Chapter 58 ~ When the Ugly Duckling
Turns into a Swan
The Crown Cup is a unique event, receiving unanimous attention and importance from the academy and all sectors. Clearly, various powers have focused their eyes on this grand tournament. After all, with Coleman Academy’s prestige, the top graduates of each session are sure to become the influential figures of their era. Knowing these contemporary heroes and their relevant information is ultimately not a bad thing. You might even cozy up to a few of them.
As one of Coleman’s key events, the academy places a significant amount of emphasis on it. They don’t hesitate to spend a fortune crafting thousands of talisman badges to ensure the fairness of the competition and the safety of the students. This is the kind of extravagance unimaginable in other academies.
The competition location is in a Secret Realm located to the northeast of Coleman City.
The era and creator of this Secret Realm cannot be traced, but nowadays, Coleman Academy uses it as the venue for the Crown Cup.
For fairness, the participants’ teleportation positions are completely random, and once they are defeated, they get forcibly sent back, preventing students from mapping the Secret Realm.
People had already started gathering here early. Before the competition began, the place was bustling with chatter.
There were mentors and academy security forces maintaining order and ensuring the students’ safety. There were also higher-class students who came purely to spectate and gossip. Naturally, the majority were the participating freshmen.
Unlike the arena ranking battles, the Crown Cup is mandatory for all freshmen, serving as an entrance assessment. Each year, around 10% to 20% of freshmen get eliminated from the Crown Cup after entering.
Those eliminated aren’t merely the last ten. Once inside the Secret Realm, students who do nothing but survive without battling enemies will also be asked to leave by the academy.
The administration was encouraging the students to compete internally. Want to stay? Then hunt down others and increase your points. Otherwise, your entire team will be eliminated.
To prevent players from exploiting the rules to avoid fights, the academy added “pursuit mode” to prevent enemies from fleeing.
All kinds of rules boil down to one simple message: no running. Beat the cr*p out of each other. You won’t d*e anyway, and ideally, bl**d should be flowing everywhere!
All the freshmen teams gathered here. As newcomers who had only been at the academy for a little over a month, the teams were evidently disorganized, with a very uneven distribution of professions.
Some teams consisted only of a necessary “Male God’s Son” role (神子) and the rest were all “Feminine God Child” roles (神姬), while some teams had no “Feminine God Child” roles at all, with fighting personnel limited to mages and alchemists.
Teams with a balanced distribution of professions would have a better chance of development, but it wasn’t much of an issue. After the Crown Cup, official teams would be formally assigned. Before that, all these teams were temporary and didn’t register officially.
There were only ten minutes left before the Secret Realm opened. The students, filled with anxiety, started to quiet down, whispering amongst themselves.
“Lady, who are you looking for?”
“Hmm? No one.” Seeing Sofia inquire beside her, Aistride shook her head and retracted her gaze.
As one of the most dazzling sights on the scene, Aistride naturally drew many people’s eyes.
“Lady, surely you’re not still looking for that human?” Sofia said petulantly when she noticed this.
Aistride tenderly rubbed Sofia’s head without replying, which clearly didn’t satisfy Sofia who felt somewhat jealous.
Sofia huffed inwardly. She didn’t think there was anyone in this year’s batch of freshmen that deserved special attention. Lady was already the most brilliant star.
Sofia felt irked and confused. She didn’t understand why such an outstanding lady would be interested in a completely average male human.
After all, he was just an ordinary person, one who would blend into a crowd and be impossible to spot, yet he had made Lady worry so much.
This made the possessive Sofia rather jealous, her heart feeling a little sour.
Judging by Lady’s expression, it seemed she hadn’t found this human.
Looks like he didn’t come. It made sense. Rumor had it that the guy couldn’t find any teammates after leaving Lady. Instead of getting eliminated and embarrassed at the Crown Cup, it would be better to make a good impression and leave quietly.
If that guy had any self-awareness, he should be packing his luggage back in the dormitory by now.
On the scene, everyone had their own thoughts, and John wasn’t the only one paying attention to Dillin.
“Where is that idiot? Is he even coming?” John cursed, his words betraying a hint of unobvious urgency.
“There are five minutes left till the match. Please get ready, all freshmen! Do not leave anything behind. In five minutes, mentors will distribute identity tags, and teams with the tags will enter the Secret Realm in order!” The grand mentor in his gray robe used amplification magic to convey his voice to everyone present.
“sh*t, does that j*rk even have stage fright or something??” John couldn’t help but curse, his exceptional observational skills as a “Male God’s Son” (神子) not helping him sense Dillin’s presence in the crowd, which made John increasingly restless.
“Captain, what’s wrong with you?” A hulking man next to him was confused, seeing his captain muttering to himself right before entering the Secret Realm.
“Ah, nothing nothing, I’m just talking to myself,” John waved his hands anxiously.
Even if we fail, it’s better than not even trying, Dillin. Don’t let me down.
John muttered silently.
“So, Prince of Divinity, have you found that Wild Female?” In one corner, Aileen laughed.
“Not yet, no ‘Realm’ skills or ‘Divine Authority’ detected. I haven’t sensed the presence of such a ‘Feminine God Child’ (神姬) at this location,” the Divine Prince in Aileen’s team shook his head.
“Tsk, why hurry?” Lalo crossed his arms. “If she shows up, we’ll kick her out of the academy first. Better if she doesn’t show up, saving us the effort.”
“Why would not showing up be better, Lalo? What you’re saying…” Aileen narrowed her eyes. “If we can add a victory without much effort, it’s a deal we shouldn’t pass up.”
“Once we enter the Secret Realm, deal with that Wild Female and her useless ‘Male God’s Son’ first. Then we can unleash our full potential without worrying about elimination. Why wouldn’t we want that?”
“Haha, right. That disabled pair better show up,” Lalo cracked his knuckles, sneering.
The starting time for the competition was entering the final countdown.
Aistride felt a bit desolate and lost.
Maybe he isn’t coming.
Is he really leaving here forever…?
Just as her thoughts were wandering, a white-gold warm breeze rushed past her.
Aistride froze, instinctively looking towards that dazzling figure like a radiant sun, while subconsciously raising the back of her hand. The silver moon pattern on it shimmered silently.
Sofia also froze, as the golden figure immediately overlapped with the golden silhouette that appeared often in her dreams these days.
The platinum-haired girl strolled calmly amidst the crowded crowd, as if walking leisurely in a quiet courtyard. The reflected light in her emerald pupils was calm and composed, unaffected by the bustling people around her.
“Who… is that…”
“Who is this person?…”
“Is there someone like this in our school???”
“Isn’t she beautiful… Don’t you think she looks even prettier than Lady Aistride?”
Carrying a long bundle on her back, wherever the golden-haired girl passed, everyone in her path gave way unconsciously, looking at this elegant young lady whose simple walking had elevated into an artistic expression.
Before they realized it, their instinctual exclamations had slipped from their mouths.
The bustling crowd suddenly fell eerily silent. The girl remained silent, moving as quietly as a cat, yet she had already captured everyone’s attention in the area.
Finally, the girl came to a stop, seemingly unbothered by the looks she was getting from everyone. She brushed her soft strands of hair from her ear.
Her flawless milk-white skin looked as though it had never seen the sun. Her thin, small lips resembled budding flower stamens, and her long and dense eyelashes looked like small fans. The hint of adolescence’s sweetness complemented her exquisite features, leaving no flaw behind. Her flowing dress and perfectly round, slender legs defined her perfect body curves.
Her youthful beauty shimmered with both vigor and charm. Her natural, unadorned beauty transcended that of heavily made-up women, forming a stark contrast.
Her long silky platinum hair was braided intricately into countless fine sections, arranged like ears of wheat behind her head, creating a princess-style braid. The ends fell gracefully to her knees, shimmering beautifully under the sunlight like the finest silk.
Her breathtaking posture made every goddess in attendance pale in comparison.
Her ethereal beauty seemed to belong to a realm beyond the mundane world.
The emerald-eyed, golden-haired girl stood proudly among the throng, like a noble white swan.
Her powerful gaze seemed to be searching for someone. At last, it landed on the stunned Aileen, her lips parted to speak a sentence that, despite its low tone, could be heard by everyone.
“Please take care of me, Aileen.” Her voice resonated like a skylark soaring over the valley, echoing in the minds of everyone present.
“…She’s Tillysha!” Realizing this only after the girl walked past her, Aileen exclaimed in shock, her finger pointing towards the girl’s retreating figure as she revealed something that her teammates could hardly believe.
“Aileen, are you joking?! Are you telling me that beauty… is the ugly duckling?” Lalo’s face showed total disbelief.
Could the reviled ugly duckling transform into this splendid white swan??…
