It was the day of the tournament.
Ning made his way to the battle arena of the sect where all the people were gathered to make their beast fight.
During the last 4 days, Ning had been continuously training Night in the two techniques. By now, he was quite proficient at using the Multi-Scratch technique but was a little behind on learning the Blinding Gusts technique properly. Still, he was good enough that Ning didn't think he would need to learn it any further.
Also, after Ning's consistent effort, he had managed to increase Ning's cultivation realm by 1. He was now in 3rd realm of Qi Condensation.
This sect-wide competition was for outer sect disciples only, so Ning couldn't see many if any, inner sect disciples. As for core disciples, he hadn't seen a single once since he had joined the sect, aside from the senior sister Soria.
'Do I leave the sect once I reach the next 2 double caps amount?' he wondered. The reason he joined the sect in the first place was partly his curiosity about what sects were like and his need to find a place where he could cultivate without worry.
Since he didn't want to be bald and didn't like the vibes of the other sect at all, he had come here. He quite liked it for now and didn't have any complaints.
'Although, it's supposed to be a school right? What sort of school lets a student learn on their own? The disciples require a knowledgeable teacher to guide them,' he thought.
He registered his name and was made to register both of his beasts. When he told them he only had one, they looked at him quite weird. 'Sh*t, should I have gotten another one too?' he thought.
After a few minutes, the tournament started. There were apparently around 350 outer sect disciples, so they started to have multiple battles at once.
'Ah the elders stay as referee huh?' he thought. He was happy that Night wouldn't get severely hurt now. He knew Night wasn't the strongest of the bunch, and given that he had to fight during the day, his skills wouldn't be shown to the fullest.
Still, he hoped to make the top half so he wouldn't have to pay anything.
Beasts were fighting everywhere in the battle arena. Some were intense, some were funny, some were boring, some were hard to look at. Soon, Ning's turn came as well.
He was sent to the arena with another disciple. He had never seen the disciple before, but he wouldn't go easy on him. Both of their beasts came out of the beast pouch at the same time.
Ning brought out Night, while the other guy brought out a very regular-looking wolf. However, Ning knew that this wolf was mid to high in terms of rankings in the Mist Origin sect's Beast data.
That meant it was way below Night's level. Ning quickly checked the wolf's cultivation and nearly laughed when he saw that it was in the 1st Qi condensation realm. It was too weak.
"Start!" the elder screamed and both the beasts started fighting at once. Without even waiting for anything, Night, under Ning's order, flew at a slow speed knocked the wolf with its non-sharp side of the talon.
While it was slow, the speed was very fast for the wolf to dodge, and instead, it was hurled out of the arena.
Ning thought that the fight was anti-climactic and walked down the arena with Night perched on his shoulders. He watched the other fight for a few minutes, and it was time for him to fight again.
He walked up the arena once more and got ready for fighting. This time their opponent was a girl with a 2nd Qi Condensation realm bird. Everyone expected the fight to last a little more than a little, but alas that was exactly what happened.
Within a single scratch from Night, not even a technique, the bird was hurt and it flew back to the owner. Once more, it was an anticlimactic fight.
Ning waited for a little longer and his turn came once more. He was starting to get bored now. He had expected to fight great battles with his beast and instead it was just asleep fest.
Finally, when he walked up the arena, he saw his opponent and was quite surprised. 'A demon caterpillar?' he thought. He knew the name of the beast at least, and also knew it was at a respectable ranking.
'I wonder why that is. I should read the other books,' he thought. Soon the battle started and as usual, Night flew into scratch the caterpillar. But suddenly, the caterpillar threw out a butch of webs that created a very hard place for Night to maneuver in.
Ning was a little surprised, but he didn't get caught off guard.
"Use Blinding Gust," he said while pointing at the caterpillar. He felt like a P*k**on a trainer right now. The gusts had tiny sharp Qi in them that did nothing to the webs.
However, upon the frail Demon Caterpillar, it was making numerous tiny cuts all over its body, including its eyes. Suddenly, it couldn't see anymore. The girl started calling for the caterpillar to perform different techniques, but in the end, it was blinded, so it easily lost to Night once more.
By this point, Ning was surprised if he was even going to be stopped at all. He waited for his turn to come p once more, but it didn't, instead, they skipped his turn to get a number that was the multiple of two.
He was now suddenly in top 32. 'What the hell?' he thought. It was now a 1v1 that the entire audience would watch one at a time. The competition started once more and people started to fight.
Soon, it was time for him to fight once more.
When he walked up and saw his enemy on the other side of the stage, he was quite surprised. "Ah, I see. We will finally get to take revenge for you Night," Ning said.
As if he had a fate attached to the guy, his opponent was Yacius.