I Can Only Cultivate In A Game

The first team stepped into the battlefield.

The dome terrain shifted, causing the floor to rumble and retract, revealing a lava-like terrain zone.

Three Drakenars were unleashed from the opposite side.

Like regular Drakenars they were scaly, red-eyed, and larger than humans despite bearing a humanoid form.

They roared with guttural distortion while stepping forward with chains still around their legs to restrict movement.

> "Team 1, you may begin."

The fight kicked off.

Victor leaned forward while slurping from his straw, genuinely curious. He had expected cocky students to fold like laundry when faced with real danger but Team 1 actually did decently well.

The berserker drew the attention of the largest Drakener while the mage launched ice bolts to slow the others. One of them got burned and had to be emergency teleported out, but overall it was a successful run.

More teams followed. Some barely scraped by while others performed impressively.

Then came Team 7.

Victor watched with keen eyes. "That's Elyra's team…"

She stood confidently at the front, taking a defensive stance. Her five teammates included a female mage with pink dreadlocks, a short male summoner, a lanky assassin that looked more like a librarian than a fighter, a 5'3 healer and a massive brutish looking Berserker who's upper half was unclad.

The terrain this time transformed into a rough canyon with fog banks and limited visibility.

Three Drakenars with magma breaths emerged, screeching and slashing through mist.

"Don't choke," Victor muttered while leaning over the railing.

Elyra moved first, disappearing into the fog with her blade singing through the air. The mage casted a level 4 wind spell that swept a specific portion of the mist away while the assassin charged forward with his daggers held in a reverse grip.

The moment he arrived before a Drakenar, he stabbed the blade into its eye.

The Drakenar screeched in pain as hot blood seeped out while the closest Drakenar tried to attack him. However, before it could get close, Elyra's figure streaked past and in the next instant, the Drakenar's body was raining from the air in bloody sliced up chunks.

Things instantly got chaotic.

The Berserker charged forward and brutally body slammed into two Drakenars that were headed for the summoner while the summoner unleashed a dog like beast with two heads that was thrice the size of a human.

Elyra parried and leapt into the air to evade another Drakenar's swipe before leaping off its arm and slicing clean through its neck with a whirlwind spin.

One of her teammates got clawed hard and flew across the field, triggering a gasping reaction from the observing students.

Victor stood up.

She was now surrounded with one beast on her left, one on the right and another leaping from above.

> "Tch. Idiots didn't coordinate their angles."

Victor raised a hand while gathering qi arounf him. However, he didn't want to interfere too early since it would defeat the purpose of the drill.

But he stayed ready.

Just before the airborne Drakenar landed, Elyra dashed forward with [ Burst Step ], slid under its belly, then sprang upward with a slashing spiral, slicing its underbelly.

The Drakenar was torn open from bottom to top.

She spun around swung her sword in a diagonal form, cleaving another Drakenar's arm off.

The last one tried spraying magma from its mouth.

A trap rune activated, set up by the assassin...

Boom!

It exploded with a concussive force, sending the last Drakenar flying with it's limbs falling apart.

Elyra twirled her blade and exhaled.

"We're done."

Victor blinked again. "Sometimes I keep forgetting she's S ranked... she has gotten stronger since the last time."

---

Hours later, the exercise had ended.

Students were escorted out while rankings were announced.

Victor finally descended from the balcony, greeted by high fives, stares, and whispers.

> "That's Victor Revenant!"

"The number 2 in the entire Academy!"

"Why didn't he participate?"

"Rumors say he is more powerful than a level 45 awakened..."

"Woah that means this drill is way beneath him."

"How the fuck is he that strong? I only just reached level 21. Man this world ain't fair!"

Victor smirked while brushing past the whispers like a prince in a crowd.

Elyra walked up beside him.

> "You watched?" she questioned with a slight look of suspicion.

"Nah," Victor said while licking his popsicle. "Just happened to glance down while the stars aligned."

"We held our own."

"You looked like you almost tripped over your own blade at the start."

"I didn't trip."

"Could've fooled me."

She rolled her eyes.

"You're annoying."

"And you're sweaty. Shower's that way."

She smacked his shoulder.

Victor grinned.

...

...

(( Day Six ))

The clouds overhead were thick and bruised as the sky flickered with blue-white veins of lightning that cast eerie glows upon the metallic walls of Sector K-22.

The students stood behind the reinforced mana viewing screen that formed part of the outer observation deck. Some leaned forward in anxious curiosity while others had their eyes wide open with anticipation as rain fell from the sky intensely.

A storm had arrived.

Sector K-22, perched dangerously close to the Agashan Coast, was always the first to bear the ocean's wrath.

It was one of the rare sectors in human-controlled territory that directly bordered the Mana Ocean which was a chaotic expanse of sentient tides, rogue elemental storms, and gargantuan magical sea beasts.

When storms rolled in, they didn't just bring water. They brought war.

A low buzz rang across the deck as Instructor Rukia stood before the students with her arms folded behind her back.

Her violet combat robe fluttered wildly as her eyes faintly glowed from recently activated magic.

She was a summoner of incredible standing and had witnessed her fair share of oceanic assaults so she was show the students how mana defense officers took care of such situations.

"Eyes sharp," she said over the howling wind. "You're about to witness what real coordinated magic warfare looks like."

Just then, the defensive warning klaxon roared like a dying beast causing a deafening blare to vibrate through the bones of every observer. From beyond the screen, the waves surged higher than buildings.

The mana barrier surrounding the sector, strained against the weight of the tide.

And then they came.

A cluster of shadowy forms surged through the wave foam with their scales emitting mythical glows.

Their mouths yawned open to reveal rows of spiky, glowing fangs.

These were massive magical Sea Serpents.

Some were long as warships, reaching up to three hundred feet in length.

They slammed against the barrier, causing it to ripple and spark.

One particularly massive beast let out a sonic bellow that shattered a portion of coral reef over a hundred meters away.

Behind them, dozens more followed. Giant kelp wraiths. Abyssal devourers. An armored water drake with fins that radiated electric arcs.

The barrier flickered due to the continous collision of these magical sea beasts and then, it cracked.

In a rush of bursting mana, the screen shattered like glass but fortunately, it wasn't where the students were located.

It was down in the southern arc of the Sector wall.

Mana Defense Officers were already airborne by then. Cloaked in reinforced armor and color-coded capes denoting their class types — red for warriors, blue for mages, green for summoners — they engaged the beasts before they could pass the inner defense line.

"Don't blink," Rukia murmured as she leapt off the observation deck.

Gasps rose from the students as some grabbed the railing in disbelief.

These beasts were gargantuan. The Drakenars they fought a day before were nothing in comparison.

This had them wondering why magical sea beasts were not seen as more dangerous than the humanoid species that had claimed their lands.

Instructor Rukia hovered in mid air with her body cocooned in mana as she rode currents of wind.

A translucent phoenix emerged behind her back as one of her summons; Arkana the Skyflame Warden was unleashed.

The spectral creature let out a clarion cry and launched forward in a spiral of blue fire before slamming into one of the serpents with enough force to knock it sideways mid-air.

On the ground, the battle erupted like a coordinated orchestra of chaos.

A berserker in a black exo-suit charged at a kelp wraith and was immediately flung by a tendril. A trio of summoners opened portals that unleashed packs of ethereal panthers, which lunged at a tide-drenched drake trying to breach the inner gates.

Mages stood in coordinated rows behind mana-infused barricades, launching orbs of ice, lightning chains, and spatial disruption blasts.

"Holy sh*t…" a student muttered under his breath.

"Language," another whispered with their eyes still automatically locked on the mayhem.

One officer darted forward with a dual-bladed spear in hand and leapt over a hundred feet into the air.

His body twisted mid-air as he flipped over a charging sea serpent and cut across its eye with meticulous accuracy.

As the beast roared, another officer leapt from above and plunged a crystal spike into its skull. The serpent froze… and exploded in a wave of pure mana.

The students flinched but the mana viewing screen flickered and reabsorbed the blast, protecting them from harm.

"How do they coordinate like this?" Mia asked breathlessly with her palms against the glass.