Chapter 299 - Tier 3 Rift Permissions

The preliminaries were supposed to last a whole week. It was split up into five matches until the second stage started.

During this time classes were not mandatory, which excited many of the students to no end. However, there were a good number of students who were more than willing to attend these classes.

In Julius's case, he only attended a couple of them. The ones like Intro to Mana, he didn't bother to attend. He didn't like Professor Stewart anyway, and he had it on good account that she didn't like him much either.

It had been two days since he had his first match. He just had his third match earlier today and it wasn't that much of a surprise that he won just as easily as the other two times.

It was worthy to note that this time he had faced a fourth year who had displayed some very interesting skills. Sadly, this didn't help his opponent all that much.

However, now he was attending Applied Combat at the insistence of Joshua and some of the others. The underclassmen didn't have to attend classes for the next week like the upperclassmen. Plus, those who were participating in the Tier 2 tournament still had fights.

Just like the Tier 3 tournament, they still had a preliminary stage of five matches. The worst thing though was that their matches were sometimes at very early or very late times. For example, Joshua had his third match at seven this morning and Tia had hers an hour afterward.

Still, this didn't stop them from wanting to take Professor Rowe's offer to delve into one of the rifts. On top of that, they wanted Julius to come along with them.

"I don't know if Professor Rowe is going to allow me to enter with you guys," he explained to them.

"What do you mean? There is usually a Tier 3 supervisor with us anyway, so I don't see a reason why you wouldn't be allowed," Tia pointed out.

"Are you guys sure that you want to delve today? Don't some of you have matches later today?" He asked. All of them were participating in the Tier 2 tournament, and according to some of them, they had some good chances at getting a pretty high finish since there weren't many powerful people left among the second years.

A few of the stronger second years had already advanced to Tier 3, which surprised Julius since that wasn't that common, but he clearly wasn't the right person to complain.

Apparently, this happened from time to time, but since there was practically zero chance of them winning, they didn't join the Tier 3 tournament and waited until next year. However, since they were at Tier 3, they couldn't join the Tier 2 tournament either.

This also meant that Helen Cromweld was in contention to win the entire thing, which was a massive achievement considering she was only a first-year.

However, based on what he had seen, he would say Polux had a good chance at matching her. Now that the wolfkin boy had been diversifying his abilities, he didn't have as many glaring weaknesses to worry about.

Joshua and Tia were also strong, but he didn't quite think they were on the level of Polux or Helen.

"I got one later, but I don't plan to overexert myself," Polux commented as he walked beside them.

"I do too, but I already lost my second fight, so I hope I am not put up against anyone too strong," James added.

That was another thing he had found out not too long ago. The way the prelims worked was that those who had better records often found themselves facing those with similar records.

That meant that the fights would become much more competitive and balanced towards the end of the preliminaries. It would also draw in a much larger crowd since there was a chance that people could see a fight between two powerful people who had a chance to win the whole thing.

However, Lily assured him that this didn't start until after the halfway point. So he shouldn't be too worried about drawing too many eyes yet. With that being said, once he got to that point, people would be keeping a very close eye on him since he would be fighting a bunch of powerful students.

"Also, this is the perfect time to delve since most students are slacking off and enjoying the break. We might even get the whole rift to ourselves," Tia said happily.

"We will probably run into Helen and some other groups," Joshua said distractedly while reading something from a piece of paper.

"Hey, is it too much to be optimistic?" Tia asked with a frown.

"Just staying realistic," Joshua responded, dodging the vine that appeared behind him to smack him.

When they arrived, they immediately asked Professor Rowe if he was allowed to go along with them. Funnily enough, the professor was very encouraging, and he went with them.

"I tell you what, if you can show me that you can oversee them on your own, then I will allow you guys to delve without an assigned supervisor," Professor Rowe said to them.

"Isn't that against the rules?" Tia was surprised at the man's answer.

"No, the only real rule is to have someone stronger accompany you in the rift. It doesn't technically say that it has to be a staff member. I am also only considering this because of your team's recent success and spotless record while delving. All of the instructors have reported that you guys are very well organized and behaved. Which further incentivises me to give you some more freedom."

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"Actually, I have a question about my future delves," Julius said to the professor.

The man turned to look at him. "I'm guessing you are wondering if you are now allowed to delve Tier 3 rifts?"

Julius smirked a little bit. "Yeah, am I that predictable?"

"Of course not, it is just a common question from students who have advanced to Tier 3," Professor Rowe said with a light laugh.

That made him feel a bit better.

"So is it possible?" He eventually asked.

"Of course it is. There are some things I would need to fill out, but it shouldn't be that much of an issue. However, there will be a separate examination to make sure you can handle a Tier 3 rift. Are you planning to delve on your own, or are you going to join some of your fourth-year friends?"

Julius didn't find himself too shocked that the man knew of his friendship with the others.

"Well, since they are graduating soon, I think it would be better to plan to delve by myself for the time being."

"In that case, let's set up a time for you. What about sometime this weekend? You shouldn't have any matches during that time," Professor Rowe offered.

"That sounds good, just let me know what time and I will make it work," he told him.

"I will, and don't worry about it too much. I saw your fight yesterday, and I don't think you are going to have any worries. You should be able to get permission quite easily," Professor Rowe said with a knowing smirk.

Julius gave the man a surprised look. "You were watching?"

"Of course, when I heard that one of my first years was going to participate, I was very interested in seeing them. I must say, I am very impressed. I always heard some good things about you from the other assistant instructors, but I hadn't gotten the chance to watch you in person. It's good to see that they were right."

Julius scratched his head awkwardly at the compliment. "Thanks."

Professor Rowe smiled. "Just saying what is already known. Look, I gotta finish some things before class starts, but come talk to me afterward, we can figure out some of the details then, okay?"

He nodded and watched as the professor went over to some of the assistants preparing the rift for delving.

In the meantime, he and the others all sat down and waited for the class to begin. As time passed, he wasn't surprised to see that some other students showed up as well.

Helen Cromweld was one of them. Taking a closer look at her, Julius observed something very interesting he had not noticed before. There was some sort of weird aura surrounding the girl. It was very well hidden, the girl must have some kind of high quality aura skill and even more impressive control, because it was better than most Tier 3 students he had seen.

But thanks to his newfound improvement in aura, he was able to sense what she was hiding.

It almost felt like a living tempest. There was a continuous swirl of erratic energy around the girl, unlike anything he had ever seen before. He could see why many considered her to be the strongest person within their year.

He was actually reevaluating his previous assessment that Polux could beat her. If the deep profoundness he felt from the girl was any indicator, then she was very strong.

He would have kept examining her, but he was distracted by an unexpected person showing up.

They walked up to him and gave him a playful bump on his shoulder.

"Hey, what are you doing here? I thought you had a match later?" Reinera asked him with a worried look.

He chuckled and bumped her back. "I'll be fine. I am just here to watch over these guys. I won't be exerting myself. What about you? Why are you here? I find it hard to believe that you want to go delving into a Tier 2 rift."

He noticed that the others had all stopped talking with each other and focused on the princess. It was still quite a new experience for them. When they first saw Julius hanging out with her, they didn't know how to act.

Even after over a week of seeing them interact, they still felt a bit awkward interacting with the royal princess.

Reinera shifted from one foot to another. "I was hoping to ask Professor Rowe about the possibility of getting permission to delve into Tier 3 rifts."

"Oh yeah? I just asked him about it, and he said it was possible and we would only need to take a separate examination to get approval."

"Really? That's all?" She asked happily.

"Yeah, you should come and talk to him with me after class. I'm sure we can take the examination at the same time if you want," he offered to her.

"Absolutely!" She said excitedly. She then turned to look at the professor, who was still looking quite busy.

"I'll come back in a bit then."

"Why not come with us?" He asked.

"Into the rift?" She asked confusedly.

"Yeah, I am just going along with them, but I don't see a problem if you join as well," he said before turning to look at them. "You guys don't mind if Reinera tags along too, right?"

Joshua gave a polite bow toward Reinera. "Of course not, it would be a pleasure if the Royal Princess were to join us."

Julius sighed and pinched his nose. "I told you to stop being so formal around her. You don't need to bow or scrape your forehead on the floor, you just come off as a weirdo. Right, Reinera?"

She chuckled. "I wouldn't say a weirdo, but yeah. I would feel much better if you treated me like a normal student."

Joshua short circuited a little bit after she spoke to him.

Thankfully Polux spoke up. "Well in that case, let's get a move on girly! We got some monsters to hunt!"

He slapped his forehead. Okay, perhaps, maybe some manners were in need.

Polux was quickly punched in the side by James. "She said to treat her like a normal student, not like some servant," the other boy whispered harshly to Polux.

"What? This is how I treat everyone though," Polux argued.

"Okay, well maybe in your case, you should treat her like a princess. Everyone else can treat her normally."

Polux gave a genuine look of confusion. "But she's not my princess. My tribe has our own version of a princess."

James gave a deadpan stare toward Polux and looked away, appearing to give up entirely.

"Just do as you please, but don't come running to us if she decides to break you in half."

Polux scoffed and gave a measuring look at the delicate stature of Reinera. "She wouldn't break me in half."

However, when he saw Julius's sympathetic shake of his head to the side, he became visibly more worried.

He slowly turned to face Reinera. "You wouldn't, right?" He asked her hesitant smile.

She shrugged her shoulders and looked at him with a blank stare, not responding. However, Julius was able to tell that she was having fun messing with the wolfkin boy. But it's not like he was planning to tell Polux that anytime soon.

With that, the group of them all headed toward the rift. He did find himself chuckling silently when he spotted Polux constantly throwing worried glances back toward Reinera, probably scared that she had actually taken offense.