Following Ye Zhen directly defeating Yun Ce and achieving a crucial victory, there was no longer any suspense in the Spirit Returning ranking tournament.
Originally, the Sun and Moon Divine Sect was leading by over one hundred points ahead of Heavenly Net Sect and Qingyun Castle, and now Ye Zhen was set to become the undisputed first place in the Spirit Returning ranking tournament, receiving double the points for first place.
Thus, with Ye Zhen’s current score of one hundred forty points doubled, it would turn into two hundred eighty points.
In this scenario, the Sun and Moon Divine Sect’s score would increase by one hundred forty points, widening the gap between them and Heavenly Net Sect and Qingyun Castle to over two hundred forty points.
With such a large gap, even if one between Heavenly Net Sect and Qingyun Castle managed to get both second and third places, obtaining the scoring bonuses for these positions, they would still not surpass the Sun and Moon Divine Sect’s score.
Thus, after Ye Zhen dominated Yun Ce, he had already become the first place winner in the Spirit Returning ranking tournament, and the Sun and Moon Divine Sect had already secured victory in the Spirit Returning Assembly.
Although the contest was still ongoing, it no longer held any meaning.
Almost all the remaining fights saw participants conceding voluntarily, as by this point, there was no need to continue fighting.
As for combat experience, most people had endured tough battles over the three days, fighting over ten matches and were exhausted, both physically and mentally; no one lacked one or two more fights.
Under such circumstances, the final fourth and fifth rounds of combat concluded quickly.
However, a minor incident occurred during the fifth round.
The incident, too, involved Ye Zhen.
In the fourth match of the fifth round, Qingyun Castle’s Yun Xin challenged Ye Zhen. Despite Qingyun Castle Master Yun Chongxiao having already conceded, Yun Xin frenziedly stormed the Martial Arena, shouting and challenging Ye Zhen.
Within Qingyun Castle, Yun Xin had the closest relationship with Yun Ce. Upon discovering that Yun Ce had become an idiot, Yun Xin was the first to lose his temper, making a scene and seeking to fight Ye Zhen to the death, even defying the Clan Leader’s orders to rush onto the Martial Arena.
Since there was already deadly enmity between Ye Zhen and Qingyun Castle, Ye Zhen did not mind delivering another harsh blow. Surely it could not be that only Qingyun Castle’s martial artists could plot to kill Ye Zhen without letting Ye Zhen counter them?
Unfortunately, in the end, neither Ye Zhen nor Yun Xin’s schemes were successful.
While Yun Xin was madly challenging Ye Zhen, Qingyun Castle Master Yun Chongxiao charged onto the Martial Arena, knocked out Yun Xin, and took him back.
The Yun Family had already lost a top genius with Yun Ce. If they were to lose more talented martial artists like Yun Xin, the cornerstone of their generation would indeed be finished.
Before long, the final battle of the Spirit Returning ranking tournament ended with this farce.
The Spirit Returning Assembly, highly valued by the Five Great Forces, thus concluded!
Although everyone understood that the first place belonged to Ye Zhen and the final victory to the Sun and Moon Divine Sect, they still proceeded to the scoring phase.
First came the calculation of individual scores in the Spirit Returning ranking tournament.
Without a doubt, Ye Zhen achieved first in points with fifteen victories in fifteen battles. However, there was some controversy over who was second in points.
Among the seed players from the Five Great Forces, nothing was certain between Heavenly Net Sect’s Shang Lingqi and Qingyun Castle’s Yun Ce. From the fifteen battles, both Shang Lingqi and Yun Ce won twelve and lost three, both scoring one hundred twenty points.
In the end, second place in points was given to the now-idiotic Yun Ce, who, compared to Shang Lingqi’s record, had once fought to the death against Yan Yijun, and despite losing, had that tough battle to his credit.
Whereas Shang Lingqi had not only lost to Yun Ce, he had also won against Yan Yijun by default after Ye Zhen had killed Yan Yijun, effectively receiving a bye.
Eventually, the leaders of the Five Great Forces decided that Yun Ce would be second in points, and Shang Lingqi would be third.
There were disputes over second and third places, and similarly, there were disagreements regarding the fourth and fifth places in points.
The dispute over the fifth and fourth places in points involved Nian Xinghe and Yan Yijun.
It should be mentioned, the rules of the Spirit Returning ranking tournament state that death does not erase points!
Even if a martial artist dies in battle, their points still exist and can still accrue to their respective force. Therefore, even though Yan Yijun was dead, he still had a ranking.
Yan Yijun had undefeated streaks up until the second round of the third day, when he was slain by Ye Zhen. While Nian Xinghe only lost to the seed players of the Five Great Forces, including defeating White Bone Young Master Lio Kechu by default, also gaining a bye due to Ye Zhen’s victory.
According to the rules, the ranking was still to be decided by the leaders of the Five Great Forces, or rather, the Four Great Forces.
In the end, Yan Yijun, with a strong record, was decided to be fourth in points while Nian Xinghe fell to fifth.
Do not underestimate the determination of these ranks.
In this Spirit Returning ranking tournament, ranks are proclaimed throughout the Jianghu, and renown is not a trivial matter. Every rank difference corresponds to different standings in the Jianghu, thus, the formalities were thoroughly observed.
After this, ranking the others became relatively simple, though there were still two pairs with the same points that required decision on ranks, such as Zuo Xiong and Heavenly Net Sect’s Luo Xin.
Both had scores of eighty points, but in the end, Zuo Xiong was slightly better and was decided to be ninth, while Luo Xin was eleventh.
Stars Tower’s Xing Fei, due to leaving early, ended up with twenty points and ranked fourteenth.
Taking fifteenth place was Longevity Sect’s White Bone Young Master Lio Kechu, with ten points.
The last place was occupied by Qingyun Castle’s Yun Feng. The slain by Shang Lingqi’s Yun Feng also accumulated ten points but was decided to be sixteenth!
This is the personal points ranking of martial artists.
Next are the points rankings of the Five Great Forces.
Undoubtedly, the Sun and Moon Divine Sect achieved the first place in force points with a high score of 490, while Qingyun Castle, including Yun Ce’s second-place addition, scored 310 points to become second.
The Heavenly Net Sect scored 300 points and ranked third, followed by the Stars Tower, which scored 130 points, and the last place went to the Longevity Sect, which ambitiously sought first place but only scored 120 points.
The moment the points were announced, Yin Changsheng, the Longevity Sect Master, was visibly upset.
This edition of the Spirit Returning Assembly earned the worst results of the last five sessions for the Longevity Sect.
Further infuriating Yin Changsheng was that Ye Zhen, previously marked in the Longevity Sect’s Soul Hook Ledger, was the one responsible for all this chaos!
Ye Zhen was still alive and had even slain the White Bone Young Master Lio Kechu of the Longevity Sect, solidly positioning them at the bottom.
In Jianghu, although the rankings of the Five Great Forces were not as crucial as individual martial artist rankings, they still had significant implications, especially being in last place, which had a profoundly negative effect!
In short, many martial artists view the points ranking of the Five Great Forces as a reflection of the forces’ strengths.
Before pledging allegiance to a force, many martial artists would heavily rely on those rankings as a reference.
Perhaps being ranked second or third did not matter much, but most people would absolutely not choose the Longevity Sect, which was ranked last.
This was exactly why Yin Changsheng was depressed to the point of nausea.
What depressed Yin Changsheng even more was that when he searched the possessions of the deceased White Bone Young Master Lio Kechu, he did not find his Mid-grade Spirit Artifact, the Soul Capturing Jade Skull.
The storage ring was present, and the battle was witnessed by all, but the Mid-grade Spirit Artifact Soul Capturing Jade Skull had disappeared.
This was a Mid-grade Spirit Artifact after all.
After searching for two days without success, Yin Changsheng was so anxious that he felt like he was burning up.
Of course, this incident made Yin Changsheng realize why Lio Kechu had not used the Mid-grade Spirit Artifact Soul Capturing Jade Skull when fighting Ye Zhen.
Because it was already gone by then.
Latter on, Yin Changsheng deduced that Lio Kechu probably lost the Mid-grade Spirit Artifact Soul Capturing Jade Skull inside the Trial Secret Realm.
And the most likely person to have acquired the Mid-grade Spirit Artifact Soul Capturing Jade Skull was Ye Zhen.
Because previous information had revealed that Ye Zhen had once severed Lio Kechu’s arm within the Trial Secret Realm, of course, these were conclusions drawn after much contemplation.
"Ladies and gentlemen, are there any objections to the rankings of this Spirit Returning Assembly?" asked Wug Mengshan, the host of the Assembly. He felt like his heart was bleeding as he spoke these words.
This meant that the Heavenly Net Sect had once again lost out on the Supreme Spiritual Vein, which they had benefited from for five years... they knew too well the advantages it offered.
The statement itself was a formality. Who could object? What could the objections be?
"If so, then please sign the Jade Talisman to complete the final procedure!"
Next, Wug Mengshan took out a purple Jade Talisman and passed it to the leaders of the Five Great Forces. Each leader imprinted their Divine Soul Imprint on it, and for the Stars Tower, the imprint was sealed by Deacon using an artifact left by the Stars Tower Master, Yan Cong.
The moment the imprinting was complete, Wug Mengshan shook his hand, and the purple Jade Talisman flew into the central cloud of the platform and disappeared.
Soon after, a large, sealed Jade Scroll suddenly flew out and landed in Wug Mengshan’s hands.
Wug Mengshan greedily glanced at it, reluctantly handing the sealed Jade Scroll to the beaming Sun and Moon Divine Sect Leader, Jian Qianxiong.
While others were confused by this spectacle, Ye Zhen discerned some meaning from it.
The Jade Talisman just now must have communicated with a terrifying existence within the Immortal Realm Spiritual Veins — an ancestral demon. Then, according to some agreement, that ancestral demon had provided something, perhaps an artifact or a promise of sorts.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we will now conduct the last item of this Spirit Returning Assembly, awarding the prizes to the top three competitors of the Spirit Ranking Contest!"
Upon hearing this, Ye Zhen and Shang Lingqi’s eyes suddenly lit up, while other competing martial artists showed envy. Yun Ce of Qingyun Castle, however, continued to blissfully play with mud and drool.
"As per the rules of the Spirit Returning Assembly, the awards are to be provided by the forces whose martial artists did not make it into the top three. For this Assembly, those would be the Longevity Sect and the Stars Tower!"
Upon hearing Wug Mengshan announce this, Ye Zhen was overjoyed. The Holy Medicine of the Longevity Sect — Longevity Holy Water was finally within reach, though he was not sure how much he would receive.
Yin Changsheng, the Longevity Sect Master, once again darkened in expression!
After such a tremendous loss, they still had to provide treasures for the prizes; the sentiment was truly agonizing...
"For this Spirit Returning Assembly, the Longevity Sect will provide... Longevity Holy Water,"
"It’s actually Longevity Holy Water, known as a Sacred Healing Medicine and life-saving Divine Artifact!"
Once announced, many martial artists were astonished, casting envious glances towards Ye Zhen and Shang Lingqi, including elders, protectors from various forces, and even members of the Sun and Moon Divine Sect like Zhu Ling, Tian Guizhang, and Jio Yuanxiu.
"The reward provided by the Stars Tower will be..." Wug Mengshan deliberately elongated his tone! (To be continued. If you like this work, please visit qidian.com to vote for it and cast your monthly votes. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users please read at m.qidian.com.)

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