First Round Winners

Foster could feel the bodies of the people around him give in as they were pushed away. The sheer power of his 'single strike' was really quite surreal. Even Lynol and Octer said that it was a lot stronger than it normally should be, probably because his Martial Necromancy skill had a 'Legacy' rating. Special skills like that were apparently stronger than normal. Not that it was something for Foster to complain about.

It's been a while since he's had this much fun fighting other people. There was no reason to feel stressed out at all. Nobody would be trying to kill him, and everyone here was ready and prepared to be beat up even beyond where Foster would usually stop fighting them.

Using these martial arts was incredibly fun, even though he was kind of bastardizing them with his dirty fighting. It was still really damn exciting though. The feeling that coursed through his body every time he punched someone with single strike was really weirdly pleasant.

And now that the majority of the people taking part in this 'battle royal' had been beaten to the point where they couldn't continue fighting, there were only four people beside Foster himself left. Once the total number of participants left within the arena reached three, this round would be over.

One of the other people that were left was that girl from earlier. Foster saw her get rid of the guys that were messing with her within the first couple of minutes, rather surprisingly. She was definitely strong, and incredibly fast. She was the one that Foster was most worried about out of all the other participants.

And while she and another strong participant were fighting, the other two seemed to be quite interested in Foster. They were both martial artists, so it seemed like they wanted to show their skill by beating those with similar skill-sets.

As they ran at Foster, he first focused on one of them. He would reach him first, and was the one whose attacks seemed like they would have the most raw damage. He pushed his hands in front of his body while leaning forward some, entering the defensive block position as he finally saw a chance to use the martial skill that he entered this tournament for in the first place.

Foster used 'Block', and could feel that sort of shell wrap itself around him tightly. The martial artist in front of him saw the chance and swung his large, heavy fist at Foster. On impact, that shell shattered apart and let the fist through as he was pushed back a few steps. At first it seemed like the block martial skill did relatively little, but when he thought about it for a moment, Foster realized that any other attack from that guy without the block skill intervening would have been incredibly tough to deal with. From his momentum and weight, the attack should have felt like it had a lot more impact than it ended up having, so the block seemed to really do something.

Either way, Foster didn't have much time to think about this. He had been able to test the martial skill out just like he wanted to, and figured out that it really did seem to make a decent difference. That was enough for him for now. So, he moved from the blocking stance into an attack stance as the martial artist in front of him tried to attack him once more.

It seemed like he thought Foster was an easy target as he left his defensive stance, and in an attempt to finish him quickly, he pushed his hand out forward. But he apparently didn't account for the fact that Foster was pushed back a few steps, so he had to stretch his arm out too much. A chance that his opponent happily took, of course.

With a grin on his face that he was practically unable to get rid of at this point, Foster swung his fist upward in an arch, targeting his opponent's elbow. And the punch strengthened with single strike as well as the heavy gauntlets he was wearing really ended up doing quite a bit of damage. Audible damage, as the martial artist's arm broke and twisted in an unnatural way.

As that guy was dealing with the damage from the attack, Foster twisted his body around and went for the other, weaker but faster martial artist. He slid his foot over the ground and punched toward the spot where the martial artist would end up being in another moment. But with his quick reaction speed, the martial artist was able to dodge, and slid past Foster.

He twisted his whole body around as he attacked, pushing his elbow into the side of Foster's head. It was a surprisingly heavy attack. The martial artist probably realized that Foster's martial arts were based on power instead of speed.

But there was one thing that he couldn't have known. And that was that Foster's 'agility' attribute was higher than his 'strength'.

Foster managed to withstand the elbow that was pushed into his face surprisingly easily, as he quickly twisted his own arm upward and grabbed the martial artist's arm. Since his body was twisted around, Foster could easily pull him forward and trip him over so that he was about to fall onto his back. And although the martial artist tried to catch his fall somehow, it was too late. Foster was already towering over him, and struck downward with high speed, and his punch once more empowered with single strike.

And as the martial artist's body hit the ground, Foster struck his shoulder, fully pushing through and pressing him into the ground. The air escaped the martial artist's lungs as he clutched his shoulder.

Meanwhile, Foster stood there in front of his two opponents. One with a broken arm, and another with a clearly dislocated shoulder, on top of all the other damage that they had accumulated throughout this round of the tournament.

Both of them yelled out that they were giving up as they stretched their respectively working arm over their heads. Meanwhile, Foster stood there and could feel some blood dripping down his face. He turned around with a bloody nose, grinning as he looked at the two people left in the arena. They were fighting each other, but stopped in surprise when they realized that Foster had beaten two other people while they hadn't been able to even beat one other person during that same amount of time. And on top of that, his face was completely covered in blood, and he still stood there with that broad, nearly demonic grin on his face?

It was a sight to behold at the very least.

"What an amazing fight, ladies and gentlemen!" The announcer yelled out, "But sadly, that wraps up this round for the Red Riverside Tournament! Let me introduce you to the ones that will advance to the next round!"

As the three of them gathered in the center of the arena, the announcer continued, "The young, beautiful 'Scout', Jasmin!" He exclaimed, seemingly talking about the girl next to Foster. She was pushing her daggers into her sheaths, as the announcer continued.

"The Spearman from down south, Argo!" The announcer said next. The spearman was grinning lightly, seemingly enjoying the attention. Either way, next, it was Foster's turn.

"And the star of this round, the brutal Martial Artist, Foster!" The audience clapped their hands loudly, but Foster was just focused on something else. He raised his head up a bit, just to see how big this place looked from down here... And seemed to see Lynol staring down at him from up there. Or at least, that's what it looked like. There weren't that many people wearing such mask around here, after all.

"Well, shit..." He said with a wry smile, somewhat embarrassed. Foster was ready to walk up there and have his entry into the tournament be mocked for the next couple of days. And just when he was walking out of the arena, the two others that advanced further stopped Foster, staring at him intensely.

"You, stop. During the next round, don't run rampage like that, got it?" The girl, Jasmin, said with a deep glare, while Argo stood next to her in agreement with this young girl, and Foster looked back at the two with a wry smile.

"I'm not gonna be fighting in the next round anyway, don't worry..."