Chapter 169: Victory Without Happiness

　　Lu Mingshu went back to the tent absent-mindedly. There were lots of congratulations, but she was too worried to care.

　　The other tents were filled with heated discussion.

　　“Why did Kou Wei surrender?”

　　“Yeah, he was about to win anyway!”

　　“Did he let her win? The Heavenly Sea Pavilion isn’t that shameless!”

　　“Shut up!” A Spirit Realm elder finally stopped their discussion. “It’s normal that he lost. How could he continue after he lost motivation?”

　　“Senior Uncle, could you explain what happened?” The disciples all chattered continuously.

　　He sighed in annoyance. “For this match… the Five Dragons Playing with the Pearl is a secret skill of the Heavenly Sea Pavilion. Kou Wei managed to master this skill even when he’s in the Harmonization Realm, which shows that he’s very gifted.”

　　“So he should’ve won!”

　　“Yes, he should’ve.” The senior uncle explained patiently. “But because of the fact that he’s in the Harmonization Realm, no matter how strong his basics are, he doesn’t have a lot of mystic force. When he used that skill, he put most of his mystic force into it. So…”

　　“Oh!” The disciple suddenly realized. “Because most of his mystic force was being controlled, he didn’t have much left to use freely. So, there was no point in trying to defend anymore because his actions were limited while Lu Mingshu’s weren’t.”

　　“Yes.” The senior uncle sighed. “Kou Wei should’ve won this match, but things are always unpredictable.”

　　Who would have thought that Lu Mingshu would have such a strong spiritual tool? The skill that was initially supposed to give him the win became his own downfall.

　　“Huh, so that means Lu Mingshu didn’t win after all! She was only able to control his dragons all thanks to her spiritual tool!”

　　The senior uncle rolled his eyes. “There are a lot of competitors who used spiritual tools, so she’s not going against the rules. Even if her spiritual tool is powerful, that’s her luck, and the win is still hers!”

　　“But…”

　　All the disciples were confused by the sudden turn of the results, but after much consideration, they finally understood why.

　　It was frustrating. Even though Kou Wei himself surrendered, it’s not like Lu Mingshu was actually stronger than him. However, she wasn’t exactly cheating either, so it was still her win.

　　They were unable to react to the sudden change. Most of them sighed and came up with one conclusion; That’s fate!

　　“This…” Yu Kuang stammered. “What the hell!”

　　The last thing he expected was Kou Wei to surrender and let Lu Mingshu have an almost free win.

　　Wei Chunqiu rolled eyes at his reaction. Is this surprising? To win from a position of weakness is not something rare. Only country bumpkins tend to make a fuss.

　　“Senior Brother Wei, why did this happen!?” Yu Kuang clung to him.

　　Wei Chunqiu slapped his hand away and sighed. “Is this more important than your Senior Brother situation? I might be in trouble.”

　　Yu Kuang stared at him blankly for a few seconds before looking at the name list.

　　Lu Mingshu; one hundred and twenty-three points. Wei Chunqiu; ninety-five points. Kou Wei; seventy-three points.

　　Kou Wei lost eighteen points after losing that round. However, there was nobody else other than Lu Mingshu and Wei Chunqiu who had more points than him, so he was still in the top three.

　　At this point, if Wei Chunqiu wanted to be in first, he had to challenge Lu Mingshu. If he won, he would have a hundred and nineteen points and first place.

　　However, Kou Wei wouldn’t just give up like that. The match between him and Wei Chunqiu would still take place, and if he lost, he would drop to ninety-six points and tie with Kou Wei, giving first place to Lu Mingshu.

　　In other words, he needed to defeat both of them to get first.

　　“…there’s nothing different from your original plans?” Yu Kuang scratched his head.

　　“I didn’t expect Lu Mingshu would come this far,” Wei Chunqiu pointed out.

　　Kou Wei had always been his aim, and that was still true. It was just that he needed to win one match more.

　　He wasn’t like those mediocre people who thought that Kou Wei’s time was over and that Wei Chunqiu would defeat him easily. He could clearly tell that Kou Wei was still just as powerful; it was just that Lady Luck was on Lu Mingshu’s side.

　　If it had been Wei Chunqiu, he could only have taken out his secret technique when Kou Wei used that skill. Even then, he wasn’t guaranteed to win.

　　“At most, only Kou Wei would be better than you, but you would still be better than everyone else. Aren’t I right?” Yu Kuang tried to calm him down.

　　Wei Chunqiu stared at him coldly. “Shut up you cabbage. Can’t you see that Kou Wei just lost? You don’t even know how to console others.”

　　On the other hand, Lu Mingshu just returned to earth.

　　She felt like everything was a dream. How could she possibly defeat Kou Wei?

　　“Junior Sister Lu,” Shao Zhengyang looked at her with a complicated look. “Congratulations.”

　　Kou Wei just lost a round, and what was left now was the match between her and Wei Chunqiu and the match between Wei Chunqiu and Kou Wei. No matter what, she would definitely be in second at least. If Wei Chunqiu defeated both her and Kou Wei, she would be second, and if Wei Chunqiu lost to Kou Wei, she would be first.

　　For Kou Wei, a win would give him a tie with Wei Chunqiu. If he lost, that would give his third place to Yue Lingyin.

　　Shao Zhengyang once thought that this junior sister of his was too young – that she still wasn’t experienced enough to know how to deal with people properly and gain benefits. He thought that securing third place would be better than continuing to fight.

　　But now… the last thing he expected was for her to defeat Kou Wei, regardless of the method. No matter what her rank was now, she would definitely become famous.

　　Lu Mingshu shook her head. “I’m really lucky.”

　　She finally knew what was going on.

　　The win was totally by luck. It was all because An Tongchen gave her the spiritual tool, and by chance, she found that it was very useful to reinforce its ability with a talisman.

　　When Kou Wei used his skill, she had no choice but to use the spiritual tool, but she never would’ve thought that she would happen to use it with a talisman that could confine mystic force.

　　Kou Wei’s ability was suddenly confined for an unknown reason, leaving him in panic.

　　To be honest, he would surely have won if he hadn’t surrendered. However, he still had to fight Wei Chunqiu later on, so he wanted to save some energy for later.

　　This made Lu Mingshu admire him more. Kou Wei had a famous reputation now; it was easy for him to win, but not lose. Losing to a newbie like her would definitely affect his reputation.

　　If he was smart enough, he would have just defeated Lu Mingshu first before worrying about the match. Even if he was drained and lost his next match, his reputation wouldn’t have been affected very much; firstly, he wouldn’t have been in his best state, and secondly, Wei Chunqiu had the same amount of reputation. Losing to Wei Chunqiu wasn’t shameful.

　　But Kou Wei didn’t do that. The match with Lu Mingshu was full of surprises, and it was his loss since he forgot that competitors could bring in talismans and spiritual tools, so he didn’t prepare himself for that. To Kou Wei, the match with Wei Chunqiu held a lot more value.

　　Even though she had won this round, Lu Mingshu didn’t even feel happy.

　　On the contrary, she became even warier. Compared to Kou Wei, she had a long way to go.