Rebirth: The Shadow Of Greed

...In the middle of it all, one student caught Z's eyes he was unmanifested, standing alone in the face of the many monsters, his shield hung behind his back as he swayed his body avoiding the beasts and dealing the beasts heavy blows. 

What shocked Z the most wasn't that he was fighting on equal ground with the monsters, but rather how he was doing so. That fighting style was so familiar to him, he had seen it multiple times before, it was the usage of the ancient arts, a form of fighting that was lost in the earlier days when mankind gained manifests, that form of fighting is only used by a handful of people and that unmanifested student was one of them.

" Itai , the redeemer,"

Z whispered under his breath, it was a name he remembered from his path, he was a soldier of legends, turning the tides of battle all while being unmanifested. Although Z in his previous life was pretty much locked away hiding from the world, he had heard of the name and had a few run-ins with them as well. He was one of those people that Z had difficulty facing previously because of the lack of understanding of the ancient arts. Z's eyes shone with interest as he continued watching him fight. He didn't expect to find a young version of Itai here, perhaps, just perhaps he would be able to pick him up and groom him. 

He watched as the battle raged on, as more and more students started to get eliminated, the students were struggling even more now, the grotesque monsters that came out of the side started mutating changing to different kinds of models. Some came out on all fours, some came out as bipedal, but all with the intent to do some damage. 

Itai looked at his surroundings and took a deep breath, he calmed himself as he vanished from his spot, using a strong kick to kick the legs of the bipedal monsters, making them crash down to the ground, before running back full speed to prevent his egg from being attacked. It was a tedious process, but it seemed to be one that works. 

Before long, even Itai is exhausted as the monsters came out quickly and overran the arena. Resulting in their loss. The scoreboard was flashed on a huge screen. 

Itai - Wave 5 

James- Wave 5

Mavan- Wave 4

Endry - Wave 4

Timon - Wave 4

.

.

The list went on to 20 with the lowest being wave 1s, not completing it at all. Itai came out of the arena and smashed his fist against the wall, he felt that he could have done better and this defeat was not justified, he shouldn't have lost at wave 5, he could have done way better than he did. He shook his head as he left the arena. 

"You did well, you shouldn't be too upset over your loss." 

A voice said, 

"Thanks... but who are you again?" 

Itai replied, with a bit of irritation and confusion in his voice. 

"My name is Zero Cromwell, I'm just a passerby who thinks highly of your talents. To be honest, at that last moment, instead of dashing towards the front and defending the egg, it would be better to use your ancient arts to directly kill the monsters near the egg before pushing the front back."

Itai raised his eyebrows as he questioned Z

"You know of the ancient arts?" 

"I dabble, I know of the fight tactics, but I haven't practised any ancient art yet." 

Z replied, this was true in this life as he really hasn't been putting in any effort into training the ancient arts, it has been on Z's list but for now he hasn't really found the time to properly train in the ancient arts. 

"Oh! that's good enough, I was afraid that the ancient arts would be lost somewhere along the way so I decided to be the one to bring the ancient arts to the top of the world. But I got defeated so easily at wave 5, how can I even bring this to the world." 

"To be honest, that is a great dream and I don't think the problem is with your practising of ancient arts, I believe it is utilising it efficiently, you're wasting too much energy doing things, every hit you deal should be efficient every point you hit has to have a point." 

Z replied, letting Itai know that his train of thought wasn't wrong, it just needed some tweaking. 

"hmm, every hit matters... That is true, I haven't really thought about it that way, maybe I should train on my precision and not overly focus on power. Thanks! You've changed my perspectives, from young I've been trained only by my grandfather, my father passed away early and my mother abandoned me when she found out I was unmanifested. So having a different viewpoint really matters a lot to me. You said your name is Zero? It's great to meet you, my name is Itai" 

"Likewise, it's great to meet you Itai, I believe meeting you here is fate and I believe in the future we will see each other more often." 

"I sure hope so, thank you!" 

Itai said as he shook Z's hand and bade his farewells as he left the arena. Walking back to his seat Z had seen that the leaderboards had gone through some changes with the highest Wave now being at wave 7. This round had ended again as the next batch of students went up onto the stage. 

Z could clearly see, Odrunn, Vero and David were all part of this batch, be it by a quirk of fate or if someone planned it, it was easier for Z to monitor all their performances now. 

 Odrunn walked into place topless, with his gauntlets hanging around his neck as he strolled in front of the egg. Vero walked up as he planted his shield on the ground before folding his arms and standing in a strong pose. David got ready for battle as he slowly transformed his body. 

" 3, 2, 1, start!" They were ready for the trials!