MMORPG: Rise of the Primordial Godsmith

Although he had been given a heads-up by Lunarossa beforehand that the second round's mechanics would be changed to mitigate some of the actions Erika was taking during the tournament, the director didn't really give him any specifics on what changes would be done.

Because of that, Valyr attentively listened to everything Schubert had to say about the second round, committing every word to memory.

To summarize what the man had told everyone, the chances of a participant moving onto the third round could be increased in two ways.

The first one would be the performance of the participant during the fight against the beasts. Whether it be one's combat strength, combat intelligence, leadership, and so on, all of it would be taken into consideration in being selected to progress further through the tournament.

However, compared to one's performance during the fight, the second method was considered more important by Schubert, informing everyone that reaching the end of it would basically guarantee one's slot into the third round.

Of course, that second method was the method the man just mentioned, which was forcing the beast they would be fighting to bring out a higher level of power.

At this point, almost everyone understood that the five individuals that appeared earlier were beast tamers who would control the beasts the participants would be fighting.

With that in mind, the announcer went into a bit of detail regarding the various levels of powers the beasts would have, prompting both the audience and the participants to pay full attention to what he had to say next.

"In total, there are five stages the beasts' strength could reach," said Schubert as everyone listened intently.

"The first stage is 50% power, which would pretty much put the beast's strength to around the peak of Rank 4 or the early levels of Rank 5."

"At that level, it would be quite simple for the participants to dodge the beasts' attacks, especially if the 100 participants fighting the beasts were working together."

"Naturally, full power comes after that," he continued. "With the beast making use of all of its stats, it's recommended for the participants to make use of the buffing skills in their arsenal to even out the odds."

"If most of the participants still remain standing even after the beast has gone all out, the latter would proceed onto the third stage, which would be when the beast uses one of its Intent Seed."

"I'm sure everyone here knows that an Intent Seed has to be formed first before one could comprehend its corresponding Intent," said the man, to which the audience nodded in agreement. "With that, I'm sure everyone also knows that the boost an Intent Seed gives to its user is marginal."

"However, aside from access to an Intent Seed, the beast at the third stage would also be allowed to use more skills in its arsenal, increasing the difficulty of the fight."

"With that being said, the fourth and fifth stages more or less work the same way, with the fourth stage giving the beast access to Intents, while the fifth stage gives the beast access to Forces."

Hearing that there was a slight chance they would have to fight against a beast that used Forces, many of the participants in the underground town shuddered in fear.

Then again, there were also those who saw this same possibility as an opportunity, especially those who had been stuck at a bottleneck in terms of their Intent comprehension.

"In other words, Lunarossa turned the second round from a battle royale into a boss raid," murmured Valyr to himself, faintly nodding as he continued to watch Schubert explain more of the second round through the magic screen.

Eventually, after a couple more minutes had passed, the man officially announced the start of the second round, prompting some of the tournament organizers to head underground and announce the participants that would make up the first few batches.

With everyone's attention more or less occupied by the organizer's appearance, Valyr stealthily made his way out of the tavern he was in and entered a secluded alley.

Then, after making sure that no one was watching him, he went ahead and activated [Soul Split], returning to the tavern with both identities after that.

"I wonder…" muttered Ataraxia as he sipped on his drink. "How long do you think it would take for one of us to be called?"

"Who knows?" Valyr shrugged as he ordered a drink of his own. "We could get lucky and enter an early batch like what happened during the first round."

"Or we could be spending a bit more time here and get called near the latter half of the round."

"Either way, we could use the time to polish our proficiency over certain skills."

"Yeah." Ataraxia nodded in agreement.

"Let's just hope the director doesn't put at the end of the second round."

…

With the first 500 participants having been chosen to fight the 5 beasts, almost all of the participants that weren't called immediately paid attention to the upcoming fight.

After all, none of them had any clue as to what the beasts' strengths and weaknesses were. Not only that, but they also had no clue what kind of skills each beast would use during the fight.

With that, all of the participants in the underground town seemingly came to a tacit agreement as they silently watched the fights unfold, gradually obtaining more and more information on the beasts before being eventually shared around.

By the time the participants had more or less noted down all of the skills the beasts commonly used, it was only then did the underground town return to its previous boisterousness, with everyone formulating their own plans on how they'd fight the beasts alongside 99 other participants.

Naturally, both Valyr and Ataraxia also came up with their own plans of action towards each beast, making sure to leverage their forte to the fullest while doing so.

Eventually, after two days of constant fighting had passed since the start of the second round, one of them was called.

"For the second round's 258th batch, please head up to the surface once your name is called."

"…"

"…Azure Spear."