Chapter 6

Nearly 100,000 young cultivators crammed themselves onto one of the many expansive training fields located in the sect. There some of them near the front saw 1,000 dark green orbs floating in the air, lined up 100 wide and 10 deep. Behind each one of these orbs, a disciple stood at attention, their snow white robes emblazoned with a scarlet flame dragon.

Li Jie gasped, “Inner court disciples!”

“Not only that, look at all those floating orbs!” Zhu Hao said, equally amazed.

“Fu fu fu~, oh my, you two don’t even know what those orbs are?” Hearing a pompous voice that sounded like it could have come from the royal princess herself, the two young men turned around and were met with a sight that completely betrayed their expectations.

Instead of a blond-haired elegant lady wearing an expensive dress, what they found was a orange haired girl who was just as tall as they were. Her vibrant hair was swept back into a short ponytail, and her freckled face gave off the same youthful vigor as Li Jie. She wore a plain shirt and long shorts that showed off her bulging muscles, with a large broadsword that was clearly too big for her strapped to her back. However, she had the back of her hand covering her mouth with another hand on her hip while she continued to laugh, “O ho ho ho ho~”

Li Jie and Zhu Hao looked at each other and mutually decided to ignore the weird girl.

“Hey don’t ignore me!”

Li Jie chuckled as the she suddenly dropped the princess tone and started pouting.

‘Well at least she seems like a funny person, it couldn’t hurt to talk a bit.’ He thought while turning back around.

“Haha sorry miss, I saw such a weird sight just now that I turned away in surprise. My name is Li Jie, nice to meet you.” He said, giving the typical cultivator sign of respect--a bow with his hands clasped together.

“Fu fu fu, that’s quite alrigh--hey! That weird sight wouldn’t be referring to me would it?” She said angrily.

“No of course not! It’s just I thought I saw the emperor himself observing the exam!”

“Nonsense, that stupid old man would never bother to come see this exam.”

Her reply threw Li Jie off, ‘She actually knows the emperor? Who is this girl?’

By now Zhu Hao had also joined the conversation by placing his elbow on Li Jie’s shoulder and leaning on it, “The name’s Zhu Hao, who’re you?” He asked bluntly.

“This one is called Yao Lu Li but all my friends call me Lily! I shall also grant you two permission to call me so!”

“Lily huh? That’s a nice name. Anyway, what were you saying about the orbs?” Li Jie said, causing Lily to blush slightly but that went away quickly as she began to answer the question.

“Those orbs are highly sensitive to qi from the Nascent Realm. They are made of the beast cores of a peak Flowering Realm wind-type magical beast! In addition, they can tell the exact age of a cultivator by his qi! Of course, they were provided to the sect by my clan!” She boasted.

Before either of the young cultivators could ask the many questions that suddenly appeared in their minds, an inner court disciple shouted, “All applicants, form 100 lines in front of each of the 100 rows!”

Li Jie and Zhu Hao scrambled to get in line with Lily following right behind them. Once they were in line, everyone became silent, listening to the proceedings happening in front of them.

The first test, the cultivation test, had two requirements: The applicant had to be at least the 1st level of the Nascent Realm, and they had to be younger than 20. The orbs would test the applicants for both of these requirements. Although the sect publicly announced both requirements, many of these young applicants and their families hoped that the orbs would fail or tried to cheat the system with home-made talismans. Talented cultivators could expect to reach the Nascent Realm at 16 and the Flowering Realm at 20. Clearly, cultivators advanced rapidly from 16 to 20 years of age, thus the various cultivation levels that the inner court disciples called out varied greatly.

“Age, 17 and 4 months... Cultivation level, 3nd level”

“Age, 19 and 7 months... Cultivation level, 7th level”

“Age, 16 and 2 months... Cultivation level, 2nd level”

The last one sent murmurs throughout the crowd, filling the golden-haired boy who achieved this feat with pride. Applicants who had passed the exam were lead into another area where they prepared to take the combat exam.

Finally it was Zhu Hao’s turn. The young man strolled up to the orb with a grin on his face and placed his hand on the orb, sending out some of his qi. The orb pulsed with a deep green color noticeably brighter than the golden-haired boy’s orb. Also touching the orb in order the read the results, the inner court disciple showed an expression of surprise as he announced, “Age, 16 and 5 months... Cultivation level... 4th level!”

The murmurs in the crowd turned into a low roar as people expressed their surprise. To the side of the exam location, an old wizened man with scars crisscrossing his worn face sat in meditation. Wearing the robes of an outer court elder, one could see that he was the elder overseeing the entire exam. When he heard the inner court disciple announce the results, he opened one of his eyes and looked towards Zhu Hao. Smiling only briefly, he once again closed his eyes and returned to his meditation.

Before the crowd could calm down after hearing Zhu Hao’s result, another voice rang out, “Age... 14 and 6 months?! Cultivation level... 4th level!”

The low roar suddenly turned into shouts of surprise as people strained their necks to get a glance of the earth-shaking genius who reached the 4th level at only 14 years of age. Most people only managed to get a glance of his fiery red hair.

Li Jie, who broke through to the 4th level with Zhu Hao due to their master’s assistance, began to feel uncomfortable after he noticed thousands of stares directed at him. He tried to leave the testing area as soon as possible, but not before the meditating elder locked on to him, this time with both of his eyes. Seeing no arrogance from Li Jie even after the result was announced, he stroked his beard and thought, ‘Perhaps this child can do it...’

Over the roar of the crowd, another inner court disciple announced more results with a qi-filled shout, “Age, 14 and 11 months... Cultivation level, 4th level!”

Though not as shocking as Li Jie, this assessment caused the everyone’s eyes to switch to Lily, standing there with her hand on the brightly glowing orb. But instead of the smug expression one might expect from her result, she simply stared blankly at Li Jie who was walking away from the testing site. After a few seconds, she snapped out of her reverie and hurried after Li Jie who had joined up with Zhu Hao at this point.

“My god who are these monsters?”

“All three of them in the 4th level, the youngest only 14 and a half years old...”

“I have to get on their good side!”

Thousands of cultivators watched the three adolescents walking away, branding the image into their minds. The most distinct trait of the three were their odd hair colors: red, orange, silver, all of these colors were quite uncommon in Huo City. Later on, people would remember this moment as the formation of the Three Annihilating Stars of the Soaring Flame Sect.

-----

Li Jie and Zhu Hao walked on towards the combat testing area with Lily trailing right behind them.

Lily timidly cleared her throat and said, “In terms of talent, I’d say you two aren’t bad! In fact, I will allow... I mean I’m willing to let you two become my slaves.... err rather servants maybe?...” Her voice began trailing off, as if she wasn’t even certain about what she was saying.

By this point, the young men had guessed that Lily wasn’t really that arrogant, but rather she was a bit lonely and didn’t know how to express herself. They sighed and decided to indulge her.

“It would be my honor, boss!” Li Jie saluted, though he lacked enthusiasm.

“No problems here, boss!” An equally unenthusiastic reply came from Zhu Hao.

Lily heard only the words and seemed to completely ignore their tone; she broke out into a brilliant smile while blushing at the same time. With an unexpectedly shy voice she barely managed to squeak out, “Please take care of me.”

The smile, the blush, the shy voice, all of it caused Li Jie’s heart to skip a beat. Who would have ever thought that this pompous princess had such a bashful side to her? Seeing both of her new subordinates staring at her as if they had seen an alien, she angrily smacked them both on the head hard enough to leave a bump.

“What do you think you’re looking at ?! Let’s go. We still need to pass the last part of the exam!”

Li Jie and Zhu Hao performed one of their habitual inward sighs, thinking about how despite the fact they already had an unreliable master, they now had a violent boss.

-----

An hour passed and 40,000 applicants sat in an adjacent field, some meditating, some talking, some silently observing the others. 1,000 small dirt stages had been prepared, clearly designed for combat. The 1,000 inner court disciples who had administered the first part of the exam now each stood in one of the arenas.

*BOOM*

An immense sound wave propagated throughout the field, immediately shocking everyone into silence. The applicants soon focused on the source of the sound which was a dozen meters off the ground in the air. It was the the scarred outer court elder who had just clapped his hands while hovering in mid-air.

Some of the cultivators whispered excitedly, “He’s floating! That means he must at least be in the Forging Realm!”

The elder opened his and mouth and an deep, ancient voice came forth, “In order to be accepted as an outer court disciple, you must defeat two opponents in combat. It will be considered your victory if your opponent steps outside of the area, forfeits, or is unable to stand up for 10 seconds. Killing your opponent will naturally result in disqualification.”

He waved his arm and 40,000 strands of qi shot out in a beautiful array of red toward the applicants, landing accurately on the back of everyone’s right hand. The qi turned into tattoo in the shape of a simple circle with a star inside.

“The magical formation I have applied to your hands will tell you which arena to go to. As for how your opponents are decided, age is the main factor. But of course, luck plays also plays a huge part. In the path of cultivation, one will not go far without luck!”

His gaze swept over the crowd and landed on Li Jie for a second before disappearing as suddenly as he appeared. Li Jie, who didn’t notice the elder’s gaze, felt his right hand telling him to north. He waved to Lily and Zhu Hao and proceeded to his arena.

Li Jie found his arena and stepped inside, where his opponent was already waiting. He looked to be around 16 years old and a look of fear appeared in his eyes when he recognized Li Jie’s red hair. The fear, however, quickly turned into anger as he pointed at Li Jie and said, “I know you. They say you’re at the 4th level and only 14 years old! Impossible, you’re just a dirty cheater who paid off the sect to get in! I, Mu Cheng, will put you in your rightful place!”

Having lived peacefully for the past week, Li Jie almost forgot about his disgust of his society. Subconsciously having picked up on his master’s habit, he thought to himself, ‘This guy is truly shameless. Nevermind that, he has eyes so I’ll let him see for himself if I’m lying.’

Li Jie bitterly kept his mouth shut and instead gave a customary bow while saying, “Please go easy on me.”

The other boy simply snorted at his bow and assumed a fighting stance.

The inner court disciple, acting as a referee, raised one of his hands, “Prepare to fight.”

Seeing Li Jie also assume a fighting stance, he brought his hand down, “Begin!”

Before Mu Cheng could take a single step, a massive force struck him from the side blasting him through the air.

‘How?’ He barely managed to think, before he barreled through an adjacent arena, tumbling across the ground. His now unconscious body had enough momentum to cause him to skid into the arena past the adjacent one. Bleeding from numerous wounds and suffering from a multitude of broken bones, he was quite the sorry sight. The inner court disciple serving as referee rushed over to deliver the seriously injured cultivator to the medical team.

Meanwhile the two Li Jies on stage returned to one as Li Jie dispersed his clone. He bent his neck to casually crack it before walking off the stage towards his next arena.

All of the adjacent fights had stopped temporarily in shock. Part of the shock was due to his power, but this test even had 8th level cultivators who far outclassed Li Jie in power. Most of the shock was from his blinding speed; the elder overseeing the exam couldn’t even see how he had moved to his opponent’s side, much less the inner court disciples. Furthermore, why were there two Li Jies? But by this time, the person in question had already left the area to go to his second fight.

The scarred elder, concealing his presence and watching from above, let out a rare, throaty laugh.

‘The Heavens have gifted me today!’ He thought as he focused his attention on Li Jie’s next fight.