Chapter 18 – Cheating in a tournament? In a cultivation novel? How could they think no one would find out?

“Nobody cared who I was, ‘till I published the tournament arc.” The author of this tournament arc, probably

“I can’t believe you would cheat Lang.” The principal, Mark Hugh had some irritation in his voice, probably as much for play as it seemed a reflection of the feelings of many who watched. However, she noticed that he himself was pleased with her victory.

Lang was standing in front of a four person tribunal including both the principals and two unaffiliated factions.

‘As unaffiliated as Emperor-level bozos can be.’ Lang thought, the two people were from the Zhou and Fong family, and because of their level, they were both Emperors. Lang hated all of their guts, and she knew that this would be an uphill battle even though the facts were on her side.

“First of all, I got punished for my ‘cheating’ in accordance with the rules.” She made a gesture with her fingers.

“Secondly, it wasn’t me who decided to introduce Body Realm techniques into our competition.” Lang smiled.

“And third, I didn’t use any Body techniques for offensive purposes. Meaning your boy, lost fair and square. I beat him on every turn, in Soulcraft, in Body techniques and even in my combat sense.”

With that, Lang sat down.

“Seeing the duel myself, I must admit that miss Bao has showcased, to a sufficient metric, that she is the superior Soulcraft user.” One of the Emperors said and then sat down.

“By bringing Runecraft into this competition you completely derailed it.” The headmaster Bien Li of the Full Cultivation Academy stood up and played up his outrage.

“That would be your student Dale by using Shadow Step, rules-wise it’s considered the same as Runecraft in this Soulcraft competition.” Lang stood up while Bien Li was still standing, which drew a smirk onto his face.

After a couple hours of deliberation, Lang ended up being the victor by Bien Li being outvoted 3 to 1.

Lang was tired.

She was tired even before that whole conversation, but somehow talking to 4 immortals made you feel small.

She went back home, took a shower, and went to sleep.

********

Chao Li was in the tournament stands. Lang Bao was an interesting case as she was not only close to Vera but had made a way for some people to get rid of the parasite. Honestly, it was intriguing how two best friends, from the same university managed to find a cure of sorts, irrespective of each other.

However, Chao couldn't interact with her much. He learned of her disposition in her family. The two dares she was so close to completing.

This tournament had so many different disciplines and age groups competing, individual matches almost didn’t matter. Every year each equivalent age group was fighting. A year winning would score a single point for the university.

There were eight distinctive years competing, each in 5 categories – Familiars, Runecraft, Soulcraft, Alchemy and the 5 on 5 melee worth 3 points. The point totals for years would only come into play if the ending score was 4 year points for each university.

In the past couple years, the ‘new’ school had started winning more of the matches, sometimes clutching out year points. If they managed to start winning the whole thing, the general public might change to favor new school over old school. However, for Chao it didn’t matter how people got better, as long as they weren’t disruptive elements to society.

Chao was here, as usual via Avatar familiar proxy. The investigations into the Vera case had gone completely cold and yet Chao’s intuition told him that there would be a lead in the school tournament.

Chao was making small talk with Kem Bao, the current head of the Bao family. He wasn’t even the furthest in cultivation, but for some reason the parasite didn’t attack the Great-Uncles of any family. The fact that it was man-made had been made clear with all the proof that was given.

“Hasn’t she matured just perfectly?” Kem said, he was drinking alcohol and the inebriation was palpable. “You know, I sometimes wish people would just do that Lifeforce trick just to age up.” Kem wasn’t really paying attention to the Phoenix egg neutralization, as that event didn’t matter much.

“I’m more interested in the other part of Lang’s cure. By creating canisters which allow people to suck their own Lifeforce back in, the whole pandemic could be cleared out from the common-folk.” Chao got closer to Kem “Say, Golden Emperor Kem Bao, I have a serious question.” He whispered in a way that only Kem would hear him. “Were there any attempts at Lang’s life since she published her findings?”

Kem became stern “It’s been over a week, so if they wanted to move against her, they could, but they haven’t.” Or maybe it didn’t matter, for one of two reasons. Reason number one; This method would never be used by emperors or anyone with a large amount of Lifeforce. Reason number two; Now that the method was out and the cure didn’t require Lang anymore, her life was as meaningless to the faction vying for ultimate power as she was when she didn’t have a cure.

Not being attacked wasn’t very interesting, but at least it might not dissuade others from trying to find a cure.

Stuck in his own thoughts, he was brought out again by Lang, who won against the other kid with a ritual not unlike the ones he trained on. ‘That sure brings back memories.’

As she was leaving the podium, he felt it, the flare up that was the Spirit Mask of Vera’s assassin. Time slowed down around Chao.

He appeared next to the location from where he felt it. Its user was gone, Soul Transference.

‘You are slower than me.’ Chao thought as he followed. There was no way the person was a higher rank than his Emperor of the Four Elements, unless of course it was the God-Emperor himself.

They both entered the Interdimensional space and Chao saw his target high-tailing it towards a Spirit Dimension with a set of very basic parameters. ‘This feels like a trap; however I am not here myself. There are things I can learn and get out with that knowledge.’

Entering the Dimension, Chao was filled with a sense of Deja Vu from a long time ago. He was reminded of the night the God-Emperor took over the cultivation world.

The person in front of him was an Emperor-level cultivator. He wasn’t moving, but Chao felt a tugging sensation from his right.

Chao Li used Meltation, to turn into a liquid and quickly scattered as an Eradication beam sailed past him.

‘Childish. I was one of the developers of Eradication.’ Eradication could destroy most people, but for Emperor-level cultivators who had access to full renewal, a move which cost about a thousand years of cultivated Lifeforce, they still had a way to survive it.

Now ready, Chao attacked the person on the side, using Cosmic Lock.

When it came to cultivator battles, Chao was the person with the most experience besides his teacher. Emperors got cocky when they hadn’t been challenged for hundreds of years, Chao could use this cockiness.

The Cosmic Lock held, Chao started writing runes in the assailant’s body, via his connection to the Cosmic Lock. ‘You need to do something kid. If you want your existence to survive, that is.’ Chao noticed the original figure attacking him, but even Eldritch Soulcraft from an unknown Realm didn’t matter to Chao’s defensive ward ‘Chaos Breaker’.

Chao felt there were 8 more Emperors preparing, he used his summoning to call forth 3 more of his familiars and one by one they transformed into Chao’s Duplicants.

They worked together like a magnificent concerto. Terraforming Soulcraft, Spiritual Overdrive and Dimension Control. Each of them exerted a significant showcase of power over the world. The Dimension had cracks appearing in it, signifying the change of ownership.

‘As I thought it was just a Dimension and not a Realm.’ Chao sent the assailant into his storage Dimension.

“You’ve prepared quite the primitive trap for me.” Chao said as he blocked off the exit from the Dimension. These were just Cultivation Emperors and a two of them were Emperors of Force.

As he was thinking of this, he realized that the Dimension itself was starting to collapse.

‘They are all astral projections!’ He wouldn’t be able to squeeze out any information out of the one he kept if they managed to end the projection.

The Dimension was cracking at an even faster pace than when he took ownership. “It seems, I did get played, at least to an extent.”

The astral projections ended quite suddenly, but not the one he was in control of yet. Using Locator runes, he found traces of the Spirit mask of him and his original prey. But he didn’t find their real hideout.

The world collapsed around him as Chao and his familiars entered a fast Stasis to negate all the damage he could receive.

Chao knew at least one of the Spirit Masks of the 8 Emperor-level people, he just had to remember who exactly it was.

“I’m on your track whether you like it or not.”

********

The next day, Lang was watching the tournament melee. One day after the other clashes had happened. Every melee signified the victory of given school as no year managed to sweep the regular disciplines.

Lang’s University age group, the 2nd master class, was up next against the Academy. The melee was a chaotic battle with two victory methods. One was to wipe out your opponents, and the other was to hold flags and obtain 100 points. Each flag minute counted as a point. There were a total of three flags.

They were wearing modified ward-gear that would calculate the amount of damage they received and if they received enough, it would silently knock them out. A knocked out contestant would yield 1 point to the opposing team and would stay knocked out for 30 seconds. Knocking out all of the contestants of one side within the 30 second window would count as an automatic win for the opposing side.

The fight started. Each side had 1 flag at the start, and four members of each team went towards the middle. One from the Academy went sneakily around the middle flag towards the start zone with the University flag.

Helena Young was defending the University flag, preparing traps and fields to help in defending it. Once the flag was sufficiently defended, her role would be to enter the fray.

The student from the Academy, with dark hair ending with red streaks, was sneaking close to the University encampment. He came out with a massive fire Soulcraft, which obliterated a portion of the defenses Helena had prepared.

Helena used her fast speed to intercept him and fought him in close range while blowing plumes of dark energy on him. This was her Yin Soulcraft.

Even though she was faster, her attacks didn’t seem to affect him whatsoever.

After a while, one of his attacks got her and she was knocked far back. She felt a small amount of pain but most of the damage was stopped by the warding necklace.

The announcer, that the contestants couldn't hear said “The Academy has knocked out three of the University contestants, it’s quickly shaping up to be a knockout.”

Lang looked at the other part of the field where Mike Zhou was facing off 3 of the Academy contestants, while there were 3 of his friends and one of his foes on the ground.

“Will the University students be able to keep up with the merciless thrashing they are receiving? The score after the first 3 minutes is just 6 to 4 but it might end here.”

Helena was back up and fighting but again it seemed as if her attacks weren’t doing anything, whether it be her Soulcraft or her Body Realm techniques.

Mike Zhou wasn’t doing much better, he was constantly defending and giving ground. He got out of the flag radius for 3 seconds and it turned into the Academy red color.

“The Academy has obtained the middle flag. If they manage to snag the University flag as well, they can win without a full knockout!” The announcer sounded again with excitement welling in his voice “This might be the fastest fight we’ve had today.”

At that time, Helena received another hit, knocking her out of the flag zone and while another of the University students came up from his knockout, the third flag was taken, and the University lost.

“THREE FLAGS, THREE MINUTES…” he continued super softly “and 54 seconds” then he continued with full boom “AND WE HAVE OUR WINNER! The Full Cultivation Academy wins another melee. This, along with their win in familiar control, gives them 4 points winning this year’s point.”

The melee was so surprisingly one-sided that an investigation was started by the Young family.

The Young family showed that the Academy had swapped 2 of the contestants for graduates of the Academy who were 6 years older. Within the day, an apology was issued and the melee itself was given as a win to the University.

“Are you listening Lang?” Her father was upset.

She wasn’t listening, the things around her were just happening. She felt empty all things considered. Finally, she said, “I need rest.” and left.

This fiasco didn’t become a big deal as more news of infections from the tournament appeared. But that’s something the cultivator society will have to deal with. As we will go back to the scheduled Vera training arc momentarily. Sit tight.