A Duel and a Scramble for Business
"Fight!"
Bai Shuyan roared, blazing golden light surging around him. He raised a hand, and the Blazing Sun Star-Shattering Palm thundered toward Gu Fei with the force to burn the heavens.
The palm strike formed the illusory image of a great sun. Before it even reached him, the scorching heat wave had twisted the surrounding air into ripples.
Gu Fei's pupils contracted. He had never expected his opponent to abandon his signature martial art and use a palm technique he had never seen before.
The stinging heat on his skin sent a chill down his back. With no time to think, he slashed out with the Profound Ice Cold Night Saber.
A deep blue frost shimmered along the blade, and the frigid saber Qi collided with the crimson palm force!
"Boom!"
Spiderweb cracks spread across the ground as icy mist and sparks erupted together.
The frigid saber Qi that was the pride of the Profound Ice Cold Night Saber melted in an instant beneath the blazing palm force, like thin snow meeting boiling soup.
Gu Fei grunted, the web between his thumb and forefinger splitting from the impact. He staggered back three steps before he steadied himself, his boot soles gouging three deep furrows into the bluestone pavement.
Bai Shuyan attacked like a surging tide, his palm strikes turning into great suns that filled the sky.
Gu Fei gritted his teeth and swung his saber to block, only to find that his opponent's feints and real strikes flowed into one another, leaving him no way to evade.
"Clang!" The long saber flew from his hand, tracing a bright silver arc through the air before hitting the ground.
A streak of golden light followed, piercing Gu Fei's body and sending him flying backward like a kite with its string cut. He crashed heavily to the ground more than ten zhang away, blood spilling from the corner of his mouth.
Who am I? Where am I?
Gu Fei lay on the ground with a bewildered look, still reeling from the crushing defeat.
Ten moves. Just ten moves.
Bai Shuyan had utterly defeated him, and he had not even touched the hem of Bai Shuyan's clothes.
Suddenly, he pushed himself up and stared at Bai Shuyan with bloodshot eyes, roaring at the top of his lungs:
"Impossible!"
"How could you have become so strong?"
"I should have been the one to win! You must have used some underhanded trick!"
"If you're weak, practice more." Bai Shuyan sneered, his eyes full of disdain. "Slandering me in front of so many people? How ridiculous."
"You only beat me before because the Gu Household's cultivation method was better than mine. Now, you can't even touch the hem of my clothes!"
Hearing this, Gu Fei was so furious that he spat out a mouthful of blood.
"Impossible!"
"Absolutely impossible!"
"I have to win it back!"
With that, he rose unsteadily to his feet and staggered forward, about to charge again.
Just then, a figure appeared like a ghost.
Gu Qingchuan, the head of the Gu Household, appeared beside Gu Fei with a cold expression and lightly tapped the back of his son's neck.
Gu Fei's eyes rolled back, and he collapsed unconscious into his father's arms.
Gu Qingchuan shot Bai Shuyan a cold glance, then turned and left with his son in his arms.
Facing Gu Qingchuan's icy, knife-like gaze, Bai Shuyan merely smiled, unconcerned. Before long, even you won't be a match for me.
He recalled how, after losing to Gu Fei a few months ago, he had left Jiangling Prefecture City and traveled from place to place, intent on finding a powerful cultivation method to improve his cultivation.
Unexpectedly, he had acquired a system in Changling County and exchanged for a peerless cultivation method in the store.
After a period of arduous cultivation, he had broken straight through from the Early Innate Realm to the Middle Innate Realm.
Moreover, his current Middle Innate Realm was different from the ordinary Innate Realm of the martial world.
His was the Innate Realm of the Dao Seed Martial Dao Cultivation System, far stronger than the Innate Realm of the martial world.
With the system's help, his strength was still growing rapidly.
Even with his Grandmaster cultivation, Gu Qingchuan might not necessarily be able to beat him now.
Thus, he paid no heed to Gu Qingchuan's threatening gaze.
The spectators stood dumbfounded, unable to believe that Gu Fei had lost so quickly.
"What rotten luck!" A burly man with a thick beard kicked a wooden post beside him and said through gritted teeth:
"I bet a hundred taels of silver on Gu Fei to win. Who would've thought the brat couldn't even last ten moves? He's a complete waste!"
"Exactly! But how did Bai Shuyan suddenly become so terrifyingly strong?"
"That palm technique was terrifying. It was like the sun falling from the sky, so hot I couldn't even open my eyes!"
"I know the inside story!" Liu Guan, a middle-aged man in a blue robe, pushed his way to the front and deliberately spoke in a loud voice, his eyes gleaming with excitement.
"He's only that strong because of the system! That palm technique just now was the Blazing Sun Star-Shattering Palm, a supreme art he bought from the System Store!"
"A system? What's that?" The crowd gathered around him, a chorus of curious questions ringing out.
Liu Guan suddenly shouted at the top of his lungs, "Don't rush, everyone! I've got System Seeds here, free of charge! Line up! Once you bind a system, you can buy all the divine techniques and supreme arts you want!"
At those words, the crowd perked up and began shouting, "Is that true? Quick, give me one!"
Bai Shuyan was beside himself with anxiety at the sight.
He had challenged Gu Fei partly to take revenge, and partly to use the duel to make a splash so he could promote System Seeds and earn Energy Points.
Now someone had barged in and started handing out System Seeds ahead of him. Wasn't that stealing his business?
The imposing expert from a moment ago immediately put on a broad smile and shouted:
"Want to know how I got strong so quickly?"
"Then hurry over here!"
"My System Seeds are the genuine article. Bind one, and you can be as strong as me!"
The spectators instantly grew excited and flocked over to Bai Shuyan.
Looking at the densely packed crowd before him, Bai Shuyan grinned from ear to ear, as if he could already see Energy Points pouring toward him by the handful.
When Liu Guan saw the crowd surging toward Bai Shuyan like a tide, his face instantly darkened, and he bellowed:
"Don't be stupid! There's no difference between System Seeds!"
"If you all crowd over there, others will have already bound theirs by the time you get your hands on one."
"They'll have seized the advantage! First come, first served. One step too late, and you'll lose at the starting line!"
Several people at the front who had gotten seeds could not wait to bind their systems.
In an instant, one of them suddenly jumped up, eyes wide, and let out an earth-shaking cry:
"Whoa! This system is incredible! The store is full of peerless divine techniques."
"No wonder Bai Shuyan got so strong! Damn! So you can earn Energy Points by giving away free System Seeds!"
Once the man realized this, he immediately began making plans:
"If I sell my cultivation method to the store, I can use the Energy Points to buy System Seeds and hand them out too. Wouldn't that earn me Energy Points?"
The thought immediately made his eyes light up with excitement, and he hurriedly sold his cultivation method to the System Store.
As soon as 1,110 Energy Points were credited to him, he bought System Seeds and began handing them out to the people around him.
More and more people at the scene followed suit, copying this way of earning Energy Points.
Some quicker-witted people took off for other parts of the prefecture city without another word.
Rather than fight for business here, they might as well open up new markets elsewhere.
Just like that, the system hosts scattered in all directions.
Before long, all of Jiangling Prefecture City was caught up in a frenzy of handing out System Seeds, and people were talking about the system in every street and alley.