In the center of the Li clan headquarters, two huge stone doors were pushed open as the female elder entered the hall.

The interior was wide enough to welcome several hundred members while the roof was supported by multiple pillars.

In each corner of the hall was a Foundation Establishment cultivator standing guard.

In the middle was a table surrounded by a dozen chair, but only a middle-aged man sat by himself on the main seat at this moment, painting conscientiously.

This person's traits were very similar to Li Qiang and Li Cheng, but he was taller, though rather thin.

The female elder stopped on the other side of the table and bowed in respect, "Patriarch."

Li Zhen didn't even look at her as he gave all his attention to his current activity, moving his hand freely while he said, "You know I don't like being disturbed when painting."

She bowed a second time then said in a heavy tone, "I have an important matter I must report."

The patriarch slightly hummed his acquiescence still focused on his drawing.

"Young master Qiang's name has disappeared from the leaderboard!"

The brush came to a halt on the canvas, which portrayed bamboos standing straight against the wind on a rainy mountain. A large blot of ink began to bleed outwards, completely destroying the atmosphere of the entire painting.

It was quiet for a moment before Li Zhen finally raised his head and looked at her, "You know, painting and swordsmanship ain't very different, it both requires diligent practice, adroitness and precision. What you want to express with blood and sword on the flesh of your opponent, this time you do it with a brush and ink on paper."

At this time, Li Zhen pushed his seat back and stood up.

"However, there is a time for everything. Bring me my sword and assemble everyone!" He gave his directives to the guard in the hall who quickly moved on, executing his orders.

The elder nodded and left the hall with determination.

During this time, beside each banner in the city, commonfolks and passengers alike talked back and forth in an animated discussion over the change in the rankings.

Some whispered among each other, but they were muffled by the loud remarks of many others.

"Li Qiang can't be seen anymore in the leaderboard, did Gao Lixin finally come to get rid of him?"

"It can't be, they have always been evenly matched. Even If Gao Lixin eventually surpassed him, the difference would never be huge enough to be able to kill Li Qiang."

"Who could have eliminated him then, Zhang Xuanhan or Jin Hao Tian don't have the strength to do so, maybe Shen Xue? No, the young masters have always avoided each other during such competitions and when they met, they wouldn't engage in a fight with murderous intentions without personal grievances between each other..."

Thoughts flew back and forth openly in the plaza as many still couldn't believe Li Qiang would lose his life in this year-end competition, but those who had no connections with the Li clan didn't really care about his death and were more interested in discussing who killed him.

In truth, rivals or enemies of the Li clan, and even more people from mortals to cultivators, were delighted by the news.

Li Qiang hasn't been a saint in life and many people hated him, holding personal grudges of the past hidden deep in their heart against him till today.

As spectators thought aloud of what could have happened, someone suddenly said, "Isn't it obvious who killed him? Look at the leaderboard."

Those that didn't look properly the first time or were so shocked they forgot everything, gave a second glance at the rankings on the banner.

In the first place was still Shen Xue, stably rooted at the top spot since the debut of the competition.

At the second place was Qiong Lieyu, closely following him.

Yet, it was at this moment that people realized Zhang Xuanhan and Yan Mei who were fighting for the podium all this time were currently relegated to the 4th and 5th place respectively.

At the third place was written in clear strokes the name of Ye Mo.

"Who the hell is this Ye Mo?"

"I never heard of him."

"From which institute is he?"

The crowd was completely bewildered by this name, they couldn't recall anyone like that.

Before, Li Qiang stood at the 8th place with forty five thousand points while Ye Mo moved back and forth between the 200 and 300 place with twenty eight thousand points. After he killed him and add up both scores, he immediately reached the 3rd place.

Originally, although both Yan Mei and Zhang Xuanhan tried to close the gap with Shen Xue and Qiong Lieyu, there was a margin as deep as the sea between them and while Ye Mo attained the podium, he was still nearly ten thousand points short from the second place holder.

Yet, he easily overtook both the Sky Martial Institute best student and the Yan clan young miss by twelve thousand points.

He was comfortably seated at his place currently and it would be difficult to change this in the remaining time.

At this moment, someone suddenly shouted, "I know him, he's the boy without any cultivation that entered the Tiger Martial Institute last year!"

With this mention, someone remembered, "Oh yes, I recall there was a body refining kid during the tournament."

"There were two actually, but he killed the second one."

Many searched at the back of their mind and gradually made noises of realization recollecting such a scene.

When Ye Mo participated in the recruitement competition and joined the Tiger Martial Institute, his brutality and the way he defeated Ha Jun made quite a sensation among the spectators who talked about it for some days after this.

However, he was still just a kid that didn't even start gathering Qi and with a talent so lackluster that it didn't make any noise outside combined with the fact he went into seclusion soon after entering the institute, everyone quickly forgot about him.

During this time, talented youths like Shen Xue or Ma Shinfei kept progressing and people talked about their new feats often, after a few months, no one could remember Ye Mo.

Yet, there was one kind of person in the city that not only didn't forget about Ye Mo, but actually looked up to him.

It was young mortals that wished to become cultivators.

As you know, many mortals join the institutions recruitement competition even though they have high chances of losing their life and almost none to succeed in joining them.

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Without cultivation, they are seen as nothing more than cattle that cultivators could use or dispose of as they please without incuring any repercussions.

Their life standard are very low and survival is difficult, their only way to escape this fate is by training their Qi and become a cultivator, but who will lend them a cultivation technique and battle skills.

Any martial art is fiercely guarded by every organization and to obtain one, you need to become one of their member, but to join them you must already be a cultivator hence this cycle where techniques were tightly guarded by those in power and never spread out to mortals.

You could also use an absurd sum of gold to obtain low level and trash martial arts in the black market or from lone cultivators, but where would mortals find these thousands of gold when most of them have difficulty feeding themselves?

Even for cultivators, it was an amount of gold countless would never see.

At last you could just pray some great master would notice and take you as a disciple like it happened to Ma Shinfei, but without excellent innate talent, you could keep fantasize about it forever.

Many young mortals that dream of becoming grand heroes wielding great powers in the Floating Cloud Region joined the institutions competition each year with the wish to turn their life for the better, yet, after decades none was able to get in and most of them were killed.

Time after time, their aspirations slowly dwindled with each try.

That's why Ye Mo, who as a mortal with no background or wealth of any kind, could defeat these powerful cultivators to join the Tiger Martial Institute wasn't forgotten by them.

They could represent themselves in him.

After all these years of failure and death, one unrelated mortal was able to join them and gather his qi.

He ignited their dying desire.

He was giving them hope.

Hope to achieve the same and become a lord that no one would dare offend anymore.

The banners were hanged on the road outside of the institute so anyone was free to pass by and get a look, mortals included as long as they didn't fear to be targeted by some ill-intentioned cultivator.

When one saw his name, he smiled brightly and immediately shouted Ye Mo's prowess.

"This nobody could never have defeated Li Qiang, it's probably a blood beast that killed him and he just took the token on his corpse, or they must have ganged up at twenty against him and he was the one to take the points."

Even though they could remember him now, none in the crowd believed he could actually kill Li Qiang by himself.

It must be pointed out that although a few had seen Ye Mo fight in the tournament or heard about him, many never went there as a spectator and still had no clue who he was.

In a study, inside the Ironheart Weaponsmiths building.

Hei Qiong layed on an armchair, reading written demands from customers, on his thighs was an open book about craftsmanship he seemingly interrupted to consult these documents.

Abruptly, the door of the study was flung open as an attendant burst inside, blurting out, "Master Hei, Ye Mo made it to the top 3!"

Hei Qiong who was about to berate him for coming without knocking nor announcing himself was stunned by the news, looking at the attendant dumbly while processing the information for an instant.

After a moment, he suddenly threw his head back as he laughed loudly, "We have struck it rich haha, Ye Mo, I didn't expect this from you!"

The attendant smiled widely as well, asking "Should we advertise it immediately?"

"No, wait for the competition to end first and see how everything goes; it will be even more of a shocker later."

They were obvisouly talking about promoting their establishment and the forgemasters by putting the credit of Ye Mo's accomplishments under the spiritual weapon they forged for him.

The attendant acknowledged Hei Qiong's decision and left the study, leaving him alone staring at nothing with bright eyes, thinking about his transaction with Ye Mo.

"This investment really paid off in the end..."

It would be a lie to say Hei Qiong expected anything from Ye Mo's participation in the competition, when they met, he was just a 7th layer Qi Gathering cultivator that would face peak-tier blood beasts and 9th layer experts.

If he could just achieve a top 500, it would be great already, he didn't even dare dream of a top 200.

However, to be ranked at the third place? Hei Qiong was still shocked by it and a wave of delight spread throughout his being.

Even if Ye Mo died right now it was ok for Hei Qiong, his deal with him would still be considered a major success and the advertisement would return them immense profits in the future.

The mood in the study was a stark contrast to the ambience in the Rallying Stone Plateau, instructors of the Tiger Martial Institute staring grimly at the banner.

Although they were shocked by Li Qiang's death, it wasn't what caused this depressive atmosphere, but because they knew what was to come.

"Who's this Ye Mo? You really hid this student well, to think he would be able to kill Li Qiang." The dean of the Sky Martial Institute asked Hong Li with a mocking smile, taking pleasure in this situation.

"He's no one important, and wether he killed Li Qiang is still to be determined." Hong Li said before distancing himself from the two deans and stopping at the edge of the plateau, looking towards the city.

He had no time to waste with these scavengers, he knew the members of the Golden and Sky Martial Institute enjoyed his predicament.

Soon, Hong Li remarked something and turned towards his own instructors among which stood Han Zhen Jun and shouted thunderously, "Don't panic and get ready!"

Every members of the Tiger Martial Institute wore somber and serious expressions as they looked ahead.

In the distance, a black army slowly approached.

More than a hundred expert of the Foundation Establishment Realm, with several elders of the Inner Core Realm advanced ominously, all wearing long dark robes with many blades placed at their waist or on their back.

Although they could easily fit in a spatial pouch, members of the Li clan enjoyed displaying their sword to the outside as a warning.

At the lead was a man with an odachi drawn out, the blade nearly his own size, shining coldly from afar.

Li Zhen and his battle troops arrived to the Rallying Stone Plateau.