Heavenly Summit Palace.
A young cultivator in plain-colored daoist robes half-reclined on the steps outside Heavenly Summit Palace, idly playing with a token of Heavenly Summit Mountain in his hand.
He cast his eyes downward toward Heavenly Summit Mountain, more than two thousand zhang below him.
On the Daoyan Arena, voices still roared.
"Not bad."
A bone-chilling wind howled past Mr. You's side high above, yet it did not even stir the hem of his robe.
What he referred to, of course, was the youth in the cyan daoist robe inside the Daoyan Arena.
Mr. You raised a hand and pinched his fingers together to calculate.
A few threads of pitch-black rifts that tore space appeared at his fingertips, then evaporated like steam and drifted away with the wind.
Muttering to himself, Mr. You slowly turned his head. The young cultivator in plain-colored robes who was playing with the Heavenly Summit Mountain token on the steps suspended in the vault of heaven also slowly turned his head, casting his gaze toward the majestic palace made entirely of white jade whose surface bore countless tiny fissures.
Everything proceeded as usual, nothing happened.
……
On the arena platform.
Su Hongzhen rested the pure white Swift Sword with its crimson flame patterns across Jia Hongtao's throat.
Silence fell over the surroundings.
Even now, Jia Hongtao had not fully come to his senses. His eyes remained fixed on the Thunderbolt Spear he had just thrown, condensed from the purest lightning energy.
The three-zhang-long spear, crackling with golden electricity, was stabbed into the paving stone, the terrifying power it radiated not having dissipated in the slightest.
Jia Hongtao did not understand why this had happened.
Both his master and the elders within his sect had given his Thunderbolt Spear exceptionally high praise.
Its motion was covert, its lightning fierce.
From a power standpoint there might still be room for improvement, but in terms of stealth and threat, his Thunderbolt Spear should have been something few Martial Spring Realm cultivators could evade.
This was his hidden killer move reserved for the Heavenly Summit Mountain Dao Inquiry.
He had prepared it specifically to face the heaven-chosen elites at the chief disciple level from the Five Great Sects.
If Su Hongzhen had not insulted and provoked him with his words, Jia Hongtao would never have bothered to use this secret technique he had kept for so long during his bout with Su Hongzhen.
But…
The cold touch at his throat did not lie.
Why!
Jia Hongtao clenched his teeth, dissatisfaction flashing across his eyes.
That change in his expression was clearly seen by Su Hongzhen.
In the next instant, Jia Hongtao moved his feet fast, retreating toward the back of the platform to avoid the blade Su Hongzhen had placed at his throat.
Electric light flickered at his sleeve, and several sleeve lightning bolts shot from Jia Hongtao's robe toward Su Hongzhen.
The distance between them was less than five feet.
At such close range, evading Jia Hongtao's sleeve lightning was nearly impossible.
But Su Hongzhen did it.
It was as if he had predicted those sleeve lightning bolts before Jia Hongtao unleashed them.
With an eerie lightness of footwork, Su Hongzhen slipped with ease and composure past the three sleeve lightning bolts hurtling in his direction.
Almost at the same time, a wave of boos rose from the crowd beneath the platform like a mountain collapse.
Those boos were aimed at Jia Hongtao.
Because properly speaking, the moment Su Hongzhen had his sword at Jia Hongtao's throat, Jia Hongtao should have cleanly admitted defeat.
But Jia Hongtao did not. He chose to act like a cheat.
In a place like the Heavenly Summit Mountain Dao Inquiry, such conduct by Jia Hongtao naturally earned universal scorn.
Having dodged the three successive sleeve lightning bolts at such a close distance, Su Hongzhen lifted his Xun-Li Sword and activated his footwork to close in quickly on the retreating Jia Hongtao.
In an instant, Su Hongzhen was once again in front of Jia Hongtao.
Jia Hongtao still had not reacted, only widening his eyes.
How could he be so fast?
Su Hongzhen's right hand swung in a wide arc in midair, and the sword hilt he gripped slammed heavily into Jia Hongtao's face.
In that moment, the Xun-Li Sword's hilt pierced through the protective true qi glowing with lightning around Jia Hongtao.
Thud!
A muffled impact sounded.
Su Hongzhen's motion flowed without pause, pressing the attack: he thrust a knee into Jia Hongtao's chest, then swept his leg to trip the other’s knees.
In an instant, Jia Hongtao knelt, a red imprint slowly rising on his cheek from where the hilt had struck.
The whoosh of the sword cutting the air sounded again.
This time the blade did not rest at Jia Hongtao's front throat.
It fell from behind onto the nape of Jia Hongtao's neck as he knelt on the arena.
Like executing a beheading.
"Winner, Su Hongzhen!"
This time the Star Heaven Sect's manager disciple did not wait for Jia Hongtao's admission of defeat, he simply and decisively announced the result of the duel.
The gap was simply too great.
The youth in cyan daoist robes, his facial contours clear and an air of unconcern about his brows and eyes, sheathed the white Swift Sword engraved with crimson flame patterns and then strode down from the arena without looking back.
Su Hongzhen wore an expressionless face.
The instant Jia Hongtao had attacked him on the platform, Su Hongzhen had immediately understood exactly what weight the opponent carried.
Weak.
Pathetically weak.
Not much stronger than the few swordsmen from Fuliuliu Willow Sword Manor he had met back on Moxu Mountain.
Beneath the arena, the onlookers instinctively parted like retreating tides, clearing a path for Su Hongzhen.
At this moment, no one dared to underestimate the rogue cultivator in the cyan robe descending from the platform.
To utterly crush the Dao Inquirer from the Lightning-Severing Sect, the foremost thunder sect in the Northern Region, at Heavenly Summit Mountain?
It seemed He An might be in danger.
On the viewing stand.
The envoy from Mirage Palace sent to Heavenly Summit Mountain, Time-Stealing Tower True Dharma Elder Lin Mo, tapped his chair's armrest with his fingers, his expression grave.
He knew why Supreme Imperial Law Elder Shang and Zhou Jinyun had so highly recommended this obscure rogue cultivator.
Even though Lin Mo possessed four thousand strands of innate true energy and was a Myriad Transformations realm great power, his gaze involuntarily stilled when he saw Su Hongzhen's footwork on the arena.
"Jinyun, is this Su Hongzhen really a Martial Spring Realm cultivator?"
He suddenly asked the girl beside him a rather foolish-sounding question.
"Yes."
Zhou Jinyun answered.
Lin Mo fell silent for a moment after hearing this, looked toward Su Hongzhen again, verified the rogue cultivator's cultivation level with his spiritual sense, then asked:
"Li Haoran, what chance does he have against him?"
"Before a fight, no one can truly know the outcome, Elder."
Zhou Jinyun continued, her eyes never leaving the cyan-robed youth who had just descended the platform and was moving through the crowd.
In truth, Zhou Jinyun already had an answer in her heart.
Li Haoran's chance of victory was zero.
Originally Zhou Jinyun had thought that if she were still at Martial Spring Realm and used her illusions, her odds against Su Hongzhen would be roughly three to seven.
But now it seemed she had overestimated herself.
From Little Su's recent performance, it appeared even she and Li Haoran together would not be enough to defeat him.
……
On the viewing stand, in a lower section, three completely separate chairs had been set out.
Three young cultivators in deep green robes sat on them. From left to right they were: An Zheyuan, chief disciple of Ten Directions Tower of Mirage Palace; Shao Yuchen, chief disciple of Weaving Dreams Tower; and Huang Qing, chief disciple of Mirror Ruins Tower.
These three chief disciples were Mirage Palace's Dao Inquirers at this Heavenly Summit Mountain event.
From the very beginning the atmosphere among them had become unusually heavy.
"Is this person really only Martial Spring Realm?" An Zheyuan said with a wry smile, repeatedly shaking his head.
"No wonder Senior Sister Zhou personally recommended Su Hongzhen to be a Dao Inquirer here," Huang Qing sighed.
"I heard making him a Dao Inquirer was not solely Senior Sister Zhou's idea," An Zheyuan said.
"What, An senior brother, have you heard something?" Huang Qing blinked.
"Just hearsay. I heard some big figures in the Grand Elders' court also favor Su Hongzhen," An Zheyuan continued.
"Even the Grand Elders were stirred?" Huang Qing murmured in surprise.
This was indeed strange, because ordinarily the Grand Elders—those Upper Three Realms figures—rarely meddled in worldly affairs unless some major crisis occurred.
Of course, Zhou Jinyun was an exception.
She was praised as having the potential to ascend to immortality and possessed extraordinary illusion talent, and since childhood had been personally instructed by Mirage Palace's Supreme Imperial Law Elder.
An Zheyuan and Huang Qing, who had spent their youth bent over cultivation with few distracting thoughts, could only imagine that the Grand Elders highly valued Su Hongzhen's talent. They could not conceive of another possibility.
That possibility was that there were other reasons behind Su Hongzhen that had drawn the Grand Elders' attention.
An Zheyuan and Huang Qing chattered on, then suddenly both their eyes focused on the current chief disciple of Weaving Dreams Tower sitting between them, Shao Yuchen.
"Shao senior brother, when you were coming back just now, it seemed you spoke with Su Hongzhen. What were you talking about?" Huang Qing asked, blinking.
"…"
Shao Yuchen was silent.
In fact, from the start Shao Yuchen had never gotten along well with An Zheyuan and Huang Qing.
Or rather, he did not fit in with the other chief disciples of Mirage Palace.
For several years now he had lived in the shadow of Zhou Jinyun.