THE MARTIAL KING, VOLUME 8 - Season 19 Episode 63

Upon hearing the prophet’s words, Zen felt rather skeptical.

In his mind and in his current state, the divine land was something very distant and abstract to Zen.

As for what the divine land was going to face shortly, that was even less likely to have anything to do with Zen at all.

Zen therefore felt very flat and uninterested while the prophet spoke. The words had little meaning to him. If something like that did happen, the True Gods were still there. And then again, let’s not forget the Holy Beings, who were even more powerful than any True Gods anyway.

Despite the little attention Zen spent on his conversation, the prophet’s last sentence still made his heart skip a beat. Did he just hear what he thought he heard?

Did this prophet fellow even know how much strength source he had recently absorbed?

After all, the strength source came from the Holy Being’s power. It was already amazing that a simple warrior, an ordinary martial artist had absorbed tens of thousands of strength source drops. It was more than just a considerable amount!

This year, it was safe to say that the amount of strength source absorbed by any random martial artist was probably equivalent to what had been absorbed in an entire year in the past.

When it came to Zen alone, he himself had absorbed as much as an entire third of the strength source. He had depleted the lake of strength source to near nothingness.

And what if the Holy Being were to discover how much strength source Zen had truly absorbed? Was it too much and would he be asked to give it back?

Feeling a little flustered now, Zen refocused his thoughts and convinced himself that such a thing would never happen.

Within the Sacred Spring Mountain sat a large lake brimming with strength source. Along with it one could find an Eight-diagram Ball that could reverse gravity, forcing the warriors who had entered this place to turn around and leave, back to where they came from. As mentioned by the prophet earlier, this should be the arrangement of his master. And seeing as he had already arranged it as such, it meant that the master didn’t care whether or not warriors entered and absorbed strength source.

The underlying problem here was that Zen had absorbed too much, for one martial artist alone.

If this lake’s strength source was a Holy Being’s full strength, then Zen, having absorbed an entire third to himself, had taken much more than his fair share.

It was then that the prophet noticed a trace of unease on Zen’s face. “The amount of strength source you’ve absorbed is strictly your own business. You obtained the strength through your own capacity and ability. My master doesn’t mind.”

Zen stared for a brief moment, trying to read his expression. Then he asked, “Are you sure he really won’t mind?”

The prophet smiled. “My master has divided the Divine Refinement Forbidden Land warriors into two categories. It doesn’t matter whether they’re from the Divine Land or from the universes.”

“And what are these two categories?” Zen asked.

“Simple. Those who are promising, and those who aren’t,” replied the prophet. Zen kept silent.

This kind of classification was too general, and Zen didn’t know what to say. He thought for a moment and then asked, “What category do I belong to? The promising?”

The prophet shook his head briskly. “No,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone of voice.

“Ah! So I’m not of the promising kind,” Zen said with a bitter smile. He was being snarky, despite not knowing what the so-called promising actually meant.

Unexpectedly, the prophet let out a short but stern sigh. “You don’t belong to either of these two categories. My master set up six great sacred places and he equally arranged six prophets.

The six of us, including myself, help him select martial artists from other races that have entered Divine Refinement Forbidden Land. By doing so, we are better capable of distinguishing which category a martial artist belongs to. However…,” he trailed off. “You belong to the third category.”

“And what’s the third category?” Zen asked.

“A unique category created for those who can transform hope into reality,” the old prophet said as he smiled, the lines and wrinkles on his face deepening as he did so. “In total, we have found seven warriors in the six great sacred places who belong to the third category.

Unfortunately, at least until now, I hadn’t found a warrior that is qualified to be in the third category in the Collapsing Mountain race. The day to change this has finally come.”

At that, Zen began to truly understand why there were restrictions in the Divine Refinement Forbidden Land. The Divine Refinement Forbidden Land was created by a Holy Being. That same Holy Being had created several cultivation places of various sizes – the six great sacred places – and even further created six different races to guard these sacred places. Following such, he then created six extraordinary prophets to quietly observe the numerous outsiders that had entered the sacred places for trial.

In secret observation, the prophets estimated and measured every warrior’s strength, capacity and development.

Martial artists who could obtain purple trial tallies in the Divine Refinement Forbidden Land were already considered outstanding. While improving themselves personally, they equally displayed their strength and talent. This method of selecting warriors based on the standards they demonstrated proved to be effective.

In the past, it had crossed Zen’s mind how the trial tallies didn’t seem to be useful to the Collapsing Mountain race, though the foreign warriors needed to hand over them as a pass to enter the sacred place.

Why did they ask for those trial tallies then? It didn’t make sense to him.

It was not as if the trial tallies could be served for much: they weren’t a source of edible food and could only be used as a currency and exchange system for resources with the other races. That said, the Collapsing Mountain race was completely self-sufficient and lacked no resources whatsoever.

The truth was that the trial tallies were qualifications. They blocked, or prevented, the incapable warriors from entering the six great sacred places just because they wanted to. The trial tallies thus saved them the trouble that might occur in the selection of talents they desired.

“You are the only warrior in our Collapsing Mountain race that meets the requirements of the third category.

Therefore, I can give you this,” the prophet said, as a black trial tally appeared in his hand. “I believe you’re aware of this trial tally’s value,” he said with a smug smile on his face.