The Path to Pinnacle is long and the Path to Home even longer...

"Great Shark strike", Wang Chen bellowed as he launched towards Fang Hao like a shark launching towards its prey.

Fang Hao smirked slightly as he raised his arm to catch the incoming fist.

"Courting death!", Wang Chen bellowed.

"Fang Hao is too green, he is underestimating Wang Chen too much due to his previous successes but he doesn't understand the true terror of a cultivator in the third level of Qi Condensation stage using a martial art.", the scholarly looking youth Zhou Yuan sighed as he watched the oncoming assault of Wang Chen before continuing: but something tells me Fang Hao won't go down like this…

Fang Hao caught the incoming fight strike before redirecting the force to slide downwards as he pushed his palm towards Wang Chen's chest and lightly spoke: How about you take a look at one of my newly learned techniques - Dragon Spirit art - Slumbering Dragon's Yawn!

Thwack!

"You tricked me !?", Wang Chen spurted blood from his mouth as he flew out of the ring before heavily crashing into the ground.

Aah!

Wang Chen moaned as blood trickled down his mouth and his eyes stared blankly into the void as if unable to accept the harsh reality of his loss.

Fang Hao gazed at the collapsed Wang Chen; his body emanating an aura too intimidating to belong to the First Level of the Qi condensation stage before walking towards Wang Chen under the shocked gazes of the crowd.

"Wang Chen according to the rules of this duel the winner has the right to one demand from the loser and I want you to send me double the amount of resources you have taken from me!", Fang Hao spoke in a plain tone before jumping down from the platform as he headed towards his room while inwardly blushing as he thought: Why the hell can most techniques here only be optimally used when the incantation (in the form of its name) is spoken aloud.

The stunned crowd parted ways as they watched Fang Hao leave before they started discussing in astonished voices-

"Did he just say the Dragon Spirit Art"

"Isn't that one of the most difficult cultivation techniques in the entire sect! To think that he would actually be able to cultivate it..."

"So after three long years of silence, the slumbering Dragon of the Carp Hall has finally awakened!"

"Didn't they say that he wasn't able to master it and that's why he wasn't able to advance in cultivation?"

"It seems like he had a breakthrough and succeeded in cultivating the Dragon Spirit Art that would explain his abnormal strength and advancement to the Peak of the First level"

…

Fang Hao returned to his room in the dormitory of preparatory disciples of the carp hall before lying down on the only piece of furniture in this room - a single bed as he pondered over the layout and structure of the continent.

The name of this continent is Lyst and it's ruled by an empire although the empire is said to be this land's ruler it is only a mere puppet of the cultivation sects.

This continent is divided into the Northern plains- a vast Greenland, the Eastern sea region- a large water body with islands of varying sizes sprinkled around (his current location), the Western desert, the Southern Ice land and the central domain.

The Eastern Sea sect is the strongest sect in the Eastern Sea region

The disciples of the Eastern Sea sect are divided into four parts- the preparatory disciples, outer court disciples, inner court disciples and the core disciples.

Out of these four divisions, the preparatory disciples are informal disciples, that is, they are not true disciples of the sect and thus they are also called as the servants.

Their job is to serve in the functioning of the sect and perform various tasks to earn merit points and exchange them for cultivation resources and cultivation techniques to advance their cultivation.

But the people who come in the top ten of the preparatory disciples' selection are different; they are allocated monthly resources from their hall- two-spirit enhancing pills every month while the champion is even allowed to select a cultivation technique of their choice for free which would have otherwise taken at least three years of hard labour to earn.

Spirit enhancing pills are pills made from spirit plants, plants that contain the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. They enhance the speed of cultivation by multiple times.

Thinking till this point, Fang Hao couldn't help but recall that all other members of the top ten except him and Wang Chen had already become outer court disciples last year making them stand out pitifully after all the top ten members received rich resources and even a cultivation technique causing their cultivation to rise rapidly.

Although He and Wang Chen also received similar resources, he had picked up an extremely difficult cultivation technique causing him to get stuck while Wang Chen was suffering from the recoil of his previous cultivation technique the emperor's domination.

*Sigh*

It looks like my path to the pinnacle is long and the path to home even longer...