The Author's POV

"Pheeew..."

Sighing in relief, I exited the section B compound.

Donna's request definitely caught me off-guard. I had come there expecting myself to just hand in the exchange form and leave, but it seemed like Donna had other plans for me.

I was so caught off-guard that I didn't have enough time to properly weigh the benefits and the costs of the deal.

*Sigh*

Just remembering what had happened moments before made me sigh. However, thinking more about the deal that I had made with Donna, my mood brightened a little bit.

All in all, the reason I accepted was because at that time, the deal seemed to work in my favor.

...and now that I had more time to think, I couldn't agree more.

After all, Donna was going to be personally coaching me for a while.

Yeah, we would also have coaches training us for the tournament, but they weren't going to train us based on skills, but rather train us for specific games. It just wasn't the same.

...and although Donna didn't practice a sword's art, that didn't matter.

Her mastery over mana and psyon control was on a league of her own.

Sword arts didn't only focus on swords. No. Psyon control was one of the most important factors when practicing any type of art.

Let's take the Keiki style for example. In order for my sword movement to reach such unparalleled speeds, I had to coat my sword with wind psyons.

If I had better psyon control, I would estimate that reaching the Greater realm of master wouldn't take long.

Moreover, because of the fact that we were training mana control, I didn't have to reveal the sword art I was practicing...and it would benefit all of my martial manuals since better psyon control would improve not only the Keiki style but my other arts too.

...taking this factor into consideration, refusing would've been stupid. The deal was just too good to refuse.

Plus, there was another reason as to why I didn't refuse her. Why would I want to antagonize a ranked hero just for a measly tournament? Wasn't worth it.

After all, she only asked for me to pass the tryout, she never said that I had to be a key player. If I managed to become a bench player, I would pretty much get all the benefits with barely any effort.

There was no point in refusing if it'd end up with me having a bad relationship with her, as, after all, she could help me in the future if needs be.

I needed to build connections for the future. If I wanted to make it till the end of the novel, I couldn't just leave bad impressions everywhere I went because of my mindset. I needed to think long-term.

to take a loss...well as long as it wasn't too

help but

like I took a loss,

as I said before. I never really needed to be a key player. All that was required of me was

I couldn't help but lightly chuckle

war...well, we both profited, so I

it was time for me to head back to my

and I needed

dorm, recalling something, I typed something on my phone and

time I tackled my

...

color red enveloped the sky. The sound of falling debris could be heard everywhere as torn buildings and infrastructures appeared

everywhere as craters and gashes appeared on the empty streets

"Khhhh..."

feet. Her skin was white as jade, and her long black hair gently fell to the side

horns

elegant red gown was now tattered, and the outlines of

stood expressionlessly in the center of the wreckage and surveyed the surrounding destruction,

she was in. The atmosphere was so stifling that it made

her contractee, Elijah got killed a few months prior, the Matriarch found herself in

using her clan resources, the Matriarch found out that the one that was responsible for killing Elijah

her to become helpless as in no way was

she realized that

was her contractee, she managed to somehow glimpse at the scenes before his death...and from what she saw, the real killer wasn't

find out, she had no idea who was responsible...and in the midst of her looking for the real killer, she was suddenly ambushed by her fellow-clansman in

she somehow managed to come

with her life on the line, having lost a part of her strength, the Matriarch found herself

taste that coated the back of her

have you got to

"Angeli-khhh"

-Vuam!

the ground tried to speak up, however, as soon as the first words came out from his

last remaining strength she had, the

for me has fallen so low that you

full name was

of the charm tribe, a subsidiary of

clan. Being referred

you got wind of my injury you tried to seize