Chapter 297: 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.”

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“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.