“Ranked first, Elizabeth Ultimatia and ranked second, Hu Zemin, please take to the arena.” Hearing her name being called, Elizabeth stopped treating her brother and jumped onto the stage. On her left arm and forehead, a flowing arm and headband appeared as she stepped foot on the arena’s cold hard floor. She almost felt ashamed wearing her armor against a fellow Warrior Stage competitor as even if she was up against a practitioner of Metal Qi, even Zemin’s strongest punch would only amount to a weak tap against her defenses. After both competitors performed the courtesy bow which preceded each one on one duel, the judge called for the match to begin.
To all the spectator’s surprise, what was supposed to be the most climactic battle of the Warrior division — the one between the two competitors ranked 1st and 2nd — began with neither party making a move.
Spitefully, Hu Zemin glared at Elizabeth, not deigning to take a defensive position as she pointed her sword and said, “Where’s your fucking weapon?!” She had taken extreme offense to Elizabeth’s apparent lack of preparation. ‘Who does she think she is?’
“Don’t need it~” Now understanding why her opponent didn’t begin the fight right away, Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders and began approaching Hu Zemin at the pace of a casual stroll… Again, managing to set her opponent into a deeper rage while also impressing the crowd with her gall.
This time squinting in malice, Hu Zemin felt like teaching Elizabeth a lesson. Yet, she still hadn’t lost her cool as she understood that for Elizabeth to earn a higher score than her in the First Stage, she must have made it at least up to the fourth Phase of the King Stage. Alas, because her surname was “Hu,” she had no clue just how off her assumption was, as only Warrior Stage competitors with surnames starting after the letter “U” would know of that ridiculous 781 Billion plus score…
Coating her legs in a Metal Qi so dense her feet started to glow a dim and dark yellow, Hu Zemin squatted as she gathered an ungodly amount of potential energy, before releasing it all in a burst of pure speed.
Whoosh! She shot forth so quickly that even an unsuspecting Late Stage King would be caught in a dangerous situation as her blade and arms also began charging up with Metal Qi. Yet Elizabeth remained unimpressed. Having made it all the way up to the Mid Phase Saint Stage of the Testing Formation without having to resort to her Chaos Seals, this kind of fighting prowess only made Elizabeth slightly less disappointed in the martial aspect of Earth’s Martial Society; everything else was still less than sub-par though.
Using nothing more than her base speed and just enough Neutral Magic to activate an acupoint without damaging it, Elizabeth looked Hu Zemin right in the eyes before smirking. Her actions went by essentially unnoticed by all, as the grand majority of the crowd watching on were paying attention to the active Hu Zemin. But to the target of this smirk, nothing but unadulterated fear shot down her spine as a very real threat against her life had appeared. In Elizabeth’s shadow, the manifestation of death itself seemed to grow increasingly life-like as Hu Zemin approached, but by the time she wished to change course, her fate had been sealed.
As if Hu Zemin’s King-esque speed was negligent, Elizabeth’s Magic-infused fingers snaked around the sword infused with Metal Qi and accurately hit six acupoints before He Zemin could even react. Because she didn’t know cultivator anatomy, she couldn’t proactively redouble the defense of her skin, muscle, and bones to ward off the effects Elizabeth’s body manipulation yielded. Though, even if she could, it wouldn’t have made a difference…
Now, Hu Zemin’s unconscious body posed no risk to Elizabeth, and it didn’t while she was conscious either. But that didn’t mean she was safe from herself. She was still moving at a ridiculous speed, which if measured would be in triple digits of miles per hour, and in her unconscious state, ragdolling defenselessly into the reinforced wall's of the tournament arena could be lethal. Fortunately, Elizabeth wasn’t the sadistic type as she kept her arm extended to catch Hu Zemin mid-flight. She even had the courtesy to not absorb all the shock while stationary even though she very easily could have, and instead took the extra couple steps back to not crush Hu Zemin’s body through an inelastic collision. The end result still caused some mild bruises to form on Hu Zemin’s body, but at least she wasn’t flattened like a pancake from crashing onto the arena walls.
Silence… The whole arena quieted down after witnessing this small display of Elizabeth’s power, but the lass herself was quickly losing her patience as a stranger — worse yet, an enemy — peacefully slept on her shoulder. Annoyed, she couldn’t help but flash the supervising judge a look that seemed to convey, “Come on, man...”
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Soon after, the tense atmosphere of the crowd was cut as the supervising judge snapped back to his senses and said, “R-right… The win goes to Elizabeth Ultimatia...” He thought he would be left off the hook after concluding the match, but Elizabeth remained staring at him as if he had killed her lover…
“Um… Is there a problem?” The judge couldn’t help but ask.
Gesturing at the body she was holding with her eyes and head, Elizabeth irritably said, “What do I do with her?” Fearing the awkwardness that would ensue from waking her opponent after knocking her out, Elizabeth would much rather just toss the unconscious body to the side. But she didn’t know where...
“Just give her to us.” From behind, Elizabeth heard a female voice and upon turning around, she saw a group of five females. “Min’er is our Forested Fortress’s prodigy.” The same girl continued.
“Mhmm...” Elizabeth turned back to the judge and after seeing him nod his head, she shrugged her should carried Hu Zemin’s body off the stage and handed her over to the group of females. Then, after giving a sigh of relief, she walked back over to her waiting spot as there were a couple more fights that needed to be settled.
Liam’s final fight was next and he easily secured another victory after using his fabled False Teleportation skill. But aside from his second fight, there weren’t any more fight Elizabeth bothered to watch. Though, even if she didn’t watch them, she took note of some of her fellow Dojo peers. Aside from herself — the most extreme of extreme outliers — the highest rank a member of Atid’s Dojo reached in the Warrior Division of the Second Stage was rank 57. Coincidentally, the person who achieved that rank was someone she knew; Carlos.
Like most of the practitioners that existed before the Dimensional Upgrade, Carlos had put in extraordinary efforts in cultivating after the phenomenon shook the dimension Earth was situated in, and had managed to increase his cultivation base by a whole Stage in the three or so weeks that had passed by. Alas, as someone way out of his prime — being a relatively old man at forty-seven years of age — Carlos had lost out on the best time to practice. Thus his rate of cultivation was understandably slow.
Fortunately for him, he still had time to catch up and thought it would be rather difficult for him to make it into the Spirit Realm without some life-changing opportunities, he was not entirely out of luck, as the True Cataclysm was fast approaching. The Dimensional Upgrade had only brought about a small grace period due to Elizabeth’s grand standing as a Chosen in the top twenty. This “babying” Stage where the world had changed spiritually with nothing “too insane” also happening at the same time was more than most Chosen’s worlds would enjoy, as the standard course of action was for the world to enter a crisis right away.
Elizabeth didn’t know whether her world would experience zombies crawling out of the earth or hell-demons plaguing the skies, but she knew that after Earth’s grace period was up and the shit hit the fan, it would be a nightmare for the average person. But for cultivators like her and more importantly to practitioners way past their prime like Carlos, the nightmare would bring about countless opportunities to quickly become stronger; albeit at a heightened risk of death.
Momentarily thinking through her options, Elizabeth added discussing the impending — nightmarish — Cataclysm with her family after they met up. “If anything, mom already understands I’m involved in something pretty outlandish. Hopefully, talking to her about the literal apocalypse might help my poor little planet out when all hell breaks loose…”
She didn’t have any hopes that she — as a mere Warrior Stage practitioner — would accomplish much of anything by ranting and raving about the Cataclysm as no one would believe her without proof. If this was before, she could only sigh for the hit humanity would take from being caught off guard, but now knowing that her mom was a super high-class VIP in the Martial Society, she hoped that perhaps the future would be as bleak as she first imagined.
Now, after the final rankings for the Warrior Stage were decided at last, only Elizabeth stood waiting by the arena as she was the only one competent — insane — enough to challenge Kings with only a Warrior’s cultivation base. As she waited for her new competition to set shop next to her on the challenger’s outdoor waiting area, the supervising judge told her, “Ms. Ultimatia… since your case is, uh… very ‘special,’ the highest jump in the ranks you can take are one hundred and fifty places. Starting you off at 1200th or last place because of your cultivation base, since we don’t want any major accidents unfolding today; especially not with someone as, um… talented as you… I hope you can understand the ruling.”
“Mhmm...” Squinting her eyes once more and taking a moment to think, Elizabeth nodded and said, “Makes no difference to me~ I’m shooting for the Saint’s division~” Her response was the ultimate insult to the King Stage competitors that were walking into the outdoor waiting area. Aiming for the Saint Division naturally meant she thought she could take ALL of them on; easily too! And though all the King Stage competitors were present to see her fight against Hu Zemin, most of the stronger Kings weren’t very impressed as they could accomplish the same.
“R-right...” As a Spirit Realm elder, the supervising judge knew of Elizabeth real score in the Test Formation so his reaction was a little more grounded than the insulted King Stage practitioners. ‘Unless the Formation’s results were wonky… she very easily should be able to qualify for the Saint Division...’ Though, since he wasn’t there to see the results first hand, he wasn't exactly convinced that Elizabeth had the inhuman ability to skip Stages...