Chapter 131: The Tingfeng Banquet Begins Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Ye Futian’s group headed closer to the battle platforms. Just then, a harsh voice shouted, “Ye Futian!” The surrounding area was crowded and in disarray. Because of this, Ye Futian did not notice the members of the Nandou Clan. It was not until he heard the shout that he turned his attention over and saw them. Nandou Ku was among the group. The look in his eyes was ice cold, ready for blood.
WHOOSH! The members of the Nandou Clan did not waste any words and released all types of spells at Ye Futian.
A figure stepped out from beside Ye Futian. With a slight step forward—just one step—the wood sorcery targeted at Ye Futian was destroyed. At the same time, a fearsome force of sword intent filled the air. The temperature dropped and every member of the Nandou Clan was encapsulated by the force. They could not help but shiver at the drop in temperature.
The small area in which they occupied seemed to have been frozen. The members of the clan stared at the figure that appeared in front of Ye Futian. Shock filled their eyes. They could not believe there was such a powerful individual by Ye Futian’s side, protecting him. Did the disappearance of their fellow clan members in Donghai City have something to do with this person?
When Ye Futian had appeared in front of their very eyes just a moment ago, they had no other thoughts but to capture him. But seeing this powerful individual, the clan members seemed to have broken out of their daze. Why had Ye Futian shown up at the Tingfeng Banquet?
“There’s no need for you guys to be in such a rush. I will pay a visit to the Nandou Clan in Donghai City sooner or later.” Ye Futian quickly glanced at the clan members and continued on his way. He did not want to get pulled into this situation with them right now and obviously, Jing Yu could not start a massacre at the Tingfeng Banquet.
Jing Yu and the others moved forward together leaving the members of the Nandou Clan to stand in place, watching Ye Futian as he walked away. No one chased after him. They were all intimidated by the powerful feel Jing Yu gave off.
What on earth was going on? It was true, everyone thought it was odd that Ye Futian had the guts to show up at the Tingfeng Banquet, an imperial event held by the emperor. Jing Yu was strong, but no matter how strong he was, he could not go up against the emperor of the Nandou Nation. Emperor Luo was a cultivator in the Noble Plane. He was the only one in all of the Nandou Nation. The Nandou Clan could not even take care of themselves as of late, so of course, they did not know what had happened in the Cangye Kingdom. To be honest, only the royal Luo family would care about what happened in the neighboring countries. Thus, never in a million years, would the Nandou Clan members guess that Ye Futian came with the emperor of another country.
Many imperial bodyguards appeared to maintain order. They stood around the nine battle platforms. Up ahead, a crowd of powerful cultivators had arrived. Some of the guards cleared the road for them while royals, nobles, and clans stood on the sides to welcome them. From the imperial palace, a group of figures headed their way. The four people at the front of the group seemed to be chatting happily, as if they were the best of friends. The four of them had a certain aura around them. In the blink of an eye, the noisy area quieted down and everyone paid undivided attention to the group approaching. They knew that Emperor Luo was in the group but who were the other three?
The four figures arrived at the platforms and sat down in their own respective seats. Their status seemed to higher than people expected.
“Today is the beginning of the Nandou Nation’s Tingfeng Banquet. I have specially invited the emperors of the Cangye Kingdom, the Yunchu Nation, and the Yan Kingdom to come watch the competitions. We shall enjoy the performances put on by the youths of the Nandou Nation. They are our future and I hope that our younger generation cultivators will not disappoint our three guests from afar,” smiled Emperor Luo as he introduced his fellow emperors.
Immediately, the area was filled with discussion. Besides the one side of the country that was bordered by the sea, the other three sides were joined with bordering countries. Today, the emperors of those three countries had come to attend the Tingfeng Banquet. This year’s Tingfeng Banquet was graced with the presence of four emperors, the four strongest cultivators in the Noble Plane.
Below where the four emperors sat, everyone began to sit down. Beside Emperor Luo, Crown Prince Luo Junlin as well as other princes and princesses had arrived but only Luo Junlin could sit next to the emperor. This was the obvious difference in status among the children of the emperor.
Below the throne were the left and right ministers. Minister Zuo no longer had the same energy in his eyes as he once did. It seemed like he was no longer interested in anything. On the other hand, Minister Hua looked fresh and energetic. Even though things in Donghai City were not a success as planned, to see Minister Zuo fail, was the best thing for him.
Jing Yu, Ye Futian, and the others headed to where Emperor Ye was. As citizens of the Cangye Kingdom, it was only natural that they stayed by the emperor’s side.
The Nandou Clan members kept eyes on Ye Futian. When they saw that not only was Ye Futian not avoiding being seen by Emperor Luo and was even headed in his direction, some of them had already made predictions. They shivered at the thought.
“Isn’t that Ye Futian and Yu Sheng?” Among the large audience, there were some people who came from Donghai City. They froze at the sight of Ye Futian.
Naturally, the people of Donghai Academy also took notice. Yan Shao frowned. What’s going on? His gaze shifted to Emperor Luo and Minister Hua. They did not seem to care at all, as if they already knew Ye Futian would be here.
Zhuo Qing and other students of Donghai Academy were all confused at the sight of Ye Futian. Lin Xiyue had obviously seen him as well. Her beautiful eyes froze on him. She never imagined she would see Ye Futian at the Tingfeng Banquet.
One step at a time, Ye Futian’s group arrived at the very front of the area, right below where Emperor Ye was seated. The members of the Nandou Clan felt their hearts skip a beat. It seemed they finally understood. The reason why Ye Futian dared to show up in the Nandou Nation was because he had royalty backing him. The emperor of the Cangye Kingdom. Those from Donghai Academy looked very interested. Their mouths hung open as they watched Ye Futian take his seat slowly.
Ye Futian went to the Cangye Kingdom?
In a little over a month, Ye Futian had escaped from the Nandou Nation to its rival country, the Cangye Kingdom. Furthermore, he had been recognized for his talents by Emperor Ye. Now, he had returned on the day the Tingfeng Banquet began. However, he was not a participant of the banquet but one of the audience.
Zhuo Qing felt disheartened immediately after seeing Ye Futian. Zhuo Qing was here to participate in the banquet and did not even know if he would even be able to impress with his performance but then, there was Ye Futian. He was already seated by the emperor, though not Emperor Luo.
Yan Shao glanced at Zhuo Qing who was beside him. Then, he turned to another person and said, “Tianhao, that’s the person you’ve always wanted to meet. Full Attribute genius with twin spirits, Ye Futian. Do you think you can defeat him?”
Yun Tianhao stared at Ye Futian. In reality, he had taken notice of Ye Futian very early on. It was because they knew each other, but that was when they were younger. They battled once at Qingzhou Academy. As a top student of Heiyan Academy, Yun Tianhao lost to Ye Futian. After that, Yun Tianhao left Qingzhou City in pursuit of experience and better education. So, at the beginning of this year, he was admitted into Donghai Academy. His arrival shook up the whole school.
Then, he heard of another person who left a deep impression on the students of Donghai Academy. Ye Futian—a name that he kept engraved in his brain.
“I will defeat him,” said Yun Tianhao. Full Attribute and twin spirits? So, this was his true gift.
Seated below Emperor Luo, Minister Zuo first stared at Ye Futian and then at Emperor Ye. He felt disappointed.
After their trip to Qingzhou City together, Minister Zuo showed great interest in Ye Futian. It was not only for himself but for the royal Luo family as well. However, it was impossible to know what the emperor was thinking. The royal family actually got the idea that Minister Zuo wanted to revolt against them. They believed that Ye Futian was fated to become emperor of the country and was a threat to their family. Thus, an imperial order was sent to Donghai City. None of these events could be undone. As for Minister Zuo himself, the emperor lost trust in him because he insisted on rushing to help Ye Futian in Donghai City. If Minister Zuo was Emperor Luo, he would do anything to kill Ye Futian right now. Even if Emperor Ye would get mad and kill a lot of people, it would still be better than the downfall of the royal family. But Emperor Luo would never do that. Although Emperor Luo believed in fate and Minister Zuo’s prophecies, he would not trust them fully. Emperor Luo was very headstrong and believed that as an emperor and a powerful cultivator in the Noble Plane, he could easily change fate.
Obviously, Minister Zuo was not going to attempt to persuade Emperor Luo. He wouldn’t do it even if he could. He was not going to come up with anymore plans for Emperor Luo. Despite this, Minister Zuo knew, he would never be able to leave. Even if the emperor was not going to give him anything to do anymore, he would also never let him go. The reason the emperor has not yet killed Minister Zuo was because he did not have a crime to accuse him of. The minister had recruited and bred many talented officers for Emperor Luo. If he killed Minister Zuo without reason, it would be poorly received by the emperor’s subordinates.
“I heard that the Cangye Kingdom’s Fenghua Banquet ended not too long ago. These should be the ones from the Fenghua Rank, correct?” Emperor Chu of the Yunchu Nation asked with a smile as he looked at Ye Futian and the group.
“They are the top ten. My goddaughter had other business and could not join us,” answered Emperor Ye. He returned a smile.
“In my Yan Kingdom, all those with outstanding gifts and high cultivation have the chance of being recognized by me. Some are even made lords or ministers. It has been like that for generations now. This is a policy that everyone agrees on. My people have the utmost trust in our royal family. To this day, as long as there is a brilliant person, they would make themselves known to me. There is no need for us to hold some boring banquet. I’ve always been curious. Your countries hold these events once every couple of years. Does it actually help to pick out brilliant individuals?” said the emperor of the Yan Kingdom. He looked at the group of people seated below Emperor Ye.
His words also included Emperor Luo who was holding the Tingfeng Banquet, but it did not seem like Emperor Luo minded. He smiled lightly and replied, “Every country has their own way of doing things. What matters is that we all do it for the same reason. I invited you all here today, so we’ll just have to wait and see if some outstanding young cultivators will appear today. And, all of you have brought some younger generation cultivators along. If interested, you can tell them to give it a try as well. I don’t mind,” Emperor Luo continued.
The people that the emperors of the Yunchu Nation and the Yan Kingdom brought along were indeed younger generation cultivators. They were all people their country had high hopes in. They had been brought to attend the Tingfeng Banquet to check out the genius cultivators of other countries.
As of now, the Tingfeng Banquet had not begun. Nobody knew what kinds of outstanding individuals would appear. But Ye Futian and the others had already piqued the interest of the cultivators from the two other foreign countries. From time to time, they would turn their gazes over to the group from the Cangye Kingdom.
Just then, Emperor Luo stood up. To everyone in the large area, he said, “Today is the start of the Tingfeng Banquet. Four emperors have gathered to observe the event. Starting from now the stage is yours. I look forward to all your performances!”