This Young Master is not Cannon Fodder

The match after Ji Shuye's was Duan Muli versus a Buzhou Immortal Sect disciple. Duan Muli was clearly superior despite both of the combatants being the Nascent Soul Realm. Although Duan Muli was kind enough to have allowed his opponents to display all of his capabilities before defeating him

Xia Yushan and the other disciples patted the defeated disciple and said some words of comfort. The next round was Xia Yushan against Nanfang Wubai. 

"Is sweetie not here?" Nanfang Wubai asked immediately after the match started.

Xia Yushan, who was about to attack, paused. After contemplating a moment, Xia Yushan decided to answer truthfully. "Junior Brother Xi didn't make it past the second trial."

Nanfang Wubai showed a truly broken-hearted expression, and to Xia Yushan's surprise, he turned around and jumped off the stage. "If sweetie isn't here, I'm not interested." 

Xia Yushan couldn't help but feel stifled by Nanfang Wubai's words. Although he felt pity for Junior Brother Xi's predicament for catching such a person's attention, that didn't mean he liked being ignored in such a way. 

After calming himself down, Xia Yushan realized that it was all a scheme from Nanfang Wubai. He was alone among the sixteen participants and only at the Core Formation Realm. If he used love as an excuse to give up, then it would cause others to ignore him subconsciously.

Xia Yushan looked over at Nanfang Wubai in praise but saw the gloomy atmosphere that hung around him like a cloud of depression. It was even more attention attracting.

'Or maybe not,' Xia Yushan thought.

The next match was a nascent soul grandmaster against a core formation master, San Mirong, against the icy female disciple of the Eight Pillars Sect. Unlike Nanfang Wubai, the female disciple showed no intentions of giving up before even fighting. 

"Eternal Night Sect Disciple, San Mirong."

"Eight Pillars Sect Disciple, Yang Linyin."

Xia Yushan paused to process what he had just heard. He probably heard wrong. Her name was probably Lanyan or something like Luoyin, right? Perhaps she was the twin sibling of Yang Linyin. That would explain her similar aura. It wasn't unheard of for twins to have extremely similar auras in the Huang Realm.

Although it was generally rare for twins to have the exact same talent for cultivation in the world, the reason was because the stronger twin would cannibalize the weaker twin's talent while still in the womb, like sharks. However, this rule was not absolute.

No matter what Xia Yushan thought, the two women on stage began fighting. 

The first to attack was not San Mirong but Yang Linyin. Yang Linyin waved her hand forward, and ice spiked from the ground towards San Mirong. San Mirong didn't show any change in expression as the lightning under her skin emerged above her skin and forced a protective barrier.

 

When the ice spikes touched the lightning barrier, they only lasted for a moment before disintegrating, but San Mirong frowned. Although others could not tell, she who cultivated the lightning snakes under her skin was able to feel the slight weakening of her lightning barrier.

San Mirong carefully appraised Yang Linyin. Her eyes no longer had the look of a senior of an enemy sect but that of an enemy of equal rank. Yang Linyin's attack was able to threaten her, something that only the strongest masters among core formation masters could accomplish. It wouldn't be wrong to say such a core formation master would be as rare as qilin horns and phoenix feathers.

The barrier of lightning snakes shrunk and covered San Mirong like an exoskeleton with but a thought. In the next moment, San Mirong instantly appeared before Lan Linyin with her ax already in midswing. 

Lang Yanyin's reaction was also very quick as a coffin made of translucent black ice covered her.

The ax chop was unstoppable and instantly sliced through, but the inside of the ice coffin was empty. As the top half of the ice coffin slid off the bottom half, it revealed Yang Linyin standing behind the ice coffin, unharmed.

Yang Linyin made a hand seal and pointed at San Mirong. Both halves of the ice coffin exploded into tiny crystal-like fragments. The temperature instantly plummeted and each breath condensed into a white fog. There was no immediate effect, but San Mirong frowned as she continued her ax swings, intent on finishing the battle as fast as possible. San Mirong could feel the cold temperature pierce her lightning barrier. 

Yang Linyin practically ignored San Mirong as ice coffins continuously appeared in the arena and exploded. Most of them turned into tiny fragments nearly invisible to the naked eye, but others exploded into larger chunks that struck against San Mirong. None of the ice chunks were able to pierce through San Mirong's lightning snake armor, but those with sharp eyes would be able to discern that with the passing of time, the ice took longer and longer to disintegrate. If San Mirong didn't do anything, Yang Linyin would prevail.

Although Yang Linyin was continuously changing the environment to her advantage, she wasn't having a good time either. Her robes were in slight disarray with numerous light flesh wounds from almost failing to dodge San Mirong's ax chops.

Lightning condensed onto her ax blade like when San Mirong faced Duan Muli on Heaven Shroud Island, only there was a little something extra.

Yang Linyin's expression hardened as she saw this, and she clapped her hands together. Instantly, tens of ice walls enclosed around her like a human-sized fortress. 

But this was not enough to block San Mirong's unstoppable ax chop.

The ice fortress was bisected horizontally. The upper half shattered into countless tiny fragments revealing the shocked Yang Linyin in the middle of it. There was a flowing line of lightning where San Mirong's ax had passed. 

However, San Mirong was frowning.

Yang Linyin's figure began to shimmer as her body turned into dark ice and shattered into the air. The remaining half of the ice fortress did so as well. San Mirong extended her spiritual sense to find where Yang Linyin was hiding, but her spiritual sense moved like molasses, hindered by the icy mist.

That wasn't all, as the temperature had dropped even lower to the point where her breath was beginning to crystallize. San Mirong growled, and the light on her ax increased, exuding an aura of wanting to cleave everything in half. This was her Ax Light, the second stage of intent.

Yang Linyin had continuously expended her true qi in order to manipulate the battleground to her advantage, but if she used all her true qi, then she would not have enough to unleash a finishing strike. Then once the battleground cleared up, Yang Linyin would be a fish on a chopping block for San Mirong.

But San Mirong didn't want to win in such a fashion. The lightning snakes that composed her armor became agitated, and a black storm cloud began to form above the arena. She frowned. Her techniques were being affected by the icy mist as well. The farther away from her it was, the harder it was to control and form. If something only took thirty percent of her attention to do, now it took sixty percent. 

Yang Linyin didn't appear before San Mirong or do anything to stop her. Instead, the temperature dropped at an increasingly fast rate. San Mirong noticed that it took even more effort to control the storm clouds. Her brows furrowed, but she devoted even more attention to her technique, but her wariness towards her unseeable foe did not decrease at all. After a tense moment of peace, lightning descended onto the arena. 

San Mirong had intended for the lightning to all gather towards her, but their trajectories had been altered. The longer the battle went on, the more San Mirong regretted not unleashing her full ability at the beginning of the battle.

However, there was no medicine for regret in this world, and the lightning that descended onto her merged with her lightning snakes, increasing their size to the point that they completely covered San Mirong from view. Soon the lightning began to change in color, becoming a brilliant whitish blue, making her resemble a thunder spirit. Even her flesh partially electrified. 

Lightning Snake Thunder Armor Transformation.

The storm clouds didn't disappear and continued to rain lightning bolts down, reducing the icy mist. With each bolt of lightning, the storm cloud reduced in size. Finally, the mist began to conglomerate into crystal clear pillars of ice that pierced into the storm clouds and caused the lightning bolts to stop.

At the same time, the icy mist disappeared, and San Mirong's spiritual sense and sight were no longer hindered. She could clearly perceive an unharmed Yang Linyin with her arms raised towards the sky. San Mirong didn't waste a single second, and her ax blade seemed to have merged into her right arm. Within a second, she appeared before Yang Linyin and slashed down with Yang Linyin unable to do anything but stand there.

This blow contained tremendous force, and even a peak nascent soul grandmaster would incur a fatal injury from such a strike. San Mirong intended to kill the core formation master before her. They were originally from two enemy sects. Taking any chance to kill each other was normal.

Yang Linyin also had killing intent towards San Mirong, but San Mirong didn't put it in her eyes. The moment San Mirong's ax blade slightly gouged into Yang Linyin's torso, it stopped. Black ice encased the ax blade, and the temperature surrounding the two plummeted.

Yang Linyin allowed her arms to fall and grabbed onto San Mirong's ax hand, her eyes incredibly fierce. San Mirong immediately sensed danger, and without any chance for thought, lightning clad her left hand and slashed her right arm, severing it! 

Once San Mirong severed her right arm, she immediately retreated. Her thunder armor began to collapse onto herself, and her lightning snakes buried themselves once again under her skin.

Her choice proved to be correct as after she escaped, Yang Linyin exploded into ice. The exploded ice created a beautiful orange peony full of yang qi.

San Mirong released a relieved sigh but soon became gloomy.

Lightning Snake Thunder Armor's greatest strength was its incredibly defensive and offense. But its greatest weakness was that once one piece was destroyed, the whole armor would fail. Just like what San Mirong did to herself, she could not cancel the armor technique fast enough, so she could only amputate her right arm and armor. Although San Mirong survived the attack, she had lost a great portion of her qi and a large number of her refined lightning snakes.

San Mirong relieved expression quickly stiffened as the orange ice peony flower began to emit an intense heat. Soon it turned from an ice peony to a fire peony. The fire peony began to charge towards her. San Mirong frowned and made several hand seals with her remaining hand to control the storm cloud. But it was for naught as the ice pillar also converted into fire and swallowed the storm cloud and turned it into a cloud made of fire.

"You!" San Mirong cried out as she saw the male Yang Linyin who had taken first place in the Three Heavens Connection Meeting, walk out of the fiery peony.

The male Yang Linyin did not exhibit any weakness. Rather, he was full of vitality and exuded a fiery pressure. He looked like he had not even begun fighting, and his true qi reservoir was full.

The fire peony crashed into San Mirong, and even she who had experienced numerous hardships couldn't help but cry out in pain. San Mirong was removed from the arena after she managed to scream out her forfeit. 

After the fire dispersed, it revealed her a horrible state. Her clothing appeared to have melted into her skin, and burn marks covered her whole body. Even some parts of her muscles beneath the skin were revealed. Her hair was haphazard, with half of it being burned off and the other half singed. 

Although it was hard to call San Mirong a beauty because of the lightning snakes slithering under her skin, the current wretched state would cause many people to tremble in fear.

Yang Linyin stepped down from the stage, and Duan Muli gave him a nod of acknowledgment. All the other participants couldn't help but reevaluate Yang Linyin and his true capabilities. His strength was enough to contend against many peak nascent soul grandmasters despite only being a core formation and acupoint opening master.

If they weren't careful and allowed Yang Linyin time to gather power for his technique, their fate would be the same as San Mirong's. The terrifying part was that he seemed to have two lives, both at the peak of the master level of strength.

San Mirong gnashed her teeth in pain, and her hatred-fueled eyes stared unblinkingly at the Eight Pillar Sect disciples. The gnashing of her teeth was extremely loud. Her cheek had a hole in it and exposed her grinding teeth.

"Senior Sister, you have to heal first. Otherwise, it might leave a hidden problem in the future and sever your immortal path." The only other member of Eternal Night Sect said.

Hearing this, San Mirong could only allow her sight to leave the disciples of the Eight Pillar Sect. She swallowed a pill and then started to focus on recovering. 

The next match was Li Mu against Wei Daiying. 

"Saint Scholar School Disciple Li Mu, please advise."

Unlike the sudden victory of Yang Linyin, Wei Daiying showed strength that was normal. Of course, this normal was within the scope of the top disciples of hegemonic sects. Wei Daiying displayed strength normally only achievable by nascent soul grandmasters by merging the power of his spiritual and martial cultivation base.

"Daoist Wei is indeed a hero among heroes. You already have a feature of the Unity Realm, harmonization." Li Mu praised as petals appeared and hindered Wei Daiying's vision.

Wei Daiying had a rainbow-colored aura covering him, and three green orbs circled around him. He spread his hands out, and a tornado appeared and widened with him at the center. Despite this, the flower petals remained unperturbed, as if the tornado did not exist.

Wei Daiying frowned and formed several hand seals, and pointed at Li Mu. The tornado disappeared, and in their palace, eighteen wind blades appeared, and all of them sliced towards Li Mu. But Li Mu continued to smile and held his hands behind his back. When the wind blades reached him, they dissipated into a clear breeze that caused Li Mu's hair to float behind him.

Wei Daiying's eyes dimmed. He stored his three artifact orbs and clasped his hand towards Li Mu with a bow. "Many thanks for Daoist Li's mercy."

Li Mu smiled and waved his hands. "It's nothing. We are all people on the same path, after all. No need to go to the extremes."

Compared to the battle between San Mirong and Yang Linyin, the last three battles of the first round were comparatively stale. Heng Huesheng won the sixth battle, the Eternal Night Sect's nascent soul grandmaster won the seventh round, and the Saint Scholar School's nascent soul grandmaster won the eighth and final battle of the first round.