The followers threw their punches, but before they could land, a black-haired young man stepped in front of them, his hands moving like snakes.
With the sides of his hands, he parried all the thrown punches and left the followers stunlocked.
They were already starting to imagine Julian's blood-covered face, but before their punches could land, they were somehow parried with such ease that they weren't even sure whether they punched properly.
"How?!" The young woman exclaimed.
"Heh, that's Kiernan for you!" Julian grinned and then punched at the young woman.
The young woman crossed her arms in front of her face and blocked the punch, but Julian immediately followed up with a low kick that bruised her side.
The young woman's eyes turned almost red out of anger.
She used the backs of her hands and started pushing Julian a few steps back. Her attacks were quite furious, and even Julian had trouble dodging them.
'She is not weak!' Julian used his Sea Steps to move his body effortlessly on the uneven ground.
At the ground, there were all sorts of mounds, roots that were peeking through the grass, and rocks that seemed to jump out of nowhere.
With Sea Steps, he was easily able to keep his body balanced.
The rest of the students just watched the fight unfold. A few of them even filmed. They expected the girl of the Purist Family to win rather easily.
She wasn't the strongest person around, but she had gotten time under fifteen minutes, which made her decently talented among her peers.
Julian blocked a couple of the punches, but his veins started to bulge out of irritation. He was becoming even more heated.
It was because he started to feel like his martial arts lacked something.
It was a thought he had since his first sparring match with Kiernan.
'I don't know what it is, but maybe I should try that Iron Style?'
Julian narrowed his eyes and whispered under his breath. "Rendering Edge…"
The young woman's punches came through, but then, Julian's hands smacked them away effortlessly.
However, then another couple of punches came through and punched him in the face.
'Yep, haha!' Julian laughed to himself. 'I didn't think that I would magically learn it. I felt it, though, a new spark in my martial arts!'
With that thought, he twisted his waist and punched. He smashed through the young woman's defense and struck her square in the face.
She stumbled backwards, tripped on one of the roots, and fell on her butt.
"E-e-eh?" She sat in stun, blood dripping from her nose. "I-I am bleeding?"
She started trembling in anger and climbed on one knee, about to start standing, but then she heard her followers groan in pain behind her.
She turned around, and to her surprise, all her followers were sprawling on the ground, clutching their stomachs in pain.
In front of them, Kiernan stood uninjured, a tight-lipped expression on his face. It didn't look like he had any trouble defeating his followers, and it even seemed like he was bored doing so.
"Oh?" The cold-faced young man looked over to Kiernan. 'Pretty good… for a tourist.'
"You're still fighting her?" Kiernan asked. "Need a hand?"
"She is a little feisty, this one." Julian said. "But I got a feeling that she is done fighting."
"Grr…" she gritted her teeth and shouted. "Someone help me! Are you letting these filthy, trash-blooded mutts do whatever they want?!"
When she asked for help, she thought that there would be a few who would come to her aid. She wasn't the only member of the Purist Family present, but when she looked around, she saw that everyone just looked away.
No one wanted to help her!
A few students laughed while watching the filmed video of the fight. They were already uploading it to the school website for the whole school to see.
She bit her lip, fighting back tears, and then left, running away. The humiliation was too much for her to bear.
"I am feeling bad." Julian said. "This looks like we just bullied her, didn't it?"
"Self-defense." Kiernan said. "We got attacked and just defended ourselves."
Julian shrugged his shoulders and then saw something happen in the cave.
A student stumbled out of the arched pathway. She looked like she was in pain, but there weren't any injuries on her.
He heard some murmurs from the students.
The time on the stone tablet got completely reset.
'You can fail the run?' Kiernan raised an eyebrow in surprise.
"Whose turn is it now?" Julian asked the students.
"Whoever wants to go next," the cold-faced student said. "There are no real order."
"What if two people want to go at the same time?"
"That would usually be resolved with a fight."
"Hmm…" Julian caressed his chin and turned to Kiernan. "Do you want to go first?"
Kiernan stepped forward, and as he walked towards the arched pathway, no one else moved. It seemed like they wanted to see what kind of time he would do.
Julian crossed his arms and thought. 'I wonder what kind of obstacles there are. However, none of them should be a problem for Kiernan.'
"The time starts once you enter the cave!"
Kiernan nodded and tied his shoelaces to make sure they were not going to come undone.
'The speed is key. Don't get stuck in any of the obstacles, and just run through. I do kind of wish now that I had put more into Agility.
'I am sure that would come to great use in this.'
He then stood up, brushing off his knees, and then, instead of starting it slow, he leaned forward into a sprinting stance and took off in a full-out sprint, feeling the wind rushing past him as he let his legs carry him forward.
In an instant, he ran through the darkness, and without him knowing it, the entrance of the cave completely vanished behind him.
It was almost like he had entered a whole new dimension.
At that moment, Kiernan's eyes turned round in surprise as he came across the first obstacle of the Game.