Chapter 2106 — Wagering With You
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 2
"Give up? Pull the other one! If you were really capable of giving up, I, Pi Zhifeng, would hand you my head on a platter!" Pi Zhifeng was so incensed by Wei Zhao that he had lost his head entirely.
"What use would I have for your head? How about the two of us make a wager instead—if I do give up, you give me another bottle of that external-body tempering elixir. Deal?" Wei Zhao asked.
"That..." Pi Zhifeng's words had been spoken in the heat of anger, but now that it had actually escalated to the level of a formal wager, he felt a flicker of misgiving.
"Can't make that call, can you? Then forget the bet," Wei Zhao said mildly.
"Take him on! What's one bottle of elixir? If you lose, I'll compensate you with pills!" You Panhu harbored the deepest hatred for Wei Zhao—and for good reason: Wei Zhao had just swindled his family out of two pill cauldrons! Naturally, he was eager for Wei Zhao to forfeit a match.
What was more, in You Panhu's eyes, Wei Zhao's words were nothing but bluster, merely a matter of him having locked horns with Pi Zhifeng. Judging by how Wei Zhao had followed up with "then forget the bet," it seemed Wei Zhao did not truly wish to give up the contest either.
To forfeit a match meant being forced to lose a treasure, all to trade for one bottle of tempering elixir—by any reckoning, no sort of bargain at all. That was precisely why You Panhu kept goading Pi Zhifeng into standing his ground against Wei Zhao.
You Panhu had come to watch the contest today as well; he simply had no chance to speak, and so kept his head down and his light hidden.
"Fine, then I'll take your wager. If you give up the match, I'll give you a bottle of tempering elixir!" Pi Zhifeng said with a nod.
Old Master You looked on as You Panhu opened his mouth, and his lungs nearly burst with fury! Was there something wrong with You Panhu? Telling Wei Zhao to forfeit? If Wei Zhao simply gave up in the final spirit-beast trial, would their whole plan not be for nothing?
But this plan had been laid by the old masters of several families and the heads of the various sects; You Panhu naturally knew nothing of it, and Old Master You could not possibly have revealed it in advance. So in this moment he was seething, silently cursing You Panhu for having far too loose a tongue.
"All right, Old Zhao, can we announce the results now? I'm about to drop dead from exhaustion!" Having finished his wager with Pi Zhifeng, Wei Zhao turned his gaze to Old Master Zhao.
"In this round, the hidden Han family wins. Second place goes to the hidden Pi family, third to the Golden Bell Sect!" Old Master Zhao announced the results. "Will the hidden Han family come claim the stakes; the hidden Pi family and the Golden Bell Sect may withdraw theirs!"
Wei Zhao glanced at the hidden Pi family's stake—it was the Meridian-Opening Pill he had traded to them earlier. Wei Zhao had no interest in it whatsoever, and so refused to exchange anything for it. Pi Zhifeng gave Wei Zhao a cold look, then, pill in hand, left together with Pi Zhitao and Old Master Pi, without another word.
The hidden Pi family had been lucky indeed—they had also won third place in the first contest, breaking even once again.
As for the Golden Bell Sect in third place, Wei Zhao was not surprised. It seemed that external-body practitioners did hold a certain advantage in the sheer might of their martial techniques, but that advantage was confined to brute force against brute force; the techniques of internal practitioners tended more toward skill. Take the Frenzied Flame Fist, for instance—the power born of raw force alone might be somewhat lacking, but with fire-energy to complement it, it could inflict damage on an enemy in combat that they would never anticipate.