The First Cultivator - Changing Existence

They both looked at them, and after seeing Mora, stood and bowed.

"Welcome, Young Master." They both said.

It didn't take much thinking for the others on the platform to realize who Mora was.

"So the Ruler of the Scholar Region decided to send his son."

"It seems so. However, who is that riding on the front of the horse?" Another person asked.

From the looks of it, the other person seemed in charge.

The two on the side of the Scholar Region also noticed Skymender.

"And who are you, sir?" One of them asked.

"My name is Skymender. I was sent by the ruler to participate."

This enlightened the other two. Neither of them were young people, and despite Mora being among the most intelligent in the Scholar Region, they would have found it weird if he was sent to participate.

"We've still got half a month until the competition starts. We can get to know each other during that time." One of the two men said.

Skymender nodded and got off of his horse with Mora following behind.

The platform atop the mountain was clearly divided four ways. Skymender saw nine others in total, three in each of the three other sections. Mora was the only person on the mountain that wasn't participating.

There wasn't much conversation between those in different sections. Skymender sat and spoke with the other two people participating.

From what he had learned, they were among the most intelligent scholars in the Scholar Region.

They were much better than any of the scholars on the Continent of Wu. Only the Imperial Scholar would be able to stand above them.

Even on the Mainland, even in a region specifically focused on scholarly attainments, the Imperial Scholar still would have been among the greatest in history.

Half a month passed smoothly. They were not always on top of the mountain. They slept halfway down the mountain in a finely designed cave. Food was brought to them three times a day.

Skymender could see that in the other sections, they trained their skills with their weapons. Each and every person, whether practicing a Sword, Spear, or Bow, were equal to first rank masters.

Of course, it was hard for Skymender to accurately estimate the strength of those from the Spear and Bow regions, but he could imagine it was so.

Luckily, there were no Grandmasters. If there were, then it would mean that the Mainland was far stronger than estimated.

The Emperor had told him that there should be less than five Grandmasters on the Mainland. However, even he wasn't sure of the exact number. It just wouldn't exceed five.

Skymender and the other two sat in their seats as the time for the competition arrived. Mora stayed in the cave, not allowed to go to the top while it was underway.

A person stood in the middle of the four sections on a stand.

"Welcome to the Mainland gathering. This competition has existed for thousands of years. Here, we will not only be comparing each of the regions to each other, but also to the regions of the past."

The man pointed to a bunch of stone steles, ten in each section. They sat on top of each other, forming a top ten ranking of each region throughout history. Skymender had looked at it many times.

This was the 357th Mainland gathering. The first ranked of the Scholar Region was the 355th. The second ranked was the 3rd.

Skymender had already been told that the 355th Mainland gathering had been the only one in which the current Ruler had participated in.

It listed the name of two other people, but the other name was crossed out and erased from the stele. Presumably, it was the name of the Ruler himself.

"We will first begin with the competition between past and present. Throughout many years, the rule of only participating once has been set for the purpose of absolute fairness. Although the tests change every year, they have been reviewed over thousands of years and made equally by a committee of specially trained people never seen throughout their lives."

This applied not only to the Scholar Region, which would be taking a literal test, but those of the other three regions as well, though their competitions would be different.

"There will be two ways to conduct the competition between the regions. One will be based on the ranking. Whoever ranks the highest among those on their historical ranking will win in that way. The second way will be in a joint competition, in which all sides have equal challenges to overcome, determining a ranking based on their performance. But for now, let's begin the test of past and present."

As he finished speaking, twenty people wearing masks reached the top of the mountain. They quickly set up things for all four regions. When they were done, those of the Scholar Region had a test in front of them.

The people of the other four regions all had something different in front of them, but relating to Swords, Spears, or Bows.

Skymender began to take his test. It was an hour long, and with the size of the packet in front of him, it would be impossible to get a perfect score even if he knew all of the answers. It would simply take too long to write it all down.

Skymender flew through the pages going as fast as he could.

As he reached the later points, he began to have to avoid some questions for the sake of time. Although he knew a bit more about the history of the Mainland now, even more than an average person who had lived here all their life, it was shallow.

These were the questions he most often skipped. Others involved rare materials or plants, some of which only grew on the Mainland. Skymender had to skip these as well, though they were notably rarer than the history questions.

After an hour, Skymender put his pencil down and closed the packet, as did the others from the Scholar Region. Similarly, so did the others from the other three regions.