Soon after the Talisman Puppet Sect arrived, so did two smaller sects.
At this point, fourteen of the Fifteen Major Sects of the Northern Domain had arrived. Only the local host, the Celestial Sword Sect, was missing.
By all rights, as the hosts in the Withered Wood Forest, the Celestial Sword Sect should have been the first to arrive and welcome the other sects.
In fact, this was the practice at the other fourteen trial locations: the host sect always arrived first.
However, the Celestial Sword Sect was the sole exception. In all past Inner Sect qualification competitions, no matter whose Land of Trial hosted the first stage, the Celestial Sword Sect always arrived last.
It had become their tradition.
The fourteen sects had all arrived at roughly the same time, with no more than a two-hour gap between the first and the last.
