"Sofia, I'm already 18, so I know what I should choose for myself!" Lucy shouted at Sofia. "Steve isn't as bad as you think he is, and I believe in my choice."

Sofia was astounded, as Lucy had never flared up at her before. "You actually shouted at me, and all because of him?!" Sofia pointed at Steve, she had even lost the will to kill Steve at the moment.

Lucy was fl.u.s.tered, as she said, "Sofia, it's not what you think…"

Her original intent was not to fight with Sofia. She had only wanted Sofia to respect her choices, and see that she was not the little girl who needed Sofia's protection anymore.

"Alright Lucy, I'm here. I'll help you handle this." Steve stepped forward suddenly, touching Lucy's hair and murmuring in her ear. Sofia was still glaring at Steve with rage.

But, unfl.u.s.tered, Steve said calmly, "Lucy has already grown up, so even though you're her older sister, you can't try to protect her forever. She has the right to choose for herself, and you should respect that."

"I can respect her decisions, but I will never allow you two to be together." Sofia said.

"You're not respecting her, you just want to selfishly keep her by your side." Steve said coldly, "Since you don't approve of us together, if I were to win and surpa.s.s you in the ranking battle, proving that I am stronger than you and have the ability to protect her, shouldn't you allow us to be together, then?"

"You actually want to try to best me?" Sofia mocked him. "If you lose, then you have to promise to leave Lucy immediately!"

"No problem! But, you also have to agree to something if I win," Steve said.

"As long as you fulfil your promise when you lose, I can agree to anything." Sofia obviously never thought that Steve would win.

The audience was laughing at him as well, tickled by how ridiculous Steve's wanting to defeat Sofia sounded, especially with his mediocre skills! It was truly a joke. n.o.body felt that he could do it, as anyone among the new recruits was stronger than him.

"Lucy is not an object! I'm only doing this to prove that you are wrong, Sofia!" Steve said, while both of them looked at each other.

Sofia smiled mockingly, not taking Steve's words seriously.

"Gather!"

Right at this moment, Leikas' voice cut across the entire place. After his command, all of the new recruits gathered and lined up promptly. As they did so, Steve did not notice that, not too far away, Stuart was looking at him coldly, as if he was a wolf stalking its prey.

"Count off!"

"Recruit 12 reporting!"

"Recruit 18 reporting!"

Soon, all of the recruits had finished reporting. Leikas walked up to Wendy and said, "Chief instructor, everyone's here."

Wendy's eyes wandered over the recruits and landed on Steve, a surprised look flas.h.i.+ng across her eyes. While the others could not sense Steve's transformation, with her skills and powers, she could clearly tell that Steve's cells had grown a lot stronger.

This fellow is surprising indeed..

Her expression was as strict as ever, as she said, "Today is your recruits' ranking battle. After today, all of you shall officially enter the military and live with the seasoned recruits, going on missions with them."

She continued to explain. "This ranking battle uses a c.u.mulative round-based point system, one c.u.mulative point for those whose ranking was a 100 and below for the previous test, two c.u.mulative points for the top 100, three c.u.mulative points for the top 50, and the points then vary for the to 10. The tenth place gets 10 points, ninth place gets 20 points, eighth place is 30 points, up until first place, which will receive 100 points."

She paused for a moment, then continued. "You guys might not know the purpose of the c.u.mulative points, but I can tell you that, once you're officially in the military, the points that you've gotten shall be more useful to you than any riches."

The recruits present were silent, as Wendy did not ask them to speak. Hence, n.o.body dared to open their mouth.

"Obviously, Leikas shall explain the ranking battle's rules to you," Wendy said.

As if right on cue, Leikas walked up to the center of the stage and started announcing the compet.i.tion rules. "This compet.i.tion uses the elimination system…"

As he explained, both the recruits and the crowd listened quietly. Other than not allowing people to cripple or kill someone purposely, another important part of the compet.i.tion rules was the winning method of c.u.mulative points.

The victor could take away all of the loser's points. The loser's points would not disappear entirely, but would instead decrease by half. In other words, whoever lasted till the end would acc.u.mulate the most points.

Hearing this, everyone was tempted. According to the news that Mike had leaked, c.u.mulative points could be used to purchase rare resources that otherwise could not be bought outside of the official military camp. Thus, everyone naturally wanted to win in the end!

Most of the new recruits were all guessing who the top 10 would be, especially the person in first place, as he was the biggest prey in their hearts.

"Now, you can use your military serial numbers to go online and check your rankings. You can also check the ranking list," Leikas announced.

Now that he had finished his announcements, the silent platoons could finally speak. The whole place was abuzz, with everyone discussing among themselves.

"The one in first place got 100 points, so who could have gotten first place?"

"The top 10 are all bountiful prey!"

Everyone logged on to the official website hurriedly, so that they could check their points and rankings. A short while later, an exclamation rang out.

"This is impossible! The first place actually went to Steve?"

"What? You must be blind! How could he have won first place?"

"It really is Steve, but why would it be him?"

"First place is Steve, second place is Stuart… what has this world come to, that even trash like Steve could get first place in this test?"

Exclamations arose everywhere, as the new recruits all looked as if they'd seen a ghost, their gazes landing on Steve. This result was unexpected to everyone, except for the top 10, who already knew the results beforehand, of course. As such, all of the others could not believe it, some even refusing to accept the results.

"Stuart, how could you lose to such a piece of useless trash?" Will asked, looking at Stuart, who was beside him.

Stuart's face turned gloomy in an instant. He also wanted to know how Steve could score higher than him.

"That fellow's lucky, which is why he got first place. Don't let me meet him, or I'll defeat him personally, trampling over him!" Steve said contemptuously.

After the crowd recovered from the shock, they realized something, which one onlooker shouted out loudly.

"The one in first place has 100 points, so we'll get 100 points if we defeat him!"

In an instant, everyone's gaze turned from shock to greed. Their gazes were almost dripping with desire. They were looking at Steve like starving wolves eyeing a delicious meal.

Everyone knew of Steve's limited skills, and seeing that he was a relatively weak person in their eyes, who also now happened to have 100 points, no matter who it was, they'd naturally see him as easy prey!