Chapter 103: Knockout.

Those in the first group of students could only mind snort at the professor's words and remain because even in a thousand years to come their opinions wouldn't matter.

'Calling it a draw makes life easier and most importantly saves a lot of research time.' When he thought of his next task in his lab he was excited and couldn't wait for it to end

When the entire exercise was over it was already evening. A wide brimming smile was on his face as he walked out of the forge ten thousand points richer.

'There isn't more time to do anything else, guess I am forced to take a rest.'

Having not much time for any other activity, Blake went to his room and had a quick bath before heading to the canteen for dinner.

'Wow, so much peace…' Blake thought as the aroma of onion beef with noodles and honey garlic chicken breast wafted into his nostrils.

The very large canteen that could easily fit more than a thousand students was almost empty. After a long and stressful day, the silence was soothing to Blake's nerves.

"Seems a lot of pressure is on them… Uhmmm! … but at least they should… get something to eat. Why haven't I tried the honey garlic chicken breast before?!" Blake muffled.

[The pressure will surely be on them because not all of them have a system that can remember every single thing they have been taught.]

The courses he had for the next day was history and advanced combat. Just like Earth, history was boring and filled with many dates to memorize, but in the case of Infinite realm, the difficulty was literally on another realm.

Unlike earth that was only 4 billion years old, infinite was eons older than it making history 10 times more difficult than math. 

[And lastly, don't talk with a full mouth!]

"…" Hearing the system's words, Blake paused for a moment as the memories of his mom telling him the same thing.

[Am sorry…] the system apologized when it realized the mistake he had made.

"There is no problem, just that the food tastes different now…"

Although he was in a sad mood and the food didn't taste as good as before, he still finished the food without asking for seconds, before heading to his room.

…

The next day…

All the students of the elite class were focused on their papers, as they answered close to 500 questions on history. It was just like any other theoretical exam and luckily for Blake, it was an objective exam, if not he might have died of boredom.

As long as Blake had heard or seen anything, even if he was absent-minded the system would able to recollect. Thereby making the exam a piece of cake.

The history exam was to last for 4 hours but Blake was done within 1 hour 30mins but decided to wait in order not to raise suspicions. An hour later after he was done, Blake had run out of patience and decided to submit the booklet that was close to half the size of a textbook.

'Patience isn't one of my virtue…' Blake said to himself as he stood up and submitted.

"Are you done already?" The history professor was shocked, but nevertheless, he still collected the booklet and let Blake leave the class.

Unlike the array mastery and forging class, the results of the exams couldn't be announced immediately because there was no way the professor alone could mark all of these works with so little time.

'I wonder what Instructor Zirrack will give us as the final exam?' Blake thought as he heads towards the canteen for a bite before heading to the training grounds.

[There are many variables but one thing I am sure of is that it will be troublesome.] Blake could only agree.

With everything that has been going on in the advanced training exercise, Instructor Zirrack had been branded the name, Beast. If Haldor and instructor Zirrack were to be compared, Haldor was a puppy while Zirrack was a hydra with 20 heads!

He was too radical and unpredictable. Blake had a feeling that if instructor Zirrack was to become principal more than half of the students would be dead before the end of the 1st semester.

"What is going on here?!" Blake blurted out when he reached the training grounds and saw that the different battlegrounds were enchanted with water barriers that protected powers from escaping the battleground.

'Are you thinking what I am thinking?'

[Yes I am…]

"You are here already, take a seat and wait for the rest of the class to arrive." A familiar voice that made him shudder came from behind.

"Good day instructor Zirrack…" Blake said with a bow as he turned and saw the beast. Instructor Zirrack nodded to his greetings before leaving without saying anything.

After waiting for 30 minutes, Castiel, Brian, Luciano, and a few others arrived at the training grounds.

"We are screwed, or let me put it in the right way I am screwed..." Brian said as they joined Blake.

"You've already guessed it…" Blake said with a wry smile.

From how the battlegrounds were set it was already clear that the advanced combat exams were a knockout battle.

"Why are you like that, I should be the one complaining. With my elements, I won't go far!" Brian cursed the heavens for his rotten luck.

"Like my brother always says, the element doesn't matter only the user does. Besides you have proved that point already in the awakening test." Luciano said in a calm tone.

Brian wanted to retort Luciano's words but they were true. The problem was that their levels have gone up and people have gotten wiser which means he had to make better plans.

When the history class was finally over and everyone in the elite class was now on the training grounds, instructor Zirrack came to the center and began his announcement.

"As you all can see, this is a knockout exam and it will proceed as follows; two students will be picked at random, and whoever wins proceeds to the next round until we have only 2 students standing. The higher your position in the knockout exam the greater the points awarded to you.

For the rules; you can make use of your powers and weapons, no artifacts allowed. If any is found you shall be disqualified and punished accordingly." Instructor Zirrack said with a creepy grin.

"To ensure fairness of the exam and also the safety of every student, different professors would be in each battleground acting as the referee. Their job is to save anyone in danger and to spot any cheats." After making sure there wasn't anything he was forgetting he decided to begin the exams.

"Let's get straight into the competition. If you hear your name, please proceed to the designated battleground and wait for the signal to begin…"

Names were called for some minutes before it got to Luciano's turn who was assigned to the 12th battleground.

"Let's get this over with..." Luciano said with a bored expression.

'It is certain that I would meet either Damon or Luciano in the finals.' Blake began imagining what would happen if they ended up meeting.

[We haven't seen that darkness kid in action, so we should be wary of him.] The system warned him.

Brian, Castiel, or any other student were to hear his conversation with the system, they would have a fight to the death with Blake, but it wasn't his fault.

He didn't put anyone else in his eyes because they were weak and he had neither the time nor strength to care about their feelings.

While Blake was thinking about his opponents, Castiel was trying to make a tough decision.

'If I am to use only fire, I wouldn't last long even if I am to use the ignitor powers. Guess I have no other choice. It is time to show them the darkness powers.' Castiel sighed as he made his decision.

From the beginning of the semester when he had awakened the darkness element he had kept it hidden even in the survival exercise, but this time a lot of points were on the line and without it, he would surely lose.

"Castiel, proceed to battle-ground number 20."

"…"

"Brian, proceed to battle-ground number 27."

After all the battlegrounds prepared for the exam were occupied, Blake was still seating at his original spot.

'I forgot, the advanced class is 63 in number meaning one has to watch, but why is it me?' Blake was kinda happy because he was going to save some energy while the rest fought their hearts out, but he was quite disappointed since he was itching for a fight.