Clean and Neat

Chen Xuan was in no rush to head over, instead controlling his Cloud Sword to land a few finishing blows.

Only after confirming the Black Iron Bear was dead did Chen Xuan approach to examine the carcass.

After glancing at the miserable state of the Black Iron Bear, Chen Xuan stowed it away into his Storage Bag.

Everything harvested within the secret realm, including slain demonic beasts, could be kept by the sect disciples.

This was considered a perk for the disciples participating in the trial.

However, to claim this perk, one required sufficient strength.

"Flowing Cloud Myriad Forms truly lives up to its reputation as a top-tier Daoist technique; this thing is incredibly useful."

Chen Xuan couldn't help but sigh with emotion in his heart.

Having put away the Black Iron Bear's corpse.

He didn't dawdle, instead executing Flowing Cloud Moon-Stepping to depart the area and go in search of tokens.

Sect Plaza.

The three elders watched the light screens in the plaza; although there were three thousand screens, their spiritual sense was strong enough to observe the situation of all three thousand individuals simultaneously.

"This little fellow... despite not having a Spirit Body, he has reached the third level of Qi Gathering, and his mastery of two Daoist techniques is quite profound. Which peak does this disciple belong to?"

Among the three elders, the one resembling a white-haired old man asked the two beside him with curiosity.

The middle-aged elder shook his head; he did not recognize him.

The other female elder also shook her head.

"Check which peak that little fellow belongs to."

The middle-aged elder summoned a disciple from the Deacon Hall.

"Yes, Elder."

The Deacon Hall disciple immediately went to check the information on this year's new disciples.

Soon, the Deacon Hall uncovered Chen Xuan's identity.

The Deacon Hall disciple returned to the three elders and reported, "Elder, this person is named Chen Xuan. During the entrance examination, his temperament was considered excellent, but his talent ranked in the lower tier among the new disciples, so he was ultimately assigned to Hundred Herb Valley."

"Hundred Herb Valley? To be able to cultivate to the third level of Qi Gathering in three months in that place!?"

The female elder said in surprise.

"Average talent yet not shallow cultivation... it seems this kid has had some opportunities of his own."

The middle-aged elder said with a smile.

The white-haired elder looked at the two and said, "Hundred Herb Valley is subordinate to the Pill Hall, and the Pill Hall is subordinate to my Danxiao Peak. After the trial ends, let this little fellow join my Danxiao Peak. What do you think, Junior Brother Zhang, Junior Sister Song?"

"Then let it be as you say, Senior Brother."

Elder Zhang shook his head, having no intention of competing for the person.

Chen Xuan's performance was indeed decent, but they were all Purple Mansion elders; Chen Xuan was not yet worth them fighting over.

Inside the secret realm.

Chen Xuan was unaware of the situation outside and was currently scouring the mountains and plains for tokens.

After searching for half a day, he realized this wouldn't do.

How long would this take? The tokens were so small and randomly scattered.

The efficiency was too low.

Chen Xuan pondered for a moment and decided to stop looking for tokens and start looking for people instead.

Finding people was much easier.

Working hard was simply not as fast as robbery.

Once the thought arose, the world suddenly felt vast!

Chen Xuan began searching for his fellow sect disciples.

After spending some time, he found a disciple.

Looking at the other person, Chen Xuan quickly came up with a plan.

Fighting head-on was out of the question; he intended to ambush him.

If he fought directly, even though he was stronger, the other party would still have a chance to tear their Teleportation Talisman. While half of the opponent's tokens would still be deducted and given to him, half... was not what he wanted; he wanted them all!

An ambush was different; it was much safer.

Chen Xuan hid in a tree, concealing his aura, and waited until the other party approached before directly executing Flowing Cloud Myriad Forms.

The cloud energy transformed into an extremely long silk ribbon, rapidly shooting toward the target, with one end instantly binding the person while the other end covered their eyes.

"Hey..."

The opponent let out a startled cry, but before he could scream, the Cloud Qi Silk Scarf bound his mouth shut as well.

Chen Xuan dropped from the tree, landing almost silently.

Yet, the opponent still sensed someone approaching.

By now, however, he was already wrapped like a mummy by the Cloud Qi Silk Scarf, and could only squirm frantically on the ground.

"Mmph... mmph..."

Chen Xuan did not dawdle, quickly locating the man's Storage Bag.

He promptly wiped the imprint from the Storage Bag and removed its contents.

There were not many tokens, only a few pieces.

Chen Xuan stowed the tokens away, returned the Storage Bag to the man, and immediately took off.

After running a fair distance, Chen Xuan's cloud qi dissipated automatically.

The man was still dazed.

Seeing the Storage Bag beside him, he hurriedly picked it up to check.

Everything else was intact, but the few tokens he had spent ages painstakingly searching for were gone.

"You beast... you absolute beast!"

A grown man was actually moved to tears by his rage.

Being robbed was one thing, but to be ambushed on top of that?

Being ambushed was bad enough, but he didn't even know who had robbed him.

The more he thought about it, the more aggrieved he felt.

They were all fellow disciples; how could someone pull such a stunt? This was treating him like some sort of demonic heretic!

In the plaza.

The three elders were all stunned by Chen Xuan's actions.

"Was this kid some kind of mountain bandit before he joined the sect?" Elder Zhang remarked.

"But you have to admit, his movements are quite nimble. He tied that man up like a zongzi in the blink of an eye; his mastery of Flowing Cloud Myriad Forms is truly impressive. He's efficient, too—he secured all of the other disciple's tokens in one go, and didn't even forget to cover the man's eyes." Elder Xie of Danxiao Peak said with a chuckle.

He was currently looking at the boy through rose-tinted glasses.

Since Chen Xuan would soon be a disciple of Danxiao Peak, he found everything the boy did pleasing to the eye.

"Oh, Senior Brother Xie, Senior Brother Xie."

Elder Zhang and Elder Song both smiled at these words, saying nothing more.

Over the next three days.

The three thousand disciples within the Floating Cloud Secret Realm dwindled steadily, with hundreds already eliminated or having given up and left the realm.

However, compared to previous years, this number was actually quite low.

Chen Xuan deserved some of the credit for that.

Many disciples had originally intended to give up once they found a few tokens.

But then, some had the misfortune of running into Chen Xuan and getting their tokens snatched.

Having been robbed, they were naturally unwilling to quit; since they had no tokens left anyway, how much worse could things get?

Thus, many ended up staying behind.

Staying was a good thing.

To Chen Xuan, these were all leeks ready to be harvested.

In three days, he had encountered quite a few disciples.

However, their cultivation was only at the first or second level of Qi Gathering.

Most were at the first level, with second-level cultivators being a rare sight.

Robbing these disciples was effortless.

And one shouldn't underestimate these disciples; finding tokens was sometimes a matter of luck.

In three days, he had collected over three hundred tokens.

Likewise, he had managed to build up a bit of a reputation.

Thanks to the "publicity" from his victims, many people now knew that a sinister villain had arrived this year.

He only knows how to ambush his fellow disciples.

This caused his reputation to skyrocket; regardless of whether it was good or bad, his fame soared nonetheless.

Gaining such notoriety over this matter could be considered an unprecedented event.

In truth, the Floating Cloud Trial has been held for many years, and there have been others who chose to ambush their peers to obtain tokens.

However, those people were different from Chen Xuan; lacking sufficient control over Flowing Cloud Myriad Forms, their ambushes simply resulted in the elimination of their targets.

In such cases, the eliminated person would still be able to keep half of their tokens.

Chen Xuan was different; he would never harm a hair on your head, taking only the tokens.

It left people feeling both heartbroken over their lost tokens and relieved that they hadn't been eliminated.