Chapter 0902: He’s not Ji He

After the first fifty rounds concluded relatively quickly, Ning Cheng’s entry card once again lit up. Next match: 11th Round, Opponent No.: 29.

Ning Cheng knew a bit about ‘Opponent No. 29’. He had seen that this person was slightly stronger than the dark-spotted cultivator and used an artefact called ‘Tetra-form Spirit Flame Banner’.

Overall, it became clear from the first fifty rounds that the strength of the Grand Essence Sacred Children surpassed everyone. However, Ning Cheng also observed that not all twelve Grand Essence Sacred Children participated. At least Qu Baiyi and Huo Erqi did not come. Ning Cheng didn’t know if Huo Erqi survived or not, but he knew that Qu Baiyi had managed to come out alive.

Among the twelve Grand Essence Sacred Children, only Ye Luoping lost a fight against Aiden. Lu Yixian, Guo Haoge, Ji Pingzhong, Yin Ying, and Keke Luoxi won effortlessly. It also meant that among the twelve Grand Essence Sacred Children, four more had not participated apart from Qu Baiyi and Huo Erqi.

Determining the top 25 would most likely take a long time as the cultivator’s strength had risen by a notch compared to the previous round. But it was also in favour of the crowd. Especially as many of the cultivators on the public square, watching the contestants on the battle stage, seemed drunk on the excitement. However, Ning Cheng didn’t feel any of this so-called passion. Most of his fights after coming to the Grand Essence Realm had been against half-step Dao Sculpting experts. Therefore, he thought that even if the participating Eternal experts were the best, they still couldn’t compare to the half-step Dao Sculpting Realm.

A while later, the eleventh round finally began. Ning Cheng faced a thin, short-haired cultivator with late-stage Eternal cultivation, ‘No. 29’.

When this male cultivator came up, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he immediately brought out his Tetra-form Spirit Flame Banner, which rolled up a massive multi-coloured flame. This flame contained several different types of fires, but it also seemed to include a flame-type grand array, which seemingly wanted to drown Ning Cheng.

Ning Cheng, by nature, also wasn’t a nonsensical person. He also immediately brought his long spear and rushed forward. Whether it was the array formation or the flames, for Ning Cheng, neither of them posed a threat.

On the surface, the fight seemed desperate. The clash between the spear shadows and the flames also looked very intense. But only Ning Cheng knew how much he exerted. To his slight relief, the battle stage shielded against spiritual consciousness probing from the central platform. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have dared to do such a thing.

But even if that was the case, Ning Cheng had a lingering suspicion that some people might have already noticed that he wasn’t using his full power. But Ning Cheng didn’t feel too stressed about it, as he wasn’t the only cultivator in this great meet who hadn’t used his full strength. The best examples were Aiden and Lu Yixian. But even though they didn’t use their full strength, he didn’t care too much about them.

……

Because of the connection with the Grand Essence Great Meet, Heaven Essence Sacred City had turned quite lively. Some people even undertook several hardships all year round just to come here and broaden their horizons. Moreover, many people came here not to watch the matches but to take advantage of this opportunity to participate in some item exchanges and other high-profile auctions.

At each Grand Essence Great Meet, the busiest part wasn’t necessarily the great meet itself, but the various trade fairs accompanying the great meet.

But despite the apparent allure, Barbarian Dragon Clan’s Man Huishan decided to stay in the Grand Essence Ruins. A month ago, he rushed over to the Grand Essence Mystic Realm because his son, Man Jiuren, had died inside it. He remained by the side of the Grand Essence Mystic Realm’s transfer array for a long time, scrutinising every cultivator coming out. But despite having relatively high fame and verifiable histories, Man Huishan found no trace of any of them killing Man Jiuren.

Although it wasn’t a quick investigation, he still couldn’t find the murderer. Ultimately, he could only go back to the Grand Essence Ruins and search for Ning Cheng with the Five-coloured Star Splitter Arrow. Since my son died, then so be it. I can’t resurrect him. Besides, Man Jiuren isn’t my only son. With that thought, the Five-coloured Star Splitter Arrow became more important than his dead son.

Unfortunately, he found no breakthroughs even after more than a year, apart from that one lone piece of news of Lifeless Poisonhand appearing in Grand Essence Ruins once again. Therefore, he immediately focussed all his efforts on searching for Lifeless Poisonhand. As long as he found Lifeless Poisonhand, he could then confirm whether Ning Cheng had died or not.

On one particular day, while Man Huishan drank tea at an inn in the Grand Essence Ruins, a message appeared in his communications pearl.

The message only contained the results of the top 25 of the Grand Essence Great Meet. It just displayed the names of the top 25 candidates.

Man Huishan casually swept through the names but didn’t see any disciple from the Barbarian Dragon Clan. Although feeling very disappointed, he didn’t feel too surprised about it. Over the past several generations, no one had reached the top twenty-five from his Barbarian Dragon Clan.

But just when he put down the communications pearl, he suddenly saw a more familiar name, Rank 8 Pill Emperor Ji He.

He knew that Ji He was just a non-consequential Pill Emperor that got trapped in the mystic realm with Profound Moon Spirit Gate’s Qi Shisanxing.

Therefore, after the mystic realm closed, only Ji He and Qi Shisanxing’s status felt weird. Consequently, he paid particular attention to Ji He and let other people inquire about Ji He and Qi Shisanxing.

Ultimately, he concluded that both Ji He and Qi Shisanxing weren’t faking their identities from the information he gathered back then. Moreover, even if he didn’t ask around, he also knew that the Grand Essence Mystic Realm had many dangerous places. Man Jiuren might not have necessarily died at someone’s hands. Maybe he ventured into such a place and simply couldn’t make it out alive.

Regardless, he had investigated Ji He as much as he could and only learned that Ji He was just an Alchemy Master. He didn’t have a very high level of strength. In other words, Ji He shouldn’t have the power to reach the top 25 of the Grand Essence Great Meet. In fact, even a random Eternal cultivator might easily defeat him.

But now that he saw Ji He’s name in the top twenty-five of the Grand Essence Great Meet. Man Huishan immediately started thinking that Ji He might be a fake. That is, maybe it was someone else masquerading as Ji He with a changed appearance.

However, he also understood that Ji He might have obtained a rare opportunity within the mystic realm, explaining the surge in his combat power. Although it felt strange, it was still within the realm of possibility.

Huishan no longer thought of drinking tea and instead issued two messages.

He sent the first message to Silver Light Fort and the second to Heaven Essence Sacred City to ask for Ji He’s battle recording.

The message sent to Silver Light Fort was for Qu Baiyi, one of the twelve Grand Essence Sacred Children. Man Huishan had heard the news that Qu Baiyi had encountered a powerful nameless expert in the Grand Essence Mystic Realm. This unidentified expert didn’t seem to have reached full-circle Eternal Realm. Yet, he easily ran roughshod over Qu Baiyi and Huo Erqi of the twelve Grand Essence Sacred Children.

But Man Huishan didn’t see any nameless expert come out of the mystic realm. Based on Qu Baiyi’s report last time, this person most likely got eaten by the Human-faced Poison Centipede. Man Huishan had even cross-verified this information from other cultivators. They all mentioned seeing a Human-faced Poison Centipede chasing after a person. All this new information forced Man Huishan to second-guess Ji He’s identity. He started to think about the possibility that this nameless expert might have used Ji He’s identity to come out.

A moment later, two replies arrived. The first one was from Qu Baiyi, containing a message and a battle record. He mentioned that the nameless expert used a long spear as his weapon. Moreover, the video record showed that the spear traces used were also particularly powerful. The second one was Ji He’s battle record from the great meet. Man Huishan noticed that Ji He also used a similar long spear. Although it appeared that the spear traces produced were only of general strength, this fellow truly used spear traces to fight against his opponents.

Man Huishan had no idea what weapon Ji He used before entering the mystic realm. But he didn’t have any mood to investigate it. This nameless expert had obtained a lot of divine grasses in the divine grass medicinal garden. Ji He had received a spot in the Grand Essence Great Meet after bringing out many divine grasses. With these, he felt 80% confident that the nameless expert who had steamrolled Qu Baiyi and Huo Erqi was Ji He or at least someone who had changed their appearance to Ji He. He might even have something to do with his son’s death.

Man Huishan slapped the tea table in front of him and turned it into slag. He then handed the responsibility of searching for Ning Cheng and Lifeless Poisonhand to some of his servants. With that, he then rushed towards the transfer array. He wanted to reach Heaven Essence Sacred City as soon as possible while feeling a slight regret of not thinking about the divine grasses from the medicine garden.

Whether or not this fake Ji He killed Man Jiuren, he had to take this person away. If this fellow had nothing to hide, why would he change his appearance to become Ji He?

Not to mention a rogue cultivator, even if he was Profound Moon Spirit Gate’s disciple, he would take him away and investigate.

……

Qu Baiyi hadn’t gone to Heaven Essence Sacred City to watch or participate in the Grand Essence Great Meet. After escaping from the mystic realm, he went straight into closed-door cultivation. He didn’t even bother looking or investigating the cultivator who obtained those divine grasses from the garden.

Now that Man Huishan sent a message to Silver Light Fort asking about the weapon used by that nameless expert. He felt a little confused but still sent a reply with a record. Why did Man Huishan ask about the same person who snatched away his divine grasses in the mystic realm? Don’t look at him, Qu Baiyi, as one of the twelve Grand Essence Sacred Children. He knew very well that someone like him couldn’t even compare to someone like Man Huishan. Besides, the last time Man Huishan sent a message to his Silver Light Fort was to look for any information related to the death of his son Man Jiuren.

Therefore, when Man Huishan sent another message regarding someone he had already mentioned before, it showed that things weren’t as simple as they appeared on the surface.

However, before he could figure it out himself, the people from Silver Light Fort had already realised why Man Huishan had asked about it. Silver Light Fort naturally would pay attention to the top 25 cultivators in the Grand Essence Great Meet. Even if Man Huishan hadn’t asked anything, after a little while, they would have connected Ji He’s spear traces to the nameless expert that fought against Qu Baiyi.

Therefore, when Qu Baiyi saw Ji He’s recording, he realised why Man Huishan had asked him about that nameless person’s weapon.

Qu Baiyi’s injuries hadn’t fully recovered. But he also quickly rushed towards Heaven Essence Sacred City with Silver Light Fort’s elders.

……

Ning Cheng didn’t expect Man Huishan and the other old monsters to have such a devilish mind. They had already figured out some clues about him even without being here in person because he reached the top 25 in the Grand Essence Great Meet. Moreover, Ning Cheng had never thought that his choice of weapon would expose him as a fake. Mainly because many cultivators used spears and spear-type artefacts. Furthermore, the spear traces he used in the fight weren’t even his original. Just random ordinary skills any spear wielder could use after gaining some proficiency. Plus, he wasn’t the only one who used spear traces on the Grand Essence Great Meet’s battle stage.

At this point, after a ‘hard’ struggle, he had narrowly defeated his opponent to reach the top 25.

Cen Caixuan still stared at Ning Cheng from a distance. After Ning Cheng reached the top 25, she muttered, “He’s not Ji He. He is absolutely not Ji He….”

The green-robed woman next to Cen Caixuan also kept a close eye on Ning Cheng. But when she suddenly heard Cen Caixuan’s mutterings, she asked, “Caixuan, what did you say? What do you mean that he isn’t Ji He?”

When the green-robed asked, Cen Caixuan quickly replied, “No, no, I didn’t mean…”

But before she finished, she recalled her previous mutterings and whispered to the green-robed woman, “Well, keep it down. I think that this Ji He should be someone else with a changed appearance. I’m pretty sure that I didn’t see it wrong.”

“Ah……” The green-robed woman exclaimed but immediately knew that it wasn’t proper and quickly stopped herself.

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