Chapter 17: THE FLAME AND DARKNESS.

As the announcer finishes his speech, Emerald redirects the young knights into their starting chamber. Each team was put into their chamber before they were lifted into the skies. Emerald announces to the knights saying, "Listen up everyone, the rules of the exams are basic. Each team is going to fight along-side one of their teammates. Two members who are paired together can separate if needed with another member of your team, and you'll be fighting one of us. There is absolutely no killing allowed, and the battle stars will be moderating your every movement. The point of the exams is to work together, it's not based upon how many points your team can earn or who gets one thousand points first. Each team will have a point gainer in their chambers, whoever strikes their point gainer's in the ground the deepest will accumulate points quicker. Remember that, if you reach one thousand points, your grade is boosted for all your members. I expect all of you to use your full strength and go all out on us. You all are now Knights of Asalikith, so act like one. Do All of You Understand?!" With great force and spirit, they all shouted, "Yes Mam!" All except Chris and his team. Darcie and Sharaletta rushed to their chamber in preparations for take-off.

Chris and his team were last to their chamber and planned things differently, Chris said to his members, "Listen, we won't worry about the point gainer, at least I won't be. You two, go out and fight whoever, I don't care who. I will eventually move into the position of Taski when there is an opening. You two better stay alive." Mandy shrugged her shoulders while ignoring Chris's words. Yegor didn't give any attention to him and only was focused on his mission. The chopper arrived for them, the pilot shouted, "Alright, let's head out!" Chris approached him slowly and smirked at the pilot. This confused the pilot and made him disturbed. He approaches the pilot and takes his hand and places them on the pilot's head and causes confusion to the pilot. Chris speaks to him and says, "Don't worry about taking us to the drop zone, take us over to the outer lands, going out of the battleground." The pilot then responds to his command and flies them out toward the outer lands; the rest of the pilots weren't even aware. The others boarded their flight and set off to the drop zone of the battleground; which was in the center of the map. The pilots who were controlling the choppers were thrown into confusion as to why the third chopper went in the other direction of the drop zone. The announcer shouted with exhilaration, "Alright, everyone, it's time to begin our countdown toward our next grand knight exams."

The announcer counted down to the start and the knights skydived out their choppers, dropping into the battleground. Darcie began her search for the point objective, she noticed a white lining deep within the forest biome. She strikes downward like a lightning bolt to the point objective, leaving the point gainer stricken deep within the ground to accumulate points faster. The announcer speaks to the audience saying, "Team Darcie has struck the point gainer three feet into the ground!" The crowed cheers loudly and parades wildly as Darcie looks with great pride on the television screens. She radios her team saying, "Everyone, did you all catch that? We're accumulating points at speed level four. We are going to produce points fast enough." Mikado lands close to Darcie and unstraps her parachute, realizing she had no need of it. Drake lands in the mountain and forest biome along with Taski. Drake summons his nun chucks as Taski unstraps his parachute while summoning his fire sword. Ariah landed within the tall trees of the mountains near the lake biome, she had her eyesight on her team and injected the earth with boost and healing for her members. Vines traverse throughout the deep dirt of the earth as a spirit injected through the veins of her allies, keeping them high in their feet. Taski and Drake were among the first to experience the terrifying strength of the two strongest of the strong, terror radiated off Emerald Nayner and Tolem Shekhar. Emerald and Tolem approached them with a strong, powerful and a hair-raising aura flowing through both Taski and Drake. Emerald shouting with excitement, eager to finally taste the power of the king's son and what his ability could do against her own, she shouts, "It's about time, now you can show me that incredible power of yours, Mr. Prince. You better not hold back either, or else I'll give you a reason to resign!"

Tolem clenched his fist, and only the sound of rocks fracturing could be heard coming from his knuckles. Taski and Drake guard up their weapons while standing their ground. Taski felt as though the two terrifying forces approaching them were like two colossal giants, with the intentions only to cause chaos, like two demons, ready to rain down destruction. Emerald and Tolem begin their charge, she shoots her way toward the sun only to smash down back to the earth. The intense shockwaves erupting from the impact becomes a strong wind force blowing up against the prince as well as his partner. Emerald launches out of the smoke and rocks, charging in with a superfast strike that caught Taski off guard. Her strike just slits Taski cheek, She follows up with a charging blast in her other hand to either follow up or to counter incoming attacks. Drake catches this small detail and yells out, "Incoming, look out Taski! She's going to blast!" Emerald turns around and unleashes her blast in Drake's direction, he sidestepped quickly avoiding the incoming attack. She continues her assault on Taski, adding continuous pressure from her brutal strength, which seemed to be little to no hope for Taski to escape. She slowly began slowing down due to her continuous barrage, Taski sought the moment to escape her lock on him. He launched himself backwards, shooting both of his feet upward at her jaw, causing her to become stunned only for a second.

She made a speedy recovery and charged forward once more. Tolem viewed the ongoing fight between the two and found little interest in attempting fighting against Drake, who had no ability; therefore, he left Emerald and turned to the Queen's daughter. After Darcie implanted the point gainer into the earth, she sprinted off at high speed to find her next objective goal. However, her goal made its way toward her instead, in the form of Tolem Shekhar. Tolem spotted her coming from afar, he squatted down charging up his jump power, with his charging complete, he let all the force off him and jumped to the heavens. She catches him high up, like a rocket launch never seen so rapidly fast, Darcie stops on a dime, but, Tolem ground-pounds into the earth which caused many stone rocks in the ground to emerge out. She then is lifted to the sky with many stone rocks around her, Tolem makes his appearance known to her. He thrust his fist forward with extraordinary power and force, sending her flying back down to the ground, almost like a lighting bolt striking the earth at unimaginable speed. Darcie gets herself up but struggles to keep her posture up right, she then leaps backward from the incoming strike that is the great Tolem. Mikado floats above the trees, searching for Darice's location within the biome, Mikado becomes aware of who was fighting her and collects small asteroids from the cold reaches of space.

The audience then gazed up at the sky and noticed many asteroids coming together in one place, like an army of flying Valkyries ready for war. Tolem was busy attacking Darcie while not being aware of what was forming from behind him, the asteroids were tremendous in their numbers. Mikado thrust her hand forward, launching her supplies of asteroids at high speed, in an attempt to pressure him. Tolem then hears what sounds like flying debris and looks behind at the sight of asteroids flying at high speed like shooting stars flying from the east. The asteroids flew at him like powerful hail storming down on him consecutively, like rockets hurdling through the skies. Tolem raised his fist to the heavens, shattering the asteroids like glass with his head bowed down, and all he could do was hold a smile down. Unseen by the crowd. He struck each asteroid ruthlessly, as his wind force coming off each thrust of his fist pushed back the other incoming asteroids. Mikado gasped as her attack was being used against her now due to the wind force, she then rushes over to the side before she would become ambushed by her attack. Tolem stands proud in the chaos with his fist in the air and with his smile still shining on his mouth, the crowd begins cheering with exceeding joy at his performance.

Mikado looks down on him from high up in his taunting stance, she uses the time she has to put together another attack that is bigger and stronger. She lifts her hand up to the sky and begins pulling in the gravity pushing down on her hand, doing this made an asteroid the size of a huge monument pull into the earth's atmosphere. Meanwhile, over in the rocky mountain biome of the battleground was a fight in which Sharaletta was out numbered and unmatched against the small but strong, crazy but encouraging Elijah Elter. Elijah had the ability of soundwaves, as well as base boosted air waves. He pressured her shield, which caused her to be pressed backward. He continuously beat against her shield with incomprehensible force, each strike against her felt like sonic booms exploding with nothing but pure G Force. She was perfect at her defense, but lacked in offense, she was left with almost no way of striking him. She remained on defense long enough for Toronto to charge up his exploding thorns to strike Elijah secretly. However, he became curious about Sharaletta's battle performance and to why she would refuse to fight back. Toronto then shouted, "Hey! Over Here!"

Elijah turned around to sharp thorns flying toward him, Elijah quickly created a sonic boom wave which blew away the thorns and destroyed them. Sharaletta took her chance to strike and shoved her knee-cap straight into his abdomen without hesitation, the painful feeling of a strong knee bone being driven into his stomach became a hard pain to bear. She delivered a mighty back-kick to Elijah, which sent him flying into the mountain nearby. Toronto fired his exploding thorns into the mountains, he then ignited them all creating a massive explosion in the mountains, with many large rocks falling, half of the mountain came crumbling down. The crowd jumps in joy from the outstanding performance of Sharaletta and Toronto. During this, deep in the stands was the mysterious man quietly traversing throughout the stadium, he found a secret path that lead to the transportation toward the battleground. He then broke into one of the emergency choppers, powering the chopper on and flew over toward the battleground unspotted by anyone. Now Ariah was forced to continue moving due to the intense battles growing more and more. She found a spot to be hidden in which was near Taski and Drake as well as Emerald. Their fight became intense and even gave her a slight shock. She took her opportunity to power her team and boost their attributes, however, Yegor Antakov approached her from behind a bush and said to her," Hey! Romeo will not be there for you this time." As he giggles with his evil and cold intentions, Ariah becomes scared and stoned, but, the words of Taski's promise revealed itself to her again. These words encouraged her to be brave and strong in her troubles, she turned around and stared down Yegor and shouted, "Listen here Yegor! I'm not afraid of you anymore, I am strong, courageous, brave, and I am not your slave anymore! I'm going to become a knight and serve the country! You're not going to stop me!"

Yegor stares her down while clenching his teeth together and responds, "You can think of that dream all you want, but you are going to ultimately fail anyway. Keep on dreaming, rodent." Yegor then departs away from her and walks deep within the forest to keep himself hidden from any eyes of the crowd. Yegor finds Mandy within the giant forest, sitting in the middle of the small pond, she then asked him, "Well, what is his status? This Chris kid is really killing me with all of this waiting. I feel as though me being here isn't even needed." Yegor approaches her and responds," Mandy, there is no reason to rush anything. We are doing exactly what needs to be done, and if Chris screws away our plans, then that will be all on him and not us. Remember now, we are the top best within the Solar Pyramids." Mandy becomes agitated and speaks again, "That's just it, we really can't screw this up. If we do, then the boss will be highly upset with all of us, and I don't want anything to happen to you or me." Yegor put his hand on her shoulder as a way to calm her, he then reassured her, "I will be fine Mandy, ye of little faith. You need to trust me when I say that we are going to accomplish this." Mandy then felt the connection between him and his words, she then stands up with confidence and departs from him to go keep her eyes on the knights for when a perfect opportunity comes around. Yegor then stands in front of a tall and thick tree that stands tall above all the other trees within the forest. A voice then shouts from the distance saying, "Stay right there, your time has come today. I've searched for you for a hot minute now, so I hope you're ready."

Yegor then turns around and stares down someone he thought he'd never face again, Yegor says to him, "Well, if it isn't my old friend. What brings you here, you old drag?" The mystery man then throws off his cloak and reveals himself to Yegor. He then states, "I Fang, will bring you to justice, now let's make this quick and painful, just go ahead and clock out." Fang summons his Ruger GP one hundred revolver and fires directly at Yegor's head; however, Mandy slipped through and sliced the bullet quickly. This almost caught Fang off guard, he kept his stance straight and strong. Mandy threatens Fang with a cold-blooded intention as she pointed her kunia at him saying, "You better run kid, I don't know who you are, but, I'll slice you until you can't breathe. I'll cut your life off if you dare even touch Yegor. You think you're the only one that can talk all of that, yet you're too scared to face him in hand-to-hand combat, such a weak coward." Fang replied to her threats and remarks, "No, It's called I work smarter and not harder, I'd rather just get my work done than to tip toe around you both. I can give you both a reason to tell your boss who really in charge. Anyway, why don't we call it a day and you two answer the last roll call."