Chapter 99 – New Challenger
He was actually the Spirit Master responsible for hosting the second round of the Large Competition!
Liu Ming was in great shock after seeing the fat elder’s face from before but after a few fast heartbeats, his expression was back to normal again.
The fat elder shook his sleeve and small flags immediately shot out. They shook in the wind before transforming into banners that were inserted onto the the two sides of the stage. There were at least twenty banners that formed neat rows, side by side.
Looking at the symbol on one of the banners, one side had ten banners with the symbols of ranks from one hundred to ninety-one and the other side had the symbols of ranks from ninety to eighty-one.
At this time, the fat elder spoke plainly.
“All the Core Disciples that conform to the banner rankings can now enter the stage.
As soon as he stopped speaking, whooshing sounds were produced from the stone stage below. Twenty Barbarian Ghost Sect disciples, who were already prepared, immediately flew to their respective banners one by one. No one was missing.
Liu Ming’s eyes flashed, he could see Xiao Feng and Du Hai, two familiar people. The two were respectively ranked in the ninety-third and eighty-ninth positions.
“Very good, the order will be according to the rank placements. The lower ten people can freely challenge the opposing ten people once and the winner will go to the higher rank while the loser will now have the lower rank. After I ask three times and nobody continues make challenges, that will be the end of the challenges between these two groups. In each round of challenges, everyone will only have the right to challenge once. The round begins now.” After shaking his head, the fat elder said without hesitating.
After the core disciples on both sides looked at each other for a bit, a robust male walked out from below the banner and challenged one of the opposing disciples.
The fat elder formed a one-handed sign and the inscriptions on the rock stage immediately flashed before a wall of light enveloped the whole stone stage.
Since the two disciples in the center of the stage had already signed the Life and Death Writs yesterday, they did not need to do it again. One immediately pulled out a long knife and the other one put on black boxing gloves as they both started forming hands sign and casting spells from far away.
The battle between the two could not be said to be fascinating. They both constantly activated the Practitioner Weapons’ attacks to attack the opponent, while using different, simple techniques to aid the attacks.
The two were both abnormally cautious and protective people. They did not even think about approaching their opponent.
However, like this, it temporarily became a battle of Fa Li consumption.
The attacks from their Practitioner Weapons were easy to release but their power was obviously not enough, causing them to be unable to break through their opponent’s defenses. The strength of their Secret Technique attacks was enough to do damage but the release speed made the techniques usable with most of techniques being interrupted or easily dodged.
Therefore, the battle between the two was just a process of constantly activating their Practitioner Weapons, simple techniques and constant running and dodging. It was enough to cause the crowd to feel drowsy.
However, after the time it takes to eat a meal, the challenger finally caught the opponent at a moment where he was unable to dodge and a fire ball hit the opponent, knocking him out. Then the fat elder announced the result, before the challenger went and stood under his opponent’s banner with great exultation.
The fat elder descended from the sky. After checking on the injured and giving him a quick treatment, he quickly ordered for the loser to be carried off the stage. He then announced for the challenges to continue.
Perhaps due to the influence of the first person, almost at the same time, two people immediately scrambled to give a challenge. One of the two was surprisingly Xiao Feng.
The two looked at each other in the eyes and Xiao Feng, who was half a beat slow, backed off somewhat unwillingly.
Therefore, after the new challenger chose his opponent, another round of battle started.
However, Liu Ming only watched a little before silently sighing.
The battle between the two on the stage was almost the same as the one before. They also used simple techniques and would activate their Practitioner Weapons to fight. There wasn’t any great reason to watch.
Liu Ming immediately stopped wasting his time watching and instead walked out of the crowd. He sat down cross-legged in a corner on the rock mountain with nobody around, silently maintaining his eyes closed.
Although he could not see what was happening on the stone stage, he could still hear the cheering sounds from that side. However, he remained expressionless.
On the side of the rock stage, as time passed, challenges ended one by one. Xiao Feng finally challenged an opponent in the end. He defeated his opponent with luck and took the eighty-fifth rank.
Du Hai, on the other hand, successfully defeated a challenger and protected his rank.
Therefore after two more competitions, under the circumstance that there was nobody who still wanted to compete, the one hundredth to ninety-first ranked disciples left the stage. They were replaced by the ten core disciples ranked from eighty to seventy-one, once again starting another round of challenges.
However, this time, Du Hai and the other nine people were the challengers.
In this manner, the whole competition maintained this configuration of the lower ten placements challenging the higher ten placements. However, after the past two days of intense battles, a large portion of the disciples, who knew the extent of their abilities, did not use their right to challenge and only went up to show their faces before leaving the stage in satisfaction.
In this way, other than the other rounds of battles between the disciples becoming slightly more exciting, the entire competition passed quickly, round by round. After half a day, Shi Chuan, Sima Tian and the other people ranked in the top twenty went up on the stone stage.
At this time, Liu Ming, who was originally resting, opened both eyes. He rose up and walked toward the stone stage.
It was indeed as he had expected, the battles between the top thirty and top twenty Core Disciples became abnormally intense. Almost every disciple ranked above thirty put forth a challenge. The disciples ranked above twenty, including Shi Chuan, all displayed terrifying strength that made those previous disciples under rank thirty seem completely inferior.
In the battles between these disciples, there was someone who used the Falling Rock Technique that was close to Complete Spell Mastering, causing pieces of head-sized rocks to fall like rain from the sky. There was someone who summoned two Soldier Level Ghosts at the same time and under coordination, they caused the opponent to fall back step by step before pushing him off the stage. Another person displayed the extraordinarily strong Body Cultivation Technique, utterly destroying his opponent’s defensive Practitioner Weapon with one punch.
Among the battles, after facing a challenge from a strong opponent, Shi Chuan also could not help but use his silver chain for the first time. He solidly bound his opponent with countless chains in an illusionary manner, before finally achieving victory over his opponent.
Sima Tian also produced an ink-black, strange chilling short ruler for the first time and with a swing, clouds of strange chilling black air crazily floated out. The black air transformed the challenger into a black ice sculpture in a short while, surprising many people.
However, other than those two, the bald, large man called Gu Jue also caused Liu Ming some surprise.
Other than the abnormally thick spirit chain, this person’s aura gave him a faint, indescribably familiar feeling.
However, the bald large man only used the black chain in his hand to easily defeat his challenger, obviously hiding his strong and secretive strength.
What made him care even more was when Martial Uncle Ruan saw the bald big man get on the stage, his expression became a little abnormal. While the big man competed, his eyes never left the big man, as if he was interested in the large man’s every action.
Liu Ming, with a shred of doubt, also mutter to himself a little in his heart.
Even though these battles were intense and a portion of the people were defeated and replaced, Shi Chuan, the bald big man and quite a few more people all protected their rank.
As the last battle between two disciples finished, the fat elder did not call Liu Ming and the other people to get on the stage. Instead, he announced that there would first be a two hour rest period before beginning the final fight with the top ten Core Disciples.
Taking advantage of this time, Shi Chuan, Sima Tian and the other people all took pills where they were as they sat down. They firmly grasped the time to meditate and regulate their bodies.
The other Barbarian Ghost Sect disciples started to excitedly talk and discuss the next round that was going to start soon. They began speculating about who people wouldn’t be challenged and which people would lose their ranks.
Liu Ming faintly heard many conversations regarding him and most of them thought he would do badly. He could not help but grin bitterly in his heart.
As the two hour time period ended, the Fa Li lost by Shi Chuan and the other people was just about fully recovered.
After the fat elder inserted the banners of the top ten Core Disciples into the side of the stage, he announced for Lei Zhen and the other nine people to go up on stage.
Liu Ming and the other people, after hearing such, naturally went up on stage without hesitation.
The fat elder’s originally smiling expression immediately became slightly dumbfounded as he saw Liu Ming walk to the ninth banner but after a small flash in his eyes, he immediately returned to how he was before.
Gao Chong flew onto the stone stage from another direction and just happened to meet Liu Ming face to face. He looked at Liu Ming coldly for a moment before walking to his own banner without saying a single word.
Lei Zhen, who flew in from the side sniggered a little when he saw Liu Ming. He revealed an expression that showed he wanted to try fighting Liu Ming.
“The battle for the ten Core Disciples now begins. The victorious ten will be the real top ten Core Disciples and will be able to enter the top ten Core Disciples ranking battle later on. Now, you can start freely challenging.” The fat elder said two sentences with lightning speed, before flying back to the side of the stone stage.
Although the people on the stage constantly looked at each other with keen eyes, the ten, including Shi Chuan, standing opposite Liu Ming, did not immediately have someone stand out for some time. However, among them, there were at least five or six gazes constantly sweeping across Liu Ming’s body.
Liu Ming’s facial expression did not change but he sighed inside.
It was obvious that the opposing side had almost half of the people choosing him as their challenge target.
This was a very ordinary thing, from the surface, compared to the others, he seemed the weakest. The reason why they did not immediately challenge him was mostly due to the fact that they were worried about if he still had other hidden techniques or cards up his sleeve.
However, just when Liu Ming was thinking about why they didn’t challenge him, someone on the opposing side who was close to Shi Chuan, finally and abruptly stepped forward. After a short hesitation, he spoke up loudly.
“Disciple Hu Fei would like to challenge the ninth ranked Junior Bai. I hope Martial Uncle Ruan will allow my challenge!”
This person was tall and skinny like a bamboo pole but the embroidered robes he was wearing constantly revealed a faint azure light that would flash from time to time. At the same time, he carried a narrow, long, weird knife with the shape of a crescent moon. It stood out and gave people a cold feeling of him being a poisonous snake.
Hearing this, Liu Ming’s eyes immediately squinted and examined his opponent a few times.
After hearing this, the fat elder looked at Liu Ming plainly before nodding his head to give approval.
Seeing this, Liu Ming walked forward from underneath the banner with no expression.
Only at this time did the fat elder form a one-handed sign, making the light screen on the stage appear once again. The light screen surrounded the two fighter. He then announced that the challenge had started with a loud voice.