you to come on stage!"
The maiden’s voice woke Roger up from his dream. He rubbed his face and then
gradually recovered. His original confusion once again became clearer.
Today was a big day, which happened every twenty years, the day that
youngsters from all the branches in the Green family compete.
It had been more than four hundred years since the legendary shaman "Green Sea Tenant" founded the
Green family. He was originally all alone in this world, but his
posterity constantly grew. It already had six branches, which made up a big
family of more than two hundred people.
No matter how many great powers he possessed, he still did not have ability to
nurture these numerous children and grandchildren. Not to mention, those with
poor potential didn’t qualify to be nurtured either. Hence, two hundred years
ago, the grand master had made a rule that if the descendants in the family wanted to
have the best conditions to develop and were not satisfied with leisurely and safely being rich, they had
to rely on their own abilities to participate. Only using
one’s own power to win in the competition could earn the family respect,
and gain nurturing from the grand master.
This competition was held every twenty years. In other words, unless one could
accomplish something for one’s self, the majority of the members of the Green family
could only participate once in their entire life.
The participant was only ten years old when competing their first time or
he would have been thirty years old if he waited till the second time. And how
can a thirty-year-old person be seen as young?!
Roger was considered pretty advantageous. He was twenty-seven years old this year,
not far from the limited age of thirty years old. His strength almost reached the
peak of youth. In the meantime, among his rivals, the oldest would just pass
twenty-five, much younger than him.
He was certainly pleased with this point. Maybe, someone would criticize him for
being lucky, but having luck was also a part of his strength!
His eyes scanned across the fighting stage not far from where he was. Right then, two
youngsters with the same surname - Green were competing there. They didn’t really
fight, but elegantly discussed their researches about magic knowledge-- -- this kind
of "Verbal fight" was not only safe, but also showed their complete accumulative
knowledge of a shaman. One who could take the upper hand in the discussion process usually
had a stronger ability than their rivals.
The level of those two youngsters had a clear gap. Not too long after, one among of them
was rebutted to the point of being tongue-tied, and could not say anything more. Accordingly,
victory and failure were decided.
"The next round: Roger from the second branch versus Tanner from the third branch!"
The old shaman who hosted the competition used an amplified voice to send out
orders, "Both sides come on stage!"
Roger fixed his things a little, adjusted his mood, then went over to the
fighting stage.
His footsteps were not quick, but maintained a stable speed, so that he could
deal with any unexpected situation at any time.
His rival - Tanner was not an ordinary man. Despite his age of nineteen years old,
he had already displayed the mid-level magic - "arbitrary door". This magic gave one an
unbelievable moving ability. At any moment, he could show up in any position on the
fighting stage. In the practice fight in the past, while the opponent still hadn’t
seen Tanner’s figure clearly, he had been beaten by Tanner from behind.
The innate talent of Roger could be considered not bad. Ever since he came back to
the Green family when he was twelve years old and started to come in contact with
magic to now, he had fifteen years to practice. But it was just the same, he could
not master even a single mid-level magic. However, he had already mastered
more than twenty types. He was pretty skillful in some types among those. In the past,
when practicing, he also beat a lot of people by coordinating magic.
This was the strength that helped him have guts to step on the fighting stage.
As long as he could defeat Tanner, he could get more resources. Moreover,
after he had reached the semi final, no matter if he won or lost, he had the
chance to showcase his talent in front the great legendary master.
To him, that was a very good opportunity. He must seize it!
As he was thinking this way, Roger walked to the fighting stage. Tanner was thinking the
same as he had already put on the pose of welcoming the enemy.
"The winner will definitely be me!" Tanner said like hitting the nail on the head,
"Although I am very sorry, I really need this chance!"
"So do I." Roger said nonchalantly. He didn’t wait for the opponent to get ready, but
immediately raised his hand, and started to chant the spell.
According to the rules of the competition in the Green family, before the host
commanded, both sides could not attack each other -- -- -but "chanting a spell" and
"attacking" were two different things. As long as Roger didn’t complete the magic, it
could not be taken as an attack.
This was the plan he had prepared since long ago. He originally wanted to use
this in the final. In the end, he decided that it was now or never.
In fact, he thought there was no other ways. As compared to this genius, he was still
lacking a lot. If he didn’t fully make use of this strategy, he would not have
a possibility to defeat Tanner.
The old shaman pondered a moment, still picking fault in Roger’s action,
in the end but commanded for the battle to start.
At this moment, the Rogers’s magic was almost finished preparing.
Tanner of course knew this magic. With just a glance he realized the
magic Roger used was the most evil one, the "Stinky Cloud" magic. He instantly frowned.
The power of the "Stinky Cloud" was not too big, but its disgusting smell made the
infected people so grievous that they wished they were dead. Someone even had
anorexia and had to go to the God shrine to get treatment.
Among the magic Roger had, this magic could be considered the highest
level of difficulty. Although its damaging range was quite wide, it could distinguish
friend or foe. But Roger had specially trained his resistance ability to the stinky air so
that he could display this magic, "Stinky Cloud". In comparison, Tanner’s
magic casting ability was more superior than his by a fraction, but the stinky smell could
make Tanner dizzy, and hence could not allow him to display magic, and lose for sure.
However, Tanner’s choice was way out of Roger’s expectation.
Tanner took out a space bag, then pulled out a crossbow from the bag whose string
had been tightened and arrow had been installed as well.
In a relatively small fighting stage of the shaman, one "Stinky Cloud" magic had covered
more than half of the stage. This also meant Roger couldn’t avoid the
attack from Tanner’s arrow in such a close distance.
What would the result be if a weak shaman was hit by a crossbow in such a close
distance?
Roger was scared out of his wits. His magic, which was about to be complete,
wasn’t able to be launched. In that split second, he suddenly thought of something
and screamed out, "You have broken the rule!"
He turned around, denounced Tanner with the hosting old shaman, "Grand master,
Tanner uses bow in a battle between the shamans. This goes against the rule!"
But the grand master just sighed and shook his head.
Roger was stunned as he then turned his head around and saw that the crossbow had
already disappeared in Tanner’s hand. Instead, a magic light flashed up.
In the next moment, several magic bullets fired up from Tanner’s hand, which should
have carried a bow. Instantly, these bullets overcame the distance between them and
hit Roger’s body.
The sound of crystal crushing came up from Roger’s body. This meant he had been
severely wounded and that he couldn’t keep on fighting.
He was eliminated.
Until this moment, the old shaman host spoke up, "Making use of the boundary of the
rule to hit a ball on the sideline is of course possible. But you launched magic
sooner. The result of your magic was still one step lower than the other’s. This gap is too
obvious. Not to mention, you were too immersed in displaying your magic,
completely ignoring Tanner’s magic-- -- although the ‘Silent phantom’ Tanner
displayed is just a really low-level magic, it has successfully overtaken you."
"It is not only that, but under the circumstance where a crossbow was targeting
you, you didn’t quickly think of a method to deal with or avoid it, but chose to
denounce it. This is a serious mistake-- -if there are some violating behaviors,
won’t I stop it? Moreover, is a shaman who is competing able to report to
the referee?"
"Look at Tanner. Facing your violating action, he chose to immediately perform a
counter attack, which secured the victory in his hand. This is a quality a shaman
should have!"
"Roger, you have lost not only in the magic casting ability, but also in
your eyes and your mentality. You are defeated from top to bottom!"
Roger stood there blankly, not knowing what to do.
How can it be this way? This was just the first round. How could he already lose?!
"It is impossible!" As he screeched, the scene in front of his eyes shattered.
A light flashed up, bringing him from the illusion back to reality. He was
dumbstruck sitting on the ground. The giant jellyfish in front of him was sneering.
"Without Kahn, you have no way to succeed." Sui Xiong coldly said, "You can’t
even beat a young man who was easily defeated by Kahn."
"Nonsense! It is just that my innate foundation is too weak!" Roger said loudly, "I
came back to the Green family when I was twelve years old. I’ve wasted too much
time. Not to mention with the identity of an illegitimate child, even though I am
recognized, I can’t receive many resources either-- -- -- -if I could receive
resources and be nurtured like Kahn since I was young, I absolutely would have
won!"
Sui Xiong smirked, "Are you sure that is right? Then let me clean your eyes."
The magic light flashed up again. As everything before Roger became blurry, he once
again fell into the illusion.
This time, he completely replaced Kahn, becoming the oldest son of the second branch
of the Green family, was taught by good teachers since he was little, and received a large
amount of resources. Under such sufficient conditions, he grew up very
quickly. When he reached twenty, he had already been a pretty-capable
shaman, even started to research the mid-level magic.
However, in the family there were some excellent young men like him. The oldest son
of each branch were approximately at the same level as him, some were
even stronger than him.
To win the competition that happened every twenty years in the family, he had hired
some adventurers to explore the Immemorial Forest to find some famous relics in
hopes of getting some treasures that could help him increase his power.
He had already failed. Since he was little, he was brought up in wealth. In critical moments
faced with danger, he couldn’t react timely. Although, thanks to the sacrifice of his
subordinates, he could luckily escape, but he was still heavily wounded. The worst part of
it was that due to the mental injury, his magic casting ability dropped.
To treat him, the family had also spent lots of effort. After confirming his situation
was incurable, they gave up nurturing him. Instead, they chose to nurture an
illegitimate child, who was younger than him, whose innate talent was also weaker
than his. But the mental quality and the level of effort of the illegitimate child both
surpassed his.
In the end, he could only sit in the audience, watching that little mixed-breed rascal;
who didn’t lay an eye on him, winning every single match all the way to the end.
That little mixed-breed rascal finally won the competition that happened once every
twenty years in the Green family.
Roger’s life from that point onward had nothing special to talk about. His spirit
became more and more depressed. He became more dispirited, then quickly
started to degrade. He used alcohol, beauty, and drugs to paralyze himself.
When he was about thirty years old, due to long-term drinking and excessive
indulgence in debauchery, after one time of using psychedelic drugs, he no longer
woke up from the hallucination.
The light flashed up, the illusion disappeared, but Roger didn’t open his eyes
anymore.
He had already died because of desperation.
Maybe he had realized since long ago, he was just in his own illusion. Even
though he had seized the resources and nourishment of the oldest son, he still couldn’t
succeed. His proud talent until now was in fact just his illusion about himself.
He was not as excellent and capable as he thought!
The moment he was aware of this point was the moment just before his death.