A big announcement rocked the barracks. The official ranking competition would commence in two weeks!
Whoever takes first place becomes the commander of the regiment!
Rank 2 and 3 respectively become the two vice commanders of the regiment!
Rewards would be distributed based on your placement in the first round of the competition as follows:
Rank 1 (Commander): 100 ether fragments
Rank 2 (Vice Commander): 50 ether fragments
Rank 3 (Vice Commander: 25 ether fragments
Rank 4-10: 10 ether fragments
Rank 11-100: 5 ether fragments.
In addition to this, after the competition, a weekly allowance will be distributed based on your rank as follows:
Regiment Commander: 20 ether fragments
Regiment Vice Commanders: 15 ether fragments
Regiment trainees rank 4-10: 10 ether fragments
Regiment trainees rank 11-100: 5 ether fragments
Regiment trainees rank ≥ 101: only 1 ether fragment
However, these positions were not permanent. Every month, those in the top 100 could be challenged for their ranking position.
This meant that even the position of the regiment commander was not permanent. Only the strongest had the right to lead.
The people ranked outside the top 100 were all likely to lack strong combat abilities, if any. When you were deemed too weak and unpromising, the clan would invest very few resources into you.
They would all have a bleak future unless they had promising utility skills.
Because of this, they were all sent into a frenzy.
Everybody had the same thought. They needed to become stronger and achieve success no matter what!
Blight was calm. He understood. This was the carrot on a stick that domesticated the human animal, slowly luring them into the cage until it was too late and impossible to escape.
The powerful, arrogant, and haughty would be given the weight of responsibility, wearing them down into chained kings, unaware of their own leash. While the weak, full of fascination for authority and power, would be lured into submission willingly. They would do anything for a taste of it!
Blight sat cross-legged atop his bed inside his dormitory bedroom.
He did not have any interest in leading these children, and he could not care less about this clan, but the temptation of ether fragments clutched at his heart.
'If I can get first place earning 100 fragments, and gaining another 20 ether fragments every week, then by the end of my year of training, my ether core would be strengthened by 1500 fragments.'
[Ether Core]
Rank: Awakened
Ether fragments: [0]
That would put him halfway over the limit of an Awakened ether core, but of course, this rank would not be his limit.
Boon: [Limitless]
Boon Description: [Your ether core can be strengthened infinitely.]
'Does this mean that my awakened ether core could be upgraded to the ascended rank if I can absorb more than a thousand ether fragments without reaching the ascended realm?'
The description of his ability did not specify exactly what it meant. Would its rank be upgraded, or would the number of ether fragments just go up?
Was there even a difference? He did not know.
'My competition is fierce, but with [Gaze of the Abyss], I have a tremendous advantage. At least with the rules of these fights. I have a chance of achieving a high placement.'
Blight clenched his fists.
The next morning, when he arrived at sorcery, he told the old man of his desire to achieve a good placement and asked if there was any way he could help him achieve this goal.
"What gives you the confidence to aim for such a thing?"
Blight shrugged, "Man is something to be surpassed. Such is the path of ascension. What is the point in living a life of mediocrity like a common herd animal?"
The instructor stared blankly at him. He had no counter to that!
Were these the words of a child?
The more time he spent with Blight, the more he recognised that this kid was something special.
He had no standing within the clan, pitifully useless abilities, and a bleak-looking future, and yet he was not discouraged in the slightest.
He worked diligently, trained hard every day, and did not slack off.
In addition to this, he was practically a natural-born genius. While he was still young and ignorant, his potential and ability to learn were among the highest he had ever seen.
He'd developed a good impression of Blight and wondered what was driving him.
These children were all driven by something, whether they knew it or not. It could simply be a fear of death or the weight of their families' needs or bitter expectations.
He could always easily see through them, but Blight was like a blank canvas.
It was more accurate to say he was a canvas that was entirely obscured with black ink.
"Hmmm... I have an idea, then. Follow me."
Blight stood across from the old instructor at the training grounds.
The old man had his hands crossed, looking down at him curiously.
"Activate one of your abilities."
Blight obliged and activated [Gaze into the Abyss].
"Your eyes have a constant stream of ether going to them. that's your lifeforce vision ability isn't it?"
Blight gulped lightly and nodded.
The sorcery instructor began to sign hand movements for a surge spell. "Don't freak out."
A white thread that looked like spider silk shot out from the instructor's hands and attached to him.
Almost immediately after that, his additional vision from [Gaze into the Abyss] disappeared, and he felt extremely uncomfortable.
Blight asked, "What did you just do?"
Then his vision came back.
The instructor stood stilly in place, stroking his beard, and dispersed the thread with his fingers.
"This is a crude technique I thought up, which disrupts ether flow in other beings."
'Spider sling can be used in this way?' Blight was shocked.
"I know what you are thinking." The instructor shook his head. "This trick would never work against any experienced awakened, but against oblivious children, you can easily disarm them and achieve a high placement in this competition."
"It works because this thread is made of pure ether, acting as a perfect conductor to inject with ether. It will travel toward the target and disrupt their own flow of ether. But it is really easy to prevent such an attack, it only works because you kids don't know what you are doing yet."
He began to sign with his hand again, instructing, "This time, try to block my flow of ether with your own."
When Blight felt the sling attach itself to his body, he immediately used his own ether to block any invading ether from entering his body and found that it was incredibly easy, even easier than reinforcing his body with ether normally.
This time, [Gaze into the Abyss] was not disturbed.
"See how easy that was? When you ascend, you will naturally become immune to such a crude attack, but for now, you should be considerate of such attacks made against you."
"With this ability, you should be able to do well. Just don't reveal this technique until you face an unbeatable adversary."
Blight nodded, agreeing.
"After they learn your little trick, they will learn how to defend against it, at that point wether you are able to maintain your position will be up to your own efforts."
"Thank you very much, teacher."
Blight bowed deeply and left.
The old man remained in his place for a while, deeply contemplating something before he left the barracks, returning to his other duties.