The audience of the sparring ring had dispersed. Though there were some who wanted to recruit Dusksnow Morningstar, they quickly dismissed the idea when they considered his background. In their eyes, the booth that he’d entered was very likely occupied by someone from the Starspace King’s faction.
Additionally, his failure to make kinghood after such a colossal battle slightly disappointed more than a few.
“Should we go take a look at some of the other rings?” Lu Yun smiled at the little fox after they left their booth.
“Yes, we need to!” she responded adamantly while staring at an image projection.
“Hmm?” Tipped off by her expression, Lu Yun followed her gaze to the fighting ring that she was focused on.
It was one for slaves and there was weedy figure inside drenched with blood. As they watched, he barely managed to take down his opponent. Though covered in injuries and almost half of his body torn apart, he stood solidly within the center of the ring.
Pale gold energy rippled over his body and brushed off the blood. He was an inferior, but somehow seemed to tower like a mountain with the force of his resolution.
Cultivators howled and yelled in the audience stands around him, venting their overabundance of energy.
Lu Yun’s face darkened ominously.
“What is he doing here, and why is he a fighter in the slave rings?!” He shook with fury.
Jin Gushen!
The inferior realm slave inside the ring was Lu Yun’s old acquaintance from the chaos!
Lu Yun hadn’t made many friends in the second realm; Jin Gushen was one of the few apart from the Six Royals and had gone missing after the fall of the metal elemental sacred land. Since everyone had their own path to walk, Lu Yun hadn’t intentionally set out to locate his friend.
To think that he’d end up in the Hongmeng!
He certainly wasn’t a slave fighter of his own volition. Someone must’ve kidnapped him here.
“We’re going to take a look!” Lu Yun took a deep breath and forcefully shoved his anger down.
“Someone you know?” Dusksnow Morningstar took a look at Lu Yun’s face and continued hesitantly, “You better not cause any trouble in the Colosseum. Starspace Region has a certain degree of influence here, I’ll find a way to save your guy!”
Instead of responding, Lu Yun set out for the relevant fighting ring.
“Excuse me, sirs, it’s a hundred premium crystals for the entrance fee.” The guard at the entrance quickly blocked them when he saw new faces barge in. “Since there’s six of you, it’s six hundred premium crystals!”
Six hundred crystals was absolutely nothing compared to the hundred million of earlier, but it was still no negligible sum. Regular superior realm cultivators wouldn’t be able to afford it.
Lu Yun couldn’t be bothered with words and flung a thousand crystals at the guard, who bowed and scraped and let them in.
The atmosphere here was starkly different from the previous sparring ring. Here was found paradise for wealthy good-for-nothings and upstarts flush with new money. A constant din of hoots and hollers added to the unceasing, sordid cacophony.
“This is Jin God’s forty-ninth consecutive win!” A strapping young man stood to the side of the ring and roared into a sound amplification treasure, “He’ll reach an unprecedented fifty wins if he wins his next one!
“Folks!” His beguiling voice was filled with persuasion. “The Colosseum will not permit inferior creatures such as this animal to make history! We will award one million premium crystals to anyone whose slave defeats Jin God!!”
The scene erupted in another uproar at his words. Countless dandies and hooligans agitated for their slaves to set foot in the ring and prevent this “Jin God” from taking home fifty consecutive wins.
On the ground, Jin Gushen lowered his head and clenched his fists tight, humiliation surfacing in his eyes. He could only submit to fate in this terrifying third realm. He didn’t even have the right to rebel. Death? That would be a luxury for him.
He’d never thought that the true form of the third realm so ardently yearned for by everyone in the chaos would be like this. It was the hell of legend!
“Of course!” the young man bawled out again. “You are free to place your bets as well. Bet on whether or not Jin God will be the first person in history to hit fifty wins in a row! If Jin God can achieve a hundred consecutive wins, the Colosseum will reward him with freedom!
“Ladies and gentlemen, let me clue you in on something. Jin God is very likely from the chaos, so his cultivation and strength system is vastly different from ours!”
“What?! Did you say he comes from the chaos?” Jaws dropped with shock.
“Aw come on, what chaos? That’s just something cooked up by the Colosseum! How many slaves have they said comes from this or that, but it all turned out to be fake as shit in the end?”
“That’s right! The daos of the Hongmeng are damned plentiful in their multitude. It’s no big deal that someone’s cultivation and strength system is different from everyone else’s,” sneered another voice.
“Ahem!” An awkward expression crossed the young man’s face. “Alright then! In conclusion, whoever can stop Jin God from achieving fifty wins in a row will win a million premium crystals!
“The betting will commence at one to a thousand odds! Ladies and gentlemen, you are welcome to bet on Jin God winning his next fight! If he does, the Colosseum will pay out at a thousand times your wager!
“Naturally, everyone is welcome to collude and purposefully lose to Jin God…”
“None of that bullshit! Are we here for that pathetic sum of purple crystals?” Brays of laughter echoed from the ceiling rafters. “If we really wanted to gamble, we’d go to Elysium Atelier! Let’s go let’s go let’s go! I’m going to take that million crystals from the Colosseum today!”
“Haha, Brother Chuan is right! None of our highly pedigreed slaves have won the honor of fifty consecutive wins. Are we going to let this baseborn mutt set that precedent?” Parts of the crowd shoved and jostled to determine whose slave would participate in the important fight, and even more shouted about the bet.
Just as these wealthy young masters and ne’er-do-wells had said, fighting slaves was a matter of pride and face. Colluding for the sake of a few purple crystals was pathetic. Anyone who could put down roots in Multitude City lacked not for money, least of all those who could enjoy themselves at a place like the Colosseum.
“I say, Overseer Xiao! You’re only taking bets on whether or not that Jin God will win. Are you too chicken to take bets on if he loses?” hooted someone from the crowd.
“Hahaha! Since it is the public desire, then the Colosseum will also take the bet. The odds are one to a hundred if Jin God loses!”
“Damn straight!”
“I’m betting on him losing and getting torn to pieces!”
“That’s more like it! I’ll double dip by winning the bounty and the bet!”
……
Absolute disorder engulfed the audience stands as cultivators screamed and gestured at each other, pushing their fighters forward to challenge Jin God and win the prize. Of course, there were also many who bet that Jin God would win.
The Colosseum wasn’t a gambling den and the main source of their income wasn’t through gambling. These bets were just a sideshow to whet the appetites of the idle scions and rich layabouts, to keep them so engrossed that they wouldn’t be able to extract themselves from the pleasures here.
What did a few purple crystals matter when compared to that?
“Skyfall, conceal your cultivation and take my crystal mountain into the ring. Give my mountain to Jin Gushen so he can win a hundred times,” Lu Yun snapped out.
“Understood!” The Skyfall King nodded and bounded into the fighting ring before anyone had a chance to react.
“Hey! Who the heck are you and why did you suddenly jump in?!” Everyone froze when the Skyfall King suddenly appeared in the ring.
They were still argu—discussing whose slave could challenge Jin Gushen, but someone had circumvented all of them just like that!
This wasn’t how things were done.
If I did a good job in this chapter, your internal voice should be very tired after listening to all of them.
