CHAPTER 17; THE TOURNAMENT PT I

CHAPTER 17;

  THE TOURNAMENT PT I

The elevator opened to reveal a white room, akin to a laboratory and a hive of new characters that I had only read about in books from our library who quickly turned around to see the invaders who disturbed whatever it was that they were doing, behind them, was a machine that I also read about from books; 'THE PAS'.

The Potential Analysis System [a.k.a] the PAS, was a machine that was used to ascertain the current level of a person and their combat potential. The machine was to be used to ascertain the potential of the children who to participate in the tournament, in order to separate those who were useless from those who were actually worth time and resources on.

What this basically meant, was that, out of the fifty or so families, who brought along their one-hundred children, the PAS was the first round of the tournament that was used to reduce the number of fighters down to only the cream of the crop who actually had futures in the top spots of the world, and while it wouldn't have been hard for people like Alex and Scarlett to check the potentials of everyone there, the event itself was made public for those people who did not have the abilities to check for themselves, in order to promote fair play in the tournament.

Several heads of top families, some of which were amongst the strongest stood at the helm of the room, as they watched from afar the destinies of their kids as they crossed through the gate-like machine to be evaluated.

"Henry Le Noir!" A man's voice called out as I quickly ripped the suit off my body, to reveal my martial robe and dashed towards the gate-like-machine, into the line where the other children my age[technically] lined up. 

The bald man who wore a white lab coat and wore large round glasses that stared emptily into his tablet from which he called people's names simply eyed me as he nodded for me to move forward.

Quickly, I stepped to the other side of the machine, as I looked at the screen that showed the results, with very little expectations.

As soon as the results came up, everyone's faces had completely different expressions; some had looks of utter disappointment on them, as some people smiled at it, while a few other like my grandmother, simply looked at it with no expression whatsoever.

The Screen was streamed to every other television in the hotel showed;

/ALEX LE NOIR

AGE; 12+

HEIGHT; 5'8

HEIGHT POTENTIAL; 6'4

MANA CONTROL; 7TH STAGE – MANA'S SAINT

MANA CONTROL POTENTIAL; 10TH STAGE – MONARCH

COMBAT TYPE; NONE

COMBAT TYPE POTENTIAL; MARTIAL ARTIST

COMBAT ABILITY; NULL

COMBAT ABILITY POTENTIAL; 7TH STAR – COMBAT SAINT

YEARS MORE NEEDED TO ACHIEVE NEXT COMBAT STAR; THREE

TOTAL RESULT OF EVALUATION – GENIUS/

The entire hotel was filled with mixed expressions as murmurs flew around,

"I guess the oracle was right." The patriarch of Le Rouge said,

"What a waste." Another person said as voices flew across the road,

"Le Noir is done for,"

"At least they still have the twins,"

"Maybe the next patriarch would be from an indirect line,"

"How disappointing."

The expressions on their faces, however, quickly changed as the next person followed me through the PAS Gate.

"That must be the Alexia Le Blanc, the daughter of the Administrator," Voices roared as his results were displayed on then screen.

"Wow,"

"Maybe Le Blanc has finally overthrown Le Noir's reign,"

"Wow,"

"Wow."

I heard so many 'wows' that I almost screamed at everyone in anger, but how could I blame them, the girl was a beast, I looked around to see the screen that displayed fantastic numbers and simply smiled and turned around.

Her results showed;

/ALEXIA LE BLANC

AGE; 13+

HEIGHT; 5'5

HEIGHT POTENTIAL; 5'10

MANA CONTROL; 6TH STAGE – MADE OF MANA

MANA CONTROL POTENTIAL; NULL STAGE 

COMBAT TYPE; MAGE/MAGICIAN

COMBAT ABILITY; 5TH STAR – DESTRUCTION

COMBAT ABILITY POTENTIAL; 10TH STAGE – GENESIS

YEARS MORE NEEDED TO ACHIEVE NEXT COMBAT STAR; NULL

TOTAL RESULT OF EVALUATION – SUPER GENIUS/

The reasons why her result was so astonishing, asides from the fact that she was at the 6th stage-5th star at the age of 13, were her results for Mana control potential and Years needed to achieve next combat star.

The PAS was only able to measure mana control potential up till the 10th stage, which meant that anyone who was already at the first stage of mana control and got a 'null' had the potential to reach the 12th stage, something that only the 'Le Noir's' have been able to achieve among humans in hundreds of years.

When it came to the 'number of years needed to achieve the next combat star' the system could only give a definite result if the subject being examined was not going to have a breakthrough within the next year. Meaning, within less than a year, Alexia Le Noir was going to become the first ever to achieve sixth stage-sixth star before the age of twenty.

*

I could see the disappointment in my grandmother's eyes as she simply left the room, leaving my father behind who had a rather stern look on his face.

Soon enough, the evaluations were done, and we were all given special contact lenses to wear during our battles. These lenses were going to help update our evaluation results in case they were to change in the midst of battle. The reason for this exercise happened almost 300 years ago, where one of my ancestors; Carmille Le Noir took their version of the evaluation tests back in her time and it showed results that were normal for a 'Le Noir' only for her to achieve results that far surpassed what the tests showed.

Apparently, she was so strong that her parents had to suppress her potential down, so she wouldn't become a target all through her life, by her siblings, or anyone who could harm her. 

Carmille Le Noir later went on to become the first person since our founding ancestors to have triple combat classes and achieve tenth star in all of them, in our family history, she was the second most powerful Le Noir who lived, second only to our founding ancestors; the couple who achieved tenth star in every combat class.

Thus, for an incident like Carmille's to not happen again, the contact lenses acted as mini Potential Analysis Systems that would live stream the results of those who were them during their respective battles.

*

The Assessment ended, and only the thirty-two children who were ranked as either, 'Genuis' or higher qualified for the tournament.

The tournament was to begin in about three hours, as I dashed to my room, took off my robe and jumped on the bed, quickly knocking out to get some good rest before the tournament started.

*

"Henry!"

"Henry!"

Voices called out to me in muffled tones as my eyes opened with fatigue written all over my face, drool seeped from my mouth as I looked at the face of my father, screaming my name,

"HENRY!!" he shouted, rocking me front and back until I finally snapped out from my vegetative state.

"Yes, yes, yes dad…I'm awake." I said to him as he quickly adjusted my hair and cleaned the drool from my mouth with a rag.

"The match ups just came out..." he said as he searched my luggage, "And you're first." My dad said as I looked at him in confusion.

"So..?." I asked, as he threw my black and red 'Le Noir' robe at me.

"Put that on quick…that means you're up…in two minutes."

"What?" I asked rhetorically as I put on my robe in the space of seconds.

"Tsk tsk tsk." I familiar voice snickered from one corner of the room as I looked over to see Scarlett, shaking her head in disappointment.

"What a waste you are?" She said to me, "Alex…you should just leave the boy to not fight, it's better than letting him out there to lose to those LE Rouge scum after all," she said as she walked to the door, grabbing on the door before turning back to say one last thing,

"I can't stand to see the boy up close; it vexes me…I'm going to the arena; I'll see you there, son."

"Listen to me Henry," My father began, squatting down in front of me and holding me by my shoulders.

"Be careful out there." He said, with a stern look on his face.

"I'll be fine d-" I was about to say before my dad cut me off, 

"What the oracle said was true; 'The former reign of Le Noir has reached the ended with this generation'…I knew what he said was true from the day I saw you, from the day you were born,"

"Father," I said, feeling pitied,

"You are the strongest Le Noir the world has ever seen," my father continued as my eyes widened in shock, "I don't know how you concealed it, but I know you are the beginning of a new power in our family, one that's better than any of us ever were…so please," he paused for a while as his formerly stern expression melted into a smile,

"Be careful who you beat up out there, Henry." He finished as I jumped on him and hugged him tightly, [I was devoid of most emotions, but not even myself could help but feel the way I did when someone had that much belief in me].

"Hmm," I nodded at my dad as I pulled away from him and rushed to the door, waving at him as I left the room.

*

'Kritic, Diablo.' I called out.

'Yeah,' they both said to me in unison as I entered the arena and tied my robe.

'Are you ready?' I asked as they both replied with excitement in their voices,

'Yeah!'