Chapter 1568: Rising Stars' Cup Ranking

Every bone in Zhang Lie's body shone with a faint golden aura, like dragons in miniature. They howled, shaking the entire realm.

Burgeoning vitality emerged from his body, causing bone, blood, and flesh to resonate.

Incredible vitality nourished his body and caused it to gleam with light.

Zhang Lie was reforging his truesoul and growing stronger than ever. His latent talent was blossoming.

The vitality in his body gushed forth, stronger than ever before.

His bones gleamed with radiant light. The faint golden sheen that they had given off turned red.

His body glowed with a sheen like that of top-quality jade.

His long hair lay draped over his shoulders, and his eyes were clear and limpid. He looked almost divine in nature and being.

His blood boiled, rumbling like thunder, a frightening sight to behold.

His status of life had just risen by one level, but the transformation wasn't yet over. His genes were still to be expanded.

His blood and flesh creaked loudly as frightening strength welled up from deep within his body.

All of his bones were snowy-white, crystalline, and lustrous.

His flesh and blood gleamed like jade, overflowing with strength.

After the genetic expansion, Zhang Lie's reforged body returned to the dimensional realm in a stream of light, conferring endless benefits to his physical body.

His body in the dimensional realm underwent a transformation in kind.

His bones cracked. He shuddered in overwhelming pain as natural law seeped into his very bones.

The bones shattered and reforged, a process that looked as though it would continue for quite some time.

Within the stars, which the members of Team Zenith believed to be the fifth realm, the end of the Rising Stars' Cup marked the end of an era and the start of a new one.

The virtual realm on which the Cup had been hosted collapsed, shocking the entire universe.

𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

The virtual realm had always been exceptionally stable. It had never crashed before.

By questioning the competitors that had most recently emerged from the Cup, the spectators learned of a name: the eighth Immortal King, a man who had once conquered the universe before vanishing all of a sudden.

The genius of Starbright Academy, Feng Xian; the rising star of the Leiting Domain, Leiting Zi; the pride and joy of the Holywings, Sheng Gu... Cultivators famed across the universe confirmed that they had witnessed the eighth Immortal King in the ancient hall that formed the end of the Cup. It was clear that the eighth Immortal King had been preparing for some sort of endgame.

Many among the universe believed that the destruction of the virtual realm had to do with the eighth Immortal King, who had vanished and reappeared in an astounding fashion.

Other than the eighth Immortal King, no one could have done so.

However, the eighth Immortal King himself, the subject of all this discussion, had vanished. Many believed that the Hall of Immortals was responsible.

The Hall of Immortals was closed. No response or inquiry was answered.

The fact that the Hall of Immortals was recognized as the most ancient power in the universe meant that it had a reservoir of strength.

No one could do anything about the Hall of Immortals in the short term.

While the entire universe attempted to hunt down the eighth Immortal King to understand what had happened, the results from the Cup were announced publicly.

In first place, Zhang Lie; in second place, Sun Xiaowu; in third place, Zhou Ying; in fourth place, Yang Ze; in fifth through seventh places, Sun Mengmeng, Li Feng, and Fang Yi; in eighth place...

Zhang Lie's ranking was indisputable. When the heavenly cordon finally made it into the ancient hall, none of the members of Team Zenith resisted or fought among each other.

They allowed the heavenly cordon's might to strike their bodies. Sun Xiaowu had received tremendous benefits during the tournament, and had managed to survive until the very end. Zhou Ying's strength when it came to vitality and resilience was unparalleled, whereas Yang Ze boasted impressive dimensional ability and was able to hide in a high-dimensional space and survive to take fourth place.

Meanwhile, Sun Mengmeng, Li Feng, and Fang Yi had been eliminated near-simultaneously, whereas the eighth place and beyond were represented by those competitors who were the last to make it to the ancient hall.

In the end, none of the lauded geniuses who had chosen to side with the eighth Immortal King had managed to place among the top ten.

The whole universe was taken aback. This was an upheaval of the natural order of things, an outcome no one would have expected.

Compared to the potential destruction of the virtual realm by the eighth Immortal King, this was clearly far more impactful.

Before the results of the Cup were made known, everyone had been wondering whether the genius of Starbright Academy, Feng Xian, would be stronger than the rising star of the Leiting domain, Leiting Zi, or perhaps the pride and joy of the Holywings, Sheng Gu. Some others favored the Immortal King's substitute, and a small minority believed in the strength of Team Zenith.

No one, however, expected such a devastating outcome.

The supreme forces of the universe felt as though they had lost much of their reputation.

The Rising Stars' Cup had always been a fight among the young generation of talents among the supreme forces. That was why the elders of those forces had been willing to provide their intuition and insight as prizes for the cup, as rewards for the younger generation to strife for.

To them, the Cup was nothing more than a game played among the supreme forces.

Unexpectedly, however, there was a huge upset that year. Not only had the virtual realm collapsed, none of the top ten competitors had come from the supreme forces.

Many believed that Zhang Lie and the members of Team Zenith had taken advantage of some underhanded strategy.

After all, even the eighth Immortal King had appeared in the competition. How could he have lost to any of the competitors?

Who would believe that?

The genius of Starbright Academy, Feng Xian; the pride and joy of the Holywings, Sheng Gu; the Immortal King's substitute... None of them spoke up to confirm or deny the allegations being made.

The conversation grew even more heated. Everyone wanted to learn about the winners of the Cup.

However, they seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. Who knew where they came from, what race they belonged to, and where they were now?

The lack of information about these purported winners was shocking.

Many claimed that Zhang Lie and the others had cheated like the Splitsilver race, perhaps with methods that were even more advanced.

The Splitsilver race had even issued a bounty for the location of Zhang Lie and the other members of Team Zenith, claiming that they would purchase whatever cheats that they had used at an exorbitant rate, but they received no response. After all, Zhang Lie and the others were unable to see what sort of fuss they had caused.

Many criticized Zhang Lie and the other members of Team Zenith until Leiting Zi of the Leiting Domain finally stepped forward and put an end to the rumors. He vouched for Team Zenith's strength, claiming that they had managed to make their way into the ancient hall with their own abilities and had even managed to take down the lauded geniuses that stood with the eighth Immortal King. Whether they took down the eighth Immortal King in the end, however, he didn't know.

He also described his own experience taking down Leiting Ya with the help of Fang Yi.

Leiting Zi's testimony caused a huge stir.