Chapter 37 – Ranking challenge
“Ok, we’ll act as the two main judges say and allow Zhao Feng to participate.” The head of the sect Zhao Tiancang looked interestingly at Zhao Feng.
With the head of the sect and the two main judges agreeing, no one dared to oppose them. This was the first time Zhao Feng felt a sense of belonging to his sect.
Zhao Tianjian was trembling in anger. He couldn’t believe that Zhao Feng could return alive.
“Gray eagle has failed.” With gray eagle’s strength, how could he possibly fail?
“Zhao Feng!”
The judge said: “I shall explain the rules to you now.”
“”Yes.” Zhao Feng listened carefully.
People challenged one another in this tournament. The first round “spot challenge” was when the fifty outer disciples challenged the fifty inner disciples. If they won they took the places of inner disciples. Every outer disciples had three chances to challenge someone, if they lost all three challenges then they would remain outer disciples. Therefore, before the outer disciples challenged anyone, they first had to estimate their own strength and choose the weaker inner disciples.
“Zhao Feng, since you were late, you only have one chance to challenge someone.” The judge said strictly.
One chance?
Zhao Feng nodded his head: “I understand.” With his strength, he could easily become an inner disciple. Unless Zhao Feng was retarded and chose someone like Zhao Linlong, he would win. Obviously, Zhao Feng would do that and challenge the strongest guy straight away.
“Now you can choose one person. If you win, you can take their spot.” The judge warned.
“Ok!” Zhao Feng jumped on stage and surveyed the fifty people.
Fifty people, fifty seats all arranged in order.
The order from left to right went Zhao Linlong, Zhao Chi, Zhao Han, Zhao Qin….
The first row of ten represented the top ten inner disciples. On the seventh chair of the second row, Zhao Feng spotted Zhao Yufei. Zhao Yufei looked at him and gently smiled. The two were neighbours and were quite familiar with each other.
Zhao Yue, Zhao Yijian, Zhao Gan, Zhao Guang were between fortieth and fiftieth place. Apart from Zhao Feng, there was only five others that had become inner disciples.
Who should I challenge? Zhao Feng smiled as he inspected them. Zhao Linlong, who was in first place had his eyes closed, as if he was trying to gain insights into something. It seemed like the tournament had nothing to do with him.,
The top inner disciples didn’t even worry. However, the disciples ranked at the bottom were nervous. After all, Zhao Feng was the top outer disciple. He could easily reach the top ten with his strength.
“The second row… Sixth seat… ” Zhao Feng’s eyes settled on the person on Zhao Yufei right.
“Number sixteen “Zhao Fei”, please come out.” The judge said. Zhao Fei was sixteen or seventeen years old. He had the cultivation of the peak third rank, but his aura wasn’t any weaker than cultivators of the fourth rank.
“Kid, don’t think that you can beat me just because you’ve reached the fourth rank!” Zhao Fei calmly walked on stage.
“Heh, this Zhao Fei is pretty strong. With his [Block Metal Body], he’s beaten two quasi-martial artists.”
“Zhao Feng might not advance so smoothly.”
In terms of winning, Zhao Feng obviously had a higher chance. But his opponents strength wasn’t weak either, so it would be a tough fight.
“Metal Sand Palm!” Zhao Fei only used a middle ranked martial art.
Pah!
The damage was higher than most high ranked martial arts. This was because it had been trained to the peak level!
Zhao Feng was slightly moved. At the outer disciple contest, only he had trained middle ranked martial arts to the high level. The thing was, Zhao Fei’s Metal Sand Palm complemented his Block Metal Body. Therefore, this palm could beat Zhao Yijian’s Ice Flowing Sword.
“Zhao Fei’s strength is not any weaker than half-step martial artists now.” A few of the inner disciples nodded in approval.
Flaming Metal Fist!
Zhao Feng casually threw out a punch. He was using core ranked martial arts. Not only that, he didn’t add any Inner Strength to it.
This scene caused many people to be shocked. Not using Inner Strength meant that he didn’t have an advantage.
“Kid, don’t try to be cool!” Zhao Fei took a deep breath and circulated Block Metal Body and Metal Sand Palm to the max.
Originally he didn’t think that he’d beat Zhao Feng, he could only spar a bit. But since the opponent was so arrogant…
On the stage, the two figures closed in on each other and the fist and palm hit the other.
“Break—–”
Zhao Fei had a face of urgency and happiness But reality is cruel.
Peh!
The second his palm hit the fist, he felt overwhelming power numb his arm.
Ah!
Zhao Fei’s started to sweat. He felt that Zhao Feng was as powerful as a bull.
Pong—
Zhao Fei didn’t even understand what was happening and he was sent flying. One move. All it took Zhao Feng to beat Zhao Fei was one move. Although it wasn’t surprising that Zhao Feng would win, to win in one move was unpredicted.
“He won by using core ranked martial arts and he didn’t use any Inner Strength.”
“Zhao Feng has learnt a high ranked body martial art… ”
……….
“Zhao Feng, challenge successful! You are ranked sixteenth for now. As for Zhao Fei, you have three chances to challenge someone… ” The judge declared.
After beating Zhao Fei, Zhao Feng walked calmly towards the sixth seat of the second row. On his left was Zhao Yufei.
“Your Metal Wall Technique has reached at least the third level.” Zhao Yufei said slightly surprised. Zhao Feng had learnt this skill from her grandfather.
According to her knowledge, Metal Wall Technique was very hard to train. Her grandfather had said that Zhao Feng would only be able to train it to the second level at max. But from Zhao Feng’s performance, his Metal Wall Technique had reached at least the third level.
“Yep.” Zhao Feng smiled. His Metal Wall Technique had already reached the peak fourth level. There was a huge difference between the third and fourth level. Zhao Feng didn’t even use half his strength when fighting Zhao Fei.
Onstage, the fighting continued. According to the rules, Zhao Fei had another chance to challenge someone. Soon, Zhao Fei successfully beat someone and was ranked twenty-sixth
The tournament was delayed since Zhao Feng had entered halfway through.
Because there were fifty spots for inner disciples and there was fifty-one people, one person was eliminated.
Zhao Feng and five other outer disciples had become inner disciples.
“The spot challenge has finished… ” The judge let out a breath and started to declare the start of the next round. They were proceeding to the Ranking tournament.
According to the news before, the top twenty, ten and three had different rewards.
Especially the top three, they could choose peak ranked martial arts.
This was where Zhao Feng was especially moved. It was obvious that the competition was going to be very fierce. Also, the inner disciples ranking decided one’s honor and glory. All the youth’s here were eighteen or under, and they had desire to win.
“The second round “Ranking tournament” means that all of you have three chances of challenging someone. If you fail then your chances decrease by one… ” The judge said.
The rules were very clear.
The one’s ranked behind would challenge the one’s ranked higher. If they won they would replace the opponent’s rank. Everyone only had three chances to challenge someone. If they were successful, they still had three chances, but if they failed, their chances decreased by one.
“Understood.” The fifty people nodded their heads.
The one’s ranked last challenged others first. It first started with rank fifty.
However, for those at the bottom, they were already very happy in becoming an inner disciple and they knew that they had no chance to get to the top twenty.
Therefore, there weren’t many people challenging others between fortieth and fiftieth place.
Even if there were, they just wanted to show off and they won higher rankings even if they didn’t get any rewards.
Fortieth… Thirty-ninth… Thirty-eighth…
The rankings edged closer and closer. When it reached twentieth to thirtieth place, the fighting became more and more fierce. People such as Zhao Yue, Zhao Yijian had all reached the top thirty. Zhao Yijian reached twelfth and Zhao Yue had reached fifteenth.
Overall, the top twenty inner disciples had the strength of quasi-martial artists. Zhao Feng and Zhao Yufei were both true martial artists so no one dared to challenge them. There were less than ten disciples who had reached the fourth rank of the martial path.
After the top twenty was confirmed, they started to compete for the top ten. Soon, it was Zhao Yufei turn to challenge someone. Zhao Feng would challenge someone after Zhao Yufei’s turn.
There were many top ten inner disciples that had not reached the fourth rank of the martial path.
Zhao Yufei decided to challenge number six and she won her match easily.
After reaching the top ten, Zhao Yufei gave up her chance to keep on challenging someone. This way, she could still save her two chances for the next two rounds.
“Number sixteen Zhao Feng, it’s your turn.” At this moment, the judge declared.