You Ditched an R-Rank, Now That I’m an SSR, You Wanna Cry? Chapter 54

After the provincial competition concluded.

The national tournament still needed one week to begin, so they temporarily stayed in Chongyang City's top-tier hotel, waiting for the arrival of officials from Great Xia Imperial Capital.

During this week, Xia Yuan didn't plan to spend all his time gaming.

Gojo Satoru's personality influenced him, making him less of a homebody compared to his previous life—he couldn't sit still for long.

He glanced at the black-stockinged JK girl lounging on the sofa, her rear slightly raised.

Mo Shiyu was looking at her phone while rhythmically tapping her beautifully curved black-stockinged legs on the sofa, the mysterious area between them quite captivating.

She didn't seem to know what she was watching either, always wearing a faint, elusive smile at the corners of her mouth.

Xia Yuan stroked his chin, carefully appreciating the view for a moment before remarking with satisfaction:

"Did the sun rise from the west today? Your fashion sense suddenly improved so much?"

She snorted coldly, "I just suddenly felt like wearing this!"

Xia Yuan sat down next to her and asked curiously, "What are you looking at that's making you so happy?"

Mo Shiyu visibly tensed up, hiding her phone, "It's nothing. Can't I just be happy?"

Her attempt to hide it only made things worse.

This concealment completely piqued Xia Yuan's curiosity.

Grinning widely with his bright white teeth, he leaned forward and easily snatched the phone from Mo Shiyu's hand.

Mo Shiyu was pinned down and couldn't move at all, only able to blush and shout:

"Help! A Contracted Spirit is murdering his Spirit Tamer!"

"Xia Yuan, get away! There's really nothing there!"

"You're violating my privacy!"

Too bad.

Xia Yuan specialized in being thick-skinned—when you're shameless, you're invincible—showing no mercy toward the fairer sex.

He opened the phone to look and discovered it was filled with various handsome photos of himself.

When he released the Imaginary Technique "Purple".

When he expanded the Unlimited Void Domain.

And even when he was laughing maniacally...

Xia Yuan put on a frightened expression, crossing his arms over his chest and looking warily at Mo Shiyu, "Where did all these photos come from? I never expected Fatty Yu to be a pervert—the secret photographer was right beside me all along!"

Mo Shiyu snatched back her phone, blushing fiercely as she glared at him angrily, "I'm not a pervert! I didn't take these—they were captured by your online fan club! I just wanted to print them out as punching bags to vent my frustration every day! Do you think I actually care about them?"

Xia Yuan looked skeptical, then said with deep affection, "Really? But I'm your Contracted Spirit, Fatty Yu. Actually, whatever you want... you can just tell me directly. For example..."

He slowly began unbuttoning his white shirt.

Mo Shiyu gulped audibly, unconsciously swallowing.

She hurriedly covered her face with her hands, peeking through her fingers, "Xia Yuan, you, you, you... don't be a pervert! I'm warning you, I'm your master!"

Xia Yuan burst out laughing, doubling over with amusement, "Look at you! I was just teasing—did you actually take it seriously?"

Mo Shiyu realized she'd been tricked again and could only angrily deploy her propeller-like flailing fists, pounding wildly on Xia Yuan.

Xia Yuan's tone became somewhat more serious as he asked:

"Alright, enough joking. Let's talk business. Is there anything like the Contracted Spirit Arena around here? Even underground fighting would work. I want to hone my skills more before going to the national tournament."

Compared to traditional dungeon grinding, killing Contracted Spirits in the Contracted Spirit Arena gave more system reward progression.

Plus, it genuinely helped hone skills.

He had mostly mastered Gojo Satoru's template by now.

But he still wasn't very familiar with the two universal skills: Eight Gates Released Formation and Zanpakuto Senbonzakura.

Only by thoroughly integrating all abilities, even developing new techniques, could he become stronger.

After hearing this, Mo Shiyu stopped fooling around, thought for a moment, and blurted out:

"There's always been one! And it's quite common too—the Great Xia Spirit Tamer Online Ranked Matches!"

Xia Yuan was slightly stunned.

Online ranked matches?

This was familiar territory for him too—just like the online ranked PVP in gacha games.

Xia Yuan promptly tucked Mo Shiyu under his arm and gently squeezed her forehead, complaining:

"Something this important, why didn't you tell me earlier?"

Mo Shiyu kept crying out in pain, clutching her head with a wronged expression:

"Ouch, ouch, ouch...!"

"Xia Yuan, be gentler!"

"Spirit Tamers like us from academies usually don't start ranked matches right away. Rather than spending spiritual energy on ranked matches, we're better off grinding more dungeons and leveling up."

"Besides, the ten placement matches are really important! The win rate determines what initial rank we Spirit Tamers get assigned!"

"What kind of Spirit Tamer would start ranked matches before properly training their Contracted Spirits!"

Xia Yuan released her and asked:

"Does this ranked system have tiers?"

Mo Shiyu sat up rubbing her temples and muttered:

"As expected from someone who games every day. Yes, the ranks from low to high are: Iron, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, Master, and King!"

Xia Yuan pondered for a moment, "Let's grind the ranked matches this week and see how high we can climb."

Mo Shiyu suddenly felt an itch on her legs. When she looked down, her pretty face immediately flushed crimson:

"Xia Yuan!"

Xia Yuan calmly removed his hand and stood up, "Time is tight. Let's go do the placement matches now!"

Mo Shiyu bit her lip, her watery eyes glaring at him, "How did it feel?"

Xia Yuan coughed and gave his evaluation, "Still a bit chubby, but better than pork."

Mo Shiyu grabbed his arm, opened her small mouth, and bit down on it!

Xia Yuan grimaced in pain, "Are you a dog or something!"

........

After their playful scuffle, Mo Shiyu first logged into the Great Xia Spirit Tamer Online Ranked Matches official website and registered an account.

She got stuck on choosing a name, "What should I use as my username? Any ideas, Xia Yuan?"

Xia Yuan thought for a moment and casually suggested a name, "How about 'Knife in Rainy Night Without Umbrella'? My gaming username is 'Sword in Toilet Without Paper'—they kind of match."

Mo Shiyu's mouth twitched slightly. Only this guy could come up with such disgusting names...

Thinking about it, Knife in Rainy Night Without Umbrella wasn't too bad.

After creating her Spirit Tamer account, they went to the ranked match portal set up within the hotel.

Mo Shiyu started explaining again:

"For the Spirit Tamer Online Ranked Matches, you need to enter another special space to queue for matches."

"The rules of online ranked matches are essentially the same as the Contracted Spirit Arena—no real deaths, you can revive in the Contracted Spirit Space by consuming large amounts of spiritual energy."

"However, you can spar with powerful Spirit Tamers from all over Great Xia anytime, anywhere, researching tactics and Contracted Spirit team compositions."

"Plus, Great Xia provides corresponding Spirit Stone subsidies for Spirit Tamers at each rank! The higher the rank, the better the Spirit Stone rewards!"

Xia Yuan nodded slightly to show he understood. Having played so many games in his previous life, he could comprehend this without any barriers.

After they stepped through the portal, the scenery suddenly shifted.

The surroundings transformed into a space resembling a virtual game environment.

After Mo Shiyu logged into her account and bound Xia Yuan as her Contracted Spirit, a prompt window appeared before them asking if they wanted to change their appearance.

"To protect privacy and prevent encountering acquaintances who might reveal tactical arrangements and Contracted Spirit intelligence ahead of time."

"The ranked match space also provides a character customization system that allows you to change your appearance!"

Mo Shiyu was somewhat excited. Although she'd been exposed to these basics since childhood, this was her first time entering this magical ranked match space. "Since we're here, let's try the character customization and costume change too!"

Xia Yuan laughed, "I'm very familiar with this."

Then he began carefully tinkering with the character customization system.

After a while, while Mo Shiyu was still deliberating, Xia Yuan had already finished customizing his appearance. "Done!"

She turned to look and saw that Xia Yuan had transformed into another handsome man!

He had handsome features and an extremely cool expression.

He wore a black and white coat with a silver-white windflower scarf.

His black hair was tied up with a unique hair accessory—the Star-Pulling Clasp gathering strands of long hair that fell across his forehead.

A pair of sharp purple eyes.

This uniquely individualistic outfit was particularly stylish!

Cold and stern!

Dignified!

And noble!

That's right—the appearance Xia Yuan had created was precisely Captain Byakuya from the Bleach world!

He deliberately spoke in a cold voice, slowly saying:

"Scatter, Senbonzakura..."

After saying this, Xia Yuan couldn't hold it in anymore and burst out laughing, instantly ruining the cold and stern image. "I feel like I have quite the talent for acting too..."

Although universal skills couldn't change the original character's appearance, being able to create it in this ranked match space was quite interesting.