Chapter 16: Battlefield Royale
A month later.
Sounds of steel meeting steel could be heard throughout the dojo.
2 figures of young age clashed using close quarter combat weapons. One held a sword while the other one had 20 centimeter curved daggers in both of his hands.
The youth with daggers dominated his opponent as cuts appeared all over his body one after another. Eventually, the tendons of his wrists and ankles were cut at the same time rendering him immobile and at the mercy of victorious youth.
The victorious youth was none other than Andrew! He had his black daggers covered with blood at the edges of the blades.
On the same old and glorious spot, Instructor Arashi oversaw their battle as he nodded in acknowledgment.
Andrew was quick and fierce in his attacks. He exploited every opening and used various distracting moves to make his opponent fail to defend himself against his deadly daggers.
His movements were smooth as if his bones were jelly. He attacked from impossible angles as his opponent's advantage of a sword was rendered useless.
He didn't stop when he executed one movement, but combined his moves into a chain sequence. For an onlooker, he would look as if he was performing a weird dance rather than a series of complex and deadly techniques.
Andrew already won 20 consecutive matches! Every kid trained in the same close combat technique and even then he utterly dominated them with his battle iq!
His experience with cold weapons certainly surpassed every kid here.
Andrew looked at his next opponent, it was a battle-crazed kid! He also had curved daggers in his hands as if wanting to beat Andrew in his specialty!
This kid won all of his matches too! Although all of the kids had the same start except Andrew, the geniuses and the talented ones in the ways of close combat beat everyone who didn't manage to adapt quickly enough.
"Start!" Instructor Arashi said to Andrew and the battle-crazed kid. His name was Noah.
Noah darted towards Andrew with his annoying to point smile. Andrew took a defensive stance since it was clear as water what move the crazed kid is going to use.
Noah executed a fake feint as he instantly went for Andrew's neck instead. Andrew just sidestepped and increased the distance between them since going too close might give him an unpleasant meeting with Noah's daggers.
He maintained distance as he observed Noah's behavior pattern. Noah was impulsive and cautious at the same time. He knew what kind of person he is fighting against.
Andrew didn't pointlessly try his luck as he dodged around. He sidestepped at the last moment, he ducked when needed and slid when he wanted to mock Noah.
He was using phycological warfare too! He slid around and casually dodged as he had his own mocking smile painted all over his face.
He wanted Noah to slip up to give him an opportunity to exploit the possible opening.
Although, bystanders might label him as a coward for constantly avoiding frontal clash, the seasoned warriors knew exactly what he was doing!
He had everything under his control since the beginning of the match. Toying with his opponent however he wished.
Noah didn't understand how Andrew's timing could be so perfect. At times Andrew would dodge by millimeters!
Instructor Arashi was convinced that Andrew was one in a time battle genius. He wasn't wrong, even in his past life Andrew was one unique specimen who could adapt to any environment and stressful situation.
The battle went on with Andrew dodging and Noah doing his best to even scratch him. But every time he thrust his daggers, every time he swung his daggers, his opponent looked more and more unreachable and unfathomable.
With his quick and unpredictable moves Noah defeated every kid with ease. But this boy who was younger than him was toying him around the whole dojo.
And at that moment Noah finally slipped up, Andrew used this opportunity and thrust directly at the center of Noah's nape.
A transparent barrier deflected his dagger as he was rendered immobile.
"Andrew wins" said Instructor Arashi as he put Noah and Andrew into their seats. He didn't want them to continue since he could still see latent battle intent in Noah's eyes.
The latter fights were intense since only capable remained and small fish was kicked out.
The girl that managed to run alongside Andrew and Noah was called Eve.
She ruthlessly fought against her opponents as she cut away their fingers with her rapier. During the past month, she experienced the most heart-wrenching pain in her life.
This place has a Life Invigorating Array which is like an Elementary Sustaining Array but of low-level tier 2! The Elementary Sustaining Arrays was just a high-level tier 1 array.
In the beginning, she was timid and shy. Not wanting to harm anyone, but it changed when a sword sliced her shin apart, her leg was severed! But the array didn't let her lose her leg and perfectly healed it back. Unfortunately for the little girl, those who created the array were rather twisted people who wanted to nurture successful mages at any cost. So they made sure that the pain factor doesn't weaken but instead worsens...
Yes! They made it so that while being healed they will experience excruciating pain which will convince them to never ever get injured again since this array makes sure that each small cut remains as painful as possible before being healed.
She ruthlessly cut apart kids from the same orphanage she has come from. She didn't spare even one of them as her rapier made gorry and bloody cuts on their bodies. Some of them even had their testicles pierced through...
Naturally, no matter how traumatized the children would become, Instructor Arashi would force them to train and polish themselves. There have been a couple of children killing themselves because they weren't able to handle all of that training.
Magical society truly exploited the arrays to their best. You could train elite soldiers without fearing them dying as long as the array's tier was high enough. In the magical society of Aria, it's a norm to subjugate kids to extreme and harsh training which can lead to suicide, but they don't care about bad seeds that can't handle the best nurturing they are given.
Of course, there were a few people who had morals and sought this to be inappropriate, but they were in the extreme minority and most of them won't become successful and powerful mages because of their prejustices and their morals.
For power, you must be willing to do anything!
Soon after all kids were done fighting against each other.
Instructor Arashi announced "Now you will have a battle royale where the fittest and strongest survives!" as soon as he said those words the children were forcefully warped!
A new scene manifested in their views as there was lush vegetation everywhere. The kids understood what it meant...
An all-out fight to determine the person who can adapt, withstand, overcome and conquer the best! It was basically a fight for the title of the most powerful.
Naturally, after being subjugated to countless painful experiences, the kids had irremovable determination and desire for power. Even if someone tortured them to death, they would not give up their ambition! It will only reinvigorate it!
The children were cut and pierced in so many places and so many times, that those unfit had already killed themselves.
"There are no weapons provided, you all fight for yourselves. Don't disappoint me" said Instructor Arashi as his words were like booming thunder as the kids became instantly riled up.
"Start" with this one-word kids darted around as they wrestled, kicked, bit, poked, strangled and many more actions that were aimed to kill!
And the possibility of the array malfunctioning and not being able to heal gravely injured kids in time? They didn't care even if they killed someone for real. Right now everyone wanted to reach the top. No matter what method they had in their hands all of them desired victory.
Those kids that were seconds away from being killed were warped out of the biome since kids didn't hesitate to gang up and attempt to kill each other.
It didn't look like a battlefield, but rather a hell on earth where small demons fought over the title of the strongest no matter the cost and the sacrifice!
Andrew mercilessly poked the eyes, snapped throats, broke spines and sliced apart the tendons of the kids without hesitation.
The kids made all kinds of weapons using different earthly materials. Like vines to make strangling ropes or crystals to tie to the tip of the stick to make a spear.
That battle royale went on as kids ruthlessly fought each other. There could be only one winner!
Like on any other battlefield, the skilled kids were eliminated when exhaustion took over them after defeating many opponents. Weak preyed on the weaknesses of the strong!
The battlefield was chaotic but Andrew perfectly navigated around and eliminated children when the opportunity presented itself. Sometimes all he had to do was just push a kid for him or her to fall into a messy pit of battles.
The battlefield kept raging on!
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone