Two Weeks Left

In the backyard of Karuza High's cottage, the young men and one young woman trained under the watchful eye of their coach.

Ryan and Kang were doing slow sparring, meaning they were moving at slow speeds to focus on technique and precision rather than speed and power.

Nath was striking a heavy bag nearly, his arms fully extended to their limit. He had one weakness, and that was that he was a worse fighter when his arms were stretched.

It was because he had focused on fighting in his default state. Thus, Jin made him fight only with his arms stretched to their limit. It was a difficult challenge for him to overcome, as those extra seven centimeters made his arms feel like they didn't belong to him.

On the other side of the backyard, Leon sparred against Klaus, and Shura faced Timothy.

Jin and his new assistant coach, Madigan, who arrived yesterday night, were watching from the sidelines, whispering with each other about the training techniques.

Meanwhile, on the inside, Jonathan was making the food today. He was on the food duty because he was the weakest person around—usually, the youngest person would be on the food duty, but Kiernan was going to participate in the nationals.

Kiernan was striking against a wooden dummy. As his legs and arms smacked against the dummy, it sounded like a drum.

After last week's rank up to the middle stage and level up, his strength has reached a whole new level. Yet he wasn't satisfied. After all, last week, he lost a fight.

"Coach!" Suddenly, Jonathan's voice came from the kitchen, and he hurried to the backyard. "We have visitors!"

"Who?" Jin asked with a frown.

After hearing that, everyone stopped training.

"That person looked like someone important." Jonathan said and then heard footsteps behind him. He stepped aside, and they saw three suited individuals walking towards them with serious expressions.

"Is everything alright, sire's?" Jin asked with concern.

"Yes, is this Karuza High?" The man in the middle said with a deep voice. He sounded and acted like a very important figure with an aura of power and authority.

"That's us," Jin said.

"The tournament bracket has arrived." The man said and handed over a piece of paper to Jin. "The tournament starts next week's Friday."

'We do not have a long time left.' Jin said with a sigh and accepted the piece of paper.

"We also have a few important people wanting to meet you." The man said, "They're from Martial Academia. They are here to look out for potentially talented younglings."

"Martial Academia?!" Jin exclaimed in shock.

"Coach, what's that place?" Nath asked.

"It is only the world's biggest martial arts academy." Jin said with a cold sweat running down his face. "It is a place where the world's greatest talents go after high school is over. It's famous for its ruthless training, intense competition, and low graduation rate."

"Low graduation rate?" Ryan asked. "Just how low?"

"Catastrophically low. I don't know what is happening inside there, but the expelled students have talked about how their time at Martial Academia was the hardest time of their life" 

Jin said solemnly. 

"It is where geniuses go to thrive, but also to die. If one doesn't graduate, they might as well quit martial arts altogether."

"They're currently talking to students of Magma High, but they will be here shortly." The man said and then bid farewell, as they had a few more schools to go through.

"So we also have a chance to go to this Martial Academia if we impress their talent scouts?" Nath asked in excitement.

"Sorry to pour cold water over y'all, but that's very unlikely." Jin sighed. "This is only a Tier-4 country. I am sure they're here for only one person—Johan Yeager. Out of courtesy, they're also checking out other schools.

"However, I doubt they're actually thinking that they can find another talent of Johan's caliber. He is one of the greatest talents to come out of New Rakuya in a very long time, and in Martial Academia, everyone is as talented if not more talented than him."

At that moment, more footsteps sounded from the inside as the front door opened and closed.

Jin and everyone else instinctively straightened their backs to stand tall.

At that moment, Godfred stepped through the doorway and eyed the group with a look of superiority. His aura was like that of a volcano, ready to erupt. It was clear that his strength was far above that of a mere tier-4 country.

'This is not a mere talent scout!' Jin's hair stood in attention. 'This strength can only belong to one of the professors of Martial Academia. It was said that they have the strength to defeat a Tier-4 country alone.

'They're basically a one-man army!'

Following Godfred, two more people entered the backyard—one of them was Cadell, and the other was sweet-looking Muriel with a gentle smile on her face.

"Whoah, an elf…" Nath said, his cheeks turning slightly pink.

Others were as smitten by her appearance, while Shura started to feel self-conscious. She was so beautiful and graceful that seemed like she didn't belong to this world.

At that moment, Muriel saw a familiar person and waved her hand excitedly to get his attention.

Cadell's eyes turned cold as he saw Muriel do that. He then sent a deadly glare in Kiernan's direction.

Kiernan looked away and ignored her wave and Cadell's death stare. He didn't want to have anything to do with them.

"Huh?" Muriel stopped waving and dropped her hand, feeling embarrassed and confused.

This was the first time she had been ignored like this, and she couldn't understand why.

Godfred's muscles tensed as if he were about to burst out. He wasn't watching their interaction, but he was still able to see everything that was happening in the backyard with his exceptional peripheral vision.

It allowed him to see everything without turning his head.

'How dare he ignore her?' Godfred's nostrils flared. 'Maybe I should be happy? No, she clearly looks distressed. Humans are truly trash! Wait, I am human as well; how troublesome! I didn't expect being a grandfather would be so complicated.'

"Wait, do you know her?" Ryan asked Kiernan. "She was waving at you."

"No, I don't." Kiernan replied while looking away. "She got the wrong person, I suppose."

"Sir, we are honored to have you here." Jin, without knowing what was happening, greeted them with a humble smile.

"This is Karuza High, correct?" Godfred asked as he scanned the students gathered in the backyard. 'Weak, not a single one in Martial Fighter. They're going to lose in the first round.'

"Yes," Jin replied humbly.

"Well, nice to meet you." Godfred turned around and said, "Cadell, Muriel."

After seeing him depart, Cadell and Muriel followed after him.

Muriel still turned her head towards Kiernan, pouting enough to make her cheeks look like chipmunks, and then left the backyard with Cadell.

Jin wryly smiled as he saw them come and go in a hurry. He knew their team wasn't strong enough to make them interested for even a little bit, but it still hurt.

'Our school is not strong, we all know, but I want everyone who hears the name Karuza High to at least remember us!'

"Everyone!" Jin shouted and waved the sheet of paper in his hand. "Our first matchup has been revealed! Come check it out!"

Everyone gathered around Jin, who showed them the sheet of paper. There were indeed 256 teams in the tournament. Karuza High was just one of them, but they were determined to make a name for themselves this year.

"Our first match is against Seisen High School!" Jin announced. "They're average high school, at best, but so are we. We cannot underestimate them!"

"Yes, coach!" Everyone echoed.

"Go back to training; there's only less than two weeks left!"