I Have a Plan

Seeing Long Hengxu grow more excited the more he spoke, Yu Zhen smiled and waved his hand. "All right, all right, Director Long. The Skysea Alliance Grand Competition is next semester, after all. Let's consider this semester's Class Promotion Tournament first!"

Eastsea Academy had a tradition: at the start of every academic year, the academy held a major competition for both the intermediate and advanced divisions.

The intermediate division had six grades, and every class in all six grades participated in the Class Promotion Tournament.

The rules of the Class Promotion Tournament were simple, direct, fair, and transparent. The competition began with the weakest class in each grade issuing a challenge. Class Five challenged Class Four, Class Four challenged Class Three, and so on, challenging upward in rank.

A victorious challenger could directly swap class-number rankings with the defeated class. Simply put, as long as Grade One Class Five defeated Grade One Class Four, the bottom-ranked Class Five could immediately become Class Four and move up in rank.

Lower-ranked classes were entitled to keep challenging. After winning, they could continue challenging upward until they lost. Challenges spanned every grade, with all six grades, from first to sixth, open to one another.

Competing teams could challenge not only classes in their own grade but, provided they were strong enough, classes in higher grades as well. For every victory against a higher grade, the academy awarded generous special prizes, ranging from cultivation resources and Soul Tools to access to cultivation grounds.

This competition was both a contest of each class's strength and the best stage for students to fight for resources and display their talents. It was also a contest over the face of every class and its teachers.

In previous years, the Class Promotion Tournament had tested each class's overall average strength. The gaps in strength were small, and wins and losses were all within reason, so no one paid too much attention.

But this year was different.

Bai Yushan's appearance had shattered every balance of strength in Eastsea Academy's intermediate division.

He could fight a Soul Emperor at the Soul Elder level head-on across levels without falling behind, and crush geniuses at his own level as though crushing ants.

With such heaven-defying combat strength, he simply had no opponent anywhere in the intermediate division.

As long as Bai Yushan was willing to fight, Freshman Class One could absolutely sweep every class in its grade during the Class Promotion Tournament, crushing its way through and easily claiming first place in Grade One.

And that was not even the most crucial point.

With Bai Yushan's strength, he could challenge higher grades all the way, fighting from Grade One into Grade Two and Grade Three, and directly taking on the top classes in Grades Five and Six.

If that happened, every competing upper-grade student and the teachers leading them would lose all face.

The upper-grade students had cultivated diligently for years, with cultivation and actual combat experience far beyond those of the freshmen, only to end up crushed all the way through by a first-year student who had just enrolled, with no one able to stop him. This Class Promotion Tournament would become a humiliation for the upper grades of Eastsea Academy's entire intermediate division.

This was the problem that gave Yu Zhen and Long Hengxu the greatest headache.

If they allowed Bai Yushan to compete and crush his way through the higher grades, the academy's upper-grade teachers and students would lose all face, and the internal atmosphere would grow tense, breeding countless conflicts. If they restricted Bai Yushan's participation, they would bury a genius's strength, waste a perfect opportunity for him to shine, and fail his talent.

The two exchanged a glance, both looking utterly helpless, caught in a dilemma. Silence fell over the office for a moment, and the atmosphere grew particularly heavy.

Just as the two were at their wits' end, racking their brains for a solution, Long Hengxu abruptly raised his head. A flash of inspiration crossed his eyes, and he spoke rapidly.

"Ah! Dean, I have a plan!"

Yu Zhen looked at him at once, his face full of astonishment.

"What? You have a plan? Out with it!"

Long Hengxu stepped forward with a smile and explained it at an unhurried pace...

Bai Yushan arrived at the auction house in the center of Eastsea City. After checking it against the address in his mind and confirming it was correct, he reached into the backpack he carried and took out a pure white mask.

The mask was cool to the touch and fitted the contours of his face, covering most of it securely and leaving only his narrow, indifferent eyes exposed. Once he had put it on, he walked straight through the grand, luxurious entrance of the auction house.

The attendant stationed at the entrance immediately hurried forward and respectfully offered a reminder.

"Hello, sir. There is no auction today. The exhibition area for the items being auctioned in three days is over there."

Bai Yushan ignored the attendant's directions, his eyes remaining unruffled as his fingertips trembled slightly. A faint bioelectric current quietly flowed, slightly altering his originally clear, youthful voice into a deep, hoarse one that gave away nothing of his true age.

He casually took out an antique-looking black token and held it out to the attendant, his tone flat and brief.

"Lead the way."

The instant the attendant saw the token clearly, the professional, polite smile vanished from his face, replaced by heartfelt respect as he adopted an exceedingly humble posture.

"This way, sir."

With that, the attendant bowed and led the way, taking Bai Yushan past the guests coming and going in the front hall and into the auction house's dedicated staff passage farther inside.

After turning left and right along the way and passing through several quiet corridors, the two finally stopped before a concealed elevator. It had no external signage at all, and an ordinary person would never have found the entrance.

They rode the elevator slowly downward, its thick insulating doors shutting out all the clamor aboveground. Just over ten seconds later, the elevator doors opened, and a mingled scent of liquor, gun smoke, sweat, and extravagance struck them in the face.

This was Eastsea City's most secretive, most exclusive underground fighting arena, located on the lowest level of the auction house.

Compared with the underground illicit fighting arena in Aolai City's slums, this place was the opposite extreme.

Aolai City's illicit fighting arena was filthy, chaotic, and dilapidated, its air foul and thick with blood and the viciousness of desperate men. It was an outlet for desperate criminals and down-and-out sailors at the bottom of society. Most of its fighters had killings to their names, clinging to life and risking their lives merely to scrape together a living.

Eastsea City's underground fighting arena, however, was extravagantly luxurious and resplendent in gold. Brilliant lights illuminated the spacious venue, its decor exquisite and carefully chosen. Booths and sofas stood in neat rows around it, and everyone coming and going belonged to high society, dressed in finery and possessing an extraordinary presence.

This was a playground for the highest-ranking powerful elites, where the wealthy squandered resources without restraint, indulged their desires, and watched the most primal, brutal fights to the death.

Liquor, lust, wealth, and indulgence intertwined within the arena. The greed, delusion, and anger in human hearts spread unchecked, and extravagance and madness seeped from every corner.

Bai Yushan stood at the entrance and swiftly swept his gaze across the entire venue, not the slightest ripple appearing in his eyes.

For three years, Chen Qingquan had taken him to Aolai City's underground illicit fighting arena every weekend. His strength had grown too quickly, and the power accumulated within his body surged in vast torrents. Ordinary cultivation could not fully vent it; only this most primal form of mortal combat could let him completely release his excess vigor.

Chen Qingquan knew his temperament and understood his strength. Every time, he tacitly allowed him to enter the ring and fight, but strictly forbade him from having any dealings with the other fighters or the financial backers behind the scenes, allowing him only to fight.

Throughout three years of underground mortal combat, he had always worn this pure white mask and never shown his face. Over time, everyone in Aolai City's underground fighting arena came to know of a mysterious fighter in a white mask who had never lost and whose combat strength crushed everyone there. His reputation had long since been firmly established.

A year earlier, he had won a main-event bout and pinned his opponent firmly beneath his foot against the floor of the ring. Unable to accept the humiliation, the defeated fighter had mocked him on the spot.

The man had mocked him for only being able to throw his weight around in a small place like Aolai City, saying he would spend his whole life fighting bottom-tier illicit matches, and that if he had any ability, he should try his luck in the larger Eastsea City.

Bai Yushan had remembered those words to this day.