Chapter 3: The Start of the Examination
“What would it be?” Someone asked curiously.
“Elder Su Rou is giving her body?” Some were even shameless and had lewd thoughts.
Although Su Rou was an elder, she was only 20 years old. Compared to the old antiques, she was a lot more easy-going. Because of that, a lot of people didn’t worry at all when they talked like that.
Su Rou only smiled charmingly in response to the guesses of the crowd. She raised five slim fingers, then said, “Five Saint Spirit Grasses.”
“What? Five Saint Spirit Grasses?”
“I didn’t hear wrong did I? The reward are Saint Spirit Grasses, and five?” With those words, the main hall went into chaos and everyone could not remain calm.
Saint Spirit Grasses were extremely precious and even the Chu family could only give each person one per year.
To ordinary people, Saint Spirit Grasses were priceless treasures and some had not even seen it before.
Seeing that the Azure Dragon School could take out five of them, it was a huge temptation to the outer court disciples.
But for most of the people, they could only dream about it because they knew that they had no chance in getting those Saint Spirit Grasses.
However, to the disciples who were aiming to be the first, they were all eager to give it a try and they got even more excited.
Su Rou nodded with satisfaction as she saw the high-spirits of the disciples. Then, she waved her hand.
Behind her, rumbling noises came. The gate that was dozens of feet tall slowly opened.
“What are you waiting for? Don’t want to pass the exam?” Su Rou smiled beautifully as she looked at the disciples who were staring blankly.
“Go~~~~”
At that moment, endless cheers resonated and the tens of thousands outer court disciples were like wild horses who got rid of its reins as they all rushed towards the huge gate.
Chu Feng went along with the flow of people and continued forward. Finally, they entered a deep cave.
The cave was very vast but it was very dark in there. The field of vision was extremely low and people knew the danger of traps that could be triggered at any moment.
“Go! For the rank 4 skill, for the five Saint Spirit Grasses, go~~~”
But of course, there were some people that cared about money and didn’t care about their life. They knew that there was danger but they still went ahead by themselves and didn’t even look back. There was even quite a few of people who were like that.
*whoosh whoosh whoosh*
But after going ahead for a hundred meters, whooshing sounds came in front and endless amounts of silver needles were shot out from the wall, and they shot towards the crowds as if it was rain.
“Ah~~~~~~”
“Waa~~~~”
In an instant, all sorts of cries echoed. The disciples that rushed in front were caught off guard and over half of them fell.
Regardless, people still continued forward and they did not have any traces of retreating. They madly ran deeper into the cave.
Although the silver needle was strong, it wouldn’t kill, and they knew that. After all, it was only a mechanism and to the people at the 3rd level of the Spirit realm, they could dodge it as long as they were careful.
As they continued to go in deeper, the silver needles also got denser and denser and the people that they hit were usually caught off guard.
In situations like those, the crowds quickly distanced themselves. The people who were running at the front were no longer people who came hoping they would pass in the confusion. They were strong people such as Yang Tian Yu and Duan Yuxuan.
It had to be mentioned that those people were indeed not ordinary.
As they walked in the storm-like needles, they needed to be extremely careful.
But it was as though they were leveling the ground with their shoes and it didn’t look like they were running through mechanisms at all. They were simply people in a running race.
Chu Feng was always behind them in the Spirit realm army that consisted of people at the 3rd level. He did that for two reasons.
Firstly, he didn’t want to stand out.
Secondly, his situation was very special and he didn’t want to show his true strength too early.
That was why he was waiting for a chance where he could surpass everyone when no one was looking.
“Duan Yuxuan, you’re already so old yet you can’t even win a child like me in a race. Don’t you think it’s a bit embarrassing?”
“Hmph. Little brat, in the journey of martial cultivation, age doesn’t matter. Only strength does. If you want to boast then do that after you win.”
Let us travel through time a bit. There were only two shadows left in the very front. They were Duan Yuxuan and Yang Tian Yu.
Both of them were at the 4th level of the Spirit realm. One of them had outstanding talent, the other had plenty of experience. The two of them were fairly even and the tension between them got stronger and stronger.
It was because they knew that their largest competition was each other. As long as they win over their opponent, the prize for being first would belong to them.
“Huu~” Suddenly, a breeze of wind came from the front.
The two of them were surprised as they looked closely and they couldn’t help but slow down their paces. It was because dense fog appeared in front of them.
The cave was already dark, and with the fog it meant that their vision would be even poorer. With that, it also greatly increased the difficulty of dodging the mechanisms. Even if it was them, they needed to treat it carefully.
“Good chance.”
Just as everyone was slowing down, Chu Feng secretly rejoiced. He went forward in huge strides, and with a whoosh, his entire body was like an arrow leaving a bow as he flew forward.
*whoosh*
At that time, Duan Yuxuan was concentrating on dodging the silver needles. Suddenly, a black shadow flashed past him. Without giving any time for him to react, that person disappeared once again.
“Did I imagine it?”
With that, it made Duan Yuxuan feel quite a bit of shock. He thought it was Yang Tian Yu at the start, but he noticed that Yang Tian Yu was not far behind him. Then, he was distracted with his thoughts.
The person who successfully left everyone behind, Chu Feng, didn’t care about them that much as he increased his speed to the maximum.
After that long running, he didn’t feel any fatigue. The spiritual energy within his body was endless to take and it continuously surged from his dantian.
Not only that, his speed and strength, hearing and vision power all surpassed the people who were at the same level than him. At least it greatly surpassed Duan Yuxuan and Yang Tian Yu.
Chu Feng wasn’t too surprised at that chance because it was something special about him.
He already seen this specialness five years ago. From now on, his specialness returned and it gave him incomparable self-confidence because there was no one who could call themselves a genius in front of him anymore.
As he ran with flying speed, Chu Feng finally left the mechanism stage, exited the dark cave, and arrived in the middle of a wide hall.
At the end of the hall, there was a tall platform made out of stone. On top of the stone, there were several items. It was the rank 4 martial skill book and the five Spirit Saint Grasses.
Seeing those things, Chu Feng was a bit emotional. However, he didn’t not rush ahead. Rather, he looked at the stone doors on the side of the hall.
“So behind those are the legendary Fierce Beasts?” Chu Feng’s mouth curved up in expectation.
He knew that this exam just only started. The creatures that he was going to face were terrifying, blood-thirsty, ruthless creatures, called Fierce Beasts.
“Elder Su Rou look, this is too astonishing.”
“I’ve been guarding here for so many years, but this really is the first time that I’ve seen a disciple that passed through with such a speed.”
Within a mysterious stone room in the underground palace, an old elder was staring at a disordered stone and astonishment filled his gaze.
That was not a normal stone. It was a mechanism within the underground palace. The stone only disordered itself after a mechanism got triggered.
Looking at it, the entire stone was disordered. Which only meant one thing. Someone already passed the mechanism stage.
The fastest person to clear the mechanism stage took two hours from the past examinations. But currently, only one hour had passed.
This change grabbed everyone’s attention. The dozen or so elders in the stone room all gathered around and they were all very startled.
“It seems that there’s an interesting character within the outer court disciples this year.”
Su Rou also gathered over, and as she looked at the disordered stone, she nodded with satisfaction, “Since it’s like this, we can’t let him pass so easily. Let me make it more interesting.”
After saying that, she looked above the stone. There were three round stones embedded in the wall.
Suddenly, she smiled strangely, and hit the three stones with three bangs.
“Don’t touch it!” Seeing that, all of the elders there were alarmed.
But it was too late. At that time all three stones were already pressed by Su Rou.
“What? Didn't you tell me that these stones would release the Fierce Beasts?” Looking at the elders in panic, Su Rou also felt that something was wrong.
“Those three stones do indeed release the Fierce Beasts, but they cannot be pressed at the same time.”
“If they are pressed at the same time, they will release all the imprisoned Fierce Beasts at the same time.”
“That would be thirty rank 2s, nine rank 3s, and one rank 4.” After saying that, Elder Li’s face was already pale and his voice was trembling a bit.
The elders that guarded there understood the Fierce Beasts very clearly.
They were ruthless and terrifying creatures, and they were many times stronger than the people who were at the same level.
Seeing so many Fierce Beasts being released at the same time, a round of slaughter could not be avoided.
To think of the tens of thousands of disciples in the underground palace being slaughtered by the Fierce Beasts was not a pleasant thought.
“Why did you not remind me earlier?”
At that time, Su Rou’s face also changed greatly. Her body rose and became the wind. When the stone doors opened, she already disappeared.
“Elder Li, what should we do?” Everyone’s gazes landed on this aged elder.
“What else can we do? Hurry and go help!” Elder Li bellowed angrily and rushed out.