Minor competitions within Tiance Palace were held every few days.
The arena was set up on the martial arts field on the east side of the main peak. Anyone could go up to challenge the defender. If they won, they would take the other person's place as the defender until they were defeated and knocked off.
Whenever Lin Zhiyue had free time, she would go to challenge the arena. She didn't pick any specific opponent; she would just stand on the stage, glance at whoever was opposite her, draw her sword, fight, and once she won, she would sheathe her sword and turn to leave, never staying on the stage to defend it.
Sometimes she went in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon, and sometimes she would casually step up for a match when passing by in the evening.
The arena defenders changed batch after batch, but the person who could defeat her had yet to appear.
She would leave as soon as the fight was over, without any small talk or lingering, as if she had casually scored a perfect mark on an exam and walked away without looking back.
At first, some thought she was just lucky, but after she defeated nearly a dozen defenders in a single month, gradually, no one called it luck anymore.
When the outer sect disciples saw her walking toward the martial arts field from afar, they would start passing the word around: “Senior Sister Lin is here again.” The crowd originally gathered around the arena would spontaneously step back, as if clearing a space for what was about to happen.
She didn't say much when standing on the stage, only uttering a single word, “Please,” and then waiting for the opponent to make the first move.
Her moves were not wide and sweeping; instead, her swordplay was light and agile. Most of the time, the match would end in three to five moves.
Her movement when sheathing her sword was very clean, with almost no redundant gestures. Pointing her sword tip toward the ground, she would give a slight nod to the opponent as a greeting, then turn and walk off the stage.
A few times, as she walked down, she could feel someone in the dispersing crowd behind her pausing to take another look at her, but she never looked back.
Having lived a lifetime as Su Jinyu, she understood those convoluted games and probings better than before. In that deep palace and behind those high grand gates, everyone lived by weighing options and plotting. But here, the deterrence of raw strength was far less exhausting than any scheme.
She didn't need everyone to like her; she only needed to let those who might cause trouble know that she was not to be trifled with.
Her style of “only challenging and never defending” gradually spread through the sect, and some privately called her the “Passing-by Arena Champion.”
Lin Zhiyue heard it once and let it go, not taking it to heart.
She was simply using those matches to repeatedly confirm her touch, sword speed, and the stability of her spiritual energy pathways. Every time she sheathed her sword and left, she would store these data points in her mind, then add a record to her notebook after returning to her courtyard.
Over the course of three months, Lin Zhiyue had fought almost every opponent in the Golden Core Stage within the sect.
From the outer sect to the inner sect, and then to the personal disciples of each peak, as long as they were disciples with a Golden Core Stage cultivation, she had faced most of them on the stage.
The defenders of those minor competition arenas changed more and more frequently, because every time she went up, she ended the fight quickly and decisively, leaving no breathing room for her opponents to adjust.
A few times, right after she stepped off the stage, disciples behind her would whisper, “What on earth is her style? How are her sword moves even cleaner than last month?”
Until one afternoon, as she was passing by the martial arts field, she happened to see Chu Zhixun defending the arena, so she went up.
Everyone was saying Senior Sister Lin had gone mad.
Senior Brother Chu was a cultivator at the Nascent Soul Stage. She was only at the Golden Core Stage; even if she was the strongest in the Golden Core Stage, it was impossible to cross a major realm to challenge a Nascent Soul cultivator.
“Senior Sister Lin's three-month undefeated record is probably going to be broken today,” someone sighed with regret.
These words circulated through the spectating crowd—some shook their heads, some clicked their tongues, and some craned their necks, waiting to see the outcome.
Lin Zhiyue didn't respond, not even sparing them a single glance.
Instead, a voice rose unhurriedly from the crowd: “Have you all still not figured out Senior Sister Lin's approach? She isn't aiming to win against Senior Brother Chu at all, nor does she care about some hollow three-month undefeated reputation.”
The person paused. “She is doing this to improve herself. To her, Senior Brother Chu is the best opponent right now.”
On the arena, the two clashed for over a hundred moves, fighting from one end of the martial arts field to the other. The frost and flames from their clashing sword light left marks of varying depths on the bluestone ground.
In the end, Chu Zhixun forced her to the edge of the stage by a mere half-move. He sheathed his heavy sword and said with a smile, “If you practice for another three months, I'm afraid even I won't be able to stop you.”
Lin Zhiyue sheathed her sword, took a few deep breaths, nodded, and turned to walk off the stage.
Another two days later, she was sparring with Cen Xi'er on the martial arts field.
As they fought, Cen Xi'er thrust her sword forward. Just as Lin Zhiyue sidestepped to avoid it, the spiritual energy within her body suddenly surged without warning, like a river that had accumulated for a long time finally overflowing its banks.
Her hand holding the sword paused slightly, and then she felt the barrier inside her dantian loosening on its own.
She sheathed her sword and stood in place. Cen Xi'er also stopped, her gaze falling upon her. A few disciples resting on the stone steps by the martial arts field looked over as well.
Lin Zhiyue stood quietly with her sword sheathed, waiting for a few breaths. The surging spiritual energy inside her rose to a peak like a tide, then receded on its own, returning to a state of calm. However, the spiritual energy fluctuations radiating from her were no longer at the level of the mid-stage Golden Core.
She looked down at her hands, then lifted them to flex her fingers, feeling that the speed of her spiritual energy circulation was nearly fifty percent smoother than before.
Just like that, she broke through to the late-stage Golden Core right in front of everyone without any warning, as naturally as drinking water.
Beside her, Cen Xi'er glanced at her, said nothing, but simply sheathed her sword and patted her shoulder.
The side of the field fell silent for a moment, followed by a wave of low gasps and discussions. The news did not even take a night to spread; it traveled from the martial arts field to the mountain gate, and from the mountain gate to every peak. Within two days, it had spread across the entire sect—the name Lin Zhiyue was now firmly established as the strongest of the Golden Core Stage.
Everyone in Tiance Palace was saying that their sect had produced a once-in-a-century genius.
Another month passed, and Lin Zhiyue began to attempt seclusion to break through to the Nascent Soul Stage.
She sorted out the affairs in her courtyard, entrusted Yuetuan to Liu Fengyao's care, prepared enough pills and dry rations to last half a year, laid down a simple protective formation around the courtyard, and then closed the courtyard gate and sat on the futon.
Just as she calmed her mind to circulate her spiritual energy, the system light screen lit up: [Quest Instance Task Released: Sect Assembly. Core Task: Obtain first place in the Sect Assembly to receive the quest-drop outfit “Peach Blossoms Beaming.” Simultaneously unlock the permanent card pool “Ancient Path, Lingering Smoke.”]
Lin Zhiyue finished reading the lines with her eyes closed. Without interrupting the circulation of her spiritual energy, she simply noted it in her mind, then refocused her attention on the spiritual energy vortex slowly condensing within her dantian.
The wind outside the window drifted in through the gaps in the courtyard wall, rustling a corner of the notebook on the desk before letting it fall back down.
She sat on the futon with her eyes closed, her breathing steady and deep, as the spiritual energy within her body flowed slowly forward along her meridians.
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