The second day of the Convocation of Swords dawned with just as much excitement and energy as the first. Everyone was eager to fight again, to gain glory and prove their sword.
The rules and procedures remained the same. Those that managed to earn a spot on the ranking pillar started the day as the rankers. Others that were not able to and those that had been forced off were the challengers. As the sun rose and the fog that blanketed the mountains slowly lifted, the first nine pairs of duelists took to the arena and began to fight.
One crowd-pleasing aspect of the second day was the re-matches. Those that had lost yesterday were eager to challenge the same opponent again today. They wanted to wash away the shame of their loss and climb atop the heads of their rivals. Some fought for personal honor while others fought to gain honor for their sects at the expense of the enemy.
In particular, the battles between the House of the Northern Blade and the House of the Southern Sword were explosive and violent. They had been somewhat courteous during the first day but now, they were no longer holding back. Sabers and swords from both sides clashed with cruelness, resulting in many injuries before the judges could intervene. Seniors bullied juniors, who were then punished by more powerful core disciples. This cycle of enmity was great entertainment for those not involved.
While some sought to make enemies, others sought to make friends. For some sects, it was in their best interest to have good relationships with other sects. Disciples became like ambassadors as they exchanged pointers with each other. Those that had good temperament easily made friends with their opponents as it was not a duel to the death but a duel just to compare notes.
This was in line with one of the goals of the convocation, for disciples to improve their understanding of the sword. Even if one could not gain a spot on the ranking pillar, one could still learn a great deal through these duels. It was a rare opportunity for everyone as constantly practicing the same sword style often resulted in bottlenecks that could only be resolved by clashing against other sword styles and helping each other.
Other sects took it a step further, directly establishing strong bonds through intermarriage. Their duels became a great big matchmaking affair as talented male and female disciples sought each other out. On a few occasions, a particularly beautiful sword maiden would be desired by many challengers and she would only accept the affection of the one who managed to defeat her. As for the most talented and handsome men, they received an equal amount of attention from female suitors.
Red Peak School and Cloud Peak Sect were the most eye-catching in this regard. The rumor was that the two sects were going to merge into one in the next few years and their conduct proved this to be true. Out of all the sects, these two had the most relationships between disciples. There were husbands and wives passionately dueling each other. Brothers and sisters competed against each other to settle disputes. It was one big family meet-up.
Yet not everything went smoothly as was often the case with relationships. There were plenty of conflicts as people fought for their future happiness. New rivalries were established instead of relationships. Old relationships were broken irreparably. One enterprising young man even tried to court the beautiful but untouchable nuns of the Virtuous Sword Villa, causing a great scandal when one of the female disciples actually reciprocated his affection.
The sect master of the Virtuous Sword Villa, a ferocious old spinster, threatened in public to lock away her unruly disciple for thirty years. In response, the sect master of Skycloud Temple, where the brave young man came from, jumped out to defend his disciple. The two almost came to blows before peace was finally brokered by a few friendly immortals.
All of this was very entertaining for the audience and even the immortals. However, Chen Wentian was unconcerned with these matters. He still needed to figure out the schemes of the demons. His shadow fox, Chen Mo, was scouring the entire city and laying down a web of shadow anchors. Additionally, he had called upon all available souls that could be of any potential use to aid him.
He used He Xingping, an executive elder of the Lion Lord faction of the Beast God Sanctum, to send several squads of underlings to Everblade City. Their outward pretense was to find interesting beasts to buy and bring back. Their hidden task was to support Immortal Tempest Badger Qiu Chuyi and be on guard for suspicious activity.
He even brought over the immortal Void Bee queen who was supposed to be guarding Ten Thousand Flower Valley to act as an additional source of surveillance across the city. To offset the queen's absence, he called upon General Kong, the Spirit Lord steel-furred gorilla beast he had taken over some time ago. Although such an eye-catching immortal beast could not easily move about in human territory, it was easy enough to sneak into the vicinity of Black Rock City since he controlled Cloudy Mountain Province. In an unforeseen emergency, the gorilla could forcibly activate the teleportation array in the city and arrive where ever it was needed.
On top of these preemptive measures, he still had to pay attention to his disciples and their individual performances. He had to note their weaknesses and strengths and customize future training plans for everyone. But, he was lucky to have a group of talented women who didn't cause problems for him and didn't seek out problems with others.
His disciples continued the same team strategy as yesterday. Wu Qianyu and Li Yuechan, being the two strongest, acted as the anchors. If a fellow sister lost their spot to a strong challenger, they would give up their spot just to storm into the rankings again. The others were still shameless enough to utilize every delaying tactic at their disposal to avoid defeat.
He expected no problems with this setup. Although the twins were the weakest and faced the most challenges, they could gain their spots back easily enough. He had wanted to help them break through but he didn't have enough time last night. He also had to wait until the demonic poison within their bodies had been utterly cleansed. This would take one more night at most and he would be left with only the third night which was not enough time for them to break through.
"Hmmm." Chen Wentian rubbed his chin as he pondered.
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