fifty miles to them already," Maxine told him in a strained voice while doing her utmost to remain in control of herself and at the same time, the five challengers before they collapsed while screaming as they finally felt every wound that Maxine gave them, "And next time that someone even thinks about bringing an Alliance such a heavily restricted substance to Earth, I'm killing EVERYONE involved. No exceptions."
She quickly created an arch that lead to the training room back home and ran through it. Without hesitation, she howled and lashed out wildly at her surroundings to vent her rage within her.