"Brother Pei Ye, you're now one of the sixty-four strongest people in Bowang Prefecture!"
"Win one more match and you'll be in the top thirty-two!"
Pei Ye sat down with a smile and complained, "Cheer a little louder next time. I couldn't hear you down there."
Several mouths immediately crowded up to his ears. "We shouted ourselves hoarse!!"
Pei Ye bent over, covered his ears, and begged for mercy.
With that match finished, the boy's fighting for the day was over. People called the first day of the Martial Competition "the great waves sifting the sand." Across sixty-four matches, some began to shine, while others remained nameless. This was also the day the spectators got to know the competitors, matching each name on the roster to those figures dodging, attacking, and defending on the platforms.
Pei Ye sat beside Master Huang, watching the remaining matches amid the children's overlapping questions.
No one familiar appeared in the next three matches. Only in the fourth did a light, graceful streak of green leap onto the third platform. Pei Ye straightened and called to the children, "Quick, look at your Sister Piao Qing."
Her victory was clean and decisive. Her opponent was the boy from Jade Feather named Cui Xiaoyan. The girl spared him no dignity, sending him off to the losers' platform in a single move.
"Brother Pei, Sister Piao Qing is much stronger than you!"
Zhang Junxue was also on the third platform, going on immediately after Li Piaoqing. Her opponent was a saber wielder from Can County. After just one exchange, she pinned his saber beneath hers. He tugged with all his strength three times without budging it and could only concede in red-faced embarrassment, drawing cheerful laughter from the crowd.
On the fourth platform, Zhang Mozhu and Yang Yan