The day of the Newcomer's tournament had arrived. It was eight in the morning and all participating teams were heading towards the tournament arena. The Newcomer's tournament was popular but not well regarded as the participants had only trained for a short time. Its purpose was to discover talented seeds for monitored training under the different houses.
The vice-head teachers of all houses would preside over the tournament to ensure fairness. The tournament is divided between a preliminary selection and a ranking tournament. The preliminaries would decide the 32 strongest teams out of more than a hundred participating ones. While the ranking tournament would rank the top five teams and reward them with Tiancai points. The winners would be rewarded with 500 Tiancai points, The top three with 300 points, and the top five with 100 points.
The knight house was the first to arrive with 50 teams of three, they were lead by vice-head teacher Mo who was a master bladesman. The knight house was ranked third amongst all houses but also had the most members. The next house to arrive was the sorcerer house with 45 teams and it was lead by vice-head teacher Luo who was a master in thunder elemental techniques. The sorcerer and knight house were rivals and would clash whenever met with each other, this time was no different. Both houses started their rivalry at first sight. The two vice-head teachers stayed away from each other, but the participating teams entered a provocation match with no conclusive winner. A minute after the sorcerer house arrived, the strongest of the four houses, the mystery house with five teams arrived. Mystery house ranked first in every tournament and every participant of their house could rival the strongest of the other houses. The other two houses quieted down after mystery's arrival under vice-head teacher Gu, who was known as the number one poison master in the academy. The teams under mystery house looked arrogantly over the other teams as if they were ants, but no one dared to anger or provoke them. The musician house was the last to arrive and received contempt and disdain from the other houses.
Jiang Mang and Xia Ruoyin formed the only team of their house. It was already extraordinary for their house to have a participating team and they had lost in the preliminaries every time they dared to participate. They were led by their vice-head teacher Qin who was the only possessor of the profound spirit nature's guqin. He is known as the best healer in the Imperial Academy and was thus well respected even though he was weak in combat. Every other vice-head teacher greeted him with a smile and discussed the tournament before officially announcing the start.
All teams gathered together and were allocated a number. The duo's team gained the last number 106. The preliminaries began with an elimination match. Jiang Mang and Xia Ruoyin were seated in an inconspicuous place waiting to fight in the last match against team 105 of the knight house. The duo was seated in meditation, at first he paid attention to the fighting sounds, but after discussing with her, they determined it was a waste of their time. The other teams eventually forgot about their existence after failing to provoke or bully them. The last match started at noon, and both teams headed on stage. When the duo faced the three students from the knight house, their opponents held them in contempt and disdain. The leader of the trio said: "We can spare you if you give up, but if you don't, then don't complain when we beat you up."
Both Jiang Mang and Xia Ruoyin ignored him, which angered him into a rage. He decided to humiliate both of them by saying: "You two are fools to come on stage against us. One is a blind joke while the other is a weak little girl!". Jiang Mang took his flute and sat down on the ground, and when the referee started the match, he performed Immortal Paradise, which immediately pulled the trio into an illusion. The trio was immediately rendered incapable of fighting, but the match continued as Xia Ruoyin didn't disturb his performance. While the trio was trapped and tranced in the illusion, the referee was hesitating if he should decide the winner or continue to wait as it was unknown if they could break free from the illusion and close in on the musicians. The referee decided that the duo was the winner after seeing that the trio couldn't break free in ten minutes, but the trio was already hypnotized and remained in a trance after Jiang Mang left. He had kindly responded to their provocation by strengthing his illusion, which made Xia Ruoyin happy. He had designed a unique illusion during his training to respond to all the derisive opponents. The target would be pulled into an illusion where they would be trained to become obedient slaves and then be sold to a noble young master to serve. This illusion didn't compel the targets to integrate into a certain lifestyle but subjected them to slave training and let them experience the life of a slave. The difference between the two approaches is hypnotizing and compelling someone doesn't impact their original personality while experiencing such training while remaining themselves would directly change their personality as they had truly experienced the life of being a slave. He made their illusion last for 24 hours so that they would wake up after being illusioned for a day. He had mentioned this detail to the referee so that they wouldn't disrupt his plans by bringing them earlier back. They should experience one year while being in a trance for 24 hours and should have changed their ways of being arrogant spoiled young masters.
When the duo won, all the other teams were shocked but quickly dismissed the duo as weak but lucky that their opponents were careless. The preliminaries continued by having another three matches to determine the strongest 32 teams. The duo rested for an hour before having their second match, their opponents this time were from the sorcerer house. They were vigilant but still held the duo in contempt. Jiang Mang was merciful as his opponents didn't mock them and played Drunk Night which trapped the opponents and Xia Ruoyin defeated them by hitting them with Ice arrows. They instantly defeated their opponents and shocked the other teams. They would no longer look down on the duo as they would earlier because they were scared of Jiang Mang's eccentric methods. The duo won their remaining matches and entered the ranking matches.
The tournament's preliminaries ended that day and the ranking matches would last two days. That night Jiang Mang continued perfecting his qi application on his other qi songs and managed to improve all his qi song's to the same level as mid-Huang tier techniques. Immortal Paradise still disrupted the target's senses to form the illusions and trap them however, the hypnotic effect had become more potent due to the more accumulated qi, which would ram into the target's consciousness and confuse their identity instead of making them integrate into the illusion. The target would forget their identity, the moment they enter the illusion and only be confused about their surroundings. If the target has a strong will and cultivation, then they can quickly recover their memories, but they would still be trapped and follow the old integration pattern if they couldn't free themselves from the illusion. Drunk Night's disorientation effect had become more potent. Demonic Lust's preparation time had been shortened and could immediately work if the target was unprepared and had a weak will and lower cultivation stage.