Beastmaster of the Ages

”If I last three more days, I’ll be ranked much higher.” Even though the rankings seemed insignificant, it was among the highest honors. Even Bai Feng, who was the first to be eliminated, had already created history for the Whitechalk Star and had fully earned their care and protection. The glory from this event would follow every disciple who participated in it for life. Once they returned to their respective worlds, the rewards they received would depend on their ranking.

After all, it wasn’t as if the children of sovereigns could just enjoy unlimited access to their worlds’ resources. Not to mention, sovereigns would usually have many descendants. For instance, the sun emperor had ten sons ranging from decades to centuries old. They still had to compete for those treasures. The one that earned more glory would be given corresponding resources to match, and that applied in the Mysterium Cluster as well, hence why the hundred and eight absolute geniuses were trying so hard.

Tianming included, none of the contestants in the Astralium Seeking desired the rewards given to the top ten at all, but rather access to resources on their home worlds. In Tianming’s case, he also wanted the worship of the Violetglorians. Historically, only mysterians had been given the actual top ten rewards in the first place. Even if non-mysterians could theoretically win them, who was to say if they would actually be rewarded? Additionally, according to historical precedent, non-mysterians that actually got those rewards would have bad endings if they didn’t proceed to one of the three deific-class worlds. Those that did end up going weren’t considered mysterians, either, and often only begrudgingly went.

At the end of the day, all that was in it for non-mysterians was raising the reputation of their worlds in the astralscape, so the two contestants in Tianming’s zone desperately fought. When one of them was killed, Tianming suddenly appeared to strike down the worn-down fellow. Both of them had been eliminated one after the other.

”I got another three days of safety.” Tianming was in quite a good mood. ”Thanks to Yin Chen, I managed to take advantage of an opportunity. Let’s continue expanding my zone!” He had a feeling that he would be using it more actively later. After all, he didn’t doubt that his power was on the level of the top ten. ”Let’s try going for the top five.”

However, he soon came upon another realization. ”The longer the battle lasts, the fewer people there’ll be, so it’ll be hard to maintain the three-day safety periods. Perhaps everyone will be rednames if time goes on.”

Once that time came for him, he would only be able to rely on Meow Meow and Yin Chen to evade his enemies.

......

Another three days passed. The battles on Astralium had continued without end, but the rate of elimination began slowing. The last one to be eliminated was ranked forty-third. In other words, there were forty-two people left. Tianming was still calmly expanding his zone; by now, he had eyes across a radius of a hundred and fifty thousand meters around him. The nearby mountains were all in his range, though he still found it insufficient.

That day, Yin Chen spotted another unlucky fellow entering the zone. He was a third-level solarian in power and it wasn’t easy for him to have lasted this long. But Tianming didn’t hold back and defeated him, gaining another three days of peace.

”Weird....” He looked to the north and noticed something odd. There were eight red names across the horizon, all of them incredibly close together as if they were next to each other. Perhaps they had been on the other side of Astralium until now, which explained why Tianming hadn’t seen them before. It felt weird, as they didn’t seem to be running or fighting at all.

”The number hasn’t changed even after two hours. There’s even an additional redname. There’s nine of them now,” Tianming said.

”What’re those nine doing together instead of fighting?” Ying Huo said. There were forty-one people left in total, and nine rednames had joined together, leaving only a few left.

”Looks like they’re probably close. Perhaps they’re from the same place,” Tianming said, furrowing his brow. He had a really bad feeling about this.

”What kind of place? Who are they?” Meow Meow asked.

”Mysterians.” That much was clear. Only mysterians could have so many of their own in the Astralium Seeking. Other skypiercer-class worlds, like Darkfiend Heptus, couldn’t possibly send nine people to participate. The fact that they were free to form parties in the first part of the event no doubt made it possible for them to gather their strongest people together, much to the disadvantage of non-mysterians.

”Why’re they grouped together? Are they hunting in groups?” Ying Huo said with disdain.

”That’s right! If my guess is right, they won’t kill anyone for the time being. Instead, they’ll attract other mysterians to them, leaving few non-mysterians remaining. If they don’t kill anyone, they’ll all be rednames. Eventually, I’ll be a redname, too, and the group of mysterians can hunt me and the others down together until only mysterians remain. They must be trying to eliminate all non-mysterians so that nobody else can rank even close to top ten.” He couldn’t help but applaud. ”It is a good plan.”

”What good plan? That’s cheating!” Xian Xian’s spiritform angrily said. ”This is shameless! They’re from deific-class worlds, making them much stronger in the first place, yet now they’re banding together like cowards!”

”The rules have nothing against it, so nobody can say anything about it. They’re too powerful and numerous, so they’re trying to wipe out the riff raff before fighting among themselves.” That was just the reality, and no amount of complaining would change a thing. He believed it to be sensible for the strong to have special privileges. Might made right, after all.

Xian Xian spat, ”These damn young brats have no refinement!”