First Trial

"Sect Master is here!"

Everyone shifted their attention to the entrance of the Ancient White Pagoda as Ji Chen slowly emerged from the inside. He stood before the curious gazes of disciples and elders.

"You are all here." He said after taking a glance around. He had yet to organize what he wanted to say after having a conversation with the little girl Lulu who was older to him by countless years. The stories Lulu narrated were just too distant for him to understand, too distant to the Saint Star Continent and too distant to his strength.

Clearing his throat to catch the attention of everyone, he slowly explained the white pagoda in front of them. "This is the newest place in our sect, the Ancient White Pagoda. Inside, anyone below the Great Emperor Realm can test their combat ability, willpower, and comprehension."

Before anyone could express their reaction, he added another surprising news.

"A month from now, the City Lord Residence of our city will organize a competition between geniuses of less than a hundred years of age. This is not an ordinary competition. The top ten will go to Whitedrift City for Northern Prefecture Competition and the top ten in that competition will go to Northern Capital to compete with the other geniuses in our kingdom."

'A competition involving the whole kingdom?' Everyone became excited at the big event. However, when they heard Ji Chen's follow-up, they were stunned.

"The top ten in our kingdom will participate in the Saint Star Competition where all the top geniuses in our continent will convene. That's too far ahead so just think about the competition in our city."

'You already said it, now you want us not to think about it?' They complained in their minds as the importance of the incoming competition just got heavier for them. A big opportunity that they couldn't miss.

Of course, the elders who were all aunties and uncles felt some bitterness after hearing this. 'Why now? Why not during our younger years?' The timing of the competition was not for their generations.

Regardless of their emotions, Ji Chen continued his announcement.

"As a newly renovated sect, we need to perform well in this competition if we want to recruit more people."

"I have some ways to quickly increase your strengths but I need to understand your combat ability, willpower, and comprehension skills. This is where the Ancient White Pagoda will be used. The pagoda has three trials and its own ranking system."

"To make it fair to everyone, the top 50 in the overall score of three trials will get awards from me and the top 10 will represent the Three Peak Sect one month from now." Ji Chen knew how to be realistic. Even if he sent fifty members, only less than ten would probably make it into the later rounds of the competition.

After all, the Three Peak Sect had really deteriorated from the past years. The geniuses in the sect had a lot of catching up to do with their peers in the other forces.

"Everyone can try once for these trials. The pagoda itself will calculate your scores to be posted in the stone tablet near its entrance door. Do your best but try not to die in the first trial. Although you will not really die in reality, the pain of dying can still be felt. The time limit is a week."

"After one week, the pagoda will remain open to everyone with unlimited access for an indefinite period to polish yourselves. Be sure to read the rules written on its front door." Ji Chen finished the announcement without any interruption before calling the elders alone.

"Do your best, Ningshuang." He sent telepathically as he left with the elders to have a proper meeting.

The disciples immediately went into an uproar hearing the explosive announcement.

"I feel excited!"

"Me too, Junior Sister Fei. Do you want to come together?"

"I just need to be in the upper quarter to gain a reward from the Sect Master!"

"Competition? Great! Let's crush those beast riders!"

All of them quickly crowded the front of the Ancient White Pagoda and found three stone tablets with one still blank and the other with engraved characters.

According to the tablet containing rules, consuming pills or any kind of temporary enhancing substance was not allowed and would automatically cause the trialist a disqualification. Weapons beyond earth grade were also prohibited. Formation and other auxiliary items were also prohibited.

Moreover, the pagoda could only accommodate 500 trialists at the same time for the first trial and only 10 trialists could climb at the same time in the second trial.

On another tablet showed the rating system for the three trials.

The first trial straight out measured combat ability based on the body refinement tier of the beasts the trialist could defeat.

The second trial involved the number of steps the trialists could do until his or her willpower collapsed. As for where they would step onto, it was not indicated.

The third trial measuring comprehension ability, the rating was listed as: Thinker, Scholar, Master, Prince, King, Emperor, Sage, Saint Sage, Celestial Sage, and Divine Sage. Each rating was further divided into Lower, Average, Greater, and Pinnacle.

"So many?" One of the disciples said in amazement while thinking what would be his ranking in three trials.

Swish!

"Someone already entered the pagoda!"

"It's Senior Sister Bai!"

"Yah! I love you Sister Ningshuang! My idol!"

The crowd became more lively after Bai Ningshuang volunteered to be the first trialist. Naturally, the other direct disciples entered one by one as they did not want Bai Ningshuang to solo the limelight. The core disciples followed along with inner disciples.

Due to the small number of disciples, everyone already developed friendships with each other. The distinction between core and inner disciples was almost nonexistent.

At the same time in the Ji Peak, Ji Chen and the other elders started deliberating about the future plans for the sect. They discussed procuring resources for weapon forging of Weapon Pavilion under Ziye Fengru and for alchemy of Alchemy Pavilion under Axila.

"My pavilion will be in functional state after we add 2 more alchemy rooms with complete equipment and stock of common herbs." Axila gave the summary of his request.

Ziye Fengru also shared her own wish list. "I also request two forging rooms with a complete set of equipment and common materials."

After the bitter struggle between elders to get more share in the incoming resources, they also brainstormed about the rough planning of recruiting disciples and everyone agreed to using the Ancient White Pagoda as the testing center.

Ji Chen also shared to them about the details of Saint Star Competition and everyone felt overwhelmed by the ambition of their Sect Master. Still, no one objected since they felt an inexplicable feeling that the sect was only going to rise from this point onward.

The elders also updated Ji Chen about the development of their direct disciples with special bloodline or physique after he proposed that all eight of them must join the incoming competition.

"So we have three agendas, the competition, the recruitment, and replenishing our foundation and resources." He summarized all the contents of the meeting.

"Oh, our disciples are already starting their trials, let's watch first." Ji Chen chuckled with delight as he took out a silver disc with many intricate patterns. It was included in the Ancient White Pagoda along with three other items, its core where Lulu, the artifact spirit, resided and two complex formations.

After injecting his energy, the silver disc vibrated before a scaled down 3 dimensional map of the first trial materialized. Tiny figures could be seen fighting ferocious beasts inside the vast jungle.

"Just magnified your vision to your target scene." Ji Chen reminded them before squinting his eyes at the figure of a silver-haired lady valiantly fighting a large serpent and a swift poisonous scorpion.

Inside the first trial of the Ancient White Pagoda, Bai Ningshuang was tensing her muscles while keeping alert against the rapid stinger and claws of a 2-meter long black scorpion. She knew that once poisoned, she would be doomed.

Swish!

Hearing the sudden sound coming on top of her, she instantly twisted her upper body and leaned it slightly backward before slashing her sword.

A cold mist accompanied the icy blue sword projectile deflected the sneak attack.

"A large snake?" She mumbled after seeing the thick red snake hissing at her as it dodged the projectile in midair before latching itself at a branch of a nearby old tree.

As much as she wanted to deal with this cunning snake, Bai Ningshuang was still waiting for the sneaky scorpion when suddenly, she stepped forward just in time to dodge a stinger.

'I have to change my position.' Her mind raced seeing that she was being pincered by two beasts.

After a brief contemplation, she moved five steps to the left , away from the trunk of the nearest tree, while keeping her sights on the direction of the scorpion and the snake.

Hiss!

However, in the next moment, a smaller green snake emitting green mist tried to ambush her from the top of an extended branch.

Three directions were easily covered by the three beasts, only giving her the direction where there was a shallow depression.

'That place is too suspicious.' She shook her head and planned her next response but the three beasts would never give her the time to do so.

The black scorpion closed the distance in just a breath before using its two claws to clamp her feet. At the same time, a green snake could be seen at her periphery arching its half front while tightening its tail part, readying for a sudden lunge.

What worried Bai Ningshuang most was she could not find the red snake which slithered its way towards the dense branches above her.

She jumped backward while a stinger quickly targeted her in the midair. If this stinger connected or even grazed her skin, she could fail the trial in an instant. Thus, she hurriedly drew circles in the air with her sword.

An invisible wall slowed the stinger until it stopped completely. Bai Ningshuang used the wall to change her position in the midair as she already saw the green snake lunging to her original trajectory.

With a simple twist of her shoulder, a fast and accurate freezing swipe froze and beheaded the green snake just a meter to her side without allowing it to twitch or struggle.

Thud. The snake corpse fell to the ground.

She succeeded in landing meters away but a faint hissing sound alerted her again. The red snake used the gravity and its striking physical strength to quickly reach her from the branch above. If not for the hissing of the stupid red snake, she would never know that it somehow calculated her landing spot.

'Light Phantom Art'

Her figure, in an instant, left afterimages as she narrowly avoided being constricted. After using once more the Light Phantom Art Manual, a low-tier earth grade movement technique, she arrived beside the blindspot of the black scorpion faster than it could respond.

'Severe Frost Sword Art'

Injecting at least 20% of her elemental energy reserves, a terrible misty sword projectile that could stagnate the air cut and froze the black scorpion.

With one remaining enemy, she easily finished her battle against the three.

In another scene being watched by Long Zhu, his disciple Xu Kai was fighting head on physically against three common ferocious beasts. His body glowed a metallic gray luster with his fists kept punching the pitiful beasts on the ground.

Although his direct disciple was disheveled and using crude style, Long Zhu had his eyes becoming brighter the more freestyle the battle became.

In another scene, a small-faced lively woman was standing on her spot while three canine beasts bleeding on their orifices tried to inch closer to her but to no avail.

The Ji Peak became lively with the elders watching the disciples struggled against the illusionary beasts.