Afternoon.
The gong on the training ground had barely fallen silent when several hundred people eliminated in the first round were driven out the gate, their heads hanging low. The half who remained didn't look much happier.
The dusty rest area was sharply divided into two worlds.
Beneath the awnings on the east side, several large basins of ice steamed in the heat. The Aristocratic Clan scions lounged, fanning themselves, while maids brought them chilled sour plum soup.
Jin Shijie sat with one leg crossed over the other in a Grand Master Chair, surrounded by a ring of obsequious hangers-on. Every so often, a burst of grating laughter rang out.
By contrast, on the open ground to the west, hundreds of commoner candidates like Chen Ping could only huddle beneath a few sparse old locust trees.
Chen Ping crouched at the very edge of the shade, minimizing his movements as much as possible. Even his breathing was slow and faint.
The Longevity of Pine and Crane circulated slowly within him, quickly restoring his stamina during this brief respite.
"Hey, you big idiot over there! Make room for me!"
A shrill shout shattered the hush.
One of the sharp-faced lackeys at Jin Shijie's side had wandered over at some point. He carried a baton and pointed arrogantly at Tie Niu, who was leaning against the tree trunk with his eyes closed.
Tie Niu's eyes flew open, their bell-sized pupils threaded with bloodshot veins.
He had already spent a good deal of strength in the stone-lock lifting round and was in a foul mood. When he saw the lackey picking a fight for no reason, he sprang to his feet, his tower-like frame casting a vast shadow.
"Did your family plant this tree? Why should I move?"
Tie Niu's booming voice made the cicadas in the tree pause for a moment.
"Why? Because this is the spot Young Master Jin picked out to tie up his horse!"
The lackey looked amused, smacking the baton against his palm now and then.
"What's the matter, got a problem? Believe it or not, I can make sure you never even get on the platform this afternoon."
Tie Niu was a straightforward man. How could he stomach this kind of insult? The veins bulged in his neck, and his fan-sized palm was about to swing.
A lean but powerful hand silently clamped around Tie Niu's wrist.
Chen Ping's sallow face wore his trademark ingratiating smile, but his body was wedged between the two like a nail. Lowering his voice, he said into Tie Niu's ear:
"Brother Tie Niu, don't lose your temper. If you fight now, you'll give them the perfect excuse to disqualify you. Save your strength for the exam. Don't fall for their provocation."
Tie Niu stiffened. The words "disqualify you" forced his impulsive anger back down.
He panted hard and glared at the lackey, then finally jerked his hand free and plopped back onto the ground.
Chen Ping turned to the lackey, bowing and scraping with a sheepish smile.
"Sir, I'll talk some sense into him. You're a great man who won't hold a grudge against a nobody. Please don't take offense at this lout."
Seeing Tie Niu back down and Chen Ping's spineless manner, the lackey lost interest.
He spat a thick glob of phlegm onto the ground right beside Chen Ping's feet.
"Tch. So you're a coward. What kind of trash do you think you are, taking the Imperial Military Examination?"
With that, he sauntered away. As he left, his vicious gaze raked over Chen Ping, clearly fixing his face in memory.
Chen Ping kept his head down, staring at the glob of phlegm. His humble expression didn't waver, but the fingers hidden in his sleeve gently rubbed together.
Above the character for patience sat a knife.
Showing off his courage now would only make him a target for everyone.
The Jin Family held great power. If they set their sights on him now, there would likely be all sorts of underhanded tricks waiting for him in the afternoon's combat trials.
Once the lackey had gone, Chen Ping sat cross-legged again. As he drank, his gaze casually swept across the grounds.
Apart from Aristocratic Clan scions like Jin Shijie, who made no effort to hide who they were, there were plenty of other tough opponents concealed in the crowd.
The man in the blue short jacket at the front left had bulging temples. His chest barely rose and fell as he breathed—he had clearly practiced inner breath control.
The skinny man on the right, who kept filing his nails, had thick, blackened knuckles. He had likely trained in a vicious technique like Eagle Claw.
Chen Ping silently marked them with red crosses in his mind.
If he encountered them, he absolutely couldn't let his guard down.
Suddenly, his gaze stopped.
In the shadow of a broken wall, far from the crowd, stood a young man in black.
He held a sheathed long sword in his arms. He was like a thousand-year-old block of ice, and no one dared go within three feet of him.
The man sensed the gaze on him and looked up sharply.
What a sharp gaze!
Chen Ping's heart gave a jolt. He hurriedly looked away, pretending to watch a nearby vendor.
The Black-Clad Man was named Leng Feng. Chen Ping had noticed him earlier, during the stone-lock lifting.
He hadn't used brute force at all. He'd lifted a three-hundred-pound stone lock with one hand as easily as picking up a piece of tofu. And the murderous aura that burst from him in that instant had the unmistakable scent of someone who'd survived a mountain of corpses.
He was a formidable rival, even more dangerous than Jin Shijie.
"Come and get them! Our ancestral Strength Pills! One pill makes you as strong as an ox—guaranteed three straight wins on the platform this afternoon!"
"Victory Charms hand-drawn by Maoshan Taoists! Stick one to your chest and you'll be impervious to blades and spears!"
A few vendors who had sneaked in through a gap were shouting their wares as they wove through the crowd.
The multicolored pills gave off a strange odor, and the crudely drawn charms were so poorly made that anyone could see they were scams.
Yet plenty of candidates still crowded around them.
Some emptied their purses to buy a Strength Pill and swallowed it on the spot.
Others tremblingly stuck a Victory Charm to their underclothes, muttering prayers under their breath.
Watching this, Chen Ping felt nothing but a faint urge to laugh.
When people were desperate and anxious, they'd cling to even a straw as if it were a lifeline.
Too bad there were never any shortcuts on the path of martial arts.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Three rolls of the war drum sounded, shaking everyone's hearts.
The noisy training ground fell silent in an instant. Every eye turned toward the General's Platform.
An armored examiner strode forward and unfurled a scroll of yellow silk. His voice rang like a bell.
"Midday has passed. The combat trials begin! The rules are simple: draw lots and fight in pairs. Step off the platform and you lose. Surrender and you lose. Death and injury... are of no concern!"
Those last four words carried a bloody chill. Many inexperienced youths who had never seen blood turned deathly pale.
Chen Ping drew a deep breath and rose, following the crowd toward the lottery box.
The Longevity of Pine and Crane circulated faster within him, bringing his body into the ideal state—relaxed on the outside, tense within.
He reached into the box. His fingertips touched a bamboo slip, cold to the touch.
He pulled it out and read: Group D, number seven.
"Group D, number seven, step up!"
At the examiner's command, Chen Ping lowered his head, hunched his shoulders, and climbed step by step onto the platform built from rough-hewn timber.
His opponent was already standing there.
He was a mountain of flesh.
The burly man stood nearly two meters tall, bare-chested and covered in black hair. He held a pair of Flower-engraved Axes, each as large as a cartwheel.
Their blades glinted coldly, freshly sharpened.
When he saw the slight Chen Ping step onto the platform, the burly man grinned cruelly. He stuck out his crimson tongue and slowly licked the icy blade, as if gazing at a scrawny chicken waiting to be slaughtered.
"Kid, if you don't want to be chopped in half, get off the platform yourself."
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