The Conspiracy of the Elites

After months of preparation battles, the date for the finals of the individual tournament was finally scheduled.

After the end of the team tournament, the gladiators in the teams who won are already eligible to take their awards. But they don’t get it immediately, the Seafarers alliance extends the award ceremony to the week after the end of the individual finals.

Some gladiators won in the team tournament with their teams but unfortunately, they died in the individual tournament. The alliance was not ready to give awards to ghosts. So, the award ceremony commences, only after the whole gladiator tournament ends.

…

Bam!! Bam!! Clark’s spear stabbed forward in quick succession, as his opponent hastily raised his spear to parry the strike. His hand blurred, as the stab was quickly converted into a sideways slash.

Boom!! Arthur narrowly blocked the strike again, but the force from his vice-captain’s strike still pushed him back. As his opponent was rushing forward to finish him, his teammate finally recovered, as he slashed his sword forward in retaliation.

Jian Wushaung’s sword appeared so fast like something under the effect of a space warping device, his opponent could only dodge as he quickly rolled backward.

Clang!! Clang!! Clark could only suppress his irritation, as he withstood the fierce attacks of his 2 temporary opponents.

He knew this was just a virtual simulated training environment, but his face couldn’t help but morph into a frown, as the impact from his opponent’s blows numbed his hands.

Boom!! He finally started executing his battle art, as his strikes grew faster while having stronger force behind them. His 2 opponents reciprocated, as they both also executed their battle arts.

His figure could only keep on retreating, as he tried every possible means to force a breakthrough. As he fought, he would occasionally leap back to avoid the fierce counterattacks of his 2 opponents.

Whoosh!! His spear suddenly stabbed forward swiftly, as he took advantage of an opening made by his opponents. His target dodged the initial stab, but his spear quickly drew back, as it drew a bloody gash across his opponent’s face.

Despite him paying for it with the blood currently gushing out of his face, Jian Wushaung succeeded in creating an opportunity to end the battle.

He and his teammate finally had the required space to unleash their self-created technique, and they executed it without hesitation.

Bam!! Bam!! The sound of the collision was like that of the rolling waves of a tsunami, as Clark was flung back, hitting the floor with a loud bang sound. He quickly rolled to the side, narrowly dodging his opponent's follow-up attacks as he sprang back up.

He also finally had the chance to execute his self-created technique, as he dug his legs firmly into the metal floor. Boom!! His figure was launched forward like a rocket at his pursuing opponents, as they scrambled to dodge.

After sparring with him for so long, his opponents already started devising strategies to endure his outrageous self-created technique.

After a lot of failures, they finally concluded that when facing his dragon breaks the ranks, the best solution was finding cover or be fast enough to react and dodge.

Facing it directly, was a free ticket to defeat, if not death directly. Though their strategy worked occasionally, it was still not easy.

After finally getting a counter to his technique, he also did not let it be, as he tried developing ways to limit the effectiveness of this strategy.

His training yielded some good results recently, as he succeeded in evolving the capability and versatility of his technique. It was no longer just a one-hit, then run something. If he wanted, he could keep executing it, while exchanging multiple blows with opponents.

Arthur and Jian Wushaung reacted fast, but one of them was still got, as he was the targeted one.

Ptui!! The sound of metal piercing flesh reverberated, as Jian Wushaung coughed out blood in waves. He was able to narrowly survive, as his body did not explode on impact. But he was incapacitated.

Already expecting such an outcome, Clark followed up, as Arthur also turned back to help his teammate. With his opponent’s evolved technique, Arthur was more cautious, but he still advanced.

Jian Wushaung managed to raise his sword again, as he slashed at his approaching opponent. Clark calmly dodged, he went to his side as his spear dug ruthlessly into his opponent’s brain.

Boom!! Before he could turn around, Arthur already arrived, as his spear stabbed at him. He was startled at the unexpected speed from his opponent, but he still tried to parry as he withdrew back.

Ptui!! Hmm!! He grunted in pain, as his opponent’s spear stabbed into his chest. He was still able to do something at this short time though, as his spear also stabbed at his opponent’s abdomen.

Arthur’s face tightened, as he felt the impact of the spear in his stomach. There, the 2 stood, as they just watched each other, while blood slowly seeped out of their mouths.

Pop!! Their projection finally burst into white light with a pop sound, as the A. I deemed them unable to fight again. The battle ended in a draw, much to Arthur’s frustration.

Every day, this was their training schedule, as they all tried various means to make their vice-captain improve. After a lot of trials, they finally decided that Arthur and Jian Wushaung fighting him in a 2 vs 1, was the right set-up to draw out his potential.

Clark always lost against them, since the time they started this set-up. But yesterday, he seemed to break a limit as their battle ended in a draw.

Arthur knew he was just helping his teammate, but the draw still impacted him fiercely. He could not fathom how this same Clark, whom he once looked down on, could now draw with him in a 2 vs 1 battle.

Saying he was shocked, was undermining his current feelings. The current words to describe his shock and frustration, can not be found in the dictionary yet. Maybe, it’ll be found a century later.

Whoosh!! The lids of the nutrition cabins finally opened, as the 3 soldiers came out of theirs.

Clap!! Clap!! Emily and Aurora clapped for the group of 3, as they presented fresh drinks for them to refresh themselves. “You guys were awesome,” Emily said with a smile, as they all sat down to rest.

Jian Wushaung ordered Sabertooth to display their battle evaluation, as he secretly glanced at Clark. From the outcome of today’s training, he knew that he was witnessing the birth of a legend.

It was not exaggerating to say Clark was the most talented person, he had ever met in his 30 plus short life. He could not help but ruminate in admiration and envy, “some people are really different from others in this life”.

As his thoughts fleeted about, a projection of the battle evaluation was finally displayed.

Individual Battle Evaluation.

#1- The Stranded Dragon: Attack power: 98% Attack speed: 88% Endurance: 86% Decision making: 90%

#2- The Emperor: Attack power: 92% Attack speed: 83% Endurance: 87% Decision making: 80%

#3- Jian Wushaung: Attack power: 84% Attack speed: 83% Endurance: 89% Decision making: 91%

He sighed again, after going through the battle evaluation. It was like Clark simply had no bottleneck; his improvement was just out of this world.

Compared to the last time they checked, this guy improved most by a considerable margin, followed by Arthur, before him.

Seeing this, he felt like he somehow wasted the last 10 years of his life. He only improved by 1%, and it was his decision-making.

Though intelligence was one of the major attributes needed to break through to the next rank, he still felt embarrassed. He could only shamelessly heap praise on his 2 teammates, to hide his embarrassment.

Clark felt satisfied after seeing the battle evaluation, his improvement was considerable this time. He was not too anxious about his stagnant attack power, as he already noticed long ago that he met some kind of bottleneck.

Despite his satisfaction, his face was still grave, as he was unsure if this could allow him to emerge victorious in the coming battle.

No matter how confident he was, physical battles were still a different thing entirely from virtual battles.

During this his short life, he already met a lot of life-threatening encounters, and this was undoubtedly the one he was the least confident about.

Like normal human beings, the instinct of survival was forever planted in him. Despite him being a soldier, despite him already possessing the tag of a killer, he was still afraid of death.

No one can see death coming, and welcome it with a smile. When you see someone doing that, then that is not a human being anymore. It is natural for a sentient being, to be afraid of death.

He could only hope for the best, he was not a magician that could turn reality around with just some words of incantation. And, he was not the main character in a fictional novel, that plot armor will come to save.

He was the main character of his own life, not that of any novel. According to his mentor, Lieutenant Spoky; “you’re the main character of your life, you’ll only become independent when you recognize that”.

He stood up again, after resting for 15 minutes, as he entered his nutrition cabin to embark on a speed battle with Emily. Training relentlessly and sapping himself of all strength, was the best he could do to improve his situation.

…

A man with a muscular frame, drenched completely with sweat, slowly emerged out of the training arena. He went straight to the pool, as he lied down on the water to cool himself down.

Unlike Clark, World dominator preferred to train physically with real opponents. The regional General of the Microsoft empire organization, provided him with his soldiers to serve as his sparring partners.

As he slowly cooled down, a middle-aged man, holding a datapad quickly entered the room.

“Good afternoon, young master. I can see that you’ve experienced another slight improvement lately, that’s good. I looked for information behind the scenes, the way you requested. And it seems the stranded dragon is not forfeiting the battle”.

World dominator kept silent a bit, on hearing what his care-taker said. “Hmm, it seems this guy is really gutsy. His participating, means that he rejected the offer of the Seafarers alliance”.

“I don’t believe that they’ll allow a gladiator they already poached, to come to die at my hands. Well, I already warned him the other time”.

“If he does not love his life, he is free to come, I’ll gladly take it from him. I even suddenly want to have a physical battle experience with him. Good, maybe with his help, I can break through this bottleneck that is obstructing my advance”.

“I want to fight him now. So, your new job is to make sure that he doesn’t back out of the battle. Got it?”

The middle-aged man slowly replied with a nod of his head, ignoring the commanding tone at which this kid talked to him, as he swiftly noted down on his datapad.

“At least, I only have to endure this for the next 5 years to get my daughter back”. At the thought of his daughter, his expression could not help but morph into that of hatred. But he suppressed it, as he stood up respectfully to leave.

…

After another week of preparation and hype, the last battle that will mark the end of the gladiator tournament was finally about to be fought.

For the past few months, the spectators were always high and stimulated from the highly intense and exciting battles of the gladiators.

The anticipation in the air was tangible, as the surviving gladiators and everyone else settled down, to watch the battle between these 2 pinnacle soldiers. Clark still participating, meant he did not accept the offer of the Seafarers alliance.

Betting sites started being created, as people intended to use the hype from the battle to make some cash. Bets were cast in waves, as everyone predicted who will emerge as a legend, from this last battle of survival.

[Thank you for reading this chapter, I really appreciate it. If you love this book, please leave your power stones behind to support it.]