378 Chapter 378: Eve of the Knock-out Rounds

Bu Fan was finally released from jail after a couple of days, thanks to Sacha pulling some strings. As an aside, Rottsfield really was fired and blacklisted from the police force. I would pity him, but he totally deserved it. I still remembered how he beat me up and kicked me just to force a false confession from me. All so he could close the case early.

Bloody corrupted cop. I heard that he was even going to have to serve a jail sentence for a few years at least. All the false confessions and acquittals were happening now, across the Federation as a result of Rottsfield and his colleagues forcing false confessions and dishonestly imprisoning prisoners just so their job could be easier. It had become quite the scandal.

Not that I cared. The police had nothing to do with me now. I was more concerned with the upcoming tournament.

Bu Fan, as you would expect, returned to the hotel in a foul mood. He was absolutely fuming as he stomped through the lobby. However, the moment he caught sight of Xin Chun, he brightened up and rushed over to hug her.

\"I'm so glad you're all right!\"

\"Brother! They finally let you out! I hope they didn't abuse you in jail…\"

\"Hah!\" Bu Fan scoffed. \"Who do you think I am? They don't dare to touch me in my cell. I had the whole group of inmates serving me throughout my two days there!\"

As I expected, he really became the prisoners' boss. Wow.

\"I made you guys worry as well,\" Bu Fan said when he caught sight of the team gathering around his sister, scratching his head sheepishly. \"Sorry about that.\"

At a glare from his sister, who was reminding him something, he lowered his head. I was startled when I realized he was bowing to me.

\"Thanks for helping me save my sister. I really appreciate it.\"

\"No, I only did what other people would have done if they were faced with the same situation.\" I raised both of my hands.

\"You're way too humble,\" Yue Chu mocked me, throwing an arm around my neck. \"Oh, and make sure you inform us before you pull this kind of stunt in future. It's not fair to leave us out of the fun! We want a share too!\"

\"That's right!\" Craig hollered. \"How dare you leave us out of a scrap?!\"

\"Okay, okay. I'll call you guys in future when I go pick a fight with assholes and idiots dumb enough to kidnap my sister.\" Bu Fan raised both of his hands and laughed good-naturedly. I doubted he would actually do it too, and honestly the chances of his sister getting kidnapped again were low. Not unless her mother was as much of a prime target of revenge as my dad was, and so scum of the underworld from all over the globe decided to converge upon her and kidnap her to enact vengeance or blackmail her mom.

I still had no idea who her mother was, and why they were so fixated on drawing her attentions. Not that it turned well for the previous batch of abductors, who were nothing more than dust now. If only I had suit of armors, I could entomb the dust inside those power armor and revive them as automatons. Then have them moan, \"All is dust\" as they marched forward.

Rubric Marines are awesome.

\"Anyway, I'm glad you're back. You should get some rest, and I'll update you on our plans going forward tomorrow.\"

\"You included me in your plans? I'm flattered.\" Despite Harrison's sincerity, Bu Fan's tone dripped with sarcasm. He looked apologetic when Xin Chun sent him a harsh glare, and he forced a smile. \"I'll do my best to live up to your expectations.\"

\"You will,\" Harrison assured him. \"For now, take a rest.\"

\"What, already?\" Craig complained. \"That's not right! We should celebrate his release tonight! Let's go eat somewhere!\"

Oh, yay. Food. I couldn't wait to eat. For some reason, I was feeling slightly hungry, and this sounded like a great chance to…well, eat.

\"Hmm, this sounds like a good opportunity,\" Bu Fan remarked with a nod. \"Might as well brief me over dinner instead of waiting until tomorrow. What do you say, Harrison?\"

\"I say yes, zutto!\"

Why was Harrison quoting the name of an ending song from a relatively old 2000s anime?

With that settled, all of us left for the nearest restaurant.

*

After dinner, we returned to our rooms to…well, rest, but obviously I spent it training. I had reached a breakthrough of sorts with my ice magic, particularly with several ways of applying it to my summoning magic. Several of my Constellation spirits benefited from the ice spells, and I made sure to improve Canis Major's Sirius spell – even though it was still ice type, I made it a lot more destructive so that the targets would disintegrate and crumble apart when the ice shattered, rather than them being trapped for a minute or so.

To put it simply, I increased the potency of Canis Major's Sirius. Of course, I could adjust the output of the spell, so if I chose to incapacitate my opponent instead of kill him, I could just ensure he gets frozen for a very long time. Obviously, the more powerful the opponent, the higher his resistance toward magic, and thus the likelier he would be to break free of frozen spells, but I had to learn to let it go. I mean, I had to learn to roll with it and adjust my strategies accordingly. Right now, ice-type Sirius should be just as destructive and powerful as the original Sirius, but more versatile in that I had the option to immobilize my foes rather than kill them outright.

\"Good.\"

Satisfied with my progress, I moved on toward the rest of my magic, until I was done for the night. Completing the last routine of my training, I returned to my room, only to run into Harrison. He nodded at me right outside the door of the training facility that the hotel provided.

\"There you are. You weren't in your room, and you didn't answer your phone. Yue Chu said you might be in here…turns out that he was right.\"

Yeah, Yue Chu knew me best, out of the team. We had been through a lot together. Even though it was almost 360 chapters since I first met him, now that I thought about it, in terms of in-universe temporality, it had been less than a year. A little over six months. Wow.

Maybe doing daily updates wasn't a good idea as it would screw up one's sense of time.

\"Do you need me for something?\" I asked bluntly. I wasn't trying to be unfriendly or anything. That was the only reason why Harrison would search for me in the first place, and there was no reason to hide it. We were friends, I guess, but we weren't exactly buddies. Harrison rarely socialized with me outside of team matters.

That didn't mean we had a bad relationship. We trusted each other, cooperated well with each other, and held no grudge against each other, but it was a working relationship. You know, like your colleagues. You spend quite a lot of time working with each other, even have lunch or dinner with each other, but outside working hours you wouldn't really hang out. When you wanted to have fun during the weekend, you wouldn't call your colleagues for that. That sort of relationship.

Harrison knew me well enough not to get offended, and he nodded without any hesitation.

\"Yeah, for the first round in three days, you know who our opponent will be, right? The students from Adolf Academy.\"

\"Huh? Adolf? Why Adolf?\"

Harrison blinked in confusion. \"Why not Adolf? That's the school that was assigned to be our opponents for the first round, remember?\"

\"I know. That's not what I mean…never mind.\" Evidently Harrison had not read Battle Frenzy or he would have known that Adolf Academy was a reference to a school from there where Wang Zhong led his team to victory over them.

Since I wasn't Wang Zhong, I wasn't confident that we would be able to prevail over them. But I was going to place my faith in Harrison. Unlike him, I didn't have any tactical nous or a brilliant mind for strategy and teamwork, so I could only obey.

\"Anyway, what about Adolf Academy?\"

\"Well, I was thinking of assigning you to a particular opponent. If he shows up, I'll have you deal with him. If that's fine with you.\"

\"Of course it's fine with me,\" I told him. \"You're the captain. Just tell me who to fight and I will obey!\"

\"Thank you.\" Harrison beamed. \"Of course, there's a possibility that they wouldn't field him, but if they do, I'll be relying on you to take him out.\"

\"I'll do my best, but no guarantees.\"

The format for this tournament worked in quite the strange manner. The knock-out stages would first beign in a series of five one-against-one matches, where the captain (and vice-captain, depending) of each team would select who to field. After which, they would have a team match where it would be five versus five.

The captains had to be very careful in selecting their members, because those defeated in the earlier one-versus-one matches would be eliminated and no longer available for the team match. So, in order to prevent a comeback, some captains thought it wise to hold their stronger members back for the team matches instead of commiting them to the individual battles, for fear of having their strongest cards eliminated too early.

Of course, that was…a bit rude of me. It wasn't about stronger members or weaker members. Though I wasn't naïve enough to deny some members are stronger than others, I doubted that matches and victories were achieved by individual strength. Each member had a role to play, and even if you weren't strong individually, if you worked in a team, you could more than make up for your so-called weakness. Synergy in team battles was far more important than individual strength. The strength being more than the sum of its parts, and all that.

Furthermore, even if you were powerful individually, that didn't mean you worked well in a team. And that could be more detrimental to the team than beneficial, especially if that one person's ego was too big. Everything would fall apart. A team of five powerful individuals but no teamwork would fall easily to a team of weaker individuals with flawless coordination and superb synergy. If I were to liken it to Magic: The Gathering, while big 6/6 and 7/7 Creatures were powerful and could potentially win you the game if your opponent had no blockers or they had Trample, your opponent could still pull off a win with his supposedly weaker 1/1 and 2/2 Creatures with awesome abilities that synergize with each other – essentially combos. Pulling off combos with a few small Creatures and Enchantments or Artifacts or spells would turn the whole game around and win it for your opponent, no matter how many big Creature cards you had in play.

That was why teamwork was so important, more so than a single individual's ego.

Returning back to the present, I decided to raise the question that led me to that info dump in the first place.

\"You're not saving me for the team battle?\"

Harrison considered for a second. It was a valid point – after all, my summoning spells would work best in a team battle, where my teammates could cover for me and protect me until I summoned my big Creatures to overwhelm our opponents. That came with a set of problems, however. They were risking everything on me, and if I got taken down early, the whole strategy would fall apart. Moreover, my abilities didn't synergize well with the rest of the team, it wasn't as if I could buff them with my Constellation spirits or whatever. There was no combo, just brute strength.

\"No. I think you would do better against this guy.\" He raised his smartphone and smiled. \"I've sent you several video replays of his previous matches. Could you watch them over the next couple of days? Familiarize yourself with his fighting style. Oh, and I do have the other videos for the rest of the members, so watch them when you have the time, but I want you to familiarize yourself with this guy's style at least.\"

When I saw the name in the email that just got sent to my smartphone, my eyes widened and I raised an eyebrow skeptically.

\"Are you sure? You want me to take on this guy?\"

\"Yeah. I'll be counting on you.\" Harrison patted my shoulder and smiled. \"I think your abilities will serve us best in this matchup.\"

\"What about you?\"

\"Me? Well…\" Harrison grinned, and for a moment his expression appeared sinister. I couldn't help but feel sorry for our opponents, who would be dancing in the palm of his hand. \"I'll be leading the five versus five team battle, so I'm going to need you to set an example for the team during the individual matches, Vice-captain Richard.\"