Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
The following day was the quinquennial Holy Vermilion Flame ceremony.
This was an extremely important ceremony to the Vermilion Bird Sect.
This was the day during which the Holy Vermilion Flame would pick out the most outstanding disciples of the sect to plant the seed of the holy flame within, thereby allowing them to manifest the power of the holy flame within their sea of vital energy.
Several tens of thousands of sect disciples were gathered at the Holy Flame Plaza to await the commencement of the ceremony.
Da Bai and the other beast pets could only stay behind as they weren’t disciples of the Vermilion Bird Sect.
An Lin and Xu Xiaolan made their way to the Holy Flame Plaza side by side, and they instantly attracted the attention of most of the disciples. The legendary feats of An Lin had reached everyone’s ears by now, and all the disciples were eager to get a good look at him.
“Look, that’s An Lin!”
“He doesn’t look like anything special, maybe a little bit handsome, but that’s the extent of it.”
“You don’t know sh*t! True masters keep their auras subdued! Look at his eyes, they’re as deep as the ocean; it looks like the entire world is encompassed within those eyes, ah… so handsome!”
“Wake up you pervert!”
“He’s just a backdoor entrant that came here only for the power of the holy flame, what’s there to be in awe of?”
“You can’t put it that way, he’s already a member of the Vermilion Bird Sect, and he risked his life to rescue Brother Yang Yuan. He wouldn’t have done that if he was just here solely for the holy flame.”
“That’s right, An Lin did his duty as a disciple of the sect, so he has the right to earn the approval of the holy flame.”
An Lin and Xu Xiaolan arrived at the center of the plaza amid waves of heated discussion.
There were many powerful elders and core disciples gathered here and most of them nodded to acknowledge his arrival while some looked at him with friendly smiles.
Xu Xiaolan looked around the plaza before turning to speak to An Lin in low voice, “You need to go stand over there in the red area.”
An Lin cast his gaze toward the direction Xu Xiaolan was pointing in to discover that there were already five people there; all of whom were candidates trying to earn the approval of the holy flame. Mo Hai, Shangguan Yi, Lu Jiazhi, Ji Yongfang, and Yang Yuan were all there. He nodded to Xu Xiaolan with a smile before making his way toward the red area.
“Haha, you’re finally here, An Lin, we were just talking about you!” Mo Hai laughed heartily as he walked up to greet An Lin.
A smile appeared on An Lin’s face. “Were you guys talking about how gallant and powerful I was in battle?”
Mo Hai and Lu Jiazhi both rolled their eyes while Shangguan Yi burst into laughter.
Lu Jiazhi spoke up first, “Mo Hai and Shangguan Yi were telling me about how peerlessly delicious your cooking was. To be honest, I’m a bit skeptical… How about you let me taste your cooking some time?”
An Lin faltered slightly before nodding. “Alright, so it’s going to be a hundred thousand spirit stones per dish, save up some money first.”
Lu Jiazhi was in shock. “So they were telling the truth when they were talking about your prices as well? Are you f*cking crazy? A hundred thousand spirit stones per dish!”
“I’ll take ten!” A clear, crisp voice suddenly sounded.
Everyone turned to find a young man with the appearance of someone around fifteen to sixteen years of age looking at An Lin with a smile on his face.
Lu Jiazhi’s expression darkened slightly. “Brother Yang Yuan, you can’t just donate money to An Lin like this even if he saved your life.”
“I’m not donating money. I believe in An Lin, and I believe his dishes are worth the amount he’s selling them for.” Yang Yuan looked deeply into An Lin’s eyes with unconditional confidence glowing in his expression.
Lu Jiazhi opened his mouth, but he found that he was at a complete loss for words.
An Lin was almost moved to the point of tears. An Lin didn’t really have any cooking skills to speak of and Yang Yuan was the first person to place so much trust in his cooking skills before he had even tasted his cooking.
Mo Hai and Shangguan Yi both began chuckling at the sight of Lu Jiazhi’s speechless expression.
Ji Yongfang stood off to the side and stared blankly at the five of them.
What the hell was going on? Wasn’t Shangguan Yi supposed to be icy and aloof? Wasn’t Yang Yuan supposed to be looking up at the sky?
An Lin had only been in this sect for a few days, how did he establish such close bonds with these four people already? Even if they did save Yang Yuan’s life, they were a bit too friendly with one another, weren’t they?
A sense of loss and disappointment flared up in Ji Yongfang’s heart. Whenever he thought about how lovey-dovey An Lin and Xu Xiaolan were, his heart would throb with rage.
Before they knew it, all the sect disciples had gathered on the plaza.
The sect leader wasn’t present, so the Great Elder of the sect, Chen Xinran, delivered a speech to everyone. His speech spanned over a hundred thousand characters, and he spoke at an extremely fast frequency, but all his words were clearly and accurately engraved in everyone’s minds. To summarize his long and illustrious speech:
“As one of the four great sects of the Kingdom of the Nine States, as well as a superpower sect renowned across the entire continent, our Vermilion Bird Sect is an extremely awesome sect! We’ve achieved a lot in the past five years and nurtured countless prodigious disciples.”
He then elaborated on the plan for the next five years as well as his hopes for the future.
He also offered words of praise to An Lin, Mo Hai, and Shangguan Yi for risking their lives to save Yang Yuan in the Vermilion Bird Trial Grounds. This was the embodiment of the spirit of the vermilion bird, and he advised everyone to follow in their example and so on and so forth.
After that was the commencement of the highly-anticipated Holy Vermilion Flame ceremony. The Holy Vermilion Flame floated in the air above the plaza, and the pure white flames began to transform into a white flaming phoenix.
The flames grew brighter and brighter, to the extent that everyone had to lower their heads in order to avoid being blinded.
However, a peculiar flow of warmth also descended upon everyone which cleared everyone’s meridians, and the flame power within everyone’s bodies also received a slight boost.
Everyone closed their eyes and basked in the blessing of the holy flame.
An Lin wasn’t an exception to this either as he could feel the flame power within his body slowly growing stronger.
He stole a glance at Shangguan Yi to find her staring blankly at the disciples around her with no change in her expression.
Shangguan Yi’s eyes glowed with excitement when she discovered An Lin looking at her, and she inquired in a soft voice. “Do you not feel anything as well?”
An Lin shook his head. “No, I was just curious about your reaction. It’s ok, Sister, walk your own path and ignore everyone’s judgment.”
He offered up some words of consolation before closing his eyes again to bask in the blessing of the holy flame.
Shangguan Yi: “…”
The blessing of the holy flame persisted for a long time, and the flaming phoenix only turned back into a normal ball of fire when night fell.
All the sect disciples opened their eyes, and their expressions glowed with joy and contentment.
An Lin felt like the four Divine Flames in his body had become even more powerful. The enhancement effect was not inferior to consuming a low-grade immortal pill!
Although these effects differed depending on the person, this was a blessing which encompassed tens of thousands of people!
This was one of the reasons why the Vermilion Bird Sect was a superpower sect. Just the quinquennial blessings of the holy flame alone was enough to give their disciples a considerable headstart compared to disciples from other sects.
An Lin heard from Da Bai that there was a Beast Soul Holy Realm within the Mythological Beast Sect, which was one of the most precious resources of the sect, and it was open to all Soul Formation Stage soul beasts of the sect, thereby allowing them to obtain the revered inheritance of the ancient beast soul.
An Lin couldn’t help but sigh with emotion. The four great sects were already extremely powerful, but the Heavenly Court transcended all of them as the overarching body ruling over the Kingdom of the Nine States; that one notion alone was sufficient to demonstrate what a gargantuan monstrosity the Heavenly Court was.
“Next, it’s time for the outstanding sect disciples to earn the approval of the holy flame. Yang Yuan, Shangguan Yi, Lu Jiazhi, Mo Hai, Ji Yongfang, and An Lin, please prepare yourselves,” Great Elder Chen Xinran’s voice sounded once again.
An Lin immediately focused his attention upon hearing this. The main event was about to take place!