The students that stood around Amon, although they came from poor clans, they were the best those clans had to offer. Different from those rich clans who sent their young generations who are talented yet the clans didn\'t wish to nurture directly. These poor clans didn\'t have enough resources to properly nurture any of their talented descendants. Hence, they sent their best in the hope that the royal academy could help them grow. Even if later they ended up leaving the clans and joining the royal kingdom, it was still better than letting them rot in their poor clans.

Hence, all these students even though having a feeling of inferiority against the big clans, they also possessed the pride of being the best from where they came from. All of them had the thought that if only they were provided the same resources as those big clans\' descendants, they won\'t lose.

Most of all, they were all hot-headed teenagers. After being challenged in such a way by Amon, how could they back off?

Amon\'s words had struck a fire inside them. They had been feeling oppressed for so long. Ever since they were born, they were told to be careful to not offend those big clans. Only now that they heard someone tell them to stand up against these big clans. This was what the small voice inside their hearts had been telling them to do for a long time, ever since they first experienced bullying from the big clans\' kids. They thought this voice had vanished already. Now, this voice had come back with a holler. Telling them that it was time to stop taking shit! It is time to stand the fuck up!

"Hahaha! I don\'t know about them, but I\'m for sure going to join instead of leaving!"

A teenager with a body as large as Amon landed beside Amon.

\'The simpleton,\' Amon thought after seeing Wu Di. This person was not officially his faction member, but since he had offered himself, Amon didn\'t object.

"Brother Lin Mo, count me in! Your speech about challenging fate and overthrowing the oppressors has truly riled me up. I\'ve come to this academy precisely to break away from those assholes in the Wu clan. I\'ve always hated those bullies who abuse their power. Kidnapping a student in broad daylight, I came as soon as I heard. I will follow even if you don\'t let me!"

"Count this big sister in as well!" Tuang Yin came forward. Amon had seen her among his crowd, he just ignored her. She was also not truly a member of the faction, she came and go as she pleased. She didn\'t abide by the rules and timetables that Amon had established. The others tolerated her because they had seen her help during the confrontation with the five factions.

"Anyone giving trouble to my boyfriend\'s faction will have to answer me!" She declared.

\'Will you stop it with the boyfriend thing,\' Amon thought. But he didn\'t try to chase her away. She was an additional pawn to be used.



With the two\'s announcing their fiery support, the others were also affected. They started to show their determination as well. Amon looked at them. He could see the flame in their eyes. Nobody showed any intention of leaving. He had stoked enough fire. Any further words might have the reverse effect. He had to strike when the iron was hot.

"I\'m going! Any of you who wish to come with me, then come!" Amon exclaimed and started walking.

He heard footsteps following behind him and grinned.

*

In a wide field with beautiful scenery filled with decorative sculptures, tended plants, a small pond, and a small garden filled with flowers, around seventy students were hanging out leisurely. Surrounded by them was one student who was bound. His face was black and blue with blood coming out of his nostrils. He was shivering in fear as the students around him continued to antagonize him.





"See what you get for joining a nobody faction?" An antagonizing student said. "You are such a fool. You should have expected this to happen. Not only do you not join the Bloodless like the other Lin people that came before you, but you also have to go and support an upstart from your clan. You deserve this beating."

"Brother Lin Mo will not give in to your demand!" The bound student exclaimed. The bound student was no other than Lin Anwen, the only other Lin member that had managed to join the academy in this batch.

The Nobles had targeted him because he was from the same clan as Amon. Since Lin Anwen had chosen to join Amon\'s faction instead of the Bloodless which had many of their seniors in the Junior and Senior classes, they figured that he might have a special relationship with Amon. They thought that with Lin Anwen as a hostage, Amon would become anxious and act to their advantage.

They had had people monitoring that upstart faction. They mostly had forty members seen. It was normal considering the faction had just been established. To get that many students joining was already impressive. They had thought at first that the initial thirty members would reduce. But instead, they increased. But the increase seemed to stop at forty as that was the number of students they saw within the faction\'s territory. Even if there were more who were having activities elsewhere, they should be no more than fifty.

Hence, they didn\'t think the need to force all their members to be present here. They had around eighty members in total. Seventy were here, the other ten were doing their activities elsewhere. Including the freshman faction leader, Gao Dou.

"Hmph! All Gao descendants are selfish. They never truly bother to lead the faction, they just do whatever they want. They should have just given the rein of leadership to us, the Yan clan," A man uttered. He appeared the oldest among the teenagers here. That\'s because he was. He was not of the freshman class, he was from the Junior class. His name was Yan Dose, a cousin of Yan Long.

"You are right, cousin," Yan Long agreed. "I am the one who organized everything. That Gao Dou didn\'t even bother with anything."

"Maybe you shouldn\'t talk too loud about this, people might hear," Wu Yang said. Since he had a grudge against Amon, he was the second most passionate person to stage a conflict with the Vicious clan. He was Yan Long\'s second in command due to that.

"Hmph! Let them hear," Yan Dose said.

"But, cousin, why are you here?" Yan Long asked.

"The news about a new faction appearing in the freshman class had spread to the junior and senior class. Although most of us thought this new faction was nothing but a tasteless joke that will disappear on its own, some of us still express concern. If any commoners think they can go and create a new faction, this can be a bad precedent for the others. I am here to make sure whether we should take them seriously or not."

"They are just a joke. There is no need to take them seriously. After this, they will slowly disperse by themselves," Yan Long said.

"Hopefully that is the case," Yan Dose said.

The five factions had also been developing their influence. The freshman class was always the best place to recruit new blood. Most of the members in the Junior and Senior factions were the fixed members who joined during their freshman years. Hence, whether their faction could continue to thrive after the next five years very much depended on the freshman years. Otherwise, they would have to poach other faction members to increase their number or try to recruit those who were unaffiliated. However, if a student wasn\'t interested in joining a faction during their freshman years, it was unlikely they would do so when they entered junior or senior years.

During their vigorous campaign, the Nobles had collected eighty members. They had heard the Virtuous had roughly the same headcount. The remaining three factions, Bloodless, Astute, and Heroic, were rumored to have around sixty to seventy members.

Of course, despite they were trying hard to get members, they still placed strict requirements for people joining. They were the five factions, after all. They had a reputation to keep. They couldn\'t just let anyone enter, which they understood was what the new Vicious faction was doing, accepting any stray dogs that were willing. For this, they looked down on Vicious even more. Even after lowering their application requirement to non-existent, this faction could still only get forty members. It was laughable.

There was a total of 982 students who had passed the entrance exam and become freshman students, so there were still plenty of students to be recruited. But many among these students also formed their own smaller groups or simply wished nothing to do with the five factions. Normally, the total number of students who ended up in the five factions was around half of the existing students. With one additional faction appearing, it reduced the potential recruit since now they had one more faction to compete with. Hence, none of the five factions were thrilled when they learned about this sixth faction.

Yan Dose looked in the distance. His ears picked up the sounds of many footsteps approaching.

"They truly come, eh?" He said.