Spirit Sword Exchange Meet

The four-day student exchange meet was coming to an end.

Too many things had happened during these four days, such as the destruction of the spirit gathering arrays, the collapse of the Pengci Gang, the establishment of the General Administration of Harmony, the rehabilitation of delinquents, the near annihilation of the world, and also, the arrest of a Shadow Stream Gold Ribbon killer last night… no one could have imagined that all of these pesky little incidents had ultimately happened because of Wang Ling.

As Wang Ming was leaving, he had asked Old Antique and Director Xie to keep his identity a secret. This in fact was to protect Wang Ling so that he wouldn't become the focus of too much attention.

Therefore, although the incident had certainly caused a stir, apart from the police who knew that Wang Xiaoer was the elder brother of one of the students from No. 60 High School, everyone else had very limited knowledge of this incident. The only thing they knew was that it was due to the excellent leadership of the General Administration of 100 Schools' Comrade Odd Zhuo that Shadow Stream's invasion had been stopped and the flowers of the motherland safeguarded once again…

After this incident, however, even Wang Ling began to wonder whether he was poisonous… since entering this high school, he hadn't had a damn moment of peace! Every day it was like he was a particular death student — wherever he went, there would be dead people1!

Father and Mother Wang's wish for him was to obtain his high school diploma without a hitch and then enter college smoothly and quietly.

But judging from the current situation, this road was a lot bumpier than Wang Ling had expected.

However, life had to go on…

At night, all was peaceful in No. 59 High School's school dormitory.

Before, Super Chen and Hero Guo these two damn fat nerds had worn suits, neckties, wristwatches and shiny leather shoes and sipped drinks that definitely cost more than five yuan as they played an online game2. It wasn't until a while ago that Old Antique had forced them to turn the game off and go to bed… as for Lotus Sun and Feather Lin, these two girls had already gone to bed early on for the sake of healthy skin.

Old Antique sat in a folding chair by the door; Shadow Stream had taken advantage of the span of time close to when school was over, so he was once again on high alert.

The students' safety was paramount. Old Antique wanted to ensure that the spirit sword exchange meet proceeded smoothly tomorrow, and more than that, that his students came to no harm at all outside school before they returned to No. 60 High School.

Another person who was also awake was Wang Ling.

He touched the small wooden sword lying beside him with very complicated feelings in his heart.

He only hoped that Jingke's performance tomorrow would be somewhat normal… please, please don't go overboard.

...

It was the fourth day and also Friday of the third week after the start of school.

The spirit sword exchange meet which everyone had been waiting for was finally about to begin.

The clamor of drums and gongs filled the air, firecrackers burst with loud bangs, red flags fluttered in the sky, and there was a sea of people…

As a tradition, the spirit sword exchange meet had originated with General Yi, one of the ten great founding fathers of the nation who had fought alongside Minister Shi and Secretary Sun at the Battle of Shimen and was nicknamed Blademaster. Back then, after the end of the Battle of Shimen, General Yi had left a famous saying on a stone pillar of the Stone Doors for all eternity: "Your sword is my sword!"

This sentence was in all current history textbooks and was compulsory knowledge that Old Antique would stress every year.

The spirit sword exchange meet between the two schools had been tremendously hyped up this time because it happened to be the five hundred-year anniversary for both schools. No. 59 High School and No. 60 High School these two foes had had the same thought of using this spirit sword exchange meet to top off their anniversary celebrations, when the purpose of the meet was instead supposed to be to improve the relationship between the two schools.

Tang Jingze and his posse had caused quite a number of problems for them in these four days, but by the final day, they had completely abandoned their stance.

However, this in no way affected their strategy or the confidence which Tang Jingze and the others had in winning this spirit sword exchange meet; since they couldn't prevail using unorthodox means, Tang Jingze felt it wouldn't be bad to compete with them in a fair fight!

However!

Wang Ling just didn't know where this guy got his confidence from…

...

On No. 59 High School's wide and newly renovated sports field, students arranged chairs to form a circle around the running track according to class and grade from the different regions. The empty space in the middle was left for the representatives of the two schools to battle it out in this spirit sword exchange meet.

Wang Ling was really not used to an exchange meet with more than a thousand people present; he had never shown off any sort of talent in front of so many people before.

On the stage, the leaders of the two schools had arrived: Headmaster Chen and Director Shi of No. 60 High School; Headmaster Jin and Director Xie of No. 59 High School; the district leaders of Peiyuan district… and the old Secretary Sun Dakang, whose face was full of excitement; and Odd Zhuo, who looked miserable.

Honestly speaking, the leadership team was feeling very awkward because no one had expected this old Secretary to turn up.

Of course, the students were unaware of Secretary Sun's identity. Furthermore, they felt that this person was a bit mad — they had never seen a leader wear a motorcycle helmet on stage as he observed proceedings from there. However, the students could also tell that this Master Helmet's identity was truly out of the ordinary. He was most likely a VIP… furthermore, he was a VIP that even Wang Ling hadn't foreseen.

Of all the students present, it was only Wang Ling who was very clear on who this leader was.

Honestly speaking, he was very worried that this old Secretary would somehow figure out something from his movements.

He didn't dare look this old Secretary directly in the eye and sighed deeply in his heart; now, he could only hope he would be able to behave like a muggle as much as possible during the spirit sword exchange meet later. It would be really bad if he caught the attention of this grandmaster.

In the silence, the old Secretary looked around and then looked at the leaders of the two schools with a weird expression. "Why aren't you starting?"

Headmaster Chen and Headmaster Jin wore helpless expressions. "…" You are the most senior leader here. As long as you don't speak, who the heck dares to start!

Hearing the old leader's words, Headmaster Jin sorted out his emotions before he smiled and started to speak as the official host of this spirit sword exchange meet, his voice carrying on the wind to reach each person's ears.

"Then, on behalf of the school leaders of No. 59 High School and No. 60 High School, I would like to express my gratitude to you, the ten elite students from the two schools, for participating in this spirit sword exchange meet! It is precisely because of your excellence that our cultivation education will become even more brilliant!"

Following the old Secretary's lead, the entire audience broke out in thunderous applause; seeing how enthusiastically he was clapping, a few leaders nearby started applauding even louder lest their listless clapping displeased him.

Everyone knew that the old Secretary was a person who revelled in excitement and really enjoyed moving around incognito. He had secretly attended more than a hundred school exchange meets this way.

While the headmasters of both schools did feel very honored that the old Secretary had personally shown up this time without needing to be invited, more than that, they were actually terrified…

After the applause died down, the scene was quiet for a brief moment before the female teacher in charge of hosting the meet picked up the microphone and began to recite the rules of the contest. "For this spirit sword exchange meet, there will be no individual events. Instead, it will be a team competition that will take place in a magic array which will merge holographic imagery and cultivation spirit talismans to perfectly simulate a test environment and real sensations of pain. In the end, the winner will be determined based on the number of points which each team obtains during the event. Apart from the reference marks obtained from hitting an opponent's vital points during spirit sword combat, teams can also earn game coins to buy magic weapons and props, which will make the competition more interesting and dynamic."

The female host smiled. "These are the rules of the contest! Next, will the ten students participating in the exchange meet please enter the magic array."