"The Outer Disciple Competition?" Wang Li Tian did not know what that was. It was to be expected anyways as all he did in one year, was practice his runic inscriptions.
"Let me explain it to you then," Long Tang Yun started to describe the competition to his disciple, "Every five years, there would be an outer disciple competition to help rank the top disciples in the entire Southern Wind Academy. The ranking would not be separated out into the respective school disciplines. Everyone would be graded with the same criteria, which is based on martial arts strength. Whoever has the most talent and is the strongest in the Outer Court would be number one."
"As such, this spells disaster for our school discipline that does not actually learn any combat arts when we pursue artificing," Usually, the prime elder would ask what it would imply for their school discipline in regards to the competition. For Wang Li Tian, Long Tang Yun went ahead and gave the answer to the youth. It would be far simpler than waiting for the boy to come out with a wrong conclusion. "For the School of Artificing, it has been three decades since we last got into the top ten ranking."
"Could we not use spell scrolls in battle?" Wang Li Tian asked.
"Anyone is allowed to use spell scrolls," Long Tang Yun recited what was written in the rules, "However, the scrolls, arrays or enchantments must be done during the competition and not before."
"You saw how long it takes for one to even create a level one scroll. For senior artificers, creating such a simple scroll could take seconds. However, for novice artificers, it would usually take them the time it takes to brew a cup of tea. In that duration, they would already be defeated by their counterparts."
"You have a choice now, Little Li Tian. One, you can take part in the Outer Disciple Competition to gain exposure of other martial cultivators. Or two, you can just not take part in the competition and continue to study in the Artificing Mountain. No one will fault you if you do not want to take part as the chances of our victory was always negligible." Long Tang Yun explained the options as frankly as possible. After so many years of losses, he never expected anything from the disciples in the school of artificing anymore. He would even prefer if Little Li Tian go for the first choice as this would not waste his time taking part in a pointless competition.
"I do not really care about this, teacher Long. What would you prefer me to choose?" Wang Li Tian replied nonchalantly.
"I would suggest you to not go for the competition. After all, it would be hard for you to contend for a placement in the ranking at this stage. Most of the cultivators that make it into the top ten ranking are already close to breaking through into the Core Establishment Stage. What is your realm of cultivation at the moment?"
"I am currently at the level 3 Early Body Enhancement Stage."
"That is indeed to low to even contend against those that specialise in offensive martial arts. You may even get injured during such a competition." Long Tang Yun shook his head, agreeing to what he said. Xin Shu Yi chuckled lightly. She knew that her teacher simply doesn't want junior brother to waste time on non-important events.
"I will listen to what teacher suggest then."
"Good, good. Now, let us head into the house to learn more about Artificing Analysis!" Long Tang Yun was in a good mood. He guided his two pupils into his own study room. He thought this was a good time to enhance the knowledge of his older disciple too.
Taking out a scroll that he recently inscribed finish, Long Tang Yun rolled out the scroll and placed it in front of his two disciples. He started his lecture with a question, "In front of you is a Detection Scroll. From a glance, you should be able to tell that there is a total of three layers of Runic Symbols in the Scroll. Let me ask you this, if I told you that the top two layers have a total of 8 and 13 runic symbols, can you guess how many runic symbols are there in the third layer?"
The two disciples shook their head. Long Tang Yun smiled and took out another three scrolls, each of these were slightly less complicated than Detection Scroll. He gestured to the scrolls, "The three scrolls in front of you are also triple layered scrolls. They all result in different effects. However, they each have something in common. They follow the number order of 3, 5, 8, for each of their respective layers."
"There are even some scrolls that go in the order of 34, 55, 89…"
"Oh! Wait a minute! Teacher, is the number after 8 and 13, 21?" Xin Shu Yi answered after her revelation. Wang Li Tian was sitting by her side, confused.
"That is correct! Well done, Shu Yi." Long Tang Yun nodded in acknowledgement. That was the least he could expect from his genius disciple. Long Tang Yun did not wait any longer and started to explain to the clueless 13 year old.
"Little Li Tian, the reason why your senior sister said 21 is because of the sequence of numbers. The art of creating a stable Spell Scroll is to follow a certain order of numbers. We do not simply create scrolls out of nothing. After millions of years of research conducted by our predecessors, we discovered the magic number sequence. The sequence is such that each number is the sum of the two preceding ones. Starting from 0 and 1, it goes on to 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144 and so on…"