Chapter 072: The Selection Competition
The girls casually replied. Of course, Chen Ran didn’t expect them to go to that desolate church. He didn’t have time to entertain them either.
The few girls quickly turned their heads and greeted Colin enthusiastically again. “Senior, do your best this time. The competition is about to start. We’ll be cheering for you from the audience.”
After speaking, the group of girls pulled Colin’s cousin and walked away, laughing.
After glancing at the departing figures of the girls, Colin turned his head and looked at Chen Ran with a sly smile. “What do you think of my cousin?”
“She’s quite nice,” Chen Ran said, squinting his eyes with a stern expression. “But don’t get the wrong idea.”
“Actually, it’s no big deal,” Colin said with a chuckle. “I knew you didn’t care about what I said before, probably because you didn’t know what my cousin looked like and were afraid of falling into a trap. Now that you’ve seen her, you should have an idea. Maybe she’s not the most beautiful, but she’s definitely a big step above average. If it weren’t for the fact that you’re a sincere person, I wouldn’t have specially introduced such a pretty little cabbage to you.”
“Um… I really don’t need…” Chen Ran said, waving his hands and quickly declining.
For some reason, with ordinary girls, he could always entertain himself with his own fantasies. But perhaps because of his previous two experiences, he had an instinctive wariness of beautiful women and didn’t dare to cross the line. Just now, when he was facing Colin’s cousin, his mindset was completely normal, as if he were looking at an ordinary person.
Colin didn’t mind. “We can talk about this later. You can’t force matters of the heart. I personally think it would be more reliable if my cousin were with you. As long as there’s a chance, I’ll definitely try to set you two up. Of course, if my cousin really isn’t suitable for you, I also have an older cousin…”
“Stop!” Chen Ran quickly made a stopping gesture, speechless. “You should worry about your opponent first. I have a feeling it’s not as simple as you think.”
Chen Ran handed the Magic Berserk Potion to Colin and said seriously, “You can drink this now. It will spread through your body faster. It will remain dormant until you activate it. Don’t use it until you’re facing your last opponent. And if you can avoid using it, it’s best not to. It’s very harmful to your body. Understand?”
“Got it. You’ll see how I perform next,” Colin said, taking the small bottle and drinking the foul-smelling potion. He then quietly waited for the competition to begin.
The time was almost up. A leader of the academy came out to give a speech, a routine round of nonsense about bringing glory to the school, fair competition, and so on. This took nearly half an hour. Fortunately, it was daytime, and everyone had just woken up not long ago.
As for the groupings, the lots had been drawn a few days ago. The competition was in a knockout format. The rule was to defeat the opponent within the specified time, or make the opponent surrender. If a winner was not decided within the specified time, the academy’s tutors would decide the final outcome.
In fact, the last rule had always been the most controversial. Those with connections would often get more benefits, but this was a rare occurrence.
Fortunately, Colin’s most threatening opponent was in the furthest group from him. If neither of them was eliminated by their previous opponents, the two should meet in the final round.
The first round of assessment began quickly. Colin was in the first round.
On the stage, Colin’s opponent was a fire-element fighting spirit warrior student. Colin looked at his opponent as if he were a lamb, then unwrapped the sealed Lightning Staff…
When the beautiful lightning-element staff was revealed to everyone, a gasp of amazement came from the hall.
Just from its appearance, everyone knew that it was a valuable staff, even surpassing the one that was said to be the strongest in Xilan City, which belonged to a certain tutor in the academy. For this, many tutors couldn’t help but move closer to the barrier-protected ring, just to get a clearer look at the staff in Colin’s hand.
The competition began!
The Lightning Staff was a staff very suitable for sneak attacks and for tournament-style competitions, because it could pre-store enough magic to make the first strike an instant cast.
Without hesitation, the first skill Colin pre-stored was the lightning-element mage’s most troublesome skill for melee fighters, the Lightning Shield. Touching it was no joke. The rules of the competition stipulated that mages could not cast spells in advance, otherwise a well-prepared mage could instantly gain an absolute advantage. But such a staff could not even be stopped by the rules.
Streaks of lightning struck the competition ground. With the Lightning Staff, Colin’s casting speed was also much faster than before. His opponent was constantly hit by the residual lightning while dodging. Although he didn’t fall, he was still zapped until he was charred on the outside and tender on the inside, with climaxes one after another. But he was still fighting hard, knowing that he would lose sooner or later if this continued. In the end, he wanted to clash with Colin head-on, but was directly knocked to the ground by a super-large thunderstorm from Colin.
A round of warm applause came from the hall. Colin had won quite cleanly.
The guy on the ground was covered in lightning strikes and was still convulsing. The only lucky thing was that he was still alive and was carried away.
Amidst the thunderous applause, Colin walked off the stage with a flourish, welcomed by the screams of a group of beautiful cheerleaders. Chen Ran couldn’t help but admire this kid’s natural ability to put on a show. It was indeed a match for his own.
Next, the other contestants began their matches. But their fights took a lot of time. For example, a warrior against a rogue, one chasing and one running; a fire mage against an earth mage, one attacking and one defending. They often dragged on until the end of the competition time. Although this was their fighting style, after seeing Colin’s decisive victory, it looked quite comical. The so-called “king’s aura” was obvious at a glance.
When it was the turn of Colin’s most threatening opponent, the fire mage named Bies, Chen Ran watched seriously for a few moments.
Sure enough, this guy had changed into a set of almost luxurious equipment. From his rings to his necklace, they were all for fire energy enhancement. Although the staff this guy was using was not as good as the one in Colin’s hand, it was not far off. Not to mention, he had a full set of equipment, while Colin only had one staff…
It seemed that the deciding factor would be the unstable, unactivated Magic Berserk Potion in Colin’s body.
Watching Bies also defeat his opponent with great ease, the tutors on the judging panel also nodded in satisfaction and commented among themselves.
After a round of competition, any discerning person could see that Colin and Bies were the most likely candidates to stand out.
The competition continued. Colin went on stage again and knocked his opponent to the ground with a gorgeous thunderstorm. Bies was the same. A powerful flame roar made his opponent bite the dust. The opponent was helpless against this guy’s luxurious equipment.
This was not just a duel of abilities, but also a duel of gold coins. In a battle where abilities were almost the same, whoever had better equipment would be the final winner.
In this world, there was no absolute fairness.
