Chapter 827: The first day of the evaluation trial (part 5)
The first day of the evaluation trial (part 5)
That way, from the twenty disciples, everyone besides the archers was bringing four items, while archers had eight of them.
"Now and this apply to both authorities and disciples, wear the... brigandine, was it, Aster?", asked the receptionist girl to which Aster nodded.
"Yeah", that was the project in which Aster had been working on the most, the standard large body protection equipment that balances both defense and mobility and is also easy to produce in mass as compared to single piece armor like a cuirass.
A brigandine is basically thin metal plaques that overlap each other, attached to a flexible leather jacket, it was the spiritual ancestor of bulletproof vests, in this case Valentina and the girls that made the nets sewed the plaques on both sides of one of the jackets that Sarina had made with the leather treated by James, then that one was sandwiched in between two other jackets and sewn together, lastly Aster rivetted it to reinforce the union and that was it.
That way the armor remained hidden and for the eyes of others it only seemed as if the girls were wearing a relatively thick leather jacket only, the best part is that this protected not only the chest but also the arms and stomach.
’Mmm, I would have preferred to combine it with a proper gambeson but the cotton we obtained from cotton flowers found at the transition from the plains to the desert wasn’t that much, it was still enough to fill in key parts to better protect against blunt impact which is a weak point of a brigandine, and since the plaques are not normal steel, I would say the result is quite nice for a first try’, thought Aster as he put on his brigandine and moved his arms around for a second.
Naturally, Aster used shock absorbing steel for the plaques of the brigandine, not for all because he couldn’t activate that much in just a few days, but one of the layers was made with it, the other was normal but still high-quality steel, the result was a not exactly accurate brigandine, but much more efficient than a mortal one for sure.
"Everyone take a coagulant specialized potion, archers you can wait at the side now", said Angela, since archers had their ten items, authorities had two and disciples besides archers had six.
"Both authorities and disciples, can now take a compact backpack, one bottle of water and one energizing potion, lastly disciples take a ration of your pick", added the receptionist girl, with that only authorities had slots left, five of them to be accurate.
The compact backpack had separate compartments to keep things in place even if the one wearing them were on the move, so everyone could put the potions and rations in them without any worries, the archers could keep theirs on the quiver since they weren’t going to move around as much so they didn’t need the backpack.
"Authorities, take another coagulant potion, one meat ration and one candy ration, the last slots for your weapon of preference and one an item depending on your assigned role", concluded Angela to which Aster smirked as he added.
"Now you can drink the antitoxin", the rules said that they couldn’t bring more than ten times, but there was rule against drinking a potion before the fight, so instead of bringing the antitoxin with them, Aster planned to have everyone drink it prior to the match, healing and energizing potions were the most important ones, but Dahlia chose the analgesic potion as her role related item while Mylene picked a small medical kit, though it consisted in many things they were small as the whole thing wasn’t bigger than a palm, so it was counted as a single item.
’Mmm, this should be enough to cover all reasonable scenarios, especially if an "ally" is the one supervising the whole thing’, thought Aster as he nodded to himself.
Others would probably think of giving supporters a large back and put all the non-essentials from the other members in there, but what if they aren’t together when the match starts, others would be thoroughly screwed, that’s also why even those in non-combatant positions such as medics, scouts and supporters needed to have the capacity to fight, in case they were separated from the rest as well.
And here you might wonder what of archers since they don’t have water bottles nor rations on them, well, the potion can somewhat cover for both to a certain extent, it was better for them to be able to cure wounds, if they ran out of arrows and had to fight with a dagger.
So, yeah, unless they were thrown into the sea or something along the lines of it, which shouldn’t be the case, they should be fine for a two-hour long match, battle oriented or not, in group or individually and regardless of environment so long as it was maintained within the reasonable limits.
"We are ready, remember in case we are separated don’t make noise, the assembly points are the taller spots within your range of sight, I will be able to see you from afar so unless there is danger don’t move around much, if I judge the situation to be a trap, I’ll end the whole thing so don’t worry too much", directly said Aster.
"Mm!", the girls nodded and then everyone gathered close each other as the last minutes before 4 pm passed
[The selected group will be transported to the match area]
...
The last thing Aster saw was the whole group being enveloped a dim blue light, then a portal opened on the ground and they slowly sank into it before the scenery changed.
From the camp and its green majorly vicinities, what welcomed Aster was a rock and desertic wasteland, but first things first.
"Is everyone fine?", asked Aster as he turned around, the group wasn’t separated but he wanted confirmation, imagine his surprise when he though could see the girls of the group, couldn’t hear them, with the exception of one, namely the purple lightning princess.
"I can hear you and the others", said Valentina, to then add.
"But I can’t see anything besides Aster, I can’t even tell where the others are positioned based on their voices...", for the purple lightning princess she was floating in a black void where she couldn’t tell east from west, alone with Aster, she couldn’t even pinpoint the positions of the others because while she heard their voices, they seemed to come from every direction, obviously this was done by the blue flaming board.
"We can hear sister Valentina but we can’t see her, the opposite applies to big brother, we can’t hear you but we can see you", said the little girl, this was communicated to Aster by Valentina, because Aster not only couldn’t listen to them, but for him their lips moved to speak in an unknown language.
’Heh, our ally really thought on how to make it so we have to put real effort’, thought Aster.
"Hoh, would you look at that, an almost completely female composed team, looks like we got lucky and got paired with a team from a dual cultivator group, perfect", a mocking voice reached Aster’s ears a second later as a group of thirty appeared opposite to them.
Unlike what happened on his side, Aster could see and hear them based on the not exactly friendly comments that came from other members of the group, the one who previously spoke was a tall man with tanned skin and a small scar cutting his right eyebrow in the middle, he had a spear with a metal tip on his back and a small shield on his right arm.
"Disgusting, they are even made to wear all the same clothes", said one of the few female members of the enemy’s group, a short girl with orange hair, she had leather gloves with just a few metal ornaments to protect the knuckle area.
"I don’t recognize any of them, not like that tells us anything, since there are both people from mortal realms and divine firmaments in the mix", added a woman with brown hair who seemed to be in her thirties, she had two spears with metal tips on her back.
One would be prompt to think that none on Aster’s side could listen nor see them though, because not only did they not even glance their way, not only when the other side showed some disdain towards them, but even when a skinny man who had been standing behind others, suddenly dashed towards Aster’s group, more accurately towards Kana and yet no one reacted, well no one on Aster’s side because a middle-aged man from the enemy side did say something.
"Hey, we should wait for the crystal bush to appear before doing anything, you psycho", said the man probably referring to the supervisor in charge of them, unfortunately the skinny man completely ignored the middle-aged man, his eyes were fully focused on Kana’s neck.
"Stop it you fool", added a green haired woman to no avail, her weapon was an unusual one, a whip which had some sharpened metal spikes on it.
"Your head’s mine little girl!", said the skinny man as he slashed a rough looking dagger with rags used to make the handle, he actually had a full metal weapon though it looked rough, the thing was properly sharpened and what’s more it had a black-purple liquid staining its edge.
And the reason as to why let alone the other members of the group, but even Aster, Sarina or Kana herself didn’t do anything, was revealed the next second when the incoming dagger landed in a blue barrier that was invisible until now.
"Agh!", as a result the dagger melted on the spot and the hand of the skinny man was lit up in blue flames.
[Participants are not allowed to attack each other until the event starts, any try to infringe the rules will result in a fit punishment]
The skinny man not only lost his weapon, which considering the rough craftmanship that Aster could see meant that a full metal weapon shouldn’t be a common thing to have on the camp from which that guy came from, which makes sense, metal is not as easy to work with as wood or even bone, in fact it was already surprising to see that guy wielding a full metal weapon.
’Mmm, considering that instead of making hunting efficient weapons like spears with that iron, this guy had a dagger, the distribution of authority on their camp must be bad, for that same reason it doesn’t seem like the few female cultivators and that tanned guy on their end belong to the same group but were probably mixed with them’, thought Aster.
From his point of view, twenty of the enemies should belong to the group of that skinny man, then the other ten should belong to the group of the middle-aged man, the tanned guy, the only four female cultivators among which the short orange haired girl and the brown-haired woman as well as other two girls who seemed to be in their middle twenties one with blue hair and one with green hair, were and lastly four men which consisted in two pairs of brothers.
"My dagger damn it!", cursed the skinny man as he tried to put out the flames by putting dirt on them but it obviously didn’t work, the blue flames only disappeared after rendering his hand useless, it wasn’t to the point where he will lose it, but the skinny man won’t be able to even touch anything with it for a really long time before the burns heal.
Also, that guy seemed more worried about the loss of his dagger than the state in which his hand ended, so you could see why he was called a psycho by the middle-aged man earlier.
"A member of an assassin focused evil faction group with decently high fighting training, it’s a shame that he is stupid", casually said Aster.
Someone that while still in pain tried to put out the flames and after the attack ended, directly worried for the loss of his weapon rather than his own hand, can’t be a normal person, that skinny man does have decent battle experience and probably has killed a lot of people, at the same time given his lack of patience he must be unstable, a common side-effect of those that use evil faction manuals.
Though it can be used as an advantage as well, under other circumstances a preventive strike while the other party hadn’t raised their guard would be a good move, probably he is used to these kinds of ambushes, which means that the supervisor in charge of the group from which he comes, is not a decent one either.
Aster extrapolated a lot of information thanks to the few actions on the enemy’s end, which is why he instructed everyone to not even react to whatever they did, of course this was limited to before the blue flaming board explained things, since Aster knew beforehand that the details of the match would be explained by it, that meant the groups wouldn’t be able to mess with each other until that happened, so Aster used it to gain intel and the enemies easily played themselves into his hands.
"Hey, what’s going on, weren’t we supposed to come here to fight against them?", said one of the teammates of the skinny man, a short and slightly fat middle-aged guy with a large wood club that had nails pointing outwards, all over its surface besides the handle, a bit rough on the making but again it had metal on it.
"Where is the crystal bush, I want to ask a few things", added another guy, this one had a wood hammer whose head’s flat sides were reinforced with metal plaques, those two for sure belonged to the same group as the skinny man, based on their weapons which though also had metallic parts were clearly made with lesser quantities of it, not for efficiency like the spears and whip previously mentioned, but due to a lack of it, something a skilled blacksmith and craftmanship expert as Aster could tell with just a quick glance.
Unfortunately for them the one to answer was none other than the blue flaming board, instead of their respective supervisor which was apparently a crystal bush.
[Quartz Bush won’t be actively participating, as he had not properly upheld even the basics of decency for the groups he is in charge of], said Blue Sky.
"What, the supervisor of the other party is going to be completely in charge of the fight, that’s fishy as hell!", said the short orange haired girl, to which the blue flaming board added.
[I, the ruler of the eastern zone swear upon my title of "Blue Sky" to not show favoritism to either of the groups participating in the match, the results will completely depend on the participants own efforts so far, their arrangements, preparation and capacities, as that was the original purpose of the evaluation trial]
Of course, both Aster and the enemy’s group had no say in the previous, even if they didn’t believe the blue flaming board’s words, they couldn’t leave until the match ended, well, Aster’s group could but they did trust Blue Sky’s integrity, so there was no need for that.
"Tsk, what the hell is going on, first we can’t directly kill those bastards and now our supervisor is not even allowed to come, besides what the hell does "eastern zone" means", said the skinny guy whose name is Xander as he returned to his group side, ignoring his hand which had some serious burns on it.
"If that’s the case, do tell us what are the rules for this match?", asked a young man with dirty blond hair, which the guys on the enemy’s side could see but not listen to, he had a bow and a quiver with arrows whose tips were made out of metal based on the slight clinking sounds that Aster could listen when he moved, on his back.
In case you wonder, why the enemy’s side hadn’t freaked out at the high-quality steel weapons on Aster’s side, that’s because they can’t see them properly, the shields are on their backs which aren’t facing the enemies so they can’t see the metal plaques on them, the daggers are hidden within the girl’s clothes.
The swords have been changed from hanging on their waists, to be mounted on their backs in a way that they aren’t noticeable from the front, since they aren’t great swords but single-handed ones, as for the spears which are too large to not be noticeable Aster made the girls put pieces of cloth to cover their tips, so at most the enemies can guess that they have metal tips but can’t see their high quality.
In the archer’s case, the quivers and large size of the bows also give them away, however, the arrows are secured by individual compartments so they don’t produce any metallic sounds, which leads the enemy to believe they are just sharpened wood arrows.
All these preparations came from Mina’s "wicked" mind by the way, since she worked together with Aster in a way to give away close to zero intel to the enemy in case they met before a real battle situation happened, which ended up being the case.
[The first conditions are already in place, the two from each team considered to hold the highest authority have been restricted to not be able to directly communicate with others but keep all their other senses, or lose their senses and not be detected by teammates but be able to communicate with them]
"Ah, makes sense that I can’t see our leader but could hear him talk just now, on the other hand I couldn’t see that annoying woman but I could hear her nagging at me after that old man did so too", said the skinny man.
Apparently, the leader from the ten people group, which included all the female participants was that green haired woman, she couldn’t see what was happening, but reacted after listening to the middle-aged man’s words, since he included the word "psycho" so she knew who was she talking about.
It’s worth mentioning that since these restrictions only affected the teammates and their respective leaders, the other party had no way to know who was under them, at least if they didn’t give noticeable hints about it, like the skinny man just did.
’That damn fool, why were we teamed with a crazy bastard from the Black Dagger sect’, thought the green haired woman, since the dirty blond-haired guy couldn’t hear what he said.
Long story short, they just lost another one of their advantages because of that assassin guy.
[Now, the event is divided in two parts, first, you’ll be sent to different but equally distant points, the idea is to cross the arid area where both mental and physical fatigue will be multiplied by twenty until all of you reach the fighting platform, a trip that in the best case scenario takes one hour to make, whether you try to fight each other before reaching the platform to eliminate the other party, or focus in reaching it fast to save up your energy as the platform is the only part where the twenty times fatigue effect won’t affect you, it’s up to you]
[Be aware that there are traps and you are not the only living beings in the area, your life and death will be up to you, giving up is allowed and you’ll be instantly saved if you do so, however your team will be penalized for it, depending on the number of participants that had quitted from your team, the penalization can go from reduced rewards to direct disadvantages in the fighting platform]
[Once all the participants that are still in the match, reach the fighting platform, the second part of the match which is a group battle, will start, as for the winner, the decision will be taken based on your performance on both parts of the match, there is no direct punishment for the losing end but they won’t receive any reward so the next match they face will be quite harder as they will be paired against a winning group by me]
’So that’s what the blue flaming board meant with that there are multiple paths to victory, it really is a good way to evaluate our performance, but it’s even more of a good idea to evaluate the participants themselves’, thought Aster.
In what will they focus while crossing the arid area, the restrictions on the ones with the higher authority, the pressure of twenty times multiplied fatigue, the traps and the possibility to quit without any repercussion from the blue flaming board, made it so there would be a lot of different opinions in a normal group, what’s more some already had rifts between them because they weren’t originally a team to begin with but were paired together only a few hours ago, Blue Sky really thought this through and changed the simple killing each other event into a much more complex thing.
’So, while the blue flaming board seeks strong participants, that’s not all it matters, well, both ways work fine for us though’, thought Aster.
[You have a minute before the match automatically starts, but if you don’t have any questions, I will send you to your respective starting points right now]
"We are fine on our end, what about you guys?", asked the dirty blond haired young man, clearly wanting to even things by getting a hint on who were the higher authorities on Aster’s side.