Doomsday Pillars

Bali Island, 3 days before the meeting.

As planned, Alex will select the best 10 fighters from his team to accompany him. These 10 people will be the candidates who will represent his group when the alliance group enters the Abyss Gate. Therefore, it was important for him to make sure he chose the best out of the best in order to show the capabilities that Alex and his men have.

Today, Alex told Theo to gather all the Sky realm Magus in this base, because there was something he wanted to talk about. Within half an hour, apart from those who were currently on duty outside, a total of 212 fighters were gathered at the Antiga military headquarters. When these people reached the military headquarters, they immediately lined up on the large open field that was usually used for training.

These 212 people were all spirit enhancers, a person who has the aptitude for spirit power above normal fighters. Among these 212 people, 23 people were spirit enhancers with A grade aptitude while the rest had B grade aptitude.

'T-That's … a very large number.' thought Alex to himself when he heard the report, while nodding his head in satisfaction.. At the moment, Alex could be seen walking around the line accompanied by Colonel Arief and Aria while looking and paying attention to these 212 people.

Seeing the line filled with extraordinary people doing nothing and just standing in line, Alex immediately gestured to Arief with his eyes. Arief who saw the gesture was confused for a moment, before finally understanding what Alex wanted. He then quickly ordered the fighters to warm up and lightly spar with each other.

Alex nodded his head as he looked at the fighters starting to train with each other. Turning his head towards Arief, Alex suddenly stopped and asked the man with a faint smile on his face.

"Colonel, what do you think is the best way to select 10 fighters out of these 212 people?"

Arief thought for a moment his answer before he then opened his mouth. "I think you have to choose based on a criteria."

"A criteria?" asked Alex, intrigued by his colonel's answer.

"Yes" replied Arief calmly.

Alex stroked his chin when he heard this, a thoughtful expression appeared on his face as he pondered Arief's suggestion. Arief who saw this decided to keep quiet, letting Alex think.

"Then, what criteria should we use?" asked Alex. "Individual strength? Battle experience? Cooperative ability? Or something else?"

"For me personally, battle experience is the most important thing." said Arief without hesitation.

"Good choice." said Alex, nodding his head in agreement. After that, he continued to walk around to see the fighters one by one.

Alex strongly agreed that battle experience was the most important factor for a fighter. There was no point in having immense strength, but not being able to use it to its full potential, it was like giving a sword to a child, not effective at all. And also, strong fighters, who only had raw strength without fighting experience, were like a double-edged sword that could injure others.

Hence, all Sky realm Magus who were supported with spirit stones to quickly reach their current realm, more precisely those who had just reached the Sky realm stage with the help of spirit stones, were not included in the option because they haven't had any battle experience using their current cultivation level.

This made the number of options that Alex had actually very limited. As he walked around the field, Alex thought hard about who he should bring. After a while, he finally started choosing who to bring, as his eyes darted around like a predator eyeing its prey.

His first and second choices were Arief and Aria, who were beside him. These two were his two strongest fighters. Not only were they themselves A grade aptitude spirit enhancers, they also possessed military expertise of their own, which made them one level above the other fighters.

Alex then proceeded to choose Jerry and Sergei. The reason for that was because not only were they strong, but Alex was already very confident and used to fighting with them. Next, Alex chose Rama, a traditional silat fighter as well as a fire-element spear-oriented fighter, who has long been the strongest fighter guarding the Bali headquarters.

The next person he chose was Makali. Arief and Aria were surprised because they didn't expect it, but Alex immediately explained the reason. Besides being a reliable lightning element fighter, Alex was also amazed by the way Makali fought using melee weapons in Australia last time.

So currently, Alex had selected 6 people who will follow him into the Abyss Gate, which meant he could only choose 3 more people. When Alex tried to pick someone again, he could see a blonde haired woman hopping around the fighters who were training while trying to grab his attention.

"Me! Me! Choose me!" shouted Cindy. When she saw Alex just glanced at her, she immediately continued shouting. "Surely you have seen my beast transformation which made me stronger than all other spirit Magus!"

Even though Cindy looked very confident about her abilities and excited, Alex still ignored her and then pointed his finger at Daisy. Seeing where Alex was pointing his finger, Cindy nodded her head. Everyone agreed that Daisy had many very useful skills. Alex was also very satisfied with Daisy's progress during the mission to the Australian continent, which further convinced him to choose her.

Still in her peak enthusiasm, Cindy shouted. "Now choose me!"

Seemingly oblivious to her shout, Alex then went on to choose Theo. This time, Cindy was starting to look quite annoyed. "You chose that good-for-nothing priest, huh?! Choosing your buddy over gorgeous women like me… favoritism!" shouted Cindy, a little indignant. Not giving up, she shouted even louder. "Okay! Choose me as the last one! Just like people always say, the last but not least is me!"

Alex, who was deep in thought, didn't seem to hear her shout. In others' mind, the next consideration could be Dinda, Ark, or Raufgar. But unexpectedly, Alex walked over to Tommy.

"What do you think, Tommy? Do you think you can?" asked Alex with a smile.

Standing in front of Alex, Tommy answered firmly. "Yes, Mr Alex. I am ready."

"NO!!!" shouted Cindy, an irritated expression plastered on her face. "Are you serious?"

Tommy was currently only 15 years old, only a year older than his daughter Tiffany, but Tommy was probably the fighter with the best growth potential in Alex's troops. The reason Alex was considering bringing Tommy with him was so that he could learn more.

Cindy grumbled loudly and started making a fuss when she saw that Alex had chosen the last member, making him frown in annoyance. In order not to prolong the situation, Alex quickly said. 

"Okay! You will become our back-up member."

"What is that supposed to mean?!" Cindy asked, confused

Unfortunately for her, Alex decided to ignore it. In truth, he was sure that no one would complain even if he brought 20 or 30 members to the Abyss Gate. However, the gathering of the world's strongest fighters tomorrow also had a different purpose than just purely destroying the Abyss. Anyway, Alex did know Cindy's transformation could really be an asset, so he didn't mind bringing her along. It's just that she's not his first choice, really.

10 people have been chosen as entourage members, plus one reserve member. 

After that, Alex gave these 10 people a challenge, where they would fight against the rest of the fighters who had gathered. Starting from 10 against 10 to 10 against 20 and so on. This fight will be a good warm-up and a way for them to start working together as a team.

Alex then gave them a simple formation training based on his hexagram step technique, where Arief, Sergei, Rama and Makali will be the frontliners, Daisy, Theo and Aria as the backliners, while Cindy and Jerry will be at their centers. The formation could rotate easily during a head on attack or fighting when surrounded. Other than Arief and Aria who used to be in the military, the others neeed some time to get used to it.

The group then started training, while Alex began to observe their strengths and weaknesses one by one. The 10 strongest team could easily defeat the 10 vs 10 battle, even when one of the teams was the combination of Raufgar, Ark and Dinda with all A aptitude skyrealm magus. But just like what Airef said, it's useless when they have limited battle experience. When the fight entered its third phase, 10 against 30, Alex decided to join the fight with a wide smile on his face.

"Here I come."

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