The Legend of Randidly Ghosthound

Randidly stood on a wooden board that he had hastily covered in Engravings to support his weight. He tapped his foot twice on the board to test it and then smiled when the Engravings began to glow emerald; this would do. After releasing a light breath, he floated down from the edge of Kharon to hang over the sea of people who were waiting below for him to speak.

It was the first day of the tournament. The goal was to push through today and finish all the preliminaries.

Although the number of participants had been cut down by Tatiana to only twenty thousand, there were almost ten times as many people waiting below bright eyes. Even if they didn’t plan to compete, far too many people came for the spectacle of this first world tournament. At the edge of the vast crowd were tall platforms topped with powerful cameras; Tatiana had jokingly informed Randidly that his tournament was going to be the first difficult test that the recovering broadcast companies would need to handle. He was going to be a television star.

The demand to see the fights and watch the most powerful individuals on Earth was extremely high. Even if there were a lot of people currently who still felt that the pre-System Earth was an infinitely preferable alternative to the violent present, they couldn’t deny power had become necessary. They could only thrive when they could overcome the threat of monsters. Subconsciously, the values of the world gradually shifted under the weight of necessity.

Randidly’s gaze swept over the crowd. Compared to the immense weight of bodies below him and the size of Kharon behind him, he was a relatively small figure floating between them. Plus, he didn’t activate his images at all. He just looked down in wonder, a human standing before the weight of humanity.

These people hold the future of this planet in their hands.

With Randidly’s senses, he very quickly had an accurate impression of the capability of the gathered people. And what he found within the whispering sea of bodies surprised him. Although he had largely been disappointed with the capabilities of the average population after scanning the Orchard, the group in front of him was different.

But that gradual separation of power made sense. These were truly the Earth’s elites. They embraced Randidly’s call for images and had spent the last two years frantically training. Probably more than that, considering the recent bustle surrounding Dungeons. There were several images present that Randidly didn’t recognize, but would be able to put up a good fight against someone of Alana’s caliber.

These people would rag up the mean strength of Earth, even while the Median remained weighed down by the majority of the population that was content to be protected.

Almost instinctively, Randidly bared his teeth. The Nether Nebula that he had so carefully suppressed while he was within the Dungeon spun freely around him. Heh, although no one is a match for me individually, if all of them combine their power, it will be very difficult for me to win…

...should probably leave them with some confidence, with them heading straight toward the First Calamity. But still, six months of image training has me itching for the chance to fight… It’s almost become a habit...

Randidly’s heart began to softly pound. The weight of all the gazes of the people below him became weight that spun into his Nether. After being thoroughly and purposefully strangled within the Dungeon, Randidly’s Nether greedily absorbed this ambient weight until a tiny void appeared at the center of the nebula. The edges were tinged with grey, causing Randidly to highly anticipate how his Nebula would continue to grow. If it could reach the weight of the innocuous grey bubble…

But right now, I have other business. Randidly abruptly refocused his gaze on the light reflecting off of the lenses of the distant cameras. I won’t be here to fight against the First Calamity. I can’t stick my fingers too deeply into this tournament that will capture the imagination of the entire world.

“Welcome,” Randidly said softly. But with that word, Randidly also included a wave of his image’s strength. It wasn’t a concrete thing; Randidly didn’t suppress the surrounding area with either the Grim Chimera, Stillborn Phoenix, or Yggdrasil. Instead, only that formless potency that made those three images terrifying spread out to cover the waiting crowd. Combined with the subtle touch of Randidly’s Nether, the weight he released on his audience was enough that he could clearly sense which individuals had hidden their powers from his initial scan.

Before that weight, the lurking predators subconsciously reacted before they could help themselves. His eyes flashed side to side, marking the people of interest below. During the process, Randidly’s smile widened. This will be an interesting tournament.

But then, as he opened his mouth to continue, someone forcefully pushed his way through Randidly’s aura. “You are the Ghosthound, right? Let’s see if you are as strong as they say! Azure Claw!”

Randidly blinked as one of the unknown images that had been hiding its presence blazed immediately to life. A young man with spiky blonde hair leapt off the ground and shot upward toward Randidly and his wooden board. The man glowed with blue energy and the spectral form of a Siberian tiger imposed itself on the young man, making it seem like a tiger was pouncing upward with malicious intentions.

The man was quick, but… not quick enough that Randidly wouldn’t feel awkward bullying this obviously weaker individual.

Randidly’s eyelids twitched as he considered the fact that most of the world was watching this. The blonde-haired man traveled upward at a painfully slow speed, giving Randidly far too much time to think about what was happening. Some idiot just had to try and to test himself against me… well, this IS the sort of place that the Earth is becoming… But please wait for a more appropriate time to try and become the main character of a story… Ah, didn’t I just decide to make sure I kept my images out of the public eye?

Luckily, Randidly didn’t even have to move; the police force of Kharon was running the security at the tournament and an officer quickly prepared to intercept the attack. The nearest patrol officer exploded with a rather vague image of justice that manifested around his body as a spinning whirlwind of golden lights. His legs flexed as he used his image to empower his physical body and leap upward.

But as he did so, Randidly felt a headache growing. Everything felt like it was going in slow motion, but it didn’t feel… appropriate to intervene directly. That’s… Fenlin, right? Even before the Dungeon, his control over his image was a bit…And I have no doubt that he hasn’t adjusted to using his new image on Earth-

As Randidly had predicted, the ground beneath Fenlin’s legs exploded and collapsed as he overutilized his image. He shot upward like a rocket, not so much blocking this Azure Claw attacker as directly intercepting him, Fenlin’s shocked face smashing into the young man’s chest with all the force of a ballistic missile.

The casual image aura that remained around Fenlin was enough to shatter the image of the tiger with just the initial contact. Then the two shot off to the side where they impacted the ground and created a smoking crater.

Randidly rubbed his chin and sighed, grateful that Fenlin had carried the attacker out of the area occupied by the crowd. He’s so used to acting within the Dungeon where my image was a constant weight that he has no idea how much he needs to concentrate in order to accomplish basic tasks here on Earth… it’s like a man with a battle ax suddenly trying to wield a knife in the same manner… Guess it just shows they need more training.

A rather strained looking Fenlin stumbled out of the smoking crater and smiled awkwardly. From within the hole, some light coughing could be heard.

Randidly smirked around and released a pulse of Nether to make sure everyone’s focus was back on him. Better move this along.“Since it looks like everyone is itching to start, I’ll keep this short.”

After a smattering of laughter from the crowd, Randidly continued. “You’ve already been divided into ten groups. Today will be totally devoted to those ten preliminaries. Each group will fight in a special environment for one hour. Leaving the special environment will be considered a forfeit. Defeating other duos grants points. After the hour, no matter how many people remain, the top ten percent in terms of points will move on to the tomorrow's rounds. The round will finish early when 90% of the groups have been defeated.

“Other than that, there are no rules. Just know that I’ll intervene if I sense that anyone is out for blood… obviously this competition might not be friendly, but we aren’t here to weaken ourselves. Because beyond this tournament is the First Calamity.”

Randidly gritted his teeth. “Do not forget our true foe, people of Earth.”

Gradually, the people below nodded. Randidly glanced sideways toward Clarissa, who stood in the shadow of Kharon. Seeing Randidly’s glance she began to gather her image. Then her hands began to move through several complex signs as she started the process. The Skills that Clarrissa had developed in the Dungeon were powerful, but they did take a bit of time before they could be activated.

So Randidly turned back to the crowd. “Group 1, you are up. Show the world how much you’ve improved your images. Everyone is watching.”

Very quickly, Randidly floated upward and out of sight of the people below. He quickly moved to the Southern edge of his island, where he could look down at the battlefield and monitor the situation and prevent any accidents. Although it cut into his training time, he would be responsible for tracking the points of the fighters below. In the end, it wasn’t such a big deal to lose out on a day’s worth of training; all Randidly really wanted to do right now was work on Nether.

Most of his other areas had already reached their limits within the Dungeon. Besides, centering the monitoring and safety activities in himself would mean saving the labor of at least two dozen members of the Order Ducis. It was grunt work, but also work that he was uniquely positioned to accomplish.

As the crowd talked excitedly and split into the various groups, Randidly also noticed that the blonde-haired young man stumbled out of the crater, covered in dirt and vaguely smoking. After coughing several times, he glared up toward Randidly’s island. But compared to Randidly’s Grim Intuition, it was clear that the blonde young man didn’t possess the Perception to pierce through the silver mist around his island.

Instead, the blonde young man harrumphed and began to stomp his way toward the fighting ground. It appeared that he was part of Group 1.

Inwardly, Randidly chuckled. If defeating him was this individual’s goal, the blonde young man would need to improve quite a lot before he began a threat to Randidly Ghosthound. So Randidly just looked up at the clouds. Underneath Clarissa’s influence, the slate grey sky darkened toward black. The clouds thickened ominously, small flakes of snow drifting downward.

Very soon, the rate of snowing increased. By the time al of the Group 1 was in position, a veritable blizzard had descended. Their battlefield had turned into a snow globe that was being rather violently shaken.

Randidly closed his eyes. When he spoke, his words boomed out over the surrounding area. “You have one hour. Begin.”

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