Chapter 37 - The Hidden Dragon Trials Turn... (2/2)

Many were shocked and confused when Bazuul confidently walked toward the fifth platform. ”What the...When the f...when did he pick up a lot?!

I watched him the whole time!!” Some thought.

Jian Zheng was also among those. He just couldn't figure out why his heart would always feel uneasy when it came to this, what he considered, young boy. He would be on platform nine, but now he really wanted to be on platform five to appease these feelings of doubt and insecurity.

As Bazuul stood on platform five he observed the ten youth's that he would have to defeat. Soon, and although most of gazes on his platform were on him, his eyes were piercing into someone standing the furthest away from him. Ignoring everyone else with a smile on his face and his eyes arched he could not wait for the trial to start.

On the other end of the platform stood none other than Hugo Dias. The poor fellow thought he would ”accidentally” kill this thorn in his eyes today. Yet, the fact was, he didn't stand a chance even before Bazuul left Ralun and now Hugo was practically a little child to him. Even more so if one considered the fact that Bazuul had broken through three realms since his departure to the hidden dragon trials.

Hugo was older than him and was only at the third stage of the true qi realm with no elemental nor magical affinity whatsoever. Thus not even fit to carry Bazuul's shoes anymore.

Aside from Hugo Dias, he had only heard of one other person among the people on platform five, Brynja Donarim. The second princess of Donar. She was at the sixth stage of the true qi realm with an affinity for the air and lightning element. Plus she only had slightly worse magical talent than Bazuul.

From the other participant's aura, he could tell that most of them were around the fourth or fifth stage. Actually, only two on platform five seemed to have reached the bare minimum to participate in the second trial, the third stage of the true qi realm. One being Hugo Dias and the other, looking at his clothes, or lack thereof, a young commoner.

Immersed in his own assessment of the situation, the gong rang as its vibrations penetrated every pore of the participant throughout all of the platforms.

The moment this happened many fights across the military's training grounds broke out. So did also on platform five, and Bazuul was the first to launch his attack.

He immediately dashed toward Hugo at an extremely high pace. What shocked him was, seconds after he started his attack, before he could reach his target, six of the other challengers also pounced toward him.

The shock lasted only for a very short time before it turned into a drunken chuckle as his killing intent slowly oozed out of him. As they got dangerously close to him, he apparently vanished into thin air. Or so everyone on platform five thought. Only a second later he appeared beside Hugo, grabbed him by the collar, and smashed his fist into his face a dozen times, also within a second.

The last hit blasted him out of the platform and down on the floor against a wall. Unconscious he sat there, almost toothless, with a majority of his facial bones broken and, of course, disqualified.