Chapter 678 (1/2)

Silo was torn.

He partially was horrified at the needless and excessive violence he had engaged in. Although the guard was an asshole, that was no reason to strike him. The other part of him glorified in it. There was a simple satisfaction in being physically superior to someone else. It was a simple pleasure like nothing else Silo had experienced.

This split was nothing new. It had been a constant source of inner pain and turmoil since he had pushed himself to Level 50 with the gift from his masters.

As they walked, Silo’s gaze shifted to his group. He barely controlled a sneer. They seemed rather hale and healthy, they probably had done little actual engagement with the enemy. Meanwhile, Silo had been behind enemy lines. Every day, he had killed dozens, if not hundreds, of Wights.

In those circumstances, others would have probably fallen into the hands of the enemy, and Silo couldn’t deny there were many close calls. A handful of times he had sustained a deep injury that put him in dire straits. But with his new, more powerful images that he had received from the gift, he was able to grasp victory.

Silo was aware that he was losing a portion of his old Skills, but it was hard to care. After all, everything was to show these pompous Central Styles that they can’t just trample over the lives of the people in the Spearman School.

In his pocket, Silo’s hand tightened on his Soulstone. No matter what the rest of his squad had done, Silo was sure that his actions were enough to buy them a ticket into the finals. And from there, he could demonstrate how far he had come.

He could kill someone.

The thought came unbidden, and Silo stumbled as part of him recoiled horrified.

Without much respect, Azriel pushed lightly on Silo’s back. “Keep walking.”

Silo felt a flash of hot fury, but he buried it. Instead, he hurried forward. Why did he suddenly… suddenly think about killing someone? And why…

...did he want it so badly…

Luckily, they soon reached another room, where there were 16 larger Soulstones, about the size of a large closet. Although this new room was just as spacious as the first, the sixteen Soulstones did make it feel pretty cramped. There was a small wooden podium in front of the Soulstones, and Raption Veir walked to it and began to speak.

“Since we are here, let’s begin quickly so we can return to the festivities. One at a time, each team will come up to touch one of the Soulstones. They have been labeled. To begin, Team One.”

With an easy smile on his face, Althumber and his group walked forward. They laughed as they did it, too, which made Silo dig his nails into the palm of his hand. In his mind, Silo had no doubt that Althumber had never been placed in a situation where he was in any danger during this three-month time span. He had simply collected his points from others. It was infuriating.

But then Silo forced himself to relax. Although he had suffered while Althumber had not, the experience of fighting alone behind enemy lines was invaluable. Silo had no doubt who would be able to triumph in a direct confrontation.

Very quickly, energy flowed out of the Soulstones they pressed on the larger Soulstones. It was like watching a sphere slowly fill with mist. Silo felt a flash of glee as no more energy flowed into the large Soulstone, and the large thing was not even halfway full. It truly appeared like think grey mist was pooling around in the stone.

But when Raption spoke, it was with laughter in his voice. “Oh! Our Team One’s final scores… is 26,132! Truly impressive. They truly set a high bar. As expected of the number one team!”

Althumber looked smug. Silo did his best to suppress his twitching.

More and more teams went up and put their energy into their individual Soulstone. Team Two’s score gave Silo something of a shock because it indicated how he might have underestimated how badly the Veir’s were cheating for the First Team. Team Two scored 15,079.

Team Three was 9,010, but Team Four was 17,982, which gave Raption a moment of stiffness before he congratulated the team. It seemed that Team Four’s performance was not in the cards. The rest of the Teams were largely in the order they were ranked, however, except for one notable exception.

“Team Eleven! 25,999! That…” For several moments, Raption truly seemed unable to fathom what to say. Instead, he just stared at the lovely woman who had turned in the lion’s share of the points. Silo spared a glance for Randidly, who was yawning.