Less than six hours remained before the Scorching Sun Golden Ranking was finalized.
Nearly all the seeds who had gone out to hunt the Demon Race or complete Dao Merit tasks had returned to their cave abodes early and entered the Ancient Demon Pass within the Void Mirage Realm for one final attempt.
No one dared take it lightly.
On one hand, the Golden Ranking's placements directly affected Dao Merit rewards.
On the other hand—
The seeds who had come to Prodigy Island were all geniuses from their respective factions, young and spirited. Unless the gap in strength was simply too great, none of them accepted being inferior to the others. Naturally, they competed in secret on the Golden Ranking.
Of course, there was another point everyone understood without saying:
The higher one ranked on the Golden Ranking, the more likely one was to catch the attention of top experts from the ten great factions.
If one could take a powerful expert as a master, the path to immortality would clearly stretch bright and open ahead.
Therefore—
Within the Ancient Demon Pass—
Every flicker of light on the Golden Ranking tugged tightly at the heartstrings of nearly a thousand Prodigy Island seeds.
Figures shot through formations like meteors, broke through passes, and fought bloody battles, all to raise their Golden Ranking placement by even one more spot.
Amid flashes of golden radiance, the rankings shifted madly.
Some rejoiced wildly, some slumped in despair, and some exhausted every scrap of their cultivation only to watch helplessly as later arrivals surpassed them.
Yet amid this frenzied contest—
One name that had originally ranked near the front had quietly fallen to one hundred ninety-third place.
It was still considered extremely high on the ranking, but it had completely dropped out of the first