No Glory for the Victor

"Won?"

Wang Shuo's mouth hung open, the words caught in his throat. On the arena, Instructor Chen had already rushed forward.

Ignoring Wu Gang, who was still lying prone, he darted in two strides to where Lu Yuan had just stood. He crouched and scraped his fingernails hard across the granite surface.

Scritch-

The buzzing below the arena fell silent.

Lu Yuan held his left hand open, his Blue Silver Grass still out. Three leaves drooped limply, their tips smeared with a little sticky, translucent gray-green sap.

He raised his right hand and slowly wiped it off with his sleeve.

His movements were exceedingly gentle.

"Found it!" Instructor Chen barked, pinching up a trace of grayish-white powder. It had been mixed with dust in a crack between the stones, invisible without a close look. He held it up and turned toward the judges' seats. "Withered Leaf Snake venom gland powder! Lu Yuan, explain yourself!"

The crowd erupted.

"He used poison?!"

"I knew something was wrong!"

"A Trash Martial Soul can only resort to dirty tricks..."

Curses and boos surged up together.

Lu Yuan wiped away the sap, put away his Blue Silver Grass, and looked up at the speck of powder. "Instructor," he reported, his voice almost too steady, "that isn't poison."

"Bullshit!" Instructor Chen swore. "The academy warehouse records are perfectly clear! It has a paralyzing effect! You stole it from Zhou Chun's laboratory, didn't you?"

"It was a laboratory sample," Lu Yuan admitted. "But I treated it last night. I baked it at high heat and rinsed it in clean water, leaving only its stickiness. Its paralytic toxicity is below the safety threshold and has no substantial effect on a Soul Master's physique. An instructor from the potions department can test it on the spot."

Instructor Chen was at a loss for words.

He held the powder between trembling fingers. A test? The procedure was a hassle, and if the result...

Someone below shouted, "That's still not allowed! Outside objects that aren't Martial Souls are banned in the assessment!"

"That's right! Rules are rules!"

As if clutching at a life-saving straw, Instructor Chen immediately turned toward the voice and snorted loudly. "Hear that? Rules!" He glared at Lu Yuan. "Even if it isn't poisonous, using an outside object is a violation!"

"Instructor."

A cool female voice cut in.

Shen Moxin had arrived at the edge of the arena at some point. She didn't climb up, but looked up at Instructor Chen, her eyes behind her glasses frighteningly bright.

"Chapter three, article seven of the Annual Assessment Regulations," she said at an unhurried pace, every word clear. "'Students may not use auxiliary items such as Soul Tools, potions, or talismans that are not derived from their own Martial Souls and possess a direct offensive or defensive effect.'"

She paused.

"What Lu Yuan used was treated residue from a low-level Soul Beast material, with the property of adhesion. It has no 'direct offensive or defensive effect.' It doesn't even have a mechanism for activating on its own. It had to soak into the veins of the Blue Silver Grass leaves and work in combination with his opponent's momentum and weight to produce a slight delay."

She pushed up her glasses.

"This was more like a temporary extension of a Martial Soul's properties. If that counts as a violation, then when a Soul Master with a Beast Martial Soul uses their claws and teeth after possession to tear an opponent's clothing and hinder their movement, should that also be ruled a violation?"

The crowd below fell silent for a moment.

Shen Moxin didn't need an answer.

"Lu Yuan merely combined several properties everyone knows about, but everyone considers useless, under specific circumstances to produce an extremely slight, one-time effect." Her gaze swept over the students who had just been booing and cursing. "If that's called 'crooked trickery,' then I'd like to ask: what is the 'proper path' we teach? Does higher Soul Power guarantee victory? Is a stronger Martial Soul bound to crush its opponent? When facing a desperate situation, has even trying for a sliver of possibility within the rules become a crime?"

The crowd fell completely silent.

Only the rustling of wind through the old trees remained.

Instructor Chen's chest heaved. He wanted to retort, but for a moment couldn't find the words. Shen Moxin had cited the regulations verbatim, pinned down the definition of "direct effect," and raised the issue to one of teaching philosophy.

After struggling for a long moment, he gritted his teeth. "That's sophistry! By your logic, if everyone resorts to underhanded tricks in future assessments, will they still practice actual combat or not?"

"If 'underhanded tricks' can win," Shen Moxin said without giving an inch, "doesn't that show that the 'proper path' we teach isn't enough, or... that there's a problem with how we teach it?"

Those words were too harsh.

At the judges' seats, a gray-haired elder stood and coughed. "Instructor Chen, Assistant Instructor Shen," he said, his voice gentle but carrying weight, "the assessment is still underway, and so many students are watching. The committee can deliberate on the specific regulations and how to classify this afterward. For now, shouldn't we first make a provisional ruling on the outcome based on what happened here?"

As if seizing a way out, Instructor Chen immediately looked at the elder. "Elder Li, you mean..."

"It is a fact that Wu Gang fell out of the arena," Elder Li said slowly. "Regardless of how it happened, the result is that he left the boundary. Under the rules, going out of bounds means defeat."

He looked at Lu Yuan.

"Whether there was a violation or an opportunistic trick, the committee will retrieve the records and review them later. But today's outcome must first be settled."

Instructor Chen's lips moved. At last, he turned toward the center of the arena with extreme reluctance.

He took a deep breath, his voice sounding as though it were being forced through his teeth.

"For this assessment, Lu Yuan... wins."

Those three words weighed ten thousand pounds.

There was no applause below the arena. Only a heavy silence, broken by scattered muttering.

Supported by others, Wu Gang stared fixedly at Lu Yuan, his eyes so red they looked ready to bleed, his venomous hatred almost taking solid form.

Lu Yuan met his gaze, his face expressionless.

After making the announcement, Instructor Chen did not immediately step down. He took two steps forward to the edge of the arena, swept his gaze over the students below, and deliberately raised his voice:

"A win is a win."

He paused.

"But the path of opportunistic tricks is never the proper one. The annual assessment's overall evaluation takes more than victory or defeat into account. It also weighs a student's temperament and foundations, as well as their conduct in battle."

His words came down like a bucket of cold water.

He had all but stated outright that Lu Yuan would not receive a high score for this victory. It might even affect his final rating and allocation of resources.

Shen Moxin's fingers clenched sharply inside her sleeve. She looked at Elder Li, but he merely shook his head slightly and sighed.

Lu Yuan lowered his eyes.

He brushed nonexistent dust from his sleeve and turned toward the arena steps. His stride was still steady, his back straight, but as he walked down the steps, the sunlight cast his small, thin shadow across the stone, stretching it long and solitary.

The crowd parted of its own accord, leaving a narrow gap.

He passed through it and headed for the shade at the edge of the training ground. Wang Shuo and Bai Zhi were waiting there, Wang Shuo pale and Bai Zhi biting her lip.

No one spoke.

In the distance, beneath an old locust tree at the edge of the crowd, Teacher Sun had appeared at some point and was leaning there with his arms folded, his gaze resting on Lu Yuan's retreating figure.

The faintest curve appeared at the corner of his mouth.

On the top floor of the library, behind that window.

Ning Zhishou lowered his monocular far-seeing Soul Tool and sat back in his wooden chair. A sheet of letter paper lay open on the desk, only a few lines written on it, the ink still wet.

He picked up his brush and paused after the heading "Practical combat assessment performance," then wrote two phrases:

"Victory. Opportunistic trick."

The brush tip hovered for a moment, then he drew two heavy lines beneath the phrases.

Outside the window, the clamor of the training ground had completely faded, leaving only the afternoon sunlight shining starkly on the empty arena.

On the granite surface, the crack between the stones where the powder had been scraped out looked like a fresh scar.