PAID

I accepted the wooden token handed to me by a martial artist from the Alliance.

After presenting the one I already had, they stamped it with an insignia.

The token bore a number etched in clear characters: Seventeen.

‘Hmm.’n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

It seemed they were assigning numbers to all participants.

How many would there be in total?

‘Roughly over two hundred, perhaps?’

Given that the preliminaries spanned three days, that number seemed about right.

‘So they’ve gathered over two hundred fighters at the Jeoljeong (Peak Level) level or higher….’

It was an absurd number.

Even a single fighter at Peak Level was a rare find, yet they’d assembled hundreds of them.

‘The only time I’ve seen this many was during the conquest of Sichuan in my past life.’

Or perhaps the initial gathering to capture Cheonma.

Yes, that seemed accurate—when martial artists from every sect had converged.

‘Though they all ended up swept away by Cheonma’s hand.’

To think that this was my first memory in a crowd of martial artists. I had to admit, I was a bit unusual myself.

“Gu, what’s your number?”

“Seventeen. And you?”

“Mine’s sixty-eight.”

“I got ninety-one!”