The ground starts to vibrate immensely, and in the direction where the other students are running in, huge thick walls emerge from the ground and begin to form a maze. This formation stretches as far point A1 and this distance is comparable to the size of a big town.

The other students are caught unawares by the sprouting of huge thick walls from the ground on all sides. Some lose their balance in the process, this is also due to the mighty tremors being generated by the release of the technique. Some are unexpectedly lifted by the huge thick walls, causing them to lose balance and fall, hurting themselves. Some of the sharp ones, however, are able to escape such.

As Serena runs ahead, noticing what is going on, she quickly prepares herself. A huge wall suddenly appears before her, she quickly switches and begins to run up, vertically, on the wall till she gets to the top.

"Hmph! Cheap tricks," she says to herself, smiling at her achievement. She starts running from the top, where she can easily see the path.

On another end, as Kiiara runs ahead, she turns back and sees the formation of the huge thick walls as it approaches her. She turns forward and continues her run.

"Eagle Eyes." Immediately, her bright blue eyes turn gold in color, glowing radiantly.

After this happens, her vision extends, causing her to see farther than normal and as she sees ahead, she memorizes it. This is because, as the huge walls are formed, they block some paths, creating a maze so if one does not know what is ahead, one is likely to go the wrong way or fall into a trap; by seeing ahead and memorizing it, Kiiara can easily find her way even in the maze.

As for Dia, she just runs through the wall.

"Hmm...one of the perks of being able to use earth element and more importantly, learning that earth passage technique," she thinks to herself.

"Wow!!! As expected from the genius himself, Damian Ignition. Such display of elemental prowess, creating such a large maze, the size of big town, within a few minutes. Incredible!!!" the announcer exclaims.

The crowd give a loud and vibrant cheer upon seeing Damian's technique.

"And just look at the way some are handling the situation. We can already see the sheep from the lions," the announcer adds, laughing.

"As expected from your son, Gray," Phoenix says, turning his face to Gray who is sitting next to him though their seats are separated by a large space. Gray maintains his silence not paying any attention to Phoenix. Gray has long dark smooth silky hair, onyx colored eyes and a fair skin. For this occasion, he is dressed in a long white jacket with an indigo colored shirt on the inside, a pair of black trousers and a pair of black boots with grey designs. He is usually calm with a serious expression on his face.

Back to the participants, a good number of them make their way to the top of the walls and run from there to avoid the confusion of the maze.

"Is this all there was to this?" some say with pride.

"Like that's all there is," Damian says to himself, wearing a large grin on his face as he quietly enjoys his walk through the maze.

As some of the participants run, the walls begin shifting positions unexpectedly, making the participants lose balance and fall off while those running on ground level hit the walls and hurt them themselves due to the sudden shift. Those that are running at the top of a wall facing forward, suddenly see the wall turn left. This makes them come to a sudden halt and eventually fall off the wall. Serena is also thrown off balance by the sudden random wall shift when the wall she is running on immediately turns to face right. However, she does a front flip while in the air and lands on her feet with her left knee bent down a little.

"My my, what a troublesome technique," she whispers.

"The walls are randomly shifting paths making it an even more difficult maze. How in the world is one supposed to swiftly pass this?" she adds.

She stands there for a brief moment, observing the walls and smiles as she takes off again, with speed.

"Hmmm."

"I see. That's some serious calculations running in that guy's head, however," she says as she dashes off on ground level.

Dia is unaffected by the wall shifting as she continues to effortlessly run through the walls though Serena is already ahead of her due to her speed. Kiiara also figures out the trick of the wall shifting as she runs with her eagle eyes technique on.

"It's obvious it is the timing at which the walls shift," she says to herself.

"Once you can get that, you can avoid being caught off guard by the wall shifting," she continues.

"That being said, this maze still makes this game a hassle," she adds.

Within some minutes, some of the participants are close to point A1.

"Finally, we can see it!" some of them exclaim.

"This is where the real fun begins," a girl with two ponytails, says, as she knocks out ten participants in the blink of an eye from her path.

Serena, as she runs, becomes a bit surprised when she sees this girl appear suddenly by her side. The girl has blonde hair with two ponytails, having pink tint at the tip of each pony tails. She is wearing a faded green sleeveless top which has dark green linings, silver buttons and two chest pockets with a short collar which is standing; a pair of black tight shorts folded some distance above knee level, and a pair of black sneakers with faded green lines.

"Hooo, so you're one of the fast ones," the girl says, while facing Serena.

"Huh?" Serena replies with caution.

"Well, for this competition, the lesser the merrier I guess," the girl says and throws a swift punch at Serena, bringing both of them to a halt.

Serena quickly dodges the attack but the girl throws a quick kick, with her left leg sweeping across Serena's face. However, Serena evades, by bending backwards. The girl quickly spins and launches a kick with her right leg swinging vertically from top to bottom. Before the attack can make a hit, Serena pushes herself backwards, evading the attack, as her feet screeches against the ground surface.

"Quite some fast moves from you," Serena comments, while facing the place where the beasts are kept.

"However, I don't have time to mess around," she adds.

In the blink of eye, before she finishes her sentence, Serena appears directly in front of the girl with her left palm on the girl's chest.

"Elemental Release: Lightning Style: Crippling push."

Immediately, from Serena's hand there is an emission of lightning which flows to the girl and with a small boom, sends her flying some distance away. Straightaway after the boom, before the girl can land, Serena turns and swiftly heads for point A1, where the beasts for transportation to the next point, are kept.

Sitting at the top of a tree in the forest where the event is taking place, is a boy wearing dark grey shirt, a pair of black trousers and a pair of black boots. He has medium length hair with some of it covering his right eye. His eyes are dark purple in colour.

"Hmm Showoffs," he says to himself.

"Seems like they have not gotten serious yet."

"Oh well let's just showoff a little too, shall we?" he adds, smiling and standing at the tip of a tree branch.

"Elemental Release: Darkness style: Darkness Dome," he says, with both his hands in his pocket.

Slowly, the whole area where the event is happening, from point A to point B, starts to get dark and instantly, after some seconds, it becomes totally pitch-black. Once this happens, the boy vanishes.

"Wow!!! Another genius in action, covering the whole area with his darkness element, give it up for Erraz!!!" the commentator exclaims.

"What?!" the participants scream.

"First it was a confusing maze, now this!!!"

"How are we supposed to see the path or the beasts now!!!" they complain.

Luckily Serena is already at point A1 so she just hops on one of the beasts, one that seems like a huge white lion and begins riding it to point B.

"Luckily, this one can see in the dark and I'm used to riding it a bit since we have so many of this type in Lightville," she says to herself and giggles.

Meanwhile, Kiiara is yet to reach point A1 when the darkness dome is activated, however, she is unaffected thanks to her eagle eyes which enables her to see in the dark not fully clear but she can manage. Dia, once everywhere was filled with darkness, places her hand on the ground.

"Earth Trace," she says.

"With this I'll be able to trace at least one beast since they're stepping on the ground anyway."

"Voila!!!" she exclaims, after some seconds, having found a beast through the earth trace technique. She begins to run in the path she had traced, having no fear of the darkness although she is already close to point A1.

Kiiara, Dia and Dubnet are able to reach point A1 at the same time however, without being able to quickly recognize themselves due to the darkness, they each quickly hop on a beast and start riding to point B although Kiiara recognizes them a bit but decides not to say anything.

Elsewhere within the events ground.

"Hmm? Darkness Dome huh, nice one Erraz," Damian says, facing Erraz though it is dark and there is no light for him to see who is standing before him.

"Hoo," Erraz claps.

"As expected of the genius himself, Prince Damian Ignition of Earthville."

"Guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree," he adds.

"Tell me, how you knew I was the one?" he asks.

"Wait let me guess, since I'm standing on the ground, by using a certain earth element technique, you can probably guess it's me right?" he continues.

"Asking and answering the question yourself, as expected of Erraz, the dark genius," Damian responds.

"How about we just have our duel here?" Erraz asks.

"Soon the dark dome will clear up. I can't maintain it for long," he adds.

"Doesn't sound like a bad idea to me," Damian replies.

"I suppose we should give it a shot," he adds.

"Oh My!!! Seems an Epic battle will ensue between these two young warriors even before the main tournament!!!" the commentator announces.

The atmosphere around the two boys starts getting really tense as they stare at each other. The darkness dome begins to fade away slowly until it becomes completely bright once more.

Suddenly, Damian jumps backwards with his left hand in the air, he forms a large earth boulder and tosses it at Erraz who quickly steps sideways to dodge the attack.

"Darkness Bringer," Erraz exclaims, stretching forth his left arm at Damian.

Immediately, a big shadow arm, having a mix of dark purple and black colors with flame like edges, extends from his arm and heads straight with speed to grab Damian.

"Impressive!!" Damian exclaims, smiling, still in mid-air. He makes a pillar from the ground and hops on it with immense speed to another pillar he makes. The shadow arm keeps following him however, he makes several pillars and continuously hops on them, switching his position with great speed.

"Elemental Release: Earth Style: Grasshopper," he says, as he does this.

Erraz tries following him with his eyes however Damian is really fast with his hopping around and so in an instance, appears behind Erraz about to launch a punch at him. Before Erraz can fully turn to face Damian, Damian already launches his attack.

"Elemental Release: Earth Style: Rock Fist."

Small rocks gather around Damian's right hand, forming a huge rocky arm with which he throws a swift powerful punch at Erraz. To Damian's surprise, it was the after image of Erraz he hits as the real Erraz does a quick front flip over Damian and lands behind him.

"Dark Fade," he says, as he does this.

Immediately he lands, he sets his right palm wide open, facing Damian, with his left hand holding the right elbow. The atmospheric pressure around that area becomes so intense.

"Guess I'll just end it here now," he says.

"Elemental Release: Darkness Style: Black Canon: First Round," he adds.

A small round object, black in color forms at the middle of Erraz' palm with what seems like black smoke revolving round it and it begins to expand in size.

"This is bad," Damian says to himself as he quickly turns and steps back a bit, to face Erraz.

The black ball expands in a haste, till it is the size of Erraz' head. With a smile, Erraz says,

"It's over," and immediately, with a powerful boom which causes the ground to shake violently, launches the attack at Damian, blowing up everything in its path.

"Guess I have no choice," Damian says, as the ball approaches him with great speed as the force generated from the ball, pushes him back bit by bit.

BOOM!!!

"Wow!!! As expected from the geniuses!!!" the commentator screams.

From miles away the sound of the battle between Erraz and Damian is heard with the ground shaking violently and a thundering sound roaring through the region. The participants look round in amazement as to what can be the cause of such eruption. Added to the shaking and sound, is a powerful wind which even causes some participants to lose their footing and some riding on beasts even fall off with their beasts stumbling from the pressure.

"What the-," Kiiara says. She halts her beast (the same as Serena's) for a moment to look for the cause of the eruption. When she turns back to look for what happened, she immediately feels an attack heading towards her. She turns and faces right; quickly she lifts herself from her beast and sustains herself on it with her left hand, as she twists her body sideways to dodge the incoming water attack. Using her hand as a pivot, she spins on the axis, lifts herself and lands on the right side of the beast where the attack is coming from.

"Alayna," she whispers to herself. She quickly joins her palms together, puffs her mouth and pushes her head backwards a bit. From high up in the air, the attacker rushes down at Kiiara and when she is just some distance away, Kiiara launches an attack.

"Elemental Release: Fire Style: Breath of fire," she says and blows into the air. Large amount of fire pour out from her, burning everything in her front however, the attacker, Alayna, evades by a hair's breath after pulling herself backwards at the nick of time when she lands on the ground.

"Kiiara!! This time I'm going to get you and your sister. I'll make sure to end you both in this competition. I'll make your Father gets it for what he did to my teacher!" she screams as the fire cleared away.

She stretches both her palms, wide open, at Kiiara and bubbles of water, purple in color, form around her.

"Elemental Release: Water Style: Rapid Bubble Fire!!!" she exclaims. The bubbles begin launching, like bullets, one by one, at Kiiara.

"Those bubbles explode upon impact," Kiiara says to herself, having fought Alayna some time ago.

"Nevertheless, Elemental Release: Wind Style: Breaking Gust," she says, joining her palms and with a deep breath, blowing into the air.

A powerful amount of wind pressure forms and clashes with the incoming bubbles creating an explosion. While this happens, Alayna quickly dashes, appearing at Kiiara's left side, throws a dagger at Kiiara who quickly turns and fends off the attack with a thin rod she is carrying.

"It's not over!!" Alayna yells and launches another attack.

"Elemental Release: Water Style: Water bullet," she says, shooting out water with the speed of a bullet from her mouth, at Kiiara. Kiiara is quick to dodge by bending forward and also makes a run for Alayna. The water bullet attack is powerful enough to completely severe one of the legs of the beast of a random participant that was coming up behind Kiiara.

Once Kiiara is close to Alayna, she slides under Alayna's open legs, appearing behind Alayna. She quickly jumps up as if to twist Alayna's neck. Alayna turns to face Kiiara however, Kiiara does a front flip and goes over to Alayna's back. Alayna is about to turn again when Kiiara signals her beast with a whistle and it runs forward with speed. Immediately Alayna is dragged along as the beast runs.

"What?!" she screams.

"How?!" "When?!" she shouts.

"Ha ha ha," Kiiara laughs.

"You didn't notice the thin wires I used. Right from your first attack, I put the wire on my beast with my left hand then when I slid under and jumped like I wanted to twist your neck, I was putting the wires around you. I finalized it when I flipped over you," she explains, smiling.

"The wires are thin and light but very strong. You said you want to get me and my sister? Sure go ahead, however, this is a competition not a time for some petty revenge. We have our goals too you know," she concludes as the beast swings its head, flinging Alayna some distance away.

"Let's get out of here before she comes," Kiiara says and hops on the beast.

"Thank you baby boy," she adds, rubbing the furry head of the beast. The beast smiles at Kiiara and takes off at top speed.

Some distance away from point B, Erraz appears from thin air and is in bad shape as he crashes into the ground. Kiiara, riding towards the checkpoint, notices him. All participants are wearing different colors of bands. When Kiiara notices that his is similar to hers, she quickly picks him up and puts him on an empty beast she finds and takes them both with her to point B where the others are already waiting. Serena has reached there a while ago and is stretching to see if Kiiara is on her way while she chats with Dia who just arrives.

"Oh there she is!" Serena exclaims, seeing Kiiara and gives a sigh of relief.

"I didn't...think...that punk...was that...strong. What a scary technique," Erraz mutters as Kiiara arrives point B with him. Damian comes riding majestically and slowly on his beast, as he arrives point B as the last participant to pass the first stage of the Glory games.