Wait, Why Are They Cheering for Him?

Hearing this, Li Guanqi let out a cold laugh and scoffed, "Effort?" "Your so-called effort is nothing more than self-deluding sentimentality in my eyes." "When it comes to true ascetic cultivation, you will never know what a staggering price one can pay." With that, Li Guanqi slowly slipped off his magic robe. His lean body was covered in hideous scars. No one would have ever imagined that such a handsome youth could bear so many near-fatal wounds! The twisted, gruesome scars instantly silenced the entire hall. Just from the countless scars, the crowd could not help but speculate on what this youth before them had actually been through. Yet at this moment, no one dared to even breathe loudly, let alone utter a word of rebuttal. Even Liu Man lowered her head in mild shame. Compared to the disciples of the Great Xia Sword Sect, the disciples of the Wind Thunder Sect had indeed lived far too comfortably. Li Guanqi put his robe back on and glanced at Tang Chuan with a sneer. "Although I don't know what motive brought you here to provoke me—or perhaps doing so gives your pride a boost, or feeds your vanity, or something of that sort—I can tell you this: the very fact that I am standing here means I am stronger than you." Hearing this, Tang Chuan's chest heaved violently. The more calm and unbothered Li Guanqi acted, the more Tang Chuan felt the other was merely using his higher cultivation realm to suppress him. Yet just as he was about to speak, Li Guanqi on the stage beat him to it. "Regardless of your reasons, you dared disrupt my class, and no one is paying attention to it anymore anyway. Since that is the case, I'll give you this chance: an arena duel." At those words, Tang Chuan's eyes lit up. He hadn't expected that Li Guanqi would say what was on his mind before he even had to voice it. Tang Chuan immediately looked around in all directions and called out, "You all heard it! I wasn't the one who proposed this!" Li Guanqi curled his lip and bluntly scoffed, "Playing the whore while erecting a monument to chastity. You're a grown man—would it kill you to just admit it openly? Babbling endlessly... Where is the sect arena? Let's make this quick so we don't hold up my class." Hearing this, Liu Man spoke up softly, "Elder Li, let me lead the way." Li Guanqi nodded and followed behind Liu Man toward the sect arena on the back mountain of the Wind Thunder Sect. Left standing dazed where he was, even Tang Chuan hadn't expected his plan for the day to go so smoothly. It felt almost like a dream—before he had even said a thing, the other party had already laid down a ramp and walked right down it. Ever since hearing that Li Guanqi had come to the sect, Tang Chuan had been holding in a wave of stubborn indignation. He wanted everyone to know that he was stronger than Li Guanqi! That Li Guanqi had only become famous because of the clash between the Great Xia Sword Sect and Ziyang Palace. When Li Guanqi had only just broken through to Core Formation, Tang Chuan had already reached the peak of mid Core Formation. By that measure, Tang Chuan was the true number one of the Wind Thunder Sect! Yet as soon as Li Guanqi became a guest elder of the Wind Thunder Sect, the news swept across the entire sect in no time. Countless people were overflowing with curiosity about Li Guanqi himself. This caused Tang Chuan's mind to twist, jealousy spreading wildly in his heart. As for Tang Chuan's antics, Li Guanqi merely found them exasperating. Sect disciples would always harbor some degree of petty vanity. The moment they heard someone was stronger, their resentment would fester, and they would itch to show off in front of all their junior brothers and sisters. The disciples in the hall, however, couldn't care less about any of that; all they cared about was that there was a good show to watch! A grand crowd surged toward the arena, with more and more disciples joining in along the way. Before long, practically every idle disciple in the Wind Thunder Sect was rushing toward the Fengyun Arena. The news quickly spread throughout the entire Wind Thunder Sect. Hearing that the newly arrived elder was going to fight the foremost inner disciple in the arena, even several elders with no lectures to give came along to join the excitement. The Wind Thunder Sect's arena had gone virtually unused for years; after all, under the sect's harmonious atmosphere, conflicts rarely arose. Yet before the crowd even arrived, someone had already swept the dust-covered arena clean. Looking at the hundred-zhang arena built entirely of solid white jade tiles, Li Guanqi couldn't help sighing, "The Great Xia Sword Sect's foundations are still too shallow. Nothing we can do about it... we're just poor." *Whoosh!* With a teleportation, Li Guanqi appeared upon the arena. This move immediately drew bursts of cheers from the surrounding crowd. Yet the eyes of several elders standing in the void narrowed slightly. After all, that move just now was the signature technique of a Nascent Soul realm cultivator—teleportation! It seemed the rumors were true: this youth, not even eighteen years of age, truly was a mighty cultivator of the Nascent Soul realm! This caused quite a few to inhale sharply in shock. Such talent... was simply terrifying. *Whoosh!* With an exceedingly dashing, handsome movement technique, Tang Chuan drifted down onto the arena, instantly eliciting shrill screams from a throng of female cultivators. After all, Tang Chuan wasn't bad-looking, and as the foremost disciple of the inner sect, quite a few people were infatuated with him. Yet as Tang Chuan listened to the cheers echoing around him, he suddenly felt something was amiss. "Ahhh! You're so handsome!" "I'm dying, I'm dying! Heavens, Elder Li is so gorgeous!" "Whoa! Is that Li Guanqi? He's way better looking than Tang Chuan! Even if he's blind, I wouldn't mind at all!" "Waaaah, Li Guanqi! Li Guanqi! I adore you!" Tang Chuan's face darkened instantly. He had never imagined that the women who usually fawned over him were now all showering their affections on Li Guanqi. Not only that, but those girls had somehow dragged over a giant oxhide drum from who knew where and started beating it, their eyes gleaming brightly as they gazed at Li Guanqi and cheered him on without pause. The spectacle left even Li Guanqi feeling a little embarrassed. He hadn't realized his face would be so popular. Seeing Tang Chuan's sullen expression, Li Guanqi smiled. "I won't bully you—I'll suppress my realm." "Still... now that we're both in the arena, there should be some sort of wager, shouldn't there?" Hearing this, Tang Chuan sneered, "Of course there has to be a wager!" "Oh? From the looks of it, you've already thought of one. Let's hear it." A glint of craftiness flashed in Tang Chuan's eyes. Spreading his legs, he pointed between them and said, "If you lose, you crawl between my legs and shout that you're a dog!" Hearing this, a gleam of coldness flashed through Li Guanqi's eyes, and he teased, "What? When I crawl through, I have to shout 'Tang Chuan is a dog'?" The spectators were momentarily stunned, but they quickly caught on to what Li Guanqi meant, and bursts of loud laughter erupted from the onlookers below.