"You can be slow. You can be weak. But as long as you never stop, in the end, victory shall be yours."

*****

After the conversation with Sylvoir, Mei Gui and I headed back to the hotel. We didn't talk about much - in fact, after she introduced herself, she let us out, after an ominous 'we will meet again'.

But never mind that. Tomorrow was the day of the preliminaries. And we were ready.

*****

- The Next Day -

It was a nice evening. The girls and I woke up at 6 PM, brushed our teeth, washed our faces, and then gathered in the hotel lobby downstairs at 7, as per the instructions of Old Man Leng. We took Flaria with us, since this was the last day we had at the hotel, and she still hadn't awoken. I was responsible for carrying her on my back. When we arrived at the entrance of the hotel, Old Man Leng and his wife were there, waiting for us.

"All ready?" he asked us.

"Yep!" Qing Yue was the first to respond, excited and energetic as always.

I nodded, and the rest of the girls did the same.

Lan Xiao Su then timidly raised her hand. "U-Um... Mr. Leng, about the antidote..."

Old Man Leng chuckled. "It's all good. Don't worry about it. Also, just call me Old Man Leng. 'Mr' feels too formal."

"Antidote? What antidote?" Old Man Leng's wife asked, raising an eyebrow in suspicion.

"Ah, it's nothing," I quickly said, helping to cover up for the old man. He shot me a secret wink, which I didn't bother responding to.

"Well, in any case, I hope yer all feelin' confident. We'll be gettin' breakfast first, then we'll take ya straight to the test center."

"Sounds good," I replied, then gestured towards Flaria, whom I was carrying on my back. "What about her?"

"We'll take care of her for you," Old Man Leng's wife said. "Hopefully, she awakes by the time you are done with the preliminaries..."

I nodded, and handed the still-unconscious Flaria to Mrs. Leng, and we set off.

*****

After eating, Old Man Leng and his wife drove us deeper into District A, in the dead center of the district.

"Here it is. The preliminaries."

We were facing a massive crowd surrounding some sort of stage. There was a person standing on the stage, beside an enormous spinning portal.

"Go on. Only contestants can go past here," Old Man Leng said, instructing us to head on into the crowd.

The girls did as told, but I remained in place. "Old Man Leng... why help us so much like this?

"What do ya mean?"

"You've paid for our hotel, trained us, taught us things, and prepared us for these preliminaries. Why?"

"Hm... to fulfill a wish of mine, I guess," Old Man Leng replied with a sigh.

"A wish?"

"Yeah. Ya see... I tried to get into Fragment when I was younger. Unfortunately... I failed. And my son, he... he did it, but... just barely. I wasn't satisfied."

"So... you want us to secure good results? Is that it?"

"Somethin' like that, yeah. If I can't do it myself, at least I can train someone to do it."

"I see. We'll... do our best. No guarantees."

"That's good enough."

After that, I said my farewells to Old Man Leng, and headed in after the girls.

*****

"Welcome to the 2023 Fragment Tournament Preliminaries, District A Quadrant," the man standing on the stage said. He didn't seem to be using some kind of microphone, but his voice was loud and clear. I assumed it was some kind of Sound Magic at work.

"The goal of this preliminary contest is simple - eliminate anyone found unworthy of participating in the main tournament. The test will be straightforward - travel across tough terrain to get from Point A, your starting point, to Point B, your endpoint. This year's theme is the snowy mountains."

I heard the crowd began to murmur, saying things like 'the snowy mountains is the hardest one' and whatnot.

"Now, this year's competition will be a little bit different. Unlike before, for the purpose of this preliminary competition, you will be competing in teams rather than individuals. The reason for this is that we wish to recruit people who have strong teamwork skills in addition to their individual strength. Power comes in numbers, after all."

This seemed to startle many contestants, who probably had originally been planning on tackling this competition solo. However, this suited us perfectly fine. The girls immediately all looked towards me, and I nodded in return. No doubt, we were going to be forming a team. The only question was...how big would the teams be?

"So, without any further ado... please get into your own groups of ten. The time limit is 15 minutes. Once these 15 minutes are over, anyone who still has not found a group will automatically be forced to band together in a group, even if the leftovers do not total up to ten people."

In other words, if we didn't want to have a number deficiency, we needed to prove our worth and make others want to recruit us into their groups. Meritocracy at its finest - as expected of the IMF.

That said, I didn't need to worry about any of that. Groups of ten? That was perfect for me.

Feng Mian, Qing Yue, Yu An Yan, Yu An Xue, Mei Gui, Obsidia, Lan Xiao Su, Amane, and Xiang Peng - exactly nine girls. Plus me, that would make us a group of ten. We immediately banded together, and waited for the fifteen minutes to be over.

However... unfortunately, trouble just had to come our way. A group of boys walked over. There looked to be five of them, and by the looks of it, it didn't seem like they were just passing by.

"Hey," the leader among them called out to us. "We're in need of five more people. Any of you girls want to join?"

Man, I love how he casually ignored my presence and just only addressed the girls.

"We already have a group," Yu An Yan replied, shooting the boys a glare. "No thanks."

"Hm...? C'mon, with that kid in the back? He looks like he doesn't even care about you guys," another boy in the group scoffed, and all of them laughed.

"C'mon now, we can work something out. We'll protect you. Let's see... you, you, you, you, and... you, join our group. The rest can stay here or do whatever they want," the leader said, pointing at Feng Mian, Yu An Yan, Amane, Xiang Peng, and... Obsidia.

Well then. The other girls may not do anything too hurtful, but... he really picked Obsidia too. Man just sealed his own fate.

As if on cue, Obsidia looked into the leaders' eyes, killing intent at max capacity.

The poor boy, startled, instinctively took a few steps back, and Feng Mian chuckled.

"If you can't even handle a girl's glare, how are you going to 'protect' us?" she scoffed.

"Tch..." the leader backed down, and looked at me of all people in disgust. "Fine. Just know... when we encounter each other in the snowy mountains, I won't show mercy. My name is Qi Feng. Remember that."

"Oh, and also... no one is watching what happens in the snowy mountains. There aren't any cameras, no supervisors, no nothing... so we can do anything we want to you," another boy in the group added as they began to walk away. "I can't wait, haha!"

I sighed in exhaustion, which caused the girls to all spin around and face me.

"What?" they asked.

I shrugged. "I didn't think there would be a day when I would say this, but... I wish you all were more ugly, for a change. That way, we wouldn't encounter unnecessary trouble like this."

"Why, you're afraid we can't beat them?" Xiang Peng asked with a smirk.

"Nah. I just don't feel like spending the effort to crush them. But, of course, if they come to us... we have no choice, do we?"

Feng Mian smiled. "That's the Xuan Kai I know. I just can't stand that guy's sexist way of thinking. The way he said it, he thinks we were weak, and need his protection. That disgusts me."

"Yeah, no kidding," Yu An Yan added. "They only picked out the girls with good bodies, too... uh, sorry, I didn't mean the rest of you don't have good bodies..."

She murmured apologetically to Qing Yue, Mei Gui, Lan Xiao Su, and her own sister, Yu An Xue.

"It's meowkay!" Amane added excitedly. "Maybe Xuwan Kwai likes your body twype, you never know!"

"Yeah! Big Brother Xuan Kai likes my body the best, right?" Qing Yue said, hugging me.

"Settle down... people are watching," I muttered, sighing deeply once more.

"Hm... this is an interesting topic though," Xiang Peng said, adding fuel to the fire as always. "Hey, Xuan Kai, what kind of body do you like in girls? Is it the small, cute type like Qing Yue, or... the big and soft type like big sister here~"

Saying this, she grabbed my other arm and placed it in between her breasts. I flinched at the sensation, but stopped there.

"If you all really want to know, I don't have a preference. Both are fine," I replied stoically.

Xiang Peng, hearing my boring reply, let go of my arm. "Mmngh, you're no fun."

Just as I had hoped.

Shortly after, the 15 minutes were up, and most people had found a group. The leftovers were forced into a group of their own, just as aforementioned. It ended up only having eight people. My guess was that they would be eliminated almost immediately. They would only be a target for the stronger teams, after all.

"Now then, everyone, head into the portal. The details of this preliminary contest are confidential, so I will explain more once we are on the other side," the man on the stage announced. "Go ahead and enter."

Teams piled onto the stage and into the portal one by one, with us being the last ones to enter.

Alright... let's see now. How interesting will this contest be?