“Right, so I want the room split into two halves, on this half, the currently active student council members,” as he spoke several students walked over and formed a singular row “and on this half I want everyone else.”

Several more rows were formed, and when everyone finished moving around the old man spoke again “Ok, take a look, there are currently 5 members of the student council still active since elections haven’t happened yet. This year we won’t have any elections, as of this moment you five are no longer part of the student council. We’re deciding the new student council today.”

At that Alan could clearly see the shocked expressions of specific students who began looking at each other, most likely the other previous student council members.

“Now, tradition is that the starting lineup for the tournament has to be made of student council members, though the backups and second string don’t have to be. As you know, there are only about 20 spots, so as you can guess we’re going to have to make some cuts here…” Pausing he looked back at the holographic screen that was still displaying the information on the 6 deaths. Nodding to the woman again, the screen changed to display several names, presumably categories. “These are the different events that have been included this year.”

Red Night

Blitz

Obelisk

Incursion

Capture the Orb

Strike

“I'll be giving you each a pamphlet so you understand what they are. In the meantime I’ll tell you the 3 students who have automatically been selected as main Student Council members. That would be, Daniel Harrison, Alan Custos and Kirimara Zei.”

Immediately there were cries of outrage, but not because Alan was on the list of 3 like he had believed, but because of the last name mentioned.

“Are you kidding! He’s absolutely useless”

“What’s with that! A crappy magician like him!”

“Didn’t he almost fail the magic final last year? How could we let him on!”

The majority of the students present immediately became riled up, everything they thought made him unworthy began piling up, but the worst ones stayed stagnant at the back of their minds

‘It’s because the principal’s your father isn’t it?’

‘It’s because you have a name like you came from the east! They just don’t want to look bad.’

‘You probably just bribed the teachers or something!’

‘Everything important, you suck at, you just happen to be better at everything else.’

The upcoming tournament would mean a lot to their futures, it was an opportunity unrivaled, the fact that a seat that could have been theirs had been taken by someone they thought lesser of was taken hurt their prides massively. The value of magic in this country was above all, you could be born from a cat with a rat as a father, and a face made of literal feces and still make it big, as long as you had enough Mana. Alan had a rightful spot among them, as he had beaten their best Praes operator the day he arrived, but Key not so much. It was like preparing a team for the olympics with limited space and saying “We need XXX, since he’s the best badminton, table tennis, and archery person we have” to them.

“Whatever you may think, none of you can beat him in martial arts and we have 3 such categories. If we want to take home the trophy we need those wins, and only the main council cabinet can participate in more than 1 category. Two of those competitions are 3 on 3, so if you think you have value as a fighter than you still have that chance to prove yourself.” The old man finally finished, calming the large commotion that was building, even some of the younger teachers had gotten involved. Fighting ability in this part of the country had no value, since for the past decade and a half it had been looked down upon. Schools for martial arts had been considered worse than brothels, thanks to the propaganda and efforts of the current king.

Though this was not without basis. For the past century, Ilad and many other kingdoms had been suppressed by that same ability, by the Yavell empire. Yavell was renowned for having the toughest, strongest warriors, and placed little value in anything else. Ilad’s knights and soldiers were crushed like ants before the Yavell armies, and the only thing that kept them out of death was their magical prowess. It would only make sense then that their magical ability was valued so much higher than the dirty martial arts that came so close to defeating them.

“Moving forward we need to discuss the rest of this line-up, Angela, please pass them all the pamphlets.”

Alan, receiving a slip of paper from the woman, started to read.

Red Night: 3 operators from each team do a night drop in their Praes and fight to defeat the other team. Last team alive wins

Blitz: 3 fighters from each team are selected, no magic is allowed and fighting is purely hand to hand. Last team alive wins.

Obelisk: King of the hill type scenario. First team to reach the obelisk in the center of the map must hold it until the game ends. Whichever team completes their objective wins.

Incursion: Similar to Blitz, there are 3 on 3 matches, however magic is allowed. There is a Last team alive, or the win who completes the objective, wins.

Capture the Orb: There are two roaming orbs for each team on opposite sides. The sides are separated by a natural barrier, one team must find and return with their opponent’s orb to win.

Strike: The top fighters from each school face of in one on one battles. Anything except for Praes machines are allowed.

“The tournament lasts for 2 weeks. The first week is a preliminary round with Capture the Orb and Incursion matches as the main attraction, only the top 8 schools make it to the next week,” pausing to take a breath, the Old man who had still failed to identify himself continued, “We want to make several teams for the prelims and one or two for the finals, 23 students in all. Those 23 will be our Student Council members for this year. The other 17 of you become second string, I want the 7 students called to come with me to the arena, the rest of you prepare for exhibition matches...”

(A/N): So I've pretty much given up on waiting for that 'lull' in releases, I was hoping for one of those periods in the afternoon where people haven't updated for like 4 hours or more. I mean what is it, Easter break or something? Anyway, hope you enjoy the update, Ill post again sometime later in the week.