"Zuo Xiaoduo wins!"
Teacher Ma rose to announce the result, then added, "Zuo Xiaoduo, come forward."
Zuo Xiaoduo brushed the dust off himself and obediently walked over. "Hello, Teacher Ma. Hello, esteemed judges," he said respectfully.
"What a polite child."
Quite a few judges praised him inwardly.
Honest and sincere, courteous and well-mannered, and, most importantly, so handsome. Being easy on the eyes alone was enough to earn him extra points...
By now, everyone knew that Zuo Xiaoduo had another means of winning. Although none of them had figured out exactly what it was, they absolutely should not ask about it in front of such a large audience. This was clearly a trump card he relied on to stay alive.
Asking him to reveal it would be tantamount to harming him.
Yet they simply could not suppress their curiosity.
"Zuo Xiaoduo..." a female teacher asked kindly, "during these fights... were you wearing any weighted equipment?"
Her question was based on experience.
After all, Long Yusheng and the others had each fought with a considerable amount of weighted equipment on them. And although their team captain, Zuo Xiaoduo, was fighting in the Life-and-Death Arena... that did not necessarily mean he was not wearing any.
Zuo Xiaoduo hesitated. Faced with the eyes of a dozen or so teachers, he finally nodded somewhat bashfully. "I was."
He was!
Those two words struck the teachers' hearts like a thunderbolt.
He had actually fought in the Life-and-Death Arena while wearing weights!
Was he courting death, or was he simply that confident?!
"This match came too suddenly... and I got so worked up that my emotions were a little out of control..."
Looking honest and guileless, Zuo Xiaoduo stammered, "I completely forgot I still had weighted equipment on, which kept throwing off my performance..."
Forgot