At the evaluation tournament for novice awakeners, a strange set of events was taking place: to the shock of the other novice awakeners, several promising awakeners were eliminated one by one, in short order.

"What'shappening here now?"

"The awakeners are starting to show their true power."

The novice awakeners who had already been eliminated from the competition were bewildered: potential first-place winners were either dropping out or being defeated, and those who weren't seen as worth notice were now beginning to show unheard-of levels of power.

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And the novice awakeners were now being shown the truth of the evaluation.

"You think you're a hot shot now? You still have a long way to go, pal."

"Hey, have you ever heard the proverb 'there's always a bigger fish'?"

"How boring. Is that all you've got?"

The ringers who took down the novice awakeners started to taunt and talk trash to the others; the novice awakeners who knew what was going on, dared not reply, as they knew now the gap of power between them and the ringers in the tournament.

"If you have something to say, then come down here and say it to my face, wise guy! There are still matches to fight. Or you're just happy talking shit to me?"

One of the novice awakeners there wasn't discouraged by the taunting and the ringers revealing themselves.

"What?"

"What do you mean, 'what'?" Jake Smithson asked back. "I was just done with my match and I need someone to take my bad mood out on. Unless you're too much of a chicken to meet me behind the concession stands once this evaluation is over?"

He gave little thought to the three ringers in this tournament – yes, even the one who Liam conceded to.

'You'll bounce back, Liam.'

Out of all the awakeners here – and the ones from Brino – Liam is the one awakener he considers a friend: hunting monsters, meals, and taking watch during the night led to a friendship between the two.

Liam is also a more cerebral and analytical personality compared to Jake, who is constantly looking for his next shopping item.

Their personalities made them an odd but effective team: Liam, the clever fire-wielder and Jake, the monster-busting shopping addict.

When Liam told him what happened, he didn't react angrily: in fact, he was glad that Liam didn't get injured and conceded the moment he knew he was never going to win.

"That guy's different," he had said. "If I knew you were going to face Damian, I would have told you in advance."

Still, Jake thought that it was a very smart thing for Liam to conceded, because during the eliminations, Damian had struck him. He blocked it, but from that one strike, Jake knew that Damian was no ordinary awakener.

'I have a feeling that it's going to be me against Damian in the final – but I must not lose. Gold Label access is what's on the line here.'

If Jake can make it to the finals without a problem, he will end up confronting Damian – and Jake has to win the match. After all, access to the Gold Label is what he's fighting for, here.

He is even prepared to put his life at risk for this – he needs to win, no matter the cost and by any means necessary.

'If I have to literally bite his throat out to win, I will do it.'

It was at that moment that he decided that if push came to shove, he'd literally turn into a rabid dog.

"Step onto the stage!"

Jake opened his eyes and stepped forward from the darkness of the waiting room into the light of the stadium, seeing the cheers of the audience, the appraising stares of the division scouts, and the predatory gaze of the familiar man standing opposite him.

Scarred face.

Flails on his waist.

"About time you came out here, you son of a bitch," Jonathan, the man who quarreled with Jake and Liam in the town square, declared. "I've been waiting for this moment to come, and I'm going to teach you a lesson."

***

Everyone in the audience had their eyes trained on Jake: after all, he had been deemed one of the strongest awakeners in his evaluation. A lot of divisions have been determining his talents as to whether he fits with their division.

From the first time he arrived in Kingsville, Jake had looked more like a seasoned awakener than a novice that just defeated their third calamity-class monster.

Standing opposite from him is Jonathan – another notable awakener, according to the scouts.

The scouts also note his excellent strength and leadership over the awakeners in his tutorial area. More than that, his ruthless personality makes him stand out: he had already killed several awakeners during the evaluation, all of those accidental.

"What will happen?"

"I don't know, but let's prepare for bloodshed."

Despite the match already beginning, the two awakeners spent a few moments facing off in the arena sizing each other up, and the audience – mostly awakeners themselves – were nervous: this match would start off explosively.

"How did you make all the way to here? Oh right, you've only fought those losers and had easy victories. Or maybe you got a bye? Doesn't matter now. This is the last stage you will be able to stand on," Jonathan taunted.

"Whatever," Jake's response came back, and even across the arena, he could see Jonathan's reddening face from his insult backfiring on him.

"You son of a bitch!" Jonathan roared, and he burst towards Jake with impressive speed, rage empowering his movement.

The flails he had in his hand could be combined to form a spiked staff, and when detached, could have a chain between them.

Tricky weapons; but Jonathan knew how to use them best.

His roar of fury echoed through, and as soon as he was in range, detached the staff, and decided to leap into the air, using the sunlight to blind Jake before smashing his enemy's face in from both sides with the flails.

It was a lethal attack, and if Jake was hit by the flails, it would result in his death.

The audience saw the attack coming with bated breath; such a violent attack from the start would mean a rather bloody match.

And then, what followed happened too fast for the audience to see.

In one moment, Jake was in front of his opponent, and the next, he had flashed forward, ending in a fighting stance.

Jake's opponent landed, and after a moment, collapsed into the sand.

In hindsight, the audience was right – the match was rather bloody: bloody boring, it ended too quickly and with a single strike, too.

"That's it? Just like that?"

"Is it really over?"

One attack ended the match.

"Winner, Jake Smithson!"

And it ended with Jake's overwhelming victory.

As soon as Jake's arm was raised, the spectators started booing.

Thankfully, Jonathan was knocked out so he couldn't hear all the trash talk being thrown towards him.

"What the hell? I put good money on you, loser!"

"All that bragging and you got punked by some weirdo with jewelry?"

"What did I expect from these tutorial district folks..."

The awakeners in the audience hoped for a long, drawn-out slobber-knocker of a match ended up sorely disappointed.

The match only took ten seconds, thirty if you include the fight banter, forty-five if you include the referee counting one guy out, and it ended with Jonathan, one of the better novice awakeners in this evaluation, landing in the dirt and drooling into the sand, mouth open and unconscious.

There was no fancy skill required: since Jonathan wanted to smash Jake's head in from both sides with the flails, his body was wide open.

So Jake just moved in while the attack was coming, slammed the pommel of the Swiftstone into Jonathan's solar plexus, and used the flat of his weapon as a platform to jump off of. Once he was descending from his somersault, he spun back, extending his arm first to grab the Swiftstone's hilt, at the same time extending one of his legs, so that the momentum of his spin would end with him kicking his opponent in the head.

Those two attacks were enough, and he didn't need to turn around, as Jonathan was already knocked out even before his flails hit the sand.

As soon as the arena staff carted Jonathan's insensate body away, Jake turned to the referee.

"When's the next round? How soon will we get to it?"

It was like he was thirsting for combat; but in reality, he was thirsting for the Gold Label.

***

Thanks to the ridiculously one-sided match between Jake and Jonathan, all of the awakeners in Kingsville finally realized one fact: that Jake is different from those 'prodigies' or 'prospective novice awakeners'.

'Jake Smithson is at another level!'

Among those watching the evaluation was one who knew this fact since the beginning of his appearance in Kingsville.

"I'll go myself," Timothy, the successor of Cheon-Ji-In, one of the divisions in the "Ten Stars", declared, having already foreseen the outcome.

"Yourself?"

"I'm sure there are a lot of divisions who will try to recruit him by offering him gifts. This is nothing," he answered, as he had noticed Jake's potential even before this match.

This was a step he had to personally undertake, despite him being a successor of a Ten Stars division.

'There's a change going on in Nohas, too. I have to look to the future; can't remain obsessed with the glory of the past forever.'

Ten Stars: the days when everything was settled by invoking that name alone are coming to an end; change is coming across Nohas, and Cheon-Ji-In is no exception.

They have to adapt, and Timothy, as the successor of this division, has to lead the preparations for it.

"All right, sir. But let me at least go with you, to watch your back, if nothing else."

"Fine, but I'll do the talking to Smithson."

A member of the Ten Stars was already on the move to recruit Jake Smithson.

***

When the last thirteen of the evaluation tournament was set, divisions began to make their move: this was their starting point, where there was more certainty that the awakener they'd recruit would be a good fit for their division.

This began to manifest as a lot of scouts beginning to visit Jake in the waiting room in the hours before the next rounds of the evaluation tournament would begin.

The recruitment period had come, and Jake began to notice.

"Hey, how many people are here to see you?" Liam asked as he saw another group of scouts leave the waiting room.

"Not sure," Jake answered. "They keep coming in, so I stopped counting."

No less than five divisions had already sent in their scouts to try and recruit Jake between the end of the round of 25 and now.

"These people also came in to talk to me as well, but they were fewer, and sounded like they were reading out of a card," Liam said. "I mean, compared to you, they were dead fish when talking to me."

"Don't worry too much about it," Jake replied, the pressure of choosing a division just rolling off him. "I just forgot to turn off my swag button after that round."

"I can see that," Liam said. "So, do you still want me to scout that Damian guy? You're going to need my info if you want to beat the shit out of him, right?"

"I do," Jake replied, "but man. This tournament kind of lit a fire under you. You're a lot weirder now than when we were beating up those monsters."

"More like your personality is beginning to bleed off on me," Liam said, and they laughed. "Seriously, though. That time I spent hunting monsters with you, I already thought I was good enough."

Those 45 days helped a lot to change Liam's personality – while he was still calm and analytical, he became a lot more outgoing and outspoken, thanks to Jake's influence.

"..but after that fight, I kind of understand why you need to get stronger."

"Doesn't that fit all the awakeners?" Jake asked, and just as he was about to elaborate further, both of them felt the temperature in the waiting room start to drop.

"You feel that too, don't you?"

"Yep."

The mood within the waiting room changed, just like when the skeleton army attacked Brino.

However, all that was just due to someone at the door.

Liam opened the waiting room door cautiously and saw no source of that strange effect. Jake, however, was left stunned when someone began directly speaking into his mind.

'I've reserved one of the waiting rooms nearby for us to have a talk. Would you mind sparing someone from Cheon-Ji-In a minute of your time?' the voice asked Jake. 'You may have heard of us, we are part of the Ten Stars.'

The aura was new, but the way other divisions wanted to sell themselves to Jake was similar to this.

'Ten Stars, huh?' Jake thought, focusing on that phrase. 'Looks like it's time for me to enter the big time.'

Thanks to Liam gathering the information about the Ten Stars around town, Jake knew exactly what kind of prestige this division had.

"Hey Liam," Jake said. "Hold the fort for me. I'll be back in a bit."

***