Evan Yang turned around and smiled, "Lynn, you’re willing to risk yourself for a friend. As that friend, I feel lucky. I just can’t stand seeing so many people bully you today, so you don’t need to worry."
"But, Brother Mu..." Lynn Snowmoon wanted to speak but didn’t know how to begin.
"Don’t worry, they won’t dare act openly just yet." Evan smiled, then turned to face the four and continued, "So, have you all finished discussing?"
"Brother Mu, since you want to stand up for her, we’ll oblige you. But you must defeat all four of us!" Gavin Wu was pushed forward to represent the group and speak with Evan.
"Oh? All four at once, or one by one?" Evan sneered, surprised they actually wanted to fight.
Gavin Wu glanced at the other three and smiled, "Of course, one by one. We’d like to learn from Brother Mu."
"Oh? Who’s first?" Hearing it would be one at a time, Evan relaxed. As long as it wasn’t all four together, he was fully confident against these Core-Formation cultivators.
The four knew Evan’s aura was strong and didn’t want to lose too easily. They decided to send someone to test him first, and the lot fell to Jude Jiu, the Qi-Path Lineage representative.
Jude Jiu looked at the other three, sighed helplessly, and stepped forward with a smile, "I’m Jude Jiu of the Qi-Path Lineage."
"Please." Evan smiled.
"Let me set up a formation first." Brandon Tang glanced around the room and spoke to everyone present. They all nodded—without a protective formation, everything here could be destroyed, and the consequences would be unimaginable.
Brandon Tang set up a barrier on an open patch of ground. Since it was just a simple duel, the space wasn’t large—only enough for two people to fight inside.
"You two, go in." Brandon Tang pointed at the barrier he’d set up, speaking to Evan and Jude.
Jude glanced at everyone, then stepped inside. As Evan was about to enter, Lynn Snowmoon sent him a voice transmission: "Be careful, Qi-Path arts are special—they hurt people with qi."
Evan looked back at Lynn, nodded, and stepped into the barrier. Her words echoed in his mind: "Hurt people with qi?"
"Brother Mu, I’m from the Qi-Path Lineage. I hope you’ll give me some pointers!" Jude knew his real purpose was to test Evan’s true strength, while the other three watched Evan’s techniques from outside.
Seeing Jude so serious, Evan smiled, "I’ve actually been curious about the Qi-Path arts. Please, show me as much as you can today."
"Then I won’t hold back. Please!" Jude didn’t know Evan’s real strength, so he could only hope Evan would attack first.
"After you, Brother Jude." Evan didn’t know what ‘hurting people with qi’ meant, so he stayed cautious.
The two stood off like this, until Jude finally lost patience and snapped, "Don’t blame me then!" Suddenly, something flew from his right hand.
"?" The sudden flying object made Evan think it was some kind of hidden weapon, so he quickly dodged.
Evan dodged, and the object brushed past him, then vanished.
Such a strange attack—Evan had never encountered it before. He stared at his opponent, eyes serious.
"Brother Mu, impressive movement." Jude praised Evan for dodging his qi attack so easily.
"You flatter me, Brother Jude." Evan smiled, though he was secretly thinking that if several such attacks came in succession, he’d be in trouble.
Jude had no idea what Evan was really thinking, assuming he’d just dodged easily. Jude became extra cautious, forcing Evan to bring out his Life-Bound Weapon.
Fast, precise, ruthless—a phantom-like weapon shot out from Evan’s body. When everyone looked closely, they saw Jude’s right hand had been destroyed.
"Ah!" Jude screamed in pain, not even knowing what happened. The pain from his hand startled the other three, who didn’t dare meet Evan’s eyes. Brandon Tang quickly collapsed the formation and carried Jude out.
Fortunately, Jude’s willpower was strong—he didn’t faint, but immediately sealed his bleeding hand, glaring at Evan. "Brother Mu, your methods are impressive!"
"I just recently practiced a new art and wanted to try it out. Hope you don’t mind." Evan smiled, though he secretly sighed in relief—if he hadn’t controlled the attack just now, it would have struck Jude’s dantian and crippled him completely, leading to retaliation from the Qi-Path Lineage.
"Brother Mu, remember this day. I’ll come find you again! Let’s go!" Gavin Wu cursed, seeing Jude defeated in a single move, then quickly helped the other two support Jude out, leaving Lynn Snowmoon and Faye Violet stunned.
Evan had already recalled his Life-Bound dagger. He’d used it for a swift strike, and since his cultivation was already early Core-Formation, Jude’s qi attacks simply couldn’t compare.
"Brother Mu, thank you." Lynn hurried forward to thank Evan for offending the four on her behalf and resolving the crisis.
"No need to be so formal, Lynn." Evan smiled.
After Faye transmitted a few private words, Lynn embarrassedly said, "Brother Mu, I have some things to take care of today. If you ever need help, just come find me at Flowerview Garden." "Oh? Alright, take care, Lynn." Evan was briefly startled, then smiled.
Before leaving, Lynn glanced back at Evan, making him feel as if she’d seen through his disguise. He wondered, "Did she figure it out?"
"Kid, you’re ruthless." Suddenly, Old Clam’s voice sounded.
"If I wasn’t ruthless, I’d have to fight all four at once. Isn’t this better?" This was exactly the result Evan wanted—to intimidate the other three.
"It’s effective, but you’ve made an enemy of the Qi-Path Lineage." Old Clam replied.
"Qi-Path, is it really that powerful?" Evan recalled Jude’s sudden attack, but didn’t find anything else special.
Old Clam scolded him, "You only faced a relatively weak Qi-Path cultivator. If you met someone above Core-Formation—breaking-core and beyond—even that qi just now could have shredded you."
Evan was startled by Old Clam’s words, then asked curiously, "What exactly was that thing he fired just now?"
"That was qi!" Old Clam replied.
"Qi? But I saw it was red." Evan remembered the flash of red light, thinking it was a flying weapon.
Old Clam chuckled, "You only saw the lowest-level qi. Intermediate qi is blue, advanced is purple."
"There are levels to this qi?" Evan didn’t understand.
"Of course. The higher the level, the harder to cultivate. It’s a method that transforms one’s spiritual power into qi and fires it out like a hidden weapon." Seeing Evan’s confusion, Old Clam explained further.
"Can I cultivate it?" Evan felt this technique was useful for sneak attacks.
Old Clam paused, then laughed, "Of course you can."
"Oh? Too bad I didn’t see clearly how he did it just now." Evan was happy, then disappointed.
"Don’t worry, I have a manual specifically for cultivating qi. Take a look—I hope it’s useful to you." Old Clam finished speaking and transmitted a stream of information directly into Evan’s mind.
Seeing the new information in his mind, Evan asked curiously, "How do you have this technique?"
"I’m old—I like collecting things. Years ago, a qi cultivator tried to catch me, but I ended up defeating him and took his manual. It seemed interesting, so I kept it. Didn’t expect you’d benefit from it today." Old Clam explained with a laugh.
After Old Clam’s explanation, Evan understood. He found an inn and, under Old Clam’s concealment, began cultivating qi.
According to Old Clam, the manual was called the Moving-Qi Art, divided into upper, middle, and lower sections. Only after mastering the lower part and having enough internal qi could one progress further. With Evan’s current early Core-Formation realm, he could only practice the lower section.
Two days later, Evan walked out of the inn again. His graceful bearing made it hard to believe he was the same person who used to be a beggar.
"Everyone else’s qi has color, but mine is colorless. So weird." While cultivating, Evan discovered that the qi he produced was colorless, unlike Old Clam’s descriptions of red, blue, or purple.
Old Clam had heard Evan mention this and just thought he was a freak. In the end, he let it go.
But colorless qi had its advantages—when attacking, others couldn’t detect it. Evan felt secretly pleased, recalling how the qi could injure unarmored cultivators of the same realm, though its power couldn’t compare to his dagger.
Evan learned this qi technique mostly out of curiosity, and figured it’d be useful for sneak attacks every now and then.
While Evan was lost in thought, he noticed the streets were much emptier. After asking around, he learned the preliminary trials were starting today.
"It’s already been over ten days? I’ll look for Brother Lin." Evan hadn’t expected the trials to come so soon, so he went to the inn to find Lin Yi, but everyone had left—Lin Yi was nowhere to be seen.
"Did he go to watch the trials too?" Evan wondered aloud, then, following directions, headed toward a mountain peak inside Budian City.
By now, a huge crowd had gathered at the base of the mountain—many were even flying overhead.
"This is incredible." Evan was shocked by the sea of people surrounding the mountain.
"Look at you, all scared." Old Clam mocked Evan.
"There must be tens of thousands of cultivators here," Evan said, feeling a bit overwhelmed.
"Ever seen hundreds of thousands of cultivators in battle?" Old Clam ignored him and replied.
"Is that even possible?" Evan knew there were many cultivators, but surely not hundreds of thousands fighting at once.
Old Clam thought Evan was clueless, so he transmitted an image into Evan’s mind. Evan saw countless cultivators—humans, bizarre spirit beasts, sea beasts—covering the surface of the sea.
"What is this?" Evan was stunned by the sight of cultivators surrounding sea beasts, and sea beasts counterattacking humans.