64. Dropping Your Ankle Weights Does Not Give You Plot Armour!

The announcer’s voice booms across the arena, introducing the fighters in batches. I half-listen, my attention split between the platform below and the Gaze flickering at the edge of my vision.

Then Ling’er’s hand touches her ear, then her chin. I follow her line of sight to Platform Seven. A woman stands at the edge of the platform, arms crossed, her expression bored. Twenty-four, maybe twenty-five. Her robes are crimson, trimmed in gold. The emblem of the Crimson Dragon Alliance is stitched across her chest. The crowd barely notices her. They are too busy cheering for the muscular boy on Platform Three, the flashy girl on Platform Eleven, the young master with the jeweled sword on Platform Fourteen.

But the cultivators around me have gone quiet. I hear snippets of their murmurs, and I activate the Gaze.

I nod slowly. This is what deliberate cultivation looks like. Exactly what I meant when I was guiding Ling’er months ago, a robust foundation incomparable to those of the same rank that would pay dividends once she broke through. Ling’er is watching me. I touch my chest and signal.

‘Watch closely.’

They are cut from different cloth, but the pattern is the same. There is something for Ling’er to learn here. I turn slightly. Find Shen Qiao near the edge of the Silver Hall queue, his ledger tucked under his arm, his eyes scanning the crowd. I raise my hand to my stomach and touch my throat.

‘Small bet.’

His eyes shine, and he dips his head in acknowledgement before disappearing; he will bet on her in the Silver Hall where the mortals, dazzled by flashier fighters, have not yet recognized her for what she is. He disappears into the queue. I do not move toward the Jade Hall. I stand at the edge of the crowd, listening.

“Yan Ruohan is a shoo-in for the top eight,” a cultivator near me says. His companion nods.

“The Crimson Dragon Alliance doesn’t send amateurs.”

Never touch a match where the Gaze and crowd agree.

The cultivators are the crowd here. And they agree. I will not bet on Yan Ruohan in the Jade Hall, there is no edge. Most cultivators here are Qi Condensation late or peak. That is not surprising. The tournament draws the best from across the continent. The weak do not make it here. I scan the remaining platforms, the Gaze flickering in short bursts. Then I see him.

He is likely one of the older contestants. Thin as a reed. His robes are plain and unadorned, but it’s his sword that catches my attention. It looks simple at first glance; plain iron fittings and a leather-wrapped hilt. But the Gaze shows me what the crowd cannot see.

I shift my gaze to his robes and armor. Plain, but all carrying the same style of micro-arrays invisible to the naked eye. I activate the Gaze on the cultivator himself.

Around me, cultivators laugh. I hear snatches of their conversation.

“First round knockout, guaranteed.”

The mortals are worse. They jeer openly. A man behind me shouts, “Go home, scarecrow!”

Mu Jianyu does not react. He stands with his eyes closed, his hand resting on his sword hilt, his breathing slow and even. I find Shen Qiao emerging from the Silver Hall queue. He catches my eye. I do a sequence of hand signals, looking directly at the scrawny sword cultivator.

‘Medium bet.’

He sighs and his shoulders sag. He has just finished waiting in line. Now he must do it again. I turn toward the Jade Hall. The line there is shorter and the clerks are faster. Cultivators in fine robes place their bets with the casual ease of people who do this often. The minimum bet is ten low-grade stones. I place fifty on Mu Jianyu for the first match. I add ten on a random cultivator. A hedge. A way to make my betting pattern look like the pattern of someone who does not know what he is doing. The clerk hands me my slips. I tuck them away and return to the arena floor. The introductions continue. The last batch of fighters takes their positions on the platforms.

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