248 Chapter 248: I want ten!

Everyone watched in icy horror as Dong Fang Yue Chu toppled to the ground, the side of his head bruised and scorched by Zuo Teng's spell. It wasn't a fire spell because the fire mage would have some resistance to it, but still…

"What the fuck are you doing?!" Teacher Fielding hollered as he grabbed Zuo Teng by the collar and heaved him off his feet. "Who gave you the order to shoot a student?!"

"But he went and took the sack of rice even though he lost."

"…what's with the rice?" one of the students whispered, completely lost at what was going on. I mean, seriously, who shot a student for taking a sack of rice he had rightly won? Actually, she had a point. Why were they giving out rice to students for winning qualifiers in the first place?

The guy beside the female student scowled. "Huh? You never watched any of Donnie Yen's movies? Especially the first movie of the franchise that made him famous?"

Ah. That explained the chapter title above.

Narrowing his eyes, Teacher Fielding let go off Zuo Teng and glared at him.

"Do that again," he warned icily. "And I will kill you."

"…yes, sir." Zuo Teng straightened his collar as he backed away and audibly gulped. Fielding then turned to survey the edge of the stage, where a few healing students had hastily rushed forward to put poor Dong Fang Yue Chu on a stretcher.

The rest of the students had fallen silent by now, probably horrified by what they just witnessed. Meanwhile the black-belted students sitting in seiza around the ring maintained their stony expressions, as if used to all this violence.

"Yue Chu!" I rushed toward my unconscious friend, but the healer students waved me back in annoyance.

"Don't obstruct us! We've to take him to the infirmary as quickly as possible!"

"Don't worry," the other healer student assured me. "Teacher Cure will take care of him. I'm sure he'll be fine."

And just like that, they were gone.

"…anyone else wishes to challenge?" Teacher Fielding was asking, but after witnessing the brutal murder…uh, I mean "punishment" of Dong Fang Yue Chu, no one was enthusiastic or eager to proceed toward their deaths. Uh, I mean no one was a glutton for punishment.

Except for me.

I glanced in the direction Dong Fang Yue Chu had disappeared in, feeling rage well up inside me. The guy was my friend. And it enraged me to see him being treated like that, to be robbed of the reward he was promised just because he lost the second match against three martial artists…I mean mages. True, he stupidly overestimated himself and got overly cocky, and he sort of deserved the beat-down he received at the hands of his three opponents.

But Zuo Teng pissed me off. obviously he was looking down on Chinese martial arts and testing how strong we were against his Japanese karate…wait, what? Never mind. I should stop confusing reality with movies (did I just make a movie reference instead of an anime reference? The horror!).

Pushing my glasses up my nose and loosening my tie, I stepped onto the ring.

"I wish to make a challenge," I declared, my voice frosty with rage. Any colder and my surroundings would start freezing around me.

Teacher Fielding nodded, probably understanding the reason for my anger. He was about to choose my opponents for me, but I raised a hand.

"I want ten!" I shouted.

"…eh?"

"Huh?!"

"What?!"

All the student spectators gaped at me in total disbelief, not sure they had heard me right. I ignored them, focusing my gaze on Fielding. He was also taken aback, staring at me uncertainly.

"Are you serious? Don't be reckless."

"I said, I want to fight ten people!" I insisted stubbornly. One of the students stood up and nervously translated my words for the two teachers, though why, I had no idea. I was speaking the same language as everyone else.

"Did you say ten people?"

The student translator lowered his head. "Yes."

"Oi, cut it out! You don't need any translations!" I snapped. "Stop wasting time with all this acting! We all know which movie you're trying to parody!"

"Okay, okay." Fielding swallowed and sighed heavily. He knew what was coming, probably because he also watched it.

Beside him, Zuo Teng barked out in amused laughter. "I would love to see him try!" he sneered scornfully.

I kept my determined gaze on Teacher Fielding, my eyes steely and unyielding. He took a deep breath before he finally nodded to show his consent.

Folding his arms, Zuo Teng turning to the dozens of black-belted students kneeling around the ring.

"Division 5!" he bellowed. "Unit 1! Unit 3! Unit 5!"

Suddenly remembering something, I reached into my pocket and yanked out a packet of Calbee pizza-flavored potato chips. I then calmly turned around and returned to the place where the bloodied sack of Dong Fang Yue Chu's rice lay, and placed my snack right next to it.

While I did so, ten of the students rose from around the ring and stepped up one by one, in a concerted effort to surround me. I glanced around calmly, and then proceeded back to the center, where ten students stood, waiting. The rest of the black-belted students knelt back down in impeccable unison, and joined the rest of the students as spectators. I then slowly raised both of my hands to cup them respectfully toward the ten opponents Zuo Teng had chosen for me. They bowed in perfect accord before taking up combative stances with a yell.

"Hajime!"

No, nobody was calling for some edgy, emo protagonist from an isekai web novel that was later turned into a light novel and was now adapted into two seasons of anime (so far). Zuo Teng was shouting for the match to begin, though why he chose to speak in Japanese was beyond me. No, actually, I knew why, thanks to my fourth-wall breaking abilities, but it would be funnier to see the readers get the reference by themselves without me spelling it out for them.

"Hai!"

The first one came at me with a bellow, but I smacked him to the side with my elbow, and then turned away to avoid a kick and a punch from two different mages behind me. Why were they physically attacking me instead of casting spells, I had no idea. Okay, maybe I did, but I decided to just pretend that they were all honing their Ba Qi for real-life combat.

A fourth guy threw a high kick at the back of my head, but I spun around, caught his foot and then kicked him in the crotch. As he shrieked, I drove him downward and basically snapped his leg with a loud crack before knocking him out with a punch to his head. Another two came at me, but I whirled around and parried their strikes almost simultaneously before hammering my elbow into a third guy who tried to ambush me.

As I distanced myself from the two who were trying to attack me, I slammed my knee into the reeling ambusher and then knocked him out with another punch to his face. Spinning around, I kicked another guy who was coming at me with a punch, sending him flying. Another came at me, but I ducked under his punch, caught his arm and yanked him over. While he fell, off balance, I rained several dozen rapid blows on his face, pummeling him all the way to his chest before moving my fists up toward his face. The guy gurgled and crashed onto the ground.

"Why aren't they using any magic?" someone from the audience demanded, getting annoyed.

"They are supposed to be mages, right? Why are they just fighting with nothing but physical attacks?"

"I mean, I can sense them using their physical reinforcement spells and very rudimentary Ba Qi, but why aren't they using ranged spells or elemental attacks?!"

The spectators had a point. It was just that my opponents were restraining themselves for fear of accidentally hitting their own comrades with their own elemental or area of effect spells. Not solely because we were trying to rip off a scene from a certain martial arts movie.

"Is that Wing Chun?" Zuo Teng demanded, scarcely able to believe his eyes. "Is he trying to copy that famous martial artist who lived in Foshan before moving to Hong Kong and training Bruce Lee?"

"His grandfather is supposed to be a grandmaster of Wing Chun," Teacher Fielding explained. "Before Richard's father, Huang Shun Yin, learned swordsmanship at the Miyamoto dojo, he learned Wing Chun from his biological father, Huang Yue Wen."

"Ugh!" Zuo Teng was getting frustrated. He leaned over the railing and began…uh, railing at his students. "What the fuck do you idiots think you're doing? You think you're karate experts, is it?! You're bloody mages! Use your magic!"

He slapped his forehead and groaned, shaking his head.

"Fucking idiots."

"They just don't want to accidentally hit each other with their own spells," Teacher Fielding informed him coolly, merely echoing what I already knew. Zuo Teng grimaced when he realized his colleague had a point.

"Don't tell me that brat actually knew that and planned this from the start? He was using their numerical superiority to his advantage to nullify their magic?!"

No. quite honestly, that never occurred to me at all. I was just trying to rip off Donnie Yen from one of my favorite martial arts movies.

Another guy jumped and tried to kick me, but I moved to the side and allowed him to sail past me before I slammed my elbow into his midriff, knocking his breath out of him. As he grunted, I then grabbed him by his uniform and slammed him into the ground, and then stomped on his face, almost breaking his neck.

Three more enemies came at me from the front, throwing a flurry of punches, but I parried, blocked and deflected every one of their strikes, and even had the luxury of kicking a fourth guy who tried to flank me to discourage him from getting close. Advancing forward, I punched upward and caught one of them by the jaw, causing him to stagger, then swept low to kick the one in the middle. Ducking under another punch from the third guy, I spun around and slammed my elbow into his neck, cracking it, and then dropped him with a kick to his midriff. Without any hesitation, I then kicked the staggering guy and knocked him over before bringing my arms up to parry a blow from the guy in the middle. He came at me ferociously, backed up by the comrade I discouraged earlier, but I managed to retreat.

As the middle guy charged me again, I grabbed his arm even as his fist flew past the side of my face, and then twisted it. He yelped, but tumbled over helplessly, and I mercilessly pounded his face with my right hand, bloodying my knuckles. I refused to stop my barrage until the poor guy finally stopped convulsing and slipped into unconsciousness.

Straightening myself, I turned to stare at the others, but one of them ran at me with a yell and tried to kick me. I ducked under his foot and then struck his knee with his foot, snapping his balance and throwing him off. As he fell, I kicked his face and floored him.

All around me, the fallen groaned and moaned in pain. At least those who weren't unconscious anyway. There was two last opponents left, and they were nervously keeping their distance, aware that I would crush them instantly if they recklessly attacked.

Regardless, they could withdraw all they want and I would still pulverize them. I couldn't forgive their teacher for hurting Dong Fang Yue Chu.

At this point, though, I was getting annoyed.

"Hey!" I snapped, raising both of my hands. "Why aren't any of you using magic?! You looking down on me or something?"

The two of them glanced at each other, and then a silent agreement seemed to pass between them.

One of them dove away, but before I could understand what was going on, the other guy launched a fireball at me. Taking a deep breath, I punched the fiery projectile into oblivion, the flames dissipating harmlessly around me. I didn't even need to counter such a pathetic spell with my own magic.

However, I realized that it was merely a distraction. The other guy was casting healing spells on his fallen comrades, fixing whatever broken bones or bruises they had sustained during my fight. He wasn't as proficient as Teacher Cure, but the injuries were not fatal and relatively minor, and in any case he didn't need to heal them back to full health for them to begin using magic. Glancing around, I saw at least five different elemental spells being cast and aimed at me.

I grinned. "Now that's more like it."

Then my world vanished in an explosion of volatile elements and violent mana.