22 I accept!

"I accept!"

The woman was confused by his words, which was why Xin Feng continued, "You want to fight me. Go ahead! Come!"

Sect master Xin Fan who heard his disciple's blatant words wanted to reprimand him, but was stopped by the patriarch's hand. Since she wasn't stopped, she was accessed through the barrier.

"I'm going to make you pay for what you did!"

"No need for her hostility. I hit her in a not too critical area while holding myself back as much as possible. She should also be healthy when the sun's up with the right medicines."

"Oh… Thank you then for holding back against her. If you wish to not continue the fight, I'll allow it."

"I don't mind, come at me with all your strength." 

Xin Feng urged her after he had confirmed that she was at the nascent lower stage two, which was six levels lower than Hua Mei. The difference was that she only cultivated her inner body and Hua Mei both.  Clearly, Xin Feng was the one with the advantage. This became even more clear for Xin Feng after Balance had even said so. Indeed, the reason why Xin Feng knew of the woman's power level is all thanks to his system, Balance. He could guess with his experience in the many fights that he had so far of course, but, knowing that he was still pretty knew to everything, he had decided to trust a more reliant source…

Xin Feng rushed to her in the same way he did with her disciple. Before he was close to her, she made a wall from the ground in front of her, and did a kicking motion to break it and send it to crash on Xin Feng. The rock came in contact with his body and broke in smithereens, leaving the field barely visible with all the dust floating around.

"Foolish! You think you can use the same tricks against a master?!"

"Hahahaha! HAHAHAHAHA!!"

"You're the fool! You want to beat me with slabs of dirt?! HA!"

"…"

"Behind you." A hand came chopping towards her neck. She quickly reacted by using the earth below her to elevate herself away from him. The pillar of earth broke from Xin Feng's chop, and the woman fell down. The knife-hand turned into a fist that punched her face the moment she neared his arm.

The woman couldn't keep up with the situation, which was why she didn't expect a punch after the sudden destruction of her platform. She got punched to the ground before she was able to touch the ground on her own. That didn't finish her though. It made here activate her ultimate attack which began with her sinking to the ground. When she had completely disappeared, the ground began to quiver. The ground cracked as colossal worm like creatures that were made out of rock came bursting through it. Seven of them were moving their heads side to side with their tongue flicking in the direction of Xin Feng who was propelling himself above them.

"You coward, hiding behind worms!"

"You think I'm idiotic enough to face you in close combat." Echoed the woman's voice through every worm's mouth.

"Die!"

The colossal worms elongated towards Xin Feng who couldn't fly any higher due to the barrier. Seven heads were about to bite him, but he released seven fire balls for each head to make himself some space. The fire balls exploded with enough power to break the heads off of their body, which gave him enough time to propel himself to an open area that was far enough from the barrier.

The heads of the worms grew back as he had expected. He didn't worry though, because regrowing the missing parts of their body gave him the time to regenerate his lost mana. 'If you think about fighting me with endurance, you've lost… I have auto regeneration of mana, while you waste Qi to regenerate your underlings. A big disadvantage you have put yourself into, fighting against me. Especially since you have to cultivate to restore Qi...'

After the worms had their entire body again, they retreated underground. The ground shook and Xin Feng could feel movement below his feet. One of the worms burst out of the area where Xin Feng was standing, but he was able to react in time and propelled away in the right distance to touch the body of the worm with his hand. 'Balance, mark the area I just touched.'

The other worms came out of the ground before going back as well. They were attacking Xin Feng with the element of surprise and annoyance. Still, he was able to overcome them by putting enough effort. It was all stamina and nothing else. The reason why, was because he was planning for a flashy attack that he wanted to try out. It was an attack that would take time to prepare but end his opponent in a second.

"You think you can keep running like a little rat! You will soon be dried out like a fish, ready to be devoured by a snake!" The woman's voice was heard from the ground, after the two had been playing tag for a while. She was feeling superior after all, since she saw that his attacks only left palm prints that burned her underlings but couldn't do them any harm.

"Hohoho! I think you're mistaken!" Xin Feng rebutted, before he used his lightning abilities to zap far away in the air.

"The snake is nothing but a worm, who is about to be eaten by the fish!"

Xin Feng snapped his fingers, and within a second chains of explosions were triggered on the entire body of the colossal worms. The chains of explosions were powerful together, and since the worms were on ground, the two of them, crumbles of rock, and dust, were the only things left inside the sphere of a barrier.

Xin Feng had used his last mana to zap far enough and to trigger the explosion. A successful experiment that consisted of burning palm prints that he kept ready to trigger an explosion. A good amount of mana was used to place an explosion, and a little to restrain it from exploding. His mana regeneration made him able to recover the mana he used to plant an explosion, hence why, a cycle was able to go on until he had planted enough and the amount of mana used for restrain was already a lot.

The woman who had a weaker body than average nascent cultivator, lay paralyzed and was covered with blood and dirt. The barrier was taken down in an instant, and a sect master who knew a bit of healing arts went to check on her.

"She's okay…" The sect master assured.

The patriarch got out of his seat, and walked towards Xin Feng. "A Fine seed! Haha! Xin Fan, your son truly holds on to his ancestors! Brave warriors who look like reincarnates from the nether dimension themselves! It's a blessing he's not a slug like you!"

"From today on we shall have a feast that lasts for seven days and seven nights!"

"Now tell me Xin Feng, do you want to take the position of a sect master and strive to become the patriarch of the sect?"

"Thanks for the offer Patriarch, but I humbly decline."

"It's a shame. I guessed you would've decline based on your attire."

*Sigh* "Those who are beyond talented, do have their sight beyond the world, huh? But, rest assured. We will still support you to grow stronger with the hope that you can forever keep the sect alive."

"I will try, Patriarch." Xin Feng replied to the man who had a few gray hairs, but was brimming with life.

"Here, take this. There are enough high-grade spirit stones for you to cultivate for a few hundred years. There's also the high-grade cultivation technique that your father used before to melt you."

Xin Feng scanned the storage ring, but stopped to question about the melting part. The patriarch told him about the accident, and because Xin Feng didn't know about it, he told him his assumption of it being the legendary rebirth ability of the phoenix that the primordial champions were able to do. His assumption came to be, because Xin Feng was a second-generation champion.

Because Xin Feng was not an offspring of the second generation, he assumed Xin Feng to at least have similar abilities as the early champions of the first generation. That's why nobody was freaked out about his abilities after they were told that he was a second-generation champion. Unless Xin Feng showed his ability to control every element, people would be okay about his feats.

Xin Feng thanked the patriarch, and asked him about the celestials and their champions, and how it all worked. It turned out that things that had to do with celestial beings couldn't be questioned or understood by beings below those celestials, because the information they had about something they haven't reached were obviously too vague. Even experimenting on the champions to make mortals become immortal was impossible, because the champions were simply given powers by higher beings. It was something given by a decision of a celestial that could only be passed on to a descendant of two champions.