Five days of quiet solitude passed like a slow, deep breath. On the sixth day, a tremor of excitement ran through Verdant Creek City. In the vast, central plaza, under the watchful eyes of sect envoys in crimson robes, a small army of artisans had worked through the night. Where there had been market stalls and fountains, there now stood six grand, elevated martial arenas. Each was a perfect square of polished white stone, thirty feet on each side, inscribed with faint, glowing arrays to protect the crowd from stray energy.
Banners bearing the swirling red cloud insignia snapped in the wind, and the atmosphere in the city was electric. This was more than a tournament; it was a festival of hope, a once-in-three-years chance for a local youth to ascend to the heavens.
On the morning of the fifth day before the competition, registration officially opened. A long, ornate table was set up at the edge of the plaza, manned by stern-faced sect disciples in outer court robes.
Lei Man was one of the first in line. He had no desire to make a grand, last-minute entrance. His goal was not to impress, but to win. He walked up to the table, his demeanor calm and unremarkable in his simple, dark robes.
A disciple, a haughty young man with a sword strapped to his back, looked up, his gaze sweeping over Lei Man with a practiced, dismissive air. "Name. Age. Cultivation."
"Lei Man. Fifteen. Second level of Qi Gathering."
The disciple's hand, which had been ready to scribble on the registration form, paused. His eyes narrowed slightly, and he took a second, more serious look at Lei Man. "Second level?" he asked, a hint of surprise in his voice.
He gestured to a crystalline orb, the size of a human head, that sat on the table. "Place your hand on the testing stone."
Lei Man complied, pressing his palm against the cool, smooth surface. He channeled a small, controlled stream of his Qi into the orb. A soft, blue light instantly filled the crystal, but it wasn't just a faint glow. Two distinct, swirling rings of light coalesced within its depths, one circling the other, a clear and undeniable sign of a cultivator in the second stage of the realm.
The disciple's haughty expression was replaced by one of grudging respect. Most of the early registrants were nervous youths who had just barely broken through to the first level. A solid, second-level cultivator, especially one who looked so young and unknown, was a different matter entirely.
"Registration confirmed," the disciple said, his tone now clipped and professional. He handed Lei Man a small, wooden token with the number "37" carved into it. "Your participant number. Do not lose it. The first round of elimination bouts will begin in two days' time. The rules will be posted tomorrow. Do not be late."
Lei Man took the token and melted back into the growing crowd of onlookers and aspiring participants. He could feel the stares of other cultivators, their senses drawn to the brief, potent flare of his Qi at the registration table. Whispers followed him. "Did you see that? Solid second level." "He's not from any of the major families, is he?" "Never seen him before."
He was no longer an unknown. Among the sea of first-level hopefuls, his cultivation base alone made him a strong contender, one of the favorites to at least pass the initial rounds. He found a quiet spot near the edge of the plaza to observe, his gaze sweeping over the other youths registering. He saw the arrogant confidence of those from noble families, the nervous hope of the commoners, and the cold, focused ambition of the orphans who had nothing to lose.
This was his competition. They were all young, all talented, all hungry for the same prize. But Lei Man knew he had an advantage that none of them could possibly comprehend. They had trained for this their entire lives. He had been forged in the beautiful, chaotic, and productive madness of a furnace that was only just beginning to burn.
The rumors of the Red Cloud Sect's generosity, combined with the rare concentration of worldly Qi in the region, had drawn aspirants like moths to a divine flame. Over the next two days, the number of registered participants swelled from a few hundred to an almost ludicrous number. Youths from every corner of the local province of the Feng Empire arrived in droves—sons and daughters of minor noble houses, talented commoners from distant villages, and even a few rogue cultivators who saw this as their only chance.
By the morning of the first day of the competition, the final count stood at a staggering two thousand and sixteen contestants.
The plaza was a sea of young, hopeful, and nervous faces. Lei Man, participant #37, stood quietly in the crowd, his presence unremarkable. The sheer number of participants was a logistical nightmare. Six arenas and a standard tournament bracket would take weeks to complete.
As the sun reached its zenith, a figure appeared on the central, highest stage, which had been designated for the sect envoys. He was a middle-aged man in the deep crimson robes of an inner court elder, his face impassive, his aura as deep and vast as the sky. The chattering of the massive crowd died instantly under his silent, immense pressure.
"I am Elder Jin of the Red Cloud Sect," the man said, his voice calm but booming across the plaza, amplified by his Qi. "I commend you all for your ambition. However, the sect has no time to waste on a lengthy spectacle. We are here to find talent, not to host a festival."
He raised a single hand. A powerful, unseen force washed over the plaza. The six separate martial arenas began to tremble and groan. With a sound of grinding stone, they slid across the plaza, the protective arrays flaring as they moved. They joined together in the center, the gaps between them sealing with flashes of light, forming one single, colossal stage, over a hundred feet across. A massive slab of inscribed limestone, a temporary fighting ground for a small army.
The elder's voice cut through the stunned silence of the crowd. "There are too many of you. The first trial will therefore be a culling. All two thousand and sixteen participants will enter the arena at once."
A shocked, chaotic murmur rippled through the contestants. All at once? It was madness.
"The rules are simple," Elder Jin continued, his voice overriding the noise. "There are no rules. You may form alliances, you may fight alone. You will be eliminated when you are thrown from the stage, when you surrender, or when you are rendered unable to continue." He paused, his gaze sweeping over the sea of young faces, cold and utterly merciless. "Lethal force is not forbidden, but it is discouraged. The sect has no use for brutes who only know how to kill."
"This trial will end when only two hundred participants remain on the stage. The last two hundred standing will advance to the next round. Now, begin."
There was no bell, no gong. Just the elder's final, chilling word. For a moment, no one moved. Then, the spell broke. With a collective roar, the youths surged forward, a tidal wave of bodies clambering onto the massive stage.
Lei Man moved with them, not with the frantic desperation of the others, but with a calm, deliberate purpose. He found a spot near the edge of the stage, a place that was both vulnerable and offered a clear line of retreat if necessary. He didn't rush to attack. He simply stood, his hands clasped behind his back, and watched.
The stage instantly devolved into pure, unadulterated chaos.
Fists flew. Qi flared in dozens of different colors. Alliances formed and shattered in seconds. A group of five youths wearing the crest of a minor noble house worked together, brutally eliminating those around them. In another corner, a powerful, lone cultivator at the peak of the second level of Qi Gathering was a whirlwind of motion, sending a half-dozen opponents flying from the stage in a matter of seconds.
It was a war of attrition, a brutal, chaotic battle royale. And in the midst of it all, Lei Man was a strange, still point in the storm, his eyes taking in everything, analyzing, waiting. This wasn't a test of pure strength. It was a test of survival. And he was, above all else, a survivor.
Lei Man stood near the southern edge of the massive stone stage, a calm island in a sea of utter chaos. The air was a cacophony of desperate yells, the sharp crack of fists on bone, and the hum of dozens of different Qi-infused techniques. Bodies were already flying from the stage, some thrown, some leaping to escape a brutal beating.
His stillness, his utter lack of aggression, made him a target. In a battle royale, the one who conserves their energy is a threat to everyone else.
A group of five youths, all clad in the simple brown robes of a countryside martial school, noticed him. They exchanged a series of quick, practiced glances. They were all at the first level of Qi Gathering, their power respectable but not overwhelming. United, however, they were a formidable force. They had already worked together to eliminate three other contestants. Now, their eyes fixed on the lone, unmoving figure by the edge.
"Let's get rid of the statue," their apparent leader, a stocky youth with a determined jaw, grunted.
They moved as one, fanning out to surround Lei Man, cutting off his escape routes. They were a practiced hunting pack, and he was their cornered prey.
"Nothing personal," the leader said, as they all charged at once. "Just bad luck."
Five fists, each glowing with a faint, earthy yellow Qi, shot towards him from five different directions. It was a well-coordinated attack designed to overwhelm and crush a single opponent.
For the first time since the trial began, Lei Man moved.
He didn't retreat. He didn't block. He danced.
The Flowing Butterfly Art, a technique born of a dozen masters and refined in the crucible of his mind, was unleashed. His body became a phantom. He took a single, fluid step forward, not away from the attack, but into its center, into the impossibly small gap between the five lunging bodies.
Time seemed to slow. The stocky leader's punch whistled past his right ear. Another youth's fist skimmed by his left shoulder. He was a ghost, a leaf, his movements so subtle and precise that he avoided all five attacks without a single wasted motion.
The five youths stumbled past him, their coordinated attack collapsing into a clumsy, tangled mess as their target simply ceased to be where he was supposed to be.
They spun around, their faces a mask of confusion. "Where did he—"
They never finished the thought.
Lei Man was already moving, his counter-attack a seamless continuation of his evasive dance. He swept a leg out in a low, fluid arc—the Flowing River Kick—catching the ankles of two of the youths and sending them sprawling.
He pivoted, his hand striking out in a series of blurring, fluttering blows—the Tiger's Claw reimagined—that were not meant to crush, but to disrupt. The blows landed on the chests of two others, not with bone-jarring force, but with sharp, stinging pulses of his second-level Qi. The impacts shattered their own shaky control over their energy, causing their Qi to sputter and die. They staggered back, gasping, their brief moment of power gone.
The leader, the last one standing, roared and charged again. Lei Man met him with the Butterfly's Sting. He didn't use a finger-spear or an open palm. He simply tapped the leader's forehead with his index finger.
A single, precise, and utterly controlled burst of his pure, blue Qi shot into the youth's body. It didn't injure him. It simply overloaded his senses, a shockwave to the nervous system. The leader's eyes rolled back in his head, and he crumpled to the stone stage, unconscious.
Lei Man stood over the five defeated opponents. One was unconscious, two were on the ground clutching their ankles, and two were struggling to breathe, their Qi in disarray. From the first charge to the final tap, the entire confrontation had lasted less than three seconds.
He didn't bother to throw them from the stage; he knew they were no longer a threat. He simply turned, his expression as calm and impassive as ever, and reclaimed his spot at the edge of the arena.
The chaos of the battle royale still raged around him, but a small, empty circle had formed around his position. Those fighting nearby who had witnessed the brief, terrifyingly efficient display now gave him a wide, respectful berth. He was no longer just a statue. He was a predator in repose, and no one was eager to see him dance again.
The sun beat down on the colossal stone stage, the air thick with the smell of sweat, blood, and spent Qi. The initial, frantic chaos of the culling had slowly given way to a grueling war of attrition. Large, powerful alliances had fractured, lone wolves had been hunted down, and the weak and unlucky had long since been eliminated.
Lei Man remained at his post near the southern edge. After his initial, decisive display, no one else had been foolish enough to challenge him directly. He became a quiet, ominous landmark that other contestants consciously avoided, a reef the raging tide of battle flowed around. He didn't need to fight. His one, swift action had bought him hours of peace. He spent the time not resting, but observing, his eyes cataloging the techniques, strengths, and weaknesses of the other powerful contenders who were carving out their own territories on the bloody stage.
He saw a tall, lanky youth who used his Qi to form whips of green energy. He saw a pair of twin sisters who fought with a perfectly synchronized, deadly grace. And he saw the arrogant young masters from the major city clans, surrounded by their allies, their superior techniques and resources allowing them to stand dominant amidst the chaos.
Hours crawled by. The number of contestants on the stage dwindled, from a thousand, to five hundred, to three hundred. The fighting became more desperate, the remaining participants all possessing a significant degree of strength and cunning.
Finally, as the afternoon sun began to dip towards the horizon, casting long shadows across the stained stone, the inner court elder, Jin, raised his hand once more.
"ENOUGH."
His voice, imbued with an immense, soul-shaking power, boomed across the plaza, cutting through the din of battle as if it were a physical blade. Every fighter on the stage froze, their techniques dissolving, their killing intent vanishing under the weight of his authority.
The surviving contestants, panting and bloodied, looked around. The vast stage, which had once been a chaotic sea of over two thousand bodies, now felt eerily empty.
"The culling is complete," Elder Jin announced, his gaze sweeping over the survivors with an impassive, appraising look. A team of outer court disciples quickly moved among the remaining fighters, making a swift count.
A moment later, one of them called out the final tally. "Elder, one hundred and ninety-eight remain."
A low murmur went through the crowd of spectators. They had fallen just short of the two-hundred mark.
Elder Jin showed no reaction. "One hundred and ninety-eight. Acceptable." He waved his hand again. The colossal stage shuddered, and with a deep, grinding groan, the six arenas separated once more, sliding back to their original positions around the plaza, leaving clean, empty space between them. The great culling ground was gone, replaced by the formal stages of a true tournament.
"The first trial is over," the elder declared. "You have proven your will to survive. Now, you will prove your skill in martial combat. The tournament will begin at sunrise tomorrow. Your numbers will be drawn, and you will face each other in single combat upon these six stages."
He gave the survivors one last, cold look. "Rest. Heal. Prepare. For tomorrow, there is nowhere to hide."
The tension in the air was different now. The chaotic, desperate struggle for survival was over. In its place was a sharp, focused anticipation. They were no longer a mob. They were the chosen few, the elite who had passed the first, brutal test.
Lei Man looked at his wooden token. #37. He felt no exhaustion. His calm, observational strategy had left his Qi reserves completely full, his body untouched. He glanced across the plaza at the other survivors—the whip user, the twin sisters, the arrogant young masters. Their gazes were no longer scattered. They were sizing each other up, their eyes filled with a new, hungry light.
The real competition was about to begin.