Inner Court Entry and Death Fortress Training

The next morning, Su Han awoke to find her injuries mostly healed. Her strength had also improved, though a complete breakthrough eluded her. Still, it was a fruitful gain, pushing her from the early Fourth Tier to the mid-Fourth Tier. Most importantly, she had taken that crucial step, successfully entering the Inner Court!

“Xiao Han, did you rest well? Shall I take you on a tour of the Inner Court, help you get acquainted?”

“Hmm? Instructor Ruolin?” Su Han rose, ushering Instructor Ruolin into her room. “Shouldn’t you be in the Outer Court?” she then inquired.

“Ah? Well, I… I…” Ruolin stammered, a hint of deliberate concealment in her tone.

Growing impatient, Su Han urged, “What is it? Tell me quickly!”

“Because I know the Dean of the Inner Court, I asked them to arrange for me to be transferred here,” Ruolin explained. “This way, I can still be your instructor in the Inner Court!”

“Hey, wait, you don’t actually like me, do you?”

“Heh, was I found out?”

“Damn, a yuri romance? No way!” ‘Still, I have my hands. Perhaps a yuri romance isn’t entirely out of the question,’ Su Han mused, gazing at her slender fingers as her mind wandered.

“Eh? Xiao Han? Wake up!” “You’re drooling!” Ruolin waved her hand, rousing the daydreaming Su Han.

“Huh? What? Oh, oh!” Su Han quickly reached to wipe her mouth. To her surprise, there was no drool at all.

“You tricked me, you rascal!”

“Hehe~”

“Here, your identity token.” Ruolin produced a silver token from her bosom, handing it to Su Han. A woman with a generous bosom certainly had the privilege of tucking things away there.

“Can I use the points on this identity token to access the Inner Court’s library for information now?” Su Han inquired.

“Given your second-place overall performance in the recent competition, you’ve been granted free access to the first five floors of the library for one week!”

The library comprised seven floors in total, with the higher levels housing increasingly valuable books, secret techniques, and spells.

“Of course, you also have an additional thousand contribution points,” Ruolin explained with a sweet smile. “As long as you possess contribution points, you can enjoy all facilities within the Inner Court.”

“Oh, right, the Inner Court has a power ranking called the Heavenly Scroll,” she added. “You should try participating! The top hundred ranks all come with VIP privileges within the Inner Court, and the higher your ranking, the greater the benefits and special rights you’ll receive!”

“Me… can I?” Su Han asked, a flicker of excitement stirring within her.

“Let me see your identity token.”

“Oh.”

Ruolin reached out, taking Su Han’s identity token. “There are a total of one thousand one hundred and forty-three students in the Inner Court, and your current strength ranks you at seven hundred and thirty-three,” she stated. “However, to make it onto the Heavenly Scroll, you must rank within the top one hundred.”

“If you work hard for a few more months, I think you could break into the top hundred, perhaps even securing a spot around the eighties!”

“Who are the top ten on the Heavenly Scroll?” Su Han asked. Her aim was to ascertain Bailuan’s true strength, as she hadn’t fully believed Bailuan’s previous claims.

“Hmm… First is Ye Qi, second is Bailuan, third is Michele, fourth is Sima Yunxi, and fifth is Zulong Qin…” Ruolin enumerated clearly, counting on her fingers.

“Bailuan… he ranks second?”

“Yes, among all the students in Cangnan Academy, his strength ranks second!” Ruolin affirmed, her voice tinged with pride, assuming Su Han was interested in Bailuan.

‘Second throughout the entire Cangnan Academy?’

Su Han was indeed interested in Bailuan, though not in the way Ruolin imagined. “Oh, it’s no big deal. Isn’t Ye Qi still ranked first?” Su Han said casually. What surprised her, however, was Michele’s third-place ranking. It seemed those two High Elf women were far from simple.

“That’s not necessarily true,” Ruolin countered. “I heard that when Ye Qi and Bailuan dueled back then, Bailuan didn’t use his full strength. He‘s a Divine Mecha Master, yet he didn’t deploy his mecha during that fight with Ye Qi!”

“If Bailuan has hidden cards, do you think Ye Qi wouldn’t?” Su Han retorted with a playful smile.

“True. Indeed, the top ten on the Heavenly Scroll are all incredibly powerful!” Ruolin nodded. “So, our Xiao Han will have to work very, very hard!”

“Hmph, you underestimate me~” “Come on, take me to register!” Su Han declared, grabbing Ruolin’s small hand and setting off without another word.

“Ah? You’re going right now?”

“Why not?”

With her strength significantly boosted, Su Han’s confidence was naturally soaring. She was eager to test herself against the Heavenly Scroll.

“It’s not that I think your current strength is lacking, but listen,” Ruolin began. “The ranking competition starts in a month. At that time, you can freely challenge anyone you wish!” “Let’s go then, after a month!”

The scope for challenges was limited: one could not challenge anyone ranked more than fifty positions above themselves. For instance, if Su Han were ranked one hundred, she could challenge up to the fiftieth position, but not the forty-ninth or any higher. Of course, she could challenge anyone ranked below one hundred, but such challenges would hold little meaning.

“Alright then.”

During that month, Su Han spent all three thousand of her contribution points. Every single point was invested in tempering her body and refining her bloodline.

Furthermore, Ye Qi brought Su Han to the secret base of the back mountain training grounds: the Death Fortress, to begin special training.

“Is this the Death Fortress?” Su Han exclaimed, genuinely awestruck by the tide-like swarm of undead creatures within.

The Death Fortress was a magical array created using a specialized alchemy method, based on the necromantic spell ‘Tide of Death’. Its purpose was to summon undead creatures to temper bloodline cultivators.

The ‘Tide of Death’ was a Seventh-tier necromantic magic array. Powered by a Seventh-tier Nightmare Crystal Core, it could summon hundreds, even thousands, of undead creatures from the Spirit World. Most were below the Fourth Tier, though a few possessed Fifth-tier strength.

Beholding the snow-white Skeleton Warriors and the grotesque, putrid-green Abomination Zombies within the Tide of Death, Su Han was startled. It was her first encounter with undead creatures, and she found herself quite unaccustomed to the sight.

“Your mission is to eliminate the three Fifth-tier Stone Golems within the Tide of Death,” Ye Qi stated, before lifting Su Han by her collar and tossing her into the swirling necrotic mass.

“Ah, no… no way,” Su Han stammered, swallowing hard as she stared at the gargoyles in the center of the Tide of Death.

Their pallid skin, canine-like faces, bipedal stance, sharp claws, and ghastly white fleshy wings were a horrifying sight. The sight of their translucent, unnerving membranes sent shivers down her spine.

“Go,” Ye Qi said expressionlessly. “You can only come out once you’ve killed them.”

“Th-that, Instructor Ye Qi, someone could die!” Su Han stammered, trembling.

Ye Qi, however, paid her no heed, simply turning and walking away.

With no other choice, Su Han grimaced and charged forward.

There was no avoiding the fight; the three gargoyles were already pouncing towards Su Han with ravenous hunger.

Su Han activated Gluttony, plunging into the ocean of undead to begin her slaughter.

The weaker First-tier Skeleton Warriors and Second-tier Abomination Zombies were too insignificant to warrant her full attention during the battle.

The pallid gargoyles opened their massive mouths, spewing forth colossal orbs that radiated an eerie chill. These spheres floated through the air, slowly rolling towards Su Han.

These enormous, aquamarine ice spheres drifted through the air, pushing straight towards Su Han. Wisps of frigid air, frozen by their passage, were visible, as were trails of ice left in their wake. They crushed everything in their path, flattening hordes of undead creatures into fragments.

Su Han concentrated her blood to her feet, then abruptly burst forward, using the ice spheres’ momentum to deftly evade them. The massive orbs then detonated amidst the undead hordes, blasting countless creatures into fragments, freezing them into ice sculptures, and shattering them into shards.

Su Han instinctively recoiled, her neck drawing back as she witnessed the undead blasted to smithereens.

‘Huh? These ice spheres look clumsy, but their power is immense!’ ‘They’re stronger than TNT!’

The gargoyles shrieked, attempting to attack again. But would Su Han allow them to succeed? Never.

Driven by a desire for extreme self-improvement, Su Han no longer hesitated. She pushed past her physical limits, overdrafting her stamina and accelerating her next stage of Draconification, transforming into a dragon to enter the fray. With a mighty Dragon’s Tail Sweep, she cleared the undead horde, creating an open battleground. Then, gathering her strength, she converted all her magic into pure arcane energy, unleashing a scorching, incandescent blast of Dragon’s Breath.

Confronted by the Dragon’s Breath, imbued with the oppressive might of draconic prestige, the lesser undead creatures quailed with primal terror. Even the three Stone Golems displayed expressions of profound fear.

Yet, facing the imminent threat of death, the gargoyles were clearly unwilling to back down. Their chests pulsed with a green light as they spewed corrosive magma fireballs from their mouths, attempting a desperate last stand.

However, no matter how large the fireballs, they could not withstand the might of the Dragon’s Breath. The massive fireballs were instantly consumed by the torrent, then annihilated within the Dragon’s Breath, dissolving into wisps of white smoke.

Undead creatures were considerably weaker than their counterparts of the same tier and harbored an innate fear of flames. Thus, all three vulnerable gargoyles were reduced to ash under the scorching Dragon’s Breath.

“Phew, it’s finally over!” Su Han breathed, wiping away the cold sweat on her brow, a hand pressed to her chest as she spoke with a lingering sense of alarm.

Following this, Su Han’s visits to the back mountain grew increasingly frequent. Almost every two or three days, she would immerse herself in the blood pool, then continue her practical combat training under Michele’s relentless ‘tutelage,’ absorbing valuable experience. The rest of her time was spent training in the gravity chamber. By now, Su Han could endure training under one hundred times normal gravity.

Consequently, her strength surged proportionally. She had now reached the early Fifth-tier Bloodline, and had truly mastered the bloodline skill [Draconification], no longer needing to push past her limits for only a few minutes of transformation.

A month’s time was neither long nor short, but for Su Han, it passed rather uneventfully. Her days were a steady rhythm of repeating the same routines.

A month later, the winds of change began to stir, and the martial world braced for upheaval. The annual strength ranking competition was about to commence, and Su Han, guided by Ruolin, had already signed up in advance.