Meng Lu stood steady across the platform, one hand resting lightly on the hilt of his sword, the other curled at his side.
His expression was calm — it's not arrogant, but determination
"I've heard the rumors," he said, voice firm enough to carry across the stage without shouting. "They say you defeated Brother Feng Zhan without even drawing your weapon."
He took a breath and exhaled slowly, his gaze fixed on Lao Xie.
"I don't know if it's true… but if it is, then show me."
He stepped forward slightly, fingers tightening around the grip of his blade. "I don't fight to humiliate others. I've never bullied anyone beneath me — not even the so-called 'little mortal' everyone used to whisper about.".
His tone wasn't mocking. It was honest — even respectful in its own way.
"But now you're standing here. You've won your first match. The whole sect is watching."
He drew the blade from his back with one swift, clean motion. The steel flashed under the morning sun.\
"So—" Meng Lu said, pointing his sword forward, "—if it's true you use the sword… then let us test blades properly."
Across the arena, Lao Xie remained quiet.
"He sure does talk a lot, how noisy." he said inwardly.
A moment after, his gaze lowered briefly — toward the storage ring he wore on one of his finger where he had kept his sword.
Then, right at that moment, Elder Mu's voice suddenly echoed once more.
"Round 2 - Match Fourty Two Begin!"
In an instant, Meng Lu moved.
There was no hesitation — no testing waters or circling his opponent. His feet burst forward with strength, sword drawn back in a straight-line lunge, his stance solid and well-practiced.
The edge of his blade gleamed as it shot forward — a clean, upright strike aimed at Lao Xie's heart.
And as he lunged, he shouted clearly—
Meng Lu lunged forward with sharp momentum, his blade slicing the air as he called out mid-stride, "I heard you beat Brother Feng Zhan with a sword! Then let us match swords, here and now!"
The Martial Hall rippled with immediate noise
"It's starting already?"
"He charged straight in without hesitation!"
"Is he serious?! No warm-up, no testing range—he's going straight for a head-on clash?"
"And he wants to match swords with him? Has he lost his mind?"
"Hey, watch your mouth," someone snapped. "Do you really think he's still the 'Little Mortal' after what happened in the last match?"
All around the stone seating, the crowd began to stir, drawn in by the sudden clash of metal and momentum. From gamblers to outer court disciples, even some seated inner disciples leaned forward — intrigued.
"That guy's speed isn't bad, despite being a sixth stage," one muttered with narrowed eyes.
"True, his form's tight too..."
That voice came from a small group of inner court disciples lounging off to the side, their robes crisp and their expressions vaguely bored. They'd wandered into the Martial Hall out of curiosity, but none of them looked like they expected much.
"Well, I did hear there were some good seedlings this year in the outer court," one of them murmured.
"Good seedlings, my ass," another scoffed, arms crossed as he leaned back with a sneer. "There's only three worth naming — Zhang Weiren, Mei Yan, and Feng Zhan. All peak Body Tempering, Ninth Stage. At least those three actually have a shot at the inner sect."
He tilted his chin toward the platform with a dismissive glance.
"This Lao Xie? I don't even know where he came from."
"Yeah, and look at this lao xie. He's just standing there. Doesn't even have a presence, no qi, no aura or even anything. I can't even sense his cultivation base."
"Hah, this is why I said watching outer court fights is a waste of time," another said with a scoff. "None of these no-names are worth anything— ."
But the rest of the sentence was drowned out in the next wave of gasps.
Because right at that exact moment, Lao Xie made a moved.
He didn't wait. The moment Meng Lu crossed a certain distance, Lao Xie raised one hand casually — and with a faint shimmer of light, a sword burst forth into his grip.
It didn't appear with a dramatic flash, nor was it drawn from any visible sheath. It simply arrived, as if answering a silent call.
And just like that, Lao Xie moved — not with a sidestep nor a dodge but instead he lunged forward.
A blur of motion, clean and direct, aimed straight at Meng Lu without hesitation — as if returning the favor.
The entire arena paused.
"He's going in?! He's actually meeting him head-on?!" one outer disciple shouted.
While for inner disciple, they were truly in shocked, "Wait… wait, did you see that just now?! That's a—"
"—a storage ring!"
Gasps broke out like thunder.
Inner disciples jolted upright, their eyes wide. One of them even stood up, voice half-raised in disbelief. "Did you see that? He just summoned his sword from a ring — a ring! That's not something outer disciples are even allowed to have!"
"Impossible. No way the sect let a random outer disciple carry one…"
"There's no wealthy family with the surname Lao either. He's not from any of the regional families."
"Then how—?"
Ling Ruxin, seated quietly among the crowd, heard it all.
The murmurs, the shock. The scramble to guess and make sense of something they clearly weren't prepared for.
She didn't bother joining in but instead, her gaze remained fixed on the stage.
"…Now they know how to keep quiet," she murmured to herself, almost with a trace of dry amusement. "How noisy." A truly amusing sight to behold from a veiled maiden.
On the stage, swords clashed.
Clang!
The sound rang out clearly as steel met steel — Meng Lu's heavier sword driven off-course by Lao Xie's clean parry. The momentum imbalance was immediate. Lao Xie barely moved his feet, simply shifted his angle, twisted his wrist, and deflected the strike like brushing aside a gust of wind.
He looked at Meng Lu — eyes cold, lips lifting slightly in a sharp, mocking line.
"You're so noisy," he muttered, voice low but not unkind — more like an adult scolding a barking dog.
The crowd sucked in a breath.
Then came the next series of exchanges — sharp, precise, and blindingly fast. Meng Lu kept swinging, trying to regain control, but every blow he threw was turned, avoided, or met with just enough force to throw him off rhythm. Lao Xie's movement had no flourish, no wasted power, but every shift of his body was clean and almost unnaturally efficient.
And then, after a brief pause between clashes…
He exhaled once, "I don't like wasting time," His sword then flashed in a clean motion.
Krushh!
The next second, Meng Lu was already on the ground — his sword flung from his hand, his body collapsed with a thud onto the stone platform without any movement.
Because of that, the entire Martial Hall erupted in chaos.
"Wha—?"
"Did… did it end?!"
"What just happened?! That was under a minute!"
"I couldn't see anything!"
"His sword moved once! Just once!"
The outer disciples were the first to react, eyes wide and mouths agape. Most of them had never seen a fight end so cleanly — let alone so quietly. No qi surged. No techniques exploded. Just one motion, and the match was over.
"Where was the qi? Where was the pressure? I didn't even feel a ripple—!"
"I've never seen anyone fight like that… That wasn't cultivation. That was something else entirely."
But then came the voices from the upper rows — the inner disciples, who had originally come just to mock or observe.
"…What the fuck was that?"