I didn't dare to be negligent and used my Dao energy to sense it. I could tell that the scarlet talisman was only at the early stage of Glorious Knowledge, close to the middle stage. From its power, it was about the same level as the few Daoists from Dragon Tiger Mountain that Ye Pianpian and I had fought against.
With my current power, I could block this attack by myself if I used the dark green energy and the Golden Light Divine Incantation.
However, after thinking about it, I gave up on this idea.
It was obvious that the Metaphysical aristocratic families had put in a lot of effort in this competition. Even though I was confident that I would be the final victor, the process wouldn't be easy. I had to hide my true power as much as I could. I definitely couldn't let the people below the stage see through my true power.
Of course, this was also related to the fact that the three scarlet talismans in my hands weren't very valuable and were the most common scarlet talismans. If they were rare talismans with special effects, I naturally wouldn't waste them.
Returning to the main topic, when Chen Yadong used the scarlet talisman to form a huge ball of fire, I quickly took out the Merit Summoning Talisman that was distributed by the Metaphysics Society. I rubbed my hand and quickly guided my Dao energy into it.
The scarlet talisman instantly turned into ashes, leaving behind a white ball of light. It left my palm and floated in front of me. It quickly grew in size, forming a man in a red robe, white pants, and boots. He held an axe in his hand and a long sword hung at his waist. A wooden plate hung around his neck with the words' Straight Sun 'written on it. He was the Merit Summoning Day of the four Merit Summoning Day.
Merit Summoning Day was the name of a minor official. It was the same in the human world and the Heavenly Court. After a Fengshui Master reached the Glorious Knowledge realm, he would have the power of the stars and could communicate with the gods. Using the talismans, he could invite the gods to descend to the human world to assist him in battle.
Of course, the star power of the Glorious Knowledge realm was low, so he could only command the minor gods, such as the Merit Summoning Day, the Guardian Temple, the Six Ding Liujia, and the Five Revealing Truths.
The Guardian Temple and the Five Revealing Truths were the gods of Buddhism. It was the monks' method to command them. In terms of Daoism and Metaphysics, the most common were the Merit Summoning Day and the Six Ding Liujia.
Fourth-duty merit officials are divided into four positions: day duty, month duty, year duty, and time duty. Their abilities are the lowest, and the most commonly seen one is the day duty merit official that I summoned this time.
Don't look at how he stood there with a hatchet in his hand and a longsword at his waist, looking majestic and awe-inspiring. In reality, this was all to scare people. In reality, the merit supervisor on duty had two roles. The first was to serve as an errand boy for the mighty figures of the Heavenly Master Realm to make talismans for the heavens to hear.
Secondly, when he was summoned in a battle at the Glory of Consciousness realm, he would act as a meat shield. He would stand there, not speaking or moving, only taking hits without attacking. He would absorb the opponent's firepower until his spiritual body was scattered, and then he would return.
"Naturally, the one I summoned didn't show any abnormalities. It just stood there obediently, allowing the ball of fire to descend upon its body. After being roasted, the ball of fire and the Merit Officer on duty disappeared at the same time. The two scarlet talismans canceled out their effects.
After that, Chen Yadong was also very straightforward. He knew that he wasn't my opponent in terms of strength and external items, so he directly admitted defeat and left the stage.
I won the first round easily.
After President Gu personally went on stage to announce the results, I went to rest.
Afterwards, the other eight great metaphysical families, as well as the Metaphysics Association's Li Encheng and Zou Yu, took turns to fight. Besides Li Encheng and Zou Yu's two battles that were a little anxious, the other three battles all ended cleanly.
After the first round, there weren't any dark horses. On the side of the metaphysical families, the victors were Han Wennan, Lu Zhenyang, Zhang Kunlun, and Xu Kun from the Xu family of Jin Ling, whom I hadn't seen at the Young Phoenix Gathering.
On the side of the Metaphysics Association, Li Encheng and I won. Zou Yu, who had the same talent as Zhang Wenfei, was unlucky and met Lu Zhenyang.
Lu Zhenyang was much calmer than before. He knew to hide his strength during the battle, so he didn't use much of his Dao Qi. He only used scarlet talismans one after another. Zou Yu, who only had the two merit calling talismans given by the Metaphysics Association, was powerless to resist, and was forcefully thrown off the platform.
It was already noon. After everyone had rested, Ye Pianpian drove me and the fatty back to the small courtyard. In the afternoon, the ranking of the six people who were defeated would be decided. It had nothing to do with me, so there was no need to waste time there.
The night passed uneventfully. On the morning of the second day, I rushed to the Metaphysics Association. The rankings of the six people who were defeated yesterday had already been decided. I glanced at the rankings and didn't care about the others. I only noticed that Zou Yu from the Metaphysics Association was ranked last.
In terms of strength, Zou Yu was carefully selected by the Metaphysics Association. His strength wasn't any weaker than the others. It was a pity that the Metaphysics Association only gave him two scarlet talismans, and he also met Lu Zhenyang yesterday.
Even though the current Lu Zhenyang's way of doing things had become much steadier, his ruthless nature hadn't changed in the slightest. In the battle yesterday morning, he'd successively used numerous scarlet talismans to force Zou Yu off the arena, and at the same time, he'd heavily injured Zou Yu. This had caused Zou Yu to suffer a crushing defeat in the afternoon battle.
Everyone from the Metaphysics Association had ugly expressions on their faces. Yang Shilong purposely came to look for me and Li Encheng. He said that Zou Yu had failed to live up to his expectations and that the Metaphysics Association's hopes for the Blazing Stones were now on me and Li Encheng. He wanted us to do our best and not be careless.
His words made me pout. Zou Yu had an eight meridian talent. In terms of strength, even though he wasn't as strong as Lu Zhenyang, he wasn't much weaker than the others. He shouldn't have lost so badly. It was a pity that the Metaphysics Association only gave him two merit talismans. It was fine if he couldn't stop Lu Zhenyang, but he couldn't even protect himself in the end.
Yang Shilong's' failure to live up to expectations' was unfair.
Of course, I only cursed in my heart and didn't communicate with Yang Shilong at all.
In this competition, the Metaphysics Association and I were just using each other. I was only interested in the first place, the twelve Blazing Stones. I wasn't the least bit interested in the Metaphysics Association's glory.
After Yang Shilong finished his long-winded speech, he took out two more scarlet talismans and passed them to me and Li Encheng respectively. "Yesterday's battle was very intense. The Metaphysics Association underestimated the difficulty of the competition, so the talismans they gave you were a little shabby. These two talismans were made by me and I'm giving them to the two of you privately. I hope that you can use them today."
I lowered my head to sense. The grade of the scarlet talisman that was made by the Glorious Consciousness realm wasn't high. I could easily sense the type of talisman.
The two scarlet talismans were Earth Terminating Talismans. It was one of the strongest defensive talismans among the scarlet talismans. Depending on the abilities of the person who made the talisman, it could summon three to nine rays of Earth Terminating Qi to protect the body.
This surprised me, and my opinion of Yang Shilong changed a lot.
Even though the Metaphysics Association had given me three scarlet talismans, their total value couldn't be compared to the Earth Terminating Talisman.
Moreover, even though the scarlet talisman wasn't much, in actual fact, the materials needed to make the scarlet talisman were astronomical. The Earth Terminating Talisman was a powerful talisman that could only be made in the later stages of the Glorious Consciousness realm, so its value wasn't low. Yang Shilong actually took out two of them under his own name. His attitude was much better than what the Metaphysics Association had done previously.
What was more precious was that the competition concerned the benefits of the participants and the Metaphysics Association. It had nothing to do with Yang Shilong's benefits.
From this point alone, it could be seen that Yang Shilong, as the vice-chairman of the Metaphysics Association, definitely wasn't doing nothing. He was wholeheartedly working for the Metaphysics Association's benefits.
I had known Yang Shilong for quite some time and always felt that he was a peacemaker. During the Young Phoenix Gathering, when I was being suppressed by Lu Zhenyang, he didn't speak up for me at all. He had always been trying to smooth things over, so I didn't have a good impression of him.
After this incident, my impression of him had changed a lot.
Now that I thought about it, even though we knew each other, we didn't have much of a relationship. During the Young Phoenix Gathering, it was already kind of him not to help Lu Zhenyang deal with me. I really couldn't ask for more.
After putting away the Earth Terminating Talisman, Li Encheng and I thanked Yang Shilong. Then, we followed the director of the Metaphysics Association to the venue from yesterday.
We had arrived a little early today, so the people from the Metaphysics Aristocratic Family and the Metaphysics Association hadn't arrived yet. However, the six participants of the competition had all arrived.
After the Young Phoenix Gathering, Han Wennan and Zhang Kunlun were considered old acquaintances of mine. After seeing me enter, the two of them came over to greet me.
Zhang Kunlun was a little fatty. He had a cheerful smile on his face, but his words were still a little distant from me.
Han Wennan and I might have gotten to know each other through a fight. Even though his face was cold, his words were much more intimate.
It was a pity that this fellow was a cultivation maniac. When he spoke, his words were always about cultivation and realms. As he spoke, he also strongly expressed his desire to exchange pointers with me again.
From what he said, he seemed to have made some progress in the past year. He felt that his strength wasn't any weaker than mine.
In the end, I made an agreement with Han Wennan. If the two of us met in the competition, we wouldn't use any talismans and would only use our cultivation to fight.
Han Wennan was from the Han family of Qinling Mountains. He was probably too rich and overbearing, so he didn't care about obsidian stones. I couldn't be so free and unrestrained. The reason why I agreed was because I was certain that I was invincible among those who had reached the pinnacle of the acupoint pressing realm.
As for Zhang Kunlun, he shook his head without hesitation in the face of Han Wennan's invitation. He said that his family had given him an important task. If he didn't get a good ranking, he wouldn't be able to explain himself. He smiled and refused Han Wennan's suggestion.
While we were chatting, Lu Zhenyang stood not far away. He coldly pursed his lips and looked at us with a sinister expression.
Han Wennan didn't pay attention to him. I didn't know what Zhang Kunlun was thinking. He specially reminded me, "I'm afraid that the person from the Lu family has some ulterior motives. If Brother Zhou were to meet him, you should be more careful … I heard that Brother Zhou comes from a poor family. Even though you are representing the Metaphysics Association, you and I both know that the Metaphysics Association won't provide much support.
If Brother Zhou needs it, I have two silver talismans here. I can lend them to Brother Zhou to use. It won't be too late to return them when Brother Zhou advances to become a Heavenly Master. "
His words stunned me. I almost thought that I had heard wrongly.