Those of the Earth Hall have some possibility of being won over by forces of Sky Fortune City. Even though they will shower you with money and beautiful women and other sorts of enticements, you have all passed the Dream Trial test and have a heart of martial arts! But! Even a heart of martial arts can slowly be corrupted. These temptations might become the maggots that eat your clothes and gnaw at your will!”
“Remember this! Only strength is the most important! They want to win you over because you have the strength! If you do not have strength, then you have nothing! Come with me.”
The red haired man said all these and then led the group to a place deep within the back mountains.
The lands occupied by the Seven Profound Martial House were broad and vast. The entire Zhou Mountain was the land of the Seven Profound Martial House. In the back mountains there were only a few buildings. The path was dotted with beautiful green grass, great mountains stones and ancient trees that seemed to come to life. Occasionally, water springs flowed to life, giving the beautiful image of spring come alive.
After they walked for about the time an incense stick takes to burn, they reached a giant cliff. The cliff was several dozen feet high, and its surface was polished as smooth and shiny as a mirror. On it, was densely engraved numerous names. The name at the top was as big as a bucket. It said: Ling Sen.
The names downwards were smaller, and they were written in lines row after row. Altogether there were 20 rows.
Lin Ming faintly guessed the purpose of this cliff. Hong Xi’s words only verified his suspicions. He had said, “You saw the cliff, but the truth is that it is just an illusion. The names above are constantly changing; this is the Seven Profound Martial House’s Ranking Stone. The Ranking Stone has the names of everyone from the Earth Hall and the Heavenly Abode. Their names are all listed. There are over 200 individuals, these people are you fellow senior apprentice brothers and senior apprentice sisters.”
It really was some sort of ranking system. Lin Ming looked at the strange names and followed downward from Ling Sen. He read them and still did not see Qin Xingxuan.
Why didn’t it list Qin Xingxuan? Lin Ming had some doubts; perhaps Qin Xingxuan was not included together with the disciples of the Heavenly Abode.
Lin Ming continued to look, and then after some time his eyes narrowed. He saw an extremely familiar name – Zhu Yan!
Zhu Yan, rank 39.
Heavenly Abode, 39!
Lin Ming took a deep breath. How long would it take for him to achieve this?
He continued downwards and was pleasantly surprised to see his own name. But immediately after him was that man, Wang Yanfeng. The rest of the 20 of them of the Earth Hall were listed. As for the others, their names were not written on the cliff ledge.
The Ranking Stone only showed the names of those in the Heavenly Abode and the Earth Hall.
Hong Xi said, “One way of the martial path is to hack your way through! If you wish to reach higher, then you must step on others underneath your boot! This land has no lack of talent! But do you know why we selected so many of you so called geniuses?
Hong Xi spoke this far, and the disciple were stunned. One disciple said, “Instructor Hong, choosing a talent is naturally to raise them and help them cultivate.”
“Raise them?” Hong Xi laughed and laughed again with unbridled impunity. You know how a beast trainer trains a vicious beast? They have the most excellent of systems. The beasts with the best qualifications and potential are chosen, and then reared. They are fed good, hearty meat daily, and trained. Then they put them in a cage and let them fight. Out of the several hundred beasts who began, there would only be one left; that is the king of the beasts.”
“You lot are in this cage of beasts. On the path of being a powerhouse you will need to step on countless peerless geniuses and climb over their corpses. Therefore the reason we chose and gathered so many talents is not to raise you, but in order to be raised for battle and slaughter! You are nothing more than stepping stones for the true talents to step on and climb higher!”
“There is no strongest, only stronger. You either step on the corpses and crawl up someone or you face the cruel death and are trampled underneath everyone else. This is the truth!”
Each of Hong Xi’s words hit the disciples like a steel ball. It made their hearts plummet into ice. The talents were not gathered together to focus on training, but only to be bodies for powerhouses to climb up and reach higher goals.
Hong Xi’s beast cage analogy planted a strong sense of crisis within the disciple. Even Lin Ming felt a surge of emotions.
“The last is the king…” Lin Ming clenched his fists and his eyes filled with thick fighting spirit.