Chapter 634: Penultimate Preliminaries
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Captain Zhen Ba Yin waved his subordinate good-bye as he brought his attention back to the crowd of people milling about the outer perimeter of the arena, most of which was focusing on a projected display that he was hiding behind.
A part of him felt glad that so many people still showed interest in the Zhen Clan’s activities, since such events tended to have the added bonus of bringing new recruits for the city guard and military apparatus as a whole, but another part of him was feeling…dread.
‘I shouldn’t be this wound up, since everything went down so smoothly yesterday, but…it felt way too easy,’ Zhen Ba Yin thought to himself as he kept staring at the crowd below.
Yesterday, an attack coordinated by the Fallen Clans had been prevented by Captain Zhen Ba Yin and the city guard before any real damage could occur.
All of the assailants had been apprehended with zero casualties, and the leaders were undergoing interrogations as of this moment.
That should’ve been a highlight to Zhen Ba Yin’s day and he should’ve been able to enjoy the remainder of the Sapling Festival, and the tournament, without any more clouds of worry hanging above his head like a dark shadow.
But…something felt off.
This wasn’t the first time the Fallen Clans had attempted to attack Willow Scale City, or it’s sisters of Yew Scale and Oak Scale. But everytime those incidents occur, the toll had always been a touch more violent.
The Fallen Clans’ warriors would normally fail, but there would always be a destroyed building or three, people would get injured or killed and sometimes an important resource would be destroyed or stolen in the process.
This time, however, the assailants were found in high traffic, civilian areas and barely put up a fight before being apprehended.
As absurd as it sounded to Zhen Ba Yin, it was as if the attackers wanted to get apprehended as part of the operations of a more insidious plan. He had thought about it bringing this up to his superiors, but quickly dismissed the notion once he was informed by the resident anima wielders that the assailants truly believed that their strange attack plan was going to work, with no hint of any external motives or plans.
Regardless of this assurance though, Zhen Ba Yin couldn’t help but think that something bad was still going to happen.
Which is why, even as his closest relatives were about to showcase their abilities to the entire world, Zhen Ba Yin chose to keep guard and watch over the perimeter of the arena to make sure nobody could ruin this event.
Zhen Ba Yin’s expression turned a bit harder as he kept staring over the crowds of people below him.
‘Alright you bastards. Try and attack again, I dare you,’ Zhen Ba Yin thought it himself as he gripped the hilt of his sword even tighter.
The captain had no idea whether or not an attack would actually come to pass, but he would be ready regardless.
Of course…how does one prepare for ill intentions, when those intentions are from internal sources?
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Meanwhile, back at the lounge area…
[Milord, are you okay?]
‘Gonna be honest Nepherage…not entirely sure. I appear to be shaking, but I can’t tell if it’s out of fear, anxiety or…’
[Or what, maestro?]
‘…I think it’s excitement.’
[Huh…well, look alive director. I think our turn is up next.]
‘Huzzah…’
Before Zhen Liu’s eyes, a familiar teleporting orb of light appeared from the doorway read to whisk him away to his final bout in this preliminary fight.
It was a funny, despite knowing that this fight was only just a way to determine who would be in the top eight for this contest, and not the ultimate champion, he couldn’t help but think that this moment was more suitable for a finale fight than a preliminary.
‘Huh…why do I get the feeling in my gut something is about to go sideways?’
[Paranoia…]
[You’re a danger magnet.]
[Pessimism, maestro. It’s unhealthy.]
[Because you always think something will go wrong?]
[A reasonable observation given past events.]
‘SILENCIO, PEANUT GALLERY!’
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In the span of two days, sixty-four fighters had been divided into eight groups of eight, and were made to fight in round robin style matches.
For the most part, a lot of the audience didn’t care too much about any individual fighter participating in these matches, due to how round robins were structured. When there was clear front runner in regards to matches won in a particular block, it became less and less interesting to watch as it was just delay of the inevitable.
However, as the sixth batch of round were coming to an end, the audience began to focus on the round robin boards and many of them noticed something a bit peculiar in regards to at least half of the blocks.
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Now, as previously stated, a round robin tournament gets less and less interesting to watch when there is a clear front runner that could simply just surrender once and win the whole damn thing. However, when there are two obvious front runners who’s only obstacle to victory are each other, suddenly, the round robin becomes a lot more interesting to watch. And luckily for the audience, there were going to be four such matches happening at the same time, with some rather interesting match-ups.
Albeit, only the participants themselves understood why these match-ups were interesting.
In the first block, Zhen Yue was about to face off against Zhen Ren Fa. The two young women were both at six wins and zero losses, so the winner of this round would determine who would move on to the top eight. And to make matters worst, the latter was holding a grudge against the former. As to why this grudge existed in the first place…only a few people would know.
Next, in the third block, Zhen Xing was going to have to fight a man who he picked a fight with only two short days ago, Lei Zhong. When the two sides initially met, Lei Zhong was the clear winner, but now…Zhen Xing had a shot.
The fourth block consisted of Zhen Hai against Alvis de Howlite. The former proved himself to be as dangerous as a tidal wave and then some, smashing through his opponents with brute strength, while the latter was a dangerous mimic who could copy his opponents’ moves, but do them even better than the original. Making this match-up more interesting though, Zhen Hai has had a rather colorful history with Alvis’s relatives. One can’t help but to wonder if the young Howlite man knew about these interactions.
Now…amongst all of these penultimate matches though, there was one that seemed to grab everyone’s attention, not just because it was a sudden death match like in three other arenas, but because the people fighting in this particular arena just so happened to consist of both the tournament’s favorite, Ren Jin Yan, and the tournament’s dark horse, Zhen Liu.
The former had charmed the arena with his mysterious demeanor, handsome face and the fact that he could use dragon force, an ability that was normally attributed to the Imperial Family. In other words, some thought he was a hidden prince in disguise.
The latter, on the other hand, had essentially pissed everyone off with an aloof and antagonistic behavior, that drew both ire and respect from the audience. They hated to admit it, but Zhen Liu was a hell of a warrior.
And now, well, in a couple of moments actually, these two (in)famous figures were about to clash in a moment that could best be described as “climatic”.
<{"Ladies and gentlemen, are you ready for the final round of the preliminaries?!"}>
“WOOOO!”
<{"THEN COUNT WITH ME, BECAUSE WE'RE STARTING IN THREE...TWO...ONE! FIGHT!"}>
