The three teachers from the Blue headband were as nervous as anything as they saw their students make their way to the stage. Liam had been cultivating a Qi pill to regain his energy and help his body heal the wounds at a quicker rate, but there was no doubt that he was still injured.
To Teacher Lee, the whole proposal was something that just made no sense to him. 'Why would he pick Liam, and who was that other student, Pink?'
Looking through the assessment book again, he could see that although Pink wasn't at the bottom of the list of students, he was in the middle and closer to the bottom half than the top half of the students they had.
'I can't fully trust the results Tod has given me, but if he's around the center, then I can't just fully say that the assessment was completely wrong either.'
Teacher Lee was trying to find a positive out of the current situation, but all he could think about were the negatives. This was because of the difference in levels. Although Raze had managed to beat a Yellow headband user, there was a difference between those at the top of the Yellow headbands.
Then there was another gap between the Yellow and Red headbands, and finally, the largest gap that existed in this academy was the gap between the Red headbands and the main disciples.
"I hope our relatives don't finish this match too quickly," Gavin said as he took another big swig of an alcoholic jar. He was enjoying the tension in the air and everything that had occurred so far.
"Are you really entertained by such childish fights?" Feebie asked. "We won't even see our disciples perform half-decent skills with this lot. I think this might even be a little too cruel."
The five main disciples had set up, with most of them holding onto wooden swords by their side as they stood on the main stage. They were spread apart from each other about a meter apart, and Ricktor was in the middle.
All of them had a relaxed stance, almost as if it was annoying that they had been called up. Some of them were looking at their nails or off into the distance. Only Ricktor was looking straight into Raze's eyes, and Mada was looking down at the floor.
"If looks could kill, huh?" Dame said, standing next to Raze. He then leaned in to whisper while covering his hand so the others were unable to see.
'So what do you want me to do? I don't think your plan was to have me take them out. I mean, I could do that for you if you really wanted to, but it would cost you quite a bit,' Dame whispered.
'No, don't take them out,' Raze replied. 'But just do whatever you can to stop the others from getting involved in my fight... and wait for me.'
Dame was hoping for this answer.
'So he really does plan to deal with them all on his own. Alright, I can do that for him... but these guys, they aren't going to be as easy as you think. I wonder what I should ask for in return when he asks for my help,' Dame thought.
"The match!" Pincer shouted. "Will now begin!"
The fight had started almost instantly, with a lot of them hesitating and the main disciples not even moving forward. But the only one to rush straight in was Raze.
"Crap, we have to follow him; there's no way he can win if all of them take him apart!" Simyon said, rushing to protect him, and the rest followed.
Raze continued forward and he was going for the disciple right at the very end. This was Ossep, the bald-headed disciple from the Moon Shield clan, and he also had a wooden shield as his choice of weapon attached to his arm.
When close enough, Raze went in, and he did the two-step shift, throwing out his fist. Lifting the shield up, the attack was blocked.
"You won't get us with the move you used before; you'll have to use something different!" Ossep said, but he could feel his arm that held up the shield was a little numb.
'The attack is stronger than I thought... is that really the Qi of someone who's a stage 1 warrior.'
Turning to the others were the rest of Raze's group, and almost immediately, Lisa from the Lethal Bite clan, with a smile on her face, had appeared right in front of him.
"Did I just hear you say win?" Lisa laughed. "I can't believe you would think of such a foolish thing in a place !"
A fist went right up toward Simyon's head, and he lifted both arms to protect himself, but it was a feint, and a strong powerful punch had hit him in the stomach as well. The power caused Simyon to slide across the ground and he knocked into Liam.
As soon as he was hit, he was knocked back onto the ground.
"F*ck me!" Liam said. "You piece of lard, why do you weigh so much!"
With his fist tensed by his side, Simyon lifted his head, seemingly fine from the punch.
"Ow... that... hurt." Simyon let out some air from his body. It was true it did hurt, but the hit wasn't enough to take him down.
'Huh, what is going on?' Lisa thought as she looked at her fist. Her knuckles were a little red from impact. For a level 1 warrior's body, it should only be a little harder than flesh, and she shouldn't have felt such an impact.
It was almost as if she had directly hit a shield of sorts.
'My attack, it should be enough to have taken down a Blue headband student, no, not just a Blue headband student, a Yellow one as well. What is going on?'
Simyon smiled, all of the abuse he had suffered in the last month, getting hit day by day by Dame, it was paying off. His body had grown in strength, and a strong body was perfect for the item's effect on his ear.
"I'll just hit you again until you fall!" Lisa shouted as she charged forward. Throwing out a fist, it hit Simyon again, who had placed his shoulder in the way of the punch, and right at that moment, Liam came down swinging his sword.
Lisa was able to react by pulling her body back; the strike had missed, but it was incredibly close.
"Haha, this will work; you be the shield, and I'll be the sword, let's do this!" Liam said.
Lisa couldn't help but grunt and was wondering what the others were even doing.
On the stage, Safa was using her spear skills the same way she had before, stabbing against Mada, causing him to stay back. He hadn't been hit, but he was unable to get closer. This wasn't because of his skill but because his mind wasn't in the right place.
'She's that no-name's sister, right?' Mada thought; his skin was still crawling all over the moment he thought of this. 'If I hurt her, if I try to attack her, will that bloody hand come for me as well.'
Full of strange thoughts, Mada was unable to even focus to find a way to get in. He was performing subpar, and it was just enough for Safa to use her skills.
Lastly, there was Dame; he held the wooden sword in his hand, and the moment Ricktor tried to strike with his techniques, Dame would perform a basic strike. He pivoted forward and attacked just before the skill would be performed, stopping it on the spot.
Right after, Sherry would attack with her sword from the side, but he was able to avoid the strike by hitting it away. What Dame was doing, none of it looked fancy. He was careful to use basic skills; he just used them at the right time to diminish the skills of the main disciples before they could reach the peak of their power with their skills.
"There's two of them going against that student, and the main disciples are unable to handle him!" One of the merchants noticed.
"Come on, they must be taking it easy on him. He hasn't even performed any skills yet." Another commented.
"Still, I thought the white-haired kid was one to watch out for, but it looks like there are multiple talented ones in the group after all. The teacher must have done well to raise them. This has become quite the match after all."
While most of the onlookers found it entertaining, the same couldn't be said for the leaders of the five main clans. All of them were frustrated.
Feebie was clenching her hands and biting her bottom lip as she watched everything going on.
'Just what is happening right now? Lisa, she used the full strength of her Qi, but that student just won't fall, and how is it that a single person can hold off two of the main disciples... this is...'
All of the leaders were thinking the same thing. They had no clue what they were seeing in front of their eyes, how all of this was possible, yet they were unable to make a scene in front of the others because how could they admit that their most talented were struggling against these nobodies.
Nearly all eyes were focused on Dame as he held back Ricktor and Sherry at the same time. They were so focused that they hadn't even witnessed what had happened in the back.
"ARGHHH!" A loud scream shouted.
When they saw who it was, they could see Ossep, with blood from his mouth and a large cut on his arm. The next moment, he had fallen right in front of Raze.
In his hand was the small statue, with his back facing away from the others. He quickly covered it and placed it away.
"Now, onto the next," Raze said, turning around with blood on his wooden sword and walking towards the rest.