The First Match

Tao Xue was utterly shocked when he came to know that Kai Yuan would be someone who was able to alert his master, and to such an extent that he was only showing his astral projection here, not his whole body.

When Tao Xue asked what was wrong with Kai Yuan, his master just told him to keep his distance from him, and be prepared for an assault. His master, or rather his projection, had vanished into thin air, without even telling him what was so suspicious about the youth.

It was a rare opportunity to see his master panicking, and he was happy to see it, but now was not the time to be focusing on that, as it was one of the least important things on his mind. He was only thinking about Kai Yuan right now. He seemed to be a man of little to no words, but there was nothing so striking about him.

He was just an ordinary Soul Cultivator of the peak of the 3rd level, and that was practically nothing for his master, as he himself had the ability to stand toe to toe with him, because of his ability. If it was a 4th level, however, he would not be able to counter him. It was impossible for 5th and above levels, but that was for him, not his master.

His master was at another realm compared to the strongest human realm Cultivator currently. To him, these people were just ants trampling each other, while he could squish the whole bunch of them in just a single footstep.

The time right now was rather tense, as everyone wanted to hear the second name. That was a good cover for Tao Xue, who was also tense, but for another reason. If he had been in that kind of the mood when everyone else was excited, or when everyone else was bored, he would have stood out like a sore thumb. If that would have happened, then he would have easily been spotted by Kai Yuan, who was the reason for all the panicking.

Just then, the host of the competition shouted out, grabbing everyone else by a sudden jolt, as he said, "And the second name is..."

Once again, there was a huge pause, while everyone waited anxiously. This was the moment of truth, which was what everyone had been waiting for, for the last minute. The host was a man who knew his job pretty well. He gave the audience the time to be surprised, and then he suddenly speaks, grabbing hold of them from their collars. He waited and gave a suspense like feeling when he would be about to reveal the basic details, and again make the audience get themselves occupied in a whole bunch of their own discussions regarding who would be picked.

As everyone (except Tao Xue) was waiting for the answer, the host abruptly shouted out, "Qiu Yuan!"

There was a moment of silence, after which everyone broke out into their own discussions. Qiu Yuan was a person who was at the early 3rd level, and was a Body Cultivator. He was a bit behind Xiang Yuan, but he also was younger than him. The fact that surprised everyone was that he was very skilled in predicting what his opponent would plan to do next, which was why he had previously defeated opponents of higher levels than himself.

Xiang Yuan, however, was a Soul Cultivator, who was considered as an expert at assault, and was used to be known for going berserk while fighting, madly devouring the opponents, without any use of strategy in his mind at all, which would put the unique skill of Qiu Yuan at a little bit of a disadvantage, just particularly in this very match. If he was pitted against someone else out of the top three, then he might've been able to show his talents, and at least put up a good match, if not win, but right now, his chances were completely minimized.

At this point of time, Tao Xue didn't even care about the match, or the competition, as he had an even more serious matter to worry about. He wasn't interested in the match anymore, and was about to leave, when he remembered that he was here to see how people battled, to gain some experience, which would eventually help himself.

He tried to pursue the matter further, but it was as if his mind was blocked completely, as he wasn't able to think of any solutions.

As he thought about this matter further, the match was about to begin, so he decided to watch the match and forget about this matter for now, but he would still keep his guard up at all times.

As he looked at the stage, he saw that the host was creating a barrier, which was needed to be placed for safety reasons. It wasn't necessary in the mini game, as it wasn't directly fighting with their opponents, and they were easily able to stay inside the boundary limitations.

Now that the real fights were beginning, the barrier was necessary, and it was required at all costs. Once the barrier was completely set, the fight was about to start.

The countdown began.

"3...2...1... Begin the fight!" shouted the host, in a voice that actually echoed around the whole vast and wide arena.

Just as he announced the start of the fight, Xiang Yuan leapt forward. He didn't care if he was acting a little too idiotically, but he had gone totally berserk from the start of the match, itself. Most of the people thought that this was stupid, but actually, this was something that was the correct decision for a fight like this.

If he uses strategy, the enemy would be able to see through his moves, and he would be at a disadvantage. As his enemy could predict the moves only based on strategy, if he went berserk, then he would have a higher chance at winning the match.

First of all, he made the whole ground shake, as if an earthquake had descended. The land started to break into different chunks, while Qiu Yuan only simply dodged the attacks by frantically jumping to avoid getting hit. The chunks of land that had come apart were all thrown towards Qiu Yuan, who punched them and shattered them with his extra strong physique.

Just as he had shattered the pieces of rock, there was another attack coming towards Qiu Yuan, which was a barrage of fireballs. There were fireballs coming from all directions, and he had to dodge them all, which was quite difficult. Currently, he was on the defensive, and that was only what he could do when facing such an enemy.

This strategy, though, had a disadvantage to it, as wherever the fireballs hit, the fire remained there, as Xiang Yuan had manipulated the ground to be in such a state that it could be able to get burnt.

While the fire was burning these areas, it was difficult for Qiu Yuan to go to these places again, and that resulted in him having even less of area in the battlefield, as he dodged the fires. Now that he was not in a good enough position to defend, he thought that he should go on the attack. He suddenly jumped towards the side, and started running towards Xiang Yuan. He was being thrown fireballs at, but that was no use, as he only jumped, or avoided them somehow, which only resulted in him getting more tired, but he still kept going.

Once he was a bit closer, he jumped up in the air, and landed a punch on the ground, which made the dust scatter, and also mix itself inside the air, which made it difficult to see. This was the chance that Qiu Yuan was waiting for. He jumped up in the air again, and this time out of the dust field, and saw the location of him enemy, even though only briefly. He ran towards where Xiang Yuan was, and threw a kick, which covered a lot of area, but missed.

This was a trial and error method to pinpoint one's location. Due to this, though, the dust scattered, and Xiang Yuan got to know where his enemy was. Even if he knew, he would still be at a disadvantage, as it was practically next to impossible for him to be able to dodge another kick, which was incoming, from such a close range.

As Tao Xue looked on, he found the match to be pretty interesting, and was also a bit weary about the outcome. It couldn't be that one of the top three would be defeated by a member who was of a lower level than himself, without even landing a single blow on them. It was a bit suspicious, but it still wasn't completely unacceptable.

As Tao Xue looked into the match a bit more, he understood something. He had found out what was going on. This match was way more complicated than it was seeming to be, as there was a big secret in it.

Tao Xue smiled, as he said, "Poor, Qiu Yuan! He's already lost the match!"