Cao Chen stood up again ‘’Now that we have our top ten, we will proceed to the final stage of the tournament, you will draw random numbers again and will fight one on one with the person who draws the same number as you, killing is not allowed’’
The servants then brought a wooden box which had ten crystals in them, each crystal contained a number of small dragons in it, from one to five.
‘’We will now proceed with the draw, Kong Feng come forth’’ said Cao Chen while signaling for Kong Feng.
Kong Feng put his hand in the box and drew a crystal with three dragons in it.
Then his name was written first on the tournament sheet for everyone to see.
Cao Bai then drew a crystal with the number five, Jin Ju drew number two. The 4th core disciple Song Shun drew number four, Wentian drew number four like Song Shun, which means they would fight each other.
The 6th core disciple Shao Ya drew number five like Cao Bai, the 7th core disciple Xiao Lei drew number one, the 8th core disciple Yang Lin drew number 3 like Kong Feng and the 9th core disciple Xie Shu drew number 2 and got matched with Jin ju.
Then finally Bingyue drew the last number which was number one.
‘’Now that we are done with the draw the tournament sheet looks like this’’ said Cao Chen.
7th core disciple Xiao Lei VS Xia Bingyue
3rd core disciple Jin Ju VS 9th core disciple Xie Shu
1st core disciple Kong Feng VS 8th core disciple Yang Lin
4th core disciple Song Shun VS Qiu Wentian
2nd core disciple Cao Bai VS 6th core disciple Shao Ya
Cao Chen then continued ‘’Go back to your pavilions, the first battle will start immediately. Xiao Lei and Xia Bingyue, enter the stage.’’
They both stepped onto the stage and were now facing each other with a 20 meter distance between them.
‘’I know that I’m not a match for you after your recent breakthrough Xia Bingyue, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t try my best’’ said Xiao Lei with a serious expression.
‘’I would expect nothing less from a core disciple’’ said Bingyue with a smile.
‘’Divine Ice God first stage’’ the Ice sword appeared in Bingyue’s hand, she then lifted it into the air and charged at Xiao Lei while releasing her ice Qi and soul power.
Xiao Lei released her Qi and soul power and when the sword was about to hit her she disappeared from Bingyue’s sight.
Bingyue immediately turned around and guarded with her sword, this was the right choice since in the next moment Xiao Lei was slashing at Bingyue’s back with a thin sword that looked like a needle. Bingyue had no idea where Xiao Lei was hiding that sword before.
‘’CLANG’’ the two swords clashed and sent Qi waves around the stage.
‘’Good speed, this may be troublesome for Bingyue if she doesn’t find a way to immobilize her first’’ thought Wentian to himself.
At the same time the crowd was cheering crazily, they finally were seeing some action between the top.
The two girls broke contact with their swords and both flew ten meters back.
‘’That’s an amazing movement technique’’ said Bingyue with a surprised face.
‘’This is the Profound Wind technique that my Xiao clan has passed down for generations, you can’t catch me like this Xia Bingyue, much less hurt me’’ said Xiao Lei with a smirk.
Xiao Lei then disappeared from Bingyue’s field of vision again and attacked from her left, with Bingyue barely managing to defend in time.
Bingyue retreated fifty meters away quickly, her plan for now was to keep her distance until she finds a way to deal with Xiao Lei.
‘’This will be a good lesson for Bingyue, sometimes the technique you use may be the difference between life and death in battles between opponents of similar cultivation realms’’ thought Wentian to himself while smiling. He was not worried for Bingyue, she was a smart girl and it wouldn’t take her long to figure something out.
‘’She is not so powerful, her sword slashes aren’t hurting me. But her speed is amazing, if I manage to take away her speed then it’s over’’ thought Bingyue, and then an idea came to her head and she smiled.
Xiao Lei who was charging at Bingyue again with her amazing speed, saw that Bingyue was smiling which gave her an uneasy feeling.
When Xiao Lei closed in on Bingyue she felt a chilling cold Qi, the floor and the air in a fifty meter radius started freezing rapidly. And before she knew it, she fell into Bingyue’s trap. Both of her feet were now frozen solid to the ground, and the ice was spreading up her legs slowly.
Bingyue then walked towards Xiao Lei and pointed her sword at her throat ‘’you lose’’ she said with a smile.
Xiao Lei sighed, then said ‘’I concede!’’
The crowd burst into cheers and applause, and Cao Chen announced Bingyue as the winner.
‘’Next battle Jin Ju VS Xie Shu’’ said Cao Chen while gesturing for both of them to step onto the stage. But Jin Ju just remained seated. This surprised the crowd but in the next moment the voice of Xie Shu sounded from the 9th pavilion ’’I concede’’.
Jin Ju smiled while having his eyes closed and sipping his wine. It looked like he knew that she would concede so he didn’t even bother moving.
Cao Chen sighed ‘’second battle, winner Jin Ju. Third battle Kong Feng VS Yang Lin proceed to the stage’’
‘’I concede’’ shouted Yang Lin while looking scared, looks like even the thought of fighting Kong Feng scared her, she knew she was not even close to his level. Not to mention Kong Feng was notorious for his brutality and mercilessness against his opponents, no matter who they were.
The crowd didn’t blame her for conceding at all, everyone knew she stood no chance and would probably get badly hurt if she tried to fight.
‘’Kong Feng wins battle three, next is Qiu Wentian against Song Shun, step onto the stage’’ said Cao Chen.
Both of them gave each other a side glance from their respective pavilions and stood up, then while they were walking to the stage Wentian said to Song Shun ‘’you should know that you are not my match, why get in my way? I will have to fight Cao Bai in the next round most likely’’
‘’Oh? I don’t know, you can think and take a wild guess why I’m fighting you here’’ said Song Shun with a sinister grin on his face and then added ‘’maybe if you stopped hiding your cultivation I would instantly surrender’’. He now had a sarcastic grin, which Wentian thought made him look like an idiot.
From what Song Shun said, Wentian could speculate that this guy was Kong Feng’s lackey and his only goal was to make Wentian’s advance in the competition as hard as possible.
They both stopped opposite of each other on the stage, with about 50 meters space between them.
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Song Shun still had a sinister grin on his face while looking at Wentian.
‘’Let the battle begin!!’’ shouted Cao Chen.
As soon as Cao Chen announced the start of the battle, Song Shun released his soul power and his Qi, his cultivation was at the 8th Core formation realm.
‘’Your run in this tournament ends here you filthy bastard, how dare you hurt Kong Jie like that!!’’
‘’This idiot is too emotional, he went and blew his cover’’ thought Kong Feng while facepalming himself.
It looked like Song Shun was going all out from the get go, he was trying to inflict the worst possible injury to Wentian even if that meant he would lose.
‘’WATER METHOD!!’’ shouted Song Shun, all of his soul power and Qi started fluctuating, slowly it all started gathering above him and formed into a huge wall of water. Song Shun then performed some hand seals and the water started forming huge razor spikes. There were about a thousand of them and they were all about a meter long. The water that formed the spikes was spinning which would add to their piercing effect.
‘’This is my ultimate attack!! Now let me see you try to defend against this!!’’ shouted Song Shun who now looked a bit pale, he really overdid it with his Qi and soul power in order to release this attack.
‘’Tianshen, it looks like your friend might be in a bit of trouble this time’’ said Kong Zhi with a grin on his face while observing the stage.
‘’Oh, I wonder’’ smiled Tianshen lightly. He knew that Wentian held a secret but he didn’t know if he would use it at this moment.
Wentian who had a blank face suddenly smiled ‘’You think just because your Qi and soul power has compatibility with the water element that it’s enough to extinguish my fire? If so then you will be disappointed’’ said Wentian.
‘’Stop with the bullshit and eat this!!’’ shouted Song Shun, he then extended his hands forward and all of the water spikes started flying towards Wentian very fast.
Wentian closed his eyes for a second and then muttered in a low voice ‘’Divine Golden Crow Flames, stage two…’’
The water spikes were now just a couple of seconds away from hitting Wentian when he suddenly opened his eyes and shouted ‘’…Golden Fire Storm!!’’
Amazing golden flames started to come out of his body, the temperature in a twenty meter radius around Wentian rose to the extreme. In a second, a hurricane of fire formed with Wentian in the center of it.
The crowd roared with cheers, most of them were shouting Wentian’s name. He really did become a favorite in the sect. Especially with the girls, he was far from being unattractive, plus he was strong and behaved righteously. A lot of girls dreamt of dating boys like him.
The water spikes finally collided with the fire storm, but contrary to Song Shuan’s expectations, the fire was not being extinguished, not only that, it could not even pass the wall of flames around Wentian since the water was being evaporated as soon as it got close to the fire.
Wentian then shouted ‘’Divine Golden Flame’’ and proceeded to spit a huge wall of flames at the rest of the water spikes that were closing in.
After about ten seconds everything settled down, there were no more flames or water, but the stage was full of steam now, caused by the collision of such big amounts of fire and water.
Song Shuan was in a weak state and could not see very well with all the steam around, he used all of his soul power on that one attack but he underestimated Wentian’s strength, and his control of fire.
Suddenly Song Shuan saw a hand coming out of the steam and before he could react that hand grabbed him by the face and slammed him into the ground with a lot of force.
‘’AAARGH’’ Before Song Shuan knew it he was heavily slammed into the stage floor which buried half of his body in it. He spit a mouthful of blood and passed out on the spot.
From the outside, the crowd did not know what was happening. The only ones that could see were the elders and Tianshen.
Tianshen looked at Kong Zhi and with a smile said ‘’what were you saying?’’
Kong Zhi gritted his teeth but didn’t say anything, inside he was smiling because this competition would be meaningless soon. Nobody knew that besides him, his sons and his elder supporters.
After a minute the steam cleared out and the crowd and the rest of the competitors saw Wentian standing next to a passed out, buried in the ground Song Shuan.
The crowd roared in cheers and applause, some girls were blushing crazily while looking at Wentian.
‘’Battle number four, winner Qiu Wentian’’ announced Cao Chen with a smile. He was happy that this year’s core disciples are so strong, but he couldn’t shake off this eerie feeling he had from the beginning of this competition. He knew that something was wrong and he knew that Tianshen noticed it too but he just couldn’t put his finger on it.
The healers took Song Shuan to the infirmary and Wentian walked back to his pavilion and sat down cross legged to recover his Qi and soul power for the next battle.
‘’Last battle of this round, Cao Bai against Shao Ya, proceed to the stage’’ announced Cao Chen.
Cao Bai and Shao Ya stood opposite each other on the stage, they were both smiling. Obviously their relationship was good.
‘’Elder sister Bai, let’s have a good fight, please go easy on me’’ said Shao Ya while cupping her fists towards Cao Bai and smiling.
Cao Bai smiled and cupped her fists back to Shao Ya ‘’You have grown a lot since I last saw you Shao Ya, let’s have a good fight’’
Meanwhile, in a not so distant place, about a day’s worth of travel from the Azure Dragon sect, inside a forest were walking three people. The one in the middle wore an elegant golden robe and gave off the aura of a king. He was a tall, middle aged man handsome facial features. The other two walking on both of his sides were two elderly people but their cultivation was also very profound, yet their clothing was a bit simples compared to the one in the middle.
The man in the middle said ‘’is everything ready? We need to move out as soon as possible or we will miss the chance, Kong Zhi said that we have to be there in one day’’
One of the elders nodded and replied respectfully ‘’Chief Tang Huo, rest assured, everyone is ready and standing by, we will move out in about an hour, and will arrive at the Azure Dragon sect in about a day’’
‘’Good, good, if Ju’er’s and Kong Zhi’s information from one month ago is accurate, then the Azure Dragon sect should be at it’s weakest now, plus Kong Zhi said that Cao Chen can’t use the ancestor’s protection power to defend his sect, this is the perfect opportunity to extinguish the Azure Dragon sect from this province. Our Tang Clan has ruled this province for a thousand years now since the fall of the Azure Dragon sect, we should tie up the loose ends’’ said the man in the middle that was called Tang Huo.
At his point the three men exited the forest and came to stand at the edge of a small cliff. All three looked down with a satisfactory expression and smiled.
The reason they were smiling is because they were looking down at a huge camp of thousands of cultivator warriors. From elders to disciples, they all looked arrogant, exuded a superior aura and looked like they were ready to kill.