Chapter 54: Chapter 54

“Kill!”

At this moment, no one even needed to issue specific tactical commands. The instant they laid eyes on the target, the remaining eight men immediately and tacitly formed up and charged toward the enemy.

Because of his continuous observation of the Pollution Secret Patterns, Ron was in the worst condition among the eight. At this moment, his mind felt as if countless little figures were chattering at him, yet he had absolutely no way to talk back.

Upon seeing the blurry figures ahead, his emotions nearly spiraled out of control. It was Karel tugging at him from the side that allowed him to regain a sliver of rationality.

Thus, during the final charge, he was placed at the rear of the formation, not even at the very end, tasked only with basic lookout duties.

But to everyone’s surprise, those few Wastelander elders who had been left behind as the targets for the apprentices’ trial didn’t show the slightest bit of resistance when facing the apprentices’ assault.

The main attacker, Sivara, thrust his sword straight into the Wastelander elder closest to the group, the longsword sinking fully into the elder’s body. At this moment, it felt as if those extraordinarily powerful Wastelanders they had encountered outside earlier were all just a dream.

The bodies of these Wastelander elders were actually only on par with ordinary people!

In the next moment, two secondary attackers swept in from the flanks, and with two sword strikes, bisected two of the Wastelander elders at the waist. Finally, Sivara delivered a follow-up strike, hacking down the last Wastelander elder still standing.

With that, all four enemies were completely slain.

Not just Ron, but the other seven all revealed expressions of disbelief. It wasn’t until they severed the heads of those Wastelander elders that everyone truly confirmed the mission’s completion.

“That was actually so easy!”

The apprentice who spoke grinned, but in the very next moment, his body swayed, and he vanished abruptly right before the eyes of the remaining seven.

“This…”

Ron instantly felt a sense of not knowing whether to laugh or cry. The enemies had already been slain; this could be seen not only from the severed heads of the enemies, but Ron could also confirm it once more from the way the Pollution Secret Patterns had begun to thin out.

Yet right at this crucial moment when the mission was about to conclude, an apprentice who had participated in the mission and was on the verge of finishing it and receiving the reward, had actually collapsed at the very last second.

The remaining seven all became vigilant in succession. Their taut nerves had first relaxed, then tensed up again, and as a result, yet another person vanished under everyone’s gaze.

“Everyone, hold your swords and stand still for a while. I feel that this black qi canopy is dissipating. Hold on, we can do it!”

The tranquility of the black qi canopy was fundamentally the maximum degree of chaos, but Order could counter this chaos. The external Battle Formation was one aspect, and holding their swords to consolidate their internal force was another.

With both internal and external forces combined, everyone would possess the strongest enhancement of Order available in their current state.

Of course, if they could maintain the Sword Stance state, meaning if they became Knights, it was entirely possible that they wouldn’t be affected by this black qi canopy at all.

While standing still with his sword, Ron was also striving to untangle the chaotic thoughts in his mind, simultaneously selecting a single conviction to serve as the core and closely uniting all his other thoughts around that one conviction.

He did this in hopes of achieving a combined force state on the spiritual level.

…

He didn’t know how much time had passed before Ron suddenly felt the external pressure lighten drastically. Raising his eyes, he saw six apprentices maintaining the exact same standing posture as him, as well as…

the other apprentices scattered all over the ground, lying this way and that!

Sure enough! The apprentices who had disappeared earlier hadn’t died, but had instead left the black qi canopy in some temporarily incomprehensible manner.

Reviewing this mission in retrospect, Ron realized that the inside and outside of the black qi canopy seemed like two parallel but non-intersecting worlds. The apprentices who had vanished from within the black qi canopy must have exited that world and returned to the real world.

“Ron! Karel! Are you alright?”

Just as he was pondering, Ron suddenly heard Morris’s concerned voice from not far away, so he hurriedly responded, “Instructor, we’re fine. We just don’t know how Justin and the others are doing.”

“Don’t worry! They’re fine. At worst, they’ll just sleep for a while.”

Morris glanced at Justin and the others still lying on the ground, not paying them too much attention. Instead, he fixed a burning gaze on Ron and said with a hint of excitement:

“Your performance far exceeded our expectations! Never has an apprentice with only a month of training accomplished what you did in the Domain of Chaos! Tell me, how did you find those Wastelanders?”

To put it more accurately, the Sis Territory had never before had an incident where a group of apprentices with only a month of training were made to enter a Domain of Chaos.

Under normal circumstances, entering a Domain of Chaos should have been the final trial of apprentice training. Now, this final trial had been moved forward due to an accident, and Morris didn’t know what kind of trial these apprentices would face two months from now.

But judging from their performance this time, they should be able to pass the trial!

At least, in Morris’s eyes, Ron was definitely capable of passing the trial.

That was why he was now extremely curious as to how Ron had managed to accurately find those Wastelanders in the Domain of Chaos. He knew full well that his own performance during his trial back then was nowhere near as dazzling as Ron’s was right now.

“It was a kind of intuition. I don’t really know how to describe it. I just felt that the target was in a certain direction,” Ron said somewhat vaguely.

At this moment, he was especially grateful that Morris had reminded them yesterday to trust their intuition, because this reason could not only be used to deflect the other apprentices, but was now also being used by him to deflect Instructor Morris himself.

“Intuition?”

Upon hearing this, Morris’s expression turned somewhat peculiar, as if he wanted to say something but didn’t know how to begin. Just then, Waynes, who had been behind them a moment ago, walked over.

Completely abandoning his previous awe-inspiring and solemn demeanor, he became exceptionally approachable. He chuckled as he patted Ron’s shoulder and said to Morris:

“Didn’t you remind him before to trust his intuition? Why is it that now you don’t believe it yourself? This is actually the fundamental reason why you’ve been unable to achieve the Senior Rank. You have far too many misgivings and attachments!”

These words seemed to Ron to carry a bit of showing off, but to Morris’s ears, they resonated like a sudden toll of a massive bell, shaking his mind and spirit intensely.

“Young Master Waynes, I…”

Morris was genuinely speechless this time, his eyes, filled with gratitude and excitement, darting back and forth between Waynes and Ron.

“Alright, there’s no need for unnecessary words. I’ll be waiting for you to achieve the Senior Rank!”

Waynes also patted Morris’s shoulder, then turned his gaze back to Ron. “Do you know why I said those things right in front of you?”

“No,” Ron said very modestly.

“No, you do know.”

Waynes revealed a slightly playful smile. “The reason I said those things in front of you is because you possess the potential to achieve the Senior Rank!”

Hearing these words, Ron instantly felt immensely flustered, having never seen anyone call out someone’s inner thoughts so bluntly.

However, Waynes didn’t dwell on this topic, and instead continued to explain his purpose. “The Sis Territory right now may seem peaceful, but it is in fact fraught with peril.

“The territory desperately needs the power of Senior Knights! If we had five Senior Knights, the Aberrant Beasts wouldn’t possibly have been able to run rampant for so many years.

“So, young man, work hard! I have high hopes for you!”

Faced with these words of encouragement grounded in reality, even though Ron was a psychologically mature adult on the inside, he couldn’t help but feel his blood surge.

He nodded forcefully and said loudly, “I will! I will definitely achieve the Senior Rank and completely eliminate the territory’s crisis!”