Martial Arts Worlds

"The losers will have to stand naked in the yard of Nightingale's school for the duration of tomorrow!"

Gardner said with a smirk.

"That's the penalty?" Julian scoffed.

'We're at a great disadvantage.' Kiernan thought. 'These two must've done hundreds of runs. I am not surprised if they have a run of under 10 minutes already.'

"You can also choose and run away!" Gardner said with a smirk.

'They are confident in their victory, which is why they suggested such a penalty to embarrass us even further. If we decide to leave, I am sure we will become laughingstocks in his school.'

Kiernan thought and glanced briefly at Roesia—she was hiding something in her hand.

'She thinks I haven't seen the phone in her hand, which she is using to record. If we decide to leave, they'll spread rumors of us two being spineless cowards or just blackmail us with it.

'While I don't really care, I won't stay here either way.

'If we accept the bet and lose, they can use that recording to force us to do the penalty. They've thought far. I wonder how many they've swindled before.'

"We're in!" Julian said and cracked his knuckles.

"Sigh…" Kiernan sighed and rubbed his forehead. "I guess we're in."

Gardner smirked and then walked over to the entrance of the cave—Julian walked next to him and threw a brief glance at him before turning his gaze to the front.

Fae stood behind them, raised her slender arm, and said.

"Ready when you are."

"Ready!" Gardner shouted.

"Ready…" Julian narrowed his eyes and moved to his sprinting stance.

"Set…" Fae whispered and then swung her arm down. "Go!"

The dust kicked up as the two young men bolted into a run and disappeared into the darkness of the cave.
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The time started counting up.

"Your friend will lose badly," Drago said. "Like you will."

"We will see about that."

Kiernan returned to sit on his fallen wooden log and watched silently as the time ticked up.

Around the clearing, the students were also watching with great interest—some were messaging their friends what was happening here.

They all expected Gardner and Drago to win—they were among the fastest runners in their school, after all.

Thus, they already started to spread rumors of the two tourists having to do the embarrassing punishment tomorrow.

…

As soon as the ten minutes were reached in the time tablet, footsteps sounded from the cave, and the timer stopped.

A young man stepped out of the cave.

"Ah~" Gardner stretched his arms with a smile. "That was fun!"

[FINAL TIME]

[10:01.944]

Kiernan's eyes shook in surprise.

"Heh."

Drago high-fived Gardner and turned to look at Kiernan with a look of "I told you so."

"Where is Julian?" Kiernan asked with a frown.

"Somewhere bleeding, probably!" Gardner said with a smirk. "Since he hasn't respawned yet, he isn't quite dead yet!"

'What the hell did he do?' Kiernan frowned. 'I forgot about the possibility of sabotage.'

…

The time passed slowly, and the students started to get bored for having to wait for Julian—it had been close to an hour already since the race began.

However, at that moment, Julian walked out of the cave with a limp in his step, and as he threw a rageful glance at Gardner, he walked past him and towards Kiernan.

"No hard feelings, oye!" Gardner said with a laugh. "Anything is fair!"

"Fucker…" Julian gritted his teeth.

"What happened?" Kiernan asked as he stood up.

"This bastard kicked me off when we were busy climbing." Julian said. "I fell all the way down."

"You didn't die from that?" Kiernan asked in surprise.

"I broke both of my legs." Julian said. "Try to do those challenges with broken legs. It was painful as hell!"

"Why didn't you just quit?" Kiernan asked.

"And give that bastard the pleasure of seeing me give up? Never!"

Julian angrily sat back down, but he didn't even once think about how impressive it was to do the challenges with broken legs.

He was only busy being extremely pissed off.

"You must win." Julian said. "I don't want them to give satisfaction of humiliating us."

"I'll do my best." Kiernan said and began heading over to the cave's entrance.

"Good luck~" Gardner patted Drago on his shoulder and sat down to watch.

Kiernan and Drago stood at the cave's entrance. Neither of them looked at each other. They were fully focusing on what was ahead of them."

"Ready?" Roesia asked.

"Yeah!" Drago smiled.

"Yes." Kiernan moved to his sprinting stance.

"Set…" Roesia lifted her arm high and then lowered it slowly. "Go!"

Swoosh!

The two young men bolted off the starting line and ran through the darkness. Behind them, the timer started counting up.

Within moments, they had already arrived at the climb.

They were neck-and-neck, neither having a lead.

Then, Drago sprang off the ground as he jumped and skipped the first few holds with that jump.

Kiernan fell slightly behind, but he started to climb quickly and kept with Drago's pace.

When they reached the halfway mark, Drago stopped moving for a moment and kicked his leg down, but Kiernan nicely weaved his body out of the way.

The kick missed him.

Kiernan grabbed the leg and tried to yank Drago down, but he kept his grip on the holds and kicked his second leg down.

Kiernan had to let go and ducked under the kick.

Drago continued climbing quickly, and Kiernan rushed after him.

During his first run, Kiernan was very awkward when it came to the climbing. He was very new to it.

However, during his run, he memorized the holds as well as he could because he expected to do another run to improve his time.

Thus, he was much faster now—fast enough to keep up with Drago!

A few moments later, Drago did the big jump to the next holds, kept climbing, and soon reached the top.

Without waiting for Kiernan, he started running towards the second challenge.

Only few seconds after Drago, Kiernan reached the top, and without letting out a single pant of exhaustion, he ran after Drago.