Day passed by me meditating and soon it was the second day of the sect's selection trial, which means that today we are going to have 98 places for the other disciples.
Why 98 when we have 100 places In total? Because there are two chief disciples participating in the eternal wail trial so they are automatically qualified to go to the final round so the others are going to fight for the remaining positions. I say 'they' but in reality, I'm talking about Hu Anjing and myself.
We don't have to fight in this round and Hu Anjing is probably training for the main event and won't come to see the selection, but I have my own reasons to check these fights.
One reason is to simply see who I would be facing in the final round but that is not my main reason. I want to see if Jin Fen would show some of his powers so that I can be ready for him, he might be just trying to cultivate and I won't be that petty to kill him just so that I think he might be a danger, but I have to be ready for any possibilities.
If today I can get a better grasp of his power and personality I can be more certain of my future so wasting my time for today's competition is more of an investment that I can be sure about its positive outcome.
Getting out of my room I didn't go on with my usual daily plans and went straight to the sword valley to see the competition.
Going through the same route, I used the teleportation station to get there. Teleporting is a good way to avoid unnecessary social interactions.
As I arrived at the sword valley and the location of the selection, I saw that the decoration has changed drastically.
There were 100 thrones on the stage that represents the 100 final places with two of them having a sword on top of them. This is probably to show that this seat is already taken.
There was a total of 200 participants for today and only less than a half of them would get the chance to see the [Eternal Wail Chasm].
Looking around I could see all kinds of disciples in the mix. Some from the outer court, some from the inner court, and to no one's surprise most from the core court. In fact, it could be said that seeing disciples from the outer courts here, shows that they have immense potential for teaching and being future pillars of the sect.
As I was thinking with my business mindset to maximize the sect's gains, a group of elders walk to the stage.
All of them were walking at least a step behind the one leading them as a sign of reverence for the leading elder.
The elder who was in front was none other than grand elder Wan. He is one of the top elders of the sect and is from an older generation even compared to my grandfather who has lived for 674 years already.
(A/N: if you have forgotten, "Chu Feng" was the great-grandchild of grand elder Wan…)
Even from this much information, you can see that the importance of this event is very high in the eyes of the sect and even a grand elder showed up to supervise this event.
The sect is showing a big favor to the young disciples who are here, by letting them meet one of the grand elders.
This is a good method to give them one more push to be more hardworking and gain a sense of pride that a big shot like grand elder Wan is giving them face by showing up here.
When grand elder Wan stopped on the stage and looked at the crowd, there was no one that uttered a word for a few seconds.
As grand elder Wan was scanning the crowd, he saw me and gave me a smile and i gave him a small bow to show my respect.
After a few more seconds the disciples were coming back to their senses. They immediately cupped their fist and greeted the grand elder.
""Disciple greets the grand elder."" We all said in unison.
There was no one who didn't greet the grand elder, this shows how much respect there is for the position of grand elder in the heart of the disciples.
Grand elder wan smiled amiably to the disciples.
"Today we are having a selection on the 100 places that would go to the eternal wail chasm to compete for the final 10 quota that the sect has for the eternal wail trial." He spoke to all of the participants.
"Two places are filled from the start because we have two chief disciples that are qualified to go to the trials. you can not challenge them on this round but on the finals, you are free to do so." As he was saying this, he looked at me.
"At the start we would fill the 98 places by luck. After that, you are free to challenge for the seats, but keep it in mind that if you lose a challenge as the challenger you have to wait at the end of the queue for your turn to challenge again so choose your opponent wisely." He continued with his explanation.
"Now, let us see who are the 98 disciples who have the fate with them this time." He waved his hand and 98 nameplates were chosen from all of the names.
After that with another wave of his hand, grand elder Wan sent the nameplates to the disciples. It seems these plates had the corresponding disciple's Qi, so grand elder Wan could easily find its owner and send these plates to them.
Evidently, Lai Xinyue was one of the lucky ones. As I looked around I found Jin Fen and he seems to be unlucky and didn't get a head start so he had to challenge for a seat.
After everyone who was given their nameplate got on the stage, grand elder Wan spoke again.
"Now you can choose the one you want to challenge and get in line for the challenge. Keep this in mind that you are challenging for the seat so even if the owner of the seat changes, you are still on the queue of that seat challengers…" he clarified for the disciples.
As he finished speaking he gestured to the other elders to continue the selection process. The disciples also started choosing their opponent to fight.
As Lai Xinyue had a small frame, many who didn't see her fights on last round chose her to fight and without exception, they lost. Even I won against her with a bit of complication.
The fights were going on and after half a day (A/N: a metaphor for a long time) Jin Fen choose someone to fight and that was to fight one of the core disciples that no one had challenged until now.
This core disciple is named Dai Bao. He is one of the influential disciples of the sect and some even consider him a good candidate for the patriarch position. This means that he is kind of my rival…
But the fun part is that Jin Fen had the balls to challenge him when no one challenged him from the beginning.
'Ah, so this is how I protagonist would act. I have a long way to go…' I thought to myself.
When Dai Bao heard that he had a challenger he only smirked at the foolishness of the challenger to choose him.
And Jin Fen on the other hand was waiting in the queue to fight on a free stage.
'This is going to be fun…' for some reason that I didn't know myself I was rooting for Jin Fen. I mean this is always fun to cheer for the underdog, right?