145: Chapter 145 The Lies of Data! The audience burst into laughter! This is true ancient martial arts!

Under the watchful eyes of the masses, Lin Qi's hand was lightly placed upon that cold Attribute Tester.

Buzz.

A slight vibration sounded.

The scanning beam at the top of the tester lit up, and a soft blue light slowly swept across Lin Qi's body from top to bottom.

The uproar that had surged across the plaza because of Lin Qi's words eerily subsided.

Everyone held their breath.

Countless eyes stared fixedly at the hundred-meter-tall holographic screen in the center of the plaza.

They wanted to see what kind of confidence this guy, who dared to mock "Thor" to his face, actually had.

Was he a peerless dark horse hiding his strength?

Or a complete and utter madman?

The answer was about to be revealed.

On the screen, the four data bars representing Strength, Agility, Intelligence, and Physique began to flash frantically.

Strings of meaningless garbled code scrolled past as fast as a waterfall.

The precision core inside the instrument was analyzing Lin Qi's physical structure at a frequency of hundreds of millions of times per second.

"It's moving! It's moving!"

"The results are coming out!"

Someone in the crowd let out a tense, low cry.

Li Pojun crossed his arms over his chest, the gloom on his face having dissipated, replaced by a playful, cold sneer.

He wanted to see what kind of "surprise" this country bumpkin could bring him.

However, one second passed.

The garbled code on the screen continued to scroll.

Five seconds passed.

The scrolling speed of the code seemed to slow down slightly.

Ten seconds passed.

The digits on the screen were finally no longer garbled and specific values began to appear.

But...

[Strength: 3]

[Agility: 2]

[Intelligence: 4]

[Physique: 1]

These numbers were like a drunkard, jumping back and forth between single digits without any pattern, refusing to rise.

The entire venue fell into a dead silence.

Everyone's eyes widened, their faces filled with disbelief.

What was going on?

Was the instrument broken?

Even the middle-aged man from the organizing committee in charge of operating the device frowned and tapped on the instrument's control console.

"Beep beep—System self-check normal."

The cold mechanical voice dispelled everyone's doubts.

The instrument wasn't broken.

Then the problem lay with this young man.

Finally, under the gazes of countless people—some expectant, some mocking, some confused—the jumping numbers on the screen slowly came to a halt.

The final values were completely fixed.

[Name: Lin Qi]

[Strength: 5]

[Agility: 5]

[Intelligence: 5]

[Physique: 5]

[Comprehensive Evaluation: Unranked]

It was still those familiar, ridiculous "all 5s" Blank Slate data.

Compared to the Five-Academy League, there wasn't the slightest change.

Silence.

After a full three seconds of dead silence.

"Pfft—"

Someone, it was unclear who, was the first to fail to hold back a laugh.

Immediately after, this laughter was like a contagious virus, instantly detonating the entire venue!

"Hahahahaha!"

"I'm dying! What am I seeing? All attributes at 5? This is the so-called Double Champion?"

"I take back what I said before; he didn't cheat, he's just a pure lucky dog! Has the level of the Five-Academy League dropped to such a low point?"

"With this kind of data, he can't even compare to my pet dog! How does he have the nerve to stand here? Is his skin made of city walls?"

"Has Tianhai City run out of people? Sending such trash to participate in the All-Federation Tournament? This is an insult to all of us contestants!"

Roars of laughter, mockery, and disdainful whistles surged toward Lin Qi from all directions like a mountain-toppling tsunami.

The media reporters were even more like they'd been injected with chicken blood, fixing their lenses tightly on Lin Qi's face, wanting to capture any hint of shame, anger, or embarrassment.

"Thor" Li Pojun laughed so hard he was doubling over, tears nearly coming out.

He extended a finger, pointing at Lin Qi from a distance, and spoke to the cameras of the entire venue in an extremely exaggerated tone.

"Everyone, did you see that? This is the biggest joke of this year's championship!"

"I'm even starting to suspect whether my standing here has lowered the grade of the entire Prodigy Championship."

His words triggered another burst of intense, collective laughter.

Beside the tester, the middle-aged man from the organizing committee showed a triumphant smile.

He cleared his throat, picked up the loudspeaker, and announced loudly in a businesslike tone.

"Test result: Contestant Lin Qi's physical data is normal; no traces of any prohibited drugs or illegal modifications were detected."

This result made everything clear to everyone.

Although no evidence of cheating was caught, this "garbage" data that was hair-raisingly bad was itself the greatest humiliation to him.

A piece of trash with all attributes at 5 had actually won the Double Championship.

This was a hundred times more embarrassing than directly saying he cheated!

On the outskirts of the distant crowd, Instructor Su Qing was dressed in casual clothes, wearing sunglasses and a hat, hiding herself in the shadows.

She looked at the lonely back in the center of the plaza being pointed at by a thousand fingers, her brow furrowing into a knot.

She knew Lin Qi was hiding his strength.

But she hadn't expected him to hide it so thoroughly.

In this kind of live-streamed occasion, was it really okay to respond to doubts in this way?

This was almost cutting off all of his own retreats.

However, Lin Qi, at the center of the storm, surprised everyone, including Instructor Su Qing.

He looked at the four eye-piercing "5s" on the big screen; not only was there not a hint of shame or anger on his face, but the corners of his mouth even curled up slightly, revealing a hint of... a satisfied expression?

Yes, satisfaction.

[A bunch of idiots.]

Lin Qi let out a light chuckle in his heart.

[You only see the tip of the iceberg above the water, but you can never glimpse the massive mountain beneath the surface.]

This was the wonder of ancient martial arts.

[Returning to Simplicity].

When the Martial Dao is cultivated to a certain Realm, all power and all blood-qi will be perfectly locked beneath the muscles, bones, and skin, restrained within the Dantian and Qi Sea.

As long as he didn't actively erupt or trigger his blood-qi.

In front of these precision instruments, his body was no different from an ordinary person who never exercised.

His strength was hidden within his silver bone marrow.

His True Qi surged like a river within his Dantian.

His spirit was the heart of a Martial Saint, tempered through seas of corpses and mountains of blood.

These were things that this cold machine could never measure.

To the "System" of this world, having no class change, no talents, and no skills was the most thorough Blank Slate.

This massive deviation in perception was exactly Lin Qi's greatest camouflage.

It was also his greatest trump card.

Lin Qi withdrew his gaze, turned to look at the still-smug middle-aged man from the organizing committee, and spoke calmly.

"Finished testing?"

His voice wasn't loud, but it clearly drowned out the surrounding noise.

"Then... my registration is successful, right?"

The middle-aged man was stunned by his calm tone, then looked at him as if looking at an idiot and mocked him.

"Of course, registration is successful. Welcome to your death; I hope you don't get cried by a single punch from your opponent in the first round, that would be too disgraceful."

Lin Qi ignored him.

He turned around, shoved his hands back into his pockets, and walked step by step toward the exit of the plaza under countless gazes of disdain and ridicule.

His back didn't show the slightest bit of wretchedness.

Instead, it exuded an indescribable pride and tranquility.

It was as if the storm that had just swept the entire venue had nothing to do with him.

"Seven-ge! Seven-ge!"

Zhang Wei, carrying that massive karma cutter, squeezed out of the crowd panting and caught up with Lin Qi's pace.

His fat face was flushed red, though it was unclear if it was from anger or haste.

"Seven-ge, you... are you okay?"

"What could be wrong with me?" Lin Qi glanced at him.

"But... but now the whole internet is cursing you! Saying you're a disgrace, a liar! Our... our betting pool..."

As Zhang Wei said this, his voice carried a hint of trembling and a strange excitement.

He handed his communicator to Lin Qi; the screen showed the real-time updated odds from various underground casinos.

"Seven-ge, look!"

"Just now, after your test results came out, our betting pool odds have... have soared to one to five hundred!"