Talent

Eyes widened she watched as the spears slowly entered her body, 'I messed up.'

The spears skewered her like a kebab on a grill forming a gruesome sight, the pain burst through her body until darkness overwhelmed her.

---

On the altar, the two remaining contestants flew off at the same moment and fell.

Ireya slowly stood back up massaging her forehead, she looked at the person who had fallen off with her. It was a young man who looked about 17 with long black hair, his face had delicate features looking similar to a girl.

She took her hand out, "Thanks.", he took her hand and pulled himself up.

Ryle began speaking, "Combat Test is over, follow us to your final test. But before that.."

Runes appeared on all of the contestant's foreheads, 6 of them were red while the rest were all green. These runes then slowly disappeared.

Bam!

He threw 6 of the contestants out the door, "They all failed.", he said then looked at the floor.

This time the floor began opening up with a rumble, stairs appeared which lead to some sort of underground room.

As they followed the stairs down in the darkness the young man came up to her, "Thank you for the help, my name's Kyle, yours?"

"Ireya, no problem.", she looked at him from the side of her eye as she continued walking.

'Is he also one of those plotting people? I need to be careful.'

He continued talking to her as they walked down, looking from the side all the other young men felt jealous, they would all love to talk to such a cute girl but they couldn't bring themselves up. They couldn't compare in the slightest to Kyle.

A long walk later light appeared at the end of the stairway, walking into the bright light a vast mountain appeared. Buildings built a path up the mountain and much smaller building surrounded all sides of this mountain, the further up you looked the mistier it got.

"Wow!"

"What is this place!"

The contestants blew up in discussions, Ireya looked back and saw that the entrance they came from was a cave that disappeared within a mountain. "How can such a vast world exist under such a small city..."

Ryle and Charlotte expected this type of reaction, "Welcome to Fifth Alliance City!"

"Alliance City?", Ireya asked, seeing this giant city she was curious as to how it could even exist underground. The sun shone down on her just like normal and the weather existed, it seemed as if they were on the surface.

"That's right, normal people don't know that this place exists, they just think that the Cultivators Badge represents people who are cultivators. The Cultivators Alliance is a massive academy that is governed by the Dynasty. We exist to protect the peace of this continent against Oceanic Beasts."

Now Ireya understood why Raya had originally wanted them to get Cultivator Badges, this was the reason why. It was perfect to train and get stronger, her dreams of getting stronger, however, were quickly shattered.

"The only way to have an instructor guide you is by slaying Oceanic Beasts, you do get some starter Oceanic Points though, they are given depending on your talent. From here on all of you are officially a part of Cultivators Alliance, but this next Energy Talent Test will decide who good your experience will be from now on."

Ryle went quiet and allowed Charlotte to speak, "This next test will be governed by me, follow."

The students followed Charlotte and spoke between themselves as they admired the view.

---

Upon a far hill lay an old woman admiring the sun, her senses picked up new energy points.

"New students, I've lived for so long, this is already the 1565th batch of students I've seen. You two came in 300 batches ago right?", sighing she continued admiring the sun.

Two old women stood in the back continued watching over the old lady making sure nobody interrupted her, not even the tiniest ant could slip past their attention.

But hearing her words they couldn't help but reminisce the past with her.

---

Coming up to the first of many buildings on the mountain Charlotte called out the first person's name on the list.

She called them up in reverse order, from worst in the combat test to the best.

One by one they left and entered the building, an hour later 15 names had passed by. "Kyle!", she called out.

"I'll be going ahead Ireya.", Ireya nodded at him and watched as he walked off.

4 minutes later the doors opened back up, he had a wide smile on his face, he walked up confidently to Ireya stood next to her. "How did it go?"

"Very well.", he responded.

"Ireya!", her name was called out next.

She stepped forward and entered the building, the inside was quite plain with a few couches and a marble tablet in the middle, Charlotte stood to the side of it.

"Put your hand on it.", she ordered.

"That's it?"

"That's it.", Ireya listened to her and placed her palm on the cool surface.

A cool thick liquid seemed to enter her body, it swept up to her brain and down to her feet. This thick liquid circled over and over again for 4 minutes before finally calming down.

Charlotte watched the marble and waited.

Boom!

A thick brilliant wave of light broke through the top of the marble and flooded upwards towards the ceiling, the roof reflected this wave and caused it to flood the room with brilliance. On the outside of the building, there was no trace of the energy but on the inside, the light had almost blinded Charlotte in its brilliance.

"What the! My eyes!", Charlotte guarded her eyes for a full minute before the light finally calmed down.

Ireya woke up the moment the light had faded away, Charlotte stared at her like she was looking at a monster. "Wait right there!", she took out a small piece of paper and burnt it.

After a minute of awkward silence between them, a figure shifted before them.

A man with a trimmed beard and large posture with short black hair stood in front of them, Ireya studied him as he watched her.

"Is she the one?", he asked with a rough voice.

"Yes sir.", she got on her knees and bowed at him.

"Come with me little girl.", his hand landed on her shoulder before she could react and they disappeared from the room.

Charlotte was left behind sweating, but then a voice appeared in her head, "Never tell anyone of what happened, if you do...", she felt the threat in his voice and quickly swore on her own life that she wouldn't.

Fixing herself up she exited the building.

"Where's Ireya instructor?", Kyle stepped up after seeing her leave without Ireya.

"Don't ask any questions, just follow me.", she didn't expose any information and led them on to get there badges and robes.

---

When they appeared again they were within a small garden, beautiful trees were growing on the side and fruits that seemed to explode with juice hung from there.

"Bow down to the master.", the robust man pushed Ireya onto her knees whilst he got onto his knees too.

"Master?", even so, he couldn't stop her from speaking up.

A kind-looking man in plain white clothes looked her, "You can get up you two."

"Thank you, master, you thank him too.", he looked at Ireya.

But the man raised his hand stopping them, "No need, you can leave now Luke."

Luke bowed and turned around and walked away.

Only Ireya and the man were left, "Take a seat next to me."

The man sat on the grass next to the pond and ushered her down, she listened and sat down next to him. She couldn't keep her mouth shut after they sat in silence for 5 minutes and spoke out, "May I ask who you are?", her usually rowdy personality had calmed down while sat next to him so even when she spoke it was in a different manner.

"Haha! No one's asked me who I am in a while, but it's fine. There's no need to know my name.", he then pointed at the pond in front of them.

"What do you see?"

She looked into the pond and saw nothing but fish swimming around.

"Just fish.", she looked again after saying this then felt confident with her answer.

"But there's no fish in there.", he laughed lightly.

"No fish?", she looked again and saw the fish.

He looked at her confused face and finally relaxed, 'She's not a spy.'

Flicking his wrist the fish in the water suddenly transformed into a bunch of children swimming around and playing around.

"What!", she was beyond confused at this moment.

"Is it much easier to believe in a city existing under a city or to believe in fish turning into people?", he watched the children as he said this.

Hearing this Ireya chuckled, "But you can build a city under a city, you can't build people!"

"How can you be so sure about that?", the man then slowly dissipated into mist.

Ten more figures appeared all around her and began talking, "Still sure?", he then turned back into one figure, this time he was sat on a bench.

She was hesitant to go over to him, "Are you real?"

"Of course I am! Come sit next to me."

Thump, she sat on the bench.

"Confused?"

She nodded, "Very confused"

He smiled, "Well so am I."

"Why are you confused?"

"Because you shouldn't be able to exist, your lucky Charlotte contacted the Earth Pavilion first, otherwise you'd be just another test subject under the Mortal Pavilion by now."

She shivered after hearing his words, "What do you mean I shouldn't be able to exist?"

"The Energy Mist within you is 10 times larger than ever recorded, now do you understand?"

Listening she remembered something, it was many years ago now, but her mummy had explained to her that only 10 grades existed, and the tenth was only 100 million Energy Granules, she had 1 billion.

"I understand."

"But what I assume you don't know is that only Oceanic Beasts have been recorded to have more than 100 million Energy Granules due to their naturally powerful bodies. What I should be doing right now is forcefully invading your brain and uncovering all of your secrets, but I won't."

As she heard his final few words she grew quite fearful of him but relaxed when she heard that he wouldn't, "Thank you so much.", she solemnly got off the bench and bowed to him. He watched her do this without stopping her.

"I'll allow you in, but with one condition."

"What is it?"

"Become the number 1 Ranker in under a year.", he said smiling like the most innocent man in the world.