Once again, these two same people faced each other. Once again, Yan Yiming lost. Once again, it was a crushing defeat.
And once again,
The difference was that this time, Yan Yiming had used his family's supreme martial art, and his fighting mindset had shifted from his previous underestimation of his opponent to giving it everything he had.
Yet the one who fell was still Yan Yiming.
And it was still within the agreed-upon three moves.
This meant that even with Yan Yiming going all out, he still couldn't withstand Jiang Chen's three strikes.
Of course, Yan Yiming was not so lucky this time. During their previous spar, Jiang Chen had shown some restraint and hadn't truly activated his true qi. This time, however, Yan Yiming's repeated provocations had crossed Jiang Chen's bottom line. So what he tasted was a finger backed by at least seventy percent of Jiang Chen's power.
After taking that strike, Yan Yiming would be lucky to get out of bed in three to five months.
"What's the saying again? A full bottle doesn't slosh, but a half-empty bucket loves to splash around. I suppose that's exactly the kind of person you are."
Jiang Chen didn't even spare a glance at Yan Yiming's condition. In the Royal Capital, brawls between heirs of the noble houses were extremely common. Besides, the Hidden Dragon Tournament was explicitly designed to encourage competition among the heirs.
Watching Yan Yiming lying on the ground, unable to get up, several noble heirs who had previously been on bad terms with Jiang Chen unconsciously retreated a few steps back into the crowd.
They were terrified that Jiang Chen might spot them and throw out a challenge—and they didn't even possess Yan Yiming's level of strength.
By now, no one could possibly still believe Jiang Chen was only at the three-meridian true qi level.
That finger strike just now—only a fool would think Jiang Chen had achieved it with the "initial true qi" of the three-meridian stage.
Could a mere initial True Qi Realm cultivator produce injuries like those on Yan Yiming?
Defeating someone as insignificant as Yan Yiming was hardly a cause for celebration in Jiang Chen's eyes. After all, his current cultivation had already reached the peak of the five-meridian true qi stage. With all the advantages he possessed, defeating a six-meridian Yan Yiming was only to be expected.
If he had to struggle against a mere six-meridian Yan Yiming, then all the advantages of his previous life would be nothing but a joke.
As for
What was the most important thing for a servant? To feel at ease, to walk with your back straight no matter where you went!
And today, Jiang Zheng's back was very straight indeed.
"Steward, my young master wishes to register for the three basic assessments," Jiang Zheng announced, his voice considerably louder than usual.
In the past, coming to take the three basic assessments at this point would have been utterly humiliating—Jiang Zheng wouldn't have been able to even bring himself to say it. But after Jiang Chen's utter annihilation of Yan Yiming, the situation was clearly very different. Could someone powerful enough to crush Yan Yiming possibly fail all three basic assessments?
Why hadn't he passed before? Because our young master was simply too busy to bother showing up!
As for the deadline for completing the three basic assessments—aside from Jiang Chen, there was no one else who hadn't finished them yet.
As far as procedure went, no one dared to give Jiang Chen any trouble.
Very quickly, Jiang Chen arrived at the examination hall for the first assessment.
In the center of the room sat a large circular disc with twelve holes. In each hole stood a white jade pillar.
These were the True Qi Pillars, used to measure one's true qi.
No one could cheat in this portion of the assessment. The number of meridians a challenger possessed was the number of white jade pillars they could illuminate.
You could hold back your strength, but you absolutely could not inflate it.
In other words, if you possessed ten-meridian true qi, you could choose to display only eight, or even just four. But if you only had four meridians of true qi, there was no way to produce a fifth.
So this was a test that cheating made utterly impossible.
"No wonder the previous Jiang Chen couldn't pass this test. With his original three meridians of true qi, how could he ever have gotten through?"
Jiang Chen shook his head slightly and stepped forward. He placed his palm into the slot, and at his command, the five meridians of true qi within his body surged to their limit.
The disc emitted a rapid series of clicking sounds as it began to rotate.
One by one, the white jade pillars atop it lit up.
One, two, three, four, five…
When the pillars stopped at five, the surrounding crowd reacted in various ways—some felt relieved, while others showed a trace of disappointment.
All manner of reactions, but Jiang Chen paid them no mind. In this portion, he had held nothing back.
"Hmm, look at that. Although only five pillars are lit, the brightness…"
As soon as someone pointed it out, others immediately took notice.