61 Team Chanras

The next morning when Savyrran woke up, the boy was nowhere to be found.

What Savyrran did not know was that the boy had disappeared out of Naa Vah. Since technically, it was Savyrran who had ended the boy's life in the trial, according to the rules of Naa Vah, he was temporarily dead in the trials. However, he was still alive in real life and thus, he had disappeared back into the academy. Had he died from the bull serpent's poison instead, he would have actually died in real life too.

But since Savyrran had no idea about any of this, she did not know how to explain the disappearance of a dead person in the middle of the night. Had someone come in here while she was sleeping? No, that made no sense. If that were the case, shouldn't her space rings be gone then? But instead, they were both on her fingers and everything was still intact.

Even the small lantern was still shining and it did not seem to have moved from its position. No longer knowing what to think, she decided to leave the cave and continue her hunt for the cores. The memories from last night came rushing back to her, however, she willed herself to focus on her trials.

The time monitor on her wrist told her that she had six days left. Things were going slower than she had anticipated. She had thought that once the trial began, she would have collected all the cores in the maximum of two days. But the whole of yesterday, the only soul beast she had come across was that horned serpent. The only reason why she now had six cores was because of the boy whose name she did not even know. If she continued at this pace, won't she fail the trial?

Where were all the soul beasts?

Savyrran washed her face and rinsed her mouth in the river once she came out of the cave. She contemplated about whether to wash herself under the waterfall, however, she decided against it. If the entire academy was watching this, then she did not think this was a good idea. It was not that she was ashamed of her body. Actually, she was very proud of it. It was just that she did not like the idea of showing herself naked to everyone in the academy. At least, she imagined everyone was watching.

Once she was done, she began the day's hunt. Savyrran scoured for miles and miles within the forest, however, she found nothing. All she found were trees, and more trees. There was something amiss about this place. How was it that that boy had found six soul beasts yesterday, and yet, she could not even find one? Though the rule said they could plunder the cores of their colleagues, she knew she was not going to do that. There was no way she was going to steal from someone who had done nothing to her. Due to her own lack of essence, she could not sense the soul energy of other people or soul beasts thus, she had to come up with a way to find those soul beasts before the time was up.

But two days later, she did not find anything. All she had were six common class cores and she needed a hundred of them to pass. There was only three days left for the trials to end. The only way she could possibly pull this off was to find the core of a legendary soul beast. Where to find one was the problem.

What Savyrran had noticed was that ever since she entered the forest, she had never once even felt hungry. Though she felt exhausted and sleepy as she normally would, in her four days of being in the forest, he had never once been hungry. Perhaps, that was a blessing since she did not think there was any food in the forest either.

By noon, she found herself in another part of the forest, perhaps, a deeper part. Then she heard it.

She heard the rustling of leaves and the breaking of twigs. Then there was the sound of footsteps. Several footsteps. And they seemed to be approaching her direction. Quickly, she climbed up a tall tree and hid behind broad leaves on the branches. Anyone who passed below her would not know that there was someone atop the tree.

From below, Savyrran saw two girls running together. They both seemed to be around her age or a few years older than her. What caught Savyrran's attention was the smell of blood; the two girls were bleeding. In spite of the wound on their faces and arms, they were running with every bit of their strength, their orange essence hovering around them.

For a moment, Savyrran wondered what kind of soul beast was chasing these girls for them to be running for their lives. A soul beast. That alone was enough to bring Savyrran back down from tree. Well, she was not going to steal cores from other applicants. But taking soul beasts was another matter. This one was hers. She was too desperate to care how powerful it was.

The girls suddenly stopped in their tracks once Savyrran jumped right in front of them.

There was an expression of wary in the girls' eyes. It was like they were sizing up Savyrran like she was the soul beast.

"We are not giving you our cores." One of the girls blurted out. Though she tried to sound tough, Savyrran could hear the fear in the girl's voice.

"Well, that's good. I don't want them."

Savyrran's words must have taken the girls by surprise because then their brows raised in surprise. Was this some kind of a joke?

"Aren't you part of Chanras' team?" The oldest of the girls said.

"Who is Chanra?"

"It's Chanras." The other girl said. "Lorvan, I don't think he's with them."

"Well, if you know what's good for you, you will run too before Chanras and his team gets to you. They are attacking and stealing from other applicants." Lorvan said. "Let's go, Yuil."

"Wait." Savyrran called after them. Lorvan and Yuil halted to their chagrin.

"What!"

"Aren't you been chased by a soul beast?"

"No. I just told you Chanras is after us. He's trying to take our cores and I'm sure he will definitely kill us once he finds us. So you better run too. He has a team of yellow users and he himself is a green user."

"Oh. Do…"

Before Savyrran could say anything, Lorvan and Yuil were already running again.

How disappointing. Savyrran thought. She had been hoping that it was a soul beast but instead, it was rather a group of self-entitled bullies.

"Hey, wait! Lorvan… Yuil…" Savyrran ran after the two girls and soon, she caught up with them.

"Why are you still following us?" Lorvan spat out. This boy was getting on her nerves. Could he not see how serious the situation was?

"I'm not following you." Savyrran smirked. "I just want to know where you've been meeting all those soul beasts. I haven't even seen one."

Yuil and Lorvan glanced at each other before looking back at the boy. For a moment, Lorvan realised that the boy was keeping up with their speed even though he had not even revealed his essence yet.

"Oh by the way, my name is Savyrran." She smiled cheerfully.

"Huh… you are a girl?" Yuil asked, her orange eyes widening in surprise.

"Yes. In the last fifteen years." Savyrran chuckled.

"Whatever. You don't seem to realize that we are in danger." Lorvan said.

"Danger from what?"

For a moment, Lorvan wanted to smack this boy… girl into oblivion. Where was she when she told her about Chanras and his gang? Why was she not taking this seriously?

Suddenly, an arrow whizzed past Lorvan and then shot into a tree standing next to her. The three girls stopped.

They were here. Lorvan bit her lips nervously as she looked around her cautiously. Yuil unconsciously held on to her older sister's hand. Team Chanras was here.

Savyrran saw flashes of yellow light within the thick green foliage surrounding her. Then from behind the bushes emerged four boys with their essence surrounding them. The tallest among them had green eyes and green essence while the other three had yellow eyes and yellow essence around them.

"Chanras." Lorvan muttered under her breath. But it was loud enough for Savyrran to hear.

"Ah, so you are Chanras." Savyrran said as she came to stand in front of the two girls, the smirk not leaving her face. "You are quite the famous bully."

Chanras laughed heartily at the boy's words. Look at him, trying to act all brave in front of girls. How laughable, Chanras thought.

"Surely you must see you are outnumbered. Now give use all your cores and maybe I will let you live." Chanras said.

Savyrran chuckled like she had just heard the biggest joke in her life. "Outnumbered? Where? All I see are a bunch of weaklings."

Lorvan felt her throat run dry while goosebumps colonized her skin. Why was this girl provoking a maniac like Chanras. "Savyrran." She whispered.

But Savyrran raised her hand as if to get her to remain calm. Her black eyes were even blacker, and the smile on her face got more malicious. "Usually, I would give you the chance to retreat. But I'm a little desperate now since I need more cores. So how about this. Why don't you give me your cores, and maybe I will let you live."

Chanras glanced at his companions and then they all burst into a hysterical laughter. Was this some kind of a joke? This was too funny.

"Pray that your soul armos is as powerful as your wit, boy."

In that instant, the boys revealed their soul armos. All the three yellow users had weapon-type soul armos while Chanras had a beast-type soul armos. Chanras' soul armos was a massive ape with six arms. The ape was as tall as two men and each of it's arm was thicker than a man's thigh. A loud roar echoed throughout the forest and then with its massive arms, the ape beat its hairy muscular chest as though challenging Savyrran to a fight.

Lorvan and Yuil retreated slowly at the sight of the Six Armed King Ape. This soul armos was a rare class beast, and they were no match for it. They were doomed for sure. It seemed their desire to join the Combat School was about to end here. Why wasn't Savyrran running for her life?

Savyrran laughed. "I wonder if beast-type soul armos have cores like soul beasts."

"I can't tell if you are brave or just stupid." Chanras said.

Badisk appeared in Savyrran's hand. "I guess we will find out, Chanra."

"It's Chanras."

"Oh I know. I just don't care. Now ladies, please step back for me, will you?"