"Has Xuan Niao released the list of competition participants yet?"

"He said it's open registration; go check it out if you have time," Mo San said, flipping through the form in his hand. "Currently, there are about twenty people: Jue Xun, Guan Hai, Luo Shen, Chen Qingyang, Shen Yue, Yellowstone..."

"So Shen Yue has finally stopped moping? That's good, a good thing."

Older Cousin nodded. "Has Luo Lao replied yet?"

"It depends on what Luo Xian thinks," Mo San shrugged. "Xiao Xian basically has never given a direct response, so it's probably up to her mood."

Older Cousin nodded and didn't say anything more. Taking the participant list of the Astronomical Society from Mo San, he paused. "Huai Shi isn't on the list?"

"He's already registered, as an individual participant... He could have teamed up with the Astronomical Society, but he has been staying in Luo Lao's gym these past few days, and we haven't been able to contact him."

"Is he still in there?" Older Cousin gasped. It seems Luo Lao has truly brought out something extraordinary this time.

After sighing a few times, he buried his head in the reports again, his headache growing worse.

Time kept ticking away relentlessly.

"Is he still in there?"

Luo Lao, returning from a stroll in the evening, heard the clanging of steel from the inner chamber and raised his eyebrows in surprise. "The rookie competition is tomorrow, and he still hasn't given up."

"He seems to be quite spirited," Luo Xian remarked, looking up and listening for a moment. "By the sound of it, he's almost there."

"Hard to say." Luo Lao shook his head. "His footsteps are a bit unsteady now; he's almost out of strength..."

"He came close to succeeding a few times just now," Luo Xian said. "It shouldn't be far off."

"With skills like that, a slight improvement means reaching immeasurable heights—it's not a matter of effort, but of talent and luck," Luo Lao said, sitting down and sipping the protein powder his daughter had prepared. "He's also reaching his limit. At most, he might try once or twice more."

Luo Xian turned to look at the door behind her. "I actually have high hopes for him."

In the inner chamber, footsteps arose again amidst the trembling steel, accompanied by hoarse breathing.

"The breathing rhythm isn't wrong, but the footwork is messy. A pity, no strength left," the old man observed. He paused, then shook his head. "When he faints later, carry him out and dump him..."

At that moment, he saw Luo Xian's eyebrows slightly raise.

Then, he himself was stunned.

A booming sound erupted.

The blast tore through the heavy soundproofing foam, turning into a thunderous roar that spread outwards, causing all the windows in the gym to shake violently. Yet, even more astonishing than the blast was the clear, rising tone mixed within it, growing increasingly sharp!

It was the sonorous hum of steel trembling countless times. Three distinct sounds overlapped, shaking countless pieces of steel. This caused them to resonate, creating a long, river-like reverberation that spread in all directions. Neither walls, windows, nor buildings could withstand it.

From the moment it burst forth, it soared up, spreading its wings. It rose with the night wind, freely soaring in the night sky, as if enveloping the entire Jinling under a fine ripple of Source Substance.

It felt almost sentient.

In that instant, the youth practicing with a gun in the Social Security Bureau, the man sitting quietly and focusing in the Astronomical Society, even the girls wandering the streets and alleys—dozens of Sublimators all looked up at once, gazing towards the source of the sound.

Then, the door, which had been closed for a week, finally opened.

"Who said I couldn't make it?"

Behind the door, Huai Shi staggered out, leaning against the doorframe, barely able to stand. But upon seeing Luo Lao, he proudly raised his head. A look of delight spread over his pale face as he exclaimed, "Just a chord, was that supposed to be hard for me!"

The old man opened his mouth as if to speak.

But before he could, he saw the youth fall straight to the ground, unconscious.

Snoring soon followed. In the silence, father and daughter exchanged glances.

"I told you so. He could make it," Luo Xian said, scrutinizing her father's rare loss of composure. "You guessed wrong."

After a long silence, Luo Lao looked away and continued sipping the protein shake from his shaker, but his shoulders began to shake uncontrollably. Eventually, he couldn't help but throw his head back and laugh out loud.

"Tonghua Wandering Danshan Road, a young phoenix sings clearer than the old..." the old man recited, slapping his thigh joyfully and laughing heartily. "I never expected that at the very last moment, he would give me such a surprise!"

And so, on the very last day before the rookie competition, in the last moments before midnight struck, Huai Shi finally graduated.

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