88 Striking Tiger Arena - Preliminaries.

Shu He waded his way through the crowd as he left the bickering pair behind, his eyes locked on to a large structure in the distance as people lined up as its entrance.

The training area was fairly large, but towards the back this structure sat towering over the surrounding area, it was made with the beautiful white stone that was ever-present in the sect's architectural design and seemed to be the size of a large football pitch, in the grand scheme of the sect it may not be the largest key area, but it was well known for its name.

The Striking Tiger Arena! It was where all major duels and tournaments took place, Shu He was surprised when he heard the newcomers tournament was taking place here, he thought they'd just use the sparring arenas of the training areas but no, it was here he would be fighting.

He hadn't ever entered the place, nor did he know what special features the arena had, but he heard that it was a place for disciples to fight without needing to hold back, whatever that meant.

He reached the entranceway and saw there were in fact, two lines, there was some disciple standing at the entrance holding a sign that read Spectators -> and below it Participants <- which made it easy to tell where to go.

'I wonder how many points he's earning for doing that' Shu He thought for a moment as he walked towards the line for participants, rather it wasn't even a line since there was no-one there, most likely there weren't too many entrees, so they just go straight in after registering.

He walked up to the temporary desk that set up on the left and spoke "I'm here to register for the tournament".

The man at the desk, a rather subdued looking man in Elder's robes looked up at him with a serene smile "Very well, please state you name and rank and then present your token" He asked, once again there was a small machine with a metal plate like in many other areas of the sect.

"Shu He, Outer Disciple" He replied and tapped his token on the plate.

The man watched the pattern on the plate and read the symbols that appeared on the one facing him before nodding.

'I've seen that text a lot on those plates, I wonder if it's another language or some sort of encrypted code?' Shu He thought as he waited around.

"I've verified your details, Shu He, since you're a new disciple you don't need to take part in the preliminaries, you can either go on through or wait outside but please make sure to return before the main event starts" The man explained.

"Oh, I'll go on through then" Shu He replied, bowing slightly before walking into the entrance.

"20 points for a back row seat, 40 points for a front row!" He heard someone barking on the other side of the line.

'They're charging for entry as well, Is it so the arena doesn't get too crowded?' He wondered since it's an official tournament a disciple couldn't benefit off the entry fees right?

He walked through the long hallway, there were paths leading left and right here and there before he reached a large hall that seemed to encompass the entire arena, it seemed to be below the spectator seats as he could hear voices and footsteps occasionally echoing through the stone roof above him.

There were quite a few people walking here and there but not as many as outside, he could see a lot of them were heading to stairwells that were on the inside of the hallway he was in, he could assume that those led to the spectator seats.

'But where do I go?' He looked around in confusion, clearly his expression caught some of the other disciples attention since they glanced at him as they walked past.

'I guess I'll just go and walk until I find my way, this place isn't that big'.

He was considering using his 'sight' to find the pathway, but just as he was about to walk off a voice called out to him.

"You there, why are you standing around like an idiot?".

"Huh?!" Shu He's head snapped to the source of the voice, about to respond to the sudden insult but when he saw who it was his expression became lively.

"Bai Shun!"

"It's Senior Brother to you now!" The black haired, blue eyed young man barked at his with his arms crossed.

He was clearly trying to be imposing, but because he was basically the same height as Shu He he ended up looking like a rude kid to some people earning them some weird stares.

"R-right, Senior Brother Bai. Where have you been? I haven't seen you since I joined the sect?" Shu He corrected himself.

"I've been busy, I was promoted to a core disciple recently after all!" He said with a clearly happy smirk.

"Really? Congrats!.. I don't really know the difference between ranks though" Shu He shrugged his shoulders as he said the last part.

"I'm sure you don't, you'll find out when you're called for the inner disciple exam, but it doesn't really matter until then; Either way that's why I've been busy, after being promoted I had running this tournament shoved in to my hands so I've been run ragged trying to get everything done" Bai Shun sighed, a hint of listlessness in his expression.

"I thought core disciples would be exempt from this kind of work?" Shu He expressed his doubt.

"You'd think so, right? Chao Shi was so carefree I thought he didn't have any responsibilities…" he rubbed his head to stave off the headache he had growing "Seems the core disciples have collective responsibility to run certain events or do tasks asked of them, and the newer core disciples get burdened with most of it until they can stand on their own".

"Sounds hard…" Shu He tried his best to express sympathy but in his head he noted 'I need to remember, when I become a core disciple I need to dodge the tasks!'.

"Oh, speaking of him, why has Chao Shi gone in to closed door cultivation?" Shu He remembered what Na Xue mentioned and decided to ask. "I thought you'd know since you're close to him".

"Close? Well… more than most people I guess" A slight pained look grew in Bai Shun's eyes before swiftly dispersing "I'm surprised he didn't leave you a letter or something considering he invited you to the sect… Hmm…"

"What's wrong?" Shu He asked, seeing as Bai Shun seemed to have paused in thought.

"I'll tell you about Chao Shi after the tournament, you should focus on it since you're entering right?"

"Oh… Yeah I am".

"Then make sure you're in top shape, I want to see that my efforts weren't wasted on you".

"Got it" The two stared at each-other with slight smiles.

"Right, why were you standing here anyway?" Bai Shun asked, reminding Shu He that he was lost.

"I don't know where I'm supposed to go as a participant".

"You don't?" Bai Shun asked as he began to look around the area.

"Where's the disciple that's supposed to be guiding you… bastard better not be off slacking" He murmured to himself before point down the hallway.

"If you head that way, eventually you'll reach a large exit on the left wall that leads to the centre of the arena, the others are already there so head on out".

"Ah, thanks, I'll go since I want to do final checks on my equipment before it starts" Shu He said as he waved and walked away.

"Sure, see you." Bai Sun nodded as he turned away "Now, where is that slacker" he grumbled with a glint in his eye.

…

Shu He did as instructed and came upon a grand exit, he walked through and saw it led directly outside and was very reminiscent of the entryways sports players would leave as a team.

The closer he got to the outside the louder the voices and chatter were, it was like he was truly entering a sports stadium with the occasional yells.

""""Ooooooh!"""" A loud exclaim of surprise came from the crowd.

'Huh? Is something going on already? I thought it hadn't started… no wait, the elder at the gate said something about preliminaries, is that it?' He thought as he walked on, sunlight began shining in to the hallway and before long he was once more bathed in it as he got a glimpse of the arena's inside for the first time.

'A colosseum! But rectangular!' Were his first thoughts, it was very much exactly like that, there were stone seats built in all around the arena with the stairwells in the corners, they went all the way down to the ground with a small wall separating spectators from the central area.

"No!" He heard a man yelling out as he flew through the air, crashing into the gravel, opposite him on a stone slab was another disciple looking smug.

There wasn't only one stone slab, there were tens of them all lined up in an orderly pattern serving as arenas for a bunch of duels, they were all about 5x5 meters in size so not too big.

'This is the preliminaries?' He stared at all the duels that were taking place, there were many more than he thought there would be, he watched as someone was socked in the face and knocked out, another was tripped with a staff and forced to forfeit.

And then he saw a grand blaze, a disciple had used a combat technique! He watched with bright eyes but with a hint of worry as a fireball the size of a head flew through the air and struck the other disciple that had been knocked off balance beforehand.

'Won't that kill him?!' His eyes fixed on the action, yet after the fireball exploded and engulfed the disciple there was no screaming, just a short yelp before the flames dispersed and the disciple was covered in some weird red light.

It resembled a shell that was surrounding the disciple, Shu He could see the clothes of the man underneath were slightly singed, yet he was not injured, but the expression of the man was filled with sadness and disappointment.

'What's that weird light?' Shu He looked towards another duel, in this one the two disciples were both using weapons, one spear and one saber, the duel began and the saber user charged ahead and the spear user backed off while trying to ward off the saber users advance, the spear thrusted towards the others abdomen but it was dodged at the last second, the saber user grabbed the shaft and pulled himself towards the spear user with it, saber in the other hand, he used the momentum and swung it, directly at the disciples neck!

*CLANG*

But the expected bloody scene didn't happen, again that light shell appeared around the spear user.

'This time it wasn't all red at the start though, it was blue mostly and the red was only where the saber impacted, before spreading to the entire light shell' Shu He observed intently.

'Is this the reason why disciples can fight all out here? This arena must have some sort of life saving formation… it seems to only react to lethal blows, or maybe strikes deemed potentially dangerous' He carefully pieced together what was happening as he watched, this was the first time he had seen such a large-scale display of martial competition, the training area was nothing like this.

He looked around some more, seeing some elders littered between the arenas here and there likely to decide the results and record them or mediate if someone complained, and then off to the side in a small tent there was a group of people sitting there.

'Is that where the participants are supposed to wait?' He began walking over since he saw nowhere else to go.

"Oh, if it isn't Shu He!" He heard a voice call out to him, cheerful and bold, he looked up to see that someone had exited the tend and stood to greet him.

Tall, dark and handsome was the way he would still describe this man, Tai Hui stood waving with a smile.

"Tai Hui, haven't seen you in some time, I heard you've been very active in the Battle Division." Shu He replied, thinking of the rumours he had heard flying around.

"Indeed I have! I must say I wondered why all my life I had been holding a pen when a sword is oh so much more entertaining!" He gloated as his eyes sparkled.

Shu He couldn't help but noticed the man had a more ragged feeling to him since the last time they had met which was back during the entrance exam, his eyes seemed to contain an almost feral feeling hiding under his scholar like exterior.

"You should join the Battle Division as well! It's great having so many people to spar with!" He extended an olive branch without hesitation.

"I'll consider it, I have other things I'm working on right now, so I don't want to split my attention just yet" He shivered at the thought of joining another division right now.

He was still settling into the Beast Taming Division and learning how to handle different animals from Jian He when he had time, he had already started practicing extraction for the test for the Alchemy Division, he was learning the two new techniques in the past month and polishing off his skills with the bow and having his cultivation to progress on top of that he had been pretty busy.

"Is that so? I'll wait for you then; I think you'd make a great partner".

"Thanks?" Shu He said with confusion as he watched Tai Hui walk off back to the tent.

'I am interested in the Battle Division, but I hope it isn't filled with combat nuts like him' He quietly prayed to the heavens for his sanity.