Two teams stared at each other in the middle of the Light Arena. Although one of them didn’t seem to know what was going on, this didn’t affect the unfolding of the situation.
“Oh, it’s the mixed category, not the alchemy category…” Ye Lanyu didn’t seem to realise Ye Lang wasn’t kidding. She was pretending to be stupid… although Ye Lang was actually stupid- wait, no- clueless.
In this competition, there was a freestyle segment, which was the most important segment of this event- the mixed category.
You can tell from the name that teams consisted of members from different backgrounds, occupations and levels. Anyone could make up this team as long as it didn’t go against the basic rules of the competition.
This meant that Ye Lang, as an alchemist, could form a team with warriors and magicians, all he needed to do was register.
Mixing students among different academies was allowed too. As long as they were willing, students from different schools could register for the competition.
However, since this entire competition was a ranking competition among different schools, and any category would affect their school’s ratings, people didn’t usually mix students from different schools. They mostly only mixed people of different specialisations.
In the past, there had been many famous schools who collaborated to compete. They either knew each other beforehand, i.e. they were from the same city or grew up together but separated because they picked different schools.
Ye Lang could team up with his second sister if he wanted to.
Typically, one team consisted of five people. No one competed alone because they already had individual categories for that.
Registration didn’t fix the number at five though. Four, three or even two people were allowed. However, it would only place the team at a disadvantage since every man counted.
Unless they were the type to think they were already very powerful and didn’t think they needed more people. Or the kind who were only participating for fun and weren’t playing to win.
Obviously, Ye Lanyu’s team was the latter, they were only participating for fun.
Ye Lanyu’s team had only four members, and since the beginning of the competition, only three people showed up and one of them- Zhen Xiaoyan- mostly stood around to watch the show.
Of course, sometimes Zhen Xiaoyan would be a little useful, i.e. cheering with a sign that said ‘Go Team Lanyu’.
This scene looked very similar to the time Ye Lang ‘cheered’ when she was losing weight…
Nonetheless, Zhen Xiaoyan always showed up. Everyone was more curious about the team member who never showed up.
Ye Lanyu and the seventh princess’ appearance had already attracted a lot of attention, and in addition to that, they won every fight although it was just the two of them. This drew curiosity among the crowd, everyone wanted to find out details about the team.
After some digging, they found the team had four members instead of three. However, the fourth person never showed up. No one knew who the fourth person was supposed to be.
Due to the secrecy of such information, no one knew who the fourth person was.
Some people guessed that Ye Lanyu only submitted a random name to make it a four-person team, others guessed the person flaked on them and decided not to show up.
Ye Lanyu’s team was here for fun anyway, they must not care about winning or they wouldn’t have submitted only four names.
No matter what, no one expected the fourth person to be Ye Lang. They’d thought of it, but quickly denied it was a possibility.
Based on Ye Lang’s personality, it was already impressive he registered for the alchemy category. Why would he compete in the mixed category too?
If the mixed category’s event was something peaceful like a theoretical exam or a Q&A style, it would’ve been likely for him to show up. However, he would absolutely not agree to an event like this.
Unless…
“Our thirteenth prince obviously didn’t know about this.”
“Yeah, Ye Lanyu must’ve signed him up without telling him.”
“That’s the only explanation.”
People who were familiar with Ye Lang and Ye Lanyu all knew that this must’ve been Ye Lanyu’s doing.
As for people who didn’t know them, they didn’t care. All they knew was that they were jealous of that weird kid who turned out to be the fourth member, that he got to team up with that cool ice and fire girls.
Other than the people of the Sacred Teachings and the Royal Institute, very few had met Ye Lang in person. No one knew who he was although he had affected so many lives in the past few months. Here, in front of regular people, he was still a kid with no name.
The legend of the clueless genius doctor was only a legend, not many people knew it was Ye Lang. The Sacred Teachings didn’t release any official statements either, hence accidentally keeping Ye Lang’s identity secret. Perhaps they didn’t want Ye Lang to be harassed.
As for the thousand-year-old alchemy battle that happened half a month ago, this was still the Teachings’ secret, never revealed to anyone who wasn’t directly involved.
The situation with the Sacred Lady, Xuan Yuanbing, was the most secretive affair.
Therefore, this matter was similar to what happened in Soaring Sky- only the people directly involved knew of Ye Lang’s existence. Outsiders never knew of him.
This was perhaps a blessing from Lady luck in disguise. This allowed him to roam freely across the mainland without being the focus for jealousy or harassment. People only saw him as the Ye family’s thirteenth prince, not Ye Lang.
In summary, most people respected him because he was the son of a patriarch, not because of himself.
Many also knew of his skills in alchemy, but they didn’t pay much attention other than an occasional suspicion. No one really thought his alchemy skills could create ripples here anyway.
As we’ve seen so far, anyone who’d ever touched Ye Lang regretted this, perhaps wanting to kill themselves over their assumption…