With yet another flash of light, Mei and the disciples were sent away.

The first thing Mei noticed was the scent of soil and greenery. The next thing was that there no longer a chair under her bum. She fell backwards, flailing as she crashed into the grass.

Great start.

Apparently she had been sent into a forest of sorts. Lush trees covered with vines stretched to the skies, their leaves merging into a dark canopy above, long grass up to her knees covering the ground. In the distance, she could hear the chirping of birds, the sound of insects and the calls of animals.

"Ah!" someone yelped.

She turned and saw Liu Qiang had fallen onto Wang Wei.

"Get off me, you fatty!" he said, kicking him off.

Looking around, she saw that Zhang Ming, the ice fatty was here too!

"Zhang Ming? What are you doing here?" Liu Qiang frowned.

"Ah? Well, I threw my prize slip away, so I couldn't join a team... guess I happened to be matched with you guys," he said awkwardly. "Teehee?"

Mei took out her prize slip and turned it around.

---

[Points]

500

[Teammates]

Lin Xiuying - Leader

Liu Qiang

Wang Wei

Xu Yingyi

Zhang Ming

---

Huh, so those were Xiuying and Yingyi's surnames. And indeed, Zhang Ming was in the team.

While it was unexpected, Mei wasn't opposed to it. He seemed nice enough, and his ice powers would definitely come in handy.

Wang Wei stared at him cautiously, before reaching his hand for a handshake.

"W-why so formal?" Zhang Ming laughed nervously.

"Ah, don't worry, it's fine! Welcome to the team, Zhang Ming!" Xiuying smiled.

After talking for a little more and familiarising themselves with one another, they walked through the forest cautiously. Except for one little detail.

Whenever vines or bushes got in the way, Wang Wei would burn them to a crisp with his flames. Mei was a bit worried the forest might just go ablaze, but thankfully, there weren't any leaf litters in the virtual world. Huh, maybe that was why the scent of soil was stronger than in real forests.

"Don't you think this is a bit risky?" Zhang Ming voiced out. "What if our opponents follow the trail of burnt plants and attack us?"

"Hmph!" Wang Wei incinerated yet another bundle of vines. "If they follow us, so be it! We'll just defeat them! We're aiming to snatch first place, so why should we be afraid?"

"First?!" Zhang Ming was shocked. "Wait, are you all-"

"Nah, it's just him. He has high standards." Yingyi shrugged.

Zhang Ming seemed relieved.

As for Mei, she wasn't really that opposed to what Wang Wei was doing. After watching all those matches, she felt a lot more confident. Their team seemed quite competant, so she felt like they had a good chance against most people. Plus, disciples following their trail to attack would be more exciting than wandering aimlessly in search of people.

But as they continued to destroy the greenery, the growls of a bear came from a distance. She could hear its running from behind.

Wait, what the hell? Why were there wild beasts interfering in the tournament? What was the sect master thinking?

Behind them, a brown bear came into sight, grunting as it approached rapidly.

"Wang Wei, go burn it!" Liu Qiang shouted.

"I don't have that kind of range, ask Xiuying!"

"But my fire isn't as strong..."

Faced with this dilemma, Mei could only resort to her "ultimate move". She activated her body techniques, before flinging her axe at the bear.

Bonk!

The bear stumbled from the force of the blow, the axe flying off to the side.

Because injuries weren't a thing here, they had no idea how injured the bear actually was. Regardless, Wang Wei ran over and began shooting flames at the bear, which had already begun getting up, roaring in anger.

Tsk! This thing was so tough! Based on what Li Jie said, his flames should be super nasty, right?

As the bear prepared to pounce, Zhang Ming ran over and shoved Wang Wei to the ground. At the same time, he shot a huge burst of blue qi to the ground, coating it in a layer of ice.

From it's pounce, the bear landed right onto the ice, slipping and crashing headfirst into a tree.

Bang!

From the impact, dozens of leaves rained down.

"Quick, kill it!" Liu Qiang yelled.

"You don't have to tell me!"

Putting on a stained expression, Wang Wei began to fire a constant stream of flames at the bear. It made a sad roar, then vanished into thin air.

"It-it teleported?" Xiuying stuttered.

A few minutes passed, Mei and her friends filled with anxiety but there was no sign of the bear coming back to attack. It was only then when Yingyi thought of checking the prize slips, finally realising that their points had gone up.

Apparently, enemies would just vanish when defeated, something which Mei found very misleading. Couldn't the sect master have made them turn into a puff of smoke at the very least?

Wang Wei had gotten 200 points from being the one to defeat the bear, while the rest of the team got 100 each.

As Mei looked at her 600 points, a thought came into mind. Since they could get points like this, did that mean they could get first place from just destroying all the wildlife? Was this even a disciple tournament anymore?

That being said, the wild beasts did seem rather powerful. To have survived the flames for so long, the body cultivation of the bear must be stupidly high.

Wang Wei leaned against a tree, pale from qi exhaustion. He panted for a bit before swallowing a pill out from his ring. Seeing that Zhang Ming was a little out of it too, he offered a pill to him. Ice fatty nodded in thanks.

Mei suddenly thought of something.

"Why don't you give all of us some of your pills?" she said to him. "It's a virtual world anyway, so you won't actually lose them."

"Eh? Okay..."

Wang Wei seemed a bit reluctant, but he took out a few jars of pills and handed a some to each of them.

Qi Replenishing Pills, Recovery Pills, Focus Pills...

They all looked the same, little white pellets. Without containers on her, Mei could only put it in different sections in her bag. It was a bit unhygienic, but it wasn't real anyway, so she figured was fine.