Saiyan stowaways on the Ark

That's a pile of junk on the street corner used to store household waste.

Two broken bracelets were thrown inside.

At that time, several Liberi beasts that were pecking at the garbage were flapping their wings on it.

The radar's response stems from this.

"But if they were forcibly taken away... how could there be no sound at all?"

Ignoring the stares of passersby, Thomas picked up the bracelet from the pile of trash and said in a puzzled tone.

No other operators have arrived yet, so there's not much we can expect to get from the analysis.

"Hey."

At this moment, Badak called out to Tomat in a low voice, and then asked:

"No matter how fast a vehicle is, it can't leave this city in such a short time, right?"

"Probably. What do you want to do?"

Thomas was confused and had a bad feeling.

"Is there even a need to ask?"

Bardak raised his hand, and an energy blast condensed in his palm.

The bulging veins on his wrist indicated that he wasn't suppressing his strength too much.

"Let me fly up there and shout a few words. If they don't release the people, I'll blow up the whole city."

Passersby scattered in panic once again.

But Tomat pressed his hand down on the back of Badak's raised hand, using his muscular arm to hold him down.

Badak paused for a moment.

Besides being puzzled by the actions that stopped him, he was also a little surprised—if he didn't put in more effort, he probably really wouldn't be able to lift it up.

"Stop."

"Tomat said in a calm voice."

"Imprompting them without any context will only put them in real danger."

Bardock suppressed his agitation, but still yelled at Tomat, pressing him for answers.

"Then what do you suggest we do...!!"

Thomas raised his hand and tapped his head, saying with a confident expression:

"Don't forget, I'm a professional. Last time in Siesta, wasn't it me who helped when the mayor's daughter went missing?"

"Ha, yeah, and then you blew up the volcano!"

"You were involved that time too, weren't you?!"

A few simple words of argument calmed Badak's agitated emotions to some extent.

"Fine, maybe I'm not as smart as you. I'll listen to you for now, but don't stop me when it comes to actually doing it!"

The two reached an agreement, and Badak's idea of ​​turning the entire city upside down was temporarily abandoned.

However, they are still unable to locate the two individuals.

"Something was off from the very beginning when the two of them disappeared without a word..."

Thomas tried his best to analyze the known clues in his mind. He was also a little impatient, after all, he didn't know how long Bardock's patience could last.

First of all, the two disappeared without a trace. It's understandable that Bardak didn't notice that they had fallen behind, but there were other children present, so it's unlikely that they were forcibly taken away by special means.

Therefore, the probability of "leaving the team voluntarily due to certain reasons" is higher.

Then, after they had traveled some distance from Bardak and his group, they encountered a situation where they were taken away by someone.

The bracelet couldn't have been removed by the user; its presence in the trash suggests someone deliberately threw it away...

Thomas looked at the garbage heap.

The remaining traces indicate that the bracelet was placed in a large garbage bag and was pulled out by an animal pecking at it.

"If we could find the source of this huge bag of garbage..."

Thomas walked straight to the pile and, ignoring the mess, tore open the garbage bag.

Puffed food packaging bags, beverage bottles, cigarette butts...

The amount of garbage is large, and the types are limited.

Rather than ordinary household garbage, it's more like miscellaneous items discarded on some occasion.

"...Is it the arena? Or something else?"

Thomas recalled the mess he had seen at the Howling Arena when he watched the match before.

At the time, the audience members each had a drink and a large bag of snacks in their hands, watching the game as if they were watching a movie.

After leaving, they casually left their trash behind.

"Seriously, you've scared all the passersby away. Come with me, let's go to the nearest arena and look!"

Since these analyses were all done in his head, Bardock didn't understand the cause and effect. It was only after Tomat suddenly seemed to realize something that he followed him to the nearby neighborhood.

Thomas asked a random passerby:

Do you know if there's any arena around here?

"Arena? There's no arena here! If there were an arena, this place wouldn't be so poor. You're probably a tourist from out of town. If you want to watch a match, go to the city!"

But passersby found Tomat's question laughable and walked away while denying it.

Tomat once again fell into deep thought, while Badak stared blankly at him.

If they were taken somewhere and their wristbands were removed, then it shouldn't be too far from here, since there's no need to go too far to throw away trash.

But if there's no arena nearby, what else could it be? A movie theater?

Or perhaps the inference is entirely wrong, and the garbage just happened to be packed together?

"Hey! You two!"

Just as Tomat's thoughts reached a dead end, some unfamiliar female voices reached his ears.

It was a Kuranta woman dressed in neat casual clothes and wearing a sun hat who was running quickly towards them from the crowd.

Her brown hair was styled into a ponytail, which, along with her tail, became two parallel lines as she ran at high speed.

She stopped just in time in front of the two of them, panting heavily as she wiped the sweat from her forehead.

"Is it...is it Mr. Thomas and Mr. Bardock? Where are Lily and Bubble? I received news that their coordinates have changed..."

"Ah...you mean this?"

Tomat produced the broken bracelet to demonstrate that the previous displacement was because he had moved the bracelet from its original position.

The Kuranta woman's expression immediately turned panicked, and under her questioning, Tomat told her what he had discovered so far.

As the other party's expression grew increasingly serious, they also took the opportunity to introduce themselves:

"By the way, I'm Meteor, a sniper operator from Rhodes Island... Sorry, I'm the one Kal'tsit mentioned who 'often tells children Kazimierz stories'..."

Meteor, who was also uninterested in matters related to knightly competitions, had been taking a walk in the vicinity of the city's borders. After receiving the notification, he rushed to the scene as soon as possible, thanks to Kuranta's speed.

In fact, some people could have arrived much faster with their superhuman speed, but because their location was too far from the area where they went missing, dispatching them would only be a waste of manpower. Therefore, Kal'tsit did not notify those people unless intelligence indicated that the two were in the corresponding city area, in which case she would notify them separately.

"What's there to apologize for? Let's find the brats first! Otherwise, it won't be something that can be resolved with an apology."

Bardak urged the newly arrived reinforcements on, seemingly hoping that Meteor, a local, might have some good ideas.

"Wait, there's no knight's arena here... but there is a place that looks similar..."

Urged on by Bardock and influenced by Tomat's speculations, Meteor seemed to remember something.

However, her expression didn't improve with the new idea; on the contrary, she seemed even more worried.

"...It's the 'Infected Arena'."

[Main Text] Terra's World's Number One Martial Arts Tournament. Debate Chapter: Chapter Twenty-Eight: You're Not Worthy?

Although Kazimierz is known as a commercial capital with a diverse range of economic sectors, knightly competitions still hold a leading position.

After all, no matter what kind of company it is, even if they are the ones supporting the competition itself, they still have to attach themselves to this hottest gimmick in Kazimierz.

Some cities are vying to build uniquely styled arenas to serve as city landmarks for external promotion and investment attraction.

Some even built the arena first, and then used it as the center to build the city.

Therefore, regardless of the circumstances, the arena always represents the financial center and the most prosperous place in all the cities of Kazimierz.

But there is one exception to the term "arena," so much so that locals are reluctant to use it.

That is the "Infected Arena" under the "Infected Knights" rule established after the 23rd Major.

This allows the infected to fight as knights and earn money. Although they are certainly not as good as regular knights in terms of medical skills, it can still be considered a means of making a living.

Of course, they would not allow outstanding infected individuals to have the opportunity to become regular knights. Even if they received a perfunctory title, they would not be allowed to participate in any formal competitions.

After all, having a certified knighthood means they have the opportunity to enter the political arena, thereby expanding their influence.

But to most people, as long as they fight and maintain their knighthood, they won't be banished, which is much better than their original situation.

—That seems to be the case.

"That system... is by no means compassionate."

The meteor was moving very fast, but it was still a bit too fast for the two Saiyans following closely behind.

However, this gave her enough time to explain what exactly the so-called "Infected Knights" were in Kazimierz.

As the meteor's explanation unfolds, this seemingly "compassionate" and "romantic" system is gradually revealed to be cruel in nature:

There are a lot of infected people participating in the competition. These people who do not have enough combat experience must first go through a preliminary selection.

In order to avoid being stripped of their knighthood, the infected must fight constantly to maintain their points, facing more than a dozen bloodthirsty pincer beasts without ever having held a sword before.

Only after that can one qualify to become an Infected Knight.