The enormous dueling grounds fell silent. Almost everyone wore the same expression of disbelief.
Ranked one hundred and eighteenth, Zhou Zhenlie had actually had his qi sea shattered… by Fu Yan, who was ranked in the six hundreds.
“That was… insane!”
“Yeah, I still can’t quite believe my own eyes. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes today, I wouldn’t have believed it even if you beat me to death.”
“But Zhou Zhenlie’s second uncle is Elder Zhou from our inner sect. Once today’s life-and-death challenge spreads, I’m afraid Junior Sister Fu is going to be in trouble.”
“Wait… isn’t there a rule that the sect can’t interfere in life-and-death challenges between disciples?”
After that question, the person beside him could only give him a helpless look, as if saying, “You’re way too naive.”
Fu Yan naturally had no mind to care about the chatter below the stage. She had indeed crushed Zhou Zhenlie’s qi sea, but her own condition was far from good. Her qi sea was almost completely drained of true essence, and that final clash had also left her with serious internal injuries.
Leaning on the Linglong Broken Sword in her hand, Fu Yan finally managed to slowly sit up. She hurriedly took out a True Qi Pill, sat cross-legged right there on the arena, and began to regulate her breathing. Otherwise, she doubted she could even manage to walk off the stage.
After a long while, Fu Yan finally felt some strength returning to her limbs.
Very soon, she sensed her identity token shifting. Fu Yan paused, split off a thread of attention to check it, and with a single glance saw her new rank.
One hundred and eighteenth place: Fu Yan.
Putting away the identity token, Fu Yan, who had finally recovered a bit from the battle, didn’t stay there any longer. Under countless curious and complicated gazes, she stepped down from the arena.
Just as she came out, she suddenly noticed someone leaning casually against a tree in front of her. The person wore the pale blue sect robes of Shuiling Sect. His looks were very ordinary, nothing that stood out, and he was hugging a long, curved saber in his arms.
It seemed he had been waiting for her on purpose. The man under the tree lifted his eyes when he saw Fu Yan come out, his clear gaze burning with a fiery… desire.
Fu Yan paused, a little at a loss.
“Your swordsmanship is good. But…”
He spoke slowly. It should have been praise, but then he turned the words.
“Your cultivation is too weak.”
With that, he didn’t bother to see how Fu Yan took it. Hugging his saber, he turned around and walked off without a care.
Fu Yan came back to herself, but before she could even process this baffling person and his baffling words, she heard someone nearby exclaim in surprise.
“Hey, was that guy who was just standing under the tree Senior Brother Chen Jun, ranked fifth?”
“Huh? It really did look like Senior Brother Chen Jun. What’s he doing here? Did he also come to watch that life-and-death duel just now?”
Someone immediately shot that down.
“No way. Why would Senior Brother Chen come watch something like this? He didn’t even show up last time when Senior Sister Bai sparred with Senior Brother Yu Heng.”
Hearing the name Chen Jun, Fu Yan suddenly showed a look of realization. She had been puzzled by that look in his eyes just now, but now she understood.
That had been a desire for battle.
Fu Yan did have a faint impression of the name Chen Jun. She remembered that in the early parts of the novel, he had indeed appeared a few times.
Blade Maniac Chen Jun—that was the nickname everyone secretly gave him.
Calling him a blade maniac wasn’t an exaggeration. His talent was exceptional, and he was utterly obsessed with saber cultivation. His attainment with the saber was extremely high. In the later stages, he even comprehended what all saber cultivators dreamed of—Blade Intent.
But the man was hopelessly single-minded. His entire being revolved around battle. When the male lead first began to show his edge, Chen Jun’s fighting desire toward him was stirred, and he became fixated on defeating the male lead.
And later… naturally, he became one of the countless insignificant stepping stones on the male lead’s path to godhood, his Dao heart crushed into dust, never to recover.
Thinking of this, Fu Yan more or less guessed what he had meant just now. He had probably happened to see her duel with Zhou Zhenlie and felt a desire to challenge her sword, but then discovered her cultivation was only in the early Illumination stage and instantly lost interest.
Fu Yan: “…”
“It really was pretty inexplicable,” she thought, but she didn’t dwell on it.
Treating it as a minor interlude, Fu Yan went straight back to her small wooden hut. Her body was in such a state that without two or three days of rest, she probably wouldn’t fully recover.
Over the next few days, Fu Yan devoted herself entirely to cultivating the Frost-Tempering Body Art. As for what was happening outside, she didn’t bother to ask.
Three days later.
Fu Yan finally opened her eyes from meditation. She could clearly feel that not only had her internal injuries healed completely, but her physical strength seemed to have grown even stronger. This body-tempering technique truly wasn’t some ordinary thing.
Realizing she hadn’t eaten in three days, Fu Yan washed up briefly, put on her sect robes, left the hut, and headed straight for the dining hall.
Perhaps because of the life-and-death challenge with Zhou Zhenlie last time, Fu Yan felt quite a few curious gazes fall on her along the way. She paid them no mind.
What she didn’t expect was that while she was still in the middle of eating, someone came over to challenge her.
She had already learned the first form of the Wuhuan Sword, but she still couldn’t fully draw out its power. Strength needed real combat to temper it, so Fu Yan agreed.
The duel turned out fairly ordinary.
Over the next two days, people continued to come challenge Fu Yan. That was when she finally understood: climbing the rankings was easy; keeping them steady was the hard part.
She was a newly risen dark horse. Even though Fu Yan had defeated Zhou Zhenlie, plenty of people still didn’t believe in her strength, so they wanted to use her as a breakthrough point to boost their own rank.
Sparring was a good way to push one’s strength forward. Fu Yan didn’t resent it much, so she continued cultivating while accepting challenges from those whose strength wasn’t too far from her own.
After several days like this, her rank finally stabilized at one hundred and sixth.
That day, Fu Yan had just stepped out of the dueling grounds when someone blocked her path with an outstretched arm.
The newcomer wore a water-green dress. Her long black hair was pinned up with a jade hairpin, and her dark eyes were full of ice.
“So you’re Fu Yan?”
Shui Liuqing’s gaze swept Fu Yan up and down.
Fu Yan recognized her. She was Elder Zhou’s personal disciple, cultivation at the late Illumination stage, ranked thirty-seventh in the inner sect, and known for her skill with poison.
When she shattered Zhou Zhenlie’s qi sea, Fu Yan had already known trouble would come knocking sooner or later. So when she recognized Shui Liuqing, she wasn’t surprised. She simply nodded.
“I am.”
Sensing that Fu Yan’s cultivation was only at the early Illumination stage, Shui Liuqing immediately grew impatient. She really couldn’t understand how that idiot Zhou Zhenlie had managed to lose to someone at early Illumination.
But whatever the case, Zhou Zhenlie was still of the same clan as her master. This wasn’t something she could just swallow. She had come straight to look for Fu Yan the moment she returned to the sect.
Thinking of this, Shui Liuqing let out a cold laugh.
“I want a life-and-death challenge with you.”
“But I don’t.”
Fu Yan answered honestly.
“…”
Shui Liuqing clearly hadn’t expected her refusal to be so blunt. She was a bit taken aback. Before coming, she had already inquired around. In the past few days, Fu Yan hadn’t lost a single duel. Very few people could remain so calm and rational after a string of victories.
“How about this, I’ll suppress my cultivation to mid Illumination.”
She looked at Fu Yan with an expression of leisurely superiority.
“What, don’t tell me you’re scared?”
She stacked temptation on top of provocation. In Shui Liuqing’s mind, no normal person should be able to turn this down.
But the Fu Yan in front of her was still completely unmoved.
“Sorry, Senior Sister Shui. If you want to spar, please find someone else.”
“…”
Shui Liuqing really wanted to curse.
Fu Yan wasn’t stupid. With her current strength, facing Shui Liuqing would only mean one thing: death. There was no benefit to be had at all.
Having said her piece, she didn’t care how ugly Shui Liuqing’s expression became. Fu Yan simply turned around and left. The reason she could remain so calm was simple—so long as she didn’t accept a challenge, within the sect, neither Shui Liuqing nor Elder Zhou could do anything to her openly.
Of course, that didn’t mean they wouldn’t resort to underhanded methods.
But in the end, they were still under the sect’s nose. Trying to secretly kill an inner sect disciple wasn’t that easy.
Back in her wooden hut, Fu Yan finally had a clear sense of how precarious her position in the inner sect was. It felt like everyone was eyeing her like a tiger eyeing prey. She clearly needed to raise her strength as quickly as possible.
So Fu Yan once again threw herself into relentless cultivation. As for Shui Liuqing, ever since Fu Yan had refused her life-and-death challenge that day, she hadn’t shown up again.
This day, Fu Yan had just left the dining hall when she saw disciples in twos and threes hurrying toward the main peak, as if something had happened.
One disciple who, like Fu Yan, had no idea what was going on grabbed someone and quickly asked,
“Hey, where are you all going? What happened?”
“You don’t know? I heard that when Senior Sister Bai Li went to train in the Scarlet-Black Mountain Range last time, she killed two inner sect disciples from Zilan Sect.”
The person rambled on,
“Now, an elder of Zilan Sect personally brought the two corpses to our door. They should already be at the main peak by now.”
“No way. Why would Senior Sister Bai kill disciples of Zilan Sect for no reason?”
“Senior Sister Bai never kills lightly. I don’t believe it either, but Zilan Sect is dead set on blaming her. They’re insisting on an explanation.”
“They’re definitely framing Senior Sister Bai! Come on, let’s get to the main peak!”
With that, the group flew off toward the main peak.
Having heard the whole story clearly, Fu Yan couldn’t help freezing for a moment.
If she hadn’t guessed wrong, those two people were the ones she had killed.
But she had erased all traces at the time. How had Zilan Sect suddenly tracked it to their door?
And on top of that, they were insisting it was Bai Li who had done it.
Thinking of this, Fu Yan didn’t have time to ponder further. She immediately flew toward the plaza at Shuiling Sect’s main peak.
