Chapter 1433: The Six Great Outer Shenzhous

"Only snatching one layer of the Celestial Domain, wouldn't that be... not quite filling the belly?" Li Luo sighed inwardly, then carefully chose his words and asked.

"Haha, Mentor Li Luo, you're looking down on our Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou Sacred Academies' abilities, saying we can only snatch one layer of the Celestial Domain." Guo Guo Jiufeng laughed as he spoke.

The other Sacred Academy teams could only smile wryly. One layer of the Celestial Domain could yield at most twenty grains of Celestial Mirror Sand, yet their Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou had brought thirty-seven Sacred Academies this time, and each Sacred Academy's team had nearly ten members, so strictly speaking, it really wasn't enough to fill their bellies.

"Mentor Li Luo is a peerless prodigy, so naturally his ambitions are stronger than us old fogeys. To be honest, having you come to our Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou is indeed a bit of an injustice to you." Vice Principal Chenshi was quite understanding about this. With Li Luo's talent and methods, he would even qualify as a core member among the Inner Shenzhou teams.

"But there's no helping it. The Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou's strength, among the six great Outer Shenzhous, while not at the very bottom, can only be said to be in the lower three. And the competition format of this 'Contention Crossing Zone' is especially brutal, so the fact that our Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou managed to snatch one layer of the Celestial Domain last time was already a passing grade."

"Could it get worse than that?" Li Luo asked in shock.

"Every Contention Crossing Zone, there will be one Outer Shenzhou that returns empty-handed, without claiming ownership of any layer of the Celestial Domain." Guo Guo Jiufeng said.

The corner of Li Luo's mouth twitched slightly, and he couldn't help but ask curiously: "This Contention Crossing Zone, what exactly is the competition format?"

"The six great Outer Shenzhous, in the first round, will use a drawing of lots to determine three victors. These three victors will enter the Winners' Zone, and the three losers will fall into the Losers' Zone."

"The Winners' Zone has six layers of the Celestial Domain up for grabs, while the Losers' Zone can only contest for two layers." Guo Guo Jiufeng said.

Li Luo asked the question he cared about most: "In the end, how many layers of the Celestial Domain can the victor obtain?"

"Three layers."

"Only three layers?" Li Luo frowned.

Three layers of the Celestial Domain meant the equivalent of sixty grains of Celestial Mirror Sand, but if he was pursuing a 'Perfect Po Jing', then he alone would need forty grains of Celestial Mirror Sand.

"Mentor Li Luo, don't think too far ahead. Our Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou hasn't won three layers of the Celestial Domain in this Outer Shenzhou Contention Crossing Zone for a hundred years." Guo Guo Jiufeng said with a bitter smile.

Li Luo sighed. Being with underachievers was exhausting too; whatever he wanted to do, they all thought he was overreaching and impossible to understand.

"Are you thinking about that 'Perfect Po Jing'?" Mentor Mentor Xi Chan understood Li Luo's ambition and asked softly.

Li Luo said frankly: "With such an opportunity right before my eyes, I have to give it a try."

Guo Guo Jiufeng, Wang Xu, and the other vice principals were all rendered speechless. Being able to achieve Po Jing within the Celestial Mirror Pagoda was already quite remarkable; as for Perfect Po Jing, that was truly something one dared to imagine. One must know that even among the four Ancient Academies, such an achievement was hard to come by, let alone for their Outer Shenzhou Sacred Academies.

After all, the requirements for Perfect Po Jing were too stringent; sometimes even if one truly gathered forty grains of Celestial Mirror Sand, it didn't necessarily mean one could trigger it.

"If Mentor Li Luo truly has such ambition, then after this Celestial Domain contest, you might be able to participate in a 'Sand Fighting Match'." Guo Guo Jiufeng pondered slightly and said.

"Sand Fighting Match? What is that? It sounds rather bloody." Li Luo said in surprise.

Guo Guo Jiufeng couldn't help but laugh, then briefly explained: "This is an extra competition specially prepared by the Academy Alliance for teams with ambition, talent, and ability."

"Its rules no longer use the Outer Shenzhou as the unit, but rather teams, and it requires two teams from different academies to join forces to defeat another side."

Upon hearing this, Li Luo couldn't help but burst into laughter. What great rules. Teams from different academies — was there any more suitable partner than Jiang Jiang Qinge?

The might of a husband-and-wife duo was known to everyone in Tianyuan Outer Shenzhou.

"What are the rewards?" Li Luo hurriedly asked.

"The Sand Fighting Match only allows participation in one round. It requires paying ten grains of Celestial Mirror Sand as an entry fee, and the loser must hand over all their Celestial Mirror Sand to the winner." Guo Guo Jiufeng said slowly.

This kind of competition, their Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou hadn't participated in for many years, because they couldn't even scrape together the entry fee.

And honestly, even if they did gather ten grains of Celestial Mirror Sand, they wouldn't want to participate in this kind of competition, because it was too bloody, too brutal. Only those top prodigies brimming with ambition would have such boldness.

Li Luo sucked in a breath of cold air. What a bloody competition — winner takes all, loser ends up with nothing. The 'Sand Fighting Match' truly lived up to its name.

However, true top prodigies actually liked this kind of all-or-nothing fighting.

The path of cultivation was inherently a road of great contention.

Ordinary people would shrink back in fear, but ambitious prodigies needed this step.

But to participate in this Sand Fighting Match, one first needed to fill up on 'Celestial Mirror Sand' from the Outer Shenzhou, otherwise they couldn't even afford the entry fee.

"Vice Principal Guo Guo Jiufeng, do you have detailed intelligence on the other five great Outer Shenzhous?" Li Luo said.

Guo Guo Jiufeng nodded and said: "The other Shenzhous refer to our six great Outer Shenzhous as the Upper Three Provinces and the Lower Three Provinces."

"And the Thunder Fire Outer Shenzhou is the strongest of the Upper Three Provinces."

"They have already been the ultimate victors in the 'Outer Shenzhou Contention Crossing Zone' five times in a row, obtaining three layers of Celestial Mirror Sand."

"And this time, their lineup remains formidable, and among them, there are even Seven-Pillared Marquis-level powerhouses."

Li Luo's gaze sharpened. Seven-Pillared Marquis — such strength, even placed among the Inner Shenzhou Sacred Academies and Ancient Academies, would count as a seeded contender. He hadn't expected such figures to exist in the Outer Shenzhou as well.

"The Cangming Outer Shenzhou's strength is second only to the Thunder Fire Outer Shenzhou; they've always been the perennial runner-up."

"The Ten Thousand Wind Outer Shenzhou's strength ranks third."

"And our Eastern Region Outer Shenzhou, the White Spirit Outer Shenzhou, and the Polar Night Outer Shenzhou are collectively known as the Lower Three Provinces. Of course, we're slightly better off, barely counting as first among the Lower Three Provinces. Those two fellow sufferers take turns returning empty-handed from the Celestial Mirror Pagoda." Guo Guo Jiufeng laughed with some self-deprecation.

At the same time, he took out a dossier and handed it to Li Luo, saying: "Inside are some academy profiles from the other five great Outer Shenzhous, including those formidable vice principals. You can take a look when you have time."

"Also, in three days, the Celestial Mirror Pagoda will officially open. These next few days, just adjust your condition well."

Li Luo took it and nodded thoughtfully. Judging by this, the most troublesome strong enemy in this Outer Shenzhou Contention Crossing Zone would be that Thunder Fire Outer Shenzhou.

Li Luo assessed his own strength. He was a Peerless Second Pillared Marquis, but his own phase force was more abundant than that of an ordinary Peerless Second Pillared Marquis, because he possessed four phase palaces. Although the fourth phase palace was empty, it wasn't entirely without function — at the very least, this fourth phase palace could be used to store cultivated phase force. The only flaw was that, due to the lack of a phase attribute, this phase palace couldn't generate phase force on its own, and once consumed, it would take some time to refill.

But even so, when he was at peak condition, the abundance of his phase force was even comparable to that of a Six-Pillared Marquis-level powerhouse.

Combined with the 'Six-Phase Force' imbued with wisps of Origin Power produced by the Myriad Phase Wheel, if it came down to a contest of phase force, he wasn't afraid of those Six-Pillared Marquis powerhouses with deep foundations.

This was also the root reason why that Wang Xu hadn't gained any advantage against him earlier.

And beyond these personal phase forces, there were also some other methods.

Such as Marquis Arts, Marquis Treasures, Mi Fa, and the like.

This...

... was even more of Li Luo's forte.

Moreover, he also had a professional support.

Therefore, Li Luo felt that if he truly went all-out, revealed all his cards, and faced an ordinary Seven-Pillared Marquis powerhouse, it might not be entirely impossible to put up a fight.

Only, doing so might cause quite a stir. After all, a Second-Pillared Marquis fighting a Seven-Pillared Marquis, even in this Celestial Mirror Pagoda brimming with prodigies, would probably count as quite an eye-catching event.

His name would resound through every academy.

It was just a little too flashy.

But... I'm this outstanding, so being a little flashy is only natural, right?