When he called out Peter's name, everyone who belonged to Del's class started to look at each other in confusion, while Quinn and his friends just stood there stunned. Due to Peter's shocking incidents, many knew who he was, especially after he was suspected of working with Pure.
However, the other classes were unaware of why Del's class were gossiping and making an uproar.
"Is that the same Peter as before?" A student said.
"I thought he was a member of Pure?"
"Maybe he wasn't, and they just found him?"
The speculation surrounding Peter grew as to why he hadn't appeared. If he was there in front of them, it meant the military must have cleared him as innocent. Still, after the students stopped wondering why Peter was there, a bigger question popped in their mind.
'Why did he get selected as a replacement for Vorden in the fighting tournament?'
Peter was well known for being a level 1 weak earth user for most of his school days. It was only later on that he had improved and managed to get himself up to level four.
The students weren't the only ones questioning their motive, though; so were Quinn and the others.
Out of thin air, a light circle started to light up at the front, next to where the other students stood. A few moments later, the light had dissipated, and in its place stood a soldier, and in front of him was Peter.
When seeing Peter in front of their eyes, their hearts and minds started to settle slightly. Everyone there felt a little guilty for deciding not to rescue Peter. Seeing him up on the stage without a single scratch on his body allowed their minds to be at ease.
'It looks like the connections were right after all?' Quinn thought. 'They haven't been hurting him in the dungeon, but why have him participate in the tournament? It makes no sense.'
However, Logan, who had been busy coming up with multiple outcomes, had thought about this possibility as well. It was just one of the lower chanced ones.
At this point, the military most likely already considered Peter as a member of Pure. Not only had a video been made confirming this detail, but the fact that he reinfiltrated using a transformation skill was like a double confirmation in their eyes.
The only reason why they would want Peter to be in this fight was if they thought Pure was watching. If they cared about Peter that much to save him from the clutches of Truedream, then perhaps they would do the same again at the Inter Base Tournament.
The problem was, it wasn't Pure who had saved him last time. They didn't care about Peter at all. What this also meant was Peter wasn't out of the woods yet. The fighting tournament would be the stage to show all of the Pure members what they were doing to their colleagues.
After all the participants were called out, the contenders were all shipped off together and headed out first. Following General Mike, Layla decided to stay close to Peter. She didn't know any of the others and wanted to learn more about what was in the dungeon.
This was because part of her mission at the military base was to find out information about the dungeon.
"Hey, Peter, are you alright?" Layla whispered.
Before Peter could even answer, one of the soldiers escorting the group by their side got in between the two of them.
"No one is permitted to talk to student Peter Chuck until after the event." the soldier said.
Layla backed down, and the other students found it strange that Peter was receiving special attention, but they didn't think much of it. They were far too focused and excited about their own upcoming events.
The rest of the students followed the two Generals, Nathan and Duke. They carried on walking and took a path around the main central plaza area. It was where most of the non-military personnel and soldiers who were on break would be resting and enjoying their time.
Eventually, they were led to a place they hadn't seen in a long time. It was the training ground. It was a place mainly used for soldiers to practice battle with their mechs or test new equipment, but today it was empty.
A massive orange wasteland with barely any signs of life, apart from a few large craters here and there made from who knows what.
Towards the side of the field were several large handlers. Usually, these would be used to store such equipment—the students were then led over to the hangar. When inside, it was different from what they had imagined, it looked like the whole place was empty.
There weren't any mechs, not a single storage box or anything.
"They must have cleaned this place out recently?" Logan said.
"What made you say that?" Fex replied.
Logan and Fex were part of the same class, but they didn't speak much together when Quinn wasn't around. Perhaps due to their first meeting not being a pleasant one. Not everyone enjoyed being blasted to the other side of the room.
Fex had only joined Quinn 's team before due to Erin and Peter leaving, and Logan was never in their class, to begin with. Since this wasn't a portal outing, there were no such teams, and students had to stay with their classmates.
"You see all that rubble. If it were like this from the beginning, the dust would have settled. There are also several markings and patches suggesting that things have been moved out of here recently." Logan explained.
"Oh well, not like it means much. I thought we were going to head over to military base One, what the hell are we doing here?" Fex asked.
"Attention!" Mike shouted, and the students stopped and saluted. The next few words he spoke after were short and sweet. "Good night!"
In an instant, he had placed a mask over his face, and at the same time, the soldiers, including the sergeants and staff, all did the same. Gas instantly started filling the room. Some of the students began to panic while few remained calm.
"Of course, this would happen," Logan said. "They gassed us on our ride here, and now that we're moving to another base, don't you think they'll do the sa...sa.. same." Logan gently let out before his eyes closed and fell to the floor.
The students around started to collapse one by one.
[Your body is being affected by a strange substance.]
[Resistance +1]
[Resistance +1]
[You are now immune to the substance]
Quinn had received the same messages which appeared when he was traveling to the school by bus, only this time, it had stated he now had an immunity against it. When looking around, he could see all of the students nearly collapsed by now, with a few struggling to fight against it.
One of those was Fex, but even he was eventually affected and fell on the floor. Unlike Quinn, it was his first time being subject to the gas.
Not wanting to seem suspicious, Quinn too decided to sway his body slightly while letting his limbs go floppy after faking a fall to the ground.
Once all the students had been put to sleep, the hangar doors were opened, allowing the gas to be let out. After the soldiers got to work, placing a black bag over each of the student's heads.
After what had happened with Peter, the military was taking extra precautions. There was a chance a student could be woken up or even have an ability that counteracted the smoke.
While Quinn was being bagged, he tried his hardest to pretend to be asleep; it seemed to work as after the bagging, the soldier went on to the next student. It was impossible to see, but he could still hear everything that was going on outside.
The sound of something large and heavy was heard, followed by several men grunting. He could then hear the squeakiness of wheels. A big clunk was heard and what followed after was a sort of humming sound, like an electric current passing through something.
'I've heard this sound before, but where?' Quinn thought. He tried to pinpoint the sound, but his mind was working against him. It was nearly impossible to shift through his memories until he figured out where he had heard this sound before.
"Start shifting the students in through the portal one by one." A soldier said.
The words were spoken from far away, and maybe others wouldn't be able to hear it, but Quinn could. He finally figured out why the sound was so recognizable because it was the sound of a teleporter.
'Wait, why do we need to go through a teleporter?' Quinn thought. 'Wasn't the military basis on Earth?'
After finding this information out, he felt like there were two possibilities, either the bases weren't located on earth. Or the event itself was on a different planet altogether.
****
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