Chapter 11 - Registration

After leaving the pavilion Long Yang started to walk towards the inn that got recommended by the middle aged lady.

The inn was named as Happy Dire-elk Inn. The building had 3 floors and above its entrance was a pair of gigantic antlers.

Despite its grandiose appearance it was relatively cheap and had good food. That was why it was recommended by the lady. A room for one night was 20 silver and when you include the meals it was 30 silver. Having suffered enough in the forest he chose to pay 2 gold and 10 silvers for one week. He had almost finished his funds in gold, it would be probably useless in the sect anyway. The remaining 14 spirit stones was his real funds.

Since he changed his sack to a more materialistic things such as weapon and armor, he had nothing to do in the city anymore. Thereafter he chose to stay in his room until the start of the recruitment of the sect. While he was staying in the inn, he learnt the recruitment would be done in the trial grounds in the city in exactly seven days later, registration for the exam would be open then too.

Thus he focused on his cultivation for a week without doing anything except sleeping and eating.

...

In the morning after seven days later, Long Yang opened his eyes from his cultivation when the daylight entered his eyes. He decided to not sleep the day before since this world had no alarms. He couldn't afford to miss the event he had been waiting for months.

After taking a deep breath he left the inn and started walking towards the trial grounds.

When he reached the trial grounds what he saw was four huge circles in the ground. Three of them had a different colored stones in them. The other one had unknown writings on the ground written in a seemingly ordered way.

Before the circles there was the registration table with an old woman sitting behind it. There were not many people for registration but around the trial grounds there was a crowd.

'It seems many are not qualified to join the sect but still here to watch the show.' thought Long Yang before going to the old lady. There was five people before him so he had to wait for a couple of minutes.

"Name, age and cultivation." said the old lady in a dull manner without looking at him when Long Yang's turn came.

"Long Yang, 20, Seventh Layer of Qi Condensation." said Long Yang truthfully.

When the lady heard him, she raised her head and took a close look at him.

"Not bad, you may proceed with the test. The first test will be for your age, the second one will measure your cultivation and the third one will measure your talent. The last one will be an illusion trial which you will fight with a beast in your level." said the old lady while passing him a wooden card which had number 48 on it.

Long Yang nodded in affirmation and went to the first circle which had a couple of black stones in it. In the entrance of the circle a middle aged man was noting down the ages of the people who are testing. He watched people come and go for a minute before entering.

Since he knew the test was about age he came before the man and said "Long Yang, number 48, age 20.".

The man nodded and said "Alright go ahead, the test is about verifying your age. Don't take offense, in history there were lots of people who was lying about their age. Just go and put your hand on a black stone you find.".

"Alright, thank you." said Long Yang and went to a black stone which was towering three meters from the ground. He put his hand on it and on the side of the stone five red dots appeared.

"Hm. You may proceed to the next test." said the man after noting down his age.

Thus Long Yang went to the second test which had a similar middle aged man before its entrance. The man said similar things but more in detail. Since the cultivation border for passing were differed for each age, he explained that to him. Before age of 14, anyone would be counted as passed from this passed, only their talent in cultivation mattered. Before 15, it was first layer and before 17 it was second layer. For someone like Long Yang who was at the age of 20, the borderline was third layer of Qi Condensation.

Having learnt the rules Long Yang came before a green stone which had a similar height to the black ones and put his hand on it. For measuring cultivation he had to circulate his Qi, so he started circulating his Qi.

On the side of the stone one red dot and two yellow dots appeared. As soon as his result was shown, Long Yang heard gasps around him.

There were some people in the crowd outside started gossiping.

"A seventh layer at the age of 20... This man has quite the talent." said someone.

"Hmm, not at the level of a genius but he should be someone famous. What was his name, anyone heard it?" said another.

"I heard it was Long Yang, I heard no Long family around Emei City so he shouldn't be a young master of a Clan."

"And I have been in a couple of cities, I haven't heard a rogue cultivator named Long Yang too..."

"It seems Emei Sect has found a hidden gem this time."

"Hmph. My young master has not arrived yet this meagre of talent is nothing."

"You're here but where is your young master?"

"He is not someone who will come for the test this early. Don't you see the people who came at this time of the day are all low level bunch."

"True... Is that an unwritten rule or something?"

"Probably, or it's just how they act, you know how those arrogant people act." said a young man.

"Hey watch your words or they will come bite you some day." said the man who was talking about his young master.

...

After listening for a while Long Yang decided to turn deaf ear to the those people. He knew the results for the first two tests but he was excited for the third one.

'My talent should be good right? I have reached the seventh layer in five months... But that was probably because of my cultivation art... I really wonder how will I do.' thought Long Yang. Thus he found his way to the third stone.

This time before the entrance, there was a middle aged woman.

"For this exam you will put your hand on the stone and start cultivating. The stone will test your speed of accumulation of Qi." said the woman.

Hearing that Long Yang was puzzled and asked "Then wouldn't cultivation arts differ from person to person too? All kinds of people come here.".

"You don't have to worry about that, most of the high grade cultivation arts are regulated by sects. And sharing them without the approval from the sect is a crime which is always watched closely." said the woman while shaking her head.

"Thank you." said Long Yang before bowing slightly.

This time the stone was colored cyan. Long Yang stood before it after putting his hand, he started his cultivation. For this test stones weren't about numbers anymore, so there wasn't any dot. While he was on his way here he saw people taking this test. On their hand the stone would be shaking a little bit on avarage. Some people couldn't the stone move even a little bit, such people were the ones got disqualified.

When he started cultivating he noticed he could absorb the Qi in the stone.

'So the shaking is because people were absorbing it.' thought Long Yang.

When he focused absorbing the Qi the stone under his hand started shaking fiercely. After only three or four seconds later the cyan lustre of the stone dimmed slightly.

"Enough!" yelled the middle aged woman her face a little bit pale.

Having heard the yelling Long Yang stopped abruptly and looked towards the woman with questioning eyes.

"You have passed, you can proceed to the last test." said the woman solemnly. She was trying to keep her face straight but in her heart there was a raging storm.

'Such a monstrous talent...' thought the woman.