Chapter Sixteen: The Battle of Candlelight (2)

The Supreme Young Lord slapped Huasheng and exclaimed, “Quick! Find the nearest candle and snuff it out!”

At once, Huasheng noticed the crowd surging around him, hearing only the constant whistling sounds by his ears. He immediately soared into the air, diving toward the nearest candle. Just as he was about to touch the glass cover, someone crashed into him with a bang, sending him flying three yards away. In that instant, the figures rushing past him blurred, impossible to distinguish friend from foe.

Huasheng wanted to call out to the Supreme Young Lord, but realized that at this moment, extinguishing just one candle would guarantee his advancement. With so many candles on the mountain, it might be best to simply pick one at random.

Glancing beside him, he spotted a candle and rejoiced, grabbing the glass cover and lifting it. To his surprise, as soon as the cover left the candle, the flame was snuffed out by a gust of wind.

“Damn!”

He cursed silently, looking up to see the number of candles in the air decreasing rapidly, like a countdown. Over a thousand had already vanished, yet the number of challengers remained unchanged, as if etched into the sky.

This meant that, intentionally or not, not a single disciple among the thousands had succeeded in leaving the field.

Either someone was deliberately reducing the count, or everyone had encountered the same problem as he did: the candle flames extinguished by the wind just as they tried to snuff them out.

Huasheng looked around, finding no candle flames nearby. The closest were hundreds of meters up the mountain. He quickly formed seals and chanted, flying toward the mountainside. He had barely covered a hundred meters when a thunderous tiger’s roar erupted from afar.

“Not good! It’s the Tiger Spirit!” someone shouted nearby.

Huasheng reacted instantly, covering his ears. The ground shook, sand and stones flew, and a wave of sound crashed over him, making his scalp tingle. Before he could recover, the sound of shattering glass echoed across the mountains.

In a flash, he realized the continuous cracking was the sound of the glass covers shattering across the entire Light Epoch Mountain.

Then, a scene unfolded that left Huasheng stunned: in just a second, the whole mountain plunged into darkness, as if a city’s power had been cut.

All the candle flames had gone out!

The darkness before his eyes resembled the flame of hope, snuffed out in an instant by a cold wind.

“Could it be… over?”

Barely ten seconds into the contest, and it was already over? Huasheng stood frozen, unable to extinguish a candle, unable to compete with the other disciples, already facing elimination.

But he quickly recovered, looking up at the fiery words floating in the air:

“Challengers: 3,722.”

More than twenty disciples had advanced!

He checked the remaining number of candle flames.

“Candles remaining: 117.”

His heart settled, though he was still amazed at how the Tiger Spirit’s roar had shattered more than three thousand glass covers.

“So, even if none are extinguished from now on, only one in thirty disciples can advance?” he thought to himself. The competition was about to become fierce.

Judging from the numbers, the mountain still held over a hundred candles, but all appeared shrouded in darkness. Where could those candles be?

---

Unable to find any glimmers of candlelight nearby, Huasheng watched as shadowy figures soared toward the mountain peak.

“That’s it! There’s no candlelight at the base; this mountain reaches into the clouds, and the remaining candles must be hidden by the mist!” he realized, immediately summoning his cloud and flying upward.

He flew cautiously, scanning his surroundings lest he miss anything. The higher he climbed, the thicker the mist became, reducing his visibility to only a few meters. Worried he might miss the candles, he landed among the mountain’s forest.

Fog blanketed the woods, and though the sounds of bustling people occasionally drifted by, no one was visible. Huasheng climbed the forested slope, struggling through rough terrain for nearly half a mile. Suddenly inspired, he floated his body about a meter above the ground and sped through the woods.

A faint glimmer caught his eye. He halted, drifting back a few steps on his cloud. Peering carefully, he spotted a candle hidden in the grass three meters to his right.

How lucky! Had it not been for the mist, this candle would have been discovered by anyone passing by. Huasheng rejoiced, landing and running toward the flame.

Just as he reached for it, he felt a grip on his collar, yanked upward before he could resist, hurled aside by brute force.

Fortunately, his recent training had not been wasted: Huasheng managed to twist in mid-air, kicking off a thick branch, and landed steadily. He finally saw his assailant—a towering male disciple, nine feet tall and broad-shouldered.

“You mere mortal, get lost!” the man bellowed, “Competing with us immortals? Careful you don’t break your legs.”

Being looked down upon by the immortals sparked fury in Huasheng.

“Ice Condensation Spell! By my command!” he shouted, and the mist around him instantly condensed into water vapor, then froze into hail, shooting from his palms.

To his surprise, the burly disciple didn’t dodge, but punched forcefully at the hail. With a boom, the hail scattered as if striking an iron wall.

“You think such petty tricks can deal with me?” the man sneered, but before he could finish laughing, he realized Huasheng had vanished. Before he could search, Huasheng’s voice came from behind.

“Earth Escape!”

The disciple felt the ground suddenly give way beneath him, and he was plunged into the earth, buried up to his neck. Huasheng had cast the Earth Escape spell on the soil beneath him, trapping him as he stepped forward.

The disciple glared furiously, as Huasheng squatted beside him about to speak. Suddenly, the man stretched a hand out of the earth, grabbing Huasheng’s throat.

“You think this trick can trap an immortal!” he roared.

The soil around him began to rumble and he rose out of the earth. Yet Huasheng made no effort to resist, seemingly fainted in the man’s grasp.

The disciple was about to taunt Huasheng, when his expression suddenly changed. “Illusion Technique! Show your true form!” he barked.

The Huasheng he held vanished with a swoosh, revealing only half a tree trunk. The real Huasheng had already leapt toward the candle.

The disciple cried, “Damn!” and made a move to snatch it, but it was too late—Huasheng was only a step away from the flame.

Yet in that split second, Huasheng was kicked hard, sent tumbling away.

He rolled to his feet, half a step from success, full of regret. He blamed himself for not paying attention, ambushed by another unexpected adversary.

He looked closely and saw a slender female disciple. She revealed half of her true form—cat ears atop her head, a ringed, spotted tail behind her. She was evidently a spirit of the civet cat.

---

“You two men, stop fighting. Since this weak girl is here, shouldn’t you give way?” The civet spirit twisted gracefully, reaching for the glass cover.

The male disciple refused, shouting, “There’s only one winner in this trial! Wait till the contest is over before you show courtesy!” With that, he lunged at her.

The civet spirit moved as swiftly as lightning, spinning to evade him and, almost in the same instant, slipped behind his back and gave him a gentle push. The man was sent flying, crashing through two trees, then another four or five before landing.

The civet spirit giggled, “Look at you, a wild bull. You’ve truly disgraced your immortal kin.”

She stretched languidly, walked to the candle, and glanced at Huasheng. “Sorry!” she said.

She reached for the glass cover, but as soon as she drew close, with a whoosh, she vanished.

Huasheng’s jaw dropped in astonishment. He searched around, but the civet spirit was nowhere to be found. She had disappeared into thin air. The candle still flickered within its glass cover.

“Wasn’t it supposed to be that only those who extinguish a candle leave the game? How did she vanish so suddenly?” Huasheng muttered.

At that moment, the burly disciple, thrown several yards away, returned in a rage. “Where did that civet go?” he shouted.

Huasheng shook his head.

“She must be playing some trick!” The man searched the area, but found no trace of the civet spirit. He turned to Huasheng sitting nearby, glanced at the candle at his feet, and reached for its glass cover.

Huasheng shouted, “Wait!”

“Don’t bother scheming. This candle is mine!” the man declared, not slowing his hand.

Just as he touched the glass cover, suddenly, with a whoosh, he vanished into thin air—just like the civet spirit before.

The surroundings fell silent.

Seeing the two vanish, Huasheng felt a chill rise along his spine.

He slowly stood, confirming that the two were truly gone.

The candle on the ground flickered mildly, ordinary in every way.

Huasheng dared not act rashly. He moved closer to examine it.

Suddenly, a voice spoke behind him.

“If you bring your face any closer, you’ll get to go home and sleep early.”