Chapter 45: The Arena Upset

-Spirit District Arena-

The third day of the arena battles came quickly. The number of competitors had been whittled down to only 26. Some of these competitors had managed to sneak into the top 26 only by sheer luck at having lucky draws from the box, while others had stepped into this position through a great deal of hardship.

Of the 26 remaining competitors, 9 of them were from factions unaffiliated with a nation or super power and weren’t seed members. One of these people was the sword girl, who had basically walked through the competition so far without even raising a sweat.

The other 17 members were all seed members. Betto, his older sister Baily, and the arrogant youth, Aris, were all from a Nahtiro faction called the Atsunari Sword Sect. That old man that always accompanied them was the vice guild master, simply referred to as Owl.

So far, none of these three had displayed any significant level of proficiency and seemed to all have had an easy time reaching this point, not even bothering to reveal their elements.

One member of both the Soel Church and the Hastoel Aristocracy remained. The son of the Pope, also called the Son of the Order, Brightly, was the Soel seed member and from his battles could be considered rather powerful. He wielded the element of light and carried himself with a noble grace customary of a man of powerful position.

The Hastoel seed member was the son of a very influential member of the Hastoel Council, which essentially ruled Hastoel. He was one of those lucky few that had been matched up with rather weak competitors earlier on and hadn’t needed to display any significant level of power yet, making him somewhat unknown. At the least, everyone knew he wielded the element of wind and was named Gregor.

The Profit Sect had two remaining competitors, and as far as the standard set so far could go, they were rather weak. However, what they did have going for them was a massive horde of artefacts with all sorts of nasty abilities. They’d achieved their position through the use of an endless horde of artefacts, which actually made them rather frightening. Their delegate leader was the big nosed Feng and another older man dressed in very expensive looking robes.

James could only smile when he watched Feng and the man he presumed was his master, casting confused glances at the Hall Master of the Blood Gallery every now and then. Naturally, even with his face covered by mist, the duo recognised their most trusted aide and assassin.

The other two Nahtiro factions were surprisingly guilds. One of them was a dark guild called the Skull Guild. It had two members remaining who kept their face constantly hidden behind masks. They both displayed water element skills and were incredibly proficient in deceptive tactics and assassination techniques.

The other Guild was called the Hell Pill Guild. As opposed to most other guilds, this guild didn’t focus at all on public services and job requests. In fact, very much like the Brotherhood, it was structured similarly to a sect. The only reason it wasn’t a sect was that members retained some amount of freedom and weren’t bound to the sect for life, which is often the case in many sects.

This guild was actually founded by Tantsu and was the most powerful and well respected alchemist guild in all of Atsunari. Naturally, a man as aloof and narcissistic as Tantsu wouldn’t deign to come to this little backwater city for some boorish fighting. Instead, he sent his oldest alchemist apprentice, Tier 4 Alchemist Hallow.

The two competitors remaining from the Hell Pill Guild were similar to the Profit Sect. They didn’t appear to have much personal combat strength, and instead wielded a vast array of pills, potions, poisons, and everything else under the sun that could be derived from alchemy to cause harm or heal damage.

The remaining 8 were from the various other nations of Atsunari, including James. Because of the number of remaining competitors, the battles today would instead all be 3 way battles, with one two way battle. However, against James’ expectations, weaker members all chose to bow out.

This was for two reasons. First, they realised that they would most likely not be able to achieve much better than what they had so far and most likely, if they continued to battle, they would get killed instead. They can’t really be blamed for this. After yesterday’s battles, many of them acknowledged that some of these genius’ were like bloodthirsty monsters.

The second reason was that they had been able to accomplish their goal. For the competitors that entered the top 26, they all received discounts from the Brotherhood and the right to buy equipment and other services that were normally reserved from sale, even to account holders.

For the smaller factions that they represented, this was already a huge boon.

In total, more than 8 people backed out of the competition. This left 18 remaining participants. Due to the numbers, Gary decided to only have two three way battles this round. That would result in only 8 competitors next round, which would lead to the semi-finals.

Lots were drawn, and the battle order was arranged. James somehow found himself trapped in another 3 way battle. This time, his two competitors were both unknown variables. The first was a strangely familiar young man who couldn’t be more than 13 or 14. He was dressed in ragged common clothes, and his faced was still young and immature. He seemed to look on other competitors with some level of disdain.

The other participant was an old woman, who was a representative of the United Islands. She was dressed in graceful flowing robes and looked quite well off and seemed to be a part of the upper class of the United Islands.

James hadn’t paid much attention to the boy until the three of them stood in the arena together. He seemed to remain under the radar for most of the competition and had been rather lucky in getting weaker opponents until now.

The Old Woman had been in a few intense battles, and James could tell that she had taken a similar route to him in her cultivation. Instead of increasing the quantity of her spirit power she instead chose to increase its quality.

This made her rather dangerous, but not unable to be dealt with. James found himself focusing on the boy’s face, again and again, unable to shake that feeling of familiarity. Just as the bell of the arena rang out, James’ face suddenly changed dramatically.

Without thought, James flicked his hand and summoned his Arc Cannon from his storage ring. His body swivelled as he raised the Cannon to his shoulder and looked down the sights at the boy. Until now, the only time James had used his Arc Cannon was in the previous round. That said, everyone readily acknowledged it as a serious threat.

The boy, who had been watching James this whole time, seemed slightly shocked and his eyes widened into two saucers, revealing his surprise. “Woah! Woah! Master James, please give my Master some face and...”

BOOM!

The resonating boom of the Ark Cannon sounded out just as the boy began back peddling and yelling. The world seemed to slow down to a crawl, and the supersonic slug that had just been fired seemed to be moving at the same pace as an ant.

Apart from the rapidly backpedalling boy and James, everything in the world seemed to be on the verge of stopping. Then, out of nowhere, a man appeared and plucked the slug out of thin air.

James’ pupils dilated into pinpoints and he, without reservation or conscious effort, began trying to run. Before he could even turn his eyes away, the man appeared only a few steps away from him.

This man was very familiar to James. In fact, perhaps for the rest of his life, he’ll never forget the scene this man made when he broke into his lab. Staring at James from only a step away, through relaxed and half closed eyes, was the Old Riddle Speaking Monk.

“Ho ho! Interesting Interesting! A Dragon is hidden amongst Tigers. It looks like the Fairy Compass was wrong, when it is always right. The thunder booms with a titan’s might and young men will always have to fight.”

James felt powerless ... and speechless. He couldn’t understand a thing this old bastard was saying. He also could tell that right now, he could be squashed by this old man with a wave of his hand. Just as the bell rang for battle, James recognised the young man in the arena as the boy who came to his lab with the old monk.

With that thought in mind, James acknowledged him as a threat and immediately took actions to nullify this enemy. He couldn’t be sure if that boy was even really a True Spirit Realm Practitioner, and thus took the most immediate route.

To his chagrin, the old monk was nearby watching the spectacle and stepped in to save his disciple.

James could only smile wryly as he saluted the prune faced old monk. “Junior James greets Senior.”

After a moment’s thought, James decided to respond like he did last time. “Ahem ... errr ... The sprouting grass sways in the wind under the shade of the great oak?”

This was phrased as a question, mostly because James had no idea what he was saying. He was just making up synonyms and metaphors to express himself.

Whatever he just said, the prune faced monk liked it. “Ho ho. Good! The strong eat the weak while the weak are eaten. The Tigers prey on the hoppers, unaware of the dragon ... Stop using these toys and fight with my apprentice seriously.”

Then to James’ great surprise, the old monk finally said something understandable. However, just as quickly, he reverted to his usual speech pattern. “A thousand li is a long way to walk without shoes.”

James was now convinced that this prune faced old bastard was just a huge dick that liked fucking with people. Regardless of that, James got the message and simply saluted again after putting his Ark Cannon away.

The old monk smiled delightfully and then disappeared. Moments later, time seemed to catch up to itself, and James looked over to the distant disciple of the monk. The crowds were stunned when they realised that the boy had traversed half the arena in the blink of an eye. The old Tower Realms that were watching along with their disciples were also stunned.

Although no one else had witnessed that scene a moment ago, they all realised that something strange had just happened.

James, on the other hand, hadn’t moved a single step. He looked around at all the crowds for a moment before finally pulling his eyes back and assessing the arena. He saw the old women rapidly moving towards him, while the young boy had also started to move again.

James gave a slight chuckle when he realised that the both of them had recognised him as the greatest threat and seemed to have come to some tacit agreement. Kill James first.

He flicked his arms and allowed his Ark Pistol and Scimitar to materialise into his hands. Then without further ado, and under the loud cheers of the people, James rushed towards the old woman.

The distance between the two rapidly closed until they were only 20 odd meters apart. James raised his Pistol in his left hand and let off a few shots. The moment James had raised his arm and made an aiming action, the Old Women started taking evasive manoeuvres, dodging left and right sporadically.

Her element was the wind and she seemed like a leaf being blown this way and that on a turbulent gust. The moment she was distracted and began dodging, James rushed forward at full speed. In less than a second, he’d appeared near the old women and swung his scimitar, filled with the power of fire and wind.

The Old Women, still off balance from her rapid and sporadic movements was stunned when she felt that killing intent. ‘Just how fast is this boy?!’

With a practised motion, her body seemed to roll in the air and spin. The chopping Scimitar lightly brushed against her robes and with that simple tiny bit of contact, a massive tornado of flames sprung up engulfing the Old Women.

James quickly jumped back a few paces to observe. The moment he stopped, he had a strange sensation, deep in the pit of his stomach. It was so odd that even his true spirit seemed to be feeling this sensation. Just as James turned to glance behind him, he saw the shadow of a copper staff.

With all his effort, James raised his pistol to his left side and managed to block the staff with the pistols blade. What he didn’t realise until the staff made contact, was that the force behind it was like a train. His blocking arms felt a tremendous amount of pressure and almost seemed like it would snap at any moment.

The staff continued on in its swinging arc as if unhindered and James was launched through the air as if he was being used for batting practice. He flew dozens of metres through the air, and his body spun rapidly and uncontrollably. All he could see was the earth and sky quickly changing place until suddenly it all became earth.

Thud!

His body issued a soft thud and then rolled on a few more metres. Just as he was getting his feet under himself, that strange sensation in the pit of his stomach intensified. This time, without even looking, James blurred and shot off another 10 meters.

Just as he stopped and looked back, he saw the young boy’s staff make contact with the ground, and the entire arena shook. The ground looked like it had been struck by a meteor as it caved in to become a crater.

James was shocked. This swing had the power of an Ark Cannon behind it. Although so slow it was clear to the visible eye, the power in this swing was enough to level a building. From the corner of his eye, James saw his flame tornado seemingly being sucked up into the sky, and the slightly singed and charred old woman walked out.

The crowd was shocked by the combat power of these 3 True Spirit realm practitioners. James was also slightly shocked by the duo in front of him. He was already aware that the boy would be difficult, but he only now realised that the Old Women was just as much a pain in the ass.

Seeing a slight break as the duo eyed him cautiously, James moved his left arm about a few times. Luckily, it wasn’t broken. Otherwise, this battle would be a hundred times more difficult. As he was testing his left arm, the Old Women put her hands into the sleeves of her robes and retrieved a simple Chinese paper fan. It had no intricate paintings or marking and was pure white.

The Boy also stood up and straightened himself. Strangely, at this stage of the battle, when the duo should have been pressing their advantage, they both saluted James. “I am Cheng, Disciple of Old Monk Hong.” “I am Lacy, Vice Director of United Islands Maritime Affairs.”

James’ eyebrow twitched for a moment as the duo respectfully made introductions. ‘What the hell are you doing? Where in the middle of battle. This is hardly the time to be creating an opening by introducing yourself and bowing.’

James smiled like the Cheshire Cat then raised his weapons in preparedness. “I’m James.” He simply replied, then without further warning he fired his Arc Pistol at the boy and began running forward towards the duo.

The duo was stunned by his total lack of decorum, but at the same time were grinding their teeth together. They’d both hoped that when James introduced himself, he would also show the proper respect and at least salute, giving them an opportunity to do exactly what he was doing right now. Seizing the advantage.

What they didn’t realise was, James never bowed, and rarely saluted. He was unorthodox in this world and showed respect only to those strong enough. Needless to say, he obviously did not acknowledge this pair as strong enough.

With a shot from his pistol fired, James was already a few paces from the Old Woman. The Boy flicked his staff at a rapid speed, which was the total opposite of its slow, cumbersome speed form beforehand, and deflected the bullet from the Pistol.

Although this bullet was far smaller than a Cannon’s slug, it still packed a huge amount of punch. When the bullet was deflected, the boy stumbled back a few steps. At this moment when he was occupied, James was already swinging his scimitar at the Old Women again.

As she straightened up from her bow, the fan in her hands flicked out and waved towards the blade chopping towards her from an upwards angle. The moment the two intersected, a huge gale of wind was created which blew back the inferno generated from the scimitar.

At the same time, the pair was pushed back from the collision. As James backpedalled a few paces, the boy was already racing towards him at an unnatural speed. It was only now that James realised the boy had two attributes. Wind and Earth.

That explained the strangeness of his two martial forms when wielding his staff. One was quick and agile but lacked significant strength, which was why he was knocked back by the pistol shot just then. The other was strong and forceful but lacked speed and agility, which explained why he’d caved a 10 meter crater into the floor of the arena.

As the boy approached, James’ left hand flicked out, and 2 consecutive shots were fired from the pistol in the same moment. The moment James had aimed towards him, the boy slowed and spun his staff. It deflected the two shots, but because they were both focused on the same spot and shot in the same instant, it broke the boys balance a great deal more easily than the previous shot.

At the same time, the Old Women rushed towards James and waved her fan, which now seemed to have a leaf painted on it. James was stunned when his focus returned to the Old Women. He was starting to feel the pressure from the duo and decided to fully release his scrying field, which he’d been holding back because he wanted to test his limits in this competition.

The moment he released it fully, Gold James and Jasmine both released their own. Three points of focus suddenly appeared in James’ scrying field. One focused on each of the opponents and the last just keeping a general eye on everything.

As James scanned the old women, he realised that her fan had some strange properties inside it. She swung down and infused her wind energy into the fan. Moments later, a huge gust of wind formed and pushed towards James like a tidal wave. Rocks and dirt sprayed up towards James, and he quickly back peddled.

As the tidal wave of wind energy was released, another leaf formed onto the fan. James’ mind was spinning rapidly as he noticed the fan retaining some of the wind energy from the attack and instead appeared to be ... eating it to create more free wind energy which was fused into the fan.

Jasmine, who was the one who’s shared scrying focus was directed at the old women, couldn’t help but let out an; “Oh?”.

“James, that fan appears to be able to multiply it’s attack power the more it’s used. You should focus on limiting her ability to attack. If she feeds that fan too much, it may disadvantage us later in the battle.”

Meanwhile, Goldy was focused on the Boy.Hmm, that boys weapon is also quite disastrous. The staff is filled with both earth and wind element. He doesn’t seem to be able to use them both at the same time, but if he does it may become very difficult to deal with.~

James wasn’t surprised. He already felt the pressure from the duo and could tell that they weren’t a pushover. James swung out his scimitar filled with wind energy. A similar tidal wave of energy to the Old Women’s was released and nullified the Old Women’s.

Seeing this action, the old women was slightly stunned. ‘Did he just use my own martial technique to negate me? Truly as Master Clay said. This man is, without a doubt, a Genius amongst his peers.’

Without further thought, she lowered her stance slightly and began rapidly approaching again. The boy also rapidly started running towards James from the other side.

James could only smile wryly seeing the duo attempting to catch him from both sides. He raised the pistol towards the boy and readied his scimitar for another round with the Old Women. The moment the pistol was aimed at him, the boy started darting about as he closed in.

James pulled the trigger, and this time three rounds were shot in succession. Instead of their previous single trajectory they each seemed to curve off in slightly bent arcs from each other. At the same time, he decided to take things slightly more seriously. He imbued his scimitar with Lightning creating a strange flaming lighting on his blade.

He then spun and swung it towards the Old Women, releasing a huge arcing bolt of flaming lightning energy towards her. Seeing him using his melee weapon to try and launch a distance attack, the Old Women couldn’t help to let out a ‘humph’. After all, everyone knows that melee weapons lose a great deal of their combat potential when used to fire projectile martial techniques.

She waved her fan and created another huge wave of wind. However, to her surprise, James simultaneously followed up with a wind wave. Of even greater surprise to her, was the flaming lightning bolt. Although it seemed to lose some of its power, it continued on through her wind wave mostly unperturbed. If anything, the wind energy had only helped to agitate the fire energy even further.

She got careless and thought that it would be enough to just block it with a wind wave. What she didn’t realise, was that the very nature of lighting was to travel through the air. Admittedly, if the wave of wind was dense enough and had compressed a strong enough force of air, it could indeed block lighting. Unfortunately for her, she was not powerful enough to achieve such a feat.

As the third leaf appeared on her fan, the lightning struck her right shoulder, and the fan was flung out of her hand. She was shot back a few meters and rolled.

At the same time, James launched his wind wave to block her wind wave, he turned and began sprinting towards the boy, and he let off another shot from his Pistol. This time was 4 shots in a row. Even more interesting was that these four shots were imbued with his spirit power. Each one had a different attribute imbued in it.

This was the speciality of his pistol ... or rather, to be more accurate, it was the effect of his ammunition. Each clip had different properties. The one loaded in the pistol at the moment fired consecutive shots. That being the case, he used this pistol to deceive people. At first, it only seemed like it fired one extra shot each time he fired it, and the bullets were always the same.

Instead, each of these bullets had a purpose. He purposefully left the first three bullets in this clip as normal pistol arc bullets. Then, as he held the pistol during the combat so far, he imbued each of the rounds for the 4 shot with different attributes. At the same time, he could imbue the pistol to slightly alter the bullet trajectory when it is released.

It wasn’t just this clip, but all of his clips stored in his spatial ring had different purposes. He even had one that was only filled with paintballs ... It wasn’t unusual to see Harvy walking out of the HQ arena with James, covered from head to toe in paint.

The young boy, not realising the strangeness of these bullets, did what he’d done since the beginning. He spun his staff infused with wind energy and prepared to deflect the bullets. However, when the first bullet connected with his staff, he was blasted off his feet as if he’d been struck by a bus.

Following this, the next bullet grazed past his shoulder as he was in the air and a current of electricity filled his body, stunning him instantly.

The next bullet seemed to simply shatter on impact with his chest and suddenly released a huge concussive blast and raging inferno of flames, shooting the boy into the ground with a great deal of force. Although the boy had managed to protect himself with his earth energy, the concussive force and the collision with the ground both caused his body to ache and he even felt a rib fracture.

Finally, the last bullet, which had only been a back-up in case the boy managed to block the others, continued on and collided with the distant invisible arena barrier. The moment it made contact, the barrier shuddered to life like a thin ethereal bubble and another explosive concussive force burst to life creating an explosion of flames.

This whole battle, from the moment James engaged after the duo paused, to now, happened in less than a minute.

The crowds were astonished and made no qualms about letting the world know with their cheers. The other factions attending the war of world’s and the other competitors still hoping to win first place were all stunned.

Their thoughts were running wildly as they looked at James with incredulity. They began discussing among themselves as they watched perplexed.

“Isn’t this too much? Isn’t this too powerful?”

“His weapons are too unique ... and his elements can easily counter other’s elements.”

“Is he really a True Spirit realm practitioner? I’ve seen that old woman battle, and she’s clearly at the top of her class within her realm. How could she be so easily defeated?”

“There’s something strange about this battle. There’s no way that senior sister Lacy would be so severely injured just from that attack right? Isn’t that lightning element too powerful?”

As they discussed, and the audience cheered on, James rapidly sped over to next to the boy. Seeing him struggling to fight off the paralysing effects of the lightning bullet, James reached out a hand and placed it on his shoulder. “Good effort young man. In the future, don’t take me so lightly. I’m sure if you’re his apprentice then you should be powerful. However, you were too careless this time.”

After saying this, James shocked the boy again, and he passed out.

Without giving her time to get herself back under control, James rushed over to the Old Woman. As he reached her, she suddenly released a gust of wind and shot to her feet. Although still numb and in pain, and having a clearly broken and burnt right shoulder, she still managed to stand and face James.

James smiled like the devil. “Say, Old Granny, you’re rather injured. You should retreat today, and return again next year.”

The old women glanced over at her fan lying on the ground a meter away. She then looked back straight at James and clenched her teeth as she staggered towards it while grasping her broken shoulder.

James didn’t move to stop her. As far as he saw it, he had basically won already. The old Women picked up her fan then faced James again. She was slightly woozy, and her feet were unsteady, but she lowered her stance a prepared to battle nonetheless.

James was shocked at the persistence of this granny. “Old Granny, aren’t you afraid that I will just kill you outright? If this goes on, you will most likely die.”

Lacy coughed up some blood, then very unbecoming of her image as an old lady, spat it on the ground. “City Master James, this battle is already a battle for my life. If I forfeit now, I will only die later on. If I can’t win the assistance of your guild, my homeland will be ravaged and destroyed. I can’t afford to lose.”

James then remembered that this granny was from the United Islands and understood that her resolve was fixed. Their nation must truly be in a disastrous state if she was willing to bet her life on it here and now. James thought about it for a while.

He couldn’t help but praise this old women’s resolve. She clearly loved her homeland a great deal and was willing to put her life on the line for any little bit of hope she could find. She needed to win this competition to save her people, her family and everything she loved.

James knew that his guild had the power to help their nation. He could easily amass some weapons of war that could turn the tide for the United Islands. Even if he didn’t give them weapons to fight for themselves, he could infiltrate the enemies of the United Islands and eliminate their powerful practitioners.

With all these thoughts in mind, James looked at the resolve on the Old Women’s face. Even the crowd was slightly swayed by her resolve. Everyone knew of the plight the United Islands was in.

Then James, without warning, raised his pistol and shot the old women in the head.

Stunned. Speechless. A great wave of confusion spread throughout the crowds. James lowered his gun and began walking out under the stunned gazes of the crowd.

James chuckled to himself as he walked out. “Do I look like a charity? I warned you didn’t I?”

He felt no remorse what so ever. In fact, he wouldn’t even defend himself if people accused him of being cold blooded and heartless. He didn’t care. The United Islands could have tried to deal with him through normal channels or back channels. Instead, they tried to take the opportunity provided by this competition to use the opinions of the soft-hearted crowds to influence James.

Even if he didn’t forfeit the battle, he would surely show some magnanimity. He would at least not kill her and would at least show some kind of sincerity to the United Islands plight. Instead, he did exactly as he said he would. He killed her and then left without even an afterthought of the United Islands.