Dungeon of Pride, Laplace

That was because some of the star participants from the top five guilds would be competing on the various stages.

"Oh look at that, the battle occurring on the eleventh stage is already in full heat. Most of the participants are already out"

"Yeah, those guys… they are from the kingdom of blackthorn. It seems that they were in the same group and thus tagged together to defeat all the other opponents".

With so many participants in the tournament, it was not uncommon for a guild or faction to have multiple of their members in the same group. The kingdom of blackthorn who had three of their members in the same group, wiped the floors with their opponents.

Even some big guilds had some of their members failing for being unlucky enough to be in the same stage as them.

"Sigh it's so unfortunate for that young man from the Thunder fortress guild to be in the same stage as them. Truly unfortunate, I was hoping to see upcoming rounds some more"

"You think so. Well I pity the ones who are on the same stage with Marcus, Hallie, and the other from the top five guilds".

When the matches were filled with so many spices, how could the audience be able to resist gossiping? Of course, the same went for the group of merchants that were seated near Simon. They were fervently discussing as to who would win from each stage.

OHHH… suddenly the crowd exclaimed, their eyes glued to stage three and fifteen where a particular particiapnts confronted each other.

On stage three, was a participant from Crimson Demolition guild, Kenan Lantz confronting an opponent from the Kingdom of Blackthorn, while on stage fifteen were members of the top five guild, Assassin's guild and Magician's guild confronting each other.

Sparks generated everywhere and the atmosphere around the coliseum became instantly heated. The participants confronted each other in a short exchange before each realising that they cannot defeat the other in a short period of time and thus disengaging to find other targets.

"Well, Well.. would you look at that, aren't you very eager to clash with the participants from my guild, Grey" Karina said smiling towards the area where Grey, the guild leader of Assassin's guild was seated.

Grey smiled but did not comment further, it was just the first round of the 'Battle of the Finest' tournament, there was no need for them to go for a difficult opponent right now.

The participant from the Crimson demolition guild and kingdom of blackthorn did the same, after dishing out a few blows as a way of greeting, they each went to find their own prey.

The audience who were looking for a heated battle were left a little disappointed but that small clash of strength was enough to give an appetizer of what would come later.

The matches on the other stages were just like the previous ones, were the weak were quickly filtered out and the strong moved on to the next stage. Most of the small region guilds who brought their participants over, had all of their participants defeated while some of the medium-big guilds had a few of their members moving onto the next stage.

Obviously, the top five guilds had all their participating members in this round move onto the next stage. Hallie May, Marcus Sarge and a few members of the Sea god's trident flawlessly achieved their victory and stepped from the stage.

The strong devours the weak, everything was going as the audience had predicted when the moderator monitoring one of the stages, declared the elimination of a certain guild from this tournament which nobody expected.

"Absolute Sea Guild… Eliminated".

"Ah, my apologies, I did not know that you were the last participant from your guild" Ivan Mavis Blackthorn said looking down at the unconscious opponent he just defeated.

"You are kidding me right... the absolute sea guild got eliminated?" the audience couldn't believe what they heard.

One of the big guilds of their kingdom, a faction that had taken the seventh place in the previous "battle of the finest' tournament, had all their participants defeated. What kind of concept was that?

The crowd was in a state of disbelief, even the guild master of the Absolute Sea guild looked bewildered, unable to accept what had just transpired. Earlier it was Lark Sea who had underestimated his enemy and now even Marvin welch was defeated.

The top two remaining participants of their guild who had the highest talent out of all the others, were defeated. The Absolute Sea guild was eliminated in the first round of the tournament. Nothing could be more humiliating for a guild that placed seventh in the last tournament.

The audience sighed, it was truly an unfortunate disaster for their guild which held so many expectations from the audience and the people of their region, to be eliminated like that.

Lark Sea and Marvin Welch were both individuals with levels above 380 and a rare class, to see them dropping out on the first stage, was truly a pity.

The Second Round of the First Stage "battle Royale' concluded with 210 students moving on to the next stage. And now finally, the last round of the 'Battle Royale' would start.

Out of the 85 groups, 72 groups have already competed in the 36 secondary stages and the winners have moved on to the next phase leaving only 13 remaining groups to compete. Though there would only be 13 groups competing in the secondary stages, the hype of the audience for this round was much for than the previous 'Battle royal' rounds.

The reason for this being the 'princely round'. That was what the audience were calling it. In this round, two princes, one foreign and one their own third prince, would be participating in their own group battles.

There was no way the audience wouldn't be excited to see the top two participants in action. The 780 participants from the 13 groups, stepped into their prearranged secondary stages and waited for the battle to start.

They observed their opponents and at the same time prayed that they weren't in the same group as the two princes.

The first prince of the kingdom of Ellesmere, Alstin sighed in relief when he saw his third brother walk up to a different stage than the one from the Sanguine empire's prince.

"It's a good thing that they are in different groups. It is far too soon for them to clash in the first stage".

The third round of 'battle royale started when every member got onto their stages. Just like every round, the participants with the weaker level were quickly filtered out and before long it was only the strong ones still standing.

All the participants avoided coming near the two princes and only targeted those opponents that they have a chance to win against.

As time ticked by, multiple winners started to arise, Princess Alice from the Sanguine empire calmly walked down the stage after pushing five of her opponents out of bounds with her magic.

The members from the top five guilds and the big factions were also starting to emerge victorious one after the other.

"It's time he moved," Vouves said caressing his beard tied in a dreadlock.

The moment he said that, he saw Denzel positioning two fingers of his right hand as a sword and slash down. The move though very imperfect was still a skill that the [Sword King] Cedrick had taught to his disciple.

A two meters big blade shadow was created from Denzel's movement and was controlled by him to target exactly five people. Those five people did not even know what had attacked them before they were slashed and sent out of bounds.

WHOAAA.. the audience cheered like crazy when their eyes were fed something so exciting. On another stage, they saw their own third prince achieving a victory effortlessly by defeating five people.

Satisfied with the performance of their future heroes of the realm, the crowd was just about to move on, when a huge explosion that rocked every corner of the coliseum, rang out.

Every eyes present in the audience stands, was drawn to the stage where a completely unbelievable had occurred. Every participant on stage 1 was blown away and defeated except for a single person. The crowd couldn't follow what had transpired in the few seconds when their eyes were drawn to a different place.

"This is a lie right… a single person was able to defeat all the other participants? There were even some members from those big guilds on that stage"

"Isn't that guy the representative from the Ingolf kingdom?"

"That bastard is looking down on our kingdom. Even though he could obtain a victory and move onto the next stage by just defeating 5 members, he had to deliberately wipe everyone out of the stage and flaunt his powers"

"I wish the third prince or somebody from the top five guild takes him out in the future round".

The crowd clamoured, they were obviously enraged by this display of power. The moderator of that stage looked at Cyrus asking what to do next. The Royal Knight captain thought over it a bit before nodding his head.

Although it was a little uncalled for, there was no such rule abstaining someone from defeating all of the participants on the stage. That is to say, Graydon Brown did not do anything that went against the rules of this tournament.

Thus he was moved on to the next stage of the tournament. When the moderator announced so, the audience was a little disturbed while Oman, the prince of Ingolf Kingdom smiled derisively.

Right before Graydon went onto the stage, he told him to knock all the participants of that stage out and display the might of their Kingdom of Ingolf to everyone. The crowd's dismayed reaction was very much to his satisfaction.