Scorching days and chilling nights quickly passed.
The godly sun once again took over its heavenly throne, watching over its subjects while providing light and life for the lands beneath the blue heavenly canvas.
Colorful fireworks once again painted the skies of Balkrow City with a myriad of hues, exploding in various astonishing shapes and sizes while producing violent yet exuberant sounds.
Today, one of the most anticipated rookie events was scheduled to begin: Balkrow City's Rookie Adventurer Competition.
The competition will decide Balkrow's rookie representative in the larger and more prominent regional competition.
...The streets...were talking.
Each rookie representative was the strongest in their guilds, and now, those very same "strongest rookies" would compete against each other in a city-wide competition.
Naturally, such a competition was bound to be exciting.
However, even among the "strongest rookies" there were five particular individuals who stood out.
Ranking fifth overall but fourth in terms of actual combat strength in the hearts of the residents and veterans, Almira Black from Hong Yun Adventurer Guild.
Next was the fourth-ranked rookie in terms of overall guild contribution points but fifth overall in terms of strength, Lin Zi from Yudaina Yama Adventurer Guild.
Ranked third both overall and in terms of strength, from Dark Sentinels Adventurer Guild: John Oni.
Now, the second-ranked rookie in the hearts of the residents and the veteran adventurers was none other than Shye Crowley from Raven's Blade Adventurer Guild.
His overall guild contribution points surpassed the points of the number one, the crowd favorite, Arthur Vermillion, by over 4000 points.
However, they simply couldn't see Arthur losing to Shye.
That's why the unofficial rankings of the top five rookie powerhouses, based on street gossip, were established.
Of course, such information would never escape the clutches of the all-knowing Seira, who was currently fuming in frustration as she walked alongside the "second-ranked" rookie, her big boss: Shye Crowley.
He sent a few of his underlings to watch and record the Raven's Blade's Rookie Representative Selection finals, and naturally, John took a bit of time to watch Shye's match.
In his eyes, Shye was strong.
However, the Raven's Blade rookie representative couldn't be farther from being a threat to him, a scout-class adventurer.
Moreover, he didn't believe that the guy would be a threat to his rival, Arthur Vermillion, thus, it would be the two of them who would fight in the finals of Balkrow City's Rookie Adventurer Competition.
To sum everything up, in John Oni's eyes, Shye was nothing but a clown.
If he would be lucky enough to get matched up with Shye in the quarterfinals or the semi-finals of the competition, John vowed to obliterate Shye's reputation.
After all, the betting stations dared f*ck around with his odds because they didn't dare do the same to Shye.
Naturally, John would harbor some resentment towards Shye.
...
"Sigh...only 1.7 times the initial amount huh?" Seira lamented the "unsatisfactory" payouts of her 850 gold coin bet.
"Sigh...what can we do? It seemed that these betting stations don't dare f*ck around with the odds of your boss anymore..." Shye did the same, acting as though the 5100 gold coin payout for his 3000 gold coin bet were mere peanuts.
Again, the duo bet almost everything they had.
What surprised both of them was that people could recognize Shye even when he was wearing a hoodie.
"H-Hey! Isn't that Shye Crowley?!"
"I think so...look, that purple-haired shorty was the guy's underling no?"
"Yeah, I believe so. This is huge! Didn't you all see him bring out a huge sack of gold coins?! There must be at least 1000 gold coins in there!"
"Are you blind?! There must be at least 2000!"
Unsurprisingly, such hubbubs made their way into the ears of a tall vermillion-haired young man with a ripped physique, causing the guy to chuckle in amusement.
"Hoh? This Shye Crowley is a bit overly confident, no? The clown thinks he could easily win the competition just because he has a 4000-point lead over me. It makes me want to embarrass him in front of Balkrow's audience so he won't dare to show his face around me anymore."