Chapter 283: Top Ten (1)
While they spoke, the third round began.
Once again, the bucket with all the slips was brought to the students. Of the 46 victors, some were too weakened to continue and gave up. After all, they had fought two fights in such a short period of time. Those who had faced opponents with similar strength as themselves would be too exhausted to recover in a short period of time.
That was especially true for the ones who had fought toward the end of the second round. Even the victors of those matches were only participating in the third round hoping to get lucky during the draw. If they were lucky enough to draw a late match, they might be able to rest longer. Otherwise, they wouldn't be able to keep fighting.
Su Yu stared at the bucket for a while before shooting the instructor holding the bucket a glance. Suddenly, he looked behind the instructor and his eyes widened in shock. The instructor's expression changed and he hurriedly looked behind him.
But there was nothing there. When he looked in front of him again, Su Yu had already drawn his slip of paper with a smile on his face, as though nothing had happened earlier.
Silence descended. Nobody had anything to say. The instructor did not know whether to laugh or cry. He said nothing and walked toward the next student.
Su Yu exhaled in relief. He shot a glance at Liu Hong, cursing at Liu Hong inwardly. Since Liu Hong had insisted on making things difficult for him, he naturally needed to take his precautions. If he was still faced with a freak after doing all that, he could only accept his fate.
...
In front of the students.
Liu Hong was quite speechless. Why was that kid looking at him? He had not tampered with anything this round! Also, if he really wanted to do something, would that kid be able to do anything?
Beside him, Wu Qi was amused as well. She laughed and said, "This is a very interesting fellow. Liu Hong, you seem to have met your match. It's a pity that he was born a bit too late."
If Su Yu was born a few years earlier, things would be a lot more interesting for their generation.
Liu Hong did not mind her words. He smiled and said, "Yes, things would have been very interesting if he was born a few years earlier. But he wasn't born too late either. In the path of cultivation, a junior catching up to a senior is very common. We are both only Skysoars. There are still the Cloudbreach, Mountainsea, and other realms above us. Who's to say that he won't catch up to us one day?"
"Do you have such a high opinion of him?"
Wu Qi looked at Liu Hong curiously. From his appearance alone, Liu Hong was pretty unassuming. He liked to smile, he was quite prideful, and he also seemed quite silly at times.
In fact, for a lot of people in the academy, Liu Hong was quite dumb. After all, he had been competing against Bai Feng for years yet he had suffered a lot of losses. But the truly smart ones knew that the mere fact that he could compete with Bai Feng for so many years was in itself proof of his competence.
Wu Qi knew that Liu Hong was definitely not as simple as he seemed. And Liu Hong was also an extremely prideful person. Very few people could actually earn his respect. He looked down on most people.
In fact, Wu Qi knew that even she herself was probably only a slightly strong individual with an ordinary level of intelligence in Liu Hong's eyes. Some people wore their arrogance outwardly. Some kept their arrogance deep inside.
Liu Hong was the latter.
Liu Hong smiled, "Not really. He is still too young right now. We'll see. Perhaps I can make a judgment after he reaches the Skysoar Realm."
"Skysoar?" Wu Qi muttered, "Do you know about the incident in Great Zhou? Would this kid be able to smoothly reach the Skysoar Realm?"
"I heard, but I haven't been paying much attention to it." Liu Hong nonchalantly said, "It's not that big of a deal. Unless the single character faction produces an actual Invincible, the multiple character faction would not be fully exterminated. Unrivaled with a single Divine Character is still not impressive enough. Would that fellow be able to remain unrivaled among his peers at the Sunmoon Realm? No matter what, the multiple character faction had produced someone capable of fighting Invincible experts as a Sunmoon."
Wu Qi nodded, "Unrivaled? If he really dares to come, I...forget it. By that time, I would have probably reached the Cloudbreach Realm already. What a pity. I would love to teach that brat a lesson and let him have a taste of reality."
Unrivaled? Had that kid asked her permission before calling himself that? If she couldn't even acknowledge Xia Yuwen's superiority, how would she acknowledge the fact that a kid was superior to her? Just look at Bai Feng. He was a genius of the multiple character faction. Had she ever shown any fear toward him?
...
Meanwhile, Su Yu checked his slip and saw the number 12. He was going to fight in the sixth match. In this round, only 20 matches would be held as the other students had withdrawn. And a match would last between five minutes to only a few seconds.
Initially, Su Yu wasn't paying much attention to the matches since there was nothing he could see. But soon, someone caught his attention.
Xia Huyou! That fellow had been keeping a low profile, but he had actually entered the third round as well. Su Yu noticed him because he was the combatant for the next match.
The opponent wasn't someone Su Yu knew, so that was probably someone from a different faculty. He looked at Hu Zongji and softly asked, "Who is Xia Huyou's opponent during the previous round?"
"A high-middle student from the Pillmaking Faculty."
Su Yu nodded and looked at the smiling Xia Huyou with a pensive look.
"Cao Hui, why is a Willpower Faculty fellow like you cultivating Divine Characters? Just surrender." Xia Huyou was in no rush to start the fight. He laughed heartily and said, "If you surrender, I'll pay you three merit points. What do you think?"
The student called Cao Hui merely glanced at him silently. One of the researchers berated, "Xia Huyou, compete properly. Stop babbling nonsense."
Xia Huyou smiled, "Fine. You sure are a bad businessman. I am very strong. I need to win in this match to enter the top 20. And I need to get into the top 10, at the very least. My apologies, friend. The next time you buy anything from me, I'll give you a five percent discount as an apology for this."
Cao Hui's face turned stiff as he hurriedly clarified, "I have never bought anything from you!"
"Sorry, sorry!" Xia Huyou apologized, "Yes, definitely. You have never bought anything from me. It was my mistake. Fine, you can have 10 percent off for your next purchase."
That left Cao Hui even more speechless. Whatever. This could be a good thing. He would remember this offer. Damn fatty. If this fatty ended up reneging on the offer, he would not let it slide.
The two thus started the match. But Su Yu was wondering if the two would complete their transaction inside the grotto instead. Sure, they couldn't talk inside, but they could still form words with their willpower. In any case, nobody could see what was happening inside.
Meanwhile, Jia Mingzhen and the others were feeling greatly troubled.
"Liu Hong's black market business is doing quite badly recently. This little fatty has been eating into his market share. And this little fatty is too crafty. The academy has performed several investigations on him, but he was able to escape capture every single time, though there were a few close calls. When we schemed against Liu Hong that one time, this kid had taken the advantage and profited off it."
"He's just like his second granduncle." The sole woman in the group cursed and said, "But this kid is very picky with who he does business with. Is he starting to build his network of supporters as preparation for his ascend into the prefect’s position already?"
Xia Huyou did not do his business with just anyone. All these elders had noticed that. People like Su Yu and Zheng Yunhui were the targets of Xia Huyou. Cao Hui was also a genius as someone capable of entering the third round, so he was also one of Xia Huyou's targets.
As for the others, even if they could afford to buy from Xia Huyou, Xia Huyou might not be interested in doing business with them.
Jia Mingzhen nodded, "Prefect Xia probably won't take long to step into the Eternal Realm after leaving seclusion. So he might step down in a few years."
"Would this kid be able to step up to that position? Xia Yuwen is already in the Cloudbreach Realm..."
"We never know." Jia Mingzhen stared at Xia Huyou for a while before saying, "It's very hard for us to judge the strength of this kid. But for the position of the prefect, strength is not the only thing that matters. Other aspects are very important as well. He can be weaker now and keep growing his strength. What's truly important is his outlook and charisma..."
Sure, Xia Yuwen was stronger, but some things were not so simple. He might be strong enough to suppress those in his generation, but suppression did not mean respect. Of people like Bai Feng and Wu Qi, which of them truly respected him?
More importantly, Xia Yuwen tended to cross the line when doing things. He wouldn't have spent his time beating up all the top 10 students in the ranking twice before breaking through into the next realm and leaving the ranking otherwise.
In short, the prefect needed to be strong, but not all strong cultivators were qualified to hold that position.
"Xia Yuwen is someone that is never willing to take a loss. In my opinion, he somewhat resembles the prefect. But in that case, he would need enough strength to suppress everyone like the prefect. Otherwise, he would be a bad fit for the position."
While they were talking among themselves, a few minutes passed. Finally, Xia Huyou opened his eyes and started cursing, "Cao Hui, you're a Willpower Faculty student. Why do you secretly cultivate three Divine Characters? Are you crazy?"
Cao Hui had an unsightly expression.
Xia Huyou smiled and said, "Whatever. At least I won. I'm in a good mood today. Call me later. I can give you a 20 percent discount instead."
Once again, Cao Hui was rendered speechless. Yes. He had lost. And this fatty was too infuriating. But when he recalled the 20 percent discount the fatty was offering, he decided to swallow his anger. It almost looked like they were messing around instead of fighting in a match.
The others were also rendered speechless. The next match involved Xia Chan. While stepping forth, she glanced at Xia Huyou with an ugly expression. Acting like she didn't know him, she walked past him without saying a word to him.
What a clown!
Xia Huyou merely smiled indifferently. He even loudly said, "Good luck, Little Sister! Everyone, look at her! This is my little sister, a freak of this batch. She will most definitely place in the top three in the tournament. If she can't...well, so be it."
The crowd roared with laughter. And Xia Chan's expression turned uglier. Who the hell was his little sister?
Thanks to her grumpy mood, her opponent suffered. In less than 10 minutes, the opponent withdrew from the grotto while coughing blood. The first thing the opponent did after leaving was shooting Xia Huyou with a gloomy look.
Why would this fellow provoke her? He was nearly beaten to death by her! Not one of the students who had entered the third round was a weakling, but he had still been delivered such a miserable beating.
But as a response, Xia Huyou merely signaled the opponent with his eyes before making the gesture for 10 with his fingers.
That person was no fool. He instantly understood what Xia Huyou was trying to say. He wiped the blood off the corner of his lips and decided to let this slide. After all, a 10 percent discount was quite a good offer. He wasn't Xia Chan's match in the first place anyway, so he wouldn't be able to win this match no matter what.