“Very good. Fantastic! Hahahaha!”
Le Tian abruptly began to laugh aloud. His mask-like face of smiles seemed to spring alive all of a sudden.

  However, it silenced everyone present, afraid that Li Qingshan’s reply had infuriated him.

  Li Qingshan took in all of this and felt slightly sad about them. The laughter of the superior could lead to the fear of the inferior. However, Le Tian did not seem to possess any hostility. Instead, he only stared at him with a certain gaze that left him disgusted, like a human gazing at an interesting animal that could bring him benefits.

  Under the watch of the three-legged golden toad’s cold, merciless, and bulging eyes that resembled golden balls, he bowed towards Le Tian and moved to the side.

  By the time everyone had submitted their bookmarks, the three-legged golden toad had shut its mouth again. Le Tian introduced some details of the test first before suddenly changing the topic.

  “You must all know already, but when you join our Myriad sect, you all start off as ‘servants’ regardless of your cultivation. Once you’ve made a certain level of contribution, you’ll be promoted step by step—attendant, reader, formal disciple, inner disciple, and then finally direct disciple. Every step comes with many benefits, some of which are on par with undergoing tribulations. It’ll bring great benefit to your cultivation.”
“The Myriad sect has always been renowned for its fairness and being open to the public, so we’re not ordering you around this time for nothing either. As long as you pass the test, the magnetic ferrum will be your first contribution to the sect. The more you contribute, the more you benefit. You might even be able to start off as an attendant or even a reader right from the beginning while making a decent sum.”
“Apart from that, there’s another great benefit waiting for you all. In three days’ time, whoever possesses the most amount of magnetic ferrum will place first in the test. They’ll be promoted by three ranks in total, directly going from a servant to a formal disciple. Not only will you be able to exchange for weapons, mountains, and dwellings, but you can even enter the Pavilion of Heavenly Tomes freely. If you offer up a good portion of your magnetic ferrum as well, then you won’t be far off from becoming an inner disciple. It’ll basically be a meteoric rise!”
“Second place will be promoted by two ranks to ‘reader’, while third place will be promoted by one rank to ‘attendant’. It’ll save you quite a lot of time and energy. I hope you give it your all when you compete for this so that you can provide the Myriad sect with another direct disciple sooner!”
His announcement, clearly an attempt to rally everyone, made all of their eyes light up. No one joined the Myriad sect to be a servant. In particular, the Soul Nascence cultivators that had undergone the third heavenly tribulation were all determined to place at the top.

  Someone in the crowd suddenly asked, “Senior, do we have to collect the magnetic ferrum we offer up ourselves?”
The atmosphere froze. No one present was a fool. They all understood what he was saying.

  If it was not themselves, then it could only be someone else. It could have been agreed on beforehand, it could have been purchased from others, and it could have even been robbed from others. The person who asked this question was filled with ill will. Everyone looked around, but they had no idea who had asked that question. In the end, they all began to suspect the Soul Nascence cultivators.

  Le Tian smiled just like before, laying out his hands. “As you all know, all methods of monitoring are useless in Magnetic Field mountain, so I can only ask you to do your best. However, under the influence of the magnetic fields, this isn’t a contest with a great disparity in strength. The Myriad sect obviously encourages fellow disciples to be friendly with one another, but since you haven’t joined the Myriad sect yet, you’re obviously not bound by these rules.”
The atmosphere became even heavier. The spacious cave nearby was like the gaping mouth of a vicious beast, while the hanging stalactites were like teeth, waiting to feast on their flesh.

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  Everyone became wary and distanced themselves from one another, standing with those that they were familiar with. None of the friendliness and peacefulness from earlier remained. In the caves, anyone beside them could become an enemy. The people who had just submitted Green Jade bookmarks earlier received a particularly large number of cautious gazes.

  Through his harmless appearance and gentle bearing, Li Qingshan happened to be the one who attracted the least amount of attention, but he still wondered about it inside.

  He’s intentionally causing internal strife so that we turn on each other. What’s he trying to do? The Myriad sect definitely isn’t a demonic sect to produce a freak like Ruan Yaozhu. Don’t tell me this is a test of character? But testing the character of people like this is just brutal and foolish.

  Humans are unpredictable, always influenced by their environments. If you intentionally arrange an extremely bad environment to unearth the so-called dark side of human nature, all I can is that it’s fucking stupid. Even the conclusions you draw in the end are absolutely useless.

  “Argh!!!”
A miserable cry echoed through the dark, spacious cave, pulling Li Qingshan back from his musings. Only at this moment did the feeling of being watched fade away drastically, but it was still there.

  He could even imagine Le Tian’s mask-like smile. Ever since his experiences in White Deer country, he would never treat this sensation as a false impression again. That guy must have been using some kind of method to spy on everyone in Magnetic Field mountain, but why?

  What he did not know was what happened once everyone entered Magnetic Field mountain.

  Another four figures descended from above outside the cave, three men and a woman. They all varied in bearings, cold and proud, standing with his hands behind his back; mysterious and unpredictable as his eyes swiveled about; deep and reserved, remaining silent without a word; and natural and peaceful, with a frown on her face.

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  They all possessed their own sense of composure and bearing, standing on equal footing with Le Tian.

  It went without saying that they had all undergone the fifth heavenly tribulation. They were all Human Sovereigns.

  Even in the Human realm, Human Sovereigns were powerful existences that stood high above, only a step away from becoming Human Immortals. Normally, they all cultivated alone. Very rarely did they gather together unless something major had occurred.

  However, an entrance test like this was nothing major at all to the Myriad sect, yet it could lead to so many direct disciples spectating. It was truly a peculiarity.

  “Seniors and juniors, you better watch. The gamble is about to begin. Junior sister Ruan, stop glaring at me. Why don’t you take a stake too?”
“Senior brother Le, how can you do this? You’re going to kill a lot of people! There’s not going to be a lot of people who will pass this test this time, and those in the lead will definitely be vicious and despicable folk. How are you going to explain this to the two sect masters?”
Ruan Yaozhu glared at Le Tian. Her voice was gentle, but it was filled with determination. The nine-coloured deer held her head up high, ignoring the three-legged golden toad on the side that swiveled with its eyes.

  The three other direct disciples all watched on in fascination. The mysterious and unpredictable senior brother Pi smiled. “Senior brother Le, you’re in trouble this time!”
Ruan Yaozhu immediately turned the spearhead towards them. “Senior brother Ren, senior brother Pi, senior brother Leng, you’re no different. As direct disciples, how can you fool around so much? Not only do you not discourage him, but you even gamble with senior brother Le…”
The three direct disciples either buried their heads and said nothing or gazed at the sky and smiled away. They could not be more familiar with the personality of this junior sister Ruan. Across the entire Myriad sect, all of the direct disciples had been scolded by her in the past, basically leaving them embarrassed to call themselves direct disciples. Even the two sect masters had received much of her nagging before.

  They communicated with each other, “Oi, Le Tian, what’re you doing? Are we still gambling or not? Why’d you get her to come along to ruin it for us?”

  “Hah, once we get back to the sect, she’ll definitely snitch on us.”

  “I’m in charge of the rules and punishments. If you still don’t have any ideas to deal with this, then I’ll be leaving first. I can’t afford this trouble, but I can run away from it.”