Book 2. The Grand Gathering. Chapter 2. The Twin Phoenix School. (Part II)

The actions of the teenage inner disciple and his peers were normal to those of the Red Dragon School, but those of the Twin Phoenix School couldn’t help but feel perplexed. Why did this youth seem to be reporting to the black-haired boy, instead of the Core Disciple? Why was he so respectful, but used none of the formal terms to refer to the boy? Why did the whole Red Dragon School’s side appear to have relaxed so much that the whole tension was gone from their faces? Was it really because they now had a Core Disciple to assist them, or was it because of this black-haired boy?

Although, no matter what happened, they just couldn’t allow themselves to lose to the Red Dragon School and be shamed by them. Thus, one of the boys accompanying Nila and Anatis soon shouted angrily. “Stop spewing dog shit! It was your disciples who were being unreasonable first! We have nothing to apologize for!”

“Yeah, you guys should be the ones doing the apologizing!” another youth quickly picked up and yelled, attracting even more attention of the many people passing by the street.

The previously calmed-down disciples of the Red Dragon School started shouting back their own arguments, what in an instant resulted in both sides returning to each other’s throats. Truly, the mentality of the crowd was an amazing, but also a scary thing.

The whole incident was being spectated by the few nearby guards, but those men were just guards and nothing else. They most likely weren’t even as strong as those teenage inner disciples; they weren’t about to stick their necks out to intervene in a dispute between the disciples of the two Great Martial Schools. They held their lives too dear to do something so reckless for the mere few silver coins they were being paid for the job.

However, just as it seemed the fight would inevitably break out…

“Shut it!” Tin’Long yelled, enhancing his voice with a large quantity of Qi. Thankfully, Laien and Siana had noticed in time what he was about to do, so they shut their ears tight. The fifty disciples and the crowd surrounding them weren’t as lucky and now, many of them could hear nothing but ringing.

The shout seemed to have achieved its purpose though, as both sides piped down for the time being.

“It doesn’t matter who started the whole thing or who was in the wrong. Since no one was hurt, leave it there and go your ways. I’m not about to let you fight it out in the middle of the town,” Tin’Long commanded sternly. He wasn’t into those pointless quarrels to begin with and since his little sister was involved, it was the more of a reason to put a quick end to this ridiculousness.

“Are you all waiting for your mommies to appear and wipe your asses for you or what? Get moving already,” Tin’Long urged, worried that for whatever reason the two sides would go back to quarreling. His words appeared to have some effect as the two sides were about to reluctantly let the matter go, but given how loudly he had shouted before… how could it end so easily?

“And what is a trash from the Red Dragon School doing, ordering our disciples around? Who gave you the right to do that, eh?” a confident voice rang out from afar. The crowd of bystanders split open right afterward, no one daring to stay in the way of the two approaching young men.

“Core Disciples,” Tin’Long cursed quietly as he spotted the twin phoenix sigils on the young men’s clothes. “This is going to get out of hand…” he groaned, having heard how unreasonable almost all of the Core Disciples and Elders of the Twin Phoenix School were. With the appearance of those two, the chances of a fight breaking out have instantly skyrocketed.

“Those bumpkins still view themselves as our equals, what a joke,” the second of the young men said with a laugh. “Calling their second-rate school a ‘Great Martial School’, such a farce. Even their founder sees them as not worth attention; didn’t he spend like one hundred years in seclusion? Is he even still alive?” the man mocked, aware of Rudford’s habits.

Rudford might have accepted a disciple or two, but he still interacted very little with everyone else. As the Twin Phoenix School saw it, the Great Master likely received a very generous bribe from the Valius family and decided to accept two ‘disciples’ just for show. They treated all the rumors about the elder of the siblings being incredibly strong for his age as nothing but made-up stories, just as they similarly didn’t believe about the ‘great potential’ the younger of the siblings were said to have.

Yet, contrary to the two young men’s expectations, the thirty plus disciples of the Red Dragon School didn’t get frustrated or angry in the slightest. Rather, the majority was giving them amused looks as if they were pitying their stupidity.

This reaction made the two young men angrier than anything else would have. Clenching their teeth in their silent fury, they gave Tin’Long a threatening look and one of them spoke up.

“We obviously can’t let this conflict go unresolved, but it originally was a dispute between our juniors,” the young man said with a smirk and glanced briefly at one of the boys among the twenty younger disciples of their Twin Phoenix School; at the boy who had golden hair and blue eyes who was obviously not happy with the attention of his senior.

“I say we go to the arena and let our juniors fight it out. The side who proves victorious is obviously the one who was in the right, so the losers will need to kowtow and apologize,” he said loudly, making sure that as many people as possible would hear him. “Do you agree, or all you people of the Red Dragon School cowards?” he asked provocatively, apparently feeling quite certain that it would be their juniors who would prove to be stronger.

“… Lead the way,” Tin’Long said grudgingly. He really wanted to avoid fighting, but when the brawl on the street turned into duels in the arena, he had no choice but to accept. Otherwise, with how many people were watching the reputation of their Red Dragon School would have suffered too large of a blow.

“Duels, huh?” Laien said quietly and smiled a bit. He had been planning to intervene if things got out of hand, but he certainly had nothing against having a few duels with the guys from the Twin Phoenix School. If he could fight Anatis, then it would be even better! He was fairly pleased with this development so when the two Core Disciples from the Twin Phoenix School told everyone to follow them, he did exactly that.

“I wonder if I should try fighting them, too?” Siana wondered as she followed after Laien. “I’m not really in the mood, though. I guess I will leave it to big brother,” she decided, happy enough to watch how Laien would be showing off. Her big brother always liked to be in the center of attention, but she herself only cared about his recognition. As for whether other, unrelated people would view her as amazing or pitiable… she couldn’t care less about what they were thinking.

“It has gotten really interesting,” Sin said with a chuckle. “Let’s go see what happens,” he added carefreely, making the crimson-haired man at his side sigh heavily.

“They are going to duel!”

“Inner disciples of the Red Dragon and Twin Phoenix Schools are going to fight! We can’t miss that!”

“Come on, you will have time for shopping later. Let’s go and watch!”

Naturally, most of the onlookers followed after the two groups of disciples. It was nice to watch scheduled fights… but usually, it would be those private duels that would be the most interesting! With each minute, the crowd following after the group of disciples would grow by another few hundreds, making one wonder how many people would be there by the time they reached the closest open arena.

“They are going to make me fight again,” Anatis said quietly, his voice filled with bitterness and regret. It was already bad enough when he was made to fight his fellow disciples for the amusement of his seniors, but to face off against someone from the Red Dragon School…? It couldn’t end well.

“I hate this school, I hate all those people too…” he grumbled in a low voice, wishing to finally be left alone by everybody. What has he done to deserve this kind of treatment…? It wasn’t his fault and yet they still…!

“I just hope you won’t need to fight this ‘Laien’,” Nila said worriedly, giving Anatis a very serious look. She had planned to tell him what she saw after they returned and would be able to talk in private, but now wasn’t the time to worry about raising suspicions. “Listen, no matter what happens, you can’t fight this black-haired boy or the girl who was with him,” she whispered, hoping that no one was trying to listen in.

“I was curious how good those two were since they hanged around my elder brother, but when I checked their aura…” she swallowed nervously. “They both were surrounded by a dazzling, golden light, just like you… this ‘Laien’s’ aura might have been even stronger than yours…” she said sternly and shook her head a little. If Anatis was to fight either of those two, the outcome would be terrible.

“Laien…” Anatis said with a frown. “It can’t be the Laien, the one who Rudford accepted as a disciple?” he guessed. The age seemed to fit, the name was right and even the appearance was just like people were saying. “If he really is, then I can’t agree to fight him. Even if seniors will force it, there’s no way,” he said in a pained voice, knowing what he can expect later for disobeying the orders of the Core Disciples.

“It would be terrible if Rudford got involved, after all…” Nila said bitterly. The mere fact that there existed two kids their age who had an equal latent talent to Anatis had been a shock to her, but right now she had little time to worry about it.

“Don’t push yourself too hard, I will be fine,” Anatis smiled slightly. He was really, really happy that Nila was always there for him… but he also couldn’t bear watching her worry so much all the time.

It had been enough of a shock for him when five years ago, Nila joined the Twin Phoenix School ‘to be with him’ after they merely exchanged a few words once on the streets of Thurand City. He had thought she was totally crazy to be following him and was sure she only liked him because of his good looks; he had thought she would quickly distance herself from him after finding out what his real situation in the Twin Phoenix School was… and even if she didn’t, he had thought she would stand to the side and pretend she saw none of the bullying…

But he would have never imagined that not only would Nila stand up to his seniors, but even go as far as getting on the bad side of the Elders just to help him. He would have never imagined how stubborn she could be and how much she was willing to suffer just to lessen his burden by a little bit. With a girl like that by his side… how could he not fall in love with her? For a long time, she had been the only light he could see in the sea of darkness.

“Yeah, I know. It’s going to be fine,” Nila said with a forced smile. She wasn’t the type to lament over hardships or sugarcoat her words. Whatever would happen, they would be fine. It might be hard, painful and excruciating… but they would be fine. As long as she thought like that, she would be able to bear through anything and not give in to the despair.

“Just wait a few more years until I become a martial master…” Anatis said strongly and clenched his fists. He would keep training as hard as he could and soon, very soon a day when they would repay all the debts would come. People like those two ‘Core Disciples’ who couldn’t even break through to the Realm of Heroes despite being nearly twenty years old… he would repay them their ‘kindness’ hundredfold!

“Yeah,” Nila nodded slightly. Her own talent wasn’t bad either, but she couldn’t compare to Anatis. She was absolutely sure that when he finally became a martial master, even Elders of the Twin Phoenix School wouldn’t be comparable to him. However, one more obstacle would unchangeably stand in their path; one which couldn’t be overcome by ‘only’ the strength of the early Realms of Heroes.

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“We have quite an audience,” Laien said merrily, sitting at the top on the twenty meters high inner wall of the arena, just below the spectators’ seats. “I’d say it’s around five thousand people?” he made a rough estimate. The arena was fairly large though, so even with so many people, it seemed to be rather empty. Perhaps ten percent of the seats were occupied by this point.

“Enough people to have you thoroughly ashamed,” one of the Core Disciples of the Twin Phoenix School said loudly and smirked.

“We will, of course, be having out dear Anatis do fighting for our school. Do you want to have a go at him, kid?” the young man asked with a bit too obviously vile smile on his face. He didn’t quite like that fact that a kid who was only an inner disciple was sitting in the forefront and in the center of their two groups, so he wouldn’t mind getting rid of him first.

“So suddenly?” Laien laughed, his carefree attitude beginning to piss the young man off.

“Let me have a go first,” one of the inner disciples from the Red Dragon School said with a smile and glanced at Laien, seeking a permission from him.

“Sure, I will go second,” Laien agreed very easily. He knew this fourteen year old youth’s strength as he had sparred with him a few times in the past and he was pretty sure the youth wouldn’t be able to beat Anatis; and in some off-chance that he was, then it would only mean that his gut feeling had been wrong about this golden-haired boy’s strength.

The fourteen years old youth nodded with thanks and bowed slightly, then jumped down onto the arena itself. With his cultivation base of the sixth mortal realm, the height of twenty posed no obstacle at all.

The young man of the Twin Phoenix School frowned a little, finding it strange that it was the black-haired kid who seemed to be making calls and not the Core Disciple, but since the youth already jumped down, he only snorted and said nothing. “The Red Dragon School… if they don’t even respect their seniors there, then this ‘Great School’ must have seriously deteriorated in the recent years,” he thought to himself, awaiting the priceless expressions on the faces of all those country bumpkins which he would be able to see very soon.

“You waiting for a special invitation?” he barked at Anatis, angry to see him delaying the fight. He really wanted the fun part to already begin.

“Go,” Nila said in a low voice, her face drained of color. She wanted to tell herself that nothing bad would happen… but since the second Laien stated he would fight Anatis, all such hopes of hers disappeared. If Anatis were to fight seriously, it would be a disaster. If he held back and allowed himself be defeated… the result wouldn’t be much better.