40~Underhanded Maneuvers
“As a reward, beat her into the ground for me. Preferably wreck her misplaced self-confidence and make sure she’s too scared to step onto the Crown Cup stage.”
“On top of that, I’ll provide you with all her enrollment information and data.”
“Sir…you can fix the tournament arrangements?” Aileen’s eyes widened slightly in surprise.
“Anything else isn’t relevant to you, Student Aileen. You just need to focus on the match and crush her with all your strength without causing any fatal injuries.”
“How about it? What’s your answer?” Fland’s lips curled into a smile, looking unconcerned about Aileen refusing his proposal.
The result was as he expected.
“If Tutor Fland has gone to such lengths, it would be foolish of me to decline.” Aileen had been looking for an excuse to teach Tillysha a lesson personally, so she was overjoyed to hear Fland’s suggestion.
“Don’t thank me. You want to give that Wild Princess a memorable lesson, and I want her disqualified from the Crown Cup; we have mutual goals.” With that said, Fland turned and walked away, “Your match is scheduled for the third bout in the afternoon tomorrow. I’ll be there to watch personally, so don’t disappoint me.”
“I understand. Thank you, Tutor.” Tillysha, don’t blame me. You’ve offended too many people, and too many of them don’t want you getting away with it.
Now, how did Fland even know about the feud between Aileen and Tillysha? Simple. Ever since he found out about Tillysha joining Dillin’s team, he had kept an eye on her and her class situation, keeping a close watch on her every move within the class.
It had to be said that this half-elf’s “level of dedication” to Dillin was unparalleled. She was utterly determined, with all her focus on driving Dillin out of Coleman Academy.
“Headache.” Back in the dorm, Dillin took off his hair accessory and prepared for the upcoming rookie Princess Duel, pulling out all the props he might need.
Sign-in rewards, weekly and daily earned stakes. Over twenty days, he had accumulated sixteen stakes from weekly and daily activities, but using them against orcs had cost him two. That left fourteen stakes. Combined with his sign-in rewards, this amounted to a total of twenty stakes.
Sign-in gifts did offer stakes, but the numbers were small. Mostly, he received low-grade offensive alchemical agents like blinding potions and small quantities of thunder alchemical pots.
Dillin hadn’t missed his one free weekly draw, but unsurprisingly, there were no prizes. It was all blinding potions, with an occasional thunder alchemical pot popping up.
Feeling like he was turning into a walking beacon, Dillin figured his role in future combat would be throwing blinding potions from the backline endlessly. Neither friend nor foe would be spared— everyone would be blinded.
But none of these props would help. The reason was pretty straightforward— Princess duels forbade the use of anything other than Divine Authority, Realms, and the Princess’s weapons. Alchemical drugs, magical scrolls, wands, and the like were all prohibited. This was purely a trial of Divine Authority, Princess Realms, and the Princesses’ fighting capabilities. Allowing these props would defy the purpose of the event.
So, for tomorrow’s duel, the only weapon Dillin could use was…
Dillin glanced silently at the old, dusty muzzle-loading pistol leaning in the corner.
Thanks to the easy handling of firearms in this world, he wasn’t terrible at gunplay, but Princess duels were not simply about shooting skills.
Even if he could lock onto targets and hit heads all day, Realm protections would effortlessly absorb all attacks.
Almost all rookie Princesses at Coleman Academy had completed their transformations. In fact, among Princesses of this age group who hadn’t completed the transformation, they could be counted on one hand.
A Princess who hasn’t undergone transformation and a full Princess were practically different dimensions; their fights would be a case of dimensional supremacy, let alone Tillysha, who couldn’t access her Realm.
Dillin could already imagine how tomorrow’s duel would play out- him crouching at a corner, covering his head while getting beaten senseless.
“That year, I stood casually with my hands in my pockets, being beaten and not daring to fight back.”
As long as tomorrow’s opponent was slightly strong- no, even if the opponent wasn’t strong, bullying a frail little girl would be sufficient, right?
Sighing, Dillin understood. Even with a cheat-like Golden Cupflower, his raw strength couldn’t improve within such a short period. It was fated that he would get beaten, so there was no escape.
At this point, all he could hope was that he wouldn’t run into a Princess he had crossed paths with before. However, Dillin wasn’t overly worried. With such a large pool of rookie Princesses, there was no way he’d meet one he had issues with, right?
Let’s be honest, Tillysha didn’t enjoy provoking trouble, and she hadn’t made enemies. But the orthodox Princesses looked down on her, always creating obstacles just because they didn’t give a d*mn.
Self-defense was all she ever engaged in. She liked peace and quiet, rarely spoke, but she was not someone who would stand still and take a beating.
Her attitude and stance were pretty clear, but some people just got bored and chose to mess with her, thus inevitably forming animosity.
The tournament scheduling was a hodgepodge, and the total number of new Princesses was so large. The chance of drawing such a match was minimal. Dillin thought this way until that evening, when the tournament schedule was distributed to every Princess on a per venue basis.
Dillin looked at this schedule he had just retrieved from Tillysha’s dorm entrance with a grave expression.
Due to the massive number of games, the tournament took place in several venues, and the schedules Princesses received were for their respective venues.
Dillin wasn’t paying attention to the other timeslot matches, but he noticed tomorrow’s afternoon session immediately, where Tillysha’s match was listed.
Indoor Venue No. 23, Afternoon Schedule.
Match 3 (3 PM), Tillysha vs Ailine Cardin.
“d*mn!” After a long silence, Dillin swore violently.
That’s strange. He hadn’t had any luck with his draw cards recently, and his luck should still be relatively stable. It was impossible for his luck to hit rock bottom, so how did he encounter this kind of situation?
Soon, he realized the issue.
Could it really be that convenient? Are things really as coincidental as that?
Don’t joke. Who would believe it?
Apparently, someone was playing him.
If there were no signs of foul play involved in the arrangements, Dillin wasn’t about to believe it. But even if he knew, what could he do? Without evidence, how was he supposed to report it? The tournament staff could easily brush off his claims by saying, “This is just a regular random event, our tournament schedule is both fair and transparent.” He had no way out.
Moreover, even if he had evidence, it wouldn’t ensure anyone would stand up for him.
For Princesses, Divine Authority and Realms truly mattered a lot, and this situation made Dillin once again realize this truth.
He clenched his fists and looked at the golden chalice with only 9 days and 5 hours left on the countdown.
