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"It seems the winner of this round will be Immortal Di Yanbo."

"..."

The audience buzzed with discussions, while the various factions on the high platform couldn't help but glance at the Lord of Bai Feng Island.

The Master of Zhanhai Pavilion, displeased, said sarcastically, "That's truly shameless of you, Fellow Daoist Di, to have your saintess participate—isn't this picking on the younger competitors?"

He might as well have added: picking on his granddaughter.

The Lord of Bai Feng Island wore an arrogant expression, as if looking right through her. "Strength is also a criterion for the competition."

The Master of Zhanhai Pavilion nearly bit through his lip in anger, seething inwardly: "Indeed, our Zizi is still too young, no match for someone decades her senior. She's just a child..."

This was a clear jab at Di Yanbo's advanced age, implying she had no business joining the Sea Immortal pageant.

As the two Emperor Yuan Realm cultivators traded insults, none of the onlookers dared to interject. The only one who could speak up, Min Kuanglang, remained indifferent, just like Min Mubei, both intently watching Wen Qiao's every move in the scrying mirror.

Since entering the water, Wen Qiao had been taking her sweet time. She and Liu Zizi stayed together like close sisters, meandering about, even pausing to inspect coral reefs along the way.

Compared to the other female cultivators scrambling to find sea beasts carrying Aqua Pearls, these two seemed completely unconcerned, as if they weren't even competing.

Suddenly, someone blurted out.

"Look, are all the sea beasts gathering in one direction?"

"It seems so. What are they doing?"

"Ah, they seem to have stopped..."

"..."

Amidst the gasps of the cultivators, the sea beasts swarmed toward a small coral reef, encircling it.

Then, a ninth-tier king octopus appeared, flailing its massive tentacles to herd the other sea beasts forward.

At the sight of this ninth-tier king octopus, Qin Hongdao and the others fell silent.

Under the watchful eyes of the crowd, the ninth-tier king octopus approached the two female cultivators by the coral reef. It wielded its thick tentacles, nudging the other sea beasts forward, then gestured for the two to collect the Aqua Pearls from them.

One, two, three, four...

Like shimmering blue treasures, the Aqua Pearls might as well have jumped into the hands of the two female cultivators, who racked up hundreds in an instant.

The onlookers were stunned, exclaiming, "How can this be allowed?"

"Where did that sea beast come from? Did those two raise it?"

"Is it an outsider that snuck in?"

No sooner had these words been spoken than the sea beast produced an Aqua Pearl, pushing it toward the two. One of its tentacles bore the contract mark of a participating sea beast—proof of its legitimate status as an Aqua Pearl carrier under the agreement between Shangzhou Island and the sea beasts, not some wild intruder causing trouble.

The cultivator who had accused it of sneaking in flushed red with embarrassment.

Displaying the contract mark on its tentacle to Wen Qiao, the sea beast preened with satisfaction.

It was clever—when it had infiltrated earlier, it knew the female cultivators of Huanhua Pavilion needed sea beasts for assistance. So it volunteered, securing a legitimate participant status. Now, even if it openly helped Wen Qiao, no one could claim it violated the rules.

Thus, the sea beast unabashedly herded all the low-tier Aqua Pearl carriers toward Wen Qiao and Liu Zizi, allowing them to collect the pearls. It had memorized which sea beasts carried the pearls earlier, making them easy targets.

"Thanks for your help," Wen Qiao said to the king octopus, handing it a bottle of Spirit Restoring Pills.

The king octopus grew even happier and no longer held back, telling Wen Qiao about something suspicious it had discovered earlier. Before the competition began, it had noticed someone secretly feeding strange substances to several eighth- and ninth-rank sea beasts, making them extremely uncomfortable.

A chill ran down her spine as Wen Qiao realized someone was trying to disrupt the Sea God Festival.

Her first thought was of the black-robed figures who had previously infiltrated the Sea God Monument, followed by Di Ying, who had been lurking in the shadows all along.

Of course she'd try something sneaky. Though Di Ying had yet to show herself, she had been monitoring Dongling all this time and would certainly know Wen Qiao was participating in the Sea God Festival.

At this moment, the king octopus proudly informed her that it had already taken down those sea beasts that had been fed the strange substances—they wouldn’t appear for now, and it would deal with them later.

Wen Qiao’s expression softened slightly as she looked at this fearsome king octopus, suddenly finding it rather endearing.

So she took out some sweetened resin and fed it to the creature.

Upon tasting the treat, the king octopus understood that Wen Qiao was pleased. The clever creature knew the importance of preemptive action—when it did something good, it naturally came to claim credit. This was something Wen Tuti had taught it: if it noticed anything unusual in the sea, it should report to them immediately, and it wouldn’t be shortchanged for its efforts.

—

The cultivators watching the scrying mirror had no idea about the king octopus’s smugness. Seeing Wen Qiao and Liu Zizi collecting more and more Aqua Pearls while other female cultivators were still struggling to battle sea beasts for a single pearl, the scene looked rather pitiful.

It was just too unfair.

Hearing someone question the fairness, the Zhanhai Pavilion Master immediately countered, "How is it unfair? They earned these pearls by convincing the sea beasts to hand them over—doesn’t that prove their affinity? Winning the favor of sea beasts is a skill in itself. There’s absolutely no problem here."

With his granddaughter about to win, the Zhanhai Pavilion Master openly favored her.

After silencing everyone around him, he smugly glanced at the Bai Feng Island Lord.

The Bai Feng Island Lord watched Wen Qiao in the scrying mirror with a calm expression, revealing nothing of his thoughts.

Ten thousand Aqua Pearls had initially seemed like a large number, requiring considerable time to collect. But with a king octopus cheating on their behalf, all the pearls were gathered in less than three hours.

When the Huahua Immortal announced the end of the second round, the female cultivators who hadn’t managed to secure a single pearl wore blank stares.

Though ten thousand pearls weren’t an overwhelming amount, with sea beasts ranging from first to ninth rank, it shouldn’t have been possible to collect them all in under three hours—it should have taken at least a day. Yet here they were, in less than three hours.