The next day quickly arrived and the PvP matches continued. It was just like how Maria predicted as Gerald was knocked out in his second match of the day but surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, Lizzy was able to win both her matches that day and advanced to the semi-finals after defeating one of the rankers within the top 10. It was a major upset as many believed that her journey would end today but against all odds, Lizzy pulled through since she had revealed another card which was the new dragon-type pet that she had been keeping as a trump card and a secret.
The pet was a juvenile pureblood black dragon so although it wasn’t completely mature, her dragon was still a force to be reckoned with as it was the same level as her and had a vast HP bar with high M.ATK due to its [Dark Dragon Breath] skill. Coupled with her [Dragon’s Blood] racial passive that enhanced her regeneration capabilities if there was a dragon present on the battlefield, she bamboozled everyone and decimated her opponent in an overwhelming fashion.
The final 4 players were all guild leaders and not a single player within the top 10 rankings had won their battles against these players. In this PvP tournament, these guild masters had shown that it wasn’t just about levels that made a player strong but also their skills, equipment, and many other bonuses they acquired through completing difficult quests and the like. There was just so much level could do for a player. If one grinds levels all day long without completing quests and getting special rewards, they’d be powerless against those who had stat boosts and titles that enhanced their overall combat capabilities not to mention if they gained some unique skills that were really powerful, then those people would truly be powerless.
Coincidentally, the top 4 players were individually from the Light, Dark, Angel, and Devil Factions. Lizzy represented the Dark Faction as the Fallen Angels Guild Master while a player named Arthur, the Guild Master of the Light Faction’s number 1 guild, Camelot, represented the Light Faction. The remaining two players from the Angel and Devil Factions went without say, Eos of Nine Hells and Caedes of Testament. Both of them were the guild masters of their respective guilds.
When they battled, all of the unique skills, magic spells, items, and pets or NPCs used were incredible. They were all eye-catching and they brought a lot of flair to the battles. The way each player battled and the techniques they used were also incredibly advanced and masterful. Many hidden rankers who were participating in the tournament felt their competitive spirits ignited as they watched these players trounce all of their competitors as they couldn’t help but compare themselves to try and gauge who was stronger between them.
Naturally, a battle would have been the easiest way to figure out who was better, but since they didn’t participate in the PvP event, their chance to compare and fight had been lost. Sky, the only other Awakened player in the game besides Maria, was one of these players. She felt regretful that she didn’t participate in the PvP tournament since she would have likely caused a big splash, both figuratively and literally.
She had awakened her race from a normal Naga to a Scylla which gave her many new abilities and powers. Testing them on monsters was fun and all but Sky wanted to fight a player and what better than now when all of the strongest players in the game had gathered together to duke it out in the IGC’s ring.
It wasn’t only her, nearly all of the hidden rankers felt regretful as they could only sit in their seats and watch the battles proceed without being able to take part in all of the fun. However, that’s why they were called regrets. One wouldn’t think that they’ve made a mistake unless they didn’t make the mistake in the first place.
There were still 2 PvP-type events left and they were the Battle Royale and Free-for-All. Many of the people participating in the IGC who were confident of their strength didn’t want to pass up on the only remaining events that pitted players against each other in the ring so they began to contact their acquaintances who were qualified in the IGC and started to form teams for the Battle Royale which would be held after all of the individual events ended.
Since the PvP event had finally reached their semi-finals series, the event ended as the remaining 3 battles would be held on the last days of the IGC. The next event started and it was the Item Creation Event, an event made solely for the lifestyle classes. The Free-for-All started after the Item Creation Event and all of the confident players whose fighting spirits have been ignited after watching the PvP battles were definitely going to participate, regardless of what they had originally intended.
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It wasn’t about the glory or the honor, it was all about the fun they would have as they fought against other players whose strengths and levels were on par with theirs. Maria was also growing a little impatient as she too wanted in on all the action but unfortunately, she wasn’t an IGC participant. She could only lament at her misfortune in the seats as her brother, Mikael, patted her back in comfort.
Today, she had decided to go in with her friends and sit with them in the VIP booths. It was much better than sitting in the area the committee had prepared for them as she didn’t have anyone she knew there to talk to besides David. She didn’t want to acquaint herself with anyone either as they were all mostly big-name celebrities that seemed very hard for her to approach, especially since she herself wasn’t very approachable.
The Item Creation Event started and many lifestyle class players that had created items that were ranked high in the item leaderboards had been invited to participate. This was the only event in the IGC that had no preliminaries or qualifiers as all of the participants were invited.
There weren’t that many well-known lifestyle class players to begin with so they didn’t need a qualifying round or anything like that. The participants were all heading straight into the finals as the person who created the best item would be the winner, followed by second place, and then third place. The qualities of the item would determine the outcome. The effects, rank, and utility are the main factors though.
Any item, no matter if it was a weapon, a piece of armor, an accessory, a set of clothing, a potion, pills, or even a work of art like a painting or sculpture, as long as it had good effects, a high rank, and good utility, it was eligible to be judged in the event and win.
The participants would only have 3 hours to make the item but they would be completing it in a time-accelerated space so, in the outside world, only an hour would elapse. During this hour, it would be a sort of intermission for those watching right in the stadium. The audience also had the option to log into the game using the VR-Headgear provided to watch the entire 3 hours which was something most people did.
Maria, however, didn’t really care about it. Items were a really good thing and all, especially in a game where stats and skill effects mattered a lot but she wasn’t the type to patiently watch as an item is created. Most of the items she wore were also class or character-specific. It wasn’t something a person could create especially since the items she had on herself were mostly Mythical Ranked now, save for the few accessories she had which she hadn’t changed since she hadn’t acquired anything good yet.
Since she wasn’t going to be watching the event, Maria walked out of the booth and decided to wait the hour by wandering around with David at her side. Obviously, no one trusted her moving around by herself as she would easily get lost so someone had to watch over her.
Naturally, she still had her face covered by a mask and a hoodie over her head so she blended well with the crowd, except she sort of regretted wanting to walk around after seeing the banners, posters, and screens that advertised Unitale and the IGC. A few of her images as Fallen Angel Maria popped up here and there, making her conscious of herself as she overheard other people talking about her and the other invited celebrities that would be participating in tomorrow’s side events.
Maria couldn’t wait for tomorrow to come because it would be the day she could finally get in on the action. Unfortunately, there weren’t any PvP events that she was going to be participating in and the final event, the Gauntlet, didn’t sound like a PvP-type of event.
She continued walking around before returning to the VIP booth where her friends were waiting just as the Item Creation Event ended and the winner was announced. Maria was pleasantly surprised to see a familiar name in one of the top 3 winners of the event. It was Sfayte, the person who had designed the awesome pair of clothes for her in the competition she had hosted a while ago.
She wasn’t too concerned with the items that were created but a lot of the people in the audience and her friends were amazed by the event’s winner who had created a Legendary-grade Accessory. An auction was going to be held for the item later after the IGC and many planned to participate in it because it was the first player-made legend-grade Accessory out there. Not only that, it was the only known legend-grade accessory in the game as of now.
With that event out of the way, it was finally the time for some action as the Free-for-All event started.
This time, nearly every IGC participant entered so the organizers had to make a few last-minute adjustments before the event started. First of all, there were a total of 200 players participating in the IGC but the Free-for-All event was only supposed to be played by 50 to 80 players at most. They didn’t think so many people would participate in this event that the numbers had swelled to around 150 players.
The organizers decided to split the players into 3 groups of 50 and have them duke it out in the ring one by one. The way the event worked was that each player would have only 10 lives and after losing all 10 lives, they would be eliminated from the map. The map the 50 players would be battling on was quite large but it wasn’t too large that it would take the players some time to find each other nor was it too small to make the players feel restricted and stifled.
Since 50 players would be fighting all at once, it was really going to be a chaotic event. You could win by simply surviving and you could also win by eliminating all of your opponents. Eliminating an opponent would grant one life and every 10 minutes a heart would be taken away so this event forced all of the participants to attack one another and technically speaking, each match had a time limit of 100 minutes.
Players could team up but they’d still have to be wary of one another since backstabbing was also an option. Once only 5 people remained, the round would end. Once all 3 rounds were finished, 15 players would move onto the Free-for-All finals event which would take place after the PvP Finals.