Prologue The boisterous sound of a ringing bell echoed through the area.
The sound delivering the result.
The sound of judgment, dividing the winners and losers.
The signal of the end.
"......ah"
As Layfon stood, wordless, Sharnid made some silly noise and Felli sighed lightly. Nina heard all that through Felli"s transmitter flakes.
Without a word, she accepted the truth, while the sound of the siren freed her from tension and excitement.
"This, this, this......this is unexpected!! What a turn of events!!" The excited voice of the emcee echoed in the battlefield, and in turn, the howling of the audience became louder.
Forgetting the noise that seemed to swallow her, Nina stood still.
What did it mean to be strong?
Nina Antalk asked herself.
As the captain of the 17th platoon, Nina Antalk asked herself.
To be absolutely strong means not losing to anyone. In other words, it means to be the strongest.
If that was the case, then what was the existence of the strongest?
She searched through her memories, looking for the existence of the strongest. Different kinds of strong people surfaced in her mind.
The people she had met, the people she knew from books......These people were valiant, strong......but they were still far from being the strongest.
Even strong fighters had experienced failures. They matured through failures. As they went through a journey of failures in order to become stronger, then they weren"t the strongest.
And half of those people reached the end of their lives through that journey.
Was it impossible for humans to be the strongest?
If so, then what does it mean to be the strongest?
Is the creature on the top of the food chain the strongest being? Those filth monsters?
If she kept on following this line of thought, then the world itself was probably the strongest. Leaving aside the food chain, all creatures managed to live only by standing on the stage this world provided.
And should the world change, the so-called food chain would be easily destroyed.
In fact, there had been a huge change in the world"s distant past, before Nina"s birth.
No records remained of how this happened, but the filth monsters appeared and conquered the Earth.
They spread across the world, destroying the ecosystem, turning the Earth into a barren place.
But was the Earth really the strongest existence in this world?
That was doubtful too.
Because humans still lived and survived in this world, despite its changed appearance.
Humanity lived in mobile cities that were isolated from the rest of the world. In other words, they created their own worlds. Wasn"t this the proof of the strongest?
The other proof was the filth monsters.
When the ecosystems were destroyed and all plants and animals faced extinction, the filth monsters were born, making the pollutants their food.
Wasn"t this the result of survival adaptation?
(......I"m thinking too far.)
She abandoned her thoughts to watch the young man before her.
Here is a man who had defeated the filth monsters.
Layfon Alseif.
The new Military Arts student.
And he belonged to the 17th platoon.
The genius Military Artist who had obtained the t.i.tle of the Heaven"s Blade successor at Grendan.
To Nina, he was the closest to what could be the strongest existence, but......
"Ah......"
Layfon lifted his gaze at the ringing of the bell and loosely lowered his sword. The two members of the 14th platoon that he had struck down moaned, and relaxed at the sound of the bell.
"Geez......This is so tiring."
The captain of the 14th platoon lowered his weapon. The satisfied smile of someone who executed a successful plan blossomed on his face.
The broadcast was irritating to the ear. "Big turnabout! The 14th platoon"s plan was successful against the newly formed platoon that had won the match against the 16th platoon. This time, the veteran team has turned around the result! They showed great teamwork that the new platoon lacks!!"
Teamwork......
Nina turned around to look behind her, strengthening her vision through internal-type Kei, and saw the flag of her team had fallen. Over there, Sharnid shrugged as if surrendering. Nina resented herself for worrying about how people would have perceived his response.
"Well, that"s how it is," the captain of the opposing team patted her shoulder.
"That guy"s strong. He"s strong......But there"s a way to handle him."
The murderous eyes of the captain during the match turned back into those of a senpai.
"This wasn"t a one-on-one fight."
"Yeah......"
The exhaustion of not having tried her best loosens up her tension, and she lowered her shoulders.
"You still have lots of work to do to become strong."
The captain of the 14th platoon walked over to say a few words to Layfon, and then help his subordinates, who were still lying on the ground, get back to their base.
"Th......Thank you!" Nina bowed to the back of the captain, fulfilling the etiquette required from a junior student.
She bit her lips as she gazed at the ground.