You know that feeling when giving a speech, and all your audience expects from you is failure, and they all stay quiet, waiting for you to step on a line.
That was the scenario team 24 was in now. And Jayden was gonna crush their ego.
Jayden led the attack at the centre while Ryan and Tyler flanked him on both sides.
"On my mark, Ryan, pull a strike on the professor", Jayden whispered as they approached the man who did ultra perfectly well in underestimating them by closing his eyes.
Ryan nodded in approval; his steps were silent, and even his breath couldn't be heard. His glass beast was capable of cloaking his presence, and one day, he would be nothing less than a chameleon.
"Let's have him strike first", Draco advised, but that was Jayden's plan all along.
Immediately, they were just inches apart from the professor, the professor pulled off a punch, but not after telling its direction with his grey aura.
If only he knew Jayden was a third-generation tamer. He wouldn't have played such a rough game.
Jayden smiled and immediately ducked below the punch. "Do it, Ryan!"
Ryan immediately sent a punch to the professor's side. It was slow enough for the professor to react, but what could he do with his other arm behind his back?
The professor backstepped, gritting his teeth, but he certainly still thought, 'this was luck.'
Even the students were left with their mouths wide open, but it wasn't long before they used the excuse that the professor was closing his eyes to make up for their shame.
"You're up Tyler, give it your best shot" Jayden whispered as the team pushed forward
Jayden was running with his egg in his hand while Tyler and Ryan ran with their hands behind their backs.
They closed on the professor again, and all the man could do was throw the same punch, but a bit faster.
Jayden slightly dodged the punch, watching the fist blow past his face. This was as easy as fighting a crippled opponent.
Tyler didn't need to be signalled, he saw the opportunity and lashed the professor with countless plant vines.
The professor did his best not to moan out loud from the unexpected pain. He backstepped on one foot again, but soon enough, Jayden's team were already in front of him.
The same scenario played but when Jayden dodged this time, the professor couldn't risk taking more damage from the lowest potential students. He clenched his teeth.
He stamped his feet on the ground.
Jayden saw the stream of mana hurling up from beneath his feet, but the earth was also rising faster than it was for Zoe's team.
'Damn, we didn't bet our own hit' Draco cursed.
Jayden's eyes met those of the professor while he was mid-air. 'We would'
He threw the egg, or rather, such a heavy stone, and it landed right on the professor's feet, and that wasn't counted as cheating since the egg was his beast.
The boys crashed to the floor but with happiness. They had made the best progress which was a brutal shame in the face of the supposed top students.
The enthusiastic grin on their faces was now replaced with a shocking calm. The weakest team was taking their badge for a class.
What a sting to their pride!
"Bro, we did it! See why I called you our team's strategist," Tyler bumped shoulders with Jayden in a manly way.
Ryan smiled too, but deep down he was bitter, not for the reason of them winning but something had happened that had looked like his failure from secondary school was still with him.
"You guys wouldn't have won without me!" Draco teased.
Jayden smiled. 'You're part of the team Draco, our win is your win!"
The professor cleared his voice after biting back the painful growl.
He gathered the students and taught them the basics of mana prediction.
It was something that top-ranked tamers could easily see and also hide when fighting.
It was all about compressing your aura into a dense shield around your body or leaving it to howl like flames all around you.
That Jayden had mastered from Draco's memories and was actively using them to hide his mana, which was now blue.
It was like the reverse of the pattern Jayden used in absorbing mana from the crystals days ago.
Allowing mana to escape the skin and form another bigger body outline, like a human-shaped wall, whose solidity depended on how compressed or how loose the mana was.
The other day, Jayden's mana compatibility was just 10/10000, and for each core, it took 2500 mana points to reach maximum cultivation.
And the strongest tamer—the president, had just a mana compatibility of 2500 and a single elemental core.
Compared to Jayden, he was nothing.
But let time tell the story.
The only way for a low-ranked tamer to see mana spikes was to gain a bit from mana poisoning which would awaken the sight.
And once mana had entered the body, there was sure to be some imbalance in its distribution since the MAGEO's machine wasn't perfect, but that wasn't enough to cause any harm.
Also, since humans weren't created with mana, infusing mana in their bloodstreams would surely cause side effects, allowing them to see a faint picture of it in the air while third-generation tamers could see the clear 3D view of mana patterns.
This was just a test to see who was hardworking, who really cared about growing, but only team 24 prevailed with Draco's help
Most students only started gathering crystals while in school so it was fair to say they haven't even awakened their elemental cores.
For that reason, competition in school farms was hectic since most preferred to gather crystals rather than use the little money they had to purchase them, except for top students who had a 70% discount.
The professor announced Jayden's team as his class top one, gave them a private lecture schedule in front of everyone, and also asked that team one swap badges with team twenty-four each when in his class.
"Class dismissed."
Team one's pride had been wounded, and a wounded beast always sought to bite back, but now they couldn't attack Jayden in public since others would see them as jealous brats.
But think of it!
Was Jayden their only target now, or the whole of Team 24?