Word Count: 3,442
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Boom, Boom, Boom—
Explosions rang through the Rebellion Spirit Ascension Platform as the Eastsea Academy students fled in miserable disarray.
Yin-Yang cyclones laced with flame and frost pursued them without pause.
No matter how they twisted or dodged, those spinning vortices seemed to have eyes, clamping onto them and refusing to let go.
“It absorbs ranged attacks, sends them back with double the force, and even locks onto the target.”
Xu Xiaoyu panted heavily, sweat streaming down his temples.
“A 10,000-year spirit skill can actually be this terrifying…”
That abnormal spirit skill was the bane of ranged combatants, and by sheer rotten luck, Eastsea Academy’s two strongest damage dealers were both ranged Spirit Masters.
The Shining Sun and the Ice Staff had both been turned back on their owners, becoming deadly tools for mowing down their own side!
Mu Xi watched her classmates leave the Spirit Ascension Platform one after another and bit so hard into her lip that her teeth nearly drew blood.
How could a monster like this appear in Eastsea City?
Aren’t freaks like this supposed to be a Shrek City and Bright City specialty?
Right now, regret was eating at her.
A moment of greed had cost her classmates a rare chance inside the Rebellion Spirit Ascension Platform.
What she did not know was that after waking outside, every one of those eliminated students was grinning from ear to ear, all of them delighted to have left a good impression on the Saint Craftsman’s daughter, the genius Blacksmith Mu Xi.
They were all three-ringed Spirit Elders.
Who among them had not died a few times in the Spirit Ascension Platform before?
The first few times were painful and awkward, but after enough trips, people got used to it.
Battle Armor and Mecha both depended on metals forged by high-level Blacksmiths.
Dying once for Mu Xi in the Rebellion Spirit Ascension Platform was the same as forging a connection.
If Mu Xi put in a word for them in the future, Saint Craftsman Mu Chen would almost certainly give their commissions priority!
“Mu Xi, you and I make one more attempt. That reflection skill has to have a limit. If we break past it, we can turn this around!” Xu Xiaoyu said urgently.
“Alright!”
Mu Xi nodded hard.
Her 1,000-year spirit ring blazed as the Shining Sun above her head burst with scorching light.
A blazing sun frantically drew in the surrounding fire element, swelling like a wildly unstable high-explosive bomb!
Third Spirit Skill, Shining Sun Meteor!
“Xiaoyan, get away from me!”
Xu Xiaoyu told his little sister to run.
If they failed to bring down the BOSS, the reflected spirit skills would come roaring back, and he could not let Xu Xiaoyan get caught in the blast.
Xu Xiaoyan obediently turned and ran, her pale-blue twin ponytails bouncing as she went.
Xu Xiaoyu quietly let out a breath of relief, raised his ice staff high, and sent a burst of blue light erupting from the crystal at its tip.
Dense, pure ice energy swept through the forest as a long spear slowly condensed into shape, faint runic patterns flickering across its surface.
Third Spirit Skill, Fury of Ice!
Thanks to those two ranged Spirit Masters, Zhao Xuanzhen had already cleaned up most of the Eastsea Academy students with ease.
Only a few cats and kittens were left.
The mill had been turned.
Now it was time to butcher the donkey!
His pitch-black second spirit ring lit up.
The Yin-Yang Reversal that had already driven the pair to despair descended once more, and a black-and-white vortex wrapped around his body.
There was no invincible spirit skill on the Douluo Continent.
Yin-Yang Reversal naturally had an upper limit.
But how could the third spirit skills of two mere Spirit Elders possibly break through it!
Absorb, spin, redirect!
A four-colored mass of black, white, red, and blue locked onto the pair.
Mu Xi and Xu Xiaoyu stared in stunned disbelief as their own strengthened spirit skills came hurtling back.
A violent explosion followed, and the two of them saw their Spirit Ascension Platform journey come to an abrupt end.
“Sister Mu Xi! Brother Xiaoyu!”
Aside from Xu Xiaoyu’s little tagalong Xu Xiaoyan, the Eastsea side had only one final three-ringed Spirit Elder left: the Lightning Falcon Spirit Elder.
He had planned to exploit his flying advantage and strike from the air, but he had never found a single opening in Zhao Xuanzhen’s defense.
He kept waiting for a chance to ambush, only to watch his entire team get wiped out first!
‘I can’t let them stay this arrogant.
I have to think of something…’
The Lightning Falcon Spirit Elder ground his teeth and slowly shifted his gaze toward Na Er, who looked utterly at ease.
He had already lost the courage to fight Zhao Xuanzhen head-on.
If even a defense-type Martial Spirit as sturdy as the Rock Giant Shield had been broken by one charged elbow, then wouldn’t the Lightning Falcon’s pitiful defense amount to serving himself up on a platter?
“You may be strong, but you can’t protect her!”
He threw back his head with a roar.
His third spirit ring shone brilliantly as blue-violet lightning wrapped around his entire body, crackling sharply as if announcing the terrifying power behind the strike.
His wings beat once, and he came slashing down at Na Er like a bolt of lightning plunging from the sky!
Zhao Xuanzhen saw the Lightning Falcon’s desperate attack and could not even be bothered to react.
Did someone really take one half of the Silver Dragon King for a decorative vase?
Na Er lifted her head slightly.
Her silver eyes rested on the descending lightning, and a faintly mocking smile touched her lips.
The next instant, silver light exploded outward.
A sharp spear covered in dragon scales appeared between Na Er and the Lightning Falcon Spirit Elder.
Two 1,000-year spirit rings revolved above and below it, their resplendent purple lending the weapon an added touch of nobility.
Na Er seized the Silver Dragon Spear, turned halfway, and executed a perfect throwing motion.
A clear, stirring dragon’s cry rang out as dense silver light surged in all directions.
The Silver Dragon Spear shot through the air and blew the Lightning Falcon Spirit Elder apart in midair!
“What??!”
Tang Wulin and the others immediately broke out in cold sweat.
Na Er looked so beautiful she seemed almost transcendent, yet she was another outrageous monster too!
If neither of these two monsters got nerfed, how were they supposed to fight?!
The older Eastsea Academy students had been completely wiped out.
Xu Xiaoyan huddled behind a tree, trembling all over with her eyes squeezed shut, chanting silently to herself, You can’t see me.
You can’t see me!
“Ahem!”
Na Er walked up beside the twin-tailed girl, who was hiding with all the effectiveness of someone covering her ears while stealing a bell, and tapped the ground with the Silver Dragon Spear.
Xu Xiaoyan secretly cracked one eye open.
The moment she saw that it was the second great demon king, she immediately crouched down with her hands over her head and stammered:
“It would only take a moment.”
Na Er said with a smile, spinning a beautiful silver flourish with her spear.
“Wait!”
Xu Xiaoyan shot to her feet, her face full of tragic resolve.
“I’m scared of pain. Don’t move. I’ll do it myself!”
There was no room left to struggle.
Xu Xiaoyan stopped resisting, reached out, slapped her distress signal, and voluntarily exited the Elementary Spirit Ascension Platform!
“The field’s clear. Time to handle the real business.”
Zhao Xuanzhen and Na Er slowly walked toward the five members of Class Zero who had been watching from afar.
Black-black and purple-purple, four spirit rings glimmered in tandem, their combined auras as deep as an abyss and as heavy as mountains, pressing down on Class Zero until their feet unconsciously retreated step after step.
Gulp…
Zhang Yangzi swallowed audibly.
The black hawk Spirit Soul on his shoulder sensed its master’s fear and let out a series of shrill cries.
Those monsters had just swept aside all those Eastsea upperclassmen.
It seemed their turn had come!
“Wulin, what do we do?” Wang Jinxi turned to Tang Wulin for help.
“Get ready to fight. We can’t outrun them,” Tang Wulin said in a deep voice.
Xie Xie held his Light and Shadow Dragon Daggers in both hands.
He looked the most relaxed of the group.
“Don’t be so nervous. We’ve already passed Teacher Wu’s final exam. We’ve stayed in the Rebellion Spirit Ascension Platform long enough. Besides, that Man Faced Demon Spider’s venomous webbing killed so many spirit beasts that every one of us absorbed a huge amount of spiritual energy. Our spirit rings all went up by several hundred years. This trip was a massive profit. If we get eliminated, then we get eliminated.”
The moment he said that, Zhang Yangzi and Wang Jinxi visibly relaxed.
Class Zero entered the Spirit Ascension Platform once every month, and their spirit rings were already close to what their bodies could endure.
Getting knocked out today was no loss!
Tang Wulin’s eyes sharpened.
“They look about the same age as us, yet they have 1,000-year and 10,000-year spirit rings.
They have to be peerless monsters standing at the very peak of the continent’s younger generation.
Meeting them is our good fortune.
It lets us see beyond Eastsea City and witness the strongest monster Spirit Masters on the Douluo Continent!
Everyone, give it everything you’ve got.
Treat this as the final test of our exam.
I’ll take them head-on.
Yangzi and Jinxi, fuse.
Xie Xie, hold back the silver-haired girl.
Gu Yue…”
He paused for half a second when he reached the black-haired girl.
There was no helping it.
Gu Yue’s personality was too cold and strange.
She deliberately kept her distance from the rest of Class Zero and never listened to his commands.
All he could do was let her fight freely.
“Charge!”
Determined to strike first, Tang Wulin gave a loud shout and led his companions straight at Zhao Xuanzhen and Na Er.
The Bone Dragon King manifested around Wang Jinxi, making his body swell larger until he looked like a giant walking skeleton.
Zhang Yangzi released his Shadow Phantasm Eagle Martial Spirit, and a pair of black wings tore through the skin of his back.
The two grabbed onto each other.
Wang Jinxi’s body expanded at high speed, a huge skeletal dragon tail jutting from his tailbone, while a pair of bone dragon claws curved out like the scythes of death.
Zhang Yangzi silently fused into Wang Jinxi’s body, and the eagle wings transformed into the dragon wings of the Bone Dragon King.
Spirit Fusion Skill, Shadow Eagle Dragon!
Thread after thread of Blue Silver Grass crawled low across the ground.
As Tang Wulin ran, golden scales began spreading from the fingers of his right hand, covering the entire arm and thickening it by a full circle.
It was none other than the Golden Dragon Claw, the attack famed for its pulverizing power!
The three of them revealed the trump cards they were proudest of.
Tang Wulin advanced with both Blue Silver Grass and the Golden Dragon Claw, while Wang Jinxi in Shadow Eagle Dragon form attacked from the opposite side.
Together, they closed in on Zhao Xuanzhen from left and right.
Zhao Xuanzhen smiled lightly.
The Golden Dragon King’s power system was simple and crude, possessing the most overbearing raw stats on the entire Douluo Continent.
He had long wanted to fight Tang Wulin.
This was a clash between absolute power and absolute technique!
His hands traced a flawless dividing line of yin and yang and gathered in Tang Wulin’s Golden Dragon Claw.
Tang Wulin’s expression changed at once.
The Golden Dragon Claw was one of the greatest reasons he could stand among Class Zero despite only having spirit power around Rank 15 or 16.
Yet Zhao Xuanzhen’s palms seemed to contain a peculiar force.
The Golden Dragon Claw’s unstoppable might suddenly slipped out of Tang Wulin’s control.
Guided by Zhao Xuanzhen’s pull, his body spun like a top, and his Golden Dragon Claw swung straight toward the Shadow Eagle Dragon!
Tai Chi Yin Hand, borrowing force to strike with force!
Panic immediately appeared on Wang Jinxi’s face.
It was like an unbreakable law of bloodline hierarchy.
The Golden Dragon Claw naturally suppressed the Bone Dragon King, and even as a Spirit Fusion Skill, the Shadow Eagle Dragon was still restrained by it!
Tang Wulin and Wang Jinxi fought desperately to force the attack aside.
The Golden Dragon Claw barely missed the Shadow Eagle Dragon’s vital points and struck the overlapping bone claws at its chest instead.
Whether that counted as luck or misfortune, the claw’s pulverizing effect activated.
A crisp cracking sound rang out, and the bone claw snapped and dropped limp.
A devastating friendly fire!
The heavily injured Shadow Eagle Dragon fusion broke apart on the spot, and miserable screams burst from both boys’ mouths.
In the observation room of Eastsea City’s Spirit Pagoda, Wu Zhangkong watched Class Zero’s disastrous loss through a Spirit Screen.
Clad in white with a blue sword at his side, cold as frost and snow, he said gravely:
“Exquisite technique, and it especially restrains brute-force Spirit Masters. Wulin’s overwhelming strength has become a shackle instead…”
On the other side, the Silver Dragon Spear broke through Xie Xie’s Light and Shadow Dragon Daggers.
Its razor-sharp tip pointed straight at his throat.
A chill invaded his body and spread through every limb, making him shiver from head to toe.
“Leave on your own, or do you want me to help you?” Na Er asked calmly.
“Big sister, no need for you to trouble yourself!”
A wise man did not eat a loss he could already see coming.
In only a few exchanges, the Silver Dragon Spear had already seized his weakness.
Sighing inwardly that a monster was truly a monster, he obediently withdrew from the Spirit Ascension Platform.
After dealing with Xie Xie, Na Er turned her gaze toward Gu Yue, who had not made a single move from beginning to end.
Their gazes collided across the open space.
The shadows at their feet seemed to stretch toward each other, one silver-white, one black as night.
It was like blazing sun and lonely moon appearing together in the same sky, or like the opposing poles of the Taiji Diagram, standing against one another while also containing one another.
“You have nerve, showing up in front of me.”
Gu Yue mouthed soundlessly.
“So what?”
Na Er answered with her own silent lip movements and a cold smile.
The silver-haired girl looked utterly fearless.
In another timeline, if Gu Yue could have forcefully devoured Na Er without leaving any consequences behind, the two halves of the Silver Dragon King would never have made their bet in the first place.
Gu Yue would have swallowed Na Er long ago.
But after gaining humanity, Na Er had become someone impossible to deal with.
Go on then.
Try and bite me!
Elsewhere on the field, Xie Xie was out, Zhang Yangzi and Wang Jinxi had lost the ability to fight, and Zhao Xuanzhen and Tang Wulin began a one-on-one battle between true men!
His emotions surging violently, Tang Wulin’s eyes transformed into golden vertical pupils.
He slammed his right foot into the ground and shot straight at Zhao Xuanzhen like a bolt!
The instant the Golden Dragon Claw neared Zhao Xuanzhen’s face, Zhao Xuanzhen twisted suddenly.
Within the circular arc drawn by his Cloud Hands, Tang Wulin’s wrist became like a fish caught in a whirlpool.
His entire right arm was wrapped in Tai Chi’s soft force, like a moth falling into an inescapable net.
Tang Wulin roared and threw out his left fist while his Blue Silver Grass’s first spirit skill, Bind, activated simultaneously.
But the weak Blue Silver Grass could not even hope to get close.
Under that force, it broke apart into a shower of shredded grass.
Just as his left fist was about to land, Zhao Xuanzhen reversed his arm and blocked with his elbow, neutralizing the blow completely.
“Tai Chi, Oblique Flying.”
The world spun.
Tang Wulin’s final memory was of his vision going still while his body traced a spiraling arc through the air and crashed heavily into the ground.
Every muscle screamed with the full force of the blow he himself had thrown moments ago.
“I… I can still keep fighting!”
Tang Wulin staggered upright, his blazing gaze fixed on Zhao Xuanzhen.
The two of them moved almost at the same time, their clothes snapping in the wind like long banners whipped through the air.
This time, Zhao Xuanzhen used no Tai Chi technique at all.
He met Tang Wulin in a straightforward collision without a shred of flourish.
The pressure of the impact exploded outward.
The ground could not bear the sudden eruption of those two immense forces and split apart into fine black cracks!
BOOM—
Zhao Xuanzhen did not budge an inch.
Tang Wulin was sent flying backward!
His Tai Chi had already displayed the outrageousness of borrowing force.
This direct exchange now laid bare the tyranny of pure raw power!
“Hm?”
Zhao Xuanzhen narrowed his eyes.
By his estimation, that blow should have sent Tang Wulin straight out of the Spirit Ascension Platform.
Yet that figure was still like an unkillable cockroach, stubbornly forcing itself upright again.
At the same time, Tang Wulin’s eyes were no longer a clear black.
They had turned into a blue-gold the color of the sea!
“Variable of Fate…”
Tang Wulin murmured softly, but the voice belonged to someone else entirely!
A hazy golden light invisible to everyone else tore through the air and shot straight into Zhao Xuanzhen’s Spiritual Sea.
It was an illusory golden trident, and around it came the crashing sound of waves slamming against reefs.
Sea God Trident, Spiritual Brand!
“The variable should return to the Tang family! Today, this God King will completely shatter the Planar Spirit’s fantasy!”
The voice slid into Zhao Xuanzhen’s ears like a venomous snake.
Blue-gold currents rippled through his Spiritual Sea like ocean veins, and then an icy hiss followed.
A giant serpent awoke and opened a pair of scarlet beast eyes!
Eight Deities, Teng She!
“Soul of deceit!”
The power of the sea poured into the soul of deceit woven by Teng She.
The will hidden inside Tang Wulin believed its plot had succeeded, that the spiritual brand had taken hold smoothly, and that the Douluo Continent’s only Variable of Fate had become an aid to the Tang family!
The blue-gold color faded from Tang Wulin’s eyes.
He scratched his head in confusion, utterly unaware of what had just happened.
“Zhao Xuanzhen! Zhao Xuanzhen, are you alright?!”
Na Er sensed at once that something was wrong with Zhao Xuanzhen’s expression.
Forgetting all about glaring at Gu Yue, she ran to his side in alarm, kicking Tang Wulin out of her way as she went and sending him straight out of the Spirit Ascension Platform.
“I’m fine…”
Zhao Xuanzhen gently patted Na Er’s silver hair.
But in those pitch-black eyes, there was not the slightest trace of warmth.
Only fury, burning brighter and brighter.
“My Lord, as you commanded, the spiritual brand is now being borne by the soul of deceit,” Teng She said from within the Spiritual Sea.
“Well done. Waking you first was indeed the right choice.”
Among the Eight Deities, Zhi Fu stood at the head.
Teng She was not the strongest in direct battle, but Zhao Xuanzhen had chosen to awaken Teng She first precisely because he valued that authority which so perfectly countered spiritual power:
Deceit!
When dealing with a God King who delighted in toying with souls, none but Teng She would do!
Zhao Xuanzhen had never hesitated to judge a certain God King by the lowest limits of human morality.
On the surface there had supposedly been only three chances, but in truth there had always been more.
That God King had already acted once before, when Tang Wulin encountered the Evil Spirit Master’s Phosphor Fire Soul Refinement!
To prepare for the worst, Zhao Xuanzhen had decisively set aside Zhi Fu and chosen instead to awaken Teng She, the one who wielded the power of deceit!
‘God King, to receive without returning is discourteous.
We will meet on the night when the stars blaze brightest…’