The original 250 members were reduced into 33.
Varian expected to face difficult opponents. He wanted to show off his strength, piss off people and lure them into challenging him.
The competition and its structure were irrelevant to him. He just wanted shards. Shards, shards, shards!
Unfortunately, what happened next was just tragic.
{125 out of 250 are promoted to the 2nd round. 62 duels, 1 bye.
Blade gets the Bye.}
'A set up. This is definitely a set up.'
Varian sat in the stands, lowering his face and clenching his fists. A thick killing intent emanated out of him as he gazed at the ranked princes fighting. "F-Fuck!"
"What the hell is that creepy gaze?"
The ones fighting the duels felt as if they were treated like a piece of meat to be devoured.
What's wrong with this bastard? Why did Princess Eshala raise someone crazy like him?
They were only half-right in their assessment. Varian was looking at them as treasure troves who'd pop up sliver shards upon defeat.
{65 out of 125 promoted to 3rd round. 32 duels, 1 bye.
Bye goes to Blade.}
Varian trembled in anger and glared up. Coincidentally, the 7th Prince's amused gaze met him.
The audience were surprised to see such a blatant glare from a mere ranked prince against the leader.
How the heck was this person glaring at the 7th prince? Was he insane?
'Angry, as expected.'
Samael wasn't pissed off. Rather, he was happy. He assumed Varian's anger to be the result of his clever move. By pushing Varian into a bye, he denied him an opportunity to show off strength and re-establish the prestige of Eshala.
Varian was angry about it but not for the reason he believed.
'Are you crazy? I wanted to fight stronger opponents and get more shards.'
Even though he got the shards just a few minutes ago, his space-time paths were already showing signs of movement.
[Shards: 7]
'If just 7 could do this, then what could 1000 do? I'll need just 1000, well, 2000, yeah, 2000 would be enough. 3000 would be better though.'
[Stop being greedy. There are just 30,000 shards in total. 15,000 of them are with the three leaders. The rest 15,000 are distributed but are heavily concentrated among the top.]
That's true.
Even the guy at the edge of being top 100 had just 7 shards. If he had to get 3,000 shards, he'd have to defeat the strongest ranked princes.
Varian bragged to everyone that he would do exactly that, but—
'I'm not strong enough though.'
[Yet, you acted like you owned the place. Wow!]
'I did, for that moment.'
Varian dropped his intention to educate the stupid system which showed no intention to learn his great philosophy.
As he lamented how Logos was totally unfit to be his disciple to carry on the great legacy, the announcement rang. {33 out of 65 promoted to the 4th round.
16 duels, 1 bye. The bye goes to—}
"Enough!" Varian stomped the floor and jumped onto the stage with a kick. Glaring at the referee who looked at him with an increasingly nervous expression, he turned to the 32 promoted contestants.
"You, you, you…and you!" He pointed to 10 and hooked his finger. "We'll fight it out. If I lose, I drop out. If I win, you fuck off and settle your ranks later." His outrageous words incensed everyone in the venue, but at the same time, they also established his dominance. Not only did this guy not follow rules, he showed no hesitation about it.
If he's not perfectly strong and capable of taking on anything, why would he do that?
Just like how Guan, the one most likely to win and challenge Eshala hid his power for so long, maybe this guy too was not showing his full strength?
As angered they were by his blatant disregard, they also couldn't help but restrain themselves from directly opposing him.
When everyone thought Varian would have his way, a stern voice rang in an admonishing tone. "Rules are important. Continuosly breaking such rules constitutes disrespect agains—"
"Just hold the proper competition later. It's about qualifications to challenge me, not giving ranked princes a chance to settle their hierarchy. Samael, I hope you have your priorities straight." Interrupting him abruptly, an arrogant female voice rang, Eshala Starlight appeared on a pavilion opposite to the one where Victor and Samael were seated.
From her position, she looked closer to Varian, giving a feeling that she was supporting him against Samael.
The 7th Prince slightly leaned forward and narrowed his eyes. "Or what?"
Eshala Starlight's aura pressed down on the venue, suffocating everyone with a vice grip.
Her power seemed as high and destructive as ever.
The solemn expression on her face vanished and the princess chuckled. "You don't want to know, dear brother."
But Samael leaned back into his seat and took a deep breath. He'd rather have her be solemn than casual. 'The information is definitely right. I've verified it myself. But how much did she really weaken?'
Samael gripped the armrest and looked down at Varian with an annoyed look.
Varian smirked.
For making him skip so many matches, he definitely held a grudge.
'I'm so petty, thank you very much.'
Samael alternated between Eshala and Blade. Once again, he began to wonder who the heck the weirdness of this guy.
'I can't remember the last time a ranked prince dared to act arrogant against me.' Even the strongest under the faction leaders were restrained, much less the small fish below them. But this guy…
'I'm not even sure why, but he feels different. He is different.' He turned to Victor to ask if he noticed anything. But the 2nd Prince opened his eyes at some point and was staring down at Varian with a creepy gaze, like a scientist staring at the lab mouse.
Samael neglected it for a moment but this crazy prince was someone who should've belonged to Nexus than Jai.
'Provocations won't work against him, he's always in perfect control of emotions. And he's willing to take any amount of losses as long as he's decided on something, like a mindless brute. You can't win him with a weak heart.'
Varian sensed the peculiar gaze and glanced at the 2nd Prince. 'Victor, a peculiar prince.'
[Don't try any tricks on him. He won't accept and will simply brute force his way through. In a sense, he's accustomed to flipping the board than following any rules. If he's not worried about Eshala, he'd have you killed by now.]
Varian's lips twitched and he thanked the princess for acting as his shield.
"Alright, with the 7th Prince's blessings, we'll start."
Samael couldn't let him have it his way.
"The remaining will fight it out between themselves and eliminate the weakest. A proper dueling competition will be held later." Varian's eyebrows twitched and he cursed under his breath.
'If I knew this guy was so petty, I'd have picked 20 instead of 10.'
[But you're not strong enough to deal with 20.]
'Why are you so factual when it hurts my feelings?'
Looking at his depressed face, Logos ended up in a burst of laughter.
[Hahahaha!]