The young boy was trailing behind two legacy disciples, though he wasn't that far back. The mountain itself in terms of scale was as big as a major town of a rank 2 empire which loosely translated into the largest capital of a rank 4 empire or kingdom.
The surface area at the base of the mountain was large and it would only narrow down the higher up the peak one moved. Therefore, the participants would have low chances of stumbling onto each other in the early stages of the test, though stumbling onto each other wasn't a foregone conclusion, even at the early stages.
But, for the moment none of the participants had met up yet. From their files, the seven-year-old boy was called Liao Jiayi and was the son of a retired low-ranking soldier from a rank 4 kingdom. As for the two legacies ahead of him; both were of similar age and sex. They were 13-year-old males both in the fourth stage of the qi refinement realm.
One was dark colored and the other had brown almond hair. From what Yang Qing knew, the dark-colored one was the son of an Order employee who worked in the beast-taming hall as for the brown almond haired one, one of his parents worked as a blacksmith in the craftsmanship division while the remaining two legacies had parents in the same division, which was the external logistics division.
It came as no surprise to Yang Qing and the rest on the excellent performance of the legacies thus far, however, the other participants were not bad either. Other than the seven-year-old boy, there were other standouts behind them;
There were the twin brothers who seemed to have mastered a blue-grade cultivation art even though it was just the preliminary phase, it was still a feat. The blue-grade art gave them elemental attributes. The burly one had a study defense and was in tune with the earth element while the scholarly looking had radiant blue lightning flash around his body. They were seamless in their cooperation and they complemented each other perfectly.
Other than them, among the special participants there was a 14-year-old girl who had unlocked her mental sea due to her abnormally large soul. She could already deploy spiritual sense that covered a five-meter radius around her. However, her soul was too powerful for her body to handle, and she struggled to react to what her senses detected, in addition, her body had an imbalance due to her overly powerful soul. Her cultivation base was at the third stage of the qi refinement realm, however, her soul based on Yang Qing estimates had the same strength as a freshly broken-through core formation expert.
'As long as she finds one of the special zones, and starts practicing the 108 steps of the autumn leaves, she should be able to alleviate some of the pressure from her body,' thought Yang Qing.
The cultivation art was comprehensive and touched up on the foundation of all the major facets of cultivation which included body and soul-strengthening techniques, and with Yang Qing's additional notes, he even added means of trying to achieve equilibrium between the two, which was built upon his experiences with his Yin Yang jade bone physique that granted him a soul and a body that was at the same level of strength, as one of its effects.
As long as the lady with the powerful soul gained sufficient time to strengthen her body, and also gain insight on how to properly use her soul without straining herself, she would be a serious contender for being among the first people to make it to the top of the mountain. As far as advantages go, a spiritual sense had the greatest advantage even when pitted against all the physiques Yang Qing had noted among the participants present.
The spiritual sense was an advantage only those in the core formation realm could have. Even though her range was just five meters, which was lower than the range a first-stage core formation expert would get, she still enjoyed the benefits of a true spiritual sense within those five meters. An all-round sense that is able to capture everything by magnifying their presence to the user. Things that could escape the eye or the ears, would be easily captured by a spiritual sense.
When venturing into an unfamiliar place, a cultivator's spiritual sense was one of their lifelines. Yang Qing was eager to see how things would pen out at the end.
His gaze then trailed off to the other participants. He couldn't help but sigh at the level of talent he saw. There was already a promising alchemist in the midst, and a blacksmith. The two had already stumbled onto one of the special zones and were hard at work using their respective strengths to try and increase their odds from within the special zone.
"It looks like the Order still holds sway over the populace, despite the things that have been happening off-late."
Yang Qing couldn't help but sigh as he took count of over fifty participants who had the talent to be named elite disciples within any of the high-ranking organizations that were at rank 3 and above.
Yang Qing's gaze then trailed over to Lai Rou's position. He held a favorable impression of the tall youth for his guts to be the first to ask a question despite being overly terrified. Yang Qing admired his tenacity, and in terms of talent, even if Yang Qing still didn't see anything that stood out, he still thought Lai Rou had done well for making it through the heart-cleansing waterfall.
About a third of the participants had already been eliminated by the waterfall, while those that passed through some of them had already fallen before they climbed very high.
Lai Rou was still holding on despite having one of the weakest cultivation bases. He was even weaker than the Zou siblings seeing how he was only at the iron stage of the body-refining realm.
He was extremely cautious in his approach in using unconventional routes such as using his lanky build to scale up trees with thick canopies and moving slowly from tree to tree to keep out of sight. His progress was slow but it was still there.
'mmh," Yang Qing's brows furrowed as he cast a close eye on Lai Rou.
"Guys what do you think of that kid, Lai Rou?" asked Yang Qing with his gaze not leaving the person in question.
"I can't believe he is only 13 with that build. If he had some meat in him, he would be terrifying," Kang Huilang offhandedly said as he threw some sesame seeds and wine in his mouth.
'Has he come here just to eat,' thought Yang Qing. He kept those thoughts to himself since Huilang's help with the cultivation art was crucial to the test, especially the last special part of the test.
Thus, Yang Qing decided to give him a pass this time as he said,
"I was talking about his coordination and movement."
"He is very agile for his tall build, almost as if he is using the air to propel himself forward and the darkness of the canopy doesn't seem to affect him one bit," Xia Boqin said.
"He seems to have fine control of every part of his body. No movement is wasted, and his shoulder movements are too fluid, almost as if there is no halt in his rotator cuffs. It looks like he is dislocating his shoulders.
I wonder what he went through that made him adopt such extreme means," said Dai Chen.
"If I was to guess, he worked in a mine, and with a build like that he had to find a way to handle those small shafts," said Kang Huilang.
He was no longer casual as before but instead had a rare austere look to him.
"His movements are of someone swinging a pick axe, and with how dark those mines sometimes get, handling a little darkness from the canopy should be no problem for him.
I think he may have a talent for the sword or the saber. His skill with his movement, and the flexibilities of his wrist and shoulder, coupled with his reach, I think he'd make a terrifying sword or saber expert," added Kang Huilang.
His entire focus was completely drawn to Lai Rou.
The others sighed when they saw Kang Huilang's look. Before he joined the Order, Kang Huilang was a slave who worked in the spirit stone mines of some long-forgotten sect. The mines were a death trap. Other than threats from the sect to meet their quotas, the mines were also littered with ferocious spirit beasts.
The sect used them as both miners and cannon fodders to scout the mine for any hidden dangers. Kang Huilang only survived that place because he unlocked his peerless jade physique within that mine and made an escape during spirit beast tide that created the perfect opportunity for his escape.
Lai Rou's form might have dug long-forgotten memories from him.
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