I had never been either a fighter or an athlete. I did use to do some exercises in the morning, but not regularly; offloading train cars was enough to make one fed up with grueling work. Of course, my muscles became stronger due to years of such "training". I wasn"t afraid of the local punks that were roaming the neighborhood. On the other hand, I had no reason to be scared of them as they considered me one of them.But this world was different. Training, exercises and so on didn"t matter here. Everything depended on the abilities you had been awarded with when you first appeared here and which you had to level up. But would my leveled up abilities be enough to withstand the sparring? Eighteen people in total would take part in the tournament, everyone except for Petrovich. The weakest would be eliminated and if I wasn"t among them, I would eventually have to fight the strongest fighters. In fact, I would be satisfied even with winning third place; but taking into account my reputation, even a single defeat would be considered inappropriate.
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While I was reflecting and making plans I didn"t notice how quickly the time flew by. Dmitri announced that the compet.i.tion was about to start soon. They had thoroughly cleaned the s.p.a.ce next to the finally finished staked fence. The boundaries of the so called arena were marked by low pegs, with a thin twine stretched between them. The audience had to be located on one side as Petrovich thought that standing around was unsafe given the fact that we had crossbowmen and archers. Sending one or two spectators to the graveyard in the heat of battle would have been a bit too much.
Right before the tournament, Petrovich publicly declared that he forbade me to use my herbal tinctures. Of course, I hoped that this wouldn"t happen, but I understood where he was coming from. Tinctures could give me an obvious advantage and he had to make sure that we all had an equal chance of winning.
Before the start of the first phase, Petrovich divided us into nine pairs. Thus, nine of us were to emerge as the winners and move on to the second phase. According to the roster, my opponent was the guy with the scar from Vlada"s detachment. I knew little about him, except that his name was Cyril. He was an unsociable guy who didn"t communicate with anyone except archer Stas. It was annoying that I had no idea what to expect from him. When we had been fighting their detachment, I considered him as an opponent with whom I had to deal as quickly as possible. I believe that it was him who I had pinned to the ground with Stone Spikes, but I could be wrong.
"Let"s start!" Petrovich shouted in a thunderous voice, obviously enjoying what was about to happen.
Boris and Olga were standing on the opposite sides of the arena and staring intensely at each other. The latter had a definite advantage as she was a shooter specialized in long-range combat. I thought it would have been more fair to put shooters against each other but Petrovich insisted on things being randomized. They won"t have a choice in a real fight, he said. It was difficult to argue with him. I stood with the others, wondering who would win.
"Come on!" Petrovich impatiently growled.
Olga didn"t waste time. She lifted her hand and shot at Boris. He was obviously expecting her to attack as he rushed to the side, avoiding the bullets. Further events reminded me of some kind of a freakish circus. Boris was running and jumping around the arena, trying to dodge Olga"s shots, but she managed to hit him nevertheless. The guy uttered a scream and clutched his shoulder with his right hand, but did not stop. He continued running in zigzags. What"s his weapon? Why isn"t he summoning it?
Olga stood her ground; with her feet and shoulders wide apart, she was methodically trying to shoot Boris. Is he waiting for her to run out of ammo? It made sense; ammo wasn"t unlimited. She emptied the first clip; Boris approached her in two tiger-like leaps and got dangerously close. Olga reloaded her gun and barely managed to jump aside when Boris summoned a thorned mace and almost bashed her head in. The force the guy had invested in the blow was so great that he himself almost fell down when the mace swooped through the air with a threatening whistle.
Taking advantage of his confusion, the business lady fired at him point-blank. The bullet hit Boris right in his side, knocking him down and making him cry out in pain and surprise. Olga aimed at him, apparently desiring to blow his brains out with another shot, but the guy rushed to the side with all the strength he had left, and the bullet dug into the ground, spraying mud everywhere. Shouting furiously, Boris swung and threw his mace straight at her. The move was so unexpected that she, taken aback, missed the shot. Olga"s bones crunched as she was thrown back. After balancing unsteadily for a few seconds, she collapsed to the ground with a loud, drawn-out groan. Boris stood up, spat the blood out of his mouth and shakily headed toward her. He summoned his mace, raised it over his head, and got ready for a strike…
Olga sharply threw her hand up and shot half of the guy"s head off. He froze and fell to his side, and got sent to the graveyard. Considering the way Boris slowed down before the shot, the girl had decided to spend some of her endurance to get into his mind and disorient him for a while. Frankly, I would have started the fight with that, but Olga, apparently, wanted to keep her trump card a secret until later and had decided to deal with Boris on her own. In terms of planning, I understood her. They were almost the same level, but Boris had been weakened because he sacrificed twenty stat points. She had overestimated herself and almost lost.
"Victory!" Olga said hoa.r.s.ely and tried to get up.
Dasha and Lena ran over to help her.
"You can resp.a.w.n," Petrovich nodded in response to Olga"s silent question. With her hand trembling, she pressed the muzzle of the gun against her temple and pulled the trigger.
The guys from Vlada"s detachment dragged their bodies to the side. Boris marked the loser pile and Olga, on the opposite side of the arena, became the first one who pa.s.sed to the second phase. Boris was made to sit, his face set in a grim expression. He had not only lost but also became the first candidate to be Petrovich"s daily victim.