Chapter 9:

But then, Maximus shot his finger to the other crowd. “Evan, come up.”

I felt a quick sigh of relief come out involuntarily. Confused at the spectacle, I looked over to Maximus. He was grinning, amused at my fright. I felt the anger well up inside of me but quickly pushed it back down. Evan looked over at Brett, sighed, and walked over to Maximus’ team.

“Brett, you get two picks now,” Mrs Z said.

“I pick, Atch and Rich,” Brett grinned over at us.

“Ethan is back in commission, right?” Maximus asked.

Mrs Z nodded, “he has been healed by the nurses and is in full working order.”

“Alright, I choose him.”

“Let’s take Amber,” Rich whispered to Brett. “She’s a good supporting force.”

“What about Diana?” Brett asked, “She’s been getting pretty good at Earth attacks lately.”

I scanned the crowd seeing Diana’s blonde hair and hawk-like eyes. She was sitting next to Abby and Amber.

Name: Diana

Level: 28

SR: 303

GR: 8

Strength: 28

Power: 29

Speed: 29

Name: Abby

Level: 27

SR: 305

GR: 10

Strength: 20

Power: 23

Speed: 26

“Abby is out of the question,” I said. “She’s a lot weaker than both of them. I think Amber is the better pick.”

“Hurry it up!” Maximus groaned over to us.

“Amber,” Brett grinned.

I saw Amber glance over to me, before walking up and standing to the other side of Brett. There was still one person in between me and Amber in SR, though I wasn’t sure who they were.

“Hey, Mik, get up here,” Maximus said.

“Mik?” I thought to myself. “I’ve never heard of him, is he new?”

Looking through the crowd, I watched as someone stood up. Glasses, slicked back, dark brown hair. It was Mikael, or I guess he was now going by Mik. I guess it showed how out of touch I was with our school these past few years.

Name: Mikael (Mik)

Level: 29

SR: 301

GR: 6

Strength: 25

Power: 27

Speed: 33

Mikael, or Mik, had been our intel gatherer back in the day. It seemed like he had come pretty far, getting up to rank 6 in our grade. I glanced over to him and we caught eyes. I nodded over to him, gesturing hello. He nodded back, and a slight smile came across his face.

A few minutes later, the rest of the room was cleared out, and the final teams had been set. The teams were split directly into 30 vs 30. Our team followed Rich’s teacher, Mr K, to a large wooden door on the right side of the room.

Mr K was a tall man with light grey hair, even though he looked to be in twenties or thirties. He seemed to give off a strong aura of strength, even though he looked fairly simple and weak.

Maximus’ team followed Mrs Z toward the opposite end of the room, entering through a door on the left. As our team funneled through the large door on our side of the room, we were immediately teleported into a large, elegant looking, ballroom.

The room was filled with red. Red banisters, doors, carpets, steps, you name it, everything was red. From where we were standing, at the center of the room, I took in my surroundings. At the back left and right corners of the room were two grand staircases, twisting upward and connecting onto the second story. At the center of that, between the two staircases, was a large tunnel. There was a painting of a barred door above it, I could only guess the jail would be down that way. At the front of the room, however, were two large double doors, nearly twenty feet tall. They were already cracked open, and it looked like they were leading outside into a town-like area.

Looking around, I noticed Mr K had disappeared, leaving us kids alone in the large room. Everyone now had a green health bar above their heads, just like the ones in the elimination tournament we competed in back in kindergarten.

I heard someone clear their throat, and looked behind me. Brett was standing atop one of the large banquet tables, in his hand was a spear with a red flag attached to it. Above his head was his green health bar, and a translucent red crown.

“Alright, team!” Brett grinned. “Obviously, this is our flag. Defend it at all costs!”

Brett dropped down from the table and walked over to the grand staircase at the far left corner.

“Down that hallway,” he said, pointing to the hallway with the small painting above it. “Is the jail. We need three jailors, all at the very least above level 25.”

A few kids raised their hands, including Abby, who had ended up on our team in the end.

Brett looked at them and nodded, “Okay, you guys make your way in there.”

The three of them proceeded to shuffle out of the group and go through the tunnel to the jail.

“Alright, as for the rest of us,” Brett started. “We’ll need flag guards. At least six of us including me will be designated, guards.”

A group of students raised their hands and Brett picked them one by one to come to his side. After inspecting their stats, I took note that each of them was between levels 20-26. Not including Brett of course.

“Okay, next are the normal guards. You will all be stationed around the castle, defending the inside and outside,” He looked around at the remaining 21 of us. “I don’t think we’ll need too many guards, so ten should do.”

Ten kids made their way out of the group.

“You guys split yourselves up around the castle walls, this first floor, and the second floor,” Brett looked at each of them. “As for you last remaining 11, split into teams of two and make your moves from there. Remember to break each other out of jail as well.”

“Got it!” Rich yelled, pumping himself up. “Let’s go Atch, I’m trying to bash Maximus’ face in.”

“Everyone, quickly to your positions! The other team is most likely on their way as well!” Brett yelled. “Let’s do this!”

Brett looked at me and gave me nodded. I nodded back.

Quickly, Rich and I dashed through the large doors into the town. The buildings were almost entirely made from brick, much like the old buildings back home. Each of the buildings were either one or two stories, no more, no less. It seemed like the town was created by the school, not a location out in the real world.

In the near distance, only a block or two away, I could see the other castle which was covered in blue banners.

“Rich, let’s move through the buildings,” I said as I took a sharp left turn into an alleyway. “I want to get up high to scope out the area before we keep moving.”

“Fair enough,” Rich grinned, following me down the alleyway.

I quickly jumped up to a nearby window, scaling the wall with my claws and bashing through the glass. Leaning my upper body out, I held out my hand to help Rich up the wall.

The room of the building was completely empty. It seemed like the buildings were just for the cover. We were on the second floor of the building, and it gave less of a vantage point than I’d originally expected.

“Looks like we’re going to the roof,” I said, looking at Rich. “Unless you’d rather wait for me here.”

“Uh, yeah, I don’t think I can make it up there so…” Rich grinned sheepishly. “You got this!”

“Alright,” I threw him a thumbs-up as jumped out the window.

Spinning mid-air, I caught myself with my claws, propelling myself up and onto the roof of the building. Landing silently on the tile rooftop, I looked down on the battle. It seemed like only a little bit of each team were fighting along the center path, going directly from castle to castle. The rest of the forces were doing what Rich and I did.

Suddenly, I felt an approaching presence. Turning left I held out my hand, narrowly blocking a punch. My weight shifted and I was flung off my feet, nearly sent tumbling off the edge.

Standing where I had just been was Kenny and Alexander’s other goonie, Jordan. It had been a while since I saw Jordan, I had just assumed he’d left the school. He had definitely grown up since the last time I saw him though. He had cut his long, wavy blond hair short, though he still kept it swooping to one side. His brown eyes showed only anger toward me. It seemed like he was still mad about the past.

Name: Jordan

Level: 28

SR: 304

GR: 9

Strength: 25

Power: 34

Speed: 29

“Interesting,” I thought to myself, standing up. “So Jordan stayed on track all these years. Then again, he did have 3-star earth magic affinity.”

“Bastard,” Jordan grit his teeth. “I’ve been training for this exact moment, the moment when I would beat you to a pulp for what you did to Alexander.”

He lifted his left and right arms as pieces of tile shot up, covering them in an earthy gauntlet.

I chuckled, “Doesn’t really look like that hard work is gonna pay off though.”

My right arm shot up in black flames as it covered in my own, black scaled armor.

“You think this is it?” Jordan laughed. “I told you, I’ve been training.”

His arms started steaming and I could see him wincing with pain. I watched attentively, interested in how far he had gotten. A few seconds later, the tiles on his arms had melted into iron, covering both of his arms to the shoulders. As I looked over to Kenny, I noticed he had covered both of his fists in tiling, as well as conjured a few jagged shards that floated above him.

“It’s not like we stayed this highly ranked for no reason!” Kenny looked angrily at me. “We’ve been waiting for the day you came back into to limelight, just to crush you back down.”

“Well, today’s your chance then,” I shrugged, my right arm still glowing brightly with black flames.

The shards of jagged tile shot quickly at me, though I easily blocked the shards, the flames disintegrating the pieces before they even reached my arm. As I moved my arm from my face, Jordan was already on top of me. It seemed like they really had been practicing, their combo was completely in sync.

“This is for Alexander!” Jordan yelled, punching me right in the cheek with his iron gauntlet.

I felt the cold metal press against my skin as I was flung to the side. I felt my body fall off the edge of the roof, though I quickly came to my senses and flung my hand through the wall, sticking myself to it. Looking down, I noticed Rich was looking up at me from the window.

“Atch?” Rich frowned, looking at my arm which was jammed directly into the brick wall. “What… happened?”

“Ah, turns out Kenny and Jordan are here,” I sighed, flinging myself back onto the roof. “I don’t need help, just keep scouting!”

“Cocky prick,” Kenny yelled, flinging himself toward me.

Shards of glass and tile shot from the ground, flying around Kenny as he neared. I dropped into a low stance and readied my fist. Moving the black flames from my arm to my fist, I punched outward. A black ring of fire shot outward as I finished the attack. The blast shot right toward Kenny and exploded on impact, colliding with his shards. I smirked, and let my hand rest at my side. It was my first time trying the attack on a person, I had been training it on dummies the whole time. Practicing for endless hours to create my own “personalized attack” as Chez called it.

“I guess I’ll call it…” I had to think for a second as the name really did matter. “Black-O.”

Checking my HP bar, I noticed it was already at 85%, it seemed like Jordan’s hits did more than I’d expected, it was hard to tell when no one could inflict pain on one another in this area.

Suddenly, Jordan flew toward me, barreling out from the smoke that billowed from my previous attack. Quickly, I rolled to the side, narrowly dodging his attack, though as he passed I stuck my foot out, kicking it into his side. I felt a slight refreshing feeling as I took in a tenth of his power.

He skid to the side, before jumping at me once more. As he swung his fist, I swung mine. My knuckles met his, both of our gauntlets cracking under the pressure. But, mine was stronger.

With a large blast of black fire, Jordan was sent flying back into the air. I watched as his green health bar depleted to 25% as his body rolled across the tiles. As the smoke from the previous attack cleared, I noticed Kenny’s body was no longer there. Shrugging, I ran over to Jordan, jumping high into the air before reaching him.

I felt the black flames gathering in my palm as my body dove down toward Jordan who was still struggling to stand, his body under the fatigue of the depleting health-bar magic.

I felt some pressure on my left side as my body was flung to the neighboring building, skidding against the tiles on its roof. Standing up, I looked down to see a shard of tile sticking into my side. If it weren’t for the anti-pain magic cast upon us from the teachers, this would’ve hurt a lot.

“Take, that!” Kenny said from the other roof, his hand touching the floor to pick up more tiles.

I ripped the shard from my side and gripped it tightly in my right hand. Pushing off the roof, I shot toward Kenny with blinding speed. He was totally caught off guard and could do nothing to defend himself against my attack.

“This is what happens when I actually try to kill you,” I whispered into his ear as he stood in shock, the shard of tile centimeters away from his throat. “Good luck getting out of the prison.”

I stabbed the shard directly into his throat and his body disintegrated, the teleportation magic taking effect. Turning, I looked to see Jordan struggling to stand.

“Eh, let me put you out of your misery,” I said, picking up one of Kenny’s many tiles that he left behind. “Just, stay still for a sec.”

I held one hand out, two fingers pointed at him as I aimed my throw. As his body stopped swaying for a split second, I threw the shard. It zipped toward him, landing straight in the center of his skull.

“Bullseye,” I grinned as his body disappeared. “Serves them right for trying to mess with me.”

Jumping off the roof, I hooked my arm through the second-story window, slipping into the room where Rich was waiting.

“Oh, you’re done?” Rich asked, looking at me.

“Yea, no problem,” I shrugged, brushing some dirt off my shoulder.

“No problem?” He asked, looking at my health bar. “Then how come you’re at 50% health?”

“Oh,” I said, also checking my health. “I just wanted to play around with them for a bit.”

“Whatever,” Rich said, walking over to me. “Here, I learned this from my dad recently.”

He placed his hand on my shoulder, and I felt a slight tingling sensation. Looking at my health bar, I noticed it had regenerated, going up to 75%.

“What was that?” I asked, grinning a little.

“Stimulating your muscles. Helps with recovery,” he noted, taking a step back. “It won’t get you to full health, though it looks like it still helped.”

“Ah, thanks anyways,” I gave him a little thumbs up. “Let’s keep heading toward the castle, we’ve already wasted enough time over here.”

“You mean, you have wasted enough time here,” Rich chuckled, following me as I jumped out the window.

“Whatever,” I laughed, landing lightly against the pavement below. “Let’s get going.”

Rich landed beside me, and we took off running down the zig-zagging alleyways. As we neared the castle, we started slowing down.

“It seems like the best point of entry is through the top, right?” Rich exclaimed, following close behind me. “I mean, we could just blow a hole through the roof.”

“I guess so, huh,” I glanced back at him. “You think we could do that?”

“I’m sure we could,” he grinned.

“Okay then, let’s go!” I laughed as I jumped up onto the roof of one of the houses.

Rich jumped up onto the brick wall and scaled his way to the window. From there, he made his way up and grabbed my hand. I pulled him up and we crouched low, peering over the edge of the roof toward the nearby enemy castle.

“Looks like there are two guards outside the main gate,” I noted quietly, scanning the grounds.

“Also two guards on each side of the castle, probably trying to defend against what we’re trying to do,” Rich sighed.

“You think there are guards on the roof then?” I asked, looking at him.

“Eh, only one way to find out I guess,” Rich grinned. “I’ve got an idea.”

“Hm?” I wondered.

“I’ll throw you over there,” Rich pat his right bicep a few times. “I’ll give you a massive boost that will give you enough speed to make it to the roof.”

“I mean, in theory, that could work,” I nodded. “But then how would you get up?”

“I’ll just have to drop down and scale the wall the normal way,” he said, peering at both sides of the castle. “I think I’ll head over from the right side, with you as a distraction it should make it even easier.”

“Fine, let’s do this,” I said, putting my feet on Rich’s hands which he laid out over his right knee. “Count of three?”

“One, two!” Rich gave a hard shove upward, and I felt lightning shock through my legs. “Three!”

My body shot quickly out to the castle as sparks flew from my feet. As I hit my peak arc, maybe 100 feet up in the air, my right arm flamed to life. I could see over the edge of the castle, it looked like there was only one guard on the roof.

He looked up, seeing me rocketing toward him, and immediately reeled back in fear. I was too quick, he wasn’t even able to cast magic before I slashed through him with my claw. His body quickly disappeared behind me. I could hear a commotion below. It seemed like they noticed me flying onto the roof, just as Rich predicted.

I grinned and raised my arm into the sky. Feeling the power welling up inside my palm, I smashed it down into the floor. The roof shattered, and I was dropped into the room below. Debris flew across the room, crushing a few of the defenders. Looking around I saw Maximus next to the flag, he was staring right back at me. There was a blue, translucent crown above his head. No one else but the leader of their team could have it.

“Took you long enough,” he smirked as debris flew onto his right arm, creating a stone gauntlet that covered half almost half of his upper chest. “Time for the test to begin!”

“You’ll regret everything,” I said as my left arm erupted into black flames. “Time to show you true power.”