“So… I passed, I take it?”

At Xuan’s question, it took Grandmaster Dun a moment to respond. “… O-Oh, yes. You passed. Congratulations. You also were able to hold the pill in your mouth for the longest time amongst this year’s contestants, so… you will also receive a special reward in a while, as promised. But before that… what’s your name?”

“Xuan.”

“Xuan… I see. I will discuss the special reward with you privately lat-”

“H-Hold on!” Zhou Hai immediately cut in furiously, immediately drawing the attention of the crowd back to the matter at hand and forgetting about the announcement. “There’s no way he beat me by five whole minutes—he’s only a Body Tempering stage cultivator who cannot even channel Qi! He must’ve cheated, somehow. Yes, that’s it! He cheated!”

“… Oh?” Xuan turned to look at him, voice deadly quiet. “A bold accusation, young master Zhou. However… how can you prove your claim?”

“Hmph, since you know I’m young master Zhou, then you should know offending me is not a good way to die. Spit it out and I’ll let you live—how did you cheat your way through the test?”

“Good, good… spit it out, is it? Very well.”

In an instant, Xuan sprinted and leaped off the stage in one swift motion, before landing a painful kick onto Zhou Hai’s face.

“Oof-!”

The young master crashed into the rough concrete ground from the unexpected force, and looked up in surprise just in time to see Xuan’s boot slamming down on his face.

“Here,” he whispered, eyes filled with killing intent and bloodlust that should not have belonged to a Body Tempering stage cultivator. “I’ll spit it out.”

Gathering his saliva, Xuan spat it all out directly onto Zhou Hai’s face, humiliating him even further. The crowd, seeing this, was too stunned to say a word, and since none of them particularly liked Zhou Hai, no one moved to help, either.

“Damn… you…” Zhou Hai muttered through grit teeth, jumping back to his feet. Xuan, who was still far behind in terms of physical strength, had no choice but to back away with a nimble leap, and returned to the stage.

“I’ll kill you!” Zhou Hai roared as he dashed after Xuan, no longer caring about the rules. “Eat this—Golden Fist Pummel!”

Xuan looked up to see a massive golden fist in the air above him, shadowing over his body as it readied to punch in sync with Zhou Hai. The crowd’s eyes widened at the fight breaking out, but contrary to Zhou Hai’s expectations, Xuan only smirked.

“Hey… a little tip from your father here? Don’t yell out what your next move is going to be.”

Calmly, Xuan lifted his hand at the massive golden fist, and began absorbing it.

“Wha-?! Impossible—my Qi… it’s being absorbed?!”

That’s right. The power of the Chaos Scripture—the Heaven Devouring Body. Any attack or defense that used normal Qi would be rendered useless in the face of this special ability, known as Assimilating Qi. Unknowingly, Zhou Hai had just made a fool of himself, and delivered himself straight to his own death trap.

By the time the fool realized, it was already too late. Now without his massive golden fist accompanying him, his momentum had carried him too far forward for him to back off from, and Xuan landed a fully charged punch straight into his face after taking advantage of his momentary vulnerability.

The blow disfigured Zhou Hai even further and knocked him backwards back onto the floor, where the crowd dispersed to let him fall without any remorse. Again, no one particularly liked this young master, so naturally they weren’t going to help him. Xuan, quite regrettably, held back. He didn’t want to kill this guy—if that happened, he would end up making an enemy he can’t quite take on just yet, the Zhou family. Otherwise, he would’ve simply used Sky Devil’s Palm or something to one-shot this idiot with the help of Assimilating Qi’s amplification ability.

“Ngh!” Zhou Hai grunted in pain as he hit the floor, clutching his abdomen tightly as he rolled around in agony. “You… bastard…!”

“Is this the best a ‘child prodigy’ can do? Seems to me the ‘prodigy’ part can be safely removed from your title, Zhou Hai.”

Of course, Xuan’s punch wasn’t enough to do any lasting damage due to his low cultivation, but it wasn’t the physical pain that counted. It was the humiliation that hurt. The emotional damage.

“That’s enough!” Grandmaster Dun yelled, his booming voice instantly silencing everyone, both the watching crowd and the passing onlookers on the streets. “Do you all think the Open Sky Alchemist Guild is your playground? Come up to get your alchemist tokens, then immediately leave! Anyone who stays behind will suffer the consequences!”

Immediately, the crowd began moving—those who passed the test came up to receive their alchemist tokens as instructed, while those who were simply here to watch the show fled as quickly as they came. As Zhou Hai crawled back up to his feet and walked back onto the stage to receive his token, he shot Xuan a glare filled with murderous intent.

“… I’ll remember this, bastard. Not only did you steal the spotlight from me, you also humiliated me like this, both in front of Ruo’er. You got lucky this time, catching me off guard twice. But next time…”

“Next time, you won’t have another next time,” Xuan cut in, a light smile on his face. “Next time, you’ll die. Though, of course, you’re welcome to try.”

His words carried no malice, no edge. It was as if he was simply stating a fact, born from the confidence he had through his thousands of years of experience.

Zhou Hai clenched his fists tightly like he wanted to brawl right here, right now, but he saw Grandmaster Dun’s stern gaze and gave up on the idea. Turning around, he snickered.

“You better watch your back, trash. Xuan, was it? You never know when I might strike… heh.”

With a nasty sneer of contempt, he left, as Xuan nonchalantly gave a sigh and turned back to Grandmaster Dun, now the only person remaining in the vicinity.

“So? What’s my ‘special’ reward?”

The old man looked around to make sure there wasn’t anyone left watching, then stepped closer to Xuan and lowered his tone.

“… Boy. What are your origins?”

Xuan gave soft chuckle. “If I told you I was from a place above this world, a place that you don’t even know exists… would you believe me?”

Hearing this, Grandmaster Dun snorted and backed away. “Hmph. You are quite the troublemaker, aren’t you? Follow me.”

With that, he headed into Open Sky Alchemist Guild’s building, prompting Xuan to follow behind him. Before doing so, however, Xuan glanced off in the direction where Zhou Hai had disappeared, and narrowed his eyes.

‘That guy… he purposely let me hit him the second time, and even made an act of falling to the ground. With the difference in our cultivation levels, my punch shouldn’t have even been able to stop him given his momentum, much less knock him back. He may seem like the average arrogant young master, but… he’s actually somewhat clever.’

Xuan chuckled.

‘Trying to frame me, though? Too bad I can easily guess what he’s trying to do—and it won’t work anyway.’

How many years has Zhou Hai lived for? 25? With just that amount of experience, he dared to challenge Zero, the same person who had single-handedly destroyed entire people and sects just from using mind games and schemes? Foolish. Xuan had faced far more cunning opponents in the past—and in order to beat them, all he had to do was be even more cunning than they were.

Even so, he pondered. In this world, strength and intellect went hand in hand. One could not rise to the top with just one. The arrogant young masters who thought with their dicks and the self-righteous sect elders who protected them portrayed in xianxia novels were, unfortunately, nothing but a fleeting dream.

Generally speaking, the younger they were, the more stupid they were due to the lack of experience and knowledge of the world, but Zhou Hai was considered to be a genius in Cloud Catcher City. Naturally, he was smarter than common folk and had more sinister plans in mind than just beating Xuan up—plans that Xuan could easily guess at, given his years of experience.

Poor Zhou Hai, not realizing Xuan had seen far more elaborate tricks being used on him before. After all, nearly all of the enemies he’d encountered in his past life had been incredibly cunning, sly, and underhanded. Difficult opponents to face for sure; not only in battle, but also in strategy and planning.

Compared to those old foxes, Zhou Hai actually felt like a fresh breath of air. His goals were far too obvious and one-dimensional to get Zero, who was already long prepared for what was to come. Zhou Hai would regret trying to frame him.

With a sigh, Xuan turned back to the open doors of the Alchemist Guild and began walking in.

‘Zhou Hai, Zhou Hai… heh. If only all my enemies were this easy to take down.’