At the third watch of the Chen hour, dawn had only just begun to break. Outside Examination Area "Jiazi" of the Divine Capital Immortal Selection Bureau's martial examination grounds, a small plaza beside a spacious waiting square paved with enormous slabs of green jade had already gathered hundreds of cultivator candidates and their attendants, all varied in appearance and aura.
This was one of the examination grounds under the Heavenly Court's Immortal Selection Bureau, specially established for the martial examination of the "Talent Selection Examination."
Towering jade pillars stood around the plaza, intricate runes carved into them and faintly forming powerful defensive and monitoring formations.
Directly to the north stood a raised platform. Examination seats had been arranged upon it, and several examiners in immortal official robes, their expressions solemn, were already in place.
At the center of the great plaza was the "Sword Formation of Breaking Delusions," radiating fierce sword qi and murderous intent!
It was said to consist of forty-nine enormous, suspended phantoms of spirit swords. Sword qi crisscrossed within it, and light and shadows intertwined. Yet it was not a killing formation. Supposedly, it had been improved from a fragment of the ancient "Nine Palaces Soul Confusion" text, incorporating 3,600 talismans—including "Heart Bewildering," "Spirit Disordering," and "Form Imitation"—into a self-contained illusion that formed a small world of its own.
Though it did not focus on killing, the illusion within the formation blended reality and unreality, specifically disturbing cultivators' souls and testing their firmness of mind and ability to break through obstacles. Its purpose was to assess their adaptability, movement techniques, and ability to break through obstacles, among other things.
And this was only the first assessment of the martial examination.
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The assessments had begun gradually at the Chen hour, so the small