Liu Yuan narrowed her eyes as she studied Su Qi, her gaze tinged with skepticism.
"Do you need to go full-screen just to read the rules? And must you also watch those sisters dancing?"
Her small hand remained firmly pressed over the phone screen, leaving Su Qi no opening to exploit.
Su Qi sighed in resignation.
This silly little sister—when jealousy took over, even her usual sharp wit was overthrown.
He attempted a weak defense: "I was just... checking out the atmosphere of the venue..."
But his voice faltered under Liu Yuan’s slightly wounded stare, betraying his lack of conviction.
"Atmosphere?"
Liu Yuan’s tone lifted slightly.
"Does Brother feel the lounge’s atmosphere isn’t good enough? Need something else to spice it up?"
She leaned in closer, her face nearly touching Su Qi’s, her warm breath carrying the faint sweetness of milk tea.
Su Qi surrendered.
"Alright, alright. I won’t look anymore."
He tucked the phone back into his pocket.
"That’s more like it."
Only then did Liu Yuan seem satisfied, her face practically glowing with triumph.
"Actually... it’s not like I can’t wear those clothes... or dance..."
She murmured under her breath, staking her claim.
Su Qi couldn’t help but laugh, reaching out to ruffle her hair. "Got it."
Liu Yuan closed her eyes, enjoying the touch, though her words remained defiant. "I’m doing this for your own good. I heard there have been some scary cases lately—Brother should be careful not to end up in jail."
Su Qi decided not to engage further.
Some topics were better left unaddressed.
He deftly shifted the conversation back to business. "What was your exam number again?"
At the mention of the exam, Liu Yuan’s expression turned serious.
"A-55."
Su Qi pondered for a moment.
This year’s rules divided the arena tests into five major zones, each with ten arenas.
That meant a hundred examinees could be tested per round, totaling forty rounds.
If luck was on their side, they might be home by 1 PM.
But if they were stuck in the last group, waiting until 5 or 6 PM wouldn’t be unusual.
It all depended on how long each match took.
Incidentally, this year’s arena tests weren’t scored purely on victory or defeat.
Instead, professional evaluators would assess performance across all aspects of combat.
There might even be cases where the "glorious loser" scored higher than the winner.
"We might have to wait a while."
"Mhm."
Liu Yuan gave a small nod, her fingers tightening slightly around her milk tea cup.
Waiting was sometimes more nerve-wracking than stepping onto the stage immediately.
"Don’t stress."
Su Qi noticed her tension and softened his voice.
"Just don’t kill anyone, and you’ve already won."
Liu Yuan: "..."
Though Su Qi’s words sounded absurd, they somehow carried an odd sense of reassurance.
Her nervousness vanished in an instant, replaced by serious contemplation on how to restrain her strength enough to avoid fatalities.
"Understood, Brother."
Time slipped by unnoticed as they waited.
...
Back at the venue.
A rabbit-eared hostess, dressed more formally than the others, stepped onto the stage and picked up a microphone. Her sweet voice, amplified by the speakers, filled the arena with deliberate excitement.
"I’m sure everyone is eager to find out your child’s opponent and match order, right?"
A chorus of agreement rose from the crowd.
"Then, without further ado!" The hostess gestured to the massive screen behind her. "Let’s turn our attention to the big screen!"
The screen flickered before settling, rows of names and corresponding ID numbers rapidly scrolling into view.
Starting from "001," the list continued endlessly.
"For this tournament, opponents will be randomly matched based on assigned numbers!"
"All examinees must memorize your unique ID—this will be your key identifier for the competition!"
"Match results and the battle order will now be announced!"
Many in the audience fixed their eyes on the scrolling screen, searching for their child’s name.
The atmosphere grew tense.
The hostess’s voice rang out again: "Alright, the assignments are complete!"
The screen flashed once more before displaying the matchups line by line.
[Zone A-1, Match 1: A-03 vs. A-128]
[Zone A-1, Match 2: A-56 vs. A-319]
[Zone A-2, Match 1: A-11 vs. A-274]
...
The pairings continued to populate swiftly.
Soon, Liu Yuan found her own match details.
[Zone A-1, Match 13: A-55 vs. A-102]
"Examinees for the first match, please proceed to Arena One immediately! The match begins in three minutes! All other examinees, prepare for your turn."
On either side of the stage, several square arenas enclosed by special energy barriers had risen into position.
The second phase of the martial exam had officially begun.
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
transmigrates into the world as the sect master of the Heavenly Yan Sect, which is on the verge of being wiped out. He binds a system that grants him cultivation power based on the number of disciples he has: for each disciple, he automatically gains a year's worth of cultivation every single day! Take one disciple: every day he gains 1 year of cultivation power. While others struggle through a year of bitter training, he gets the same just by sleeping through a single night. Take ten disciples: every day he gains 10 years of cultivation power. Foundation Establishment, Core Formation, Nascent Soul—he breezes through all bottlenecks without lifting a finger. Take one hundred disciples: every day he gains 100 years of cultivation power. Even a Soul Transformation Venerable before him can’t survive a single blow. Take ten thousand disciples: every day he gains 10,000 years of cultivation power! With a wave of his hand, he topples empires. With a single step, he crushes the sacred grounds of the universe. ... While others fight tooth and nail for secret techniques, Lin Yan casually hands out Nascent Soul-level cultivation manuals as beginner textbooks. While others strain to find talented recruits, Lin Yan opens his doors to anyone—so long as they’re human. In just three short years, the Heavenly Yan Sect went from a backwater sect made up of three crumbling huts to a sacred land that every cultivator under heaven would kill to enter. ... One day, otherworldly demon gods invade, with a million demon soldiers pressing down upon the realm. Lin Yan, yawning, rises from his lounge chair and glances at the system panel: [Current Disciples: 1.28 million] [Daily Cultivation Increase: 1.28 million years] He waves his hand casually, and the countless demon soldiers are reduced to ashes in an instant. “So noisy… interrupting my fishing.”
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
lity and could only live as an ordinary mortal. He only wished to live a peaceful life. Yet he didn't know— The dog he adopted, because it ate his food, became a legendary demon king. The kitchen knife he casually forged became a peerless divine weapon, causing numerous experts to fight desperately for it. The young disciple he took in became an immortal lord that led an era, due to cultivating the techniques Ye Feng taught him. Even the skeletons he looked down on the most were ominous demon kings that suppressed countless worlds. Many years later, looking at the void shattered with a punch, Ye Feng murmured to himself: It turns out the peerless kings were myself all along...
