There were only three rounds remaining in order to conclude the winner of the Mortal combat rankings as Shane walked towards the combat arena, where a busty girl was already waiting for him.

He could already perceive the girl's fighting techniques based on the information he had read in a book. Shane only smiled lightly and labeled her as unimportant, with a rather weak combat prowess, because she had to use tricks in order to reach the quarter-finals.

Unsheathing one dagger, he kept his other hand empty. As the AI initiated the start of their battle, Shane charged towards his opponent, who began to smile slyly.

Noticing this, Shane could barely hold his own smile, because the busty girl's behavior was way too obvious, as her hands disappeared behind her back in order to pull out something from her spatial ring.

With her hands half-closed, she enveloped them with a faint mana membrane, before she used a smooth movement in order to flick her hands towards him, releasing the six tiny needles within, that were about to pierce into Shane's skin.

However, Shane, who was already aware of what was about to happen, opened his empty hand, and a large black robe appeared within. He swung the robe upwards while lifting his hand in order to block the needles effortlessly.

The busty girl used a petty trick by using poisoned needles with lethal, yet harmless paralyzing poison, which caused Shane to eye the teachers weirdly.

However, in the end, a simple robe was enough to block the needles. The girl had aimed to fight Shane head-on after poisoning him with her petty trick but throwing the robe towards the girl, was more than enough to handle the whole situation.

Astonished by the sudden appearance of a large black robe, she barely noticed Shane lean extremely close towards the ground. He firmly grasped her leg with his vacant hand in order to forcefully pull her to the ground. By the time she could react, he pounced on her and his dagger pierced through her heart..

Laying on top of her, and his dagger thrust 'killing the busty girl, the AI announced his victory.

Coming down from the girl, he stood up and murmured

"Useless petty trick", before he went back to his seat, completely ignoring the busty girl on the ground, who could only glare at him as if he did something worse than defeating her in the combat ranking.

With only two fights left until the winner was determined, Shane looked at the remaining fights that were still occurring, and he was pretty excited about his next opponent.

There was one peer he wanted to test his strength on, while another one moved extremely fast and nimble.

Only five minutes left until the quarter-finals were finally done but there was still half an hour break in order to let the students recuperate from the prior fight which included replenishing the used-up mana.

Not wasting his time, Shane thought of a way to fight his next opponent, but after pondering about it for a moment, he came to the conclusion that it didn't even matter that much.

In the end, he already faintly memorized his opponents' combat styles, if one could even call it like this.

Once the break was over, everyone entered the designated arena, with Shane standing opposite a tall, muscular youth with two large battle axes in his hands.

Normally, one would think that battle axe users were extremely slow compared to others, but the youth in front of Shane was still nimble enough to take on the dual dagger wielder he fought before, overwhelming the dagger wielder with his heavy impact.

Seeing that Shane also used a set of daggers, the muscular youth smiled, but after recalling his opponent's fights, he couldn't help but act carefully, which was noticed by Shane.

The AI issued the start of the semifinals and Shane circulated mana into his lower body in order to enhance his velocity, as he pushed himself from the ground, with his body leaning forward.

The muscular youth in front of him was likely to take the path of a Berserker as his occupation, who were wild warriors that relied on their strength in order to defeat their opponents. This aroused Shane's curiosity because he wanted to figure out his opponent's brute force.

Also, charging at Shane, the dual battle axe wielder pulled his axes back in order to attack his opponents from different angles.

Noticing this, Shane praised the youth inwardly, as he twisted his body in order to evade the battle axe that was about to reach him first. He quickly jumped to the side with his still twisted body in order to evade the second battle axe.

While jumping to the side, he used his fist in order to push himself from the ground and further distance himself from the opponent that struck at him for the third time, before Shane could land his first blow..

Shane, who used light daggers, was unable to attack even once, while the heavy battle axes were able to reach him three times due to their longer range.

However, Shane felt disappointed to see the muscular youth take heavy breaths, and looked seemingly exhausted. due to the several fights, he must have participated in during the entire day.

Sighing, Shane stood firmly on the ground as he charged once again towards his opponent, without holding back any of his strength.

Enveloping himself completely with mana, while circulating it within his body, he reached his highest speed, as he noticed the battle axes rushing at him once again.

However, this time instead of evading both of them, he only evaded the first one by a hair's breadth before he slashed at the second cleaving battle axe with both daggers.

Normally this was a fatal mistake that could either cost Shane his life or his daggers', but this was not the case, thanks to the fact that all weapons were dulled. Additionally, his daggers were a graded Tier-2 set, made out of extremely durable ores.

As such, Shane used his full force to fend off the second battle axe which was pushed away from the youth. He lost his balance for a second and was completely overwhelmed by the unforeseen action.

Falling on the ground, the muscular youth was immediately stabbed by Shane's daggers, causing the AI to announce the winner.

Though Shane was momentarily relieved to have won the fight, he felt the sudden need to purchase other weapons. Shane found it extremely annoying to come close enough to the double battle axe wielder, who was as agile as himself.

In the end, Shane could have fought differently and more patiently, but he just didn't feel like it.

Looking at the other arena, he saw that the previous fight had already ended. He entered the final round with a girl using a red spear as his opponent.

With the usage of her martial art technique that probably hailed from the system, she was able to wield her spear swiftly, while Shane was completely aware of his own shortcomings.

Fighting opponents that used weapons with an extended range was extremely difficult with daggers that relied on close combat, and without an affinity, it would be somewhat hard to manage a proper fight.

Without a mutation that established an affinity seed within the mana pool, it was almost impossible to acquire an elemental affinity before learning an occupation, which was only possible once he entered the Apprentice stage.

Affinities could even allow close combat fighters to attack their opponents via a long-range attack, but without that, Shane had to rely on his daggers, in order to fight a spear wielder that could fight him from a safe distance.

In the end, Shane had to break through the range created by the spear in order to win the ranking, which caused him a great headache.

After the short break, the two had used in order to recuperate from the semifinals, they entered the combat arena to start the finals, which was initiated by the AI.

The onlooking youths were carefully observing the match, even if they were still disgruntled about losing their own fights.

Monitoring the final would teach them a lot of their shortcomings, as the start signal resounded through the Arena.

Both Shane and the girl charged at each other with their highest speed, circulating a large amount of mana within their body, as the girl lunged with her spear, only to retract it at the last moment..

This was repeated multiple times in succession and Shane tried to analyze her attack pattern, while carefully avoiding and deflecting her red gleaming spear that seemed to thirst after blood.

Several seconds passed and the two had clashed dozens of times already. Shane used a defensive stance and retreated back often as the girl seemed to overwhelm him extremely.

However, Shane's calm analysis led the girl to be proud of her achievement. She had learned the [Mortal-(Gold)] martial art technique from her parents, within a single month to the familiar mastery.

Increasing his speed, Shane began to sweat lightly, as his movement speed seemed to increase consistently with the girl's spear thrusts.

In the end, he didn't really have to evade the attacks because deflecting them with his dagger was more than enough, but even if the spear was dulled, it would damage his daggers over a longer period.

As such, Shane continued to evade the high-velocity spear thrusts calmly, with sweat pouring down his temples, as he increased his mana consumption he circulated within his body by a small margin, amplifying his speed by another notch.

Several minutes passed and his mana reserves were almost used up, while the same applied for the girl who had already decreased the speed of her spear thrusts. This helped Shane noticing a tiny flaw, and he immediately used it to his advantage

Letting go of his dagger in his left hand, the dagger vanished in his spatial ring, while his hand flung out towards the spear, only for Shane to take a tiny step to the right.

The spear flew towards his left arm and he gripped the spear firmly before the girl was able to retract it.

Using his remaining mana and complete physical strength in order to pull the spear towards him, Shane forcefully yanked the spear out of the girl's hand. This caused the girl to get pulled towards him thanks to her resisting with her fullest capabilities when he pulled the spear.

Smiling lightly, Shane lunged with the dagger in his right hand, only for the girl to fall right towards him, before the dagger 'killed' her by stabbing into her back.

With the AI announcing the winner, the mortal combat ranking was concluded. However, instead of people cheering, the arena had gone eerily silent, as Shane looked down at the girl, and muttered.

"Sorry for the inconvenience", when he noticed that their current position might look weird from the monitoring perspective.

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