Chapter 503: Exposing a Bit of Strength

As he walked down from the Battle Platform, Cheng Feng lowered his head to look at his right shoulder; the mark left by the spear tip was no larger than a needle prick.

If not for the hole torn in the clothing on his shoulder, one could hardly tell he had just been struck head-on by Zhou Tieyi's heavy spear.

Huo Luan was not so presentable.

The knife wound on her side was a full four fingers long, blood had soaked through half her robe, and she walked with a slight limp, yet she stubbornly refused to let anyone help her.

Liu Yu had taken a blow from the back of a blade on his left arm, and his forearm was swollen high; he held his Narrow Saber in his right hand, and while little pain was visible on his face, the beads of sweat rolling down his temples betrayed him.

Gu Niangzi was in the worst shape; after the blade smashed into her shoulder, she could not lift half her arm and had to support it with her other hand while walking.

Cheng Feng wanted to help her, but Gu Niangzi waved her hand and gritted her teeth, saying, "I can walk myself. Go look after Huo Luan; her bleeding hasn't stopped yet."

The group walked to a quiet corridor behind the waiting area before stopping to bandage their wounds.

Cheng Feng rummaged through his cloth bag for medicine and clean strips of cloth, clearing the wound on Huo Luan's waist; when he sprinkled the medicinal powder on,

Huo Luan hissed and cursed with an incredibly foul string of profanity.

"Be gentle! Are you sprinkling salt?"

"It's medicine," Cheng Feng said. "More effective than salt."

Liu Yu splinted his own arm with deft movements.

Gu Niangzi fished a small, dark green insect out of a box and placed it on the wound on her shoulder.

The insect latched onto the flesh, its abdomen pulsing as it sucked the blood from the wound, and within moments, it had swollen into a round ball.

Wang Ji stood a few paces away, silent, watching them quietly; her gaze shifted from one face to the next, finally resting on Cheng Feng.

Cheng Feng felt somewhat uncomfortable under that gaze.

"If you have something to say, say it," he said.

"Nothing to say." Wang Ji withdrew her gaze and walked over to sit by a corridor pillar. "Just found it interesting."

"What's interesting?"

"You don't even have a decent scratch on you." Wang Ji's tone was flat, revealing neither joy nor anger. "Liu Yu took a blade, Huo Luan's waist is nearly down to the bone, and I fear Gu Niangzi's shoulder blade is cracked.

That spear of Zhou Tieyi's struck you head-on.

Everyone else nearly lost their lives, yet you, on the other hand, look like you could fight another round right now."

As soon as these words were spoken, the corridor fell suddenly silent for a moment.

Huo Luan was biting down on a cloth strip to tie her bandage; hearing this, she froze, lifted her blood-smeared face to look at Wang Ji, then turned to look at Cheng Feng.

Liu Yu also raised his eyelids, expressionless, though his gaze lingered on Cheng Feng's shoulder for a moment.

Gu Niangzi kept her head down, her hand still pressing on the insect on her shoulder, and said nothing.

Cheng Feng squatted where he was, his hands still stained with Huo Luan's blood.

He was silent for a short while, then said slowly, "My Horizontal Training is my greatest asset. If I couldn't even withstand this much injury, I wouldn't have reached this point."

"I know," Wang Ji nodded. "I'm not saying you're wrong. But you should realize that what you revealed in tonight's match will be remembered by many.

The fact that you have no injuries is, to them, even more glaring than Zhou Tieyi admitting defeat."

Cheng Feng did not respond. He understood what Wang Ji meant.

In this match, he had indeed fought too "intact."

Huo Luan and Liu Yu had fought for their lives in the front, Gu Niangzi had used her vital blood to fuel her insects, and he himself had charged in at the end to face three opponents alone, knocking them off the Battle Platform, yet he had emerged almost unscathed.

To those with ulterior motives, this scene was equivalent to branding the words "Horizontal Training body" onto his forehead.

In Wang Ji's words, regardless of whether he was an Immortal Seed or not, his body was far too conspicuous among ordinary Martial Artists.

"Exposed is exposed." Huo Luan tied a knot in her bandage and grinned. "I think there's an advantage to you being tough.

The way Zhou Tieyi looked at you afterward was like he was looking at a monster.

One of the old soldiers he brought was kicked to his knees by you and never got back up.

If you go out and ask now, among those gamblers under the West Three Array Platform, who would dare not bet on you?"

"If I break your leg, let's see if you can still talk so much," Gu Niangzi shot her a glare.

Liu Yu put down his Narrow Saber and said in a deep voice, "Wang Ji is right. Once your strength is exposed, the next match will be hard to fight. Your opponents will target you. No matter how hard your Horizontal Training is, it isn't without its counters. I know at least three."

Cheng Feng looked at him: "Which three?"

"Heavy armor and blunt weapons are the most reliable way to break Horizontal Training. Then there are tendon-slicing blades. And the third is the suppression of an Immortal Seed itself," Liu Yu said, word by word.

"Zhou Tieyi didn't bring a blunt weapon, and tendon-slicing blades are contraband and not allowed on the platform, but an Immortal Seed—you might not be so lucky next time. Whether it's control or lethality, if you become the primary target, then..."

Cheng Feng looked down at the back of his right hand; the dried blood still congealed there was his own, and Huo Luan's as well.

He slowly clenched his fist and relaxed it, then said after a moment, "If I really run into an Immortal Seed, I won't just sit and wait for death."

"No one is asking you to sit and wait for death." Wang Ji stood up, walked before him, and softened her tone for once. "It's just that the upcoming draws will likely be more brutal with every match.

No matter how tough your body is, you can't carry everyone alone. Huo Luan, Gu Niangzi, and Liu Yu should go find a doctor tonight.

Get the rest you need; don't push yourselves. There is no match tomorrow, but the day after is the Top Ten.

During this time, none of you are allowed to go out and stir up trouble."

After she finished, she looked at Cheng Feng: "You are the only one who wasn't injured. You are on night watch."

Cheng Feng nodded: "Understood."

That night, Cheng Feng didn't sleep much.

He moved a chair to sit in the corridor of the Lan Yuan front hall, a thick robe draped over his legs.

The moonlight in the courtyard was cold and clear, illuminating the bluestone ground until it looked stark white.

The lights were still on in Huo Luan and Liu Yu's rooms, with occasional whispers drifting out.

Cheng Feng could hear Huo Luan suppressing her voice as she cried out in pain, and he could hear Gu Niangzi's insect buzzing inside its box.

He pulled up his Panmian and took a look. Dragon Snake Nine Transformations, First Transformation (612/800).

He was a little closer to the second transformation.

In today's fierce battle, under the enhancement of the Snake Coil Seal, the Dragon Snake Nine Transformations was pushed to its absolute limit, and its proficiency increased even faster than during daily cultivation.

Coupled with the assistance of the Snake Coil Seal, if he were to cultivate diligently for two hours tonight, he might be able to raise it to six hundred fifty or sixty.

The current Cheng Feng is no longer the Cheng Feng with low talent from before.

He could also choose not to use the Panmian and rely on his own perseverance to cultivate the Martial Dao.

Yet he did not cultivate. It was not that he did not want to, but that he dared not.

He had revealed too much today; if he were to force a breakthrough tonight, the fluctuations in his Qi would be too great, and it would be hard to avoid being detected by those with ulterior motives outside Lan Yuan.

Tianqi City is not a quiet place, even at night.

It is still better to have beauties; if two more with special constitutions were to come along...

Cheng Feng felt he could fly~

Cheng Feng took the Snake Coil Seal out from his bosom and covered it with his palm.

The body of the seal remained slightly cool, but it was no longer restless like it was last night.

He tucked it back into his bosom and exhaled a breath of white mist.

While keeping watch in the second half of the night, he heard the door to Wang Ji's room creak.

Looking up, he saw Wang Ji walk out draped in an outer robe, carrying a small lamp in her hand. She walked to the veranda, sat down beside Cheng Feng, and without a word, simply placed the lamp between them.

The two sat like this for a while. Cheng Feng spoke first: "Your identity is effectively laid out in the open."

"An Immortal Seed cannot easily make a move, so you can only let outsiders lead the charge."

"In today's battle, you stood at the center of the formation watching us get hurt; you didn't feel good about it either, did you?"

Wang Ji turned her head, the firelight casting the shadows of her eyelashes onto her cheeks like two tiny fans.

She did not answer, only asking one question: "Cheng Feng, how much longer do you think you can hide?"

"I can't hide it," Cheng Feng said in a low voice. "Then I won't hide. Whoever wants to step on me to climb higher will have to see if they have the life for it."

Wang Ji smiled and said nothing more. The lamplight flickered in the night breeze, pulling their shadows together on the ground like two snakes traveling side by side.