Chapter 26: Chapter 26

Xu Wannian still hadn’t recovered from his shock before the launching of the opening ceremony of the National University Martial Arts Competitions, which began with an instrumental performance by the philharmonic orchestra of Songcheng University, followed by the graceful dancing of the young and lively dance company.

“We can sleep for a while after watching the dance.” Cai Zongming yawned naturally.

Lou Cheng deliberately made an expression of fear. “At the school’s opening ceremony, the principal talked nonsense for over an hour and a half. Think he’d get knocked out if he did the same thing again?”

“I can’t tell whether he will be hit today, but he’s not the only one who has been talking nonsense. I watched a video a couple days ago about last year’s opening ceremony. The chairman of the Martial Arts Federation made a speech that was so long it both remained fresh in my mind and also nearly put me to sleep.” Cai Zongming said with a “righteous” look on his face.

Honored guests of the Martial Arts Club of Shanbei University were seated in the front row. Listening to the speech of the president of Songcheng University, Xu Wannian looked weary. He wanted to sleep yet didn’t dare to, since it a live telecast.

“He’s just going on and on…” a delicate-looking boy with freckles on his face next to him said as his mouth twitched. “Brother Xu, could you use your ‘Misfortune Seer’ tactic on the old man to make him forget what he was going to say, or lose his notes, or make his blood pressure go up, something like that?”

After a short silence, Xu Wannian sighed. “I want to, but he’s too f*cking far away!”

He looked toward Peng Leyun next to him. “In times like this, I admire and worship Junior Brother Peng the most. He can reflect on life and go on a mental journey whether or not there’s someone around talking nonsense. I honestly suspect that he just has a supernatural ability to sleep with his eyes open!”

“I also envy Brother Leyun. He can be lost in thought while he is still talking.” Another member of the Martial Arts Club echoed the opinion.

“All of you, lower your voices,” said the instructor of the Martial Arts Club of Shanbei University sitting in the front row after turning his head. With his hair all white in middle age, he had sunken eyes and an old-fashioned temperament. He was well respected in the Martial Arts Club, so everyone shut their mouths immediately.

Half an hour later, Cai Zongming became drowsy, his eyes glazing over.

“Cheng, we should talk to each other. Otherwise, I will fall asleep and roll down from the steps. If that happened, I’d be a running joke all over the country!”

“I guess the principal may finish his talk soon. There are so many guests today, and every one of them has to say a few words. If the principal takes too long, the opening ceremony won’t finish until dawn.” Lou Cheng attempted to comfort himself.

The atmosphere that had been created by the music and dance a moment ago had already frozen over.

Lou Cheng had barely finished speaking when the principal abruptly brought his speech to an end, made a salute and got down from the platform. It seemed that the principal was unsatisfied about the time limit of the speech.

Clap! Clap! Clap!

There came a roar of thunderous applause in the gym, practically blowing the roof off the place.

Feeling as if they’d escaped from a great catastrophe, Lou Cheng and Cai Zongming also clapped their hands forcibly, showing their thanks to the principal for his mercy by releasing them from the long-winded speech.

“Next, we shall invite Mr. Fang Jingjue, the Chairman of the National College Martial Arts Federation to give a speech.” The host invited the next guest.

“…” With his mouth agape, Cai Zongming said, “Cheng, we’d better talk to each other.”

Eyeing the front, Lou Cheng watched the cameras at each position and murmured.

“About what?”

“Do you know about the special competition format for martial arts competitions in teams?” Cai Zongming threw himself into the topic with his heart and soul.

“I don’t live under a rock, how could I not know? Under normal circumstances, each party may send three fighters to fight one by one in single combat, during which the winner stays and the loser leaves. The first party to have all three candidates defeated is out of the competition. However, sometimes it’s allowed to apply for a special competition format in which all three candidates from each party come on the stage to fight. That way they can fully display all the unique aspects of that certain kind of martial arts.” Lou Cheng casually talked about the special competition format, while listening to the unending speech by Chairman Fang Jingjue.

Cai Zongming answered with a smirk, “Then do you know what they say about the special competition format?”

“What?” Lou Cheng became interested.

Cai Zongming grinned. “It is said that during the initial establishment of the Professional Martial Arts Competition, the Xuanwu School went to the leader of the martial arts realm at that time, Master Lin Zhongxun. They said to Master Lin that the competition format was not fair, for their school-based itself on swords formation and was good at the ‘Sanyuan Dingguan Swords Array (three-man swords array).’ If they were going to fight one by one in single combat, what was to stop the others from taking advantage of their weakness?”

“Ah, that’s right! Some schools are better at joint formation than single combat. The ordinary competition format truly is unfair to them,” said Lou Cheng.

Cai Zongming replied with a laugh, “Master Lin also thought so. So he formulated a special competition format where if the application was put forth in advance, one school could send three disciples in at the same time to do a set swords formation. The opponent could fight with a three-person formation or have the three substitute fighters together.”

“This sounds quite fair, a school poor at formation holds the advantage in number. Why is that so funny?” Lou Cheng gazed at Cai Zongming, puzzled.

Cai Zongming stifled his smile and said, “Hearing this, the Master of Kongtong School couldn’t help but go to Master Lin to seek equal treatment. He said to Master Lin that Kongtong School was good at ‘Five Directions and Five Elements Formation’, and three disciples were far too few to meet the demand.”

“Seems to make sense…” Lou Cheng said in hesitation.

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Cai Zongming continued. “The Shangqing was beside the Kongtong School, and they couldn’t ignore it hearing them talk like this. How else could they suffer such an injustice? ‘Master Lin, please show some consideration for the ‘Big Dipper Sword Formation’ of Shangqing Sect!’ What do you think, didn’t this put Master Lin in an awkward position?”

“This truly was a specific problem. Master Lin would have to rack his brain to find a more comprehensive competition format…” Lou Cheng said, furrowing his brow.

“At that time, the Buddhist abbot of the Daxing Temple came in. He stared at Master Lin and mentioned the Five Hundred Arhats Formation…” Clapping his hands, Cai Zongming continued, “Well, Master Lin just told them to get out!”

Lou Cheng couldn’t help but burst into laughter. “That’s true. There is nothing in the world that can satisfy everyone.”

They seemed to be entirely absorbed in listening to the speech with a smile on their face when they were chatting with each other. Talking and laughing, one guest came up after another. They enjoyed the song and dance in between, waiting until “Light in Still Night” Liang Yifan, came onto the stage.

It was necessary for Yan Zheke and others to take the lead, as the martial arts gym had exploded in the clamor.

This was not only because of the personal charm of Liang Yifan, but also due to the “efforts” made by the guests in the front row!

“I’m not the best speaker, and I know that you all are eager to see the results from the drawing. So at this moment I just want to declare my sincere wish that National University Martial Arts Competitions will be better and better, have a deep lasting impact and provide an opportunity for the youth who had missed training when they were younger!” Liang Yifan said knowingly.

“Great!” Cai Zongming, Xu Wannian and others were amongst the first to applaud. Seeing the smiles of everyone in the gymnasium, one could clearly sense the feeling of warmth amongst the people there.

The projector started and behind Liang Yifan a screen showed up, on which there was the roster for the district contest. However, the fighting competitors were still left blank.

According to the competition format, there would be four groups within this region. The top four participants of the region last year would enter the group competition directly as seeded players, while other schools should enter corresponding groups through two rounds or three rounds of individual competitions. The one who got the left side during drawing lots would enjoy home advantage.

The group competition was carried out in a single cycle, and the home field was determined according to last years results. The top eight would enter the Top Eight Knockout, and the top two Knockout would participate in the national finals as representatives of their region.

The master of ceremonies and the host then put two boxes, a large one and a small one, on the stand in front of Liang Yifan. He drew out the seeded team of each group from the small box.

“Group A,” Stretching his hand inside, Liang Yifan took out a piece of paper, then unfolded it and said out loud, “Shannan University Martial Arts Club.”

They had gotten third place last year.

“Group B… Shanbei University Martial Arts Club!” Liang Yifan didn’t skip a beat as the coaches in the gym stared at each other in dismay; the other participants on group B could only fight for second place.

“Group C… Sanjiang College… Group D… Haiyuan School.” After drawing the seeded player of each group, Liang Yifan made a bow with his hands folded in front and left the platform, while the other guests continued to draw for the teams in each knockout.

Lou Cheng’s heart was in his throat, and he realized that he already cared about the honor of the Martial Arts Club.

The fact that Songcheng University Martial Arts Club was not among the Knockouts of Group A made him somewhat regretful. Compared to Shanbei and Sanjiang, the other two martial arts clubs were not so scary.

“Group B, the third Knockout, Home Field…” Drawing out the paper, the guest spoke out, “Songcheng University Martial Arts Club!”

“Holy shit! Turns out to the most difficult group…” Lou Cheng felt a little depressed.

“No big deal, perhaps the other opponents were weak? It’s OK if we can make second place.” Cai Zongming always looked on the bright side of things.

The guest then drew out the opponent for Songcheng University – Neihai Normal School.

“That’s okay.” Lou Cheng breathed a heavy sigh of relief as Neihai Normal School was known as a weak team.

As the opponent for the second round of Knockouts would come from Qin Yang and the other weak school, the odds would favor Songcheng to enter the group competition.

When the drawing was finished, it was already late into the night. After coming back to their dorms, they were all too exhausted to pay attention to the news and went to sleep one after the other.

The next day, Lou Cheng returned to the dorm in the afternoon. He searched for news about the opening ceremony of the National University Martial Arts Competitions. Everyone was still following everything quite closely due to Liang Yifan attending.

In the Longhu Club forum, Lou Cheng found some posts below the front page where there were video news and a featured program made by Songcheng TV Station.

“Featured program?” Without reading the comments below, Lou Cheng skimmed one time through the news video and set his mind at rest after verifying there was no footage of him and Cai Zongming chatting and laughing. However, when he clicked the feature program of Songcheng TV Station, he caught sight of his own face!

“Very excited and thrilled. Umm, I’m really honored,” said dimwittedly, with an idiotic smile on his face.

That was the time they were interviewed as onlookers outside the Martial Arts Club during the orientation conducted inside… Recalling past events, Lou Cheng opened the door of his dorm and shouted toward the opposite side. “Talker! Little Ming! Come and watch this, we’re on the TV!”

Originally, when the interview had finished, they’d both eagerly looked forward to seeing their faces on TV, and would watch the Songcheng TV Station now and then. However, they never saw their faces and soon forgot about it. Who’d have known that this interview was part of the program? They hadn’t thought it wouldn’t be broadcast until the opening ceremony of the martial arts competitions.

“Really?” Cai Zongming came in and asked Lou Cheng to play it back. “Whew! Nice! I’ve got a handsome smile, not like a certain someone who seems clumsy and dumbfounded. Let’s take a look at the comments, any words of praise for me?”