Dominating Sword Immortal

"Mental consciousness body?"

Ye Chen's eyebrows flicked. Amongst the information that the Battle Emperor had imprinted into his mind, most of them were about training. Therefore, Ye Chen had known about mental consciousness bodies.

More accurately, it meant a part of soul being separated from the main body. It did not have a consciousness of its own, only the one from the main body. It would be just like the mental projection, but in a more complex way, it was something that was greater than a mere mental projection. The power it could bear was even greater.

Of course, the Battle Emperor did not train one, so Ye Chen would not know more than the basic concept.

"Let's go up!" Yan Fengfeng walked toward the peak in the lead.

The path toward the Sky Martial Pavilion was a hundred miles long, a hundred meters wide staircase; there would be a wide platform after every one thousand steps. The second Ye Chen stepped onto a stair, he had finally realized why no one tried to fly up directly—the whole mountain was somehow covered in an invisible restraining power which forbade them from using their power in midair. All they could do was to take it step by step.

After a whole fifteen minutes, the four had finally walked to the peak.

"So crowded here!"

Once they stepped into the gate of the Sky Martial Pavilion, all four of them could see a wide plaza, and in the middle of that was a one hundred meters tall wall. Around that wall were hundreds of young men and women that were all under the age of forty.

"The pavilion is only opening once per year, so it is normal to have so many people here." It was not Yan Fengfeng's first time here, so she did not feel strange about it at all.

The wall was very tall, so the four could already see that the wall was covered in names.

"Du Gujue, number one!"

"Dantai Mingye, number two!"

"…"

"Yan Fengfeng, number five!"

Indeed, Yan Fengfeng was ranked number five. Being able to rank into the top five of one thousand was already extremely impressive.

Yan Fengfeng said, "The top two warriors are indeed the top two warriors of the Sky Martial Region. Perhaps they are not the most powerful warriors amongst the young generation, but they definitely have the most to compete with. You guys can see it by the color of the names. The white represents first three levels, blue means five levels, while red means six and seven levels. If one is able to pass even the seventh level, then the color would be purple. So far, only Du Gujue and Dantai Mingle were able to pass the seventh level. Therefore, their names are in purple."

Hearing her, Ye Chen took a closer look at the wall. There were two purple names, fifty-something red ones, and the majority of them were blue ones: there were more than eight hundred of them. The white ones were less, only one hundred of them, and they fell all the way in the back.

"If you want to leave your name on the wall, then you will have to at least last three rounds. The longer you can hold on in the third level, the more likely you can make it."

As Yan Fengfeng explained the rules, she was getting a bit emotional. She was the descendant of the Phoenix, so she was full of potential. Normally, it would not be that hard for her to be in the top one or two. But, the four warriors ranked before her was just too crazily powerful, especially Du Gujue and Dantai Mingyue. Those two had passed all seven levels of challenges almost immediately.

"Head sister disciple, is it really hard to pass a level?" Ling Tianhao asked.

She let out a breath and said, "The first one would be with a mental consciousness body that is similar to your power while the second level would have two. The third level would have four, while the fourth level would have eight. Each level would have twice the challenge as the previous one. Do you think it is hard?"

"Doesn't it mean that on the seventh level, there would be sixty-four of them?" Ling Tianhao gasped. Even Miao Yin and Ye Chen were starting to look serious.

Yan Fengfeng said with a low voice, "It challenges your battle technique, mindset, and the potential that you could explode with when you are pushed into a corner. Although, the cultivation and power would mean something as well, as it has been controlled to the minimum, and the consciousness body would be at your power level. If you have a lot of power, so would it."

"I wonder where I could be ranked on that wall."

When they first arrived here, Ling Tianhao was full of confidence, and now, all he felt was pressure and battling intent.

Ye Chen had understood what Yan Fengfeng was trying to say—the challenge of the wall had not much to do with one's cultivation and power. Of course, just as she had said, although the last two parts had been controlled and suppressed to the minimum, it still has some kind of effects. For example, if the cultivation was high, then there would be a deeper understanding of the battling techniques, and the style of battling would be unpredictable as well, which equaled more power as well.

"Ye Chen, you are here as well!" Right then, someone yelled out Ye Chen's name.

He turned around to see the Thunder Princess Jing Aoxuan, and Li Xiaoyun together. These two had both reached the Sea of Souls Realm just like him. They were both at peak Early level as well.

A smile appeared on his face as Ye Chen said, "What a coincidence!"

Li Xiaoyun smiled as well, "Yes and no."

Ye Chen chuckled back; he knew what Li Xiaoyun meant. The two reaching the Sea of Souls Realm was not that much a surprise for him, since they both had reached the peak level Late Astral Reaching Realm earlier than him, so they had a chance of breaking through any second. Moreover, the Sky Martial Pavilion was only opened once a year, so it was almost doomed that they would run into each other.

"What about Chu Zhongtian?"

Although Ye Chen and Chu Zhongtian did not have the best relationship, and they were even fighting and arguing in the beginning when they first met, they were actually fair competitors afterward.

Jing Aoxuan shook her head, "He has his evil spirit body which would be even harder to make a breakthrough in. So, he is still at peak level Late Astral Reaching Realm."

"I see!"

Ye Chen nodded. With the evil spirit body, one could train evil yuan, which would be a couple of times more powerful than Zhen yuan. Therefore, it would be way harder to train as well. Of course, once he broke through, his power would increase drastically as well. He was already almost unbeatable when he was at the Astral Reaching Realm; once he reached the Sea of Souls Realm, he would only be more powerful. In other words, Chu Zhongtian would only be more and more lucky. Once he reached the Sea of Souls Realm, perhaps even Jing Aoxuan and Li Xiaoyun would not be able to compete with him, unless the two ran into some greater opportunities.

"This name wall is also a battlefield, a silent one!" Li Xiaoyun sighed suddenly as he looked at the names on the wall.

Ye Chen was not familiar with the names on the wall, but Li Xiaoyun was. He could see the top warriors of the young generation inside the Southern regions. Some of them were the last hosts of tea gathering before them. Although, they were ranked really low, even lower than five hundred. Only one of them was able to be ranked into the top one hundred.

The wall allowed ten people to test at a time, but there was no limitation on the testing time. Of course, it was actually already quite limiting, since if one wasted too much time in the early stages, it would mean that one would have less energy in the following battles. In a way, it would be decreasing the whole batting time.

"Haha…This time, I have finally been ranked in the one thousand!"

A normal-looking teenager had finished his test, and after seeing his name at the end of the wall, he looked extremely excited and happy.

It caught some people's attention. Hmm? Ye Chen frowned because he saw two "familiar" faces. They were Xie Zhiqiu and Ling Luohan, who had tried to barge into his tea gathering. These two had reached the Sea of Souls Realm as well.

Since a spot had been cleared out, Ling Luohan walked up and started his challenge.

After a cup of tea worth of time, Ling Luohan opened his eyes. Meanwhile, all of the names from one hundred had to move back one slot for his name to appear on the ninety-nine slot.

"I have to say, Ling Luohan is very talented."

Jing Aoxuan had lost to him before, and although Li Xiaoyun did not lose to him, he also admitted that he could not beat him back then. As for now, even if he did not have the confidence that he would win for sure, he did not think he would lose either.

"He entered the wrong path in blade arts, so it would be hard for him to recourse his path in a short period of time." In Ye Chen's eyes, Ling Luohan would not be that weaker than Xie Zhiqiu, and might even be able to be at the same level. But, he had walked on a slightly off-course blade art training path, since he was so focused on the efficiency of training. Of course, it would be able to increase the speed of training, but it would also leave behind a lot of problems that he would have to deal with in the future.

"Xie Zhiqiu has started his test!"

A skinny-looking teenager said, "He is rather popular amongst the young generation inside the Sky Martial Region. Once he reached the Sea of Souls Realm, he already had the power to compete with the top warriors. I wonder how far ahead he could be ranked on that wall."

"It must be really forward on that list. Du Gujie and Dantai Mingyue had reached the realm last year, and they were the top warriors of the young generation. Although they still could not overthrow the top warrior's position, their potential could not be denied."

Potential and actual power were two different things. High potential did not mean that one would have an extreme power yet; the same was applicable the other way around. The former might need a bit longer time to increase one's power, while the latter would have enough of time already, but they were just lacking the natural potential; so they would be caught up by the former sooner or later.

"Kill!"

In that world of silence, Xie Zhiqiu had made it through the top three rounds immediately. In the fourth round, there were eight consciousness bodies, with each one of them having the same power as him. Luckily, the eight of them were not that compatible. In fact, if they were, it would be impossible for anyone to make through, including Du Gujue and Dantai Mingyue.

In the fifth round, he was slightly wounded; his real body outside the wall made a low groan.

In the sixth round, Xie Zhiqiu had been killed instantly.

"So impressive!"

The real body opened his eyes. He could feel the surreal internal injuries, and knew that they were caused by his subconsciousness. He lifted up his head to see the ranking on the wall, a smile appearing on his face.

"Xie Zhiqiu, ranked twenty-two."

Before, although he was already rather famous in the Sky Martial School, that was inside the young generation, which did not mean much. Right now, his power could still not compete with the other top young warriors who were more famous. But judging on potential, he had already been ranked into top twenty-two for the next decade. It was very high up in the ranking, and even he was extremely satisfied with the result.

"Wow! Twenty-two!"

"So horrifying! Amongst the people taking the test this year, Xie Zhiqiu could be ranked at least in the top three."

Some of the people around could not help but gasp. The farther ahead in the list one got, the harder it would be. But, it also meant that he had more power to fight across realms. Xie Zhiqiu had indeed lived up his reputation.

"Interesting!"

Hai Wuya and Yan Fengfeng nodded their head unnoticeably. Although Xie Zhiqiu was not as talented yet as them, it was just a reference; what he could accomplish in the future might not be less than them.

"Hehe!"

Xie Zhiqiu turned his head to look at Ye Chen and the rest. The second he made eye contact with Ye Chen, a cold light shone in his eyes and the desire of fighting with him appeared on his face.