บท 12: Hunter's Club

The next morning, John was about to head off to the registration office to change up his classes when he ran into Steven and Mike leaving the building. "Hey John, you should come cheer for us."

"Cheer? Do I look like I have pompoms?" John asked in disgust, not even bothering to look at them as he walked by.

"Come on man!" Mike said, "It's the final selection for the Hunter's Club, you should check it out."

"Maybe later, I've got to go to the registration office and change up my classes. Apparently getting into the Tamer's Guild automatically passes you through a ton of classes I'd signed up for."

On John's shoulder, Snakey lifted her head and looked to the right. Following her gaze, John saw Ms. Winslow walking down the road with Mr. Parker and about 10 others who where headed to the forest to continue their examination. Kara and John had been the only two to pass the exam so far, with 4 dropping out due to injury or disqualification and 10 still on the hunt.

"Mr. Caplin don't worry about changing up your classes yet. The first day of school you'll pick your cultivation path, then you can pick your new classes." Ms. Winslow said, somehow managing to hear his conversation despite being over a hundred feet away.

"Yes, Ms. Winslow." John said, bowing slightly in acknowledgement.

"Who's that?" Steven whispered, watching as Ms. Winslow walked by, "She's even stronger than Mr. Parker."

"Huh?" Mike asked in surprise.

"She could be an Elder in my family clan, she's strong!" Steven said, a look of respect on his face.

"That's Ms. Winslow, she's a high ranking member of the Tamer's Guild and the sponsor for the schools Tamer's Club."

"No wonder." Steven said, before turning back and saying, "So, you coming?"

Sighing, John figured if it was boring he could sneak away to play some Tamer 101 or explore the Tamer's Club some more.

While the Tamer's Club looks like a giant zoo, the Hunter's Club looks like a giant saloon. The doors flapped in the wind as shouts and cat calls echoed from the door and the three of them stepped inside. The club had three floors and multiple basements, the first floor was a kind of sports bar with massive screens showing videos of the most lucrative hunts of the year. The second floor was a mission room, where you can pick up requests to hunt certain monsters or gather materials for the Maker's Guild. The third floor houses all the offices, leaving the first basement as a materials drop off station where you can offload all your carcasses and the 2nd basement as a massive training area.

It was in the 2nd basement that John took a seat while Steven and Mike headed to a side door to get ready. As he waited for the start of the event the crowd grew both larger and rowdier as more and more students joined in. John winced as someone tried to take advantage to cop a feel only to find their entire body on fire. No one even bothered to try to help the guy, just stepped out of they way or summoned barriers to protect themselves as they laughed at the idiot.

"Welcome to the 121st annual Freshman Showdown!" A beautiful young woman walked onto a stage erected in front of a massive projection screen, laughing as the burning man was dumped with water to put out the fire. "Are you ready to watch these noobs fight and die for a chance to join us?!?!"

The crowd went wild, and as John watched Mike and Steven walked on stage joined by several hundred people. "As usual, the competition will be a combination survival and hunting match. The longer you survive, the more you hunt the better your score. The highest ranked team after each round passes, while the lowest ranked team drops into the loser's bracket where you fight a sudden death match vs the next team to be eliminated. In the end, only half of you will pass!"

"Noobs, log in!"

The woman on stage was hyping the crowd up, using images of people dying in horrific manners in past competitions to get everyone's blood boiling while they waited for everyone to get logged in to Hunter's Paradise.

"While we wait, everyone should remember that time flows 5x faster in the game. This way we don't have to sit here and wait as someone hides for hours waiting for some action!" Behind the woman, the blank screen changed and showed the contestants picking their weapons alongside a countdown. "Alright, the map is loading in now!" The woman shouted as she jumped off the stage and a massive desert several hundred kilometers wide and 10 kilometers long appeared on screen.

"Unfortunate!" A new, male voice boomed through the sound system as the crowd watched the prospective hunter's load in. Noticing a message on one screen, John pulled out his phone and logged into the server, choosing to spectate Mike and Steven even as he listened to the announcer.

"The desert is one of the most dangerous and annoying maps. Here, you have only an hour to find water before you die and the beasts are almost impossible to see since they travel underground!" Another male announcer spoke.

"Yes, buckle your seats everyone and get ready to watch a fast round. Expect at least half of the group to die within the first two hours!" The first announcer came back through sound system, and the two continued to talk about strategies and how to survive but John ignored them and focused on watching Mike and Steven.

As soon as they loaded in, Mike double checked his weapon to make sure it was in working condition while Steven closed his eyes and took off his shirt. A rune on his back started glowing before he stood turning in a circle slowly as the rune glowed brighter and brighter. Finally, he opened his eyes with a massive grin on his face and started walking to the south with Mike following behind him keeping watch.

It was tense, but boring for the first twenty minutes. Thankfully, for John it was only 4 minutes or he probably would've said screw this and started playing Tamer 101. The groups were so spread out it was almost impossible for them to see each other, and in order to promote unity in the Hunter's killing another Hunter outside of special PVP maps would cost you points making it incredibly difficult to qualify for the tournament. Finally, Mike and Steven reached a point and they pulled shovels out of their packs before they begun digging. About twenty feet down, they hit pay dirt as water started spraying out of the hole and they scrambled back, letting the hole fill up. Wiping sweat off their faces, they filled up special canteens that removed parasites, bacteria, and viruses. They both drained the canteen's before refilling them and beginning to build a makeshift shelter to hide from the sun.

"Look at that, team Dread the Rifle has found water before anyone else!" The announcer shouted, and glancing up from his phone John saw that Dread the Rifle was his friends. Snorting at the name, he turned back to watching his phone. "Now they have to be careful, monsters are drawn to water!"

As he watched, John saw a sand scorpion nearly 10 feet tall emerge from the sand before locking onto Dread the Rifle and charging at them. With a preternatural calm, Mike lifted his rifle and shot a single time with a resounding *CRACK*. Before the scorpion even knew what'd hit him it stumbled and fell to the floor missing half it's over sized head.

"That folks is why Dread the Rifle is ranked 1st on our candidate list! Steven is the only one in the group to already begin cultivating due to his families special talents, while Mike is one of the best shots we've seen in the 121 year history of the freshman tournament!" The 2nd announcer's voice boomed through the crowd as everyone went nuts at the first kill. It wasn't long after that that the first team died in a horrific manner as another scorpion emerged from the ground and chopped them to pieces. "First death goes to team undefeated! What an unfortunate name, Team Undefeated is the first to enter the losers bracket!"

"Yeah Jack, and this goes to show that you shouldn't tempt fate. Hubris is the number 1 reason for people to smack their own faces!" The other announcer said.

At this point, the monsters began to attack all across the map and it became a montage of death. Only a few teams had managed to find a water source, which left others suffering from severe dehydration while being forced to fight tooth and nail to survive. Every now and then the announcers would switch back to Mike and Steven, who had built a kind of lookout tower out of sand where Mike would snipe anything that showed itself. The monsters that thought to sneak up on them were killed by Steven in a single hit each time. Suddenly, Steven slammed his foot into the ground and shock wave emanated out from his foot causing the sand to shift and blood to explode in geysers from multiple monsters closing in on their position.

On the hour mark more than 300 of the candidates died of dehydration, and it wasn't that much longer before Dread the Rifle was the only team left as the monsters concentrated on the few that remained alive. Watching on his phone, John saw when the screen flashed blood red, "Boss incoming!" Looking up, I watched on the giant screen along with everyone else as a massive worm at least 100 feet long and 50 feet wide erupted from the earth under Mike's lookout tower.

Thankfully, just before it arrived, Steven yelled out a warning and Mike dove off the edge of the tower with his rifle. Turning around, he watched as the worm flopped on top of their dug out well and covered it up in sand before going back underground.

"It senses movement!" Steven yelled out before Mike to take a step.

With that information, Mike grinned evily as he took off his backpack and set all the explosives and extra rounds inside to explode before jumping up and down. Just as he was swallowed alive, Mike pulled the pin and 5 seconds later, the massive worm exploded from the inside killing Mike and severely injuring the Worm.

Unable to dive back underground, it was simple for Steven to finish the worm off within a few minutes as the crowd went wild.