Daily life of a cultivation judge

"Oh, the kid has mastered the five-element dragon art.." muttered Yang Qing in pleasant surprise as he eyed Bai Chen.

The silhouette surrounding Bai Chen was of a dragon that had five colors signifying the five elements, and the colors appeared on different parts of its body.

Just from the silhouette alone, he recognized the art. The five-element dragon art was a low-tier blue-grade art that required the user to have a certain level of mastery over the five elements. It required the user to have an understanding of the five elements deep enough for them to be able to alternate them seamlessly in use.

While the art itself wasn't the most powerful when it came to potent attacks, it was one of the most stable, especially when it came to fighting a battle of attrition against an unknown foe. It was adaptable, able to grant offense and defense in one single motion provided the user had a good grasp of the elements and the art itself to be able to switch seamlessly in combat.

It had five moves based on the five elements; the dragon breath blue aqua whirlpool which Bai Chen had just released, the dragon silver fang blade storm, the stoneheart dragon tremor strike, the verdant dragon scales, and the inferno dragon claw strike, which combined became the five element dragon strike.

Bai Chen quickly showed his mastery over the art, he seemed to be just at the cusp of reaching the blooming stage.

He defended against the fists using the aqua whirlpool move while he retaliated with the stoneheart dragon tremor that produced a rebounding ripple force every time it struck Peng Zhen's body, and if a slight opening showed up, Bai Chen would deploy the inferno dragon claw strike which just like its name was a claw art which transformed his hand into a dragon claw that was coated with crimson red magma.

Peng Zhen struggled against the inferno dragon claw strike the most as it seemed to melt away his qi along with his art making him expend a lot of qi to try and maintain them. As for the silver fang blade storm, it acted as a restraining art that restricted Peng Zhen's movements by raining white piercing arrow-shaped storming attacks on him. Alone, they were nothing much, but hundreds of them had enough force to cause serious damage to Peng Zhen.

Peng Zhen's own defensive arts seemed to struggle against the onslaught of Bai Chen's moves, and when it came to the blue-grade art Yang Qing had gifted him he seemed to have only mastered two moves; the fist art which was the main component, and the solar flare finger art. He still had not mastered the rest, especially the movement art ray tracing steps that would have provided him with much breathing space had he learned it even a little.

However, his experience as a seasoned cultivator who had survived countless battles in a place as fraught with danger as the green fog region finally showed. He weathered through the attacks Bai Chen threw at him. The ones he could accommodate, he took straight on while retaliating with attacks of his own, and the ones he couldn't afford to get injured by, he dodged with calculated experience.

The fight lasted for almost an hour before cracks showed up in Bai Chen's attack pattern when he got too anxious for a win creating an opportunity for Peng Zhen to exploit, which he did as he launched a tidal wave of fists that knocked Bai Chen out after a minute, prompting the end of the fight.

Once the announcement was made, Peng Zhen waited for Yang Qing to finish healing Bai Chen, and when he woke up, he offered Bai Chen a Daoist salute for his performance in the fight as he nodded towards Yang Qing as he left the arena.

During the small interlude, he also informed Yang Qing of the bags of rice he had brought over much to Yang Qing's delight, who told him he would see him when the fights were over.

After three hours all the thirty inmates present were done with their fights with six recorded fatalities. The winners were excited as they would get to receive the rewards promised to them which was usually a week at a selected cultivation ground. Such a situation was a win-win situation for both the Institute and the inmates themselves. The inmates would get a break from Requiem while also getting the chance to strengthen themself which would increase their odds of survival and even winning when they fought the next time. As for the Institute, the more powerful those convicts were, the more they would stir up the students to keep applying themselves.

Though of the group, only Peng Zhen wasn't receiving a reward as this life and death duel was his sentence, and unlike the rest, he only had one fight a month, and he got to go back to his sect after. That freedom was considered his reward while the blue-grade art Yang Qing gave him, was more of Yang Qing helping him out as it was not something normally done.

However, some of the inmates, if they had accumulated a certain number of wins, would be given the option of having a cultivation art as a reward. But to trigger such a reward, they would need to have 200 wins under their belt, which was not an easy thing to do, so most used whatever art they knew along with their experiences.

After the thirty inmates were done, the next batch was brought over, and with the lessons ingrained in them, the students didn't drop their guard and managed to win 34 of the 40 matches they had with four draws and two defeats. But before they could celebrate their wins, Instructor Pan poured cold water over their parade by telling them, they would be having the life and death duels on the same day every week from now till their last day at the Institute. They all turned pale at the announcement.

Yang Qing left soon after, meeting up with Peng Zhen who had been waiting for him at the court building along with his assigned review committee guard, who was responsible for taking him back to his sect and bringing him over on the day of his match, which was once a month.

Yang Qing exchanged a few pleasantries with him as he gleefully accepted one tonne of crystal white rice. He thanked Peng Zhen profusely for it, and while he couldn't offer Peng Zhen direct pointers on the Brilliant ray fist art, since despite his admiration of him, Peng Zhen was still serving a sentence, and some semblance of fairness and rules had to be maintained, Yang Qing did offer indirect suggestions to Peng Zhen, such as studying various spiritual plants and creatures on how they acted.

Other than them, how or where to find said creatures and what Peng Zhen would learn from them, was ultimately up to him. 

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