Lin Yun’s words caused a commotion among the crowd. People already started to take note of him when he ascended the city wall three days ago, so a lot of people were focused on his battle. They wanted to see his strength.
“Consider it my loss if you can draw your sword? Isn’t that a little too arrogant…”
“Haha, he has quite the character. Is it because his sword is faster than Mo Qi’s reaction time?”
“It’s just empty boasting. Mo Qi doesn’t seem weak and they have the same cultivation. Lin Yun won’t have any kind of advantage.” The discussions drew even more attention to the seventh stage.
Pavilion Master Plum and the rest from the Great Qin Empire were rather nervous as this was Lin Yun’s first battle. No matter how optimistic they were about Lin Yun, they hadn’t witnessed his strength personally. So they didn’t know how far he could go in the Draconic Banquet.
“You should be worried if you can last ten moves from me.” Mo Qi sneered as he didn’t treat Lin Yun’s words seriously. His body flashed as he unleashed his sword aura and charged at Lin Yun like a bull. When he was less than ten meters away from Lin Yun, his right hand move to the hilt of his sword. Disdain immediately flashed in his eyes when he saw that Lin Yun wasn’t moving. He thought that he was moving too fast for Lin Yun to see.
After gathering his sword aura into his sword, he tried to draw his sword and pierce Lin Yun’s chest.
Lin Yun, however, didn’t move and merely accumulated his spiritual sword intent in his pupils. The moment he did this, his eyes shined like bright stars. In that split second, Mo Qi’s movements became extremely slow in Lin Yun’s eyes. He saw that Mo Qi was full of flaws from head to toe.
“What’s going on?” Mo Qi felt like his chest was pierced by a sword. Without hesitation, Mo Qi’s face changed as he loosened his grip on his sword and quickly retreated.
When he landed on the ground, his face was pale as he caught his breath. Just a moment ago, it felt as though he had just passed by hell’s gate. His legs felt so weak and he couldn’t figure out what was going on.
Raising his head to look at Lin Yun, Mo Qi had a feeling that Lin Yun could see all of his flaws. The uneasy feeling grew stronger when he saw Lin Yun stare at him. Then, Lin Yun took one step forward, which made him vomit blood and fall to his knees..
“Get off the stage.” Before Lin Yun’s finished stepping forward, he appeared in front of Mo Qi in a flash. Then, Mo Qi’s chest was imprinted with Lin Yun’s palm. This palm shattered the origin energy protecting Mo Qi and sent him flying into the Nine Dragon Lake.
“You won.” Mo Qi didn’t even have the courage to look at Lin Yun as he left in panic. When he admitted defeat, some of the profound amber aura left his jade token and was absorbed by Lin Yun.
“Thank you.” Lin Yun began to reflect on his actions and felt that he might have been too brutal by using his spiritual sword intent. Although he didn’t release it, it was still lethal to those with weak willpower.
The spiritual sword intent could attack his opponent’s mentality and their origin energy circulation would become a mess if they weren’t careful. After this, Lin Yun made the decision not to use his spiritual sword intent so casually since it would be bad if his opponents were prepared for it. Anyhow, it was enough for him to stand at the peak of the Ancient Southern Domain using xiantian sword intent at complete mastery.
“He won?” Everyone was confused because they had no idea how Lin Yun defeated his opponent. Lin Yun’s sword intent could only be seen by those he looked at, so it would be weird if they could sense something.
“Young lad, are you from the Heavenly Sword Sect? Your sword intent seems powerful.” The judge of the seventh group chuckled. He couldn’t tell that Lin Yun’s sword intent had reached the spiritual sword intent level, but he could sense that Lin Yun’s sword intent was terrifying.
“No, I’m from the Sword Firmament Pavilion,” said Lin Yun as he left.
“Interesting. This batch of newly risen geniuses are a lot better than the past.” The judge was filled with anticipation seeing that there was a darkhouse in the seventh group.
“Nineteenth battle, Yang Teng VS Feng Wudao!” The announcement woke everyone up from their confusion.
“Yang Teng? Isn’t he from the Heavenly Sword Sect? He was ranked twenty second in the previous Draconic Banquet. His ranking is even higher than Qin Yang!”
“There are a lot of top-tier geniuses in the seventh group.”
“Who’s Feng Wudao? Which sect does he belong to? He’ll probably be defeated terribly.”
“Probably five moves.” The audience was passionate about the top-tier geniuses. Up till now, no one could last more than five moves against the top-tiered geniuses, so they could only look at Feng Wudao with compassion.
When Yang Teng and Feng Wudao landed on the stage, everyone was surprised by Feng Wudao’s demeanour. He looked calm when facing a powerful opponent like Yang Teng. After a brief glance, Yang Teng smiled, “I thought that you would admit defeat. Looks like my prestige is still lacking compared to the three kings and seven elites.”
None of the three kings and seven elites even made it onto the stage as their opponents admitted defeat the moment they were called. This was a form of respect for experts, which also represented unparalleled glory.
“Of course it doesn’t measure up. You’re nothing compared to them,” mocked Feng Wudao without any change on his face. The moment he said that, Yang Teng’s face became ugly and the spectators began to laugh.
Yang Teng was feigning humility when he said he wasn’t comparable to the three kings and seven elites. The fact that Feng Wudao said this was blatant humiliation for Yang Teng. There was no way Yang Teng’s pride could handle being humiliated. Now, there was no way Yang Teng would be merciful even if Feng Wudao admitted defeat.
“You’re right, but you’re also nothing in my eyes.” Yang Teng snorted with killing intent flashing in his pupils. A crimson sword appeared in his hand as he unleashed eighteen sword rays that soared into the sky in the formation of a fan.
In that split second, Yang Teng’s sword aura exploded and enveloped the entire horizon.
“That’s the Great Amplification Sword Sutra!”
“That’s the strongest martial technique of the Heavenly Sword Sect. It’s not easy to find a sword sutra in the Ancient Southern Domain, not to mention one so powerful.” Lin Yun listened to the surrounding conversations silently. The Great Amplification Sword Sutra was truly formidable. He heard that this was something the Heavenly Sword Sect inherited from the Sword Sect. When one reached the highest level, they would be able to condense 999 swords in the sky.
Along with a brilliant sword hum, Yang Teng swung his sword out as hundreds of sword intent overlapped and attacked. With an attack of this range and scale, it wouldn’t be easy to avoid.
Feng Wudao didn’t avoid Feng Teng’s attack. All he did was clench his fist and lightning started to gather on his fist. The swords were stopped in mid-air and shattered once they faced the lightning. Then, Feng Wudao slowly walked over, dazzling like a bright star.
“Lightning intent?” Yang Teng was shocked as he never expected that his opponent was someone who had comprehended a martial intent. This also shocked many cultivators who were watching, including Lin Yun. He could tell that Feng Wudao had high control over his lightning intent, destroying the swords without wasting excess energy.
This had nothing to do with the level of the intent. This was similar to Lin Yun’s sword intent. Even if he faced those with the same level of sword intent, Lin Yun was confident of defeating his opponents because he had better control. Similarly, Feng Wudao's lightning intent had far surpassed many people because of superior control.
While everyone was shocked, they had exchanged over ten moves on the stage. They were both evenly matched and Feng Wudao soon broke the idea that no one could last more than five moves against the top-tier geniuses.
As their origin energy fluctuated on the stage, thunderclouds rumbled with lightning while sword rays flew. At this moment, even a stupid person could tell that Feng Wudao wasn’t weak. He truly had the qualification to compete with the top-tier geniuses.
“Sky Incinerating Sword!” Yang Teng became anxious and executed his strongest attack. Flames began to spread out in the sky before raining down from the sky.
“Not bad.” Feng Wudao narrowed his eyes as he could tell how powerful this attack was. Yang Teng had perfectly fused his sword intent and his sword sutra in this attack, so every single flame was highly lethal. If he wasn’t careful, he would be incinerated.
“But if this is all you got, you should admit defeat.” Feng Wudao roared, “Thunder Breaking Slash!”
Thunder began to rumble within Feng Wudao’s body as his aura began to surge violently. Stomping his foot on the ground, a huge explosion rang out on the stage and a ripple spread out on the lake. Just like that, Feng Wudao soared into the sky and destroyed the flames with a punch.
The flames were split into two as Yang Teng threw up a mouthful of blood and fell onto the ground. On the other hand, Feng Wudao hovered in the air while his face radiated from the flames.
Everyone who paid attention to the seventh group was completely dumbfounded by this scene. No one had imagined that such a powerful newly risen genius would appear at the beginning of the first round and defeat a veteran top-tier genius.