章 38: The vast universe
The girl was still spinning around in the high that she had defeated the great magical beast. She had almost completely ignored Bai Yun.
Bai Yun started to analyze the girl closely. The whip that she was using was of an extremely high quality. His new sword was already starting to break. The whip was of the same quality as the sword that was given to him by his father. Not only that, the movement technique as well as the whip art she was using was of a very high standard. But from the way she was using it, it was quite clear she was very inept at the techniques. Which made sense considering her age. She also seemed to not have any life and death experiences.
Bai Yun concluded that the girl was probably from a large clan or force and was sent here for the experience of tempering.
Even though he would normally have attacked an opponent in such a defenseless state, he decided to spare the naive and carefree little girl. Bai Yun ripped out his sleeve and tied up his wound as he watched the little girl. As he was checking the mobility of his arms, the girl finally turned to him.
"You are still here?" She seemed surprised.
"Where else would I be?" He asked, amused.
"Good. You did not run away. Now you finally can witness my, Song Hui's true strength." The girl declared.
Bai Yun watched her posturing with a smile. The little girl was probably from the Song family, one of the three great families of the Yellow City. She must also be quite high up in the clan to have such a precious weapon.
But she was no problem for Bai Yun. The biggest threat she could give was her whip technique, but he had already seen through it. Even though she was in the ninth stage of qi condensation, she seemed to be quite easy to handle. Of course, this was because of his experience. Anyone else would easily be defeated by her whip.
But it wasn't that easy for Bai Yun either. His sword was nearly broken. It would be nearly impossible for him to break through the little girl's defense. It was impossible that she did not know a defensive whip technique. And with his qi half empty, he had no chance at all. But it was also nearly impossible for her to defeat him too. She hadn't learned how to properly transfer her strength to her whip yet.
"Why don't we simply call it quits. It doesn't seem as if either of us could win." He said. There was no way the examiners hadn't seen his performance just now. He simply had to wait it out until a hundred people were eliminated. So he had no need to fight.
"No way!" Song Hui said while attacking with her whip.
Bai Yun casually parried the attack. This seemed to completely infuriate the little girl. She kept on attacking with increased vigor. Each attack was stronger and stronger than the last. But Bai Yun was an impenetrably fortress, perfectly deflecting each attack.
But Bai Yun started to frown. Based on the little girl's laughter, it was as if she had found an interesting toy and it didn't seem likely that she was going to stop soon. But for Bai Yun, it was a race to see whether his qi would run out first, or if his sword would break first.
Bai Yun knew that he had to do something. In an instant, he took a deep breath, and then directed his killing intent towards the little girl. This would be useless against anyone with even a modicum of experience as they would all be trained not to react under killing intent. But from the moves of the little girl, it was obvious that she had gone through nothing like that. He was waiting for the opening that would appear when she was flustered by the killing intent.
One by one, the seconds passed by. But the little girl did not react even in the slightest, almost as if she had not even sensed the killing intent. Bai Yun could not understand what happened. Suddenly he broke out in cold sweat. 'Could it be that she is actually a terrifying existence that had already become indifferent to life and death and is playing a role in order to trick me?' Bai Yun thought.
Bai Yun cast wind motion and ran back at top speed in order to make distance between them. He almost fell over in his haste. He looked back at the little girl who was looking at his with her head tilted. Her whip was lying in a line between them.
"Why did you run away? We were having so much fun?" The little girl asked.
Bai Yun focused his eyes on the girl. He looked at the little girl closely, checking out her stance, the way she carried herself and her reactions. Bai Yun was soon terrified. How was this the stance of an expert? He could see nothing but openings. It was impossible to hide the aura of an expert from the way one stood in front of the enemy. But he could see no such thing from the girl.
He fell to his knees in astonishment. 'How could she only have openings. Is her understanding of fighting at such a high level that I cannot even see through her stance.' He thought, as he lost all color in his face.
"Are you okay big brother. Did I hurt you?" The little girl asked, with concern in her voice.
'It can't be. It's impossible for such a person to exist. The only explanation is that she is an amateur. But how could she not react to that killing intent? Did she not sense it. But that's impossible. It's an instinctive part of life. Even a rabbit would be able to sense it.' Bai Yun jerked his head upward, as he looked at the girl.
One of his soul tendrils sneaked over to the little girl who was staring at him in concern. He quickly wrapped it around the girl's ankles and pulled, making her lose her balance and fall over with a cry.
The little girl jumped up in a moment. "Who was that, show yourself. Don't attack from behind you coward!"
Bai Yun was stunned. He had gotten hold of the girl's ankles. Any cultivator should have had enough instincts to react when someone attacked unless the attack was deliberately hidden using some methods, which he had not done. It was impossible for a peak qi condensation cultivator to not notice it. Unless that person had no instincts.
With that Bai Yun confirmed that the little girl, no the strange creature, in front of him truly had less instincts than a rabbit. It was the first time in his two lives that he had come across such a curious situation. It made him question everything he knew about life itself.
'The universe truly is filled with endless marvels.' Bai Yun thought.
Bai Yun stood up with a sigh. He had lost all motivation to fight the strange creature. "Let us stop." He said.
The strange creature turned to him. "Okay. I need to find the person who pulled my leg. I need to beat him up." She said.
Bai Yun shuddered while looking at the strange creature. He started feeling some fear towards it. He swore to never admit to what he had done. 'What an incredible creature to make even a titled god afraid.' He thought.
What Bai Yun did not know was that right now all the people in the command room was doubled over in laughter.
"I can't believe he tried to distract her with his killing intent. That reaction of his was funny." The man on the floral shirt said.
"I wanted to take a picture of that look of despair. It was perfect." His partner was on the floor by now.
The boss was trying to main a straight face, but her shoulders were shaking. "There is no need to laugh. Which one of you wouldn't be surprised if your killing intent was simply ignored. But that kid is very impressive. Not only did he not react when he was hurt, but just his killing intent was also quite terrifying. I don't think any of us had a killing intent like that when we were his age. I wonder how he trained."
The room went silent. The boss had made a valid point. If they knew that what he had shown was only a tiny fraction of Bai Yun's true killing intent, they would have been completely terrified.
"I'll inform the Hunter Union to keep an eye on him." The man in the floral shirt said.
Soon after that Bai Yun and the strange creature parted ways, with her still crying out for the unknown attacker. He walked a good distance, and then sat down for a while once he found a secluded place. Bai Yun had spend a lot of qi in the fight earlier and needed a place to rest. Of course, in a grassland, a secluded space was simply a large tree.
By now the sun had risen completely. He sat there for a while until noon, slowly recovering his qi and looking back on the fight he just had. He realized that his body still wasn't properly responding to his instructions. The wound on his shoulder was proof of that. He would have to adjust his reactions properly, and then slowly hone his body.
As noon came, Bai Yun opened his eyes. In front of him he could see a young man. He was wearing a black robe and had a spear in his hand. His entire bearing was the opposite of Song Hui and was staring straight at Bai Yun with battle intent in his eyes.
'He is strong.' Bai Yun thought.
"I hope you are strong. All the others were too weak for me to learn anything." The stranger said pointing his spear at Bi Yun.
Bai Yun stood up with a sigh. He could see that the young man was a battle maniac, and probably one of the strongest in the test. Only one of them would survive the upcoming fight. He closed his eyes and took out his sword. As he opened his eyes, an intense desire to battle appeared in his eyes.
The black robed young man's eyes shone. "Here I come." He said, before lunging at Bai Yun.
Suddenly a white light covered the two of them. As their eyes widened in surprise, they found themselves being teleported to the large hall they were in previously. Bai Yun looked around and saw quite a few people in the hall, including the strange creature and the spear youth.
"Congratulations." He heard a voice in front of them. It was the lady who had led them to the test. "The number of participants in survival has reached one hundred. You have all passed."
"From now on the second round will begin. The second round is a group round. Since we are hunters, and we have to hunt together in a group very often, the second round is geared to test the ability of a person in participating as a group. The participants will be separated into twenty five groups of four each, and then the best eight groups will be chosen for the final thirty two. Either your entire group is chosen, or none of you are."
Bai Yun knew of the rules for the second round. During the second round the choices were much more than the first. Depending on the scenario, both the rules as well as the objectives would vary a lot. He had heard about all of them from his father.
"The scenario for the second round is..."
'Please let it be hunt. Please let it be hunt.' Bai Yun prayed silently.
"... War."
"Shit." Almost the entire room including Bai Yun cursed as a collective. Only a few people like the strange creature who did not know the rules looked confused at this.
Only the staff seemed to be happy about the rules.
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