As soon as 12 students took their places Elder continued: “This year we have changes in tournament rewards as well as in the sect rules. Before each disciple could get only one QI Formation Pill a year. But now each student who achieved at least level 5 would be getting 2 QI Formation pills per year. While students who reached level 8 would be getting 4 QI formation pills per year. Additionally when a student is reaching a new level they can get a reward as an additional pill. Furthermore, all students who achieved level 6 can get a new technique which is called 'Wind Step'. If a student is achieving level 9 this student is automatically promoted to the inner sect disciple. The tournament rewards all who take part in it with a QI Formation pill.“ - After those words 57 students who didn't take part were very frustrated that they didn't try - “Next, all students who become best 32 will get an additional QI Formation pill. Disciples who would be best 16 would get additional 10 QI Formation pills. First 8 students would get low grade armour. 3rd place would, 2nd and 1st place would get the possibility to choose a book from our Palace of Knowledge. As a special reward 3rd place would get 10 additional QI Formation Pills, the 2nd place would get 20 additional QI Formation Pills and the 1st place will get a Concentrated QI Formation Pill”.
Nobody knew what was the effect of the Concentrated QI Formation Pill but they assumed that it should be much stronger than 40 QI Formation pills. But other rewards surprised everybody. Mostly due to the fact that Wind Step was increasing chances to survive in the Dark Wood. There were monsters in the Dark Wood which could be beaten by level 5 students, but those were the weakest from all. And for any sign of fight much stronger animals could appear. But additional rewards such as low grade armour could greatly increase the chance of students even against some more stronger monsters.
After the first part of the tournament has finished all competitors were required to get their number to understand with whom they would be fighting. In the first round Yu Min was lucky while he got cultivator level 5.
“That cultivator is feeling uncertain. His mind is not concentrating on the fight, but on how he will perform in front of a crowd” - Parasite was feeling the emotions of others if he concentrated on those. And he was able to share those feelings with Yu Min. So Yu Min could feel what his opponent was feeling.
Due to this parasite didn't even intrude in the fight while Yu Min was much stronger. The only thing which the parasite has done was restraining Yu Min emotions and was making emotions of calmness and confidence much stronger. Yu Min's opponent was not so confident it was his first tournament as Yu Min was stronger and due to this it was obvious that he would make mistakes. Emotions are the biggest enemy of cultivators who just began their path. Due to this Yu Min has quickly won the fight. His opponent tried to kick Yu Min, and Yu Min just threw the blow in response. As soon as two fists collided, Yu Min heard a crack. His opponent's arm has brockent. When the opponent was throwing his fist he didn't concentrate well enough and due to this energy in his fist dispersed before the collision. And without any energy his fist couldn't withstand Yu Min's blow full of energy. In a moment Yu Min heard “I surrender” and then the inner disciple admitted Yu Min victory.
Yu Min fight finished one of the first. Many other disciples from the list as well already finished their fights. While there were 12 disciples with higher levels there were many disciples who were unlucky to be their opponents.
However, there were 2 interesting cases which Yu Min and Parasite have noticed. New rewards forced students to fight like their life was at stake. And the first case which was noticed by everybody was potentially caused by an increase in rewards.
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There were 2 people standing against each other. One level 5 cultivator who was around 20 years old looking and another cultivator who was level 6 around 50 years old. Both of them had many injuries and they were already at their limit. In normal cases such shouldn't happen while both had the same technique, the only difference was their cultivation level. But the opponent who looked like 50 years old in reality was in his late 80th. Which means that maybe 10-20 years more and his life would end if he would not get to the next level. While his cultivation was stronger his body was much weaker. Due to this both opponents had similar power. After several more moves level 5 eventually won, potentially he would not be able to take part in the next round, but he was glad that he got to best 16.
Parasite sensed something in that level 5 cultivator, due to this it helped this cultivator. It uses power which manipulates the emotions of others in order to affect old men on level 6 cultivation. - “You are old, and weak. You are so weak that you can’t even compete with level 5 cultivators. Even if you win additional QI Formation pills it will not help you.” - And potential that helped level 5 cultivators, while old man just gave up to fight and lost the battle.
In the second case Kim Li, the student with mutation, was put against another disciple who was level 6. And Kim Li was not trying to defend so much in that fight. The disciple on level 6 was hitting the body of Kim Li, but Kim Li seemed like he didn't feel anything. After several punches from his opponent Kim Li began his counterattack and quickly finished the fight by kicking out his opponent from the ring. After that fight even level 8 disciplines were seeing a threat in the Kim Li. Parasite as well noticed the strength of Kim Li and as well felt fear in Yu Min. But Parasite quickly suppressed that feeling. - “You should be very calm, he is not your opponent. As well you have enough energy to defend yourself. You could win if you find his weak point.”
After all fights ended, 16 best students were identified. Out of them 10 were higher level disciples. While 6 others were level 5 students who were lucky to get through. Elder gave 30 minutes to all students to restore the energy and then began the 2nd round. Yu Min was the first who was called first and his opponent who was as well on level 6 disciple. While Yu Min was at the pick stage his opponent was only at the major stage which could still be considered a threat. In that case Parasite was required to intrude into the fight while next fights would be much more dangerous and Yu Min should save as much energy as possible. Due to this Parasite began to impact the emotions of the Yu Min opponent. For Parasite it was hard on this current stage to provoke specific emotion in another person who is not his host, however, it could make already existing emotions much stronger or vice versa suppress them. Due to this Parasite was currently suppressing the confidence of the opponent and increasing the fear and filling of weakness in the opponent. This fight took longer while both disciples were on the same level. But Yu Min was not making any mistakes in this fight, all his blocks had just enough energy to block any opponent blows as well as his kicks were slowly destroying the defence of the opponent. And with each blow from Yu Min the disciple was losing his confidence and at some point he accidently opened and Yu Min didn't waste that chance and finished the fight with a strong blow in opponents chest.
Elders and many inner sect disciples have noticed how calm Yu Min was. It seems like Yu Min is taking part in such tournaments on a daily basis. However, Yu Min should thank Parasite that he was not nervous at all in such a tournament as well as his emotions are not impacting his fighting abilities. Other disciples saw how ideal the Yu Min technique was. And they did not understand how he could be so concentrated. They were all learning this technique which was called “Crushing Fist”, but Yu Min was showing them that they were out of the lower league. Even disciples who were on the same level as Yu Min, but were older than 30 years were not so confident to use this technique with such brilliance as Yu Min.