Three days later, the cold morning mist over Central Capital Plaza burned away under a brilliant, wintry sun.
In the center of the vast plaza rose the ancient Heavenly Dragon Martial Stage, a three-hundred-foot square platform carved from enchanted black basalt.
Surrounding the stage were thirty thousand spectators packed into tiered viewing stands.
High-ranking imperial ministers in purple robes, wealthy merchants, martial sect masters, and thousands of commoners had gathered from across the Nine Provinces. Everyone wanted to see whether Lin Mo’s newly founded commoner university could survive the martial challenge of the four-hundred-year-old Imperial Immortal Academy.
Around the perimeter of the plaza, noble bookmakers had set up lavish gambling stalls.
They were offering staggering odds of one hundred to one against Taichu University.
“Place your bets!” a bookie in a silk vest shouted, waving stacks of golden betting chits. “Taichu University’s mud-legs will be carried out on stretchers in ten breaths! Easy money for the noble houses!”
However, in the commoner sections, thousands of street-sweepers, cabbage farmers, and delivery riders were pooling their silver coins and betting on Han Yu.
