Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

High above the Academy City, where the clouds drifted in thin, silver ribbons against the azure sky, stood the ancient Clocktower.

It was a monumental structure of weathered white stone and brass gears, its massive face ticking with a slow, resonant rhythm that echoed the very heartbeat of the territory.

The apex of this tower housed the grand assembly chamber, a circular room lined with towering arched windows that offered a panoramic view of the bustling city below.

The Ten Sages have gathered here today.

This was a rare occurrence. Usually, these legendary figures, who held the ultimate authority over the Imperial Academy and wielded power that could shatter mountains, only met during times of extreme crisis or grand transitions.

Even during Elder Mu’s rampage, only nine of them have gathered, but that was because Ye Hongyan was down below beating the crap out of Elder Mu, but schematics.

Today, the atmosphere inside the chamber was exceptionally heavy, thick with the scent of burning spirit incense and the unspoken tension of recent events.

Ye Hongyan sat amongst them, looking like she wanted to leave as soon as possible.

Her posture was perfect, her white and lunk robes draped elegantly over her chair, but her mind was entirely elsewhere.

Her gaze drifted toward the massive glass windows, her thoughts wandering far beyond the stone walls of the Clocktower.

She had just established a relationship with Shen Haoran, and she really wanted to spend most of her time with him now, as if she couldn’t get enough of him.

The memory of his smile, his voice, and the warmth of his presence made the dry, political atmosphere of this meeting feel like an absolute chore.

She wanted nothing more than to fly back to his side, to escape the tedious bickering of old men, and simply enjoy the sweet, quiet moments of her new romance.

But work is work. She couldn’t be willful about this.

As one of the Ten Sages, she bore a massive responsibility to the academy and the empire.

No matter how much her heart yearned to flee, her duty held her in place, so she forced herself to sit upright, suppressed a sigh, and focused her attention back on the long, crescent-shaped table.

Please, if there’s a god, let this meeting end as early as possible.

"What do you all think?" asked Venerable Sky Cloud.

He looked at the sages, his voice carrying an authority that can make almost anyone revere and praise him.

"I propose we push forward the first of the four trials and broadcast them for the entire empire to see," said the Second Sage.

The Second Sage, a stern-faced man with sharp eyebrows, leaned forward, tapping his fingers rhythmically on the tabletop, his eyes sweeping through every sages, as if wanting to see everyone’s opinions.

"The current state of public opinion is disastrous. We need a grand display to shift the narrative and strengthen people’s confidence in us."

The Third Sage nodded in agreement, "Indeed. Right now, with that incident, the whole empire lost trust in our academy, and the other academies are surely slandering us. We need to show the world that we still remained strong. If we broadcast the raw, unedited capability of our disciples, it will silence the critics and remind the vassal states of our absolute dominance."

First of the four trials, Ye Hongyan thought, her brows furrowed in deep concentration as she recalled the curriculum.

During her class, she mentioned this to the students, but only told them three.

The academy’s grand curriculum was built upon four legendary, brutal trials designed to forge the young generation into absolute elites.

The three she had publicly detailed to her disciples were grueling in their own right.

First was the once a year student faction wars.

This is a trial where factions formed by various students will be forced to go to war with one another.

This was a brutal test of leadership, strategy, and collective strength, where students formed alliances, built fortresses, and waged simulated or sometimes dangerously real territorial wars within the academy’s massive pocket realms to claim resources.

Second was the once every five years conquest of the lower realms.

This is a trial where students will be sent to lower realms to freely plunder or conquer it.

In these trials, the disciples acted as invading conquerors, testing their mettle against the local forces of lesser worlds, securing rare resources, and learning the harsh reality of survival and dominion in the wider cosmos.

It is also the most important, as students can increase their individual luck and the luck of their clan by plundering the lower realm.

Luck is the most important resource in cultivation world, far more than mere Spirit stones or Supreme Inheritance.

For those with powerful clans, this is even more important as it can decide the prosperity of their clan.

Third was the once every tenyears inter-academy competition.

This a trial where Imperial Academy students will be sent to fight students of another academies in the empire.

This was a matter of supreme pride, a grand stage where the absolute geniuses of different empires clashed to determine which institution reigned supreme under the heavens.

But there is another test, and that is a once every three month survival test, where students in pairs of two will be thrown into wilderness filled with beasts and complete an objective.

This was the hidden, first trial that she had kept to herself.

The wilderness used for this test was no ordinary forest; it was a treacherous, ancient primordial zone teeming with savage, high-level spirit beasts and hazardous natural formations.

The reason why they are paired is because there are countless treasures in that environment, and the teachers wanted to see if the students would betray their teammate for that treasure or work together.

It was a psychological meat grinder. Faced with ancient herbs, rare spirit stones, or powerful legacy weapons, the truest, darkest depths of human nature would be laid bare.

Would they share the spoils, or would they stab their partner in the back when no one was supposedly looking?

Now usually, this tests can only be seen by the Master Teachers of the academy and the Emperor, but with the recent situation, it is indeed necessary to broadcast all over the empire.

It can tell the entire world that despite the incident, the academy still remained strong, that it doesn’t affect their abilities to teach and nurture.

It would show the absolute discipline of the students, the harsh but effective training methods, and prove that the Imperial Academy remained the undisputed cradle of gods and heroes.

Of course, there is also the genius competition with other empires from another continents.

But that’s pretty much just Emperor’s dick measuring contest.

And besides, Ye Hongyan has full confidence in Haoran, and this wasn’t just her bias as his woman speaking, but also her logical mind.

There is no talent greater than him in the past and present.

If Chu Xueyu, Feng Yuyan, and Leng Shuang can dominate the world back then, Shen Haoran can do it too.

Speaking of which, isn’t Chu Xueyu, Shen Haoran’s mother, her own boyfriend’s mother, is two hundred years her junior?

This...the family dinner will surely be very awkward.

She was already interning as a master teacher in the academy back then, and she had even assisted a master teacher who taught Chu Xueyu and her sister’s class, so she can be considered half their teacher.

She had actually slept with her student’s son!

"What do you think, Sage Ye?"

Ye Hongyan blinked, snapping out of her thoughts.

She looked up, her expression momentarily blank as she realized she had been caught daydreaming, and noticed that everyone in the room was staring at her intently.

"Uh, what?" she uttered, her voice slightly strained.

Venerable Sky Cloud stared at her, thinking that this is the first time the diligent Ye Hongyan was caught in a daze.

He knew her as a woman of absolute focus and cold efficiency, so seeing her look so distracted was highly unusual.

He cleared his throat softly, a faint, knowing glint passing through his old eyes.

"We are asking if it is possible to borrow your family’s stadium to host the broadcast of the trial."

The Ye family that Ye Hongyan belonged to actually owned the largest stadium in the entire empire.

It was a colossal, awe-inspiring amphitheater constructed from reinforced obsidian and floating jade platforms, capable of holding millions of spectators and projecting high-fidelity, real-time spiritual illusions of the trial grounds.

This is because this was used as a venue for the popular Dragon-Horse Racing, popular to almost every noble lords in the empire.

The sport was a massive cultural phenomenon, involving powerful, half-dragon beasts racing across hazardous, magically altered tracks, drawing billions of spirit stones in bets and attendance fees from the highest echelons of society.

Ye Hongyan felt her cheek twitch. The mere mention of her family made her blood run cold, and a wave of irritation threatened to break through her calm facade.

"You can ask that man, Venerable Sky Cloud."

She almost spat out just saying ’that man’. In this world, there is no man she hated more than her own father.

He was a cold, calculating businessman and patriarch who viewed everything, including his own children, as mere chips on a chessboard.

He can sacrifice anything just for his family to rise and will ruthlessly eliminate anything that can damage the family image or cause it to decline.

Her relationship with him was incredibly toxic, filled with bitter silences and unresolved anger.

"Um, Sage Ye... can you at least put a nice words for us?" asked the Fourth Sage, looking sheepish.

The Fourth Sage, usually a proud and boisterous man, rubbed the back of his neck, looking incredibly uncomfortable.

They all knew the volatile relationship between Ye Hongyan and the head of the Ye Family, but they also knew that she was the only one who could potentially get a discount or bypass the bureaucratic red tape of the massive clan.

Ye Hongyan literally cringed. Her shoulders tensed up, and she stared at the Fourth Sage as if he had just asked her to swallow a live spirit toad.

You want her to talk to her father? It would be a miracle if she didn’t warp space and kick him in the balls the moment they talked.

Just the thought of hearing his smug, business-like voice made her want to summon her spiritual sword and slash the table in half.

"Sage Ye... please?" asked the Fifth Elder, his voice pleading as he joined in, holding his hands together in a begging gesture.

Ye Hongyan stared at them, looking at the expectant, desperate faces of her fellow Sages.

Eventually, she let out a long, heavy, and utterly defeated sigh.

"Fine."

She yielded. Whatever, she could find a way around this.

She didn’t have to talk to that wretched old man at all. She can ask her mother, who still held significant sway over the family’s assets and adored her.

And more importantly, she could use this chance to tell her mother that she already found a man—and not just any man, but Shen Haoran himself.

Her mother had been kind-of sort-of hunting her for decades to forget Mu Chen and settle downn, though, she remained stubborn back then.

Which was something she was thankful for, as it allowed her to meet Haoran.

Now, delivering this news would surely make her so happy that she would hand over the stadium’s keys without a single question.

"Alright, with that settled, this meeting adjourned," Venerable Sky Cloud announced, his voice echoing through the chamber.

As the words left his mouth, Ye Hongyan was already on her feet, her robes swirling around her as she prepared to rush back to the side of her beloved.

’Haoran! Here I come!’