"Beidou really moves fast. It's only been a few days and they've already recruited this many students." Zhao Ruoxi showed no surprise at the hundreds of students filing in. Noticing Shi Feng staring at them with a questioning look, she explained, "These students were handpicked by Beidou from the city's participants in the provincial youth martial arts competition. The main goal is for the city to claim better rankings at the provincial event, so Beidou specifically brought them here for training. After all, the facilities here are top-notch and perfect for helping them improve."
Shi Feng's expression cleared with sudden understanding.
This timing did indeed coincide with the provincial youth martial arts competition getting underway. What he hadn't expected was for Beidou to be this generous.
"In truth, Beidou doesn't have much of a choice," Zhao Ruoxi continued. "The sudden emergence of Divine Realm has had a massive impact on every industry, especially martial arts. A lot of people who used to follow combat sports have shifted their attention to Divine Realm now, and the whole scene has gone a bit dead. Fewer people are coming in to train. To stop the decline, Beidou had no option but to do this—make the martial arts competition more exciting and use that to win back some of the crowd."
"Fewer people are actually coming to train?" Shi Feng's mind suddenly sparked with an idea for boosting Zero Wing's strength.
In his previous life, the impact of Divine Realm had indeed dealt a serious blow to the fitness industry, though it hadn't hit this fast. The downturn had come three or four months after Divine Realm launched. But as more people began uncovering the game's secrets, physical training had surged back to life—surpassing even its peak. Business had been through the roof. Many of the major guilds had partnered with training halls and gyms so their elite members could work out and improve their physical condition at any time, allowing them to level up faster in the game.
Some first-rate guilds had even built their own large-scale training facilities, reserved exclusively for their elite members.
Zero Wing was still small now, but as the guild grew stronger, it would eventually need a dedicated place for physical training. The Zero Wing studio was close to Beidou, true, but that wasn't a sustainable long-term solution. With the fitness industry in a slump, now was the perfect time to act.
With that thought, Shi Feng decided that partnering with Beidou right now would be ideal.
Building a training hall on his own would cost a fortune—more money than he had. Rather than trying to go it alone, partnering with the local Beidou center would let all his guild members start training and improving ahead of schedule, without spending nearly as much money, while still getting access to the best training environment available.
While Shi Feng was contemplating how to approach Beidou for a partnership, a small group of people walked into the testing hall.
The moment they entered, the Beidou staff straightened with visible respect and hurried over to greet them.
"Manager Xiao, the selected students are all here. We've already followed your instructions and started the testing," a Beidou staff member said respectfully to a broad-shouldered, powerfully built middle-aged man dressed in a black martial arts robe.
"Good. Let them continue. I only came to observe how they're doing. This provincial youth martial arts competition is tied directly to Beidou's development. We can't afford to be careless," the middle-aged man surnamed Xiao nodded, ordering his subordinates to carry on.
"Yes, sir." The staff members promptly withdrew and resumed guiding the students through the tests.
Thanks to Manager Xiao's presence, the students' fighting spirits burned even brighter. Every one of them wanted to perform their best and earn more of Manager Xiao's attention—in hopes of securing better training resources down the road.
As the testing began, quite a few Beidou members who had come for their own workouts stopped what they were doing to watch from the sidelines. This sort of thing was rarely seen in everyday life. Usually it was just ordinary people who trained casually, coming in for a quick assessment. These were students, sure, but anyone who'd qualified for the provincial youth martial arts competition had to have real skill—definitely far above the average person.
Even Zhao Ruoxi looked quite interested and insisted on going over to watch. Shi Feng had no choice but to follow along.
The first test was punching force. An average person's punch landed between 100 and 150 kilograms.
Every single one of these students exceeded 200 kilograms. One student named Wang Cheng hit an astonishing 356 kilograms—more than double what an average person could manage. The watching crowd in the hall erupted with exclamations.
Even Manager Xiao's eyes lit up at the sight, and he praised Wang Cheng as a true talent.