Heavenly Jewel Change

Crow couldn’t help but squeeze Zhou Weiqing’s arms, before saying curiously: “Weiqing… Are you really human? Could it be, you’re a long lost member of my Gold Crow Tribe?”

After his competition with Crow, Zhou Weiqing had taken up his cup to drink. Hearing her words, he couldn’t help but spray out the mouthful of water.

“Who’s your long lost tribe member? I really worked extremely hard this time in my closed door cultivation!”

Crow gave another humph, saying: “Don’t give me that, no matter how hard you work, it’s impossible to gain so much strength in such a short period of time. Your current strength is definitely beyond any ordinary human means… there must be some secret behind it!”

Zhou Weiqing grinned and said: “Heh heh, since you already know it’s a secret, then you shouldn’t ask anymore. Come on, let’s finish up, I want to go back and continue cultivating. Crow, you need to buck up! It will not be easy to catch back up to my strength!”

Crow shook her fist at him, saying: “Don’t be cocky yet! Us Gold Crow Tribe members will continue growing in strength as we mature, and as our Heavenly Energy grows. Before long, I will catch back up to you!”

…

Soon, the three days of rest had ended, and the next fight begun. Perhaps because of the ferocity of the Fei Li Battle Team in the previous round, their fourth round opponents barely put up a token struggle before surrendering, giving them an easy victory. Once again, only Zhou Weiqing and Crow actually fought, with each gaining a 1v1 victory, then easily beating their opponents in the 2v2 match.

In the entire process of the fourth round fights, when the Ka’Ou Battle Team members looked at Crow and Zhou Weiqing during their fights, they immediately thought of the bloody scene of the Bai Da Battle Team and the sickening deaths. Originally, they were already weaker than the two young combatants, and with fear in their hearts, how could they possibly have a chance.

As such, the Fei Li Team had achieved victory over all four of their matches, and the only remaining match was against the seeded team of their group, the Dan Dun Battle Team. Even if they conceded to them in the next, and final, round, they were already guaranteed a top eight spot.

…

Besides the quick fight of the fourth round, Zhou Weiqing continued his diligent training and cultivation. Before the fourth round and his evolving, he had already completed the thousand-tempering training of his Touch of Darkness Skill. Alas, due to the Skill lasting longer than others, and the sheer expenditure of spirit, he had been unable to complete all three-thousand tempering as planned. Still, he had already gained a marked improvement on control and in understanding the profound mysteries.

As for three days of rest after the fourth round, Zhou Weiqing chose another of his most useful skills to go through tempering. At the same time, he also grit his teeth and went through the immense suffering of breaking through the next Death Acupuncture Point, the first of his chest Death Acupuncture Points, the ventral septum (DanZhong Acupuncture Point 1). With that, he had successfully entered the Immortal Deity Technique’s third portion.

The entire Immortal Deity Technique had four main portions, and Zhou Weiqing had already completed the first two portions, breaking through the thirteen Death Acupuncture Points depicted in them. As for the last two portions, they were of the chest area Death Acupuncture Points and the head-neck area Death Acupuncture Points respectively, totally another twenty three Death Acupuncture Points. Of the two, the third portion depicted fourteen chest area Death Acupuncture Points, the most of any portion. As such, the third portion was also one of the most important and critical parts of the entire Immortal Deity Technique.

When breaking through the DanZhong Acupuncture Point, Zhou Weiqing realised that the pain was much lesser than previously, perhaps due to his body and physique having evolved. As such, he was better able to withstand the pain, managing to go through the process successfully without going crazy, even without Bing’er’s help this time. The entire process went through much smoother than all the previous times he had broken through Death Acupuncture Points, and in barely two hours, he had successfully broken through and entered the next stage.

As such, Zhou Weiqing had finally reached the 14th stage of Heavenly Energy, the 2nd level of the Heavenly Shen Energy stage. Once again, he had taken a big step towards reaching his fourth Jewel.

However, at the same time, Zhou Weiqing also realised a problem. Although his entire maximum Heavenly Energy had increased drastically with the breakthrough of the Death Acupuncture Point, but his recovery rate and training speed did not improve any further, or perhaps only a very minimal, almost unnoticeable increase. It seemed like unlike the previous portions, in order to gain the largest benefit on recovery rate, he would have to complete the entire portion, and have the Death Acupuncture Points completely broken through to form a circulatory flow.

…

Time flew indeed, and it seemed like a blink of an eye and it was already the final round of the preliminary heats. After this round, the top eight would get five days of rest before the quarter finals begun. Once the top four had been selected out of the quarter finals, the semi finals would be held on the Heavenly Jewel Island, and the top four would have the honour of entering it. Of course, what happened there was only known to the top four teams.

With the tournament having proceeded to this point, the top eight were actually pretty much determined already. Naturally, the four seeded teams, all of whom had not fought a single match, were guaranteed their spots. As for the rest of the teams, two had already fought their way to the top eight. One was of course the Fei Li Battle Team from group three, but the other was the previously unheard of Kalise Battle Team.

The situation of the Kalise Battle Team was similar to the Fei Li Battle Team, with their last round fight being the seeded team of their group. In their earlier rounds, they had also achieved four victories, and without question they would also be in the top eight.

If everything went normally, according to the tournament fixtures, being the second of their group, the Kalise Team would likely be facing the first of group three, the Fei Li Team’s group. That meant they would likely be facing the seeded team of that group, Dan Dun Battle Team.

As the final round of the preliminary heats, the most popular was naturally still the various betting booths. After all, this was the final chance for the citizens and audience to place their bets. This year’s Heavenly Jewel Tournament had indeed let the ZhongTian Empire earn a sizeable income from organising the bets.

The seven members of the Fei Li Battle Team reached the ZhongTian Plaza early. As with the previous rounds, they claimed their winnings first. Naturally, they had all won a large amount from the fight with the Bai Da Empire, but their odds against the Ka’Ou Team had dropped drastically, and they had barely gotten much from that last bet.

Even so, after all the four rounds of fighting, Zhou Weiqing’s pocket had been fattened to an impressive million gold coins. The richest was naturally still Ye Paopao, who had amassed a rather terrifying million and three hundred thousand gold coins.

As the employee at the betting booth passed them their gold coin storage cards, he couldn’t help but feel envious, saying jokingly: “You guys sure have earned a lot this year! Are you still betting today? If you all chose to fight, it can be a chance to win big! 1 to 100 odds!”

Of course, his words had been a joke, perhaps even a light hearted jibe. After all, the Fei Li Battle Team’s opponent today was the seeded team, the Dan Dun Battle Team. Without question, the four seeded teams would never throw a fight just to earn some gold coins; not only was it their pride and face, more importantly it was also concerning a chance to enter the Heavenly Jewel Island, which was definitely critical to all the other Great Saint Lands.

Of course, that was also why the ZhongTian Empire dared to set such an insane odds of 1 to 100, to tempt others into placing bets should there be an actual fight. The five Great Saint Lands did not lack money, and their aim in the Tournament was to enter the Heavenly Jewel Island. For them to lose to any other team not from another Great Saint Lands, it would be a great humiliation.

Hearing the employee’s joke, Zhou Weiqing, who had been standing right in front, suddenly slammed his gold coin storage card down. Smiling, he said: “Alright, I bet everything on ourselves, Fei Li Battle Team victory.”

The employee started, staring at him dazedly for a moment, before he recovered himself. Laughing a little in spite of himself, he said: “Don’t joke around, keep it quickly, that is a million gold coins.”

Zhou Weiqing said seriously: “Who is joking? I am really betting on us to win. We are really fighting today; what you said is right. A 1 to 100 payout rate, our fate lies in our own hands, how can I not bet on myself.”

Taken aback, the employee stuttered in shock: “You… you mean… you are really going to fight the seeded team today?” Most, if not all, teams would not want to fight the seeded teams before the top eight. After all, no one wanted to take too many losses before the quarter finals.

Zhou Weiqing smiled and nodded, saying: “Yes, we are serious. Please register us.”

Ye Paopao stood beside Zhou Weiqing, saying hesitantly: “Weiqing, you do not need to bet so much. Our chance isn’t that high.”

Zhou Weiqing laughed heartily, saying: “Our imagination is our limit; the more we dare, the more the land will yield. If I win, my million gold coins becomes a hundred million gold coins, haha I wonder if the ZhongTian Empire will feel a heartache if that really happens! Are you all betting?”

Ye Paopao shook his head, saying: “I’ve already earned enough this time, and I shall not want to lose it all… A man content with his lot is a happy man. I will join you in betting ten thousand gold coins just for fun instead.”

The rest of the others placed a similar bet to Ye Paopao, each placing ten thousand on themselves. The only exception was Crow. She was the poorest of the entire team, and even after winning the last four rounds, she had only amassed thirty thousand gold coins. Unhesitatingly, she bet all of it on their team.

Drunken Bao laughed and said: “Sis Crow, why did you follow Weiqing and go crazy? It’s tough for us to earn money, not like that fellow who is a Consolidating Equipment Master!”

Crow shook her head, grinning as she said: “I trust in Weiqing, and also my own vision. If we do not put our backs against the wall, to break the caldrons and sink the boats2, how can we win? We must win!”

The employee of the betting booth stared at all the team members like they had gone crazy, or become idiots. Even after he had finished their registration and they had left, he was still in a daze of disbelief. However, he had already accepted the bets, that was indeed true.

Indeed, for this last round of the preliminary heats, the Fei Li Battle Team had steeled their resolve and made up their minds to fight the Dan Dun Battle Team.

This was also the words that Zhou Weiqing had used to rouse his teammates, when he had been explaining his plan before the fight with the Bai Da Battle Team.

At that time, Zhou Weiqing had told his team that his target was not the Bai Da Battle Team, but the Dan Dun Battle Team! He had a few reasons, simple but compelling. First of all, everyone was used to not fighting the seeded teams in the preliminary heats. As such, the Dan Dun Battle Team definitely would not place much importance on them, instead looking to the other groups and analysing their possible opponents there. Of course, their main focus would still be on the other three seeded teams.

Under such a circumstance, the Dan Dun Battle Team would not be expecting themselves to be challenged by the Fei Li Battle Team, and they might grow careless. As such, by challenging and fighting them now, it would be easier than any other seeded team who already knew they were fighting them. After all, the Fei Li Battle Team had already secured their top eight spot, and did not have anything to lose by fighting them here.

More importantly, amongst the five Great Saint Lands, besides the Heavenly Demon Sect, the Blood Red Hell was the next weakest. Instead of possibly facing the two strongest teams in the WanShou Battle Team and the ZhongTian Battle Team where their chances were much lower, they might as well pit themselves against the Dan Dun Battle Team now!