Chapter 51: The Final Four

On the drill ground, after the thousand geniuses were sent into the Heavenly Heart Realm, a short while passed before geniuses were successively sent back out one after another.

"Am I... eliminated?"

"That shouldn't be right. My strength was entirely sufficient to withstand that wave of attacks, but my spiritual energy has been completely depleted."

"How many waves of attacks did you withstand?"

"Eight waves!"

These geniuses who had already been sent out gathered together, conversing and discussing among themselves, most of them wearing grim expressions.

Not long after, the geniuses sent out from the Heavenly Heart Realm already constituted the majority.

At this moment, a powerfully built blond, brawny man was also sent out.

The moment he appeared, he immediately attracted the attention of all the geniuses present.

"It's Cang Yan!"

"It's him?"

"How could he be sent out this early as well?"

Numerous geniuses expressed their astonishment one after another.

Cang Yan was a top-tier genius qualified to contend for the top twenty of the hunt. Merely judging by his strength, he shouldn't have been sent out of the Heavenly Heart Realm so early.

After all, there were still over a hundred geniuses remaining inside the Heavenly Heart Realm at this moment.

"Damn it!"

At this moment, Cang Yan was gritting his teeth and clenching his fists tightly, his expression exceedingly unsightly.

"I was too reckless!"

"I should have been more cautious and conserved my spiritual energy as much as possible. Otherwise, I could have completely endured that tenth wave of attacks!"

Just now inside the Heavenly Heart Realm, facing the successive waves of opponents that appeared, he had gone all out right from the start, relying on sheer strength to forcibly blast those opponents to death.

Although this approach was fast enough to clear the eighth wave very early on, more than half of his spiritual energy had already been consumed by then. It was only at that point that he realized something was wrong, but it was already too late.

Next, he had managed to barely clear the ninth wave, but upon reaching the tenth wave, the opponents' strength surged abruptly. Having only a tiny fraction of his spiritual energy left, he was eliminated by the opponents of the tenth wave.

"In the Heavenly Heart Realm, the ninth wave serves as a threshold, and upon reaching the tenth wave, the difficulty increases drastically!"

"If too much spiritual energy is consumed during the first nine waves of attacks, one is very likely to be eliminated upon reaching the tenth wave due to the increased difficulty combined with excessive spiritual energy depletion."

Elder Mo of the Heavenly Leaf Sect stood there with his hands behind his back, watching as genius after genius was eliminated and sent out of the Heavenly Heart Realm, shaking his head inwardly.

He understood the purpose of the Heavenly Flame Imperial Court in using the Heavenly Heart Realm as the second stage of the hunting assessment.

For a genius, innate talent and strength were certainly important, but if one lacked even the most basic judgment regarding crises in special environments and scenarios, or reacted far too sluggishly, then no matter how high such a genius's talent was, they wouldn't go very far.

Someone like Cang Yan acted far too recklessly. Before truly figuring out the rules of the second stage of the hunt, he relied on brute force to blast his opponents and wantonly consumed his spiritual energy. Thus, being eliminated early was only fitting.

...

Time gradually passed, and the geniuses sent out of the Heavenly Heart Realm grew increasingly numerous.

After another period equivalent to the time it takes to brew a cup of tea, Duan Yunfeng was also sent out.

"What a pity. Even though I knew I should conserve spiritual energy as much as possible, during the clashes with those opponents, I still couldn't help but unleash some powerful saber arts to annihilate them."

"If my spiritual energy had been just a little more abundant, allowing me to execute one or two ultimate moves, I could have completely withstood this thirteenth wave of attacks, and even persisted for a while in the fourteenth wave," Duan Yunfeng sighed softly.

Inside the Heavenly Heart Realm, he had cleared twelve waves of attacks and persisted through more than half of the thirteenth wave before finally being eliminated.

Among the numerous geniuses who had already been eliminated, this result was counted among the very best.

And right now, only four mirror images remained suspended in the void above the drill ground.

In other words, only the final four people remained lingering and pushing forward inside the Heavenly Heart Realm.

These four people were...

Xia Mang, who had long been universally acknowledged as possessing the greatest strength!

Tu San of the Qi Prince's Mansion!

Wu Chao, the mysterious great monk of unknown origin!

And finally... Su Xin, who was suspected of possessing top-ten combat prowess yet faced skepticism from many due to his cultivation realm being merely at the Great Completion of the Transforming Sea realm!

...

Inside the trial space of the Heavenly Heart Realm, the thirteenth wave was already underway.

The opponents of this thirteenth wave were ten black-armored soldiers holding long spears.

The strength of each of these black-armored soldiers was terrifying to the extreme, and when their long spears thrust forward, the momentum was unimaginably dreadful.

Meanwhile, Wu Chao—the barefooted great monk with Buddhist prayer beads hanging around his neck—stood right in the very center of the trial space, holding that stone staff and swinging it out casually, time and time again.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!~~~

Every single time the stone staff smashed out, a black-armored soldier was directly sent flying.

Ten black-armored soldiers launched a combined assault, and the result was that all ten black-armored soldiers were smashed flying away.

Simple, crude!

Without any fancy techniques.

Yet those ten terrifyingly powerful black-armored soldiers, in the eyes of many, were merely like sandbags before Wu Chao, being repeatedly smashed away.

"Too strong!"

"That great monk... just how formidable is the might of his stone staff?"

"These are the opponents of the thirteenth wave, after all! Any single one of those ten black-armored soldiers could easily ravage ordinary geniuses who have cleared the second level of the Dragon-Seeking Pagoda, right?"

The geniuses standing on the drill ground, along with the powerhouses and sect masters from various forces, watched the great monk Wu Chao easily knock away the black-armored soldiers one by one in the image, their eyes filled with deep shock.

"That absolute monster!"

Duan Yunfeng also gritted his teeth inwardly. The mere thought of how he had been left dazed by a single blow from that great monk sent a chill down his spine.

The thirteenth wave was quickly cleared.

Upon reaching the fourteenth wave, the appearing opponents were still ten spearmen, except that the armor of these ten spearmen had changed from black to silver, and their combat prowess had grown even stronger.

"差不多了!"

"That's about enough!"

The great monk Wu Chao calmly watched as those ten silver-armored soldiers closed in to attack.

"Having withstood thirteen waves of attacks, this should be enough to pass the second stage of the hunt."

"This poor monk came to this hunt not for the sake of fame. Enough is as good as a feast."

The great monk smiled honestly. Under the siege of the ten silver-armored soldiers, he merely swung his stone staff a symbolic two or three times before deliberately allowing himself to be eliminated and sent out.

Watching Wu Chao appear on the drill ground, the geniuses present all wore extremely eccentric expressions.

"How could this be? He cleared the thirteenth wave of attacks so easily, why was he eliminated all at once upon reaching the fourteenth wave? Could his spiritual energy be exhausted?"

"How is that possible? Look at how relaxed and casual he was before; he didn't consume any spiritual energy at all. In my opinion, he simply lost on purpose."

Most of the geniuses saw through it clearly.

Clearly, this Wu Chao had no intention of continuing forward, which was why he intentionally got himself eliminated.

As for his strength...

The previous assessment by the Crimson Dragon Tower rating him as having top-ten hunting prowess was no longer doubted by anyone. Furthermore, many now felt that this Wu Chao's true strength might not be weaker than Xia Mang's!

"Situ Yu, I heard that during the first stage of the hunt, this Wu Chao has been searching for your whereabouts. You'd better be careful," someone nearby reminded him.

Situ Yu's expression at this moment was as gloomy as water.

He knew that the great monk was strong, but he hadn't expected him to be strong to this extent.

"Where on earth did this monster pop out from!"

Situ Yu wore a gnashing-of-teeth expression.

...

Likewise, still in the thirteenth wave of attacks within the Heavenly Heart Realm...

"His Highness ordered me to cultivate within the Heavenly Flame Palace!"

"His Highness's command must be fulfilled, even if... it costs me everything."

The slender, cold-looking young man Tu San had eyes like sabers as he swept his gaze across the ten black-armored soldiers continually charging at him from all directions.

His figure moved like a ghost, shuttling between the ten black-armored soldiers. His strength had been fully unleashed, and with strikes delivered from time to time, black-armored soldiers were killed and dissipated one by one.

He was, at root, a household servant.

His life, and everything he possessed, had been given to him by Prince Qi.

The ideology instilled in him since childhood was that Prince Qi was above everything else.

Everything he did was for the sake of the Prince Qi's Mansion.

Just like this hunt, it was Prince Qi who had ordered him to participate, and it was Prince Qi who demanded that he enter the Heavenly Flame Palace to cultivate.

As for himself... in his own eyes, there was simply no "himself."

Having unleashed his peak strength and consumed a vast amount of spiritual energy, Tu San finally cleared the thirteenth wave.

By the fourteenth wave, Tu San still unleashed his full strength, battling those ten silver-armored soldiers for a period of time until his spiritual energy was completely exhausted, ultimately resulting in his elimination.

After being sent out of the Heavenly Heart Realm, Tu San stood alone in a corner of the drill ground. Facing the occasional glances of admiration cast from around him, his expression did not change in the slightest, much like an emotionless machine.

...

In another trial space...

Xia Mang had likewise already reached the fourteenth wave.

At this moment, everyone's gaze had converged upon him.

"I am a member of the imperial family!"

"What I represent is the dignity of the imperial family!"

"The Heavenly Flame Palace—I will definitely enter it, and I must enter it taking the number one ranking of this hunt!"

"Not only the final ranking of number one, but even this second stage of the hunt must also be ranked number one!"

Sturdily built, with a cold, arrogant expression and a trace of overbearing dominance, Xia Mang stood right in the very center.

Born into the imperial family, he had not grown up in pampered luxury; instead, he had always grown through the most intense and cruel competition.

Under such a growth environment, what he had always pursued was absolute strength!

"I have broken through the Heavenly Heart Realm many times before, and in the past, I always stopped at the fourteenth wave!"

"But this time, I will definitely break through it!"

Xia Mang let out a low roar, the spear in his hand resembling a coiling dragon.

Overbearing!

Fierce!

And the might was terrifying to the extreme.

Each of the ten silver-armored soldiers rushing in a wild, frantic assault from all around was immensely formidable, let alone ten soldiers attacking in unison. Yet under the crazily unleashed, overbearing, and fierce spear arts of Xia Mang, three of them were successively blasted to death within a short span of time.

Immediately following, boom! boom! boom!

Another dozen or so frantic and fierce clashes ensued.

In the end, all ten silver-armored soldiers were completely slain by Xia Mang alone with his spear.

The fourteenth wave—cleared!

"So strong!"

"Too strong!"

On the drill ground, an uproar of astonishment erupted.

"Up until now, even top-tier geniuses like Tu San and Wu Chao only cleared the thirteenth wave, and were eliminated shortly after entering the fourteenth wave. Yet this Xia Mang has actually cleared the fourteenth wave directly, and furthermore, he didn't barely endure the attacks of those ten silver-armored soldiers; instead, he used sheer strength to frontally blast and crush those ten silver-armored soldiers to death. This strength... is too terrifying!"

"Terrifying!"

"Strong to an outrageous degree!"

"This is the universally acknowledged strongest person of this hunt!"

The entire drill ground became utterly restless.

No one had expected that Xia Mang's strength would soar to such a terrifying degree.

"The third level!"

"This Xia Mang definitely possesses the strength to clear the third level of the Dragon-Seeking Pagoda!"

Those top-tier powerhouses and sect masters from various forces felt a deep tremor within their hearts as well.

They knew very well that anyone capable of clearing the fourteenth wave of the Heavenly Heart Realm—and doing so by directly crushing their opponents with absolute strength—undoubtedly possessed the strength to clear the third level of克 the Dragon-Seeking Pagoda.

And clearing the third level of the Dragon-Seeking Pagoda represented the pinnacle of ultimate genius within the Heavenly Flame Imperial Court.

In the past, such geniuses were hard to produce even once across several or even dozens of imperial city hunts, yet this time, one had appeared.

Having cleared the fourteenth wave, Xia Mang subsequently encountered the opponents of the fifteenth wave: ten golden-armored soldiers holding spears.

The combat prowess of these ten golden-armored soldiers was clearly even stronger than that of the silver-armored soldiers. Xia Mang persisted for a brief period against these ten golden-armored soldiers before ultimately suffering defeat.

After Xia Mang's defeat, out of the entire second stage of the hunt involving a full thousand geniuses, only one final person remained lingering and pushing forward inside the Heavenly Heart Realm.

That person was none other than Su Xin!!