Chapter 77: The Most Powerful Move
In the rest area for Purple Cloud High School.
Le Mulan had already reseated herself on Lian Tianji’s back.
She watched Bai Zhenzhen hurry over to the arena, explaining the usage rights to the referee with her phone, and commented, “Bai Zhenzhen can actually use Zhang Yu’s phone for purchases? Does she know his phone password and payment password?”
“Those two must be friends willing to die for each other.”
Watching Zhang Yu slowly walk back to the rest area, Le Mulan patted Lian Tianji’s head and said, “I remember you’re friends with this Zhang Yu, right?”
The moment Zhang Yu returned to the rest area, he downed all the alchemical enhancers he had bought before the match to restore his stamina, magic power, and energy.
Feeling the rapid recovery of his strength, he felt a little more at ease.
The organizers had provided a half-hour break before the final match, which Zhang Yu felt was enough to recover eighty or ninety percent of his stamina and magic power.
Bai Zhenzhen said from the side, “…Did you remember everything I just told you?”
Seeing Zhang Yu nod, she then continued, “Then that’s all. Rest well and prepare for the next battle.”
Not long after Bai Zhenzhen left, Zhang Yu felt his phone vibrate slightly. He opened it to see that Lian Tianji had recommended a friend to him.
“Le Mulan?”
Unsure why Le Mulan would want to add him, Zhang Yu simply chose to accept for the time being.
He then saw a message pop up directly from Le Mulan: Let’s meet. There’s something I want to discuss with you.
Zhang Yu went to a deserted corridor outside the competition grounds and saw Le Mulan already waiting there gracefully.
This top student from Purple Cloud High School was beautiful, with an icy temperament, and seemed to be the focus of everyone’s attention wherever she went, drawing the eyes of others.
Upon seeing Zhang Yu arrive, she said bluntly, “Two hundred thousand. I’ll buy your loss. How about it?”
Zhang Yu was slightly taken aback. “You want to buy the competition championship?”
Le Mulan said nonchalantly, “Wealth is power, and money is a part of strength. The Martial Arts Competition selects the strongest, so why can’t I use money to buy it?”
Zhang Yu stared at her and snorted. “You’re not confident you can beat me?”
Le Mulan shook her head. “I just think that fighting you might cost more than two hundred thousand. I find it a very good deal to spend this two hundred thousand for a guaranteed victory.”
Seeing Zhang Yu fall silent, Le Mulan added, “If two hundred thousand isn’t enough, then let’s make it four hundred thousand. But that’s my limit. I won’t agree if you try to raise the price any further.”
Zhang Yu swallowed. He had to admit that the four hundred thousand yuan Le Mulan was offering right now was more powerful than any move he had encountered in all his consecutive arena battles.
Four hundred thousand—what kind of cultivation technique could that buy? For how long could he lease a spiritual root? How much cultivation equipment could he purchase? And how much could he improve his talismans?
Zhang Yu even felt that if he had this four hundred thousand, the boost to his cultivation would far exceed the championship’s fifty-thousand-yuan prize and an expert-level cultivation technique.
After all, in Kunxu, as long as you had money, you had potential, you had aptitude, and you could advance by leaps and bounds on the Immortal Dao; even righteous gods had to serve people.
Zhang Yu opened his mouth and said, “Alright, transfer it directly to my card.”
Le Mulan spread her fingers, and a purple, jade-like Talisman Tome materialized in her palm.
“Sign a contract with me under the witness of a righteous god, and I’ll transfer the money to you immediately.”
Seeing Zhang Yu fall silent instead of agreeing, Le Mulan was surprised.
“You’re actually hesitating over four hundred thousand?”
She found it very strange.
“I heard from Lian Tianji that a few hundred yuan is enough to hire you as a security guard, right?”
“You poor people fight tooth and nail every day for a few hundred or a few thousand, so why are you hesitating now that four hundred thousand is right in front of you?”
“With your background, it’s impossible for you to get into one of the Ten Greats. Is winning the Martial Arts Competition really that important?”
There was not a trace of mockery in Le Mulan’s tone; she seemed genuinely, truly puzzled by Zhang Yu’s current behavior.
Shaking her head, she turned to leave.
“Since you can’t decide right away, I’ll be going. However, you can come get this four hundred thousand anytime before the finals begin. But this is the absolute maximum; I won’t raise the price again.”
Watching Le Mulan depart, Zhang Yu used his phone to ask Zhang Pianpian: Sis, if I don’t get first place in the Martial Arts Competition, only second, how much will it affect my chances of getting into one of the Ten Greats?
Zhang Pianpian: For the connections I found for you, the better your first-year results and the higher your competition ranking, the higher the chance of being selected. First place in the competition naturally has a better chance than second.
Zhang Yu understood. That meant if he took the four hundred thousand, it wasn’t as if he couldn’t get into the Ten Greats, but the probability would just be a little lower…
But just as the thought of agreeing to Le Mulan’s offer truly began to surface in his mind, that damn ritual started clamoring at him again.
I knew it.
You idiotic thing are really afraid I won’t get into the Ten Greats, aren’t you.
As he felt the four hundred thousand slip away, a heart-wrenching pain rose in Zhang Yu, a pain more intense than when he had traded blows with Lian Tianji or grappled with all his might against Song Hailong.
Is this the heartache of losing a huge sum of money?
Immediately, Zhang Yu activated the Heavenly Martial Heart-Tempering Art, severing all distracting thoughts.
At this moment, only one thought remained in his mind.
He was going to pin that rich girl Le Mulan to the ground in the arena and beat her senseless.
…
The final match began.
Le Mulan and Zhang Yu stepped onto the arena simultaneously.
The Martial Arts Competition had finally reached its last stage.
Streams of blue-white sword qi erupted from Le Mulan’s body in an overwhelming tide, slashing ferociously toward Zhang Yu.
Once Le Mulan’s Stardust Swordplay was unleashed, it was relentless and imposing, like a military formation that was difficult to break through.
Watching Zhang Yu dodge left and right under her sword qi, occasionally using his Formless Cloud-Astral Qi to block the strikes, Le Mulan felt as if she were watching a cornered rat.
“Are you trying to exhaust my magic power?” Le Mulan laughed. “Do you think you can?”
The next moment, as Le Mulan’s sword qi erupted, the magic power within her grew increasingly turbulent, like a surging river, powerful and unending. The force of her magic power had already surpassed that of every other contestant present.
At the same time, a female voice sounded from within her body.
“Welcome to the Purple Cloud Replaceable Inner Core system.”
“Remaining magic power balance: eight million.”
Le Mulan touched her lower abdomen, then looked at Zhang Yu before her.
“This replaceable inner core inside me… I’ve charged it with a total of eight million yuan worth of magic power.”
Simultaneously, a line of text appeared on her wrist, a number counting down from eight million.
Evidently, as she continuously unleashed her magic power and sword qi, the magic power charged into the inner core was constantly being consumed. But at a rate of only a thousand yuan per second, the full eight million was still a very long way from being depleted.
But this also meant that for every second Le Mulan fought, she was spending over a thousand yuan.
Le Mulan flicked her fingertips, and streams of sword qi shot toward Zhang Yu like a tempest. Forget getting close, he was being forced bit by bit toward the edge of the arena.
“And if you’re worried that my meridians can’t withstand this surging magic power, you don’t have to be.”
“My ‘Magic-Vein’ combat spiritual root has already protected all my meridians, allowing me to maintain a high magic power output indefinitely without fear of wear and tear.”
Meanwhile, watching Le Mulan’s extravagant display in the arena—a seemingly inexhaustible bombardment funded by eight million yuan worth of magic power—the audience grew excited.
This was far more impressive than Song Hailong’s ten-million-yuan insurance policy, because that ten million belonged to the insurance company, whereas the money Le Mulan was throwing around was her family’s own cold, hard cash.
One spectator looked at Le Mulan spending money like water and praised, “So beautiful. The way she spends money like it’s nothing is just so beautiful.”
Another spectator was filled with envy. “It must be so amazing to be rich, so blissful.”
A third spectator had an epiphany. “As expected, if you want to go far on the path of the Immortal Dao, you have to throw money at it. When I get home today, I’m going to squeeze my old man for every coin he’s got. I have to take another step forward on the Immortal Dao.”
Le Mulan frowned slightly at the noise from the audience.
She continued to fire off sword qi as she looked at Zhang Yu and said, “Did you hear that? Although they’re a bit noisy, they’re not wrong. Money is the foundation of cultivation.”
“As a poor person, if you had earned that four hundred thousand today, you could have gotten a tiny bit closer to me.”
“It’s a pity you actively gave up this chance to become stronger.”
She looked in Zhang Yu’s direction and asked with a sincere expression, “I’m very curious. You’re clearly so poor, yet you’re unwilling to make money. Why is that?”
It seemed that after saying so much, all Le Mulan wanted was an answer to this question that piqued her curiosity.
Zhang Yu looked at her sincere inquiry and suddenly felt the urge to laugh out of anger.
So the rich young lady is here to observe the life of a poor wretch, is that it?
He snorted coldly. “You set the price at four hundred thousand because you thought that’s the most it would take to beat me?”
Le Mulan nodded. “Correct. I calculated that your defeat is worth at most four hundred thousand. Spending even a fraction more would be a waste.”
At the same time, under the constant bombardment of sword qi, a crack finally appeared in the Formless Cloud-Astral Qi, and a sword slash cut across Zhang Yu’s palm.
Zhang Yu said flatly, “Then what if you add in the blood of this poor wretch?”
Blood dripped into the astral qi, dyeing the Formless Cloud-Astral Qi with wisps of crimson.
But faced with the wound on his hand, Zhang Yu showed no panic at all. Instead, as if he had been prepared, he violently flung his blood-covered hand toward Le Mulan’s position.
Le Mulan, who had remained motionless from start to finish, always forcing her opponents back with sword qi, now actually shifted her feet slightly, deliberately dodging the splattering blood.
With Le Mulan’s dodge, a clear flaw immediately appeared in her Stardust Swordplay.
Zhang Yu shot forward like a bolt of lightning, intending to break through the layers of sword qi and get close to Le Mulan.
At the same time, Bai Zhenzhen’s words flashed through Zhang Yu’s mind.
…
“This Le Mulan’s first flaw is that she… seems to have an obsession with cleanliness.”
“I suggest you spit directly at her, preferably phlegm. Not only will she dodge, but I bet she won’t even be willing to use her sword qi to block it.”