Although it was very hard to accept, it was the truth. Meng Yu knew she had not a single ounce of Spiritual Qi left in her dantian and unlike Zhu Tan, she doesn’t store Spiritual Qi in her cells.
So, he got no choice but to silently stand up and leave the stage. Zhu Tan had already left the stage. He was already announced as the winner by the referee. As she walked toward the participant’s room, it was finally Fu Chen and Jian Shen’s turn.
She didn’t speak a word to him. She just silently went to the corner and held her face in her palms.
‘I lost….. I lost to a person who doesn’t have talent and never trained….’
Meng Yu hated the people who don’t train hard if they don’t have talent. She hated those people because they are just random people without any motivation or goal in their minds.
She doesn’t hate genius. She doesn’t hate people like Fu Chen. As a genius herself, she knows what kind of effect a genius could bring if he works hard. And, even if he doesn’t then he will remain at the bottom.
But, those who don’t have talent and do not train hard aren’t worthy to be at the bottom. But, Zhu Tan crushed her belief.
In her eyes, Zhu Tan’s talent was nothing much. He only had the Rank One talent. She had Rank Five Talent.
Talent is measured by certain aspects. First, it is measured by the ability and rank of the Martial Spirit. Second, it is measured by the level of comprehension.
The levels of comprehension determine how fast can you comprehend a martial art or a technique and it starts from level one to level nine. A person with level one comprehension needs nearly seven to ten years just to comprehend a Low-Tier Martial Art or Cultivation Technique.
And, a person with level nine comprehension only needs one day to comprehend the Low-Tier Martial Art or Cultivation Technique. From this perspective, she is nearly Level Seven.
Because it would take her from one week to a month to comprehend the Low-Tier Martial Art. As for the rank of Martial Spirit, it is also ranked from one to nine.
And, based on that, both levels and ranks are added then divided by two which gives the approximate talent of a person. Her Marital Spirit is only Rank Four.
Combine with her level six, it gives her ten points which further divided by two would label her talent as Rank Five.
Xue Le is Rank Seven Talent. Not only does she have Level Eight Comprehension, but she also has Sixth Rank Martial Spirit.
Fu Chen is at the bottom for both. First, his cultivation isn’t that fast and even with the mutation, it would be around Fourth Rank. At least, this is what Ysla told him.
As for his comprehension, it is Level Zero which means his talent is only around Rank Two. But, this begs the question.
Why did Ysla call Zhu Tan’s talent Level One?
Because his cultivation speed is high and his comprehension is also high especially if he puts the effort into it. Fu Chen didn’t know why she said his talent was rank one but he didn’t even remember it so, he didn’t even ask her.
He was just consumed in the thoughts of defeating his enemy.
As both of them reached the stage, he stood in his corner while Jian Shen stood in his corner. Both of them bowed to show mutual respect and immediately got into the fighting positions.
Fu Chen stared at his opponent for a moment.
‘If possible, I would like not to use the system. But, I kinda get a strong feeling that I would be forced to use the system. Anyway, let’s see where this goes. I haven’t seen him in battle so this will be my first.’
Fu Chen forcefully suppressed himself from watching any battle so that he can train himself for the unexpected situations which did happen a lot. He encountered those situations again and again but this also led to him learning a lot during the battle.
Jian Shen stared at him for a moment. His sword sheath was hanging on the left side of his waist and his right hand was on the hilt of his sword.
Whoosh!
The next moment, he just vanished. Jian Shen’s body moved so fast that before Fu Chen could react, he had already cut his stomach.
Splash!
The blood fell out of his skin and Fu Chen immediately retreated several steps.
‘What was that? I didn’t even see him using his Spiritual Qi. How did he travel at such fast speed without even giving off a slight hint of Spiritual Qi?’
“A swordsman never leaves his trail behind. He must move at the speed that can’t be seen by anyone and draw his sword to take the blood of his opponent.”
“If you want to wait until I strike then you will never get an opportunity to strike back.” Jian Shen slowly opened his eyes and put his sword back in his sheath as he spoke.
“Oh yeah? Then, thanks for the heads up!”
“Storm Steps!”
Whoosh!
Fu Chen smirked and his foot smashed so hard into the ground that his body just jolted forward. His speed was faster than before but still not comparable to Jian Shen.
As he moved forward, he was easily spotted. Jian Shen withdrew his sword and slashed.
Ding!
The blade struck against the dagger as the sparks came out from the middle.
‘He isn’t using Spiritual Qi. But how can he make his sword so strong without Spiritual Qi?’ Fu Chen noticed that he couldn’t sense any Spiritual Qi flow in the sword. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t push him back as well.
This drove him to think if there is something else that could replace the Spiritual Qi for him.
‘No, this is not the time to think about such stuff. I must find a way to defeat him without fully using three stances. If I can’t do that, then I won’t be able to face off against Zhu Tan.’
Tack! Thwack!
Suddenly, Jian Shen slightly pulled his wrist and struck the dagger with the hilt of his sword. As soon as Fu Chen lost control, he slammed the hilt against his stomach.
The strike made Fu Chen retreat while holding his stomach hard. He quickly came to realize that if he wants to defeat Jian Shen, he must get serious.
‘If you can’t see the opponent in front of you, then you can’t defeat the opponent ahead of you.’
He considered Zhu Tan as his opponent from the start of his match. At first, it wouldn’t be wrong to say that he got arrogant. But, then again, he realized that he was wrong after each battle.
Each opponent had a unique set of skills and thus, they were worthy opponents in one way or another. After all, there is no way he can match Tan Tan in strength.
And, he can’t match Meng Yu in agility. Some opponents were strong while some were weak but if he can’t defeat the opponent that’s standing right in front of him.
He can’t face Zhu Tan.
With this mentality, Fu Chen grinned for the first time in the competition and clenched his fists with powerful battle intent coming out of him.
Jian Shen quickly recognized this intent and gripped the hilt of his sword.
“Roaring Tiger First Stance”
Fu Chen condensed the blue tiger phantom behind him and then covered himself with the same phantom to create a coating of Spiritual Qi. This was highly compact Spiritual Qi which vastly increases his defenses and offenses as well as movements.
First Stance was the Jack of All but also a master of none. His defense wasn’t good because it could still be broken with continuous attacks. His attacks aren’t that strong, especially against the people like Tan Tan.
And, his speed can’t catch up to Meng Yu. It could dodge her attacks but it won’t be sufficient.
That’s why he knows what he should do next. He knows if he wants to face off against the swordsman, he must bring the best out of his martial arts.
“Storm Steps!”
Without wasting any more seconds, he ran around Jian Shen. With his enhanced speed, he added Storm Steps to move at an amazing speed which was only visible due to his blue coating.
But, this left Jian Shen confused. Because for a while, Fu Chen was just moving around him. But, he quickly sensed great trouble. He slightly took out his sword and as soon as he did that, Fu Chen stopped behind him and opened both of his palms.
His wrists were connected for the third stance and a massive amount of Spiritual Qi was gathered between his palm.
“Roaring Tiger Third Stance”
“Tiger Cannon”
Whoosh!
A powerful beam of Spiritual Qi dashed towards Jian Shen. But at this moment, his hands were already on the hilt and his sword was already slashing down.
“Crescent Moon Slash!”