62 Emotions

"Now… who's next?" Kael asked the crowd, however he was deliberately directing the question at the remaining two future City Lords.

There was an awkward silence for a short while. Everyone was waiting with bated breath for the two youths to respond to Kael's call. They were all riled up from the first challenge, and were waiting to see more exciting stuff happening in the next two matches.

The turn of events became such that the production of hybrid cores was no longer the focus, but the platform of the very best in the Myriad Lower Region's younger generation to showcase themselves.

Finally, the azure clothed youth, Darth Wilkes, stood up from the crowd. He originally wanted to stand out from the crowd with everyone looking at him with worship in their eyes. However, the effect was not quite there, since the star right now was clearly Kael. Darth Wilkes' ego was hurt and he was sorely affected by Kael's strong stance. He was used to everyone in Cloverleigh City bootlicking him, yet he wasn't receiving that kind of treatment here in Fledgling City.

However, he was a much calmer and composed person compared to Adolf Gary. Hence, he managed to keep his emotions in check. He cleared his throat and said, "Let me."

Still, there was silence from the crowd to Darth Wilkes' response. He was expecting at least some gossipy person to start a conversation around him, yet there was none. That caused him to be even more irritated.

By the time Darth Wilkes walked to the front of Kael, there was a multitude of emotions welling up inside of him. First was jealousy, that Kael had managed to steal the limelight in Fledgling City, as well as making his name known throughout the whole of the Myriad Lower Region.

Secondly, fear. He was apprehensive at the monstrous talent Kael had displayed when facing off against Adolf Gary. If Kael displayed the same level of talent he had for Spirit Array in spiritual energy control, Darth Wilkes would find it hard to measure up against Kael.

Lastly, Darth Wilkes felt excitement. To a certain degree, he had always been pampered and given first class treatment in Cloverleigh City due to his talent in cultivation. There was none in the younger generation in Myriad Lower Region that could pit themselves against him in a one to one fight.

However, there appeared a youth named Kael who could fend off against a Guardian Rank sentient demonic beast when he was only at the Commoner Rank Middle Phase level! Just what kind of monster was he? How would he compare to Kael in a one to one fight?

Darth Wilkes measured himself and he didn't have the confidence to fight one to one with Kael. However, his ego had to be protected, if not he would experience a cultivation deviation at this point.

That was why he arranged for a spiritual energy control competition. It was one of the most basic forms of assessing a person's talent in cultivation and removes all other factors that could influence a fight. To Darth Wilkes, that was the fairest way of competing.

Feeling this three kinds of emotions, Darth Wilkes finally came face to face with Kael. Though he had an inborn pride, he couldn't let it show in front of a opponent that he had to treat seriously. His arrogance was only reserved for the weak and those below him.

Immediately, Kael noticed Darth Wilkes' bearing and he realized this future City Lord was significantly different from Adolf Gary, and might actually prove to be a thornier opponent.

The two of them came to a standoff, looking at each other calmly in the eyes.

Kael realised he couldn't get any psychological advantage over Darth Wilkes through the standoff. Hence, he decided to break the ice.

"Young Master Darth Wilkes, how are we going to compete in the control of spiritual energy?"

Darth Wilkes took out a weighing scale from his item bag and placed it on the table.

"Each of us will produce an item of our choice, no bigger than one meter cube. The opponent then has to mold his spiritual energy into an exact fashion like how that particular item looks. That's just the appearance. Furthermore, the density of the spiritual energy has to be heavy enough to cancel out the weight of the item, hence the usage of this weighing scale."

Some in the crowd sucked in a deep breath of cool air.

"Wow, such a difficult topic. Is he even capable of that in the first place?"

"I think he is purposely making the challenge difficult, such that Kael will stumble in it. Besides, he is the one who proposed this challenge, so I'm assuming that he has done such an exercise before."

"True, this Darth Wilkes is different from Adolf Gary. He is a pure-bred talent in cultivation. Looks like we will have a good show to watch again."

Kael fell into silence and deep thought for a while. "Interesting. He actually proposed such a challenge. However, is it truly possible for him to achieve what he spoke of?"

Kael then spoke. "Question. It's highly unlikely to make an exact replica. How are we going to judge the differences?"

"We will have one representative from each city to be the judges to score us. Since it is representative of all the cities in Myriad Lower Region, it should be a fair challenge."

"Of course there is going to be bias. The Vice-Principal is going to give me high marks. Fairview City will be fair, and even leaning towards Fledgling City, given how they want this production of hybrid cores to continue. The Cloverleigh City representative will surely give Darth Wilkes high marks, while the attitude of Anchorage City should reflect Adolf Gary's wishes, since he would want to take revenge for sure. Hailford City for now will surely lean towards Darth Wilkes as well." Kael thought silently. However, he couldn't refute Darth Wilkes due to him holding the moral high ground of being representative of all the five cities in the Myriad Lower Region.

Kael felt that Darth Wilkes was no easy opponent, seeing how he had pulled politics into the challenge. He was somewhat ill-confident about winning this match outright now

Kael realized at once that he could only hope for a draw in the first half of this match, given how the judges' scores would play out. The determining factor then was the second part of the match.