Asher’s First Warm-up

"One versus fifteen?" The teen flared up.

"You're looking down on us. Just me alone can take you-"

A fist abruptly appeared right in front of the young teen, covering his entire line of sight.

Asher's cold voice rang in his ears.

"You talk too much."

The teen saw the fist increase in size before his eyes as he tried to react to it. But it was already too late. Although Asher didn't use his full strength, he did utilise his battle experience and skill. These alone were enough for him to outmatch the teen and leave him behind in the dust.

Bam.

The punch landed squarely on the teen's face and knocked him back a couple of steps before falling to the floor miserably.

"Who's next?" Asher glanced coldly at the other two.

The young girl glanced at her partner on the floor and frowned with annoyance, but a wary look appeared in her eyes once she shifted them over to Asher.

"The three on Guan's team, join up with four from that dimwit's squad and attack the others. I want two of you to focus on that girl and another two on that guy." She pointed at Melissa and Owen.

"As for the rest, attack as a group with me and Guan." The girl ordered.

Even though she had an arrogant countenance, when push comes to shove, she was able to throw that away and treat Asher as a much stronger opponent.

"Ten of us just for one guy?" Guan complained.

"Ten of us for one guy that froze your arm and knocked that dimwit unconscious. Tell me whether it's a good deal or not." The girl glared at Guan.

Guan immediately shut his mouth up as he knew that she was making a point. Although he refused to admit it, he could see that Asher didn't get the top 10 spot simply based off his intelligence alone. Trying to take him down alone was wishful thinking, so only ganking would work and in ganking, the more the better. Rather than saying ten was too much, Guan was beginning to wonder whether ten of them alone was enough.

"Go." The young girl ordered the seven other students after Asher's teammates.

Asher wanted to move to stop them as his original plan was for the team to only face three students, but he changed his mind on the spot because of James and Noah.

'Although they wouldn't gain much from these small fries, having them do something is better than nothing. Also, it shouldn't be a problem for them to handle their opponents and still keep an eye on Luna and Melissa.'

While it was true that Melissa was a top 50 ranker and could do well on her own against two students from the group of seven, Asher had a soft spot for women on his side of the team and normally wouldn't let them engage in fights unless necessary; even then, he would usually keep an eye on them. As for Owen, Asher wasn't worried about him one bit.

"Alright then. Let's play."

Asher smiled at then team of ten that stood in front of him, rather, around him as this was the tactics the girl had given to the others.

'I might have underestimated her a bit.' Asher thought.

Asher previously thought that Guan was the leader of the alliance as he had the highest force in the alliance. With his downfall, Asher believed the teen he defeated to be the new head as he spoke the most and seemed to act like one. However, from the way the other students obeyed the words of the girl, it seemed like his original presumptions were wrong. Chances were that she was the second-in-command, now head after Guan's loss, seeing as how everyone in the alliance obeyed her commands without any hassle.

One might argue that it was because all the leaders, apart from herself, had failed against Asher. Nonetheless, even if that were so, there was no reason for the other students to follow her words unconditionally. One should know that each team had a second-in-command who was to take charge in case the leader was missing or busy. None of the second-in-commands stepped out all this while, even if it was to check up on their leaders.

'Doesn't matter. I just have to finish this up quickly.' Asher scanned the attackers.

"Guan, support. Team, heaven and earth assault. The rest of you, attack with me." The girl said.

If one took notice of the allocation of the ten students facing Asher, excluding the two leader figures, six of them were members of the girl's original squad with only two coming from the knocked out teen's. The reason for this arrangement was to make it easier for her to give specific instructions as there were certain tactics which she was conversant with, but only her group was aware of them in practice. A good example was the current strategy she utilised, the third strategy 'Heaven and Earth Assault'. This tactic was one that combined both close combat and long distance attacks to overwhelm the opponent from all angles and at every moment, by dividing the team into two sets of attackers; the close combatants and the ranged attackers. It was one of the strongest tactics in her arsenal and one she was very proud off as the young girl believed, when done right, her team could even face one of the top ten students and give them a hard time. Now she had an opportunity to test out that theory, the girl didn't underestimate her foe and used the tactic right off the bat.

Three students stood behind and entered a magic casting stance while the rest, including the young girl, had dashed towards Asher. As for Guan, due to his frozen right arm, his fighting ability was heavily limited is he was forced to man the back lines just like the other three. Although this meant that he wouldn't be able to participate in close quarter battle, Guan was still a mage in the top 50 rank, so, his magical attacks were still worth being wary of.