After the show of talents concluded, it was time for the actual tournament. The competitors would have one-on-one battles with a time limit of five minutes. If there was no winner at the end of the five minutes, the judges would give each fighter a score based on their perception of who would have eventually won.
Since there were seventeen competitors, it just so happened that two of them would have to fight it out first to decrease the pool down to sixteen. The tournament would then follow a standard bracket structure with random seeding.
He Zicheng drew two names at random for the first round, "Divine Blazing Mountain's Fen Duanli and... Ten Thousand Flower Valley's Zhou Ziyun!"
The round of applause greeted the two fighters as they took center stage on top of the platform. Only the judges remained as the rest returned to their masters. Chen Wentian felt it was quite an unlucky coincidence for Ziyun to have to fight one extra round than the other competitors. Still, he had faith in her ability to beat them all.
Fen Duanli and Zhou Ziyun faced each other on the platform, about ten or so meters apart. Fen Duanli was the only junior sent forth from the Divine Blazing Mountain. He was twenty-one and at the 3rd Level of the Mind Focusing Realm. The crowd was already cheering for Zhou Ziyun's victory as if it was a done deal.
"Begin!"
Fen Duanli immediately charged towards Zhou Ziyun. His fists flung out wildly towards her.
"Blazing Fists!"
The air seemed to sizzle as his fists flew by, filled with heat energy. His entire body seemed to grow hotter and hotter as he exerted more and more strength. This was indeed a basic fist art of the Divine Blazing Mountain but it was a rudimentary tool in the hands of Mind Focusing Realm cultivators.
"Take this!" Fen Duanli yelled as he struggled to even get close to landing a blow.
Zhou Ziyun lazily dodged all of his moves, letting the flaming idiot dance around for a minute. She took Chen Wentian's words to heart and didn't act too arrogantly at first, making the fight look more competitive than it actually was. Fen Duanli was talented but his form was still rough and there were many openings.
Finally, she got bored as she had already found those weak points. The 1st palm in the Nineteen Demon Subduing Palms slipped through Fen Duanli's defenses and directly crashed against the side of his head.
"Ahhhh!!"
Fen Duanli crumpled to the ground and fainted, his neck bend oddly.
"Winner, Zhou Ziyun!" The judges unanimously declared.
Zhou Ziyun casually got off the stage as the audience cheered for their female idol. Lin Qingcheng gave her a hug as she arrived.
"Wow, Elder Sister is so fierce!" Lin Qingcheng laughed as Chen Wentian also gave her a thumbs up.
The next eight matches were randomly drawn for the round of sixteen and Zhou Ziyun was given the last match out of fairness. Chen Wentian and his disciples sat along the sidelines as they watched the other youths compete. It was rather boring as all the matches seemed lopsided in terms of talent. The Beast God Sanctum disciples as well as some others talents all seemed to win easily.
The crowd loved it nonetheless and seemed to gain more energy as the matches progressed. Even the Yuwen sisters gained new fans as they dominated their opponents. Zhou Ziyun's next opponent was also not worth mentioning as she won without breaking a sweat.
A one level difference in the Mind Focusing Realm was normally not a huge deal and not insurmountable. A talented cultivator at a lower level could beat an average cultivator at a higher level through mastery of martial arts and special skills. However, here in the junior talent competition, everybody was talented and their martial arts were powerful derivatives from immortal arts. In fact, the beast arts of the Beast God Sanctum were even more effective in the Mind Focusing Realm as they focused on improving physical fighting abilities. Others from the Divine Blazing Mountain or Glacier Palace were at a disadvantage until the Spirit Initiate Realm when they could fully utilize their elemental arts.
The round of sixteen finished quickly and the quarterfinals matches were drawn. The four Beast God Sanctum competitors all managed to not get drawn against each other. It was another improbable occurrence from the 'random' draws.
The first match was Yuwen Bing against Peng Feiyu of the Tower of Swords. It was pretty exciting as Peng Feiyu was quite adept at the Tower of Swords' prime sword art, Lonely Sword Wanderer. As they began to fight, it was clear that Yuwen Bing was at a disadvantage due to her lacking a good weapon and she was hard pressed despite her one level cultivation advantage.
Her art seemed to be some type of bestial transformation art that increased her physical strength and gave her elongated nails that acted like claws. However, this wasn't strong enough to overcome the profound sword forms of the Lonely Sword Wanderer. Peng Feiyu easily kept her away with his sword and made up for the difference in their speed. Yuwen Bing tried to use her brute strength to knock away the sword but was cleverly deflected each time.
"Cease fighting!" After five long minutes had passed, the judges ordered a stop.
The two fighters separated. Yuwen Bing was panting from exhaustion and sporting multiple cuts across her body. She looked pretty miserable with blood dripping onto the ground. Peng Feiyu was slightly ruffled with only a few scratches.
The judges took in every detail and displayed their scores for each fighter from a scale of one to ten. "The results for the first battle of the quarterfinals, our winner... with a score of thirty to twenty-eight... Yuwen Bing, Beast God Sanctum!"
"What is this!"
The stadium with its home crowd started cheering for the winner but it was interrupted by a shout filled with immortal strength.
Peng Yuefeng leaped onto the stage and glared angrily at the judges. "What is this farce?" He yelled again, pointing at the scores on the judges table.
Indeed, the scores were quite interesting to those who weren't biased. The two lords of the Beast God Sanctum gave their disciple nine verses six for the opponent while the two neutral judges each gave Peng Feiyu an eight and six for Yuwen Bing. Thus, Yuwen Bing won by two points, a result of obvious favoritism. The other sects all became alert and wary of the Beast God Sanctum. Wasn't this simply bullying on home turf?
Peng Yuefeng pleaded with the two neutral immortals but they didn't care too much. Gong Liyun was busy making googly eyes at a certain young immortal and Huang Wuji seemed asleep.
"Peng Yuefeng, this competition is very long..." Huang Wuji finally muttered with barely opened eyes but his tone was obvious.
"Fine!" Peng Yuefeng huffed. He couldn't do anything with no support and could only gnash his teeth and lead his disciple off the stage in defeat.
The cheers of the crowd resumed as the next round got underway with Ji Ming winning against his opponent after a lengthy battle. The two Beast God Sanctum judges again gave their disciple lopsided scores.
Zhou Ziyun's turn was next. She looked at Chen Wentian with meaningful eyes.
"Ziyun, beat them into submission!"
"Yes, master!" She grinned, full of confidence.