《Emperor (皇帝)》Chapter 7
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Most of the spectators in the arena seemed to have anticipated the speed and ferocity packed behind the fists of the two contenders, however, Ernesto was laughing his ass off, while Christopher was trying to fully concentrate in an attempt to see their moves even the slightest.
Eventually, as the two of them were exchanging blows, Daniil managed to find a weakness in his opponent's defense and hit him with his might flat in the chest, throwing him a couple of dozen feet away, followed by him spitting out a handful of blood.
One punch. Just with one punch, flat into the chest, one gained the ultimate advantage over the other. This was the display of true might of Soulguards, which made both Christopher and Ernesto even more so excited.
Druvly, the man that has been hit, instantly regained his senses, and with a smirk on his face, he clasped his fists together and closed his eyes completely. Daniil exclaimed at that moment: "Shit.", and started gaining distance away from his opponent, but was ultimately too late. He suddenly hit an invisible force with his back, and after punching it, again and again, he did not seem to be able to break it.
Druvly calmly opened his eyes and smiled, while increasing the tension in his clasped fists. As he did so, Daniil began sweating, and used all of his remaining might to try and break free from this invisible barrier, but, eventually, he completely lost control over his body and dropped on the ground, unconscious.
"WOAHHHH!" - the crowd went into an uproar, very pleased by the display of Druvly.
The referee appeared in the middle of the arena again and yelled out: "The winner is - Lord Druvly! A great display of spiritual skills! Our next contenders - Arakas from the Ghat-Dalmeri and Klaus from Talatan!"
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The referee, carrying the unconscious body of Daniil, alongside with Druvly, disappeared in the shadows of one of the gates, and replacing them in the arena were another two contenders, one human, Klaus, and a very strange-looking furred-like creature, almost resembling a humanoid tiger, burly, fast and with sharp claws and fangs, Arakas. Their speed was also unimaginable, but eventually, using his martial skills, Arakas knocked his opponent out.
And through the next ten rounds, Christopher was mostly focused on studying the arena and the remaining contenders around him, trying to guess his opponent. But, after the 10th round, the referee exclaimed: "Our next contenders - Yannis from the Kingdom of Urukhial and Ernesto from the Netherlands!"
"Well, it looks like it's my turn." - Ernesto quickly swallowed his pill, stood up and jumped down into the arena.
"Good luck, Nesto." - Christopher really wished to see him win.
His opponent was a young human, maybe in his early twenties, but well-built, revealing his chest. As the referee waved his hand, suddenly, both of them disappeared in Christopher's eyes yet again, and a moment later appeared next to each other, throwing out punches at each other.
"Woah, so that's what this thing can do..." - he looked at his blue pill.
The fight went on for over a minute, until Ernesto took a heavy punch into his chest, leaving a trail of blood as he flew dozens of feet away. But, as he was about to fall on his back, he spun his body and instantly appeared next to his opponent, that was already cheering himself from victory. Throwing out a sneak attack punch into the chin, Ernesto instantly knocked out Yannis. The crowd went into an uproar, but not as much as on the first fight.
Looking almost deathly-pale, but still with a smile on his face, Ernesto raised his fist into the air as he looked at Christopher, and quickly left with the referee back inside.
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"Our next contenders - Christopher from Dalaran and Dazel from Thardrock!"
His blood started boiling, as he quickly took the pill, and felt that everything around him seemed to have slowed down, his muscles around his entire body tensed up, and the control he felt over himself was on the highest point ever in his life. He jumped down into the arena and inspected his opponent.
Trardrock was a smaller man, but with a very wide and built figure, large beard on his face alongside with a bit of recent Ale dripping down his chin. While he was smaller than Christopher, he had a much better build and a very confident posture. However, as the referee exclaimed: "Commence!", Christopher, for the first time, clearly saw the movement of his opponent. While it was quick, he could read and anticipate his attack, as he was trying to flank under him to throw an uppercut. However, with the power that the pill gave him, Christopher tensed his feet, and with immense speed, incomparable even to the dwarf, flew out and instantly appeared behind him and threw out an elbow punch to his head. The dwarf did not anticipate such speed and ferociousness from his opponent and was caught off-guard, instantly dropping unconscious from one punch.
"WOOOOAH!' - the crowd gasped in admiration and surprise, and started talking amongst each other.
"He's from Dalaran? Have you heard about that place?"
"No, I've been around all over the continent. He definitely must have come from a faraway place."
"I really want to know what kind of place must train such young yet skilled Soulguards. Brilliant."
While Christopher was cheering on the inside and was walking with the referee towards the inside of the arena, he clearly felt his heart beating extremely fast, and he cold-sweated all over across his body, feeling uneasy.
As he came inside the building once more, there was Ernesto, with a bright smile, waiting for him.
"Well, how does it feel to win?" - Ernesto clasped him by his shoulder.
"Incredible. Never would have I thought this would help this much. I am in your debt, bro."
"Hah, well, you'll repay me later. But you need to hold yourself for a while, the side effects of this are even worse than I thought they would be. We still have some fights to go through."
"Yeah, I can tell. I'll just rest until the next fight."
With that, both of them found themselves sitting and resting on one of the nearby benches, from where they could see the rest of the fights. With the pills in effect, they both could see the moves behind most of the contenders, apart from a few. The man from the 'Bai Clan', that Christopher saw arguing back in the lobby room, was so fast that even he could not see his movements. He really had hoped not to be the one fighting him next, as his opponent was knocked out instantly.
The elderly man, who was arguing with the Bai clansman earlier, was also not simple. While one could read his movement, he possessed the same strange other-worldly ability to create an invisible force to crush his opponents, which he displayed in his fight. Eventually, after a hundred or so rounds, half of the people have been filtered away, and the next batch of fights between the current winners was about to commence.
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