"Quick, open the first page and check the top five rankings!"
Wang Jiannan's eyes widened too, brilliant light bursting from them. A thought he had once never dared to imagine also sprang into his mind.
Before Secretary Wang could move, Wang Jiannan reached out and snatched the mouse, opening the first page himself.
When he saw the results displayed above, Wang Jiannan stood there dumbfounded.
It was not just him. Everyone present fell into a brief stupor.
For a moment, the enormous office was so quiet that one could hear a pin drop.
A moment later, a loud thud finally shattered the silence.
"!!!! Number one in the nation!!??? Li Ziyu's ranking is number one in the nation!!!"
"Mayor! Mayor, what's wrong, Mayor!"
"Quick! Bring a dose of heart stimulant! The mayor has fainted again!"
"Damn, one dose isn't enough. Bring several more! The principal of Third High School has fainted too!"
The Martial Arts Association building in the center of Xujiang City.
The top-floor office.
Bang, bang, bang, bang.
Martial Arts Association President Chen Mingyuan was punching a sandbag over and over. The muffled sounds echoed throughout the room.
Just then, the office door was suddenly shoved open.
The bespectacled secretary came rushing in, panting for breath. The moment he entered, he hurriedly said to Chen Mingyuan:
"President! President! Good news! Earth-shattering good news!"
"What good news has you so flustered? How have I taught you? Stay calm when something happens."
Without even raising his head, Chen Mingyuan continued punching the sandbag, bang after bang.
"Uh..."
The secretary came to a halt.
Only then did Chen Mingyuan speak:
"Go on, how high did Nangong Ao rank in Su Province?"
The Martial Arts Exam had just ended, and the rankings had only just been released.
There was no need to guess. Any news at this time had to be related to the Martial Arts Exam.
Seeing how excited his secretary was, Chen Mingyuan assumed Nangong Ao had done well this time.
Taking a wild guess, Nangong Ao was probably among the top three in Su Province.
Chen Mingyuan thought to himself.
"Huh? It's not about Nangong Ao. It's Li Ziyu! He got first place in the nation!"
"First place in the national Martial Arts Exam! His score was a full two times higher than the runner-up's!"
The secretary spoke excitedly. Upon hearing this, Chen Mingyuan calmly nodded.
"Mm, first place in Su Province. This result really is... Wait! What did you just say!? First place in the nation!!? Li Ziyu?"
As if he had finally processed it, Chen Mingyuan's entire body trembled.
His fist unconsciously tightened. The sandbag suddenly snapped its rope and flew away.
After flying out, the sandbag slammed into the panoramic floor-to-ceiling window. With a crash, it smashed the more-than-ten-meter-long window to pieces, sending glass shards flying everywhere.
Chen Mingyuan paid no attention to the shattered glass.
Instead, he abruptly turned around and stared at the secretary without blinking.
His eyes erupted with dazzling light.
"What did you just say!? What first place in the nation!?"
"I said Li Ziyu. The Martial Arts Exam rankings were just released. Li Ziyu got first place in the nation—he became the national Martial Arts Champion!"
"I estimate that a lot of people have already received the news by now. The teachers from those four famous schools should already be on their way to snatch him up!"
The secretary was startled by Chen Mingyuan's gaze.
But he quickly began speaking again.
As he talked, he took out the printed rankings and handed them to Chen Mingyuan.
Chen Mingyuan accepted the documents from his secretary and carefully looked them over. Afterward, his face flushed with excitement, and he burst into laughter.
"Hahaha! Good! Good!"
"I never thought a dragon would emerge from Xujiang City! The national Martial Arts Exam Champion, tsk! It's truly something I never would have dared imagine."
"Looks like I misjudged him. I underestimated Li Ziyu!"
Chen Mingyuan laughed heartily.
He excitedly struck his palm with his fist and paced back and forth.
He kept muttering things like, "Wonderful, wonderful."
"I never thought our Xujiang City could produce a Martial Arts Exam Champion too!"
"In the past, the Martial Arts Exam Champions were always monopolized by the two great Martial Arts Exam cities, Demon Capital and Capital City. I can't believe Li Ziyu managed to break that monopoly and take the title."
"Impressive. Truly impressive!"
Secretary Wang was also extremely excited.
Demon Capital and Capital City were the two centers of Great Xia. Their resources and ability to train martial artists were far beyond what the other cities could compare with.
For more than a dozen national Martial Arts Exams in the past, even the top ten nationwide had come from those two cities.
That small cities could not produce a national champion had practically become a common belief.
No one had expected Li Ziyu to break that record.
"Xiao Wu, go prepare a car immediately. Also bring the city's commendation gifts. We'll go to Li Ziyu's house tomorrow and tell him the good news."
Chen Mingyuan stopped pacing. As if he had thought of something, he abruptly raised his head and spoke to his secretary.
"Li Ziyu won the Martial Arts Exam Championship, so we can bask in some of his glory too."
"We must make sure the reward is generous enough!"
The safety of Great Xia rested upon the protection of powerful martial artists. One important standard for measuring the performance of a jurisdiction was the results it achieved in the Martial Arts Exam each year.
Now that Xujiang City had produced the national champion, even he, the president of the Martial Arts Association, could bask in the reflected glory.
Perhaps he could even use this opportunity to climb higher.
Chen Mingyuan picked up his clothes and prepared to leave.
But when he saw the moonlight outside, he slapped his forehead.
"Look at me. I got so excited that I forgot it's already the middle of the night."
"Tomorrow, then. Go prepare everything now. We'll pay Li Ziyu a visit tomorrow morning."
"Oh, right. I also have to tell the Governor about this!"
The morning sunlight pierced through the darkness.
Xujiang City, which had been silent all night, came alive amid the interweaving crowds of people busy making a living.
At the garden residential complex where Li Ziyu lived.
From early morning onward, people carrying gifts began appearing one after another at the unit entrance.
Bang, bang, bang, bang.
"Open the door! You little brat, open up!"
"I know you're in there!"
Li Ziyu was sleeping when he was awakened by a series of loud knocks from outside the door.
The woman's shouts could also be heard from outside.
Frowning, Li Ziyu walked over and opened the door.
As expected, the person knocking was the Fat Woman who lived across from him.
When Li Ziyu came out, the Fat Woman wore a drooping, dissatisfied expression and said:
"Are you deaf? I've been calling you for ages, and you couldn't hear me?"
"What is it?"
Li Ziyu frowned and stared at the Fat Woman expressionlessly.
He was 1.9 meters tall, a full head taller than the Fat Woman.
His icy aura, combined with his expressionless face and cold stare, made the Fat Woman's heart jump instinctively.
An inexplicable sense of retreat and fear rose within her.
But when the Fat Woman thought of how she had bullied Li Ziyu in the past, when he had always swallowed his grievances, and remembered that her son had been accepted into a martial arts university, she felt emboldened again.
She planted her hands on her hips and glared fiercely at Li Ziyu.
"My son got into a martial arts university. Some relatives are coming over, and there won't be enough room. I'm borrowing your room for one night."
"You don't need to come back tonight. Make room for us."
The Fat Woman spoke as though it were only natural.
Li Ziyu gave her a strange look, utterly baffled.
Your relatives are coming, so you want me to move out and let you stay in my home for the night? Are you insane?
He found it ridiculous. The Fat Woman's behavior inexplicably reminded him of a news story he had seen in his previous life.
An old man had always mooched off his neighbor's internet. One day, because the neighbor changed the wireless password, the old man went to the neighbor's home and cursed him out.
Not only that, he even sued his neighbor in court.
He claimed that because the neighbor had changed the wireless password, his child could no longer attend online classes, causing the child's grades to drop, and demanded compensation from the neighbor.
That sense of entitlement was so much like the scene before him.
At that moment, only one word remained in Li Ziyu's heart.
"Get lost!"
He coldly spat out the word. Too lazy to bother with the Fat Woman, he slammed the door shut.
The Fat Woman stared at the tightly closed door and burned with rage.
She had just raised her hand to pound on the door and start cursing when a man called out to her:
"Hey, honey, our relatives are downstairs. Let's go down and meet them."
"Coming. Hmph, you little brat, just wait. Once I'm done welcoming my relatives, I'll teach you a lesson!"
The Fat Woman snorted coldly.
One of her relatives was a high-ranking official who worked for the government.
They had not been in touch before, but after hearing that her son had been accepted into a martial arts university, the relative had brought gifts to visit.
This gave the Fat Woman the feeling of finally holding her head high.
But she did not dare neglect them. She hurriedly went downstairs with her husband.
Before you continue