Chapter 485: The Morning Activities of the Fourth Day

It was the morning of the fourth day of the tournament and Joshua was woken up by a system message. Usually he would wake up before any messages about the tournament would pop up, but he decided to sleep in a bit for the day since he had already finished all of his preliminary fights and just wanted to mostly enjoy the show as an audience for the day. The system hadn't usually sent out a message so early, but Joshua didn't react to it in the same way as his sister, who he could hear falling out of her bed once more. Instead Joshua simply opened his eyes at the sudden noise and gathered his will to pull himself away from his comfortable pillow and sit on the side of the bed.

After a short stretch and a few yawns Joshua finally turned his attention to the new message from the system. From what he could see on the message window it was clearly from the battle arena which meant it would be about the tournament to some degree. Joshua wasn't sure how the fourth day would work out since all the system had said about it up to this point was that the people on the edge of just making it into the bracketed portion would be put into some sort of challenge to make it further in the tournament. Joshua opened the message so that he could quickly figure out what was going on, just in case he had to be prepared to participate in something later on in the day.

[For everyone that has made it to this portion of the tournament congratulations. Today will be the turning point where those who have just one more win that loss will be fighting against each other for a chance to be in the last portion of the tournament. There are still far too many participants left that are just barely hanging on to a spot in the tournament. These matches will take place during the first half of the day, and if you win you shall be guaranteed a spot in the tournament. For those who lose do not give up, you shall be given one last chance to make it into the last portion of the tournament during the evening events.]

Joshua knew that this information was similar to what the system had already told them would happen for the day so he wasn't surprised. However he was expecting this to be what would happen throughout the entire day and not just in the morning. Now he was curious what would be going on later in the day and he had the feeling that it was likely going to be important to him since the first part of the message had nothing to do with him or the other high level contenders in the tournament. So instead of just guessing he decided to push on and read the rest of the message.

[After the first portion of the day is finished there will be an hour long break in between to make sure all of the contenders still fighting for a place in the tournament get some rest for what is to come later on in the day. The second event of the day will go a long way in deciding the seeding of the left over contenders in the tournament. There will be several brackets with their own seeding and groups of contenders. Whoever comes out of that bracket will be put against the winners of the other brackets. To decide the seeding in these brackets everyone that has already been given a spot will be put into a specialty bout. At first those who aspire to have a high level spot in the tournament will face against three of the people who are leftovers of the fights from early on in the day. They will continue to fight against more and more opponents until the end of the day's matches. From all of these fights the system will be able to decide the seeding for the final portion of the tournament. Good luck to all participants.]

"I guess I won't be taking the day off then." Joshua mumbled out loud to himself as he got up from the bed and started heading to the bathroom to get ready for the day. It was clear that he'd pretty much have the entire morning free to just watch the matches at home, but in the afternoon he'd be summoned to the battle arena to participate in the evening events. Although it would be a bit of a hassle to fight against lower level competition at least this time around he'd be going up against more than one person at a time.

This time around the system could do several things to make the matches more challenging. Joshua didn't know how many people he'd be fighting against in later matches, but at the start he'd be going up against at least three people that were good enough to last all the way until this portion of the tournament. These three people would be able to work together and figure out a strategy to take on Joshua which would be much more interesting than one on one matches that the earlier days of the tournament had been filled with.

Now that Joshua had something to look forward to he quickly got set up for the day before heading down stairs towards the kitchen where he could already smell breakfast being prepared. It was clear that he had slept in a little bit more than usual when he saw that his mother was already almost done with breakfast and his father was casually reading through some of the news that the system posted every morning like a newspaper. Even though he tried to put on a somber attitude it was clear that he was excited to watch more of the tournament based off of how his right foot was tapping the floor unconsciously.

"Are you ready for the day sweetheart? According to the news you and your sister are going to be busy this afternoon." His mother said as she started bringing some of the food over to the table. From the ruckus Joshua could hear coming from upstairs it was clear that she was on her way down as well, so he wasn't surprised that his mother was already setting the table.

"They must be posting stuff on the system pages already if you two have heard about it." Joshua said as he took the seat across from his father. "Well at least today should be a lot more interesting than the last three. Fighting multiple opponents at the same time will hopefully put up a good challenge."

"Don't underestimate them. I know you're probably going to try to avoid showing off all of your abilities, but don't let that put you in a bad situation." His father said as he already started putting bacon and eggs on his plate.

"Don't worry about that, I'll never take my eyes away from the main goal dad." Joshua said as he copied his father in going for the bacon before the man took all of it away. He knew that Amy would be doing the same the second she came to the table as well. "If you have to worry about anyone it should be Amy. She might toy with her food a bit too much today."

His father simply nodded at that and gave Amy a pep talk the moment she came down stairs to eat. After breakfast Joshua's mother went to the hospital for work, while his dad left to go to his dojo and help any of the members of his dojo that were preparing for their fights in the tournament for the day. Amy decided to go hang out with Naomi and try to work on her smithing before her part in the tournament later on in the day. Joshua would have liked to do something similar, but he knew that as the leader of the guild he'd need to pay attention to the morning matches to see if there was anyone participating that he wanted to recruit to the guild. Henry might do the same, but it was part of his responsibility to do so and he wasn't going to run away from it.

It didn't take very long for the morning matches to start and the moment that they did Joshua noticed that the participants weren't holding back at all. Everyone in the morning matches were fighting for the right to participate in the rest of the tournament and that was plain to see by how all of the matches were starting off. There was no talking or banter between the contestants. The mages were setting up traps and doing everything they could to put the match in their favor. Close ranged fighters used movement skills to avoid such traps and close in on their opponents. Tanks however used their most powerful skills to just block all of the damage of their opponents in hopes of tiring them out in a battle of attrition where they held the high ground.

It was an interesting day of matches that Joshua enjoyed watching, but instead of just sticking to one match at a time he started to open up multiple screens as he searched for any interesting possible recruits. He did see some explorers with some potential that he marked down, but he didn't truly become interested until he came across a certain guy that stood out simply because he wasn't fighting alone. The man's name was Thomas Simmons and it was clear that he had a unique job that Joshua already knew about.

While fighting against his opponent who was a swordsman Thomas had two creatures that were fighting alongside him. One was a little squirrel that was currently clinging to his shoulder while its tail was glowing. The fact that as a beast tamer Thomas was able to go toe to toe with a similar level opponents showed that the squirrel was giving him some sort of boost. The other beast that was fighting alongside Thomas was a horse sized fox that had red fur and a white tipped tail. The fox was able to conjure flames that made things difficult for the swordsman and kept him on his toes.

Thomas didn't just let the large fox fight on his own as he charged in with two long daggers with good speed. It was clear that his speed was being synced with the fox and boosted even higher by the squirrel as he dashed all around his opponent going for any openings that his companion created. The matched dragged on for a little while since the swordsman wasn't a push over, but in the end he was overwhelmed and Thomas came out victorious. The man was young and unaffiliated with any guilds at the moment, but Joshua knew that it wouldn't last too far past the tournament. Several guilds would be swarming to get the guy to join their guilds after seeing how powerful Lilly was as a beast tamer. Although Joshua would have a huge advantage with his pitch, after all Thomas would get an opportunity to learn from the only other known beast tamer in the hub city if he joined the Fenrir Guild. Joshua grinned when this came to mind.