Parallel Memory

-BANG! -BOOM! -BAM!

There was a loud sound of a person beating someone.

-AWOOOO!

The monsters howled in pain. Currently, they were getting their asses beaten by Zero. Zero had been beating those monster leaders for quite some time.

Throughout this time, other monsters watching their leader cry in pain made them shudder. In spite of this, no monster tried to approach and help the leader for fear of suffering the same fate as them.

"Whew! I am beat! You all can leave or do you want to carry on?"

-SHAKE! -SHAKE! -SHAKE!

The Rank-D monsters shook their heads quickly and ran away.

After teaching those monsters what it means to go against me, I let them flee along with their minions.

I could have easily taken their lives, but it would have been more difficult to deal with the after-effects. Instead of fleeing, other monsters might have fought harder in order to live.

It was better that they knew that they could live if they didn't fight. Letting them flee was a better result than having to kill everyone.

Therefore, I let them go.

*****

~Rumble

The monsters ran away as fast as they could. They thought that the further they were from that human-faced monster, the better it was.

In the midst of the earthquake caused by fleeing monsters passing by him, the flute man's face twitched. He blew his flute and tried to control the fleeing monsters.

"Stop! I order you all to stop!"

The guy angrily ordered.

He didn't expect the monster army that he and others have painstakingly collected to run away before even doing anything.

However, all the things that the monsters were thinking about were running away from that place. The flute has no effect on their minds.

His flute could affect monsters thinking about how he could command them to attack other students.

That does not mean that he could completely dominate their minds. It could only slightly alter some things, which was enough for him to incite the monsters to attack other students.

Zero, however, instilled fear into monsters, which destroyed the flute's influences. No matter how much mana he poured he could not change the fear that the monster had.

"DAMMIT!"

The man angrily threw the flute.

"All the plans for this round have failed."

Ruelle said.

Arcane Academy was determined to win this year's tournament and had made several plans which had all failed. They had the advantage in this round, but they failed.

"This is all Zero's fault!"

Ruelle gritted her teeth.

It didn't seem that she would be able to have her revenge in this round. She saw that it was Zero who had chased those monsters away.

First, the plan to defeat Ace Academy and Britelts Academy was ruined by him and then all the monsters that they had commanded were scared away. This round was a complete failure for them.

"Let's GO!"

Ruelle angrily said.

She was afraid that if they stayed any longer, Zero would come and chase after them.

-WHOOSH!

******

"Well, that was easy!"

Zero said as he headed back after chasing away the monsters.

When Zero came to where the other students were, all of them were staring at Zero dumbstruck.

The crisis that would have ended their lives has easily been averted by Zero.

Soon they were celebrating and cheering. Everyone looked at Zero with reverence including the students from other schools. Even Arcane Academy students' eyes were filled with respect and admiration for Zero.

Zero has saved their lives. If not for his help, the students there would have turned into food for those monsters.

They have witnessed everything from Zero facing those thousand monsters alone to driving them away in an instant. Zero's image soared in their minds.

"How is the situation of the students?"

Zero asked Lisanna.

"Not very good. Everyone is pretty exhausted. They would need at least 2 hours of rest before regaining some strength to fight!"

She answered.

She was not in a better state. The fight between Top-5 academies had taken too much toll on everyone's mind and body. They need some rest.

"It is fine. We are not in a hurry anyway. We have obtained a lot of tokens and need only defend them."

"Yes, we got all these tokens thanks to you!"

Lisanna said, brimming with happiness.

She had thought that they would be eliminated in this round when she lost to Omar Noel. Instead, they had gained a lot of tokens that would be enough to advance 10 students to the next round.

They don't need to worry about searching for other students. There weren't enough tokens to give to everyone, but at least the strongest students of their school could advance to the next round.

"You can distribute those tokens according to their contribution!"

"Don't you need any tokens?"

"I have plenty."

I already had many tokens when I arrived at this place, not to mention that I took the tokens of that Rank-B person who had about 13 tokens with her.

We have around 25 students if we count Britelts Academy which is our ally. We have to also give them some tokens.

After talking to Lisanna, I searched for Hiro Ernest. I soon found him and began walking toward him.

"How is his condition?"

I asked Sylvia who was standing there.

Hiro had been beaten by the Rank-B girl. Though I think that most of his injuries are from using System Double Power.

Lisa was currently healing him.

"Pretty bad! He would not be able to fight anymore!"

Sylvia said.

She was feeling guilty. It was because she thought that it all happened because she was not strong enough. If she was stronger than she thought that she would have been able to stop enemies from harming Hiro and others.

( Why am I so useless? I thought that I had become stronger.)

She blamed herself for letting the enemy harm Hiro, as well as taking Omar Noel.

-BANG!

"OUCH! Why did you hit me?"

She turned her head and glared at Zero.

"Oh! Your face was ugly so I thought I ought to fix it. No need to thank me!"

Zero pretended like he did something good for her.

"GRR! How dare you call me ugly. I will tell Lisa later!"

Sylvia said angrily.

Zero waited there with Sylvia, occasionally annoying her. He was bored so he had to do something to pass the time, which was annoying Sylvia.

All the other students were also recovering from their injuries so Zero had no choice but to wait.

He can't go anywhere because he needs to protect the students from enemies or if the monsters come back. It was a boring job that he needed to do.

"Anyway, I came here to give you this!"

Zero took out the tokens from his pockets.

"Don't you need this yourself?"

Sylvia asked while being astonished by the number of tokens that were in Zero's hand.

"Do you think I lack any?"

She thought about it. How can the person who beats Rank-B lack tokens? He would have stolen tokens from anyone he saw no matter the number.

"You are just bragging now!"

Sylvia said.

"Am I now?"

Sylvia snorted.

"Tell me how many tokens you need."

In total, Zero gave Sylvia 6 tokens, 4 tokens to Lisa, and 5 tokens to Hiro. Even with those tokens given away, Zero had more than enough. He decided to keep these and give them to other students when the time comes.

"Now, what shall we do?"