A silence fell. No one quite knew how to react to these words at all. Was this really all Theron wanted to say?
They kept waiting for more to come out, for more to be said, for there to be a follow-up of some sort.
To the side, the judges hidden in the shadows frowned.
The judges—as well as the audience, for that matter—were actually selected from all five Empires. The judges themselves were even more neutral as they were hand-selected by the Black Clan and were scholars and cultivators with no strong ties to any of the Imperial Clans.
For example, the head judge in this case, a man known as Scholar Mcintyre by most, wasn’t born in any of the five Empires. Instead, he was born outside of this region entirely, hailing from a territory beyond the Black Clan’s influence before migrating here to learn of the culture and expand his horizons.
He ended up falling in love with his now wife and chose to settle down. Right now, he lived on the outskirts of Black Clan territory—not within the provinces, but instead right on the border of the true Black Clan lands.
This was a thriving region with many intellectuals and often acted as a hub for trade because it was easily accessible by so many merchants.
Scholar Mcintyre had been teaching practically all of his life, and as a Soul Mancer, he was adept at matters of the mind and was known as one of the hundred most intelligent men in Black Clan Territory.
And this was just one judge. The remaining four all had similar backgrounds and only lost out to Scholar Mcintyre to be head judge because his background was the most neutral of them all.
As for the crowd, so as not to influence the judges too much with their reactions, cheering or otherwise, it came in from all five Empires as well as several neutral sites.
It could be said that everything was perfectly curated for the highest degree of fairness.
So when Theron gave such a response… the frowns were universal, and the reactions were such not because of any ingrained bias, but because it was too disappointing.
There were several gazes on Theron now, even more than before, but only a handful of them seemed to be glowing with a hidden light as though grasping something interesting.
"Elder Black, he Saularon almost couldn’t bite her tongue, but she stopped speaking when she saw the elder raise a hand.
Mello cleared his throat. “Um… well, is this your entire statement?”
"It is,” Theron replied calmly.
"I see… well, in that case, remaining participants, please choose where to plant your flags.”
Drake Gold was the only one that didn’t seem to hesitate. He immediately took a step toward Sangun.
It was odd. The Gold Clan had pretty publicly lost a genius because of Chopra. The death was gruesome and devastating, but Drake still didn’t hesitate to stand on Faustine’s side.
Well… it was odd if you only thought one layer deep.
If one went one layer deeper, losing a genius meant it was even more important that the Gold Clan display good results elsewhere, and it was obvious that Faustine’s answer was better than Theron’s by a large margin.
From an outsider’s perspective, it looked like Theron was answering casually because he was confident that the Black Clan would stand on his side. Drake obviously found this foolish.
Even if the Black Clan wanted to tweak things in their favor, they couldn’t be so blatant.
But if one went a layer deeper than even that… if the Gold Clan lost a genius, wouldn’t it be best if the Nightingales lost a genius too? Losing a First Year weighed even heavier than losing the Fourth Year the Gold Clan had, at least in the initial rounds.
If they forced Theron onto just one stream, it would play out just the same as if the Nightingales had lost a genius too.
This left just Sura of the Firewings and Lyn of the Aurans.
The Firewings were in an obvious alliance with the Nightingales, so Sura was suddenly caught between a rock and a hard place.
By comparison, Lyn was of the Auran Clan, a Clan that had had pretty odd interactions in the Sangun Imperial City these last few days too. Their Fourth Year of the academic stream had pretty publicly attacked the Princess of the Firewings, so that should mean that he would be against Theron in this case.
But neither of the two seemed capable of deciding quickly.
"I will give the remaining two participants 30 more seconds to make their choice,” Mello spoke out again.
Lyn just stood there while Sura’s eyes practically rolled around in her skull as she tried to decide on something. Part of her seemed to want to look toward the stands for help, but she knew that she would get a penalty for that, so she didn’t dare to.
Theron, who should have been the most nervous about all of this, was only standing there with a gentle smile on his face.
Depending on the number that chose to stand on his side, he would get a cut of the speaking time that came. If no one chose him in the end, he would have to face off against quite intelligent opponents with just a fourth of the speaking time.
Sura bit her lip hard, but as the time ticked down, she was forced to act.
Sura pivoted and walked straight to Theron, standing behind him with her head lowered, still thinking about whether she made the right choice or not.
What she didn’t expect was that Lyn would actually follow right after her, also standing behind Theron.
, Theron had gained majority support. All the while, his smile remained just the same.