All the contestants witnessed their first match on the transparent screens, along with basic information about their opponent, such as their organization, stage, core color, level, and main technique.
Next, a multicolored string of mana shot out of the box into the sky, transforming into a tournament bracket.
The bracket displayed all the first matchups for the spectators to see.
The crowd erupted in various reactions, causing a lot of commotion, but the participants on the stage remained oblivious to the commotion.
This was one of the stadium's special effects: it concealed sound for the contestants, preventing them from being disturbed. It also prevented spectator's soul force from communicating with those battling unless they personally allowed it.
....
Horo saw the information about his first opponent and couldn't help but smile as brightly as his technique.
....
[ Name : Huo Hendrix ]
[ Level : 56 ]
[ Core : Blue-Purple ]
[ Primary Technique : Empyrean Sun ]
[ Class : Wrangler of Burning Wolf's Bane ]
[ Race : Human ]
[ Physique : None ]
[ Blessing : None ]
....
As Horo smiled from ear to ear, contemplating this heavenly opportunity to beat down the same person who had mocked the place that had taken him in, that same person was having similar thoughts as he stared at the name of his opponent. However, when he saw the other information on the screen, his smile turned upside down. He was baffled for many reasons.
....
[ Name : Horo Trueheart ]
[ Level : 39 ]
[ ¿¿Core?? : Golden ]
[ ¿¿Core?? : True Golden (1) ]
[ Primary Technique : True Cloud ]
[¿¿ Primary Technique??: Bright Lightning ]
[ Class : True Alternate (unawakened) ]
[ Race : ¿¿Greater Human?? ]
[ Physique : Alternate Body ]
[ Blessing : None ]
....
What the Fock! What Fock is this?
Two Cores that don't even mention mana cores? To his knowledge, there was no such thing.
Two Primary Techniques? To his knowledge, it's only possible to have one primary technique, and everything else would be secondary and auxiliary techniques.
Unawakened class? To his knowledge, classes could evolve, but awaken?
Greater Human? To his knowledge, there are hybrids, but a greater human?
And lastly, even though he's nearly twenty levels above his opponent, his opponent possesses a physique, and he had no idea what kind or level of physique it is.
Just as Hendrix was about to look up to spot Horo, he heard his sect master's, also known as his uncle, voice.
"You have to kill him. Request a death match; he has to be dealt with immediately."
If Horo's information baffled Hendrix, the shock from immediately what he just heard left him speechless for three breaths before he turned to his sect master.
He was about to respond through their soul link and inform his uncle of his concerns regarding Horo's information and his doubts about suggesting a death match. However, when he looked in the area of his sect master's seating, which is also where his closest kin and personal disciples sat, many things began to connect.
Their sect master cherished his progeny, kin, and disciples more than anything. And treated everything and everyone else as if it was all beneath him. Even the elders of the sect received treatment beneath those he cherished most, unlike all the other powers, where his children, other kin, and personal disciples were nearest to him, and the elders were beneath.
Hendrix noticed a girl unrelated to the sect master sitting next to the second young master, who sat directly to his father's left.
That's when lightning struck him. As he stared at the girl, another face popped into his head.
When he thought about the girl's last name, the last night he had seen on his match-up card, another memory surfaced.
If he disregarded the differences in their masculine and feminine features, as well as their contrasting hair, the two were identical.
With their names being nearly identical, he understood everything.
Hendrix and all his other relatives were aware of Himora and the methods their lineage used to maintain their rule over the Empyrean Sun Sect. For millennia, they had consistently possessed the most unique suns due to employing unethical methods, such as using women as furnaces, slaughtering thousands or millions, or even merging stolen inheritance techniques into theirs.
He knew that the girl's family had been annihilated because of his family's methods. Now, he realized that his family was completely unaware that the girl's twin brother had survived.
He squinted hard as he slowly turned to Horo's direction, expecting them to lock eyes. Instead, he saw Horo looking exactly where he was looking with a soft smile, at the girl.
This further confirmed all his deductions.
He knew he had no choice but to listen to his uncle, but in this case, it was strictly his sect master speaking to him.
He knew the sect master better than even the elders if he disobeyed and risked this scandal being leaked. His life and many others would be over, or perhaps a better word to use would be decimated.
....
Himora had been experiencing strange feelings ever since she had departed from the Empyrean Sun Sect with the rest of their entourage. She could sense something significant to her, and her destiny was approaching.
Her senses were always dulled whenever she wasn't inside the sect. A seal has been placed on her by the sect master and it even impairs her soul. The seal was so powerful even her vision was impaired and everything seemed blurred from all of her senses.
The seal even made her unnoticeable by even the strongest senses.
But the moment she felt daggers staring at her, she knew the feeling of the eyes from anywhere. The feelings of an abyss staring at you, an abyss that could and wanted to swallow anything and everything except her stainless existence.
Their bloodline stirred, their hearts connected, their modules connected, even something within their origins connected.
And for once, their entire existences which was totally on opposing ends of a spectrum, blended.
Then something began to stir within her, something deep within the inheritance seed her big brother gifted her. That something and her stainless aura actually began to cooperate.