Chapter 443 - Second Round

In the Sword Cloud Pavilion’s branch located at the capital, Twilight was donned in black as he faced three opponents by himself. His opponents were the deacons from the Sword Cloud Pavilion and they were all in the quasi-Violet Palace Realm. Even though they were quasi-Violet Palace Realms, they possessed the battle prowess of a Violet Palace Realm. With the three of them combined, it wasn’t difficult for them to kill Violet Palace Realm cultivators.

But they only barely managed to defend themselves against Twilight’s sword. When Twilight swung his sword that radiated like a dazzling sun, an explosion occurred and the three deacons were sent flying away. Each of them threw up mouthfuls of blood. Twilight’s sword easily crushed them all.

“Haha, Lin Yun will never imagine that Lil’ Ye has already achieved quasi-xiantian sword intent and that he also reached complete mastery in the Supreme Radiance Sword. Although it’s still far from the manifestation stage, it’s more than enough to suppress Lin Yun. Furthermore, the explosive prowess of the Supreme Radiance Sword attacks through sending shock into the opponent’s body. Not even that brat’s physique can handle it,” sneered the elders who were watching the battle.

When Twilight sheathed his sword, a heroic aura exuded from him. Right at this moment, a masked man appeared all of a sudden and sent his palm towards Twilight without any warning. The terrifying aura emitted from the masked man was in the Violet Palace Realm. This shocked many people and the spectators exclaimed, “Watch out!”

However, Twilight did not have any changes on his face and sent out his palm. The pressure Twilight emitted wasn’t any weaker than the attacker. When the two palms clashed, cracks began to spread out on the ground and a shockwave reverberated out.

But that wasn’t all as Twilight was enveloped in a radiance formed by his sword aura. When the two sword rays crossed together, they formed a gigantic ‘十’ and Twilight pushed against it with a roar.

Taking the attack head-on, the masked man was sent flying away while Twilight remained where he was standing. When the elders saw this scene, they exclaimed, “Lil’ Ye’s Supreme Radiance Sutra has reached the eighth stage!”

“Hahaha! Great!” The elder who led the team, Luo Han, walked out with a burst of laughter, “Lil’ Ye is truly worthy of being the genius of the millennia in our sect since he is able to face such a situation so easily.”

When the masked man removed his mask, a familiar face was revealed. He cupped his hands together with a smile, “Lil’ Ye, congratulations for reaching the eighth stage in the Supreme Radiance Sutra.”

At this moment, everyone finally realized that the sudden assault was a test and they all smiled. With Twilight’s current strength, it was more than enough for him to kill Lin Yun.

Luo Han walked up and asked, “Do you know what today is?”

“The day I kill Lin Yun and take revenge for junior brother,” said Twilight calmly.

“Back then, Jian Wuming chased us out of the Heavenly Qin County and created the Sword Firmament Pavilion to replace us. It’s time for us to get back at them,” said Luo Han with indignance.

A cold smirk rose on Twilight’s face and he replied, “If he’s smart, he’ll surrender. Otherwise, if he dares to show up on the stage, I’ll kill him and embarrass the Sword Firmament Pavilion thoroughly.”

“You don’t have to dwell too much on Lin Yun. You have a high chance of obtaining the top three in this competition.”

“That’s right. You might even be able to become the champion if you’re lucky,” echoed the other elders. All of them considered Lin Yun a dead man.

“Let’s go. It’s time to get going.” Not only the Sword Cloud Pavilion, but the other sects also started making their way to the Dragon Gate Plaza. It only took half an hour for the plaza to be filled with people.

When Emperor Qin made his appearance, the princess and prince also appeared by his side. As for the thirty-two disciples who made it into the second round, they were prepared for a while now. Emperor Qin swept his glance out and the princess stood up from her seat when Emperor Qin nodded in her direction. She announced, “The rules of the second round will be the same as the first. It is an elimination round to determine the best sixteen. At that time, the envoy will personally host the quarterfinals.”

Everyone’s eyes flashed with a peculiar light when they heard about the envoy. Everyone knew that the mysterious envoy was the person presiding over the competition and that his authority far exceeded the empire and the four major sects. But the envoy would only show up at the quarterfinals.

What tempted everyone was the fact that the champion of the competition could make a request to the envoy and the envoy would fulfill it as long as it was reasonable. Someone once made a request for a cosmic artifact and the envoy took out dozens of them for the champion to pick from. Another person wanted his clan to be promoted to a prince clan, which the envoy fulfilled as well.

The envoy’s words were more useful than Emperor Qin in the Great Qin Empire. After the princess explained the rules, Li Wuyou whispered, “Big Brother, how confident are you in defeating Twilight?”

“You went to place a bet again?” asked Lin Yun.

“N-no. Definitely not. I only went there to take a look, but you will never imagine that someone bet a third grade spiritual jade on you becoming the champion.”

“Who was it?” wondered Lin Yun.

“Drifting Goblet,” replied Li Wuyou.

Li Wuyou’s words made Lin Yun stunned briefly before he smiled. Drifting Goblet has always acted unexpectedly. The fact of the matter was that Lin Yun even had someone betting something as precious as a third grade spiritual jade. It would be a pity to lose it in a bet, but Lin Yun was happy that Drifting Goblet believed in him. According to his knowledge, his rates were horrendous and no one was optimistic about him defeating Twilight, not to mention becoming the champion.

“But Big Brother, how confident are you?” asked Li Wuyou. This made everyone else from the Sword Firmament Pavilion perk their ears.

“I’ll only know when we fight.” Lin Yun felt that his odds of winning were at least 50%, but he couldn’t confirm anything until they fought. They were both at their strongest state, except Lin Yun’s Aurora Dragon had gone into a deep slumber after devouring the demonic soul. This meant that he wouldn’t be able to use it in this fight.

“Let the second round begin!” The princess continued, “The first battle will be between the Primal Origin Sect’s Heartcliff and Heavenly Profound Sect’s Tong Yuan!”

Two figures descended on the stage. Tong Yuan was a core disciple of the Heavenly Profound Sect and he had his own encounter in the Demonlotus Realm that greatly boosted his strength. But no one felt that he could compare to Heartcliff, so there was no suspense in this battle.

The result was just as everyone had expected. After ten moves, Heartcliff began to unleash his dracophant energy and threw out a punch with ten cauldron’s worth of strength and saintly music echoing in the air. He used his brute strength to crush Tong Yuan’s Dragon-Tiger Fist.

Since Heartcliff only used ten moves to defeat Tang Yuan, no one was sure about his exact strength. He gave off an unfathomable feeling because he didn’t even seem to have used half of his strength.

“Heartcliff wins!” announced the judge.

Heartcliff’s lips rose and he looked down at Tong Yuan on the ground with a smile, “Is that all the Dragon-Tiger Fist has?”

Shortly after, he turned to look at the Sword Firmament Pavilion’s direction. Lin Yun could sense his gaze, but he wasn’t too bothered by it.

“It’s a pity that I can’t end that brat personally,” muttered Heartcliff as he left the stage.

“This fellow makes it seem like junior brother will lose to Twilight,” snorted Xin Yan.

“That’s what everyone else thinks,” replied Lin Yun. But he wasn’t able to see through Heartcliff strength. Ten cauldron’s worth of strength? Could it be that Heartcliff’s Dracophant Battle Physique was at the sixth stage? But it didn’t seem possible to Lin Yun.

After all, the prerequisite to reach the sixth stage was a Heavenly Soul Realm’s beast core. It was impossible for the Primal Origin Sect to kill such a powerful demonic beast for Heartcliff. So Lin Yun could only conclude that Heartcliff had a fortunate encounter.

As the battles continued, many of the fights were filled with suspense down to the very last minute. Of course, this excluded the fights of the titled figures because they could suppress their opponents. This not only proved that the titled figures were powerful, but this also proved that everyone who made it to the second round was strong.

Even if the titled figures could suppress their opponents, they were only able to do it after about ten moves. It was no longer like the first round where they could instantly sweep through their opponents.

“Eighth battle, the Sword Firmament Pavilion’s Bai Lixuan VS the Primal Origin Sect’s Zuo Yun!” This announcement instantly caused an uproar. Besides Qin Yu’s fight with Egret and Lin Yun’s fight with Twilight, this was one of the main events.

The two were newly risen geniuses. Bai Lixuan even had the Saint Physique and was known as the strongest beneath the eight titles. However, Zuo Yun wasn’t weak and was the strongest among the Primal Origin Sect’s youngest generation. Many people felt that he was qualified to fight Bai Lixuan and that their fight would be interesting.