Floating Immortal Order

Chapter 96: Change

Chapter 96: Change

TL: Sponsored chapter (2/4)

Xu Disheng put away the Yin Yang Diagram. Relying on the faint connection remaining between the Glorious Sun Bow and the two Destruction Arrows lying on the ground of the arena, Xu Disheng extended his palm, causing the two arrows to fly back to his hand.

One of the Destruction Arrows, which had collided with Jie Zizhuo’s round jade treasure, had cracks spreading down its length from the tip. The entire arrow was on the verge of breaking, so there was no way it could be reused.

Only the second Destruction Arrow that he shot out was still in good condition. Just as he put it away, he heard a clear voice in his ears. “Looks like I was right to bet on your good fortune, Junior Martial Brother Xu. You really earned me quite a few spirit stones.”

When he turned around to look, he saw He Junyu standing next to Jian Liangbi, his figure standing tall and slim below the arena. He happened to be looking over in Xu Disheng’s direction with a smile on his face, fiddling with an interspatial ring on his finger.

Xu Disheng came down from the arena and walked over to He Junyu. “Senior Martial Brother He, don’t you need to go compete?” Xu Disheng asked.

“It’s fine. In the end, I’m the strongest person in the 5th arena, so there won’t be anyone challenging me for the moment,” He Junyu handed over the interspatial ring that he was fiddling with earlier and said, “I was feeling the mood just now so I decided to make a little bet. I ended up winning a little over 4,700 spirit stones, so I decided to give you a little over 2,000 spirit stones out of it.”

Xu Disheng knit his brows, not reaching out to accept the ring. “Senior Martial Brother He…” he started.

“This amount of spirit stones is nothing to me. You’ll be needing the spirit stones, so just take it,” He Junyu said.

Xu Disheng took the ring and looked inside. He Junyu said ‘a little over 2,000 spirit stones’, but it definitely wasn’t ‘a little over 2,000′. There were more than 2,700 spirit stones inside!

Moreover, the interspatial ring itself was worth over 200 spirit stones!

In the end, this was an investment of sorts.

It was along the same lines as Bai Zhehua and his father investing in Xu Disheng. With his identity as the first son of a Divine Core stage Spirit Master and one of the top geniuses in the entire Mingxin Mountain Range, He Junyu would eventually come to rule a Peak at the very least. It was only proper for him to raise a group of people that could support him in the future.

However, his standards were unusually high. In this time, he had only fostered 4 or 5 such people. And these 4 or 5 people that had caught his eye were all just like Xu Disheng, coming from humble beginnings but possessing incredible potential!

In the records, Xu Disheng only had a Rank 6 Spiritual Root. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either. So why did he catch his eye? When He Junyu looked into the matter regarding Qingxin, he looked up Xu Disheng while he was at it and found that he had slain a half-transformed wolf demon while he was still at the Cleansed Meridians stage! Right after that, he went with Chen Xingzhou and ten other people on a mission and somehow emerged as the sole beneficiary.

Once He Junyu looked closely at the implications of these events, he could easily determine that Xu Disheng had to have secrets on his body!

What He Junyu wanted were exactly these kinds of people who had secrets and trump cards on them! After all, who didn’t have their own destiny? Who didn’t have secrets?

The nearby disciples cast envious glances in Xu Disheng’s direction. There were also many jealous stares, most of which came from people who didn’t even have the qualifications to speak to He Junyu on equal terms.

For example, before He Junyu came over earlier, Jian Liangbi had been standing alone. No one dared to come over and chat with him!

Those who weren’t in the same social circles couldn’t interact easily. Even the disciples who were slightly lower in rank than that small group of geniuses at the apex of the social ladder still felt an indescribable distance from them.

Xu Disheng stood with He Junyu for a while and watched several matches with him before taking his leave, returning directly to Morning Dew Peak’s circle of light.

Just as he stepped away from the crowd, he heard a voice behind him. “Wait up, Junior Martial Brother Xu.”

It was Zhang Haobo, Bai Zhehua, and the several other peak Sea of Qi stage disciples from Morning Dew Peak. They had been spectating the battles from within the crowd, but Xu Disheng hadn’t spotted them because there were simply far too many disciples.

“You actually managed to defeat Jie Zizhuo! You really deserve to be called the number 1 Sea of Qi stage disciple on Morning Dew Peak!” The one who spoke was Zhang Haobo, who was dressed in purple robes. His expression didn’t waver as he layered on the flattery.

“Junior Martial Brother Xu, we saw you talking with Lord He so we didn’t dare to approach carelessly,” Bai Zhehua said, sounding excited. “Anyway, we seriously didn’t expect you to be able to win against Jie Zizhuo.”

There was an implicit, unspoken meaning behind this sentence, which was ‘I didn’t think that you would actually have two Magic Treasures’.

But Xu Disheng himself knew that he had truly relied a lot on the power of the two Magic Treasures in that battle. If he didn’t have them, he definitely wouldn’t have been able to withstand even three moves from Jie Zizhuo.

Of course, that was only if he didn’t use Soul Song.

However, the increase in combat power that a Magic Treasure brought to a Sea of Qi stage disciple was too immense, allowing one to ignore the gap in profound qi cultivation to a certain extent.

If the usage of Magic Treasures wasn’t allowed, how could he have won?

The number 1 genius of the Mingxin Mountain Range, Yu Yangyao, had three Magic Treasures that were widely known, which were the Coiling Serpent, the Essence Tassel Armor, and the Burning Sea Ruler, not to mention all the other hidden cards he had. He was the great-great-grandson of the Killing Heart Spirit Master, Yu Xingchao, so it wouldn’t be strange even if he had 10 top-grade Magic Treasures.

However, it wasn’t possible to hold that many Magic Treasures in one’s sea of consciousness with a Sea of Qi stage cultivation. Even at the half-step Dao Foundation stage, it was only possible to contain 5 Magic Treasures in the sea of consciousness.

When they all returned together to Morning Dew Peak’s circle of light, the Peak Master, Lu Changge, rose from his seat and smiled widely. “Xu Disheng, I didn’t expect you to be able to fight against the 32nd place and actually win! Reward him with 500 spirit stones!”

Next to him, Lu Zimo respectfully complied.

.

Xu Disheng walked up to the Dao Foundation stage disciples and bowed slightly.

Bai Honghua’s complexion was somewhat complicated. Clearly, at the time when he gave Xu Disheng the Frozen Spirit Sword, he didn’t imagine that he actually had two Magic Treasures in his possession! Even though there was a smile on his face, he felt a bit strange at heart.

Xu Disheng could understand this though. At the time, he was just an ordinary early Sea of Qi stage disciple after all. It was already good enough for Bai Honghua to be willing to give him a common Spirit Tool with seals, which was worth over 100 spirit stones.

In the Shangqing Sacred Sect, the rules were strict. Although Xu Disheng had two Magic Treasures in his possession, no one would dare to think twice about it. Even if there were people who were suspicious about where his Magic Treasures came from, there was nothing they could do.

In the end, the Sacred Sect’s perspective on the matter was exceedingly practical. The Magic Treasure belonged to whoever had it in their possession. Unless there was evidence that could clearly prove that the Magic Treasure was obtained through scheming or a violation of sect rules, the owners of their respective Magic Treasures would receive the protection of the sect.

Xu Disheng returned to the crowd of disciples, but it felt entirely different from last time.

Even Zhang Haobo and the dozen or so peak Sea of Qi stage disciples seemed to be a bit more careful when they spoke to Xu Disheng.

The gazes from the other ordinary disciples were completely different from when he had just gotten 5,675th place in the first match. At the time, he had received questioning looks, disdainful stares, and disparaging gazes, but now, their looks were filled with envy, esteem, and even a hint of… reverence.

Having two Magic Treasures was one thing, but these ordinary Sea of Qi stage disciples might not even have a single high-grade Spirit Tool that was worth only several hundred spirit stones in their possession. If Xu Disheng wielded the Yin Yang Diagram and let out a casual brushstroke with it, he would be able to easily defeat 10 of these ordinary Sea of Qi stage disciples.

But if there were people slightly superior to oneself, it could always breed jealousy and even resentment.

Only Bai Zhehua treated him the same as ever. He patted Xu Disheng on the back and said smilingly, “When you picked Jie Zizhuo, all of us thought you chose the wrong person. But we didn’t expect that you really just didn’t know who he was.”

Another peak Sea of Qi stage disciple called Shao Liang spoke next. “Yeah, your performance was really amazing. Jie Zizhuo’s Heavenly Emperor’s Saber is a pretty famous Magic Treasure among Sea of Qi stage disciples. The person himself also cultivates some unconventional cultivation methods. He stopped your Azure Ocean Summon Rain form with one of those unconventional cultivation methods.”

He was referring to the time when Xu Disheng used the Summon Rain form to send over 10 cyan droplets of water at Jie Zizhuo, and he exerted control over them and sent them right back at Xu Disheng.

Xu Disheng of Morning Dew Peak, early Sea of Qi stage. The cultivation methods in his possession include Celestial Tide Spirit Master He Wenshu’s Azure Ocean cultivation method and the Corrosion Incantation. As for Magic Treasures, thus far it is only known that he has the Glorious Sun Bow and the Yin Yang Diagram. In terms of combat power, he is estimated to be at around 30th place in the Sea of Qi division.

In the span of just one hour, Xu Disheng’s basic information had already been recorded into the jade slips. With this, he was now truly standing on even ground with those other dozen or so Sea of Qi stage geniuses.

However, he was only occupying one of the last few spots on the list. After all, aside from the smallest circle at the top, the second social circle below approximately included the 6th to 17th places in them, which was only about 10 people. All of those people had at least one top-grade Magic Treasure, in addition to one, if not two, common Magic Treasures.

There wasn’t much that could be done about this. The Sea of Qi stage was different from the Dao Foundation stage in that the quality of one’s profound qi had a limited effect. At the Sea of Qi stage, almost all of one’s combat power came from Magic Treasures and Spirit Tools. Even the importance of cultivation methods was slightly lower in comparison.

But the Dao Foundation stage was different, where profound laws were the foundation. Most cultivation methods would only be considered to have reached a preliminary level once they had been cultivated to the equivalent of the Dao Foundation stage, upon which they would experience an explosive increase in might.

Moreover, it was possible to utilize some of the power of heaven and earth at the Dao Foundation stage, which was why profound qi cultivation was especially important at this stage. After all, the higher one’s cultivation of profound qi, the more power of heaven and earth they would be able to move. If the disparity between two opponents on this aspect was great enough, it was possible for one person to steamroll the other just based on this alone.

Even though it was possible to make use of the full might of a Magic Treasure at the Dao Foundation stage, a Magic Treasure was nothing more than a means of support by that point.

As a result, things were entirely different in competitions between the Sea of Qi stage and Dao Foundation stage, especially with regard to Magic Treasures.

Although it was a bit imbalanced, it couldn’t be helped. After all, the overwhelming majority of people didn’t own a Magic Treasure.

To top things off, the Sea of Qi stage was just a starting point. Anyone who could be called a genius definitely wouldn’t stay at this stage for long.

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