When it was the appointed time, they all met up in a room reserved by Tazeen, the tall elf already sitting in a seat at the front of the room as the team filed in. Veren walked in right after them, the man predictably and impeccably on time, for if nothing else could be said about him, he at least reliably kept engagements he had agreed to. The team fanned out across seats around the room, all looking to Tazeen for guidance, the elf waiting for everyone to be comfortable and settled before beginning his explanation.

"This is everyone?" he asked. At a nod from Beth, he continued, "Likely Young Beth has explained some things for you, but I will give you a briefing now. We are here to duel members of the White Feather Guild, a mercenary organization, battle force, intelligence operation, and far more besides that. Their businesses are largely unimportant for your role, other than understanding that all of their members are skilled warriors with plenty of experience in battling other intelligent beings. The whole reason for the fighting is access to the White Feather archives and, at this time, I cannot go further into why that access is needed or what we are searching for. Your role in this is dueling a number of the younger members of their organization in a basic tournament. Any questions so far?"

"Opponent details?" Veren asked lazily.

"Seven opponents," Tazeen replied, sending data packets to the team. "Five I have no concern over, which will likely see our victory, but two are much more concerning. The group of five are four Empowered and an Enlightened, you have their details now. None of them are any more than Masters and none of them have anything beyond a Platinum skill, most of those tier three. I don't expect your team to struggle against them, but everyone can have surprises. These are full duels, after all, and weapons and armor can also have a significant impact on how a fight plays out.

"The other two combatants are both Enlightened and far more dangerous. Initially, I had expected to lose both of those fights, considering their skills, and that would make the pressure on the other fights much greater. However, if Veren is willing to step in for one of those fights, we should be able to thoroughly crush their team. The better our record, the more concessions I can win, so we should not settle for the slimmest of margin. A win of four-to-three would still be a win, but a win of seven-to-nothing would be a much better statement and would allow us to gain far more leverage. I believe, especially with Veren's help, we can easily get a five-to-two victory, and likely a six-to-one victory, but I do not think we can do a full sweep. You should all review the data and then we can discuss who would like to be lined up against whom. We can, for the most part, pick every one of the fights, which gives us at least a slight advantage in this tournament."

The entire group reviewed the data, with Beth looking through their seven possible opponents. Tazeen had provided dossiers that were quite detailed, listing everything from known skills to suspected current stats to preferred fighting styles. There were still quite a few details that weren't known, were suspected, or were a little questionably, but the reports were still the most thorough that Beth had ever read about a possible opponent. Considering she was used to just jumping in the arena and taking on whoever was across from her with pretty much no information, this was a bit refreshing, and also a bit overwhelming. It did put them at a much bigger advantage than what Tazeen was saying, or she thought so, at any rate, as it was unlikely the opponents could get much information on them in the little time before the fights would happen.

The five people that Tazeen rated as lower priority were a mixed bag, and Beth could easily line up five of hers against them and have confidence in victory. The best of the five was the Enlightened, but the person was a dwarf with a tank-y build that was about absorbing damage and pushing through it to crush whoever he was against. Beth had a good solution for that, one that was nine feet tall and more heavily armored than a battleship while hitting like a demented freight train. With what would essentially be the toughest of the five spoken for, matching up against the other four wouldn't be nearly as difficult. There was a knife-wielder that looked like they focused on speed and precision; Beth thought either Blood or Val could match them and defeat them at their own game. There was a mage that preferred fire, which was a bit of a tricky matchup, but Beth was sure Kris could stop him. There was a sword user that had a plethora of various skills that created elemental effects or destabilized the opponent; Beth would leave the poor sap to Adam, who could absolutely crush the man with the advantage of his Mana Physique. Finally, there was a rather interesting opponent that used chains and whips in combination with speed and electrical skills; Beth could think of a certain dragon that could easily go up against that opponent, though that was a bit of a trickier matchup.

As for herself, the reason why she didn't line herself up against the fire opponent were the two other opponents. Beth wanted a crack at one of the Grandmasters, thinking both that she could put up a good fight, and that her suffering a loss there would be the least demoralizing of the options. If the five other fights went well, and Veren sliced his opponent to ribbons as she expected, she would essentially be the decider between a total sweep or not, which took a lot of pressure off of her, at least in her mind. That and with not just her Mana Physique, but the incredible power of her spatial skills, and the new added strength of the fire dominion skill, she was a very powerful threat, and rather unexpected. Very few people truly specialized in spatial magic because it was quite difficult and taxing to understand and use; Beth's ease with the rare mana type was something that would often come as a surprise. Even when she became more well-known, her skill and mastery with spatial skills and mana would still catch many opponents off-guard, as too many people were used to spatial users being just dabblers or side-practitioners.

"Thoughts?" Beth asked first, looking at the team, including Veren.

"I don't know who you want to fight against these people, but I will fight, and beat, either of the Grandmasters," Veren stated calmly.

"That's quite a lot of confidence," Beth stated, frowning at Veren.

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"Neither of them is very skilled," he scoffed. "They're jumped up losers who were likely given an insight by someone, an insight that they don't fully understand. Neither are impressive in any way, and I doubt either of them would provide even a small challenge for me. Assign someone to fight whichever of them you want and I'll defeat the other one, and easily, at that."

"Is there any need for us to draw these fights out or perform?" Val asked, piggybacking off Veren saying that he would easily win.

"There's no requirements, nor do I need you to perform in a certain manner," Tazeen answered calmly. "If you can defeat one of the opponents from the White Feathers in a single stroke, then feel no compunction in doing just that. There is absolutely no need to make this into a performance; this is a test of skill and talent. Feel free to display as much, or as little, power as you need to defeat whoever you are against."

"This is my idea," Beth said. "I want Bjorn, Blood, Kris, Adam, and Sera to face off against the five Masters. I want Bjorn against their heavy, Blood against the knife speedsters, Kris against the mage, Adam against the swordsman, and Sera against the chain user. I will fight the Grandmaster that wields a spear and Veren will defeat the sword Grandmaster. Thoughts?"

"Why Kris against the mage and not Sera?" asked Val.

"I'm open to suggestions," Beth replied with a shrug. "I figured that Kris would do quite good against their mage with opposing elements combined with her additional element. Sera is so durable that the chain user can't do anything to her and she hits quite hard. If we swapped, then either Kris is dealing with a very powerful melee fighter or we're using somebody else in that one."

Sera just looked over at Kris, who fiddled with her hands in her lap for a moment before taking a deep breath. "I can fight the caster if that's what it takes. I could do better against the whip user, in my opinion."

"Well, that's good enough for me," Sera said with another shrug.

"Adam. Thoughts?" Beth asked.

"The person doesn't have a Mana Physique," he said slowly. "And their skills aren't particularly powerful. I don't have any issues."

Bjorn waved a hand before anyone could ask. "I would have very low chances against either Grandmaster, other than stalling out, but any of the others is fine. I have no issues."

"Blood?" asked Beth.

"If I have to," the wolf said with a sigh.

"It's either you or Val," Beth said. "Unless Andrea thinks she could handle it?"

"I'm happy to watch," Andrea said with a shrug.

"Don't be lazy," Val said, pinching Blood's side.

"Fine, fine, I'll do it," Blood grumbled. "It won't be much of a challenge, just a pain in the ass."

"Any other input? Thoughts, concerns, suggestions?" Beth asked.

"I think we're fine," Val said, waving off the questions. "We have a plan, these opponents look strong but not particularly challenging, and we can adapt as we go. I doubt there's much need to really beat this one to death; we just arrange the fight schedule and go."

"Tazeen," Beth said, nodding at the elf.

"I will set it up as you have suggested, including Sera against the mage," Tazeen replied simply. "I will schedule the fights for tomorrow, as they were waiting on me bringing in people from my team, or so I told them. They will not be expecting you, which is all the better, and I will simply enroll your names against their already stated contestants and let them scramble about trying to figure out what is happening. You have the rest of today and tonight free, and then the matches will start at nine in the morning, local time, tomorrow morning. Do inform me if there are any issues or anything comes up, and be careful about your surroundings. I do not think you are in overly much danger, but the White Feathers are going to be very active and may identify you as possible opponents. I would not put it past them to try something outside the ring to tip things further into their advantage."

"Or into their advantage at all, considering our team," Andrea said, slapping Adam on the back and laughing at his put upon face.

"Be that as it may, we should still be cautious," Tazeen said. "On paper, this is an easy victory, but like many places in the universe, the battlefield can be wider and more complex than you realize. Do not fall to carelessness, in or out of the arena, because you have become overconfident in your capabilities."

"I think we have it under control," Beth said, waving a hand dismissively. "Besides, we have plenty of time to train. Isn't that right?"

The others didn't really need it beaten over their heads to catch on to what she was saying, with the reaction ranging from stoic acceptance to groans and complaints. Veren stayed out of it, but was curious enough to follow the group back to their lodgings after Tazeen dismissed them. When Beth opened her gate, he became much less curious, immediately wandering off somewhere else to do whatever it was he amused himself with in his free time. Beth had the rest of the team make use of the ten times compression in time to go after a couple more levels, though it would be tough to get more than one level before then next morning. The gate did give them enough time that they could go after levels and still have plenty of spare time to rest before they had to be down in the arena for the pre-fight roll call. The team was trying to eek out any little last bit of advantage before then, and even one more level could make a slight difference, enough that it might tilt the odds in their favor just that fraction of a percent more.

The team had close to a full day, which gave them more than two hundred hours in the gate to level and train, and they used most of that time. They took advantage of the dilation to rest for nearly twenty hours, giving them almost as much rest time as they would have without the gate if they just rested from the time they met Tazeen until right before the fight. Beth had also prepared a little bit in making sure everyone had the best gear they could be in at the moment, as well as making sure everyone was as confident as they could be in their weapon skills. They didn't have a lot of time to do any serious training, but they did some mock battles and matches before the twenty hour rest, just enough that they were properly warmed up and in the right headspace for the upcoming matches.

The team gathered in a room in the arena where they'd be facing off against the White Feathers. Beth hadn't ever used the ready rooms before, and it made it feel a bit special or a bit different to be in one of the competitor lounges before a big fight. They waited for Tazeen to take care of finalizing all the details, as he was nominally in charge of the team and was the one who was interested in getting access to the concessions from the White Feathers in the first place. Beth made sure everybody was ready before relaxing herself, pulling on her gauntlets and working her hands within their confines. She had gotten level requirement adjustment arrays from Selene, paying quite a bit for a set of them, and had applied them to the ridiculous level four hundred gauntlets she had upgraded some time before. They were now usable all the way down at level three hundred without losing any of their power or defensive capabilities, and she was sure it would be a nice little extra surprise for the spear wielder that she was pitted against. While the woman's Grandmaster-level weapon skill was something to worry about, the gap wasn't so monumental that Beth couldn't overcome it through her other advantages, which likely meant she would be the tensest and closest match of the entire day.

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