After the Sacred Summit students left, Li Luo turned to Qin Zhulu. "How're the wounds?"

Qin Zhulu brushed aside his concern. "Nothing major. But that guy's strong."

He looked in the direction that Sun Dasheng had gone in, eyes still burning bright. That was exactly the sort of opponent he would love to fight against. If it wasn't for the fact that they were in the middle of a competition right now, he would have chased Sun Dasheng down already.

Li Luo drew himself up. "If I were your father," he said pompously, "I'd say that I hope you would direct that passion towards the beautiful girls in school and not chase some ugly man. Nothing good will come of it, young man."

Lu Qing'er, Bai Mengmeng, and the other girls giggled.

Qin Zhulu scowled. "Don't make fun of me, bastard."

Lu Qing'er smiled at Li Luo. "So, o' great leader Li Luo, what's our plan?"

The others all looked at him enthusiastically. Holding his ground against Sun Dasheng had won back morale for them, even though neither side had really committed fully.

After all, Sun Dasheng was no ordinary guy. The top three hadn't just emerged out of nowhere. They had each defended their title against a mountain of enemies.

They were survivors, the best of the best. The fact that their leader, Li Luo, could stand up to them placed the Astral Sage College in the running.

It gave them hope that the Astral Sage College might just do well in this competition.

Even the ones most disinclined against him, Wang Hejiu and Duze Beixuan, acknowledged his leadership.

"Let's go find Bai Doudou and Yu Lang," Li Luo said cheerfully with no hesitation.

Indeed, they were still missing one last squad: Bai Doudou, Yu Lang, and Qiu Luo.

Li Luo pulled out his crystal compass. "They're lingering in a particular area. I asked Mengmeng to keep an eye on them every hour, but there's been no distress signal from them. I think they may have found something.

"Since they're not coming, let's go to them," Li Luo said, tapping the crystal compass thoughtfully. They had come here first because Qin Zhulu's situation had been urgent. Now that it was done, Bai Doudou's squad was next on the priority list.

 "Could it be that Yu Lang's found an anima cumulonimbus? If so, he's a real lucky star," Lu Qing'er wondered.

"Who knows?" Li Luo shrugged. Yu Lang was a secret weapon, one so secret that they themselves didn't even know what he did most of the time.

"Prepare to go," he said, leading the way towards Bai Doudou's team.

...

Deep in the mountain range were heavy snow-adorned trees and mountaintops alike with white caps.

In a copse.

Three people were sitting down and resting. Bai Doudou, Yu Lang, and Qiu Luo.

Yu Lang had gathered some wild fruits and cooked them over in melted snow. He offered some to Bai Doudou. "Here, Leader, have some food."

She accepted it grudgingly and took a bite. "You fool. I don't know if you're lucky or unlucky."

Not long after they had entered this region, Yu Lang had indeed stumbled across an anima cumulonimbus. But when he had come rushing back to report the news, they had been overheard by some teams that had been stalking them.

Without information from other teams, it was indeed difficult to hunt down the exact location of anima cumulonimbuses.

"It's not my fault," Yu Lang whined. "Who knew that they would be so sneaky and have snow snakes? Those things burrow through the snow and listen. We can't even see them!"

"You should have just whispered it. Assume the trees and birds have ears," Qiu Luo said.

Yu Lang stared at him. "But-but birds have..."

"Forget it," Bai Doudou interrupted. "The fact remains that Yu Lang found an anima cumulonimbus, and that's a crucial contribution. The turn of events was too coincidental. Not even I noticed those snow snakes."

"Now we just need to hold out. When Li Luo and the others arrive, we'll have nothing to fear."

Qiu Luo folded once he saw that Bai Doudou was defending Yu Lang. "Still, it's strange," he said, changing the subject. "They've gathered quite a few teams, but they aren't making their move yet. It seems like they're afraid of something."

Bai Doudou frowned and nodded. There was no reason why their opponents would not attack them. Still, one thing was certain: reprieve was definitely temporary. With more and more teams gathering around, someone was going to move sooner or later.

It wouldn't be just one school's teams at that point.

"Forget it, ignore them. Let's focus on buying time. Li Luo and the others are on the move already," Bai Doudou said, gesturing at the crystal compass.

Yu Lang and Qiu Luo nodded.

A few teams were gathered in a nearby cluster of trees.

"Liu Xiao, what do you mean? We have the numbers advantage, we should go capture the Astral Sage College team and force them to tell us the exact location," one youth said impatiently.

"They're just one team! Why would we be scared of them? You say that our backup is coming, but if we wait any longer, their backup will be coming too!" The one being questioned was a gaunt youth called Liu Xiao.

"You don't understand, there's more to this team than meets the eye." Liu Xiao shook his head.

"What do you mean?"

"If I'm not mistaken, this might be the Astral Sage College's ace squad," Liu Xiao asserted.

The others gasped. "How do you know?"

"Because there's a guy called Yu Lang."

"Haven't you paid any attention to the intelligence at all?! Yu Lang's name comes up frequently!" 

"Can we believe that information, though?"

Liu Xiao laughed conceitedly. "Indeed, some of the information out there is fake, but this information is undoubtedly true. Coincidentally, our Iron Sands Sage College has a senior called Zhao Ziyang. He went to the Golden Dragon Dao Fields before, and met Yu Lang there.

"Before the Holy Grail Meet, he warned us to be careful of him. He may be the only one besides the Heavenly Inferno Sage College's Lu Ming...

"... who has dual resonances."

His teammates stared at him in consternation.