10 Second Level, First Place

Cha Ming was standing on a rough gray stone stage. This stone stage was substantially smaller than the previous stage used for the group battle. It was about a hundred feet on each side, a perfect square. Despite having been baked by the sun all morning, it was still pleasant and cool to the touch.

His opponent in the second round was called Tu Sheng. Tu Sheng was the kind of man who wore his heart on his sleeve. Cha Ming truly had no idea how this sort of man had made it so far through the elimination rounds. While most people had been sitting and recovering their stamina, Tu Sheng was busy talking about how great it was to meet so many new friends. He then proceeded to tell everyone about his abilities and specialties. Perhaps everyone had clued in to his disposition and decided to pick on someone else, giving the whole group of remaining people higher odds in proceeding to the next round.

Earth users were typically defense oriented, and Cha Ming's read on Tu Sheng—supplemented by the vast amount of information he willingly divulged—was that the large burly man was a go-big-or-go-home sort of guy. Accordingly, Cha Ming decided to drain away at his opponent's stamina by using a few sword fingers mixed in with his basic fist technique.

The sword fingers, while they looked impressive, were really a low-consumption harassment technique. Tu Sheng's goal was clearly to tire Cha Ming out by continuously defending his attacks. How could he possibly know that Cha Ming's techniques consumed very little qi? Conversely, Tu Sheng's techniques were mid-range as far as qi consumption went. In addition, the techniques tended to slow him down quite a bit. He soon noticed that every time Tu Sheng cast a defensive earth spell, he would slow down drastically for a whole second. That was perfect.

Cha Ming first provoked Tu Sheng's defense with a sword finger and grinned as he formed hand seals, sprouting vines and entrapping Tu Sheng when his movement was the slowest. This took Tu Sheng completely by surprise—metal and wood were a very unique combination because most who cultivated metal would rather not cultivate wood since they could not be able combine their techniques very efficiently. He cursed under his breath, and after Cha Ming hit him with a few fists, he finally broke free of the vines. He had clearly lost in that exchange.

Cha Ming repeated the same tactic multiple times until his opponent finally ran out of qi. The fellow was really a hopeless case, and he was unable to adapt to the situation before finally admitting defeat.

"He is way too fortunate to be able to cultivate a dual element," said one girl.

Another nearby girl started mocking her. "How fortunate is that? What a rubbish combination of elements to cultivate! You can't combine these elements properly as a qi refiner, and most students wouldn't even bother to split their attention!" she said smugly.

After being mocked by the other students, the girl quickly quieted down. This was common knowledge, and even the academy did not facilitate this kind of cultivation technique past bronze grade. Perhaps they assumed Cha Ming had decided to bite off more than he could chew and was choosing to cultivate incompatible elements.

Naturally Cha Ming didn't take it to heart. These were, after all, just a bunch of teenagers. What kind of adult would lower himself to bickering with teenagers? He did not bother to defend himself and let the criticism wash over him.

Over in the elders' seating, one of the teachers asked, "Is that… the student who decided to cultivate five elements?"

Another teacher beside him nodded. "I was present when Elder Wang was administering the test. The student is quite a good seedling and has an absurdly high soul force. Regrettably, he decided to pick a dead-end path." The teacher sighed.

"But I didn't even see him using more than metal and wood. Did he decide to ditch the cultivation techniques he picked and cultivate something else?" asked the same teacher.

The teacher beside him, who was a little more experienced, shook his head and said, "He shouldn't have switched. If you had a high innate soul talent and had a choice to pick two elements, how could you cultivate a combination so worthless as metal and wood? At the very least he could have also cultivated fire as a third element, but it's still suboptimal, despite the flexibility in choosing professions. Allied elements make much more sense, so water as a third element would be a distinct possibility. Who knows, maybe he has his heart set on being a spirit doctor."

The next fight began as the chatter continued, and the other seven matches in the second level finished. Fights of this level were very interesting because the students barely had enough time to cultivate. Who knew what kind of mistakes they would make while picking techniques? These students had no combat experience, and they would take a while to improve. It was very similar to watching little kids chase each other around, only to have one of them trip on a tree branch and sprain their ankle. Taking pleasure in others' misfortunes had always been a popular form of entertainment.

There were a few noteworthy battles among the second-level students. The fiery youth that had cooperated with Cha Ming in the preliminaries was named Feng Ming. He finished his battle very quickly through a combination of fierce, overwhelming, and accurate moves. He cultivated a fire-based movement technique, a low-level fire technique for feinting, and a higher-level fire attacking technique to finish off his opponents.

Another interesting character was a girl named Gong Lan. She seemed to win by effortlessly weaving around her opponent, who soon became enraged and charged at her, only to be caught and thrown off the stage. She received loud applause from the male students since she was quite good looking.

An hour passed by, and soon it was Cha Ming's turn once again. This time he was matched up against Gong Lan, and he knew she would be a rather tricky opponent. They stepped on the stage and bowed before awaiting the command to start the match. Gong Lan winked at him right before Elder Huang yelled, "Fight!" Cha Ming resisted the temptation to roll his eyes, and they began to circle each other.

Gong Lan walked in the opposite direction of Cha Ming, advancing when he advanced, backing off as he backed off. They moved in a perfect circle, which kept growing and shrinking. When he reversed, she changed her direction as well, like a mirror to his movements. Since the battle wasn't progressing, he took the opportunity to inspect her good-looking figure. Her hairstyle was quite unusual, a bob-style haircut that was extremely short on the back and chin-length on the front. One side was longer than the other and drooped across one eye; the other, shorter side was pinned back with a white-and-blue pin. The pin perfectly matched her white tai chi uniform with a blue embroidered front.

Judging by her movements and dress style, she clearly practiced a soft-style martial art; Cha Ming would need to take the initiative. He was especially wary of her movement technique, which he had witnessed her use when she threw an opponent off the stage. Cha Ming started off by advancing and sending out a few jabs with his left hand. In response, Gong Lan began to weave around him with a water-element movement technique, maneuvering him to the edge of the stage.

Once they were three feet from the edge of the stage, Cha Ming overcommitted a punch with his right hand, an opportunity which Gong Lan quickly grasped by attempting to throw him off the stage, using the Circular Softness movement technique. Smirking, he maneuvered around her with his Ghost Steps, using his elusive technique to outplay her circular movement. In the middle of their exchange, he suddenly struck out with a sword finger, and a second, and a third! These were quickly dodged in succession, and she took advantage of the last sword finger to grab on to his wrist to attempt to throw him off the stage once again.

As he flew above her head, Gong Lan seemed very pleased with herself. This expression quickly disappeared as she felt her hands being pulled forward. She gasped as she saw that both of her hands, which had been used to throw Cha Ming, were now wrapped in thick vines that she had no way to break.

Instead of being thrown off stage, Cha Ming swung off toward the side and continued to pull, using his momentum to tug her forward and off the stage. She landed in a rather embarrassing position.

"Winner!" exclaimed Elder Huang. He was quite surprised by this reversal, and this fight looked a lot more like an exchange at the fifth level and higher. The elder fondled his short beard, appreciating the new batch of good seedlings.

Cha Ming gave Gong Lan an apologetic look as he left the stage. Meanwhile, she gave him a pouting look and limped toward the medic tent, rubbing her bottom and looking very aggrieved. Cha Ming instantly became the object of public persecution; he was slandered as heartless, cold, and ungentlemanly.

Massaging his temples, he thought, Am I just supposed to stay there while she throws me off the stage because she is pretty? She stepped on stage! Shouldn't she accept this risk in competing?

In the stands, Hong Xin was still waving her makeshift banner and seemed to have been joined by a group of young girls who were clearly less than pleased with Gong Lan and her popularity with the boys. This made the jeering teenage boys even more furious.

The matches continued as before, and Cha Ming won another two matches without having to reveal any trump cards. He had made it to the finals!

Despite his easy wins, Cha Ming did not get arrogant. After all, even a tiger should use his full strength to catch a rabbit. He walked up for his last match after being called on stage.

By now, the audience had figured out that Cha Ming cultivated at least two elements, possibly three, to create an allied metal-water-wood combination. This type of combination was sometimes employed by healers to provide themselves with some level of offensive ability, as metal combined well with water. Only at this stage of his cultivation, he would not be able to fully utilize this advantage. Cha Ming was seen as a calm and composed youth. Conversely, his opponent, Feng Ming, seemed to be quite brash, finishing all his matches very quickly. His hair was short and wild, and the skinny youth literally wore silk pants. They bowed to each other, smiling.

"I would never have thought that we'd meet again so quickly. I haven't had to take anyone else seriously, and it's nice to be able to fully exert myself." The youth smirked, hoping to throw his opponent off with an arrogant front.

Cha Ming calmly smiled. "Likewise. I still have a few tricks up my sleeve."

As soon as Elder Huang announced the start of the match, Feng Ming charged at Cha Ming, while the latter quickly circled around him using his Ghost Steps. Feng Ming would occasionally launch probing, fiery punches, which Cha Ming would dodge effortlessly. Cha Ming tried several times to trap Feng Ming with vines, but he burned them away quickly. Cha Ming became confused. While Feng Ming was very aggressive, his elemental attacks were quite weak.

He must have something hidden, he thought. And then it occurred to him—he was part of the twenty-eight new students that had a dual affinity!

As they continued their exchange, Cha Ming had been forced to the edge of the stage. He darted to his right to avoid being cornered, but as he did, a wall of earth popped up. Cha Ming gave his opponent a meaningful look. After all, Feng Ming had managed to get this far in the arena battles without exposing his second affinity. This was very similar to what Cha Ming was doing with his water, earth, and fire elements.

Trapped between the wall, Feng Ming, and the edge of the stage, Cha Ming turned around to confront Feng Ming. Once he turned around, he saw a fiery sandstorm heading his way, threatening to push him off the stage.

--

"Dual-element fire-earth technique—Desert Sandstorm!" shouted Elder Huang. "This is a very qi-intensive technique, utilizing roughly forty percent of one's earth qi and twenty percent of one's fire qi when cultivating both elements. It will be very interesting to see if Cha Ming can wiggle his way out of this one! This is a trademark skill of the Feng family in Green Leaf City, and it is not taught to outsiders!"

The announcement was isolated from the stage for the sake of fairness in the competition. After all, they did not want the competitors to obtain any extra information until after the competition ended.

--

While this technique caught Cha Ming by surprise, he was quite grateful that he'd held back his other techniques. The first thing he did was generate a strong frost cloud to protect himself from the heat. He then quickly summoned three consecutive walls of earth. While walls of earth were stationary, their defensive power against something like fire, water, or other earth techniques was quite extraordinary. This was also one of the reasons why Cha Ming had picked this particular technique—very high defense, low qi cost. Another disadvantage, of course, was that these walls were stationary, but looking at the pale Feng Ming, there was little doubt that he did not have enough energy for a follow-up attack.

Ducking behind the multiple layers of earthen walls, he sheltered himself from the blast. The first two walls crumbled, and the sandy storm buffeted the last remaining earth wall. Hot winds blew past Cha Ming but were quickly absorbed by the surrounding frost cloud. Cha Ming then quickly darted from behind the wall and threw out a few bursts of flame at the exhausted Feng Ming, who flew to the ground and shouted mid-flight, "I concede!"

A medic shot onto the stage and started treating him on the spot. It was truly an intense battle.

--

Down in the elders' seating, the two teachers who had been discussing his techniques were quite shocked. They thought they had narrowed him down to having cultivated three elements, an aspiring spirit doctor. They had no idea he had been holding out the entire time.

Some teachers were looking at Du Cha Ming curiously, while others were looking at Feng Ming admiringly—what a powerful attack for the second level of qi condensation! Elder Ling was also seated there, smiling and rather satisfied. It looked like five-element cultivation suited the crafty Cha Ming rather well, and it was the correct decision to let him pick the technique despite the failure of his predecessors.

--

Before Cha Ming stepped off the stage, Elder Huang congratulated him and handed him a bag containing one hundred spirit stones, the reward for the year's freshman competition. In addition, he produced a jade containing a thousand contribution points. Once the jade touched Cha Ming's, it burst into a thousand green lights and was absorbed into Cha Ming's original jade.

The monthly arena battles continued, but Cha Ming was quite tired and walked away laughing with the happy Hong Xin and her new group of lady friends. After recovering and taking a bath, he joined everyone for supper. Feng Ming and Gong Lan joined him and Xin for supper—they were both new students and hadn't yet had the time to make many new friends. People in the cultivation world often made friends through fighting. Gong Lan no longer looked so aggrieved and wore a sweet smile on her pretty face.

What a quick recovery, thought Cha Ming. This young lady will likely be able to manipulate the boys at the academy quite easily in the future.

Hong Xin was also quite happy because she finally had another girl to spend time with.

After staying up late celebrating all night, Cha Ming fell directly into his bed. He didn't cultivate that night, as he was quite exhausted. For the first time in a long time, Cha Ming went to bed with a smile.