Scarlet

“I welcome you all back from the first round of the tournament!” the vice-headmaster’s voice echoes throughout the auditorium before he continues, “Behind me you will see the results of your hard work, and the initial ranking after the first round!”

Most of the students in the room were already reading the names on the list, with many of them voicing surprise at the sight of a Class I first year so high up on them. But the vice-headmaster doesn’t give them any time to talk about it as he says, “Now we will be moving onto the second round of the tournament! This one is quite different from the first round.” He suddenly begins to levitate into the air with a small cloud of greenish black mist beneath his feet before moving up to the rules and magnifying them to be larger for us.

The secondary round of the tournament will take place in a magical reality imitating a forest on Tartarus.

Every student will be placed in the same forest in the same magical reality, and they will be given points for slaying demons.

The forest will be separated into two parts.The outer ring of the forest will have only Class I demons, with their levels increasing as the students get closer to the inner ring.The inner ring of the forest will have Class II demons, with their levels increasing as the students get closer to the center, which will have a single Class III demon.

Demons will give points depending on their levels.

Demons at levels 1-50 will give one point apiece to all students involved in their killing, including non-combat focused Guardians.

Demons at levels 51-100 will give two points apiece to all students involved in their killing, including non-combat focused Guardians.

Demons at levels 101-150 will give three points apiece to all students involved in their killing, including non-combat focused Guardians.

Demons at levels 151-200 will give four points apiece to all students involved in their killing, including non-combat focused Guardians.

The Class III demon will give a total of fifty points spread across whoever kills it.Furthermore, killing another student of the same Class as you or higher will give you a fifth of their points.

Should a student be killed by another student and not by a demon they will be revived in the magical reality.

The rankings will be determined through whoever has the most points.

However, should a combat focused Guardian decide to remove other Guardians from play through killing them and are believed to be specifically targeting non-combat focused Guardians during the tournament, or a higher Class Guardian targets a lower Class one, they will receive a severe handicap in the form of a quantity of their points taken away and distributed to every targeted Guardian they killed, with the specific quantity being decided upon by a panel of professors watching the tournament.

Unrelated to the rankings, five Top class student spots will be added in addition to the top one hundred corresponding to the top five scoring Class I students and 50 Advanced class spots will be added in addition to the nine hundred current spots corresponding to the next highest ranking Class I students not already in that class.

“Now, you can all read this for the exact rules should you choose to do so, but be warned that not reading them does not mean you will be exempt from them,” Alfred says, clearly warning everyone while also giving people a chance to show off their lazy side should they choose to be stupid. “You’ll all be placed in a magical reality that is meant to imitate a forest on Tartarus. One ruled by a Class III Taracht demon.” He pauses as the image of a massive spider with black hair streaked with red, which seems to be a common color scheme amongst demons, sitting in the middle of a large nest of webs in the middle of a large forest on the magical reality screen. The screen then zooms out to show a large forest surrounding the demon with thicker trees spread less sparsely in the inner ring of it and thinner trees spread more sparsely in the outer ring. “The Class II and III students amongst you will all be spawned in the inner ring of the forest, which will be infested with various Class II demons of different types. Meanwhile the Class I students will be spawned in the outer ring, which is filled with various Class I demons instead.”

Whispers grow amongst the gathered students, most of which are rather excited, but some are quite frightened instead.

“Killing a demon gives points corresponding to the level of the demon to everyone who participated in its death, with every fifty levels giving an additional point starting at level 1 giving a single point to each person who participated in its hunt, and the Class III demon giving fifty total points spread across whoever kills it instead of each participant getting the same reward,” the vice-headmaster continues while floating up to the very center of the auditorium in the air. “You may kill other students to steal a fifth of their points but be warned that you can only do this if that student is of the same Class as you or higher.” He glances at several people who I’m assuming are Class III judging by their mana. “And there are punishments for a student killing students of a lower Class than themselves.” He returns his gaze to everyone again. “Last but not least, if you are killed by a fellow student, you will be respawned somewhere at random in the same ring of the forest you spawned in. But if you’re killed by a demon then you’re out for good.”

Nothing that isn’t already said in the rules posted on the screen. Although I guess some people just have the attention spans of a gnat and don’t want to read, having to be told bluntly by someone instead. Which is a little sad, but true, nonetheless.

Even I felt a little annoyed at the idea of reading through a couple of the contracts I had to sign for joining the Silver Association. Because those things were really long.

The chatter in the auditorium raises slightly in volume for a few seconds before the vice-headmaster finishes, “You will all be sent to the magical reality in ten minutes. Take this small break as a time to mentally prepare yourselves for the second round.” He then vanishes as a large amount of black and dark green mist begin to swallow him up before disappearing into the ground.

At his exit, the chatter becomes a low roar as full blown conversations break out everywhere. Many of which are talking about the top one hundred, including people talking about myself. But I ignore them to focus on the others as Belle asks, “How did you manage to make it into the top one hundred?”

I answer rather bluntly, “By challenging everyone in my dome.”

Her eyes practically bug out at that, but I continue before she can say anything, “Although around half or so of them declined, which was disappointing.”

That doesn’t seem to help her surprise.

I just give a mental shrug at that before turning to Michael to find him not surprised. And neither are Emily or Denise. Although Denise was there, so this isn’t any news for her.

Anyways, Emily and Michael begin talking about their own domes, leaving me to just sit back and listen to them for a while. Until Belle gets over her shock that is and joins in.