Chapitre 45: First match
"Hm! Nangong Xu transfer the 3 million to me you have first, I will transfer it back to you later. " Ning Qi shamelessly asked, as he decides to bet on his sect disciples who have a 100 percent chance at winning.
Nangong Xu desired to say something but reluctantly transferred the money, as he note the threatening smile on Ning Qi's face.
"Sigh! The debt, I am taking from this disciple is getting higher and higher. I will be repaying him someday, with even better rewards." Ning Qi promised as he felt terrible about it himself.
"Father! You also bet on us... It's easy money for you." Shen Yue said to her father, as he is the one that manages the finance in their family.
Kang Xuan also wanted to bet, but he felt helpless about his financial situation. He soon shook his head, as money is going to be not a big deal once he grows more capable in the future.
Soon two middle-aged men with rugged bodies came into the caged arena from both ends.
"The one on the left is the outer sect disciple of our Yan sect, who volunteered to participate in this match, his strength is at the initial stage of the junior martial artist. The one, on the other hand, registered with us with the code name 'Lonewolf', with no data on his strength. All our matches are randomly matched with all the participants. Hence, everyone participating in the matches, please don't accuse us of your bad luck later." Fang Lian warned from the downside, before continuing.
"Now! All the guests can start betting, and you have 5 minutes to choose from your bet. Our odds for our sect disciple is 1:1 and for Lonewolf at 1:2. I won't fritter away your time anymore please continue." Fang Lian said.
Suddenly the stadium started bustling with many people calling for those disciples to place a bet. As the odds aren't that favorable on anyone, everyone started betting randomly to check their luck.
"Sect master Ning! I thought all the matches are fixed, beforehand?" Shen Tian asked anxiously, even Shen Jian looked at Ning Qi nervously.
Except for Nangong Xu, even Kang Xuan and Shen Yue visibly tensed up a bit. They also looked at Ning Qi for confirmation.
"Alright! Stop worrying, I possess a secret technique that I practiced for a long time. Presently I am relatively efficient in that, so I divined your opponent's strength beforehand. So, stop worrying so much and concentrate on winning the match as quickly as possible." Ning Qi lied through his teeth, as he can't explain the system to them.
Everyone sighed, as they marveled at Ning Qi's strength. To be able to predict something that is going to happen beforehand is not something any random cultivators can do. A cultivator must bear a strong soul to even be able to practice such techniques. This further confirmed their belief in Ning Qi's strength is way too high for them to even guess anymore.
"Sect master Ning! You are genuinely a divine personality." Shen Jian sighed and said, while all of them nodded their heads, as though agreeing with him.
Ning Qi was simply dumbfounded by their implicit trust in him. He lies through his teeth, but these people are addressing a divine person to him, and he doesn't know whether to laugh or cry anymore. But It did overcome the current problem at hand.
"Alright! We don't need betting on any of these matches, as we don't have any guarantee on who will win. Let's just watch and learn how these guys fight." Ning Qi said, as he sincerely doesn't want to try his luck.
Everyone bobbed their heads and concentrated their eyes on the two people in the center of the arena.
Both of them are performing a simple warm-up before their match, at around 5 minutes later, once everyone placed their bets, Fang Lian's voice came again.
"Alright! The betting table is closed for this match. Mr. Lone wolf and Ding Chen, you both can start the match now... Unless one of you dies, this battle arena won't open. " After saying that Fang Lian went silent, but the audience started bustling with cheers. They are cheering for those that they have placed their bet on.
"You look like a person, who came out of the village for the first time. I don't want to waste time on you, let's finish this match quickly." The outer sect disciple, Ding Chen said arrogantly, as he moved right into the opponent. But the other guy didn't take the words of Ding Chen seriously, as he also moved towards Ding Chen.
Both of their fists clashed with each other, but Ding Chen retreated for 3 steps before stabilizing himself. Lone wolf on the other hand, simply stood there without expressing any emotion, just like what he did in the start.
All the cheers from the audience died down a bit, but Lone wolf didn't give any chance to Ding Chen, he rapidly took 3 steps forward and gave a side kick with his left leg in a sweep motion, to which Ding Chen hurriedly held his hands to fend off that.
But he instantly knows he got tricked, as the energy in that kick wasn't as powerful as he guessed. The lone wolf swiftly retreated his left leg and gave a round back kick on the temple of Ding Chen, who was still unbalanced.
After achieving that, the Lone wolf released a long heave and retreated by 4 steps. While Ding Chen, who is still standing, suddenly noticed blood started flowing from his ears and nose. He looked around the arena for a moment and recognize everyone looking at him with stunned gazes, but he is incapable to hear a single thing. He next looked at Lone wolf and extended his hand wanting to state something, but before he said anything, he fell with his facing the floor. His body twitched a bit at first and after a moment or two, it stopped moving altogether.
Everything went extremely fast, they merely fought for 3 moves. But one guy is dead, while the other one is absolutely fine.
Shen Yue and Kang Xuan's bodies, which just calmed down again tensed up a bit. Nangong Xu, who didn't take the matches seriously from the start, his face suddenly turned solemn. Even Ning Qi felt like something gripped his heart and felt relatively heavy after looking at this scene. After all, they are all strong but they have never confronted a dreadful situation like this. This is their first lesson on the path of their cultivation, and they need to get used to the things like this in a regular manner.
On the other hand, both Shen Tian and Shen Jian looked at the situation with a bit of surprise. As they felt the winner is going to be Ding Chen, but this lone wolf fellow proved them wrong.
Ning Qi soon reminded himself, that he needs to get used to such situations, as he selected this path already. Once he confirmed his beliefs to himself, he felt a bit better and looked at his disciples, before saying.
"What are you all so frightened about? This is going to be a routine thing from the day you chose this path. Therefore, instead of getting nervous about such a thing, start accepting your matches seriously. I want you all to finish the matches as fast as this Lone wolf fellow did." Ning Qi once more said shamelessly, lugging them back from their stupor.
"The winner of this match is Mr. Lone Wolf. Congratulations! You can collect your reward for winning the match from the counter on your way." Fang Lian said, as he finally confirmed the death of Ding Chen. But he doesn't express any hostility in his voice, as though the dead guys were already removed from the history of the sect.
Some audience cheered while others booed, once the announcement was made. The ones that cheered won their betting, while the others lost theirs. Soon some outer sect disciples of the yan sect went to the arena to clear the dead body and cleaned all the blood neatly.
"Alright! That was a reasonably thrilling match, Mr. Lone wolf genuinely is a talented person. He is likely in the middle stage of the junior martial artist realm. Let's invite the participants of the second match already. " Fang Lian said after the audience calmed down a bit.
Two more participants gradually entered the match from each side of the stage again. This time both the opponents look quite young compared to the previous match. They seemed to be in their late twenties, almost the same as Ning Qi. One of them being a woman, caused the audience to go wild with crazy cheering, as there are not many female martial artists in the world.
"Alright! Just like the first time, please start putting your best quickly." Fang Lian urged the audience. But he didn't announce the strength of any of them, probably because both of them are keeping it secret.
Even though the audience is mostly biased toward the female martial artist, the betting most of them placed on the male guy. Female martial artists are rare, but even the rare ones are usually significantly weak. Such is the prejudice against women in the martial arts world and all these businessmen perceive it pretty well.
"I think the big sister is going to win the match." Shen Yue said with confidence, causing all of them to roll their eyes, including Ning Qi. It's not they are discriminating against that woman, it's just that Shen Yue is the one that biased toward her, just because she thinks the girl in the arena is quite attractive.
But that did release quite a bit of the tension that got on their nerves, because of the previous match.
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
-- Classement
Power Stone 
-- Power
stone