Hero's Return 31 Free-For-All

"Hey!"

Everyone looked in the direction of the voice. It was a cloaked figure, they took off their cloak revealing a green haired man with orange eyes and a muscular, tall build. Whilst looking like a typical brute, he was extremely proffesional.

?: "My name is Ravied, I'm a physical teacher at the Sta.r.s.eeker school and will be in charge of this next test!"

Everyone looked at him with confusion. 'In charge?', why would someone need to be placed 'in charge' of a series of one-on-one fights? Everyone had the impression that they would just be placed into pairs then they would fight.

R: "You were all told or read aboout the second test, right?"

Most of the remaining candidates nodded.

R: "Well, that's completely useless"

The entire audience immediately went silent, then began to shout at him.

"What do you mean?!"

"What?!"

"What kind of test will it be then?!"

"You're saying I've been preparing myself for a completely different test?!"

R: "Calm down, calm down"

Ravied tried to calm down the crowd but they didn't stop.

"This is BS!"

"I swear if the test is completely different..."

Ravied let go of the idea of calming down the crowd normally.

R: "Calm..."

"DOWN!!!"

Ravied kicked the ground in front of him, shattering the ground and creating an earthquake that split right through the middle of the crowd, the land split as the remaining candidates were split into two groups, all of them were shocked, even the most powerful in this group had been shocked, with the exception of the three who initially cleared the first test without trying, they had been as calm as ever. After the crowd had been silenced through unconventional means, Ravied continued.

R: "Listen, we didn't expect this either... but..."

Ravied seemed to be hesitant to speak.

R: "Someone arrived today and asked for this test specifically to be changed from the usual way we do it to a free-for-all, this was something we, the teachers, all denied at first but the princ.i.p.al accepted the strangers request. We, as teachers, cannot deny the decision of our leader. Please understand"

The crowd began to whisper to eachother.

"What?"

"The princ.i.p.al?"

"Shouldn't he be the most powerful one here?"

"How powerful must that stranger be then?"

"Isn't the princ.i.p.al a Legend?"

"Is the stranger a Legend too then?"

R: "Alright, quiet down. Now that you know the situation, I'll explain to you what that stranger wanted, he didn't tell us why but this is what we're going with now, the next test will be a free-for-all fight between all of you until 75 remain, that 75 will then be welcomed into the Sta.r.s.eeker school. Sora and his group looked at eachother. 75? This was a quarter lower than the norm. Many people were agitated by this, 25 possible places were just taken away by a random stranger, but after what they saw Ravied could do, none of them dared to resist like last time.

S: "Well, we just have to work harder to get into the top 75, easy, right?"

J: "I really wish I had your optimism"

D: "You have no idea"

I: "Hahaha! You guys are funny to hang out with!"

Re: "25 places taken away..."

Rez sighed.

Re: "Welp, guess we'll just have to fight harder"

Ra: "Here are the rules of this free-for-all"

Ravied took out a piece of paper, he didn't take the time to even look at it when the stranger had appeared, he was clearly quite opposed to the idea of changing the entire second test.

Ra: "Rule number 1..."

Free For All [Second Test Rules]

1. Any method of fighting is allowed but no killing.

2. The last 75 remaining will no longer need to fight.

3. An opponent is disqualified when they either give up, fall off of the arena or are unconscious.

4. Any partic.i.p.ant who goes against these rules will be disqualified, even if they are in the 75 who remain.

5. Any method is allowed to reach the top 75.

Ravied scrunched up the paper and threw it to the side.

Ra: "Alright..."

A figure with a brown cloaked appeared behind him and waved their hand, the shattered ground beneath them began to shake and rumble.

Ra: "Good luck and..."

The earth around them seemed to envelop them, turning the world dark. In this period of darkness, many of the crowd had been confused but not scared. The earth around the began to move down, revealing the sky until it had completely disappeared into the ground. As they looked around them the shattered ground had been fixed but they had no idea where they were, the gra.s.s beneath them had completely disappeared and it had just been bare earth. The sky looked much closer than usual too.

"Hey!"

"Look at this!"

Some of the people at the edge had begun to shout. Sora and his group looked over at the people near the edge, they were pointing down. With no hesitation Rez began to jump up high into the air and was shocked when he looked down.

R: "I can't believe it..."

Rez jumped down.

S: "What did you see?"

Sora and the others had been too close to the middle.

R: "We're on a ma.s.sive circular arena, extremely high into the sky... that cloaked figure created this arena and shot us up into the sky..."

J: "What?"

I: "Seriously?!"

D: "Wow..."

It was true, all of the partic.i.p.ants had been shot up into the sky and were on a stone, circular arena. It had been big enough for all of them to move around freely but was small enough so that some, if not most people would be fighting near the edge at least.

S: "Hey... there were no rules for teaming up right?"

D: "Well it did say any method"

R: "Wanna team up?"

J: "Hm? I'll pa.s.s?"

S: "Huh?"

J: "We're friends now, but I wanna fight you"

Joe smiled.

J: "What about you?"

I: "Hm? Me? Same"

Sora knew that he wanted to fight these two aswell, but this was a test with only 75 remaining, he shortly realised that these two really didn't care much about getting in, they only wanted to fight strong opponents, what he had been like before all this responsibility was pushed onto him. After thinking about it for a while, he made his decision, he walked forward to the two of them and put his hands on their shoulders.

S: "Let's fight then"

Sora smiled.

S: "Just... don't gang up on me..."

Sora let out a cheeky remark, Joe and Indy smiled and laughed before they disappeared into the crowd. He looked back to Del and Rez.

S: "So when do we actually start fighting?"

Ravied shot up through the air at one of the edges and landed at the side of the arena. Using pure physical energy he jumped all the way up to the edge. Most people left here expected this from a physical category teacher but some were still surprised. Ravied looked to the candidates he could see then nodded.

R: "Alright! Begin!"

Ravied jumped off of the arena and fell straight back down to the ground, they were so high up that they could barely see him by the time he landed. All the partic.i.p.ants looked at eachother, not knowing what to do. They were now allowed to fight but no one wanted to make the first move in fear of putting themselves at a disadvantageous situation, there were alot of people here, all of them pa.s.sed the initial test. If one were to jump in, it may start as a one-on-one but could very quickly turn into a group attack, any way of fighting was allowed and everyone wanted to cut the compet.i.tion. The surroundings seemed frozen for a long time. Sora sighed.

S: "I'm bored"

Sora jumped forward and began to rampage through everyone, leaving slashes of light and darkness where he charged through, with this charge he sparked everyone into action. People began to charge around just like Sora and multiple one-on-one's started as well as groups teaming up and attacking. Del and Rez had been completely left behind, but they expected this from Sora and stuck together, Sora had already gone too far for them to keep up with anyway. Magic flew everywhere and the arena below them began to crack. Lightning flew one direction, ice flew in the other whilst a path of light and darkness rampaged through the arena, aurusers were creating multiple shockwaves in their fights with eachother. This had all started in an instant, less than 20 seconds had pa.s.sed. Indy teleported around the battlefield, with Joe right behind him, the two exchanged blows and began to fight eachother, Joe had picked up many rocks and were using them to switch places with - he also switched with people when he, himself, was about to get hit. In less than 5 minutes, over 100 people had been knocked off the arena or were unconscious. Ful's ice seemed to fill up a quarter of the arena as he skated through it, freezing multiple people as he ran through, Garoda also sprinted through the arena, taking care of people himself. In this compet.i.tion, pet's counted as a candidate, so Garoda and Rin also had to make it to the top 75, the top of this stone pillar quickly became a colourful mesh of powers, shockwaves, elements and flying rock, the arena they stood on was no longer a flat surface, it was one filled with craters and shattered rock jutting out of the ground, keeping one's balance was extremely difficult and only aurusers or mages who could make it easier to move around were free to move, any one else just had to take their chances defending at attacks from above and fighting with those like them on the ground. Two fists collided that created a shockwave of ice and darkness.

S: "Hey Lux!"

L: "Sup Sora!"

Both boys jumped back and were attacked by a group of 20 from all sides, the two didn't pay them any mind as they charged towards eachother, exchanging another blow that either froze or knocked out the group of 20 that had thought they had the advantage, Del and Rez watched this from afar.

R: "Jeez, those guys..."

D: "We can't keep up with them..."

Rez had created four s.h.i.+elds of string that covered them on all sides with the corners defenseless, this was so Del could throw her fiery knives out, they had decided to just defend themselves and wait for everyone to get eachother out until they made it to the top 75 by default. Another blow was made, far above the arena, Joe and Indy were currently fighting in midair, constantly disappearing then reappearing in different areas.

J: "Yo! You're better than I thought!"

I: "Same to you!"

They kept fighting, Indy was finding it harder and harder to teleport as he had done it too much during this fight, he had made too much in quick succession, meanwhile, not only was Joe also getting exhausted but he was running out of stones to stay in the air and switch with. Luckily, both were aura users and were using it to make them as close to weightless as possible, so they could somewhat float. 8 Mages who utilised wind jumped up from the arena to attack them, Indy and Joe temporarily stopped their fight after noticing them and knocked them all out in an instant - Indy teleported directly next to one of them and infused his fist with aura, one hit KO'ing them, he teleported next to 3 more and did the same, they fell off the arena, unconscious. Joe was doing the same except he made use of their spells against them, they all threw spells at him, sharp winds, and tearing winds.

J: "s.p.a.ce : Switch : Mul 4"

Joe switched places with one of them but all 4 of them seemed to appear where Joe was, all of them were cramped together, it all happened so fast. Their own spells. .h.i.t them and Joe had thrown a rock behind him before he teleported, switching with the rock behind them, who were already in bad shape, he infused his legs with aura and kicked all 4 of them in the head, shooting them towards the edge of the arena, leaving them unconscious as they fell off the arena, he threw a rock and switched places with it in midair, Indy teleported in the same place and they slowly began to fall to the ground, back-to-back with eachother, this all happened in the span of about 4 seconds. Joe and Indy looked to eachother and smiled as they resumed their fight.

The Second Test, a free-for-all with all of the candidates in an enclosed s.p.a.ce, within 20 minutes, over 200 people had failed the test, either through being knocked out or being hit off the arena. There were two intense one-on-one's that were currently happening both in midair and on the ground that everyone had given up trying to interrupt on. Meanwhile there were 3 figures who had just been completely surrounded by free s.p.a.ce, all three were sitting together and had a barrier of multiple elements that no one could break through, the barrier was a mix of fire, water and wind magic, it was completely unbreakable.

With this, multiple figures had already made names for themselves, but there were still some who were hiding in the crowd...