Chapter 75 Hype Up

Lee Seng gasped as he clutched his abdomen area. He felt the ripped t-shirt and pulled it up. His abs were still there and there wasn't a hole. He looked around and realized he was sitting against the wall near the arena. Team 26 vs Team 2 hovered above the arena and the gym was filled with people screaming and cheering. He looked over and noticed that team 9 had won. The boy and girl from the other team were nowhere to be found but two pale, raven-haired men were walking out of the arena.

"What the hell happened?" Lee Seng asked. He clutched at is abs. He could still feel the arm plunging into him and blood and shadows spilling out of him.

"They told me to give this to you." The shadow man's whisper echoed. Lee Seng shuttered as he rubbed his abs.

"Hey, you alright?" Olivia's voice chimed. Lee Seng jumped and turned to see Olivia hovering above him to his right.

"Y-yeah..." Lee Seng stuttered. Olivia slid down to sit next to Lee Seng and gave him a serious look before nodding.

"You fall asleep or something? You look like you had a nightmare."

"Oh, uh..." Lee Seng's voice trailed off. He looked to his left and noticed the two pale boys were passing them.

"Nice! We won!" Pale boy 1 said.

"Ugh, I can't wait to go home!" Pale boy 2 said.

"But we gotta watch Team 2's fight! They're fighting Team 26! Four of the five top 5 soloists are fighting each other!" Pale boy 1 exclaimed. The two looked at Olivia and Lee Seng. Pale boy 1 excitedly pointed at them and then shook his friend.

"F-fine. We can stay."

Lee Seng let out a sigh of relief and shook his head.

'Maybe I was just seeing things. I meditated too hard and fell asleep. My nerves were getting to me and I just had a nightmare.' Lee Seng reassured himself. He shook his head in agreement and slapped his face a couple of times.

"Oh, you sure you're okay?" Olivia asked.

"I'll be fine. Let's just focus on beating team 2. After that, I can really rest." Lee Seng answered.

"O-okay." Olivia nodded. A loud beep noise filled the stadium. fifteen minutes had finished. People began moving into their arenas. Olivia tapped Lee Seng and motioned him to go. The two stood up and Olivia left her bag by the wall and moved over towards the arena ring. Lee Seng reached for the bow and put it over his shoulder and followed Olivia.

Ritsuka and Evan stepped into the arena ring, opposite to Lee Seng an Olivia. They looked like they were happily chatting. Lee Seng shook his head and rubbed his eyes. The strange feeling was still sitting in the pit of his stomach. He grabbed at his abdomen and held the t-shirt. He shook his head.

"Just nerves. Just a nightmare." Lee Seng tried to convince himself. The feeling stayed and he had a bad feeling about the fight. This would plague him if he couldn't shake it off now. He began to jump up and down to shake the feeling off.

"Welcome to the last match of the exam!" A male voice rang out. The crowd seemed to be in shock just like the fighters were. "This is the last fight of the duo exam portion. After this, you are all to be directed out of the school. If you need a ride, please check the bus and taxi apps. If you have anyone picking you up, please look for that in the 'Pick-up' section of the Academy app. If you didn't have the Academy app downloaded and need to quickly check where to go, you can go to the Academy's website, Capitol City Academy, and check there.

"For more help, please go to a staff member located throughout the gyms! Once again, welcome to the last matches of the day! We got some exciting matches. If you're looking for an all-out fight, go to Gymnasium A. Team 26 vs Team 2 is in the first-third section, middle arena. Team 26 consists of Lee Seng Chang, the fox gravity user and Olivia Ok, the ebb and flow, dismantle user! Versing them is team 2! Evan Trainor, the infamous kinetic shield user and Ritsuka Yamada, the weapon user!

"The biggest hyped match amongst everyone here today!" The male announcer shouted. People began to shout and Lee Seng rolled his head, cracking it. He groaned as he moved into the arena.

"They're really hyping the match up." Lee Seng said.

"I honestly hoped this wouldn't have happened, but here we are." Olivia said.

"Ha, I guess they have high hopes for us." Ritsuka shouted. Olivia and Lee Seng turned to look at him. Evan and Ritsuka were a couple of feet away from them and they all nodded. "I guess we should try to live up to the hype?"

"Nah, that means showing all of our cards." Evan disagreed.

"We don't need to show all of our cards." Olivia said. They were all ignoring the male announcer as he yapped away about other interesting fights in the other gyms. "Just live up to being rank 1 and rank 3." Olivia pointed.

"Ahh, rank 2 is telling us to live up to our ranks. You and rank 5 should do the same then." Ritsuka said. Lee Seng stretched and groaned in delight. He nodded and looked at Evan and Ritsuka.

"I guess we're all on the same page then." Lee Seng smiled. He pulled the bow off and held in his hand. He lifted it up and Ritsuka's eyes immediately landed on it.

"Did you really get that from a Blood Puppet?" Ritsuka asked.

"Mmm, I did." Lee Seng answered.

"C-can I touch it...? It looks so cool." Ritsuka's hand started to move. His body moved forward towards Lee Seng, but immediately stopped him Evan held him back.

"Ritsuka, don't get distracted by his bow. We still gotta fight." Evan said.

"C'mon, Ev. It's a cool bow! Y'know I'm a sucker for weapons like this!" Ritsuka complained. Lee Seng tried to hide his smile. Ritsuka was acting like a little kid in a candy shop.

"You can see it after the fight." Lee Seng suggested. Ritsuka's eyes lit up and he furiously nodded.

"Promise?!?" Ritsuka's pinky finger shot up and he quickly moved over towards Lee Seng. Lee Seng nodded and lifted his right hand up. He wrapped his pinky with Ritsuka's and the two lifted their thumbs to connect.

"Promise with a kiss." Lee Seng smiled. Olivia immediately burst into a giggle.

"You two are really corny." Olivia laughed. Ritsuka and Lee Seng let go and Ritsuka backed his way to Evan. "I didn't think you knew that. It's the pinnacle of Asian."

"Mmmm. I watched a lot of Japanese stuff back in the day." Lee Seng admitted.

"My mom taught me how to do that. She said it was the highest of promises or whatever." Ritsuka waved. He pointed at Lee Seng. "You swore the highest promise! Remember that!"

"Yeah, yeah. I'll show it to you afterwards."

"And those are the highlight last matches of the day! With that, let's start the last fights of the day! Remember everyone, no killing is allowed. If you are able to put your opponents out of the Arena boundaries, they are out. If you manage to knock both of them out and/or put them out of bounds, you win! Good luck!" The male announcer chimed with excitement.

Lee Seng and Olivia moved backwards a bit, mimicking Evan and Ritsuka.

"Remember the promise!" Ritsuka shouted. Lee Seng gave a thumbs up and smiled.

"Let's do our best." Lee Seng turned to look at Olivia.

"Yeah, let's do our best." Olivia smiled.

"Match will begin in 3... 2... 1... Go!" The AI voice chimed. A loud horn blared and Lee Seng quickly strapped the bow across his chest.

"Evan is probably a Tank. He's going to be tough to hit with my bow. Ritsuka's going to be annoying melee." Lee Seng said as the four ran at each other.

"I'll deal with Evan then." Olivia said. The two nodded and criss-crossed each other a couple of times. Lee Seng burst towards Ritsuka who pulled out the familiar black sword. Lee Seng smiled.

"White Fox Cloak." He spoke. The white wisps and fox mask quickly enveloped around him. He swung at Ritsuka, colliding with the black sword.

"Guess, we're going to fight?" Ritsuka smiled.

"Don't hold back!" Lee Seng shouted.

Olivia sent a barrage of attacks straight for Evan. Evan summoned his shield and the punches landed on the shield. Olivia jumped backwards as Evan shoved her away. The shield was strapped across Evan's right arm. It glowed a dim yellow color.

'Alright, if he can summon the shield then I could probably dismantle it with Dark Matter flow.' Olivia thought. She put her fists up and smiled.

"I guess Lee Seng filled you in. What're you gonna do?" Evan asked.

"I'm gonna do what I need to do." Olivia smiled. "Don't be ashamed if you're on the floor by the time this is over."