47 First Trial, The Path of Knowledge

Men Kun fixed his sight on the middle-aged man clad in deep blue robes before replying, "Men Hai, don't get so flustered. I give it a good thought before deciding to do this. Our honoured guests should already be bored of the trials being the same every three years; hence, I am changing them".

Men Hai smirked, "Bored? That's not a valid answer. The President will..."

He wasn't able to finish his speech as Men Kun interceded, "This time, I am the main host. You as the Third Elder have no right to tell me how to host the event. Moreover, the President and Men Kong are outside the Empire. The one who has the highest rank right now is me, I can take whatever decision I think is the best. If you want to inform them go ahead, I won't stop you". Men Kun flapped his long sleeves before striding away.

He wasn't afraid of the Ancient Inn's President, at most he will get some kind of punishment but whichever punishment he gets from him, it will be thousands of times lighter than the one he will get if he didn't follow the commands of the shadow with dark golden eyes in the bronze plate.

Men Hai's brows creased before turning around and walking back with heavy steps.

Time passed and performance after performance went by.

Half an hour before noon, the drums thundered again, putting an end to the performances.

The resounding drumming subsided and Men Kun's voice rose, "Now, the moment you all have been waiting for has come. The first trial will be -The Path of Knowledge and it is going to take place in -The Forbidden Bamboo Forest". He paused and waved his right sleeve; three palm-sized cards of a different colour each appeared in his right hand.

Then, he added, "The token cards had been distributed in all the vast area that our top experts can enter. You just need to find them as there are no dangerous mysterious beasts in the bamboo forest. I'm also sure that I don't have to point that the deeper you go, the higher the level of the token card would be which means that you will get more places to enter the Ghost Forest's heart. This is just the first test and there would be thirty lower grade green token cards with five places; nine middle grade blue token cards with twenty-five places; and three high grade purple token cards with fifty places. Don't you think that I'm being generous?!" He laughed.

Almost all the people's mouths twitched. The prizes were increased three times and that was good indeed but that place was full of formations; and the deeper you went the more difficult they were. Even though he said he was being generous, he didn't intend for them to get many token cards.

That bamboo forest was big and the contestants were young men that had been mostly cultivating and not spending their time on learning formations. Moreover, the token cards were distributed by their top experts; if they followed common sense, they were sure that the purple token cards would be in the fourth sector of the bamboo forest were Awakened Cultivators could break the formations with rough force. Sigh, they were doomed to not get the highest grade of token cards even if there were three.

The Forbidden Bamboo Forest got divided into five sections as time passed. That happened when the cultivators were exploring it; as not all had the knowledge of formations, they break them with rough force. The first sector could be passed with the strength of a Mundane Cultivator, the second with the one of a Mundane Core and so on; they also made sub-sectors for each section with the sub-levels of each stage of cultivation.

The fifth sector was a place that the experts in formations of the sects had been able to cross along with higher level Cultivators that used brute force to break the formations but after exploring the deepest part of the bamboo forest, they found nothing more than a field of green bamboos and formations of higher level that were difficult but not impossible to break. That's why the sects in the south didn't take interest in taking over that land; they also counted with masters in formations that had been able to break them even if it had been difficult, making possible to record down all the formations and add them to their libraries.

Because there weren't much Perfection level Cultivators and cultivators above that level were inexistent in the Liu Empire, the fifth sector was taken as one section and its area spread to more than half of the bamboo forest.

When Men Kun said his words, the men who had come from the different sects in the south became interested because of this sudden change, they had heard about this Forbidden Bamboo Forest. Thanks to the experts in their sects, they had learned how difficult that formations could be, it was going to be a difficult trial for those younglings.

Men Hai saw their reactions and began to weight this development.

Men Kun laughter grew louder when he saw the grave expressions of the young men.

He let some seconds pass for them to settle their hearts and said, "Given that this trial will take place in The Forbidden Bamboo Forest and not in the Ghost Forest's outskirts, the number of participants will double and young people with cultivation below Mundane Core can participate. This will show more of my generosity". And he laughed again.

"Whoa", uproar rose around and different tastes drove into the hearts of the participating clans.

An Bing Qing who had been diligently listening couldn't understand how things had changed so much. Her eldest brother had told her how this competition had gone in her previous life and it had been like all the past ones, even the competitions that took part after that one had the same trials.

'What is going on? Why have things changed so much? This makes me feel that something isn't quite right', she thought with confusion.