Lyrica charged forward with her mind scanning everyone she needed to eliminate.

  On her path up, 5 people were climbing to the next layer.

  Planning out her way of attack, she twirled the sword and threw it to the first enemy.

  The sword smashed against his head. An instant kill.

  Jumping up, she grabbed the sword while making sure her foothold was in place. She stepped hard on his body and jumped towards the second victim.

  Kneeing him in the ribs, she twisted her body before slashing him at the back of the nape.

  ’2 down.’ She thought.

  Tilting her head up, she narrowed her eyes on the third victim.

  Lyrica used one of the skills that came with her equipment. This skill allowed her to gather the force of her body in one short burst. The backlash will cause her to freeze up for a moment but she had already planned the next steps.

  She jumped towards the 3rd victim with incredible momentum.

  Her sword struck the woman’s head and eliminated her easily. Her body froze up as she expected but her flight path was already determined.

  Scraping the sword against the wall, she jammed it in one of the cavities and supported herself from falling. The short 2 seconds where her body was frozen felt long as she narrowed her eyes at the next 2 victims.

  It seemed like they knew each other since they were protecting each other’s backs.

  Swinging her body onto the sword, Lyrica crouched down and jumped towards the two.

  Sam managed to block her strike while Steve took notice and attacked her.

  Twisting her body, she avoided the strike. She followed her momentum whilst kicking Steve’s chin.

  The caused him to recoil backwards from the force. Grabbing Steve’s collar, Lyrica swung him towards Sam and slashed at them both.

  Due to the fact that Steve blocked his view, Sam wasn’t able to react to her strike.

  Eliminating the duo, Lyrica didn’t have anyone else blocking her path to the top 500’s.

  Crouching down, she dashed from one foothold to another.

  She left a trail of afterimages since her willow blade aura was still active.

  Landing softly on the second layer, she quickly bent backwards as she dodged a sword strike.

  ’Attacked the moment I reach this layer. Seems like this layer’s fight is more desperate than the one below.’ Lyrica thought.

  Flipping backwards, Lyrica charged at the assailant in a zip zag manoeuvre.

  The sword clashed with each as they came face to face.

  Lyrica didn’t hesitate to headbutt her enemy. The force caused both of them to recoil with pain while she threw her sword at the same moment.

  Striking him in the chest, Lyrica eliminated him and sent his body flying back to the start.

  "Ssss!" She breathed in sharply from the throbbing pain. Holding her head, she regretted acting impulsively.

  A heavyweight seemed to have been placed on her body since both her berserk type skills wore off.

  Frowning slightly, she looked around for a place she could rest for a second.

  Naturally, there were none but she was looking for an area with fewer fighters.

  Dashing towards the area with only 3 people fighting, Lyrica could already feel her speed drop dramatically.

  While it wasn’t to the point where she’ll not be able to fight, it would definitely be a hard fight.

  Trying to make sure her presence was as small as possible, she manoeuvred around the trio. This was to make it seem like she was fighting with them while in reality, she was resting.

  However, the reality was often disappointing since they found out straight away.

  One of the fighters branched off and started to attack her.

  "Ku!" Blocking his heavy downwards strike with a lot of difficulty, Lyrica kneeled heavily on her right knee.

  Gripping her sword with both hands, Lyrica struggled with the power behind his axe.

  Glancing to the side, she released one of her hands and allowed the axe to overpower her.

  Shifting her body to the right, the axe slid off to the left due to the lack of weight in her sword.

  Having successfully redirected his slash, Lyrica attacked his torso.

  The sword collided with the axe since Scott’s stats allowed him to recover before her attack succeeded.

  Quickly jumping backwards, Lyrica created some distance between her and Scott.

  ’The level is too far apart.’ Lyrica thought with a frown. Even when her Bladedancer class gave her a huge boost compared to the normal classes, it was still hard to bridge the status gap.

  When a person levels up from 1 to 20, they would get 5 points per level up to use.

  The average status page for a level 20 all-rounder would be:

  STR: 30

  VIT: 30

  INT: 20

  AGI: 30

  DEX: 30

  DEF: 20

  And then a +20 depending on what class they chose. A mage would have a +20 in INT, a warrior +10 in STR and +10 in VIT etc……

  This, however, was a one-time boost.

  After level 20, the average class gave 150 – 175 points for you to distribute and then automatic points depending on your second class.

  Her Bladedancer class gave her an astounding 225 points per level not including the automatic status.

  In addition to this, she already knew the Bladedancer class gave her incredible STR and AGI since just these two stats could be compared to people 2 levels higher than her.

  Combined with her hidden proficiency, this made for a fearsome combo.

  Even if the sword wasn’t exactly her hidden proficiency, she was able to get into a similar rhythm.

  Yet all this combined was a far cry from what a level 30 could output.

  ’If I threw my sword like before, there is a high chance I’ll lose it. I can’t fight him head-on either since he is a power-based attacker. Lyrica thought with a frown.

  This left her with only the options of suppressing him with speed, which was impossible, and eliminating him in one go. A single attack to breach his defences.

  However, that seemed rather impossible as well since she was recovering from her backlash.

  She still had 3 more minutes to go before it wore off and 8 more minutes till she could reuse the skills.

  And surviving 8 minutes against a level 30 wasn’t easy.

  Brandishing her sword, Lyrica panted slightly as she shifted her body to a more defensive posture.

  Scott charged towards her with his axe dragging across the ground. Stepping back half a step, Lyrica stabbed her sword towards the axe so that it would glide along the blade and over her body.

  Her plan worked slightly since the axe did indeed miss her body. But, this resulted in her feeling a lot of the resultant shock through her body.

  With her muscles contracted from the pain, it was hard for her to reposition herself to fend against the following attack.

  Seeing the axe chop towards her, Lyrica gritted her teeth and threw her body away from the impact zone.

  Rolling on the ground heavily, Lyrica was glad at the fact that she was able to avoid the axe narrowly.

  Scott didn’t mind and jumped towards her.

  He used the Axe Warrior’s skill, Ground Impact. This skill would use all the force gathered from his jump and attack with an area of effect skill.

  Lyrica started to sweat when she saw his aoe charge up.

  Looking around quickly, she cursed at the fact that there was no cover for her.

  Narrowing her eyes, Lyrica had no choice but to fight fire with fire.

  Her sword shimmered with a pale pink light.

  Sword dance of the lotus was a skill that allowed her to attack several times like the opening of a lotus flower.

  She planned to try to disperse as much of the force as she can before the aoe hit so she could survive.

  Using her left hand to aim, Lyrica narrowed her eyes and aimed for the perfect moment. The small interval where he is barely within her reach. The gap where she could make the most of her skill to disperse his momentum.

  ’Now!’


  A neon pink trail of light drifted from the tip of her sword as several lights followed. The streaks of light formed the outline of a lotus and collided with the axe warrior.

  A huge cloud of dust rose up from the impact, attracting the attention of the surrounding participants for a slight second. However, they looked away immediately after since it wasn’t rare for clouds of dust to form in the midst of battle right now.

  Lyrica’s body was sent flying out of the dust. Sliding on her hands and feet, Lyrica glared at the silhouette of the axe warrior.

  While she managed to survive the contact, she was left barely surviving once more.

  Checking her armband’s HP, she was pleasantly surprised at the fact that it was slowly regenerating.

  ’So this was put in place to stop people from being eliminated as easily the higher up they are.’ She thought.

  However, this also meant Scott’s HP was regenerating by the second.

  Realising she had to act fast, Lyrica decided to risk it and dashed towards him.

  Dragging the sword on the ground, she flicked up a rock before hitting it towards him.

  Since the dust was still present, she was able to catch him off guard.

  With him being preoccupied for a moment with the rock, Lyrica dashed around him and cut towards his head.

  Sensing danger, Scott quickly ducked. Narrowly avoiding the strike.

  Flowing through her movements, Lyrica grabbed the back of his collar and slashed the sword across his neck.

  "You!" Scott cried out as he wanted to take her down with him.

  Unfortunately, or rather fortunately for Lyrica, the force of the armband was too much and he was sent back to the start.

  "Fuu……" Breathing out in relief, Lyrica took a moment to relax her body for a moment.

  Looking up towards the next layer, she decided against it.

  ’If I’m struggling with the top 500, I won’t survive the top 100. They’re filled with level 40’s to 50’s.’ Lyrica thought.

  ’I should use this moment to hone my combat prowess with people similar level or slightly higher than me.’ She concluded.

  After rotating between fighting and resting, Lyrica managed to secure her spot within the top 500.

  "And STOP!!!! CEASE YOUR FIGHTING!!! The first quarter of the warrior’s division has finished! May the current participants leave the arena. The staff will clean up before the second quarter can enter."

  Walking away from the arena, Lyrica managed to find Madison before they returned to Shiro.

  "Madison!" Lyrica called out.

  "Lyrica. How did you do in your arena?" She asked.

  "Er I only got top 500." Lyrica replied feeling a little embarrassed for saying she’ll get top 10.

  "See? I told you top 10 wasn’t as easy as you thought." Madison shook her head.

  "Hahaha, yeah you did. Oh yeah, how did you do in your arena?" Lyrica asked.

  "Urg! I only got top 1000." Madison replied. Her arsenal mostly focused on defence meaning her attack was trash.

  She was able to hold her own in defence but could barely progress.

  "No worries no worries. This event was more focused on the attacking aspect after all." Lyrica said as Madison nodded.

  "That being said, I’m rather surprised you got top 500. Most of them are filled with level 30’s after all. How did you even hold your own there?!"

  "I got lucky." Lyrica laughed.

  It didn’t take too long for them to return to the area for the school.

  She saw Shiro sitting on her chair, relaxed as always, with the guys trying to please her.

  Naturally, this was limited only to giving her items and no touching allowed.

  Lyrica smiled wearily seeing a few ice statues placed aside and knew what probably happened.

  Shiro asked with a smile.

  "I got top 500 and Madison got top 1000." Lyrica reported.

  Shiro typed, shaking her head.

  She expected their ranks to as such since they are basically the two sides of extremes almost. Lyrica with attack only and Madison with defence only.

  With this, they won’t be able to get high ranks. However, the more important aspect would be to gain the experience that comes with fighting opponents. She could experience fighting in 1 on 1 battles or 5 on 1 battles.

  The options were there, they just had to take it.

  "I guess I kinda did." Lyrica said since that was the truth. She had to fight tooth and nail to keep her spot in the top 500.

  "Same. I was mostly focused on honing my defence." Madison admitted. Since she wanted to her a defence orientated adventurer, she focused on fighting multiple people at a time.

  Shiro typed with a grin.

  Lyrica shivered seeing the grin. It was one she hadn’t seen in a while and one that would make her pray for the safety of her enemies tomorrow.