Chapter 297 The Third Round
Following the rules set before, Xi Wei ranked the contestants by their points acc.u.mulated, allowing those within the top thirty-two to qualify for the final round of the Twin City Cup.
The event was relatively normal duels.
At first, Xi Wei had intended to scale up the last round, to make it grander.
However, the second round had cost him more divine energy than he had expected-even if he had relied on the simulated divine kingdom to retain and revive the souls of those who died within with less cost.
He had fork out divine powers that he had stored before the entire tourney as well since the divine power he had allocated for the tourney was basically used up. Aside from the divine power required for maintaining the Players’ daily necessities and reserved for emergencies, Xi Wei had basically not one drop of excess divine power left.
That was why the last round had to be conducted so plainly. The citizens of Lancaster, however, were not dissatisfied at all.
One might even say that they were excited to see the usually high-and-mighty priest and clerics throw themselves at each other like a bunch of wrestlers.
In fact, when Mayor Corinth announced the format of the third round, the citizens actually looked like they were a little eager than the two rounds before.
On the three days of rest for the contestants following the conclusion of the second round, everyone in Lancaster was talking about the Twin City Cup. The hottest topic, of course, was who they were hoping to triumph in the end.
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Naturally, the ones tipped to claim the final victory were the monks of the Brilliant White Church.
Even if they top champion was eliminated from the finals and their top scorer in the second round was outside the top ten, the reputation of the Brilliant White Church as the top religion of the continent and the monks’ performance in the first two rounds had earned them the support of many conservative citizens, who were a.s.sured that these monks would last until the very end.
In comparison, the citizens who supported the Church of Games were scarce.
Nonetheless, the Players didn’t think much about that since most citizens weren’t even aware of the existence of the Church of Games before the Twin City Cup started.
Still, after strong performances in the first two rounds that drew much fans for them, the G.o.d of Games rose from an anonymous religious faction to become one of the dark horses of the tourney, which could be considered a profound development.
But behind the Brilliant White Church and the Church of Games, the performances which the remaining religious factions put up paled in comparison, and support for them naturally were less warm. In truth, the wyvern knights of the Temple of Glory hadn’t been lured by the monks of the Brilliant White Church and then directly blindsided, with only their champion Isaac and Jones, who happened to be nearest to Isaac alive and qualifying for the last round.
Still, those two were hurt considerably by the holy choir bombardment of the Brilliant White Church.
And unlike the first round, when Xi Wei revived the dead on the second round, he would stuff in some missing innards and put in some slapdash healing to prevent the revived from dropping dead immediately again from their mortal wounds.
Basically, he didn’t care much about anything aside from ensuring that they didn’t die.
That way, many would be left injured and, on the surface, Xi Wei, the G.o.d of Games would take a blow to his reputation-but that proved not to be case.
Not only would he save divine energy, he could also indirectly promote his two colas in Lancaster.
And as for the Brilliant White Church selling holy water of the same effect… Who would want those expensive trinkets!?
***
“It seems that the entire city is talking about who would come out on top in the third round, and they are even betting privately. What do you think, Sir Isaac?”
Terry and Jom had taken some time off to visit their new ally while bringing along a set of cola meals.
After all, that stuff was not expensive… and they would be reimbursed anyway!
The Temple of Glory was another religious faction of great scale and influence. While they did not provide mystical holy water and didn’t possess much sacred healing arts, they were considerably learned in potions as the believers of the G.o.d of War, and could concoct potions with good effects.
When Terry and Jom arrived at the Temple of Glory, Isaac, who was caught in an explosion in the second round could now get off the bed to move, but his face still looked pale.
“If there’s nothing unexpected, the winners of the tourney would either be those monks of the Brilliant White Church or believers from your Church of Games.”
Isaac sighed. “For one, a majority of the third-round contestants are from your church. Secondly, even if the believers from other churches could heal their injures in the three-day break, they could hardly recover from their mental fatigue.”
He glanced towards the spirited Terry and Jom at that. “After all, not everyone is the same like the members of your fraternity-not one of you look tired even after beating a monster like the Night Tide Dragon. Likewise, the monks of the Brilliant White Church are used to spiritual torment, and that bit of fatigue wouldn’t affect their performance.”
The magic mirrors were still replaying the thrilling moments of the second round in Lancaster Square, with Isaac himself having made time to take a look. And when he saw that the believers of the G.o.d of Games stood off against a colossal creature like the Night Tide Dragon without fear and composedly planned countermeasures despite being foiled several times, eventually succeeding in luring the creature on land to encircle and bring it down, he couldn’t help admiring and be in awe of them.
One should know that fear was a self-preservation mechanism of humans. For example, most humans would shut their eyes when a needle was stabbing towards their eye, and even though the needle was still some distance away-it was an instinct that prevents oneself from getting hurt.
On the other hand, the believers of the G.o.d of Games had conquered that fear to directly confront a monster much larger than themselves. Hence, in mental composure alone, the Church of Games could hold their heads high even in the presence of older churches.
Naturally, for Isaac who basically lives in medieval times, it was hard for him to understand the Players’ mindset who directly converts a foe’s power to rare, powerful items…
The Night Tide Dragon notwithstanding-even if it was a true dragon, all they need were weapons and the view of a HP bar, and the Players would have the courage to attack!
“Don’t you have a good chance of winning too, Sir Isaac?” Jom said then. “I saw from the bets that your odds are one to one, just like the current leader of the Brilliant White Church’s monks.”
“If we fight unimpeded, I certainly wouldn’t fear the Brilliant White Church,” Isaac said, shaking his head. “However, half the skills of us wyvern knights revolve around combined attacks with our mounts, making it a tough fight especially since those shameless monks of the Brilliant White Church is focusing on our sacred arts of combat aura. Both my physical strength and aura would naturally drop to rock-bottom if I faced two of them-one after another, and I just can’t last long enough to fight.”
Moreover, there were thirty-two individuals who qualified from the second round, meaning that ultimate victory requires five consecutive victories. Clearly, compared to Isaac who was all by himself, the monks and the Players who could choose to save their strength and have the stronger ones enter the next round if they were matched up against an ally would have the greater advantage!