Chapter 586: Luck or skill issue, that is the question.
The moment Zhen Xun Po unveiled this strange fish bowl-like treasure, one of two immediate emotional reactions occurred amongst the participants and audience alike.
On the one hand was genuine curiosity.
The Zhen Clan had a habit of changing how their tournament function every single time they hosted it, meaning that nobody knew what to expect. The fact that it involved a strange looking aether treasure made the whole thing even more exciting.
This was the reaction of most of the foreign contestants and audience members who weren’t familiar with this treasure.
On the other hand though, those who knew what this treasure was, a deep feeling of dread and fear rumbled in their stomachs.
This was the reaction of a majority of the Zhen main clan members.
And unfortunately, both reactions were in play in a very concentrated seating area.
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In a skybox overlooking the arena with an almost perfect bird’s eye view, the Zhen Clan members of both the branch and main variety, were sitting and watching the event unfold before them with mixed levels of attention. Of course, it’d be more accurate to say that the skybox consisted mostly of the branch members, with the only representative of the main branch being none other than the matriarch, Zhen Xun Tian. While the elders and their spouses, i.e. the parents, of the branch clan were watching to make sure their children were okay, the matriarch of the main clan was chuckling at the reaction of her wayward clansmen.
After all, he was a student of hers once…distantly at least.
As such, she watched with amusement as her former disciple explain why he had such a reaction to the presence of this particular treasure to his children, especially since it was technically a very familiar one.
Then again, she also found the idea of informing them while he squirmed also amusing.
Decisions, decisions…
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Zhen Shi shook his head in response before explaining himself.
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In this exact moment, the Zhen Clan elders went silent after hearing the main clan matriarch’s words.
Not because they were relatively profound, but because it gave them a lot more context about some of the training exercises they went through as children before establishing themselves as a power in Stone Claw.
If their father had this woman as a teacher, then the concept of “badger drawers” suddenly made a lot more sense…sort of.
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She did this to partially alert the parents, while also having them go on edge.
Nothing says fun like superstition after all.
‘Then again…it might be more amusing for the branch clan scions fight our main clan disciples! The kids have been needing a good kick in the pants recently…’
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<{"..and that is how the Lottery Elimination Round is going to work. Now, any volunteers or should I picked the first one?"}>
‘Oh sweet mother of convoluted,’ Zhen Liu thought to himself as he heard the chorus of voices all wanting to be the first person to roll.
Shortly after introducing this strange aether treasure full of pocket dimension marbles to the crowd and contestants, Hero Elder, Zhen Xun Po, proceeded to elaborate the rules and as to how and why they pertained to this aether treasure. He also made sure to will the aether treasure down to the center of the arena, allowing everyone participating to bask in its aether and feel its awesome power…or be annoyed by the fact that their fate in this tournament was determined by a magic gachapon machine.
The long and short if was that inside the aether treasure were several thousand or so colored marbles and depending on what marble the contestants pull out of the aforementioned treasure. The results of this lottery grab would determine whether or not the contestant would automatically become qualified for the next round, get eliminated or have to fight for their right to move on to the next round.
That last result was apparently the most common among the marbles, but even those had some rarity to what kind of opponent the unlucky drawer would have to face to qualify.
Despite understanding all of this though, Zhen Liu couldn’t help but think that this whole lottery thing was convoluted as fuck.
He understood that this was to partially drum up some drama amongst the on-lookers and maintain the Zhen Clan’s unusual reputation to tournament preparation…but this was insane!
‘Is it too much to ask that we just do this single elimination, sixty-four matches? I would rather just punch out one random motherfucker and know its just gonna be that singular mother fucker. For all I know, I could pull a marble with an aether beast as opponent or one of the elites from the main branch, or even worse, one of the cousins I actually care about!’
[To be fair milord, those moments would also serve as an excellent opportunity to earn you and your family some glory. People do love winners in the arena,] Nepherage comforted.
=Adding on to that milord, the chances of one of your cousins being your opponent is incredibly small,= Logos added.
‘That is too much of a cliché to not happen at this point,’ Zhen Liu joked in a lightly cynical tone.
‘I just hope this goes smoothly and that me and my family gets through this…mostly unscathed…’
[Why only ‘mostly’, maestro?]
‘Realistically, someone’s bond to get hurt in a crowd this big,’ Zhen Liu answered, ‘the only question is from where and by whom…’
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<{"Alright then! You, you and you! Come up here and give it a go!"}>
As easily as pointing at the three random hands, Zhen Xun Po had picked out the first three competitors that were going to be subjected to this randomized hell.
“Wait a minute. Isn’t that-?”
“It is.”
“Man, I am counting my lucky stars that none of us got picked in this batch.”
Amongst the three contestants chosen, Zhen Liu and his cousin could immediately identify one of them as being Zhen Ren Fa, aka, that main clan girlie they had beef with. Alongside her were two other contestants, clearly from Roaring Tide but whether or not they had identities worth remembering was another matter altogether.
Judging from the expression on Zhen Ren Fa’s face though…probably not.
Once the three contestants got close enough to the aether treasure, Zhen Xun Po instructed them further.
<{"Alright competitors. All you need to do now is extend your aether and grab whatever marble strikes your fancy or intuition. After all, even if you are a one in a thousand genius, all it takes is a one in a thousand chance in succeeding for you to be defeated. Proceed."}>
Hearing these words coming from the Hero elder caused two of the competitors to hesitate a bit, giving Zhen Ren Fa time to lead by example and plunge her aether straight away into the aether treasure, causing the marbles within it to glow a rainbow of colors and release minute waves of energy that the competitors could feel on their skin.
It only took Zhen Ren Fa a couple of seconds before pulling out a gold tinted marble.
*BWOOM*
But before anybody could ask any questions, a display made of energy appeared above the aether treasure with a message that caused the audience to cheer in celebration of Zhen Ren Fa’s incredible luck.
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Golden Marble selected.
Contestant: Zhen Ren Fa automatically qualifies for the next round.
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Of course…if anyone took a closer look at Zhen Ren Fa’s face at this moment, they would see a hint of dissatisfaction.
‘Tsk! I wanted to eliminate at least one of those brackborns early!’
