Super Gene Immortal Chapter 15

Lux blinked at the sudden transition from where he had been to where he was now. The tournament of the Chosen was held here. It was an absolutely massive version of the same Colosseum design as the normal martial halls in the shelters. And there were already tens of thousands of the other Chosen loitering around in the stands as more and more people teleported in. Lux wasn't even really recognized here. He was famous throughout the Alliance for all of fifteen minutes because he had fought with that Gold Horned Shura. But he was not really celebrity status throughout the Alliance, only the areas he frequented. Here, with people gathered from all over the alliance. And not only that, the best of the best from around the Alliance. He was pretty much a no name guy. Which felt nice for a change.

 The people who were well known here were the people who had made it to the top ten last year. Skilled, powerful people, who stood at the top of the unevolved rankings. Most of the top ten Chosen tended to stay the same until someone in the top ten evolved out of the 1st sanctuary and moved on to the second, opening up a slot. This was mainly because the people at the top just had more advantages and kept improving until that last little bit where they maxed out their geno points and moved on. So, the previous top ten individuals were the ones getting all of the attention.

 This part of the tournament was 100k contestants, all in one-v-one matches, it would be a while before the competition got whittled down to just the top 100 contestants. Luckily no one had to guess their order for fighting. There was a board that seemed to have a magnetic effect on one's eyes, drawing them to their own name and time of their fights.

 Lux was pleased when he found that he would be fighting today and soon at that. It was against someone he had never heard of before. But that was not surprising. He had only really researched a little bit between Jadeskin Sutra practice and creating his game. He knew who the top 100 had been last year, but that was about it. Aside from Lux and maybe a few other newcomers the top 100 list would most likely remain mostly unchanged.

 The fights started almost as soon as the last contestant teleported in. The arena floor was soon filled with clashing weapons, shouts of triumph and wails of pain and despair. Lux was almost surprised that there was one person killed in the fights that went on. A guy by the name of Yi Dongmu had killed his opponent damn near the moment the fight began. Either the two of them had beef, or Dongmu was a psychopath. Either way, Lux didn't really care, but he noted the man for his efficient killing capabilities.

 When it was Lux's turn to fight he entered his designated arena along with his opponent. They stood across from each other, Lux giving the man a nod of acknowledgment. The gesture was returned in kind summoning a beast soul bow, and seconds later the signal for the start of the fight went off and the man unleashed three beast soul arrows simultaneously.

 As cool as launching a triple shot looks, it slows down the overall speed of the individual arrows. Lux easily dodged the arrows and summoned up his spear. His wings sprouting from his back and Shapeshifting into the Bloody Slayer as he bolted forward. Covering the distance between himself and the guy in a flash of gold as he aimed to disable the man.

 This guy was no slouch however and dodged back just in the nick of time. Managing to launch another round of arrows along with the maneuver. Lux lashed out with his spear and intercepted the most dangerous looking of the three arrows and ignored the other two as they bounced harmlessly off his armored form. He didn't slow down though, even with the blocking, Lux continued to give chase. Blocking or dodging multiple rounds of arrows as the man skillfully did as archers do, try to gain distance.

 Lux smiled beneath his armor as he transitioned a slash that swept the guys arrows away into a twirl that positioned the spear and his arm just right to launch it at the man unexpectedly. Lux's spear shot through the air like a ballista bolt, the guy tried to dodge. But the spearpoint took him directly in the thigh as he turned, and due to the angle, passed through his left thigh and down into his right calf.

 Lux's opponent went down hard from that. He felt bad about it. But this level of damage would heal up in a week or two for the guy based on his level of fitness. Lux dismissed the spear to not cause any more damage.

 "Good fight." He said to the guy. He only got a groan of pain in reply. It was kind of awkward to see the guy dragged off leaving a trail of blood.

 With a shrug Lux set the strangeness that his life had become to the back of his mind once more. Though this world was much more advanced than earth had been, it was also a lot more savage in some ways that just didn't make all that much sense to him. The fact that you could purposefully kill people in these tournaments and get away free of any consequences in the Alliance was a weird one. That guy Yi Dongmu for example was unnecessarily killing his opponents, using his real name, and showing his face. Yet he wouldn't be charged with anything back in the alliance. Yet every person that he killed here was a 1 in 100,000 talent. Like… the fact that it was expected that contestants would kill each other didn't really make any sense. Especially not purposefully killing each other. There may be 100k people here. But all of them had proven that they were the best of batches of 100k people. Killing them is wasting valuable combat power that could be used against the Shura. There absolutely should be consequences for someone like Yi Dongmu. Hell, Lux should be tried for two murders at this point. Though one of them was completely hidden from the public, a perfect crime if you will. But his second murder had been very public, and yet not a single person had even called him out on it. Sure, the guy deserved it, he had made many people's lives hell. And Lux had even been approached by a few guys that he suspected had been abused in a sexual manner by the man from how they thanked him for killing the guy. But again, humanity was a war with a superior foe and the authorities turned a completely blind eye to people killing talented people who could help.

 Lux shook his head and checked what his own schedule was looking like. He had thought that maybe he would have time to head back home for a bit and continue working on his app. But it would only be a few hours before he was set to fight with someone else. He was pretty close to having a stable game at this point. Maybe a week of work and he would be able put it out on the market. He even had a marketing strategy in that he could just go around and say stuff about the game while in his public Lux persona. Especially after he won this tournament, his fame would skyrocket and people would jump on it.

 Finding a quite corner Lux began practicing his Jadeskin Sutra. He was trying to reach the 'small success stage' of the Sutra before he started practicing the next one. The 'small success stage' is the first breakthrough point where the practice of the sutra finally causes the a minor evolution in the practitioner. For his modified Jadeskin Sutra, once he reached the first breakthrough his ability to control his body would reach superhuman levels. Individual muscles, heart rate, pupil dilation, body temperature, flexibility, and stuff like that were something that he could already control to certain degrees because of his practice so far. But achieving the small success stage would elevate those capabilities by a lot, make Lux significantly stronger, more durable, and vastly increase his stamina which was already ridiculous. His fixed version made the benefits greater than they had been already.

 The next one that Lux was going to start was the Heresy Mantra. It literally had no downsides for Lux. Upgrading it to its original Heresy Sutra hadn't even been hard. It would however be suicidal for anyone else to practice this Heresy Sutra. The Heresy Mantra already made a person feel like they were starving no matter how much they ate when practicing it. The full Sutra was even worse. One would feel like they were starving and dying of thirst while also hearing whispers of eldritch knowledge that drove the practitioners mad. Sounds terrible, but Lux had already confirmed that mental maladies were considered debuffs, hunger and thirst were debuffs as well. Lux's personal system would take all of the struggle out of the Sutra and provide only its benefits. The full Sutras benefits were the same as the mantra, which were increased strength of the cardiovascular system and more energy in the blood, and it went a step further. Fortifying and reinforcing the marrow, and all internal organs while optimizing blood flow. Overall, the Heresy Sutra was incredibly powerful, and fast to practice. It was an ideal art for Lux. But he didn't want to start it until he had time and had made progress on the Jadeskin Sutra.

 Anyway, Lux practiced until his next fight. And this fight was utterly disappointing. The woman he fought was quite the looker, but she was a close combat specialist using daggers. And Lux didn't have a single problem practically breaking her over his knee with just a few quick moves. Daggers were really just a shit weapon against a spear wielder. For a dagger to be viable in one-v-one against a spearman one had to be faster by such a huge margin that the weapons wouldn't even matter at that point. Lux almost felt bad about that victory. But he needed to keep winning.

 After the second fight, Lux was free for the next three days before he would have another bout. So, he returned home to continue making his game and practicing in the meantime. His mother had gone back into the sanctuary. She seemed like she wanted to make a concerted effort to become more powerful after their last talk. And she was actively hunting more now.

 In the news, Lux saw that the Alliance government was freaking out about the Sutra that he had released to the public. A free Sutra of that quality was just not something they wanted to spread around. But it was too late. Literally billions of people had downloaded the Sutra and reposted it. It was sweeping the Alliance like a storm. Lux was planning to release more Sutras over time. This was just the first one. The next one he planned to release was basically a modified Jadeskin Sutra combined with Atomic Physique Sutra. A generalized Sutra that was all about balanced strength and incredible endurance. If the Alliance was freaking out now, they were going shit the bed when he released this one. He was going to name it Atomic Standard Sutra. And Lux wasn't being a bitch about it either, it was just as good as the Sutras that he planned on using himself. Humanity would rise as whole.

 He planned on releasing the next one as soon as the Alliance news started to die down on The Way Sutra. The meme had been established now. If you didn't know The Way then who were you and what were doing with your life? Ugandan Knuckles would not find the Alliance lacking. Lux shed a tear at the galactic level prank he had just pulled that would forever go unnoticed by the community.

 Lux oscillated between his fights and going home to finish up his game. His fights were not the most interesting of bouts. The only ones who gave him any trouble at all were the people who had interesting combos of beast souls that elevated their combat prowess for a short time. Unfortunately for them, even if they could fly, they couldn't fly fast enough. Lux was an unfair existence in this competition. His armor was stronger than any Sacred-Blood armor should ever be because of his buffs. His flight speed was greater than anyone else's. And if anyone had armor that gave his spear trouble, he just fell back onto the katana he'd gotten from the Shura. If he could also use his archery skills, he was pretty sure that the rest of the competition would just give up. Lux's spear throwing was damn near as good as archery though.

 Lux's next match was against the psychopath, Yi Dongmu. Lux had determined that the man was indeed a psychopath due to the fact that he had killed every opponent that actually stood against him. He also happened to be Lux's last fight before entering the top ten. Lux's heart felt a little heavy at the fact that he needed to put down this monster for the good of humanity. He really didn't like killing people, it made him feel dirty. This would be his third, and he didn't really mind the second person he had killed quite so much anymore. But his first kill haunted him a bit. Killing Yi Dongmu wouldn't be adding to the haunting, however. The guy had killed seven skilled fighters throughout this tournament already, he was a cancer and needed to be dealt with.

 Stepping into the arena Lux saw the man standing there looking nothing like a serial killer as one would imagine them.

 "So you dared to show up." Yi Dongmu said arrogantly, "I figured you would just forfeit."

 Lux sighed and summoned up his Spear, "Yi Dongmu, if you face me here today, you die."

 Lux took up a ready position with his spear and summoned up his wings not feeling the need to explain himself to a dead man. Ready to spring into action the moment the fight started.

 "Hahahahaha! Yes! Come and try it Delux!" Yi Dongmu summoned up his pair of daggers and a manic grin spread across his face.

 The signal for the matches start activated and Lux flew forward in an instant. Yi Dongmu parried with one blade and attempted to close the distance while binding up Lux's spear. But Lux simply whipped the butt end of the spear up and around. Yi Dongmu rolled backwards and stood his ground after that first exchange, examining Lux with a calculating look.

 Lux only paused for a second. That initial clash had been a good measure of Yi Dongmu. Yi Dongmu was impressive, he was definitely at around the same fitness level as Lux. And he was practicing some kind of Sutra. He also had a similar skill in hiding his movements from a person's perception. Another natural born assassin. His movements were explosive and without warning. Lux could appreciate the display of skill. But he had the guys measure now.

 Lux stepped forward and began unleashing thrust after thrust. Sweeps and cuts when necessary. Yi Dongmu was good at getting around an opponents reach advantage, taking advantage of blind spots and hiding his intentions until its too late to do about them. He ducked, dodged and weaved as Lux maintained constant pressure on him.

 Lux's goal was to get a clean killing strike on him. But he may have underestimated the guy's level of skill. Lux made a thrust into Yi Dongmu's midsection while he was still in the middle of dodging a feint sweep. And Yi Dongmu pulled off some contortionist bullshit midair and only came away with a shallow cut across his side.

 Landing on his feet Yi Dongmu threw both of his daggers at Lux unexpectedly and both of them bounced harmlessly off his chest plate. Apparently, Yi Dongmu had been expecting that move to do something, because the moment it did nothing he just turned and ran out of the combat arena yelling, "You win!"

 Lux was stunned that the guy had simply turned tail and fled. The way he had postured earlier Lux was thinking that the fight would see Yi Dongmu trying to kill him to the bitter end. The guy had behaved like a bloodthirsty savage, but turned tail and ran the moment he realized that he wouldn't be able to kill Lux.

 "Fuck… I wanted to kill him." Lux grumbled as he made his way off the arena grounds.

 Lux was now in the illustrious position of being one of the Chosen. Meaning that he was now in the top ten and would have his name engraved into the Sacred Stele of every Shelter in the 1st Sanctuary regardless of whether he took the number one spot. Not that that was a concern. He wouldn't lose and he only had to win two more fights.

 Lux was unaware of this, but his victory over Yi Dongmu was something that sent waves through the Alliance within minutes of his victory. As soon as it was reported Lux became a dark horse superstar in the galactic community. His whole style throughout all of his fights had not shown off a majestic prowess at combat. It had shown that he was better geared than his opponents. He had options that they simply lacked. The fact that he just won, basically, in the same exact way he'd won every other round surprised and shocked a lot of people.

 Anyway, now that the competition had entered the top ten phase, there would be the Ranking round in ten days. The Ranking rounds were conducted by having every member of the top ten get a round of fighting with the others. Points were assigned based on performance by the sanctuary itself. Then they would be ranked 1 through 10 and rewards distributed based on placement. Top Ten wasn't elimination style like the rest of the tournament was.