Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

by <unknown>

  600 students were divided into two teams in the finals. A competitor’s individual combat ability was actually not the most crucial thing. The most crucial thing was for everyone to assemble together in the shortest time frame, form into battle squads, and fight against Demon Beasts and the enemy team.

  It can be said that in this battle, whichever team has an expert commanding admin-type talent first appear will seize the initiative. They would very likely seize the final victory!

  In the previous competitions, often it took at least several hours, or even a day, of strife and a bitter price to pay before a “Commander” was born.

  It was very unexpected for such a gifted commander talent to appear in this competition. The chaos of the Blue Team had been dissolved in a mere five minutes.

  In the Blue Team’s comm channel, Gao Ye issued commands after commands, coolly and calmly, giving no chance for anybody to refute his commands.

  Although there were people who questioned his strategic decisions, Gao Ye would justify himself and refute them within several seconds. They opposition were left dumbstruck and everyone accepted Gao Ye’s commands willingly.

  Under his command, the remaining 280+ competitors on the Blue Team gradually grouped together, forming a standard-like battle formation.

  A dozen or so competitors even formed a hunting squad, killing a powerful Demon Beast that had just walked through the transmission array!

  On the other hand, the Red Team was in a bad situation. They did not have an organizing admin-type genius among their 300 competitors. Voices were clamoring in their communication channel. If you’re noisy, I’ll be noisier. Voices were talking over one another. It was like the special bargain sale time at the supermarket.

  “My Actualization Quotient is at 75%. Let me be the commander for the Red Team. Everyone, convene onto me! Convene onto me!”

  “Who gives a fuck if your Actualization Quotient is at 75%. My Actualization Quotient is at 77%. I can kill two Demon Beasts with a single strike. But, I know myself. I don’t have the makings of a commander. Kid, you should just stay where you belong!”

  “You... You’re this arrogant? What school are you from. Don’t you dare going back after the competition!”

  “Everyone quiet! First, let’s quickly think of a way. I saw that the Blue Team has likely assembled themselves already. Our side is completely suppressed. They have seven to eight people fighting our two or three. AHH!”

  “Not good. A powerful Demon Beasts appeared in my position. My coordinates are… Someone come and help!”

  “No go. We’ve been intercepted by the Blue Team here. These goddamn bastards. How is it that the Blue Team has people everywhere! Red team. Where the hell has Red Team gone!”

  Li Yao’s body was smeared all over with sludge. On top of the sludge was an entwined layer of weeds, sticks, and vines. He concealed himself deep inside a shrub and waited calmly.

  Even Small Ji was smeared in the same fashion of camouflage. He turned down the voice mode of the comm channel, skimming over the words in the comm channel with the weakest brightness.

  Looking and looking, Li Yao let out a sigh somewhat helplessly.

  He did not expect a genius level commander to appear on the opposing team while his own team was a mess. The situation seemed to be a bit disadvantageous now.

  Li Yao knew himself. His skill was in crafting, not commanding the battlefield. And he didn’t have the ability to charismatically sway people with a few words. The ability to be revered and be saluted to. He did not have the makings of being a commander.

  Even if he does enter a squad, he would be laughed at and ridiculed by his teammates.

  “Maybe it’s about time to use my ace in the hole!” Li Yao fondled a hard and stiff object in his embrace.

  It was a simple artifact that he made at the first supply point… It was a remote control.

  Chapter 59: Paralyzed! |

  The situation was within Li Yao’s expectations. Victory was cast slanted towards the Blue Team.

  It could be seen clearly through the giant hologram in the monitoring center that the Blue Team had completely assembled together in under three hours.

  They formed into small combat units with sizes of 3-5 competitors each. The members of a single unit were mostly from the same school and area; they were familiar with each other, so their attacking and assisting teamwork were well coordinated. They attacked and defended as one entity.

  The distance between each combat unit was perfectly adjusted. Together, the combat units faintly formed a large circle, enclosing Gao Ye in the center. A dozen competitors with administrative talent provided support to Gao Ye to form a command center!

  The command center was the brain and all the combat units were fists. The Blue Team came from the north side of Devil Flood Dragon Island and moved south, sweeping everything in their path.

  The two teams were created from choosing random competitors, so their actual strengths as a whole hardly differed. When one side organized as a battle squad went to fight against non-organized scattered sand, the non-organized side was simply massacred!

  Whether it was Demon Beasts or members of the Red Team, it seemed neither beings were capable of withstanding the Blue Team Battle Squad.

  Even if there were several Red Team members with tyrannical strength who were able to resist for a while, they would immediately find themselves surrounded by tree or four, or even five or six combat units of the Blue Team. Under the endless attacks from cleaving blades, members of the Red Team were gelled off and expelled from the competition!

  Not even half the first day had past and the Red Team had suffered a loss of over one-hundred-and-twenty competitors. They were routed and stunned by the Blue Team, ending in complete defeat.

  On the other hand, the Blue Team only suffered a trifling loss of 30 or so competitors, and they were getting more and more proficient in coordinating with each other. The Red Team’s sphere of influence was being suppressed step by step. The battle losses between the teams further grew in difference.

  “There’s no suspense. If things go on like this, it won’t even take a day and a half before the complete annihilation of the Red Team!” Several experienced military officers concluded with sure confidence.

  The numerous cultivators sighed one after another. They never thought that a god-like commander genius would actually appear on the Blue Team to allow the Blue Team to achieve an overwhelming victory with ease.

  It really wasn’t quite fair in regards to the ordinary competitors of the respective teams.

  Nevertheless, this was reality. Sometimes, luck was more important than strength on the real battlefield.

  Xie Tingxian and Ding Lingdang watched with tightly furrowed brows in the corner of the monitoring center. They also did not expect the occurrence of such a one-sided situation. The Blue Team had control of great influence. No matter how strong Li Yao’s individual ability was, it was probably no use.

  Fearfully, it would be very difficult for him to fight his way into the top 300.

  “Li Yao. What are you still waiting for?”

  Two people had their eyes gazed fixed together onto the red dot representing Li Yao on the large hologram.

  Li Yao’s red dot could be seen on the map to be unmoving all this time on a dark corner on the north side of Devil Flood Dragon Island. It had been motionless all this time.

  Even when a great number of blue dots steamrolled in front of him, he did not have the least bit of intention of jumping out.

  Right now, Li Yao was behind the Blue Team’s rear line.

  All around him was emptiness. All the members of the Red Team in the area were slaughtered, save for him. All that was left were four Blue Scout Groups who continued to roam around, patrolling.

  A pair of eyes opened leisurely from within the depths of a dark shrub. Within them blossomed radiance.

  It was as if a stomach-rumbling hungry vulture had discovered the fattest lamb.

&nbs
p; “Swish Swish, Swish Swish,” rocked the shrub. Li Yao threaded his way out calmly, but not slowly.

  He examined the footprints on the ground and gouges on the trees. Then, he moved flowingly up a large tree like a large python.

  Li Yao moved between the branches without a sound. His speed was even faster than his crazed ground speed.

  Soon, a Blue Team Scout Group that was formed from three competitors appeared in his sight.

  As expected, these three competitors were all holding melee artifacts that he assembled.

  Li Yao chuckled. This situation was within his calculations.

  He had assembled several hundred artifacts during the preliminaries. There were only 600 people who entered the finals, practically each person had one.

  Additionally, the Red Team had lost a portion of their manpower. Their artifacts must have been snatched by the Blue Team.

  “The Artifacts you’re holding are all assembled by me… And you still want to fight with me!?”

  Li Yao stomped powerfully with his pair of legs, causing the branches below his feet to split with a “*Crack.”

  And just like a giant owl, he descended from the sky, throwing himself towards the Blue Scout Group!

  “Enemy attack!”

  The Blue Scout Group had gone through half a day of coordination, so they long fostered somewhat of a tacit understanding. They did not lose their heads from Li Yao’s ambush.

  In practically a tenth of a second, the three activated the Initiate Glyph Arrays on their artifacts.

  The Chainsword rumbled. The Thunder Blade vibrated. The Burning Sky Battleaxe's edge turned orange in a flash!

  But within the next tenth of a second, a stabbing pain was felt in each of these three’s hands. It was like a piercing electric current had surged into their arms from the grip of their weapons, then the current flowed all the way to ruthlessly stab into their hearts!!

  “AHHH!”

  The three scouts let out blood-curdling cries simultaneously! Their bodies locked rigidly against their wills for a second!

  In this short flash of a second of being paralyzed, two flowing black rays of light flashed past their necks. Just before the light touched their skin, three Puji Critters immediately belched out gel, securely protecting these three Blue Competitors and cutting off their hopes of advancing in the competition!

  The three Blue Competitors were judged as losers and ejected from the competition!

  “Swoosh Swoosh Swoosh Swoosh!”

  The points under their names were immediately transferred under Li Yao’s name. Li Yao shot up by over 30 places on the ranking board!

  “What’s the matter?”

  Quite a few cultivators had seen this brief sneak-attack scene from the monitoring center.

  They were bewildered by the obviously clumsy performance exhibited by the three Blue Competitors.

  Have these three Blue Competitors gone retarded? Why did they all stop all of a sudden? Had it not been for that one second of stun, even at a small price, they totally can finish off this Red Competitor!”

  “Huh? This Red Competitor seems to be the crafting expert who assembled several hundred melee artifacts during the preliminaries. I never thought he would survive until now and even eliminate three Blue Competitors in a flash! His actual strength is this strong!?”

  “Nope. There’s something weird. There’s something wrong with the artifacts of the three Blue Competitors!”

  Some cultivators with great insight saw through the ins and outs in a flash. Everyone threw their gazes at Xie Tingxian.

  Xie Tingxian had been observing Li Yao’s brilliant performance with wide open eyes all this time. He waited until Li Yao faded into the darkness before he let out a long breath and revealed an expression of revelation.

  Xie Tingxian chuckled and spoke to the people around him, “Fellow Daoists, don’t be baffled. This Student Li Yao did a few small modifications when he assembled each of his artifacts. He implemented a small spiritual energy loop capable of having each artifact receive remote commands from a short distance. The spiritual energy is overloaded in a flash, causing essence force to overflow. This causes a small ripple of essence force to be released.”

  “This ripple is weak, so it does not have too much killing potential. At most, it causes the victim to be paralyzed for one or two seconds. That’s it.”

  Chapter 60: A Crazy Backdoor |

  The entire room was in an uproar as soon as these words were spoken.

  A second or two of paralysis!? That’s what he calls “not having too much killing potential”?

  One second was enough to kill an enemy a hundred times over in the world of cultivation!

  “Well, did he make the same modification on all his artifacts?” a cultivator asked with bulging eyes.

  “Yep.” Xie Tingxian chuckled.

  Numerous cultivators turned their heads to glance at the giant hologram. They discovered that it didn’t matter whether it was the Red Team or Blue Team, seemingly every competitor’s melee artifact was an artifact created by Li Yao. They carefully rethought the outcome and simultaneously gave a cold shiver.

  This kid is really way too despicable, too shameless, too fearsome!

  “That’s truly remarkable! He’s already learned the practice of ‘Opening the Backdoor’ of the Refiner circle at such a young age!”

  A cultivator had muttered to himself and somewhat unintentionally swept his gaze at Xie Tingxian.

  There was an unspoken practice within the circle of Refiners. A great deal of Refiners were used to leaving behind some super tiny special structures on their artifacts when crafting artifacts for their customers. Ordinary cultivators were completely unable to see these marvelous structures. But in the eyes of the Refiner himself, having these structures allows him to seize the “life-gate” of the artifact.

  When the need arises, they can go through the life-gate to control the artifact.

  In the circle, this kind of move was called “Opening the Backdoor”.

  Initially, this was a method used by Refiners only to protect themselves and to prevent others from holding artifacts they crafted and conveniently silencing them right away.

  After all, when compared to battle-type cultivators, the fighting capacity of Refiners are often weaker.

  Anyway, these kind of practices became more and more common as time went on. It seemed that it became an open secret within the circle of veteran Refiners; it turned into an “unwritten rule”.

  There was only one way to prevent the backdoor from opening in an artifact… To craft your own artifact!

  But, the present was different than the old days. In the Ancient Cultivator Civilization of 40,000 years ago, all kinds of artifacts were utterly simple in nature. There were merely flying swords, throwing knives, and spatial pouches or so. An artifact like the Heaven Upheaval Seal would be considered complicated. Cultivators were certainly able to craft these themselves.

  But as time progressed into the modern era, the social division of labor became increasingly specialized and divided. The architectures of artifacts became more and more complex. The subject of Artificing became a giant can of worms, a mysterious and profound subject. It was an extremely difficult subject to succeed in without spending over dozens of years of effort. And if one doesn’t have a gift for artificing, it would require twice the work for half the outcome, spending countless hours of bitter blood. Even then, one may not necessarily comprehend the mysteries of Artificing.

  It was improbable for a common battle-type cultivator, who didn't have a hint of a gift for Artificing, to spend several dozens of years to study Artificing… Otherwise, when would they have time to fight?

  Therefore, after considering the matter, they could only pinch their noses and endure through the clearly known artifact loophole. Or they could find a trusted Refiner to craft their artifacts. Or after having an artifact crafted, they could find another Refiner to crack the backdoor.

  The offensive
and defensive battle between the installed backdoor and the backdoor cracker was also a “battle” that was completely common to see in the Artificing circle. After going through several typical battles, every Refiner sought the honor of installing an uncrackable backdoor, or even an undiscoverable backdoor. The most glorious of all was to be able to discover and crack the backdoors left behind by others.

  Of course, no Refiner would admit to any backdoors installed on his artifacts.

  Xie Tingxian curled his beard. He shook and swayed his head, saying, “Man! Although Student Li Yao’s methods are effective, in the end, they go against the professional ethics of Refiners. It’s somewhat inappropriate! If he enters Deep Sea University, we will certainly properly educate him. How could he leave backdoors on his artifacts willy-nilly!?”

  “Come on!”

  Quite a few cultivators scowled at Xie Tingxian… Deep Sea University was the Holy Land for Refiners. At the same time, it was one of the headstreams of the loathsome behavior of “Opening the Backdoor”. It would be a wonder if they were to “properly educate him”. If Li Yao really did enter Deep Sea University, he would be just like a fish back in water. It wouldn’t take years before he became a backdoor expert!

  Right when everyone was simultaneously speechless, another four blue dots, representing a scout group, strangely perished on the north side of Devil Flood Dragon Island.

  What replaced them was a tiny red dot; the dot flickered tenaciously.

  The second scout group had fallen into Li Yao’s evil clutches!

  Besides the cultivators in the monitoring center, even the 2400 competitors in the hall outside all paid attention to Li Yao’s existence at this moment.

  Despite the majority of the Blue Team charging through and slaughtering all around the middle section of Devil Flood Dragon Island, the two ambushes situated behind the back lines seemed to spell the arrival of a small change in circumstances.

  “Who is this fellow!? He’s actually this awesome!? He took out seven Blue Team competitors in succession!”