Unrivaled Tang Sect Volume 27

Book 27: The New Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament!

Chapter 265: Tough Dong'er

Jiang Nannan also rushed behind Wang Dong’er. Everyone encircled her and treated her like an enemy.

Wang Qiu’er said coldly, “I won’t hand him over unless you let me say my piece. I want to let all of you know what he did.”

Bei Bei stepped forward and was about to act up, but Wang Dong’er immediately lifted her arms and shook her head at the rest. “Don’t be like that. Let her speak. I can handle it.”

The sad look in Wang Dong’er’s eyes became even more intense. However, she wasn’t in the mood to pick on Wang Qiu’er. Huo Yuhao had returned, he had ﬁnally returned! Even though she didn’t know how he was, he must be ﬁne since Wang Qiu’er claimed that he wouldn’t die.

It was ﬁne as long as he was alive! It was still better than Tang Ya and Ma Xiaotao, who were both still missing. She had already thrown everything else from her mind. As long as Huo Yuhao was safe, she was willing to accept anything that he had with Wang Qiu’er. The ten days of waiting had taught her one thing, that she was willing to do anything in exchange for Huo Yuhao’s safety.

“Dong’er, you are too kind,” Bei Bei sighed. However, he didn’t go against her wishes.

Wang Dong’er revealed a sad smile and said, “It’s ﬁne since he has returned. I’m satisﬁed since he’s returned safely. Wang Qiu’er, tell me what you want to say.”

Wang Qiu’er scanned everyone coldly and said, “From your looks, all of you seem to think that I eloped with him? Hmph, all of you are his good friends! Is he really like all of you imagine him to be?”

Everyone was stunned by her words. Yes! They had been thinking about what had happened between Huo Yuhao and Wang Qiu’er after they left together.

Wang Dong’er was also stunned. She saw an outraged look in Wang Qiu’er’s eyes. Wang Qiu’er said coldly, “I feel bad for him. In the past ten days, he has almost died three times. However, he pressed on every time. I tried to stop him from taking risks, but he resisted and continued to proceed stubbornly. Do you really think he eloped with me?”

Xu Sanshi furrowed his brow, “How come you left together?

He even left without saying anything!”

Wang Qiu’er replied, “He left without saying anything because he was anxious. I don’t know how he found out Wang Dong’er was sick.”

Xu Sanshi’s eyes widened. “You’re the sick one!”

Wang Qiu’er focused her gaze, and a sharp light ﬂashed within them. However, she still suppressed her anger.

“He told me that Wang Dong’er was sick. In addition, he even said that her life was in danger. That day, he left Shrek Academy on his own. I caught him leaving and pursued him, seeing that he was in a rush. However, who knew that I would end up pursuing him for thousands of miles. That’s why I went missing with him.

“I hadn’t expected that he could go to this extent for another person. Do you see the ﬂower on his face? He almost sacriﬁced his life to bring it back. It’s an immortal grass called the Yearning Heartbroken Grass. It can cure her injuries.”

Wang Dong’er was stunned. She didn’t even know that she was sick or injured. However, Wang Qiu’er sounded very convincing. She also didn’t know what to do since Huo Yuhao was in this state.

Wang Qiu’er lifted her hand and unbuttoned Huo Yuhao’s sleeves.

Everyone was shocked when they saw his hands.

Huo Yuhao’s hands were covered in bandages. The thick bandages were half-stained with fresh blood. “Do all of you know how this injury came about? In order to pluck the Yearning Heartbroken Flower, he forced himself to swallow spring water that contained Ultimate Fire to counter the Ultimate Ice in his body. When his hands cupped the water, they were badly burned. His throat, windpipe and even

internal organs were greatly burned from the water. He was on the brink of death.”

“Ah!” Wang Dong’er’s ﬁgure shook slightly. An unhealthy red appeared on her face, and tears streamed down her cheeks.

“At that point, he still used his eyes to tell me to bring this Yearning Heartbroken Grass back to treat your injury. If not for the fact that I used an herb to preserve his life, he would have died.”

Wang Qiu’er recounted everything that had happened to the both of them over the past ten days.

After hearing her accounting of events, everyone’s expressions changed greatly. Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao were even crying. They hadn’t expected Huo Yuhao to experience so many ordeals over the past ten days. He had even been on the brink of death several times before he ﬁnally managed to pluck the Yearning Heartbroken Grass.

When they heard that the Ultimate Ice in his body had raged out and the blood that he spat out had frozen up, leaving him no choice but to swallow the Blazing Sunspring water, Bei Bei, He Caitou and Xu Sanshi’s eyes also welled up.

What kind of love was this? Huo Yuhao used his actions to tell them how much he loved Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er stopped crying as she heard more and more of what Wang Qiu’er said. Her body was trembling non-stop, shaking uncontrollably.

Yuhao, Yuhao, Yuhao…

Her mind was only ﬁlled with his name right now. Yuhao, Yuhao, my Yuhao. For me, you actually… What injury? Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you let me face all this with you? Yuhao.

At this moment, Wang Dong’er was heartbroken.

“Wa——” She spat out blood, and a few drops landed on the Yearning Heartbroken Grass on the side of Huo Yuhao’s face

The Yearning Heartbroken Grass shook slightly and absorbed the few drops of fresh blood. Following this, a dim red glow emanated from the ﬂower. The red glow formed two rings in the air, which looped over Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

A weird intent was also released by the Yearning Heartbroken Grass. There were no words, but Shrek’s Seven Monsters and Wang Qiu’er could understand what it meant.

It roughly meant Together through Life and Death. The contract of love. If one died, both would die together. The lives of these lovers would be connected. There would be no abandonment, and their love would carry on for eternity. Wang Dong’er had formed a strange contract with Huo Yuhao at this moment, with the Yearning Heartbroken Grass as a witness.

Wang Qiu’er was stunned. She could also sense the intent from the Yearning Heartbroken Grass. Her face turned even more dismal and she looked a little lost. She put Huo Yuhao down carefully, right in front of Wang Dong’er.

“He only has you in his heart. Even though we look similar, I was never in his heart. When he plucked the Yearning Heartbroken Grass, I knew that I had fallen in love with this man. I am deeply in love with him. I feel very tormented that I was a step late. There can never be a second woman in his heart. You must take care of yourself for him. You must take care of him, too. The herb that he consumed will help him to recover slowly. However, I’m not sure whether he will be able to fully recover.”

Wang Qiu’er paused as she ﬁnished those words. She took a deep look at Wang Dong’er and said, “You’ve won. In his eyes, I was probably never your competitor, and you probably never had any competitors before. Love him properly.” Wang Dong’er received Huo Yuhao carefully. She hugged him as she bowed to Wang Qiu’er. “Thank you.. Thank you for saving his life. If you need my help one day, I’ll do anything to help you.”

Wang Qiu’er didn’t say anything. She only turned and walked away.

It was only when the Shrek’s Seven Monsters couldn’t see her that her tears started to stream down her face. She quickened her footsteps, as she didn’t want others to see her weakness. However, she was also heartbroken.

Wang Dong’er hugged Huo Yuhao and felt the weak undulation of his life aura. She lowered her head slowly and pressed her lips to Huo Yuhao’s dry lips.

Her lips were very cold and slightly moist.

“Yuhao, I’m your wife from now on. No matter whether or not you recover, I’ll always be your wife. I love this contract. As long as you are alive, I’ll wait for you my entire life. If you die, I’ll leave with you. In the other world, I’ll continue to wait on you. Forever and ever. Yuhao, I love you!”

Wang Dong’er’s voice was very gentle, but it was the gentleness of her voice that made the rest emotional.

Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, and He Caitou couldn’t control the tears in their eyes.

Jiang Nannan leapt into Xu Sanshi’s arms. Xiao Xiao also did the same thing to He Caitou. They were bawling their eyes out.

Wang Dong’er didn’t cry. There was only a look of gentleness in her big, beautiful eyes.

She carefully carried Huo Yuhao and turned around slowly as she looked at the rest.

“Eldest senior, can I trouble you to ﬁnd some food? I want to eat some food. Third senior, please help me get the best healing-type soul master in the academy. I’ll bring Yuhao back ﬁrst.”

Even though she still seemed very pale, and her lips were still stained with blood, the look in her eyes shocked the rest of them. She suddenly looked very tough and resolute!

Yes, Huo Yuhao was critically injured, and it was unknown whether he would fully recover.

“Alright, let’s work separately! Nannan, Xiao Xiao, follow Dong’er!” Bei Bei rubbed off his own tears and started giving out instructions. Wang Dong’er was also in bad shape right now. With Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao following her, they could help her at least.

Wang Dong’er didn’t reject his suggestion and didn’t rush off, either. She only carried Huo Yuhao and slowly walked over to the shore of the Sea God’s Pavilion.

Jiang Nannan understood her intentions and quickly summoned a ferry. They made their way to Sea God’s Island, before heading into the Sea God’s Pavilion.

--- After returning to her room, Wang Dong’er started to get busy. She got a clean blanket for Huo Yuhao before inviting Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao to leave the room.

She was trembling slightly as she removed Huo Yuhao’s clothes and bandages. After that, she used clean water to wash his entire body before giving him clean clothing. She also re- bandaged his wounds. At this moment, she didn’t care about her own shyness anymore.

Finally, Wang Dong’er took the Yearning Heartbroken Grass from Huo Yuhao’s face and placed it beside his pillow.

Elder Xuan, Yan Shaozhe, Cai Mei’er and a few elders from the Sea God’s Pavilion quickly made their way over. Huo Yuhao’s injuries shocked all of them.

When they heard that Huo Yuhao had received these injuries for Wang Dong’er, they felt a little helpless. For love, he was willing to go to such an extent?...

“Where is this rascal Huo Yuhao?” Elder Xuan couldn’t help but curse.

Wang Dong’er stood up hurriedly and said respectfully, “Elder Xuan.”

Elder Xuan was furious as he walked into the room. He quickly came to the bedside and pressed his hand against Huo Yuhao’s mouth, sensing his condition.

He only lifted his hand after a while.

“He’s in a bad state.” Elder Xuan furrowed his brows and couldn’t help but curse, “This rascal, why didn’t he report something like this to the academy? Dong’er, who told him that you were injured? Let me take a look.”

As he spoke, he lifted his hand and pressed it against Wang Dong’er’s shoulder. After sensing for a brief moment, he revealed a weird look on his face. “There’s no injury, but there’s a weird force in your body. It doesn’t seem like soul power. However, my powers strangely can’t seem to capture it. If we are talking about an internal injury, this must be it.” “Elder Zhuang, take a look at him.” As he spoke, Elder Xuan gestured to another elder. This elder was also a member of the Sea God’s Pavilion. He cultivated a plant-type martial soul, and was skilled in healing.

Elder Zhuang came to the bedside and also pressed his hand against Huo Yuhao’s mouth. Soul rings started to rise from his feet. Two yellow, two purple and ﬁve black rings appeared. He was a Titled Douluo!

Vibrant-looking green vines spread from his body and moved around Huo Yuhao. Very soon, his entire body was engulfed by the vines.

An intense life aura was released by the vines as Elder Zhuang’s soul rings lit up. The vines were also shining with different colors of light.

After a time, Elder Zhuang retracted the vines.

He gently shook his head and said, “He’s indeed in bad shape. His injuries were very serious. Most importantly, there’s a blazing heat in his body that doesn’t belong. It clashes with his Ultimate Ice. Apart from his own Ultimate Ice soul power, there’s also origin energy in his body. It’s all very messy. Under such a situation, the Ultimate Ice can’t expel the heat or neutralize it. Furthermore, his internal organs are also badly burned. Honestly speaking, he should have died from such serious injuries. However, there’s a force in his body sustaining his life. He must have eaten some herb that’s helping him recuperate. It’s just that the speed of recuperation is very slow due to the clash between ice and ﬁre in his body.

Elder Xuan said, “What should we do then? Can you treat him?”

Elder Zhuang shook his head and answered, “No. My treatment is mainly carried out by pouring in life power. But his own life power isn’t weak, so there’s no need for that. In addition, we can’t just recklessly treat his injuries. If too much soul power is poured in, the unstable forces in his body might be released, and his life might be in danger. To him, the best treatment is to rest. He’ll wake up when the herb heals the injuries in his body, and he’ll also be able to control the circulation of his soul power when he wakes up. His injuries will also slowly recover then. It’s the same for his hands. It’s better for him to recover on his own.” Elder Xuan asked, “Will he be able to make a full recovery?”

Elder Zhuang replied, “I can’t tell. It’s too messy. How could his body accumulate so much origin energy? While it’s good stuff, we can’t have too much of it. Not only is he gravely injured, he seems to have taken too many tonics. Whether or not he can make a full recovery will be up to him, but I’m sure his life isn’t in danger anymore.”

Elder Xuan sighed and commented, “This rascal is really worrying! Elder Zhuang, I’ll have to trouble you over the next few days.”

Elder Zhuang nodded and said, “Don’t worry, he’s the future pillar of our academy. I’ll help him recover no matter what. I’ll check on him twice a day from now. As his body’s condition changes, I’ll adjust my treatment accordingly.”

Elder Xuan sighed and nodded, “That would be great!”

Bei Bei and the rest rushed over at this moment. Bei Bei even brought some food for Wang Dong’er, a bowl of chicken soup. It was nutritious and easily digestible. As the eldest senior, Bei Bei had always been very meticulous.

Wang Dong’er didn’t stand on ceremony. Even though Huo Yuhao was critically injured now, she was in a good mood. It was just that her heart was also aching at the same time.

Whatever it was, Huo Yuhao was ﬁnally better. At least he was still alive. He did everything for her, which had landed him in this state! As Wang Dong’er thought of all this, her tears were ﬁlled with happiness even though her heart was still aching at his predicament.

Tough, she had to be tough. Although she was in pain, she didn’t continue crying. She drank the chicken soup to replenish her own energy. However, her eyes never left Huo Yuhao.

Elder Xuan left with the elders. Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao wanted to stay behind to help Wang Dong’er look after Huo Yuhao, but Wang Dong’er declined their offer. She told them that she could cope on her own. Bei Bei was relieved after watching her consume an entire bowl of chicken soup and a plate of green vegetables. After all, they were all soul masters, and Wang Dong’er was even a Soul Emperor. Although she hadn’t been taking care of herself over the past few days, she would recover quickly as long as she was willing to eat and watch her body.

After her meal, Wang Dong’er’s complexion improved. She dragged a chair to the bedside and sat down cross-legged on it, entering deep meditation.

If she wanted to take care of Huo Yuhao and help him recover, she had to make sure she was ﬁne herself ﬁrst.

Wang Dong’er was also one of the best young soul masters at Shrek Academy right now. If she remained calm and composed, her abilities weren’t inferior to Huo Yuhao’s.

Over the past ten days, her internal ordeals and poor health had caused her to become much weaker. After spitting out blood earlier, she was extremely weak right now. After eating, she had to recuperate, too. However, it wasn’t always the case that she could enter her deep meditative state at will.

After ten minutes, she re-opened her eyes. They were ﬁlled with tenderness and heartache.

She was unable to calm herself down enough to enter deep meditation. Once she shut her eyes, she thought of Huo Yuhao. Her ears were also echoing with Wang Qiu’er’s words.

When she recalled how Huo Yuhao drank the boiling water for her, tears would well up in her eyes. Yuhao, you are really silly. You are really silly!

She couldn’t tolerate her yearning for him. She removed her outer clothes and went over to the bed. She carefully avoided Huo Yuhao’s injured hands and laid down beside him. She felt his aura and shut her eyes.

It was very weird, but she felt much more peaceful as she rested her body against his. It was an unprecedented sense of tranquility. Huo Yuhao’s heartbeat was slightly weak. One had to listen carefully to tell that it was beating. Wang Dong’er’s tears started to dry up. A satisﬁed smile surfaced on her face.

She fell asleep just like that. Very soon, her breathing calmed down.

She didn’t see the Yearning Heartbroken Grass exuding a dim red light. The gentle red light engulfed their bodies, and its fragrance drifted away and entered their bodies as they inhaled it.

---

Someone else was crying quietly as Wang Dong’er fell asleep in Huo Yuhao’s arms.

Wang Qiu’er stood in front of her room and looked at the sky outside, which was getting dark. Her tears started to fall again.

“It’s such a torment loving someone, especially when you know you can’t be with that person. Huo Yuhao, Huo Yuhao, would you have loved me like you love her if I had met you ﬁrst? Why didn’t I meet you earlier? Heavens! Why do you have to play such a trick on me? Wasn’t Wang Dong’er a guy?”

Morning...

When Wang Dong’er opened her eyes, she was stunned to discover that she had slept from the previous day’s evening to today’s morning. She had not slept so sweetly in a very long time. Although she was still feeling a little fatigued, she felt much refreshed.

She looked at the man beside her close up. He was still in a deep sleep, and didn’t look like he was about to wake up any time soon. His heartbeat was still very calm.

Wang Dong’er carefully checked on his condition. After ascertaining that he was ﬁne, she pecked his cheek and got up. After washing up, she began to help Huo Yuhao clean up.

She washed him up before gently massaging his muscles.

After that, she changed him into clean clothes. Huo Yuhao couldn’t eat anything. Before Elder Xuan left yesterday, he had left a bottle of pills behind. He had asked Wang Dong’er to feed Huo Yuhao. These pills had been created using more than ten types of valuable ingredients, and would be sufﬁcient to replenish his body.

After Wang Dong’er retrieved the bottle of pills, she placed one of the pills into her mouth before kissing him, and transferred the medicinal ﬂuid into his mouth with her tongue.

Her face was red. For an inexperienced young lady like her, this was too embarrassing. However, there was a determined look in her eyes. As she thought of how Huo Yuhao was ready to give up his life for her, she put her embarrassment aside. I’m his future wife, what’s there to be shy about?

After ﬁnishing this, Wang Dong’er went out to eat. After eating, she returned to Huo Yuhao’s side and entered deep meditation.

She ﬁnally managed to enter deep meditation this time. ---

She changed Huo Yuhao’s clothes twice a day, fed him medicine and massaged him thrice a day. She also washed his body twice a day. When night fell, she stopped meditating and just slept beside him.

Elder Zhuang came to check on Huo Yuhao twice a day, as promised. Huo Yuhao’s physical condition seemed to be recovering faster than expected. The medicinal effect that was maintaining his life was very strong, and it lasted for a long time, too, enabling his internal injuries to heal quickly. Elder Zhuang told Wang Dong’er to talk more to Huo Yuhao so that he would wake up faster. Once he woke up, he could control some of his soul power, and his body would heal even more quickly.

Night fell, and Wang Dong’er continued laying beside Huo Yuhao.

She caressed his face and muttered into his eyes, “Yuhao, I’m Dong’er. I’ve seen the medicinal herb that you brought back. Where did you ﬁnd out about my injury? Do I really have an internal injury? I didn’t even know! Yuhao, I miss you so much. I really want to hear your voice. You’ll get better. No matter what, I’ll be by your side to take care and wait on you...

“Will you wake up? You’ve been sleeping for too long. As long as you wake up, I’ll promise you anything. Even if you want to get intimate with me, I won’t object to it. I’ll let you hug me to sleep every night, okay? Isn’t that what you’ve always wished for? From today onwards, I’ll accompany you like that to sleep. I’m already your wife. This is my responsibility!

“In fact, do you know that I’m very willing to sleep with you? I feel especially safe when I sleep with you. I feel very comfortable...

“Yuhao, wake up. I really miss you. I really, really miss you.”

As she ﬁnished speaking, Wang Dong’er was already sobbing a little

She opened Huo Yuhao’s mouth and looked at his throat. It was completely scarlet-red, as if his ﬂesh were squirming and growing. The medicinal herb Wang Qiu’er had given him had a very strong healing effect on his injuries.

Elder Zhuang had also commented that it was a miracle when he saw it. Perhaps the magical herb’s strength could restore Huo Yuhao’s voice.

When Wang Dong’er saw Huo Yuhao’s throat, she started wailing. He must be in a lot of pain! He was so deeply in love that he had swallowed boiling water so that he could spit out blood that wasn’t frozen.

Even Wang Dong’er didn’t know when she fell asleep. When she was sleeping, her tear stains were still on her face.

---

The days slowly passed. Wang Dong’er took good care of Huo Yuhao. In the blink of an eye, ten days had passed. Huo Yuhao was still sleeping. Huo Yuhao’s injuries had already healed after ten days. Even his burned hands and vocal cords had been restored. His heartbeat also became stronger. Everything was progressing well.

The tournament was approaching, but Huo Yuhao hadn’t awoken yet.

Wang Dong’er was crying less and less these days. She became calmer as Huo Yuhao’s body slowly recovered. She was content to wait on him every day. She would talk to him for at least an hour every day and gently called his name to wake him up.

It was now only a month to the tournament. The rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters were stepping up their preparations and cultivations. Without Huo Yuhao as their main control- type soul master, it was going to be an arduous task to become champions in this tournament. The inclusion of sects changed everything. They were going to meet much stronger opponents!

Wang Qiu’er also came to visit Huo Yuhao a few times. Wang Dong’er didn’t stop her from doing so. On the contrary, she hosted her very passionately.

Every time Wang Qiu’er came, she didn’t speak. She only stood by the bedside and looked at Huo Yuhao for a while before leaving silently.

Wang Dong’er could see the sadness in her eyes. However, some things couldn’t be shared. She pitied Wang Qiu’er, but there was only one Huo Yuhao. He was her man!

---

Another ﬁve days passed. Huo Yuhao had been back for half a month, and his injuries had already healed. Only the two waves of soul power were still conﬂicting in his body.

Wang Dong’er didn’t dare to use her soul power to help him recover. She was worried that it might be counter-effective. She would rather he recovered slowly than take a risk.

Huo Yuhao had grown slightly fatter after lying down for the past ﬁfteen days. The medicinal effect was pretty good. Wang Dong’er fed him his medicine through her mouth every day before giving him some water. Huo Yuhao’s body stayed in good condition under her care.

---

Evening. It was time for her to speak to him again.

“Yuhao, did you know? I ate two buns tonight. So many, right? I’m afraid that I’ll grow fat.” Wang Dong’er lowered her head as she spoke and looked down at her slim waist.

“Today’s canteen food was especially delicious. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of myself. For you, I won’t harm my body anymore. When you wake up, I’ll let you see a healthy Dong’er. Will you be very happy because of this? I’ll let you see a prettier Dong’er.”

Wang Dong’er continued speaking with a smile on her face, “Did you know? Sometimes I’m not in a rush for you to wake up. The past few days have been fruitful for me. I love waiting on you. You were the one taking care of me all this while. You were also the one who cleaned our dorm room. It’s my turn now. I know you’ve sacriﬁced a lot for me over these few years. However, you didn’t know I was a girl back then. You really are a fool! We were living together for such a long time, but you didn’t realize. Come to think of it, I still want to mock you for that.

“Oh right, eldest senior and the rest have been cultivating tirelessly. However, everything is affected greatly because you’re not around. Furthermore, I can’t compete because you are in this state. I told eldest senior that I’d be staying behind with you, and he agreed to my request. We are all representing the Tang Sect this time. Eldest senior said that Na Na can be our ﬁrst substitute. She’s quite good. We can also make up our numbers by asking someone else from the sect.

“It would be great if you could wake up though! Even though you can’t compete, everyone will still be in good spirits with your support.

“Oh, right. I haven’t fed you your medicine. I’ll talk to you after feeding you.”

Wang Dong’er retrieved a bottle and placed a pill into her mouth. As usual, she fed him through her mouth.

She was used to it after half a month. She used the tip of her tongue to force Huo Yuhao’s teeth open before pressing her tongue against his. It was easier that way.

Everything progressed very smoothly as usual. However, she felt a slight touch on her tongue as she tried to pull it back.

She was stunned for a moment. Following this, she understood what was going on and quickly hugged Huo Yuhao. She continued to reach her tongue in and touched the tip of his tongue again.

Wang Dong’er was trembling slightly in agitation. Was he about to wake up?

However, his tongue had stopped moving. Wang Dong’er didn’t garner any reaction even though she used her tongue to touch the tip of his again.

Was it a false feeling? Wang Dong’er was unconvinced! When she retracted her tongue, she looked slightly disappointed. She turned around and gently rubbed at the tears that ﬂowed from her eyes. Yuhao, when are you going to wake up?

At this point, a weak and hoarse voice sounded behind her, “Again… kiss…”

Wang Dong’er’s body stiffened. In the next instant, she turned around and saw a pair of dull eyes. However, those eyes were looking at her gently!

Chapter 266: Waking Up in Comfort

“Yu-Yuhao… you’re ﬁnally awake.” Wang Dong’er couldn’t hide her agitation anymore. Even though had she told herself countless times not to cry when Yuhao woke up, she still couldn’t control herself now that he was actually awake!

She leapt onto Huo Yuhao and started wailing. She was worried and heartbroken at the same time. At this moment, her tears ﬂowed uncontrollably.

Huo Yuhao opened his eyes once again. He was still very, very tired. His injuries were too serious. Even though his external wounds had recovered, the conﬂicting origin energy and soul power in his body, as well as the Blazing Sunspring water, greatly inﬂuenced his condition.

Wang Dong’er cried for ﬁfteen minutes, and her tears drenched the front of Huo Yuhao’s shirt. She only stopped after that.

When she lifted her head to look at Huo Yuhao again, she discovered that he had already shut his eyes, and she panicked. She quickly wiped her tears away and called, “Yuhao, Yuhao, are you okay?”

Huo Yuhao struggled to open his eyes and forced a slight smile for her. “I’m ﬁne. You must stay true to your words!” After a few minutes of rest, he felt slightly better.

Wang Dong’er was stunned for a moment. “What do you mean?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “You said that you were willing to do anything as long as I woke up. You even promised to sleep with me. It’ll be like that forever. You must keep your word.”

Wang Dong’er broke into a laugh and said, “You are in this state, but you still remember these things.”

Huo Yuhao also laughed. “It concerns my happiness. I’m going to sleep a while more.” As he spoke, he shut his eyes again. Wang Dong’er quickly lay down beside him. She caressed his chest lightly, and used her light-type soul power to absorb the tears from his shirt.

When Huo Yuhao opened his eyes again, it was already the next morning. He was also much better now. Wang Dong’er was waiting on him as usual. When she washed his body, she started to feel embarrassed again.

After all, it was a different matter when he was awake!

She lowered her head and didn’t dare to look at him. She rubbed his body gently.

“Is the temperature ﬁne?” Wang Dong’er asked.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “It’s good.”

“Okay.”

“Dong’er.”

“Yes?”

“Do you like my butt so much? You’ve cleaned it six times.”

“What?”

Wang Dong’er’s face turned red, and she quickly put the towel away before covering him with the blanket.

“Dong’er.” Seeing Wang Dong’er’s embarrassed look, Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but call her.

“Yes?” Wang Dong’er lowered her head, and her face turned even redder.

Huo Yuhao said, “I want to take my medicine. I’m a little hungry.”

“Okay.” Wang Dong’er rushed to get the medicine bottle. She placed a pill into her mouth. However, she saw Huo Yuhao’s burning eyes when she lifted her head to look at him.

Huo Yuhao was smiling as he looked at her. His eyes were ﬁlled with a comforted look.

When he saw that Wang Dong’er was like a young lady cleaning up the room and waiting on him, he was touched. This was the perfect life in his heart! A family and a wife that loved him. He might even have a few children in the future.

As for his wife, one was enough. He couldn’t be like the White Tiger Duke. If not for the White Tiger Duke, his mother wouldn’t have suffered.

“If you still don’t feed me, you’ll swallow everything.” Huo Yuhao was amused as he looked at Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er shut her eyes, and her face turned red. She moved her lips towards Huo Yuhao’s mouth and transferred the medicinal ﬂuid. However, the tip of her tongue was sensitive. When she touched Huo Yuhao’s tongue, she was evidently trying to avoid it. Huo Yuhao sucked with his mouth, and his tongue wrapped around Wang Dong’er’s. Wang Dong’er’s eyes widened.

“Hoo hoo!”

Huo Yuhao didn’t stop sucking. He was sucking gently.

Wang Dong’er rushed to shut her eyes again. She didn’t dare to struggle, as she was afraid of hurting him.

They only stopped kissing after their breathing got a little fast.

When Wang Dong’er sat straight, her nose was already panting. She looked at Huo Yuhao shyly. “You are so naughty. Your tongue can move. This means you can swallow your medicine on your own. You can consume it yourself next time.”

Huo Yuhao chortled, “That’s not right. You agreed to feed me like this. You can’t go back on your word.” Wang Dong’er snorted, “I’ll help you clean your body.”

After helping Huo Yuhao change his clothes, Wang Dong’er helped to massage his muscles.

As she rubbed his muscles, Wang Dong’er asked, “Yuhao, where did you ﬁnd out about my internal injury?”

Huo Yuhao was a little annoyed. “Qiu’er is such a blabbermouth! She shouldn’t have told you. Dong’er, I’ll follow you back to the Clear Sky Sect when my injury heals. I don’t know if the Yearning Heartbroken Grass can work on your injury. It’s better to let Uncle Niu Tian and Tai Tan look after it.”

Wang Dong’er was doubtful as she looked at Huo Yuhao, “What’s going on? Who told you about my internal injury?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and smiled. “Don’t ask me. I’ve already plucked the Yearning Heartbroken Grass. Isn’t everything ﬁne now?” “Fine?” Wang Dong’er was confused. Her tears were about to ﬂow again as she looked at Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao panicked. “Dong’er, don’t cry. Don’t worry, I’ll get well. I must get well for you! In fact, I wasn’t seriously injured this time, right…” His mind wasn’t very clear, as he just woken up. He had to watch his words even if he wanted to weave a lie.

Wang Dong’er bit her lower lip. “Stop talking. I know everything. Wang Qiu’er told me everything. In fact, I know even if you don’t tell me. Was it the pouch?”

Huo Yuhao didn’t make a sound.

Wang Dong’er’s lips twisted slightly, and she clenched her ﬁst. “Eldest uncle! Second uncle! The two of you…”

Huo Yuhao felt something wrong with the atmosphere, and hurriedly said, “Dong’er, don’t be mistaken! The two of them are doing this for your own good. Not anyone can pluck the Yearning Heartbroken Grass. Only I can do so. It’s only right that I went! It’s ﬁne as long as you are okay.”

“Alright.” Wang Dong’er relaxed and didn’t say anything else. She smiled and said, “They are my uncles. Why would I blame them? Alright, you should talk less since you just woke up. Go ahead and rest. I still haven’t informed everyone that you’re awake.”

Huo Yuhao said, “Oh. Then you should go and tell eldest senior. They are busy with their cultivation, so don’t ask them to come over. I can’t do anything anyway since I just woke up. Let me recover ﬁrst.”

“Alright. That’s also my intention. It’s better not to let anyone disturb you. Lie down ﬁrst. I’ll go and wash your clothes.”

“Okay. It’s been tough on you, Dong’er.”

Wang Dong’er shook her head, “It’s what I should be doing.

Shut your eyes and rest.”

As she spoke, she took the basin ﬁlled with Huo Yuhao’s dirty clothes and went to the bathroom.

She closed the bathroom door and couldn’t control her emotions anymore. She clenched her ﬁsts tightly, and her face turned red from her anger and pain.

“Eldest uncle, second uncle, why did the two of you do such a thing to Yuhao!? Wasn’t the test at Clear Sky Peak enough?”

Wang Dong’er was intelligent. Even though Huo Yuhao didn’t say anything, she could guess that it was because of the pouch. Even if Huo Yuhao had needed to pluck the Yearning Heartbroken Grass, her uncles should have followed him, given their cultivations. After hearing Wang Qiu’er’s recounting of events, she knew that the Setting Sun Forest was very dangerous. Before even seeing the Yearning Heartbroken Grass, Huo Yuhao had already met with danger several times!

Huo Yuhao wasn’t stupid. Wang Dong’er knew that he would have known that it was a test. However, this test had been too difﬁcult. What would she have done if Huo Yuhao didn’t make it out alive?

She took a deep breath and looked at herself in the mirror. She muttered to herself, “From today onward, I’m no longer the young mistress of the Clear Sky Sect. I’m Huo Yuhao’s wife. I’ll repay Huo Yuhao for everything that he’s done for me with my life.”

After she ﬁnished speaking, her facial expression started to calm down. However, she still looked a little cold, “Eldest uncle, second uncle, I’ll deal with the two of you when I return.”

---

Two manly guys who were drinking shuddered at the same moment. They even almost spilled their wine…

---

Huo Yuhao was feeling very calm now. Although his body was very weak, he was very happy now. He was also feeling very calm.

He was very satisﬁed to be alive and able to see Wang Dong’er again. He was also satisﬁed to pass her the Yearning Heartbroken Grass. At least he was still alive!

I will get well. Huo Yuhao shut his eyes, and a ﬁgure slowly appeared in his mind. It was someone who cut a sad ﬁgure.

Qiu’er! How did she save me? I clearly felt that I was going to die then.

His doubts and the ravishing ﬁgure caused him to open his eyes. He sighed. Huo Yuhao knew that he owed Wang Qiu’er another favor. Without her, he couldn’t have survived. It’s just that he didn’t know what method she had used to save him.

She saved his life, and it wasn’t the ﬁrst time! Qiu’er, how am I supposed to return this favor?

Huo Yuhao took in a deep breath and felt an intense pain coming from his chest. To prevent Wang Dong’er from worrying, he stopped himself from shouting.

He relaxed his body, and his pain slowly lessened. Huo Yuhao focused and inspected his own body.

When he did, he was stunned. He couldn’t help but laugh bitterly. Is this really my body?

His body wasn’t even in a bad condition. It was messy.

His passageways were messed up. They were like wool that had formed knots again after being unfurled. The tips couldn’t be found at all.

He didn’t use his soul power to resist the Blazing Sunspring water. His throat, windpipe and even internal organs were scorched. With the help of a weird force, his burnt organs had recovered. However, the recovery process became very messy because he didn’t guide it. His organs were stuck together, and his passageways were jumbled up. Different energies were also present in these passageways. There was the heat from the Blazing Sunspring water, his own soul power and the origin energy that the Snow Empress had brought in. It was messy!

On the surface, he seemed ﬁne. However, he had only staved off death. The mystical force had protected his important organs so that the various energies within him wouldn’t conﬂict. Otherwise, he would have died many times over.

This was terrible. Even though Huo Yuhao’s state of mind was still stable, he could only laugh bitterly to himself now.

It was precisely because his condition was so messy that Elder Zhuang didn’t dare to treat him. With his current condition, the various forms of energies, the mystical force protecting him and the life aura brought about his Life’s Gold achieved a delicate balance. This ensured his survival. If he tried to do anything, he might endanger himself. Treatment might instead put his life at risk.

Elder Zhuang had already communicated with Elder Xuan in secret. Unless a miracle happened, Huo Yuhao would be disabled. Even if he could survive, it would be difﬁcult for him to stand up again. As long as this delicate balance was maintained, his life would only end when the mystical force disappeared.

Only Elder Zhuang and Elder Xuan knew about this. Elder Xuan couldn’t bear to tell the rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters. Moreover, Elder Xuan didn’t believe Huo Yuhao would collapse just like this. Huo Yuhao was always one to create miracles! What should he do? After laughing bitterly to himself, Huo Yuhao thought of something. Just like Elder Xuan believed, he wasn’t one to bow down to fate.

Huo Yuhao could also sense the balance in his body. In fact, he was even clearer than Elder Zhuang about his own body’s condition. He had the Ice Empress, the Snow Empress and the Skydream Iceworm’s strength inside his body, and the origin energy of Ultimate Ice compressed into his soul bones. There was also the portion of energy sucked away by the Snow Lady. He would be doomed if everything blew apart.

After pondering for a moment, Huo Yuhao straightened out his thoughts. First, he told himself not to panic. He couldn’t rush to succeed.

Chapter 267: Working Hard For the Sake of Recovering

Despite the fact that he had risked everything to help Wang Dong’er obtain the Yearning Heartbroken Grass, he valued his life like all human beings, particularly since he could only make Dong’er happy if he lived!

A stable mental state allowed Huo Yuhao to calm down. He examined his body once more, and quickly discovered a source of hope.

That’s right, at this moment, his body was completely chaotic. Even the passageways in his hands were all tangled up, and he could not move a single ﬁnger. However, there was still one place that remained intact in him. That was his brain.

In other words, despite his poor physical state, his mental state was still perfectly intact. Furthermore, after he used the Fullmoon Piercing Autumn Dew, the quality of his mental state had changed too. His Spirit Eyes appeared to be evolving once more. All these were exceptional accomplishments! In other words, while Huo Yuhao’s cultivation may have retarded, and he did not dare to use his own soul power as much, his Spirit Eyes remained the same, and his Spiritual Sea had not changed. In fact, it could be said to have become stronger. His concrete-immaterial realm was further stabilized

by his love for Dong’er. This allowed his spirit to ascend to the next level, and he even possessed a unique move where his spiritual power merged with his soul power, the Goddess of Light.

This was his advantage right now. His spiritual power had awakened within him, and was on the verge of recovery. It remained vibrant. Supported by his spiritual power, he used his Spiritual Detection and the Purple Demon Eyes of his Mustard Seed Domain to sense every change in his body. With his powerful spiritual power as his shield, he could try and heal himself.

His spiritual power was another form of energy. It was possible for him to use his spiritual power to safeguard his passageways.

After he cleared his mind, Huo Yuhao did not panic. There was no point in panicking. He had to wait for his recovery to reach its peak before he could do anything. At the same time, as he woke up, the functions of his body started to recover too. Like this, the power of the Life Gold could be felt once again. Its powerful life energy allowed him to continue possessing a powerful life energy. No matter how his recovery went, it would become easier.

After Bei Bei and the others heard that Huo Yuhao had woken up, they all came to visit him. Elder Xuan came too. However, Elder Xuan instructed that no one would be allowed to disturb Huo Yuhao. Hence, everyone could only visit him once a week. His recovery would be completely managed by Wang Dong’er.

Huo Yuhao lay there for three days. In these three days, he did nothing. He quietly enjoyed Wang Dong’er’s care.

Indeed, it was a form of enjoyment. While his body could not move and his insides were all messed up, he could look at Wang Dong’er take care of him every day. This ﬁlled him with an unspeakable warmth. Particularly at night, when Wang Dong’er, blushing, climbed into bed next to him to sleep wearing only her underwear. This made his spiritual power recover extremely quickly. Perhaps this was the power of love. Of course, this could also be due to his Goddess of Light’s soul- spirit fusion skill.

Huo Yuhao did not tell Wang Dong’er the truth. He just said that he needed some time to recover. This was good too, because Wang Dong’er did not probe or ask him any more questions. All she did was care for him tirelessly. She did not want to put any pressure on him. To her, no matter what became of Huo Yuhao in the future, no matter whether he could recover or not, she would never leave him.

------

Dawn, three days later...

He opened his eyes, and in the depths of his twin pupils, a purple light ﬂashed. Everything around him became much clearer, and with each thought that passed through his mind, he felt as if the entire Sea God’s Island was within his mental grasp.

It turned out that everything was not as bad as he had thought. When she felt the slight change in Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er immediately roused herself. She sat up hurriedly and asked anxiously, “Yuhao, are you ﬁne?”

Huo Yuhao smiled at her and asked, “Do I look ﬁne? Dong’er, close your eyes.”

“Eh?” Wang Dong’er looked at him suspiciously. Under his insistence, she closed her eyes. Her long eyelashes lightly touched the bottoms of her eyes, making her irresistibly alluring.

In the next instant, Wang Dong’er saw it too. To her shock, she realized that she was looking at the entire Sea God’s Island as if it were a 3D model. She could even ‘see’ the colors of the island, as if she was a pair of eyes in the sky gazing down on the island.

No, no, she was not just gazing down. She could see every small detail of the island. The only thing that she could not see clearly was the area around the Sea God’s Pavilion, which seemed to be protected by a layer of golden light. That had to be the power of the Golden Tree... Was, was this Spiritual Detection Sharing? Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection Sharing?

Wang Dong’er opened her eyes suddenly. With wide eyes, she looked at Huo Yuhao and said, her voice trembling, “Yuhao, Yuhao, you…”

Huo Yuhao looked at her and said, “I said that I’m ﬁne. Your husband is like an indestructible cockroach. This is the result of three days of hard work. Afterward, everything will become better. Eh, I can still do this.”

Wang Dong’er watched as Huo Yuhao’s eyes turned bright purple. To others, this might have been be slightly unsettling. However, that was not the case for Wang Dong’er. At that moment, there was only excitement and hope in her heart. She could ﬁnally see a hope of recovery for him!

------

Elder Xuan drank from a gourd in his room. Ever since he became the Master of the Sea God’s Pavilion, he could not be as degenerate as before. After all, he represented the highest level of Shrek Academy. However, he still liked his life of holding a gourd in one hand and a chicken drumstick in the other. However, he could now only do it within the conﬁnes of his room.

However, no matter how much ﬁne wine he drank these past few days, his mood could not get better. “Huo Yuhao, Huo Yuhao, what has happened to you? How can I answer to Elder Mu after I die!? This child, really…”

Elder Xuan could not voice his discontent in in public. After all, he had done what he did to save the person he loved. He did not know if he would have the courage to do so himself.

At this point, Elder Xuan’s dusky eyes narrowed. To him, it was as if the entire room had become brighter.

“Who’s there?” Elder Xuan asked in a low voice. A powerful energy pulsed from his body.

“Elder Xuan, it’s me,” a clear voice replied. Instantly, Elder Xuan felt a warm spirit appear in his room. It did not dare to approach him, but instead stopped at his door. Then, a thin layer of purple started to spread and turned into a smiling face, which looked at him.

“Eh? This is?” Elder Xuan looked at the smiling face in shock. “Yuhao? How, how did you do this?”

Of course, who could the face be other than Huo Yuhao?

Huo Yuhao smiled slightly and said, “While my body is weak, I used some herbs that helped to increase my spiritual power when I was helping Dong’er ﬁnd her Yearning Heartbroken Grass. They allowed my spiritual power to increase exponentially. It is like my Spiritual Eyes has undergone a second evolution. This has allowed my spiritual power to reach the concrete-immaterial realm, and thus, I can communicate with you from afar. This is a manifestation of my spiritual power. While I’m not yet adept at wielding it, I’m sure time will better it.”

Elder Xuan looked at him dumbfounded and asked, “How’s your body? Your spiritual power can do this?”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “Don’t worry. I’ll get better.”

Elder Xuan chucked his gourd to the side and said, “I’ll head over right now.” As he said that, he ﬂew out of the door. In the blink of an eye, he was outside Huo Yuhao’s room.

When he looked at Elder Xuan, who was charging toward his room with a face of shock, Huo Yuhao smiled happily. His successful experimentation told him that his spiritual power had truly reached a new level. It was no longer purely ‘spiritual’ like before. While it was still metaphysical, and could not attack like his soul power, he could do many things that he could not before.

For example, his Spiritual Detection could be used for communication like what he had just done with Elder Xuan. At the same time, he felt that his Spiritual Detection’s range was not bad. The Sea God’s Island was not too big, but its diameter was at least one kilometer. He could already see everything on the island, as well as parts of Sea God’s Lake.

Through his Spiritual Detection Sharing, he originally could only use it to instruct others. Now, he could connect directly with the spiritual power of another person. Then, he could communicate intentions with the other party. Not only did this fulﬁl his role as a control-type soul master, but he could also seek others’ opinions. While his body could not move, he could easily talk to anyone on Sea God’s Island.

Under his body’s present condition, this was a piece of excellent news. With the recovery of his spiritual power, Huo Yuhao became clearer about the condition of his body. He was not afraid that he would not recover. Since he was alive, there must be a reason for it. With spiritual power, while he could not use it to attack anything in the world around him, he could use it to fuse with his soul power inside him and achieve terrifying results. This was an extremely intricate scalpel. Huo Yuhao understood that the only way to heal himself was through himself.

“Your spiritual power, Yuhao?” Elder Xuan looked at him with an indescribable expression in his eyes.

As a Class 98 Transcendent Douluo who was only a step away from becoming an Ultimate Douluo, Elder Xuan could do everything that Huo Yuhao had just done. While he was not a spirit-type soul master, he could also force his spiritual power to take a concrete shape. However, he could not let the manifestation of his spiritual power leave his ﬁeld of view. If he did, he would lose control over it.

In terms of spiritual power, Huo Yuhao could not compare to Elder Xuan. However, in terms of control of his spiritual power, as well as the quality of his spiritual power, Huo Yuhao had already surpassed him. While he did not know how powerful Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power would be if he used it for offense, he knew that Huo Yuhao was not permanently crippled. Furthermore, his spiritual power was still increasing!

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “Metaphysical, it has more or less stabilized.”

Elder Xuan asked him immediately, “What about your Spirit Eyes? Have they improved, too?”

Huo Yuhao nodded.

Elder Xuan mumbled to himself, “Second Awakening, this is the Second Awakening indeed! Your spiritual power could soon be the strongest on the entire continent. While some in the Body Sect have experienced a Second Awakening too, I can be sure that at your level, no one is more powerful than you. This is excellent. How are your wounds?”

Huo Yuhao said, “My wounds are still problematic. However, I’m conﬁdent. For the Academy, for the Tang Sect, for Dong’er and I, I’ll do my best to recover.”

Elder Xuan nodded and said seriously, “Don’t rush it.”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “I won’t, don’t worry. With Dong’er accompanying me, I’m in no rush at all.”

Wang Dong’er gripped his hand lightly and smiled. She wished to take care of him forever. After this incident, their mindset toward their relationship had experienced a huge change. Their understanding of love way surpassed that of their peers.

Elder Xuan said, “How about this? You use your spiritual power to come up with a healing plan for yourself. Elder Zhuang and I will monitor you as you heal yourself. In case something happens, we can at least keep you alive. This will give you a free hand in your own recuperation.”

“Okay,” Huo Yuhao accepted the offer readily. With two Transcendent Douluo helping his recovery, it would naturally be a lot safer. His condition was complex indeed.

Elder Xuan thought for a while, and then said, “Furthermore, don’t tell anyone about the second evolution of your body soul. For now, don’t even tell the other members of the Shrek’s Seven Monsters.”

“Is there a need for this secrecy?” Huo Yuhao asked.

Elder Xuan’s mouth twitched as he said, “This is a secret weapon. Furthermore, after you have recovered, we need to talk about your punishment.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned. With a bitter expression, he said, “There’s punishment!?”

Elder Xuan said angrily, “Of course. If everyone behaved as recklessly as you, without a care for the rules, how could we run the Academy? I’m informing you right now that you have been expelled from the Sea God’s Pavilion. You can make up for your wrong with deeds of merit, and perhaps we’ll consider re- instituting you as a member of the Sea God’s Pavilion. Furthermore, the rewards from your future research into spirits have been canceled. If you die outside, how can you answer to Elder Mu? You little bastard, you really piss me off.”

Elder Xuan was angry indeed! How could he not be? Who exactly was Huo Yuhao? He was Elder Mu’s designated successor as the Master of the Sea God’s Pavilion. He had also been trained under the Ultimate Soldier Plan. However, in the face of his emotions, he had forgotten all his obligations and duties. He had risked his life to head to the Setting Sun Forest without even informing the school! It was a miracle that he had returned alive!

If Huo Yuhao had died outside, the impact on Shrek Academy would have been immeasurable! The blow would have been akin to the entire Academy losing its hope for the future and direction.

Huo Yuhao’s face was ﬁlled with regret. He really had not been thinking straight at that point in time...

“Elder Xuan, don’t be angry. I admit that I was wrong. I’ll accept whatever punishment the Academy imposes on me, just don’t expel me!...”

Elder Xuan snorted coldly and said, “Expulsion? Don’t tempt me. Rest well for now. After you come up with a recovery plan, inform me immediately. Elder Zhuang and I will help you.”

“Yes,” Huo Yuhao replied respectfully.

---

Elder Xuan stomped out angrily. He only smiled slightly when he left the room. It was a weird smile as he mumbled to himself, “A Second Awakening of the body soul and twin martial souls. Was there such a precedent on the continent? I don’t think so. Records, records. Well done, little bastard, you almost made me die from anger...”

---

As she watched Elder Xuan leave, Wang Dong’er’s pretty eyes were apologetic. “It’s all because of me. Yuhao…”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “What do you mean by that? It’s my fault for not thinking it through. Actually, I enjoy my current life very much! I don’t have to care about anything, I don’t have to do anything, I don’t have to cultivate. I can look at you every single day. This is a blissful life indeed. Come, my Goddess of Light, give me a kiss.”

Wang Dong’er could not stiﬂe her laughter as she said, “You have interesting thoughts, indeed! Lie there and don’t move and come up with your recovery plan. When you’re well, I’ll let you kiss me.”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes lit up as he said, “As many times as I want?” Wang Dong’er’s face turned red, but when she saw his look of anticipation, she nodded and said, “Yes.”

Huo Yuhao gleefully exclaimed, “Great, then I shall start immediately. Don’t worry, I’ll be very, very careful. For my Dong’er, I’ll get well as fast as I can. Eh, wait for me, where should I kiss? Should I kiss your face, or should I kiss your…”

“Go away!” Wang Dong’er blushed as she walked away.

As he looked at how adorable she was, Huo Yuhao’s face brimmed with joy. This was a blissful sentiment indeed. If not for the fact that he still had many things to do, it would be an awesome thing if he could just lie here and accompany Dong’er! After he ﬁnished with his stuff, he planned to travel the world with her. He wanted to see everything there was under the sky, eat all the tasty food there was, and have as many enjoyable experiences as possible. This was now his life’s goal!

------ With this excited mentality, Huo Yuhao started to examine his body once more. With his powerful spiritual energy, he ﬁrst swept his body, and then examined it region-by-region.

In his Spiritual Sea, he used his spiritual power to form a model of his body. In this model, he examined all the complicated passageways. For more serious areas, he represented them with deeper colors. For less serious areas, he used lighter colors.

How complicated were the passageways of a human? In spite of Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power, as well as his Sumeru and Mustard Seed Domain Purple Demon Eyes, he still took three whole days to complete this task.

Then, he shared the model of his body with Elder Xuan and Elder Zhuang via Spiritual Sharing.

When the two Transcendent Douluo saw the complete map of Huo Yuhao’s body formed using his metaphysical spiritual power, they could not help but exclaim in awe. Neither of them could control their spiritual power at Huo Yuhao’s level! Then, they used a week’s time to determine the condition of all of Huo Yuhao’s passageways to come up with a recovery plan. They considered every tiny detail to great lengths so as to minimize errors.

After ten days of rest, Huo Yuhao’s body had recovered quite a bit. The power of his Life Gold was fully revealed. While his injuries were still there, his body brimmed with life. His self- recovery ability was back, and had started to absorb some of the extremely cold origin energy of heaven and earth. While its speed of absorption was slow, Huo Yuhao carefully observed that there was nothing he could not do. In two years, all of the origin energy of heaven and earth in his body, other than that trapped in his soul bones, would be completely absorbed.

Then, it would be a lot easier to heal himself.

However, Huo Yuhao could not afford any delays. There were only twenty more days until the tournament. In twenty days’ time, he had to recover all his battling abilities.

Without Tang Ya and Bei Bei, there would be no him. One could say that the Tang Sect had made him. This time, they were ﬁghting for the Tang Sect! How could Huo Yuhao miss it? While he did not say it, he was determined to recover. Only then could he head to the Sun Moon Empire with everyone else. He was not only the center of his team because of his understanding of the Sun Moon Empire, but also their hope for winning.

Furthermore, if he waited a year, all of the problematic passageways in his body would have fully set. If he wanted to make a change then, it would be much more difﬁcult.

After his recovery plan was ﬁnalized, Huo Yuhao started to act.

His plan was simple. He would start small before moving on to the more severe injuries. He would be in charge of the initial stages of his recovery.

After a careful analysis, Huo Yuhao, Elder Xuan, and Elder Zhuang discovered that Huo Yuhao’s body could be split into three different conditions. Some parts of his body were intact, some parts of it were slightly injured, and some parts of it were severely messed up and badly injured. Hence, Huo Yuhao had to ﬁrst heal his lighter injuries before progressing to the more serious ones.

His legs and head were perfect. These three parts of his body were completely uninjured. His hands were slightly injured, as were the passageways in his shoulders. The most problematic part of his body was his torso. That was where the problems lay.

Hence, Huo Yuhao started with the recovery of his hands ﬁrst.

He distributed his soul power inside himself, concentrating it on his dantian. Huo Yuhao felt the Extreme Chill Icespring origin energy of heaven and earth brought by the Snow Empress. His cultivation had been reduced to three rings, which meant that he could only use the energy of three rings in battle. But he was still a soul king!

Huo Yuhao ﬁrst started to open up the meridians of his lower limbs.

His powerful spiritual energy slowly entered his dantian and intermingled with his soul power. As his torso passageways were blocked, his soul power had not been able to undergo circular cultivation for a long time, causing them to appear sluggish. However, as Huo Yuhao directed his cultivation, his foundation was strong, and under the guidance of his spiritual energy, it slowly came back to life. Huo Yuhao’s methodology was simple. First, he allowed his soul power to enter his legs, which helped to gradually open up the rigid passageways in his legs. Then, he made it do a simple circulation from his legs to his central meridians. This circulation allowed his soul power to come back to life.

While this could not increase his level of cultivation and was not helpful to his absorption of the origin energy of heaven and earth, this allowed his soul power to circulate non-stop. Soon, his legs regained their feeling

After an entire day’s worth of circulation, Huo Yuhao could slowly and awkwardly raise his two legs. Wang Dong’er was so happy that she wept. At the very least, his legs could move! Every energy ﬁeld in his lower limbs regained its feeling.

This was only the ﬁrst day of recovery, and he had already obtained such good results. This made Elder Xuan, Elder Zhuang, and Wang Dong’er extremely happy.

Through the circulation of his soul power, Huo Yuhao slowly withdrew the soul power in his legs, and then combined them with the soul power in his meridians. This allowed him to control more than two-thirds of his soul power.

Of course, he could not use his soul power straightaway. His passageways were battered by both the extreme chill of the origin energy of heaven and earth and the extreme heat of the Blazing Sunspring. They were already weak and messed up. All Huo Yuhao was trying to do was establish a foundation in his own body.

He next started treatment of his arms.

The passageways in his arms had been moderately injured due to the burns on his hands. Even after some self-recovery, they were still chaotic.

In comparison, the soul power in his arms could not be compared to that of his dantian. It could not even compare to his legs. However, Huo Yuhao had one advantage, which was the advantage of the soul bones in his arms. His left arm had the Ice Jade Scorpion Left Arm Bone, and his right arm had the Darkgolden Terrorclaw Bear's Right Palm Bone.

With these two soul bones, while the ﬂesh and skin of his hands were severely injured, the bones in his hands were safe. If not, if his bones had melted, he would have become a true cripple.

It was not easy to open his meridians and remodel them. Actually, it was a very painful thing to do. However, at this point, Huo Yuhao was not ﬁghting alone.

They had a complete plan for what to do. Under Elder Zhuang’s assistance, Huo Yuhao forced open every single meridian. As blood spurted from his hands and countless wounds appeared, he was able to force them back into their original positions and fuse with his body once more.

After this was done, Elder Zhuang used his powerful healing soul skills to help Huo Yuhao’s hands recover their vital energy. Then, the elder sent the blood back into his body.

The pain Huo Yuhao experienced throughout this process was nothing. In only a day’s time, he was able to move his hands again, although, due to the interference from his torso’s damaged nerves, his arms were unable to move for now. The start was good. However, what came next was more worrisome.

According to the plan, the next step was also the most crucial step. They had to ﬁrst expel the Fire Poison left in Huo Yuhao’s body by the Blazing Sunspring. Only then could he start the next step of his recovery. Otherwise, if the Fire Poison, which was close to his heart, suddenly kicked in, Huo Yuhao would die.

How would he take it out?

They would open his chest to take the poison out.

------

“Yuhao, are you ready?” Elder Zhuang asked.

It was morning, and Wang Dong’er helped Huo Yuhao clean his body. He then lay supine on his bed. When she was washing him, Wang Dong’er’s hands could not stop trembling. No matter what he said, she could not be molliﬁed.

The operation today was too important. If it succeeded, Huo Yuhao would make a complete recovery. If it failed…

“I’m ready,” Huo Yuhao nodded at Elder Zhuang while smiling slightly at Elder Xuan and Wang Dong’er.

Elder Zhuang said, “There can be no error. If there is, you will die.”

Huo Yuhao chortled, “There will be no error. I’m sturdy, and I won’t die so easily. Elder Zhuang, Elder Xuan, don’t worry. Get ready to start. Snow Lady!”

At his command, a ray of orange light appeared from his forehead. Was that not the Snow Lady?

The Snow Lady was different compared to before. Initially, she had resembled an infant, but now she had grown up visibly. She looked like a girl who was over two years old. The only thing that remained unchanged were her deep blue eyes. “Eeeyaaa! Dad, dad…” the Snow Lady cried out, shocking everyone.

She, she could talk, in human speech!

Huo Yuhao said in surprise, “Snow Lady, you can talk?”

Snow Lady pointed to Huo Yuhao’s chest and said seriously, “Dad, dad, pain.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and shook his head and said, “Daddy is not in pain. I’ll get better soon. In a while, it’ll all depend on you.”

The Snow Lady nodded her head vigorously and said, “Dad… Dad, no pain, no fear.”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “Get ready, I’ll guide you.”

The Snow Lady opened her eyes wider and gently nodded her head.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes turned purple. A layer of purplish-gold light appeared, completely enveloping the Snow Lady.

The Fire Poison from the Blazing Sunspring was an extreme form of ﬂame. To heal it, one would need a very powerful form of ice to protect Huo Yuhao’s body. Furthermore, only a powerful type of ice could draw out the Fire Poison. Huo Yuhao’s soul power was mostly in his torso, and hence, he could not use it. The only way to do so was through the Snow Lady.

The Snow Lady ﬂoated next to the bed and knelt down next to Huo Yuhao. With her small hand, she slowly touched Huo Yuhao’s bare chest.

One could see that the center of Huo Yuhao’s chest, particularly the area near his heart, was dark red. The air above this dark red patch of skin twisted and turned.

The Snow Lady’s left hand was pressed at the location between the dark red skin and Huo Yuhao’s heart. The moment her hand touched it, a faint mist appeared. The temperature of the air around it ﬂuctuated quickly. Cold and heat interchanged with each other, and Huo Yuhao’s face turned red and white.

Everyone held their breath. This moment was too important. Due to the extreme nature of the elements involved, no one could save Huo Yuhao but himself.

The Snow Lady slowly raised her right hand. A transparent, icy-cold dagger formed in her hand. Its tip was razor-sharp, and it was pointed straight at Huo Yuhao’s chest.

Wang Dong’er turned her head away, not daring to look anymore. She clutched her ﬁsts tightly and in her mind, all she could think about was how she was responsible for it. Yuhao, Yuhao, you have to live!

The Snow Lady did not make everyone wait long. Everything was calculated with precision by Huo Yuhao.

The dagger came down.

Pu-! The dagger pierced into Huo Yuhao’s chest.

Under the guidance of the Ultimate Ice, the Fire Poison in Huo Yuhao’s body spurted out immediately. A wound about the size of a ﬁst burst open on Huo Yuhao’s chest. Blazing hot blood spurted out.

Elder Xuan and Elder Zhuang were prepared. With his right hand, Elder Xuan was able to direct the ball of burning-hot blood away from the Snow Lady and into a clear blue bottle.

Elder Zhuang’s hands trembled, and an emerald-green halo surrounded Huo Yuhao’s body. An immensely powerful life energy started to rise, and the energy in Huo Yuhao’s body began to increase exponentially along with it.

The Snow Lady’s left hand, which was placed on Huo Yuhao’s chest, started to tremble violently. Most of the Poison was extracted, but some of it became active and rushed toward his heart.

The activation at this moment had been too intense. Even though Huo Yuhao had been prepared, he still felt an intense heat rising in his heart. His biggest problem now was that his Ultimate Ice could not protect him. All he could do was rely on the Snow Lady’s power. This was the most dangerous moment. Once the Fire Poison broke through her defenses, he was a goner.

At this moment, a layer of emerald-green light started to rise from Huo Yuhao’s body. The light was concentrated on a few ribs near Huo Yuhao’s heart. The intense Ultimate Ice energy was channeled outward in unison with the Snow Lady’s power. Together, they expelled the Fire Poison from his body.

After the incident in the Setting Sun Forest, Huo Yuhao had matured. He also did things more seriously. Like he had said, he would not allow an accident. This was because he still had a trump card, which was the million-year soul ring from the Skydream Iceworm.

Under the Skydream Iceworm’s guidance, the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion’s Ultimate Ice power was the last line of defense. It was able to protect his heart perfectly. At that moment, the extreme chill caused the circulation of blood in his heart to fall to one-tenth of its normal pace, turning Huo Yuhao’s face white. However, the Fire Poison had been expelled. While the Fire Poison had been expelled, it was now up to Elder Zhuang to control Huo Yuhao’s massive outﬂow of blood.

Chapter 268: One Hand

Elder Zhuang calmly reached out with both hands. A layer of emerald-green light instantly blocked the ﬁst-sized hole in Yuhao’s chest. Following that, Elder Zhuang’s hands started to move in an orderly manner. One could see countless tiny strands of green light as thin as strands of hair piercing Huo Yuhao’s body.

He was deft indeed, the countless strands of green light vibrated non-stop. The wound on Huo Yuhao’s chest recovered at an astonishing pace. Not only that, but the meridians around the Fire Poison returned to their original positions in a neat and orderly manner.

Elder Xuan walked to the side of the bed and pressed down on a particular spot on Huo Yuhao’s abdomen with two hands. A gentle soul power came from his palms and entered Huo Yuhao’s body, enveloping his internal organs. Only then did Elder Xuan nod slightly at Elder Zhuang.

Elder Zhuang intoned, “Return to your positions!” The two elders acted together. The soul power Elder Xuan released vibrated slightly, and Huo Yuhao’s entire body trembled violently. He spat out a mouthful of purplish-red blood.

The Snow Lady raised her right hand, and a ray of dark-blue light shot out. Instantly, the blood froze into an ice cube, which she held on to.

Elder Xuan’s hands remained where they were, while Elder Zhuang started to hit Huo Yuhao’s body rapidly with his palms.

The two elders worked together. Elder Xuan protected Huo Yuhao’s internal organs, while Elder Zhuang helped get his passageways back in order. Throughout this entire process, not only did Huo Yuhao have to endure great pain, but he also had to use his Spiritual Detection to assist the elders in ﬁnding the right spots.

Wang Dong’er had turned around by now. She stood near Huo Yuhao’s head. Her beautiful eyes were icy as she continually used a towel to wipe away the ﬁlthy blood that came out of Huo Yuhao’s mouth and nose. To calm herself, she appeared to have sealed off her feelings. If not, she probably would not have been able to endure the emotional pain.

The entire process did not take very long, only around three minutes. However, to the four of them, these three minutes felt like a year!

Finally, Elder Zhuang stopped. With one last stroke, he let his hands sweep Huo Yuhao’s body from his shoulders all the way to his abdomen. A powerful vital energy reverberated through his body and then slowly rose up through his body from his guts, following the motion of Elder Zhuang’s hands.

A massive amount of ﬁlthy blood spurted out from Huo Yuhao’s mouth. This was the clotted blood in his body. Elder Zhuang had just expelled it from him.

Now, Elder Zhuang’s hands were back on Huo Yuhao’s shoulders. Both he and Elder Xuan sighed in relief. Color seemed to be seeping back into Huo Yuhao’s face.

Elder Zhuang’s head steamed. The treatment just now had drained him, too. While the entire process did not require a lot of soul power, it was still extremely stressful for him. He had to organize all of the chaotic passageways in Huo Yuhao’s body, place his organs back into position, and expel his clogged blood.

This process had to be completed quickly, as Huo Yuhao might not be able to withstand it. If that happened, his efforts would have been wasted. Furthermore, the longer it took, the more blood Huo Yuhao would lose.

Huo Yuhao panted and took in great gasps of air. His chest, which had showed no real movement in the past twenty days, started to rise and fall gently.

Wang Dong’er had already used up many towels. She did not let a single drop of ﬁlthy blood stain his body.

Elder Zhuang turned to look at Elder Xuan and nodded slightly.

Elder Xuan withdrew his soul power. However, the two elders looked at Huo Yuhao anxiously. Now that his organs were back in position and his main passageways had been cleared, the important thing was whether Huo Yuhao’s body could rebuild its circulatory system. This included the circulation of his blood and soul power, and whether he could control their circulation.

Huo Yuhao’s pale-white face forced a smile. He had no energy to talk, and his entire body was covered with a dense layer of sweat. His body was wracked with excruciating pain.

At this moment, the most important issue had been resolved. However, the ice-type origin energy of heaven and earth was still in his body. His own soul power, other than what was below his dantian, was still in a state of chaos. Furthermore, there were countless passageways in his body. Elder Zhuang had only helped him clear up the most important ones. As for the rest, he had to do it himself.

When he saw that trace of a smile on Huo Yuhao’s face, Elder Xuan ﬁnally exhaled in relief. This guy’s life is safe. He will now enter a normal recovery phase.

Huo Yuhao closed his eyes. He knew that this was not the time for him to rest. His organs and passageways had just returned to their original positions. The vast ice-type origin energy of heaven and earth in his body had ﬁnally came under control thanks to Elder Zhuang’s soul energy. If he could not exert control over it immediately, his internal situation would surely regress after a night’s rest. No one knew how long it would then take for his passageways to clear up.

Thus, Huo Yuhao did not care how weak his passageways were, he immediately tried to connect his spiritual power with the soul power in his dantian. Then, he forced his soul power to circulate through his body. He wanted to regain autonomy of his body, so he had to allow his soul energy to ﬂow through his body. Only then could he suppress the origin energy present within him.

This was a painful process. As his soul energy rose in his body, he had to endure a pain that was akin to being pierced by ten thousand needles. Even more beads of sweat dripped from his body. The mattress underneath him was almost completely soaked.

Wang Dong’er continually wiped him down with towels. Elder Zhuang and Elder Xuan observed him carefully from the side. A look of admiration slowly appeared in Elder Zhuang’s eyes. He turned to look at Elder Xuan and nodded, saying, “No wonder Elder Mu chose this child. Among all the soul masters I’ve seen, he has the strongest will. He can bear such intense pain, and he did not utter a single word throughout the entire treatment. What a lad!”

Elder Xuan nodded too, and said, “Looking at him now makes me relieved. He really is like an indestructible cockroach. As long as he can recover, he’ll be even stronger than before. The origin energy in his body is vast, indeed. If he can absorb all of it, it’ll surely aid his cultivation in the future. For a soul master with an Ultimate soul, this increase would be as fast as a rocket. It seems like he is growing up much faster than we had expected.”

Elder Zhuang chortled, “Just don’t force him to grow up quicker than usual. For him, we should protect him well. He’s our hope for the future! As long as the Academy has him, we have nothing to worry about for the next hundred years.”

Elder Xuan snorted, “If this bastard gives me any more problems in the future, I’ll tie him to the main pillar of the Sea God’s Pavilion so that he can’t run anywhere.” After he said that, he could not help but laugh too. Indeed, the deeper the love, the stricter the treatment!

Huo Yuhao’s soul power slowly rose through his body, and his passageways slowly opened up. Under his careful guidance, which was derived from his control over his spiritual power, he inserted the origin energy of Ultimate Ice into his legs as he continued to let his soul power rise through his body.

Even the naked eye could see that icy-blue energy creeping over his legs. Huo Yuhao’s body trembled slightly, but he was now sweating much less. His legs experienced the greatest change. Whenever sweat appeared, it would freeze over.

As Huo Yuhao came up with his recovery plan, he came to a difﬁcult decision after much analysis. The ice-type origin energy of heaven and earth in his body was way too powerful, to the point where his soul power could not operate as usual with its presence. All his soul power could do was circulate through his body at a sluggish pace. Even if his body made a complete recovery, his cultivation would only be at the level of a three-ringed soul master. This was unacceptable. Even though he was severely injured, he still cared about the tournament. As the main player of his team, how could he not take part? Hence, he thought of a plan, which was to send all the origin energy of heaven and earth into his legs.

In the human body, the legs took up the greatest space. Blood ﬂowed easily there. In comparison, the most important area for the circulation of soul energy was the torso. By forcing the origin energy of Ultimate Ice into his legs, it was akin to turning his legs into a storage space as he compressed the origin energy into them. Doing so would allow his soul power to circulate through the upper half of his body. According to his estimate, as well as the two elders’ calculations, he could recover up to 70-80% of his cultivation. This would be enough for him to enter the tournament. Furthermore, the normal ﬂow of his soul power would make it easier for him to absorb the origin energy of heaven and earth. It would be absorbed more quickly. This was the most optimal treatment possible.

However, it was not without its problems. The main problem was that the only way to store the ice-type origin energy of heaven and earth was for him to ﬁll his legs with it. Huo Yuhao would lose control over his legs. Before he could fully absorb the energy, he would not be able to walk or move his legs at all. Temporarily, he would become a cripple. Furthermore, the origin energy of Ultimate Ice was no laughing matter. If he could not absorb it in time, he might lose control of his legs forever!

The elders had not wanted him to do this at ﬁrst. Instead, they had wanted to slowly let his soul power circulate through his entire body, which would be a more stable but slower way to absorb the origin energy. It was less risky, and while Huo Yuhao’s cultivation would drop by quite a bit, it would not affect his body.

However, doing so would take him a few months to recover completely, as he would need to adapt to the origin energy. After his injury, the recovery of his passageways would also be affected by the presence of the origin energy. He would recover much slower, which meant that he would miss the upcoming tournament!

Huo Yuhao thus chose his path without any hesitation. He had to take part in the tournament. The only way to do that was to ensure the upper half of his body would not suffer any interference from the origin energy of Ultimate Ice. Only then could he make a swift recovery and take part in the tournament. So what if he could not walk? He believed that with his abilities, he could still play a part!

What shocked Elder Xuan and Elder Zhuang was the fact that Wang Dong’er did not try to stop him. She said that she would not go against any of his decisions. Her mindset was simple. After this incident, Huo Yuhao and her were one. If Huo Yuhao was ﬁne, then she would be ﬁne. Whatever happened to him, she would accompany him. Furthermore, she understood his personality too well. If he did not take part in this tournament, he would regret it for the rest of his life. This was not something that Wang Dong’er wanted to see. Huo Yuhao also promised her that after the tournament, he would retrieve the origin energy of heaven and earth from his legs and let it dissipate through his body. There should be no problem with just storing it there for a few months.

At last, Elder Xuan agreed.

The origin energy of Ultimate Ice ﬂowed continually into his legs. As the soul power from Huo Yuhao’s dantian rose, it soon spread throughout his body, and he could move the origin energy even more quickly. After all, the origin energy was an object without consciousness. Coupled with the fact that Huo Yuhao’s second martial soul was Ultimate Ice, it was still possible for him to manipulate it.

After a few minutes passed, Huo Yuhao’s legs became stranger and stranger. Initially, they were pale-white. Then, they turned light blue. This shade of blue darkened continuously, until ﬁnally, they turned dark blue.

However, at this moment, Huo Yuhao frowned.

“Yuhao, what’s wrong?” Elder Xuan asked in a low voice.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “I can’t insert anymore. The passageways in my legs cannot take anymore. There would be complications.”

“There’s more?” Elder Xuan asked in shock.

Huo Yuhao said, “Not much, our estimate was correct. Initially, my legs should have been able to take the compressed origin energy of heaven and earth. However, here’s the problem. As I move the origin energy of heaven and earth toward my legs, the part that is in my torso has started to spill out as well. Originally, it was suppressed within my soul bones, but now, some of it has ﬂowed out. My legs can’t take this extra soul power. Furthermore, this origin energy has been dissipated into my most important passageways, and it’ll severely affect my recovery.”

Elder Xuan said, “What can we do? If you can’t take it anymore, you should stop. Take your time to recover, and don’t fret so much about the competition.”

“No, I have to represent the Tang Sect.” Huo Yuhao said with certainty. Then, he closed his eyes once more, and he could clearly see that underneath his skin, strands of blue energy were ﬂowing toward his left arm. Since my legs can’t take anymore, I shall give up an arm. The reason why he chose his left arm over his right was because the Ice Jade Scorpion Left Arm Bone was in his left arm. It would help in compressing and absorbing the origin energy of heaven and earth. Wang Dong’er covered her face with her hands. She clearly knew that like this, Huo Yuhao could only move his head, his right arm, and his torso! He was like a cripple who had lost three of his limbs. All of this was because of her!

This time, there was no problem. As all the blue energy ﬂowed into Huo Yuhao’s left arm, his left arm turned light blue. While it was not as terrifying as his legs, it lay ﬂat on the bed, unmoving. It looked like it was dead.

He exhaled and tiredly opened his eyes. He looked at Elder Xuan, Elder Zhuang, and Wang Dong’er, whose tears clouded her eyes. He forced a smile and said, “See, I succeeded. Soon, I’ll make a complete recovery.”

As his soul power ﬂowed through his body, it was able to complete a minor circulation. While he could not make a major circulation without his legs and left arm, this minor circulation allowed him to recover 70% of his cultivation. His chest, where Elder Zhuang had healed his passageways with his soul power and which was nourished by the life energy from the Life Gold, was recovering at an astonishing pace. What he needed to do next was open up all the blocked passageways in his body. This would allow him to regain even more of his cultivation, and feel better.

As he spoke, Huo Yuhao pressed down on the bed with his right hand and struggled to get up. Wang Dong’er rushed over to help him. He shook his head, insisting that he could get up by himself.

This action, which was nothing to him in the past, now became exceedingly difﬁcult. As he forced his body up bit-by- bit, the huge wound on his chest remained. There was now a layer of blood on its surface.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “I’ll represent the Tang Sect in the tournament!”

Elder Xuan huffed and said angrily, “You little bastard!” He sighed and turned away.

Elder Zhuang smiled slightly and said, “Rest well. If you want to take part in the tournament, you must recover. Remember to massage your legs every day. Even though they can’t move, you have to make the origin energy inside them move. This will keep your body supple. Fortunately, it was Ultimate Ice, and not Ultimate Fire. If not, your passageways would have been long gone. Ultimate Ice has preservative properties. A conservative estimate states that your legs will be ﬁne for the next half year. After half a year, no one knows what will happen. Whatever happens, remember that you can’t let it drag on for more than a year. If not, there’ll be huge problems, understand?”

“Yes,” Huo Yuhao replied respectfully.

Elder Zhuang reminded him a few more times before leaving. This treatment had given him much inspiration. For such a special case like Huo Yuhao, he had to quickly record it so that he could come up with better treatment plans in the future. While three of Huo Yuhao’s limbs could not move, this treatment could still be said to be perfect. At the very least, Huo Yuhao’s life was no longer in danger.

As she sent Elder Zhuang out, Wang Dong’er asked carefully if there was anything she had to take note of while caring for him. Only then did she return to the room. The moment she entered, she could not help but dash to the side of the bed and jump into his embrace.

Huo Yuhao used his only movable hand, which was still trembling, to hold her by her slim waist.

“Silly girl, can’t you see that I’m better now? You should be happy! Don’t cry, this is all thanks to your meticulous care. However, you’ve gotten skinnier. Look at you, you’re a bag of bones. You must stay healthy so that you can care for me.”

“Yes, yes!” Wang Dong’er agreed non-stop. However, tears ﬂowed down her cheeks like a broken necklace of pearls.

“Dong’er, can I explain something about Qiu’er to you?” Huo Yuhao asked. He felt that he should tell Dong’er some things. For example, the fact that they could fuse their martial souls. This would prevent a future misunderstanding from arising.

Wang Dong’er shook her head vigorously. From his embrace, she sat up and looked at him. They were only inches apart. She said tearfully, “Yuhao, I don’t want to or need to hear any explanation. After today, no matter what happens, I’ll trust you completely. You’ve already proven to me that you are the one who loves me more than anyone else in the world.”

Huo Yuhao could not help but laugh. “Saying that will make your parents sad.” Wang Dong’er said, “It’s different, how can parental love compare with how you treat me…? Furthermore, after so many years, they have never visited me once.”

Huo Yuhao quickly changed the topic as he said, “Alright, alright, don’t cry. Help me lay down to rest.” The entire treatment had been a test of his will. Had it been anyone else, they would have gone crazy from the pain. However, Huo Yuhao endured it all. Still, he was drained from the whole ordeal.

“Yes,” Wang Dong’er helped him lay down.

------

From that day on, Huo Yuhao’s recovery was well on-track. With Wang Dong’er’s help, he spent another three days opening all the blocked passageways in his body. Then, he started to regain his bodily functions. Once the other ﬁve of Shrek’s Seven Monsters learned that he could take part in the competition, they were all overjoyed. With Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er back, they were truly the Shrek’s Seven Monsters! A wooden wheelchair, made entirely from the Golden Tree, was delivered to Huo Yuhao by Elder Xuan. While Elder Xuan still wore an unpleasant face on his face, and he showed no sign of forgiveness toward Huo Yuhao, the latter still remembered his care and concern for him.

The Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament drew closer…

------

The Tang Sect Conference Hall...

Led by Bei Bei, the other members of Shrek’s Seven Monsters reached the place. Other than the seven of them, Xuan Ziwen, who was now the Vice Sect Leader and in charge of soul tool research, Mo Xuan, and Na Na, who was a close-combat soul engineer who possessed the Netherworld martial soul, were there too, along with Ji Juechen, Jing Ziyan, and the higher echelons of the Tang Sect.

The entry of Xuan Ziwen allowed the Tang Sect to develop rapidly, particularly since the Sect was supported by Shrek Academy. Every week, the Soul Tool Department students of Shrek had three days of lessons with the Tang Sect. In the Tang Sect, they were led and supervised by Xuan Ziwen. The underground factory of the Tang Sect had commenced construction. It was huge, and modeled after the Illustrious Virtue Hall.

The rapid development of the Tang Sect meant that many of its facilities could not keep up, particularly since it was small. Xuan Ziwen proposed an idea, and the Shrek’s Seven Monsters and Shrek Academy discussed it before they ﬁnally agreed to build a huge underground soul tool factory.

While Shrek Academy’s Soul Tool Department was expanding, their priority was still teaching. Hence, there was no way they could keep everything secret. Some high-level soul tools could not be manufactured there.

Shrek Academy decided to help the Tang Sect complete their secret factory after a discussion in the Sea God’s Pavilion. After all, the Tang Sect was located within Shrek City, like the factory. Its signiﬁcance to the future development of the Academy could not be understated.

After a few rounds of discussion, Shrek Academy decided to devote money, manpower, and logistics to the completion of the underground factory. At the same time, Shrek Academy also bought 49% of the Tang Sect’s shares. This meant that whatever proﬁt the Tang Sect made in the future, 49% of it would go to Shrek Academy. However, the right to choose was still with them. Of course, as the Tang Sect’s biggest shareholder, Shrek Academy would send someone to listen whenever the Tang Sect made an important decision. At the same time, someone from the Tang Sect would also be present at conferences held within the Sea God’s Pavilion.

Originally, Bei Bei had planned to use this opportunity to let Huo Yuhao resume his place in the Sea God’s Pavilion. However, Huo Yuhao hinted strongly to Bei Bei that he was against this plan. The reason for his rejection was simple. He was conﬁdent that he could regain his place in the Sea God’s Pavilion through his own merit. For the Tang Sect, this would mean that they would have two representatives at the conference table! Was that not a better thing?

At last, Bei Bei was chosen as the representative to take part in the conferences in the Sea God’s Pavilion. The Tang Sect and Shrek Academy were linked intimately, just like that.

The underground factory was massive. Initially, the construction of the Illustrious Virtue Hall took almost ten years to complete. If the underground factory of the Tang Sect took ten years, it would be too long.

At this time, the power of Shrek Academy was revealed, shocking even Xuan Ziwen.

Shrek Academy sent 20 more people to assist with the construction. With the inclusion of this group, Xuan Ziwen was stunned on the day he met them. It was then that he discovered the difference between a soul engineer and a soul master. The 20 people sent by Shrek Academy were led by Elder Xuan. They were all earth-type soul masters. Following that, Elder Xuan showed Xuan Ziwen the terrifying might of the Godly Taotie Bull.

In only one day, a huge underground cavern was excavated by Elder Xuan using his impressive power. Furthermore, he did not actually dig up the ground to be moved elsewhere. All of the soil was compressed into the walls of the hole with his soul power. This caused the cavern to be extremely sturdy, with very strong walls.

One must know that the process of excavating a cavern was immensely difﬁcult. When the Illustrious Virtue Hall was ﬁrst built, not only did the builders have to consider the underground situation, but its builders were all ordinary mortals, and they were in no rush for time. Hence, they took nearly half a year to excavate it. Then, they still had to fortify its walls. This took almost another year. Yet Elder Xuan only took a single day to do all of this himself. Once done, Elder Xuan handed the other earth-type soul masters over to Xuan Ziwen as he went off to drink more wine.

Among these earth-type soul masters with martial souls, three of them were Titled Douluo, six of them were Soul Douluo, and the rest were all at least Soul Emperors. Some of them were teachers, and some of them were students of the inner courtyard. Between them, they only needed twenty days before the Tang Sect’s underground factory was completed! This included ventilation, water supply, and other basic infrastructure. Now, they only had to deal with the installation of soul lamps

What came next was much more difﬁcult. The crucial thing was the construction of the various types of soul tools. This was a huge engineering feat. However, with the completion of the structure, all they needed to do was manufacture the various soul tools, and the underground factory could start operations. All the auxiliary-type soul tools of the Tang Sect were moved underground.

Just when Xuan Ziwen was about to draw out the design of the various soul tools from memory, Huo Yuhao, whose body had recovered, came to him, bringing a huge stack of papers.

While Xuan Ziwen was the top researcher of the Illustrious Virtue Hall, there was no way he could possibly know the construction details of all soul tools. After all, every single soul tool required a lot of research and experimentation before it could be completed. According to his original plan, he would need at least three to ﬁve years to complete his research and development of these auxiliary-type soul tools. This was under the condition that he remembered more than a third of the diagrams for these auxiliary-type soul tools.

However, Huo Yuhao gave him a huge surprise. When he saw all those extremely detailed diagrams of auxiliary-type soul tools, this super-intelligent Class 8 soul engineer looked at Huo Yuhao with his mouth wide open. After a long moment of disbelief, he said, “Now I know what you learned during your exchange...”

With help from all corners, Xuan Ziwen vowed that in a single year, he would get the underground factory up and moving. In three years’ time, it would reach the level of the Illustrious Virtue Hall. Of course, this was under the condition that he had enough resources.

Huo Yuhao brought all the precious metals he had acquired to Xuan Ziwen. At the same time, the vast riches of Shrek City came into effect. The few businesses controlled by Shrek Academy in Shrek City devoted all their resources to the underground factory. A huge amount of precious metals were bought from each corner of the continent. As a result, over the next few months the prices of precious metals on the continent increased by ten percent!

---

Of course, all this was a side-thought to the Shrek’s Seven Monsters, because they would soon leave for the tournament. The conference right now was their last before the tournament.

Bei Bei said, “Teacher Xuan, we’ll leave the underground factory to you.”

“Yes,” Xuan Ziwen replied. His head was lowered, and no one knew what he was thinking. Huo Yuhao, who was sitting next to him, could see that Teacher Xuan’s eyes were ﬁre-red and slightly bloodshot. A new Illustrious Virtue Hall would be re- created, with him at its helm. Initially, when this idea was ﬁrst proposed, Xuan Ziwen was so excited he almost leapt into the air. To a soul engineer, what was more important than making soul tools? Just for this chance, he promised to lecture once a week at Shrek Academy. At this time, he was probably thinking of a way to come up with new diagrams for soul tools. Bei Bei said, “We’ll leave tomorrow. The seven of us will go, along with Na Na. Hence, eight of us will be setting out. Brother Ji, Brother Mo, Sister Ziyan, please guard the Tang Sect. A new batch of Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons will be installed in Shrek City. Other than stationary soul cannons, we’ll stop manufacturing other types of soul tools so we can allow for the construction of the factory. We’ll be back in six weeks at the least, and two months at the most. Hence, I trust everyone here to manage the sect in our absence.”

“No.” Just as Bei Bei ﬁnished speaking, there was opposition.

The speaker was Jing Ziyan.

“Sister Ziyan, what problem do you have?” Bei Bei asked.

Jing Ziyan looked at Ji Juechen, who was by her side, and said, “We want to go to the tournament too.”

Bei Bei was stunned as he said, “However, aren’t you above the age limit?” Both Jing Ziyan and Ji Juechen were more than 20 years old, which was the tournament’s age limit. Jing Ziyan snorted and said, “So what? There will be many soul masters gathered there. Furthermore, we are both familiar with Radiant City. If we go, we can help you out with some things, and even protect you!”

Huo Yuhao laughed, “Protect us? I think the two of you are going there to cause trouble.” He knew them too well. If they went to Radiant City, they would look for people to ﬁght to improve themselves.

Jing Ziyan’s face turned red, and she said, “So what? It’s such a good chance, we won’t miss it. Furthermore, look at yourself. You need someone to push your wheelchair, right?”

“Right, I’ll do it,” Ji Juechen said in a straightforward manner. His eyes revealed his determination to everyone.

The two of them had given Bei Bei a lot of trouble. Since they had joined the Tang Sect, there was not a single moment when they were idle. Sometimes they would be looking for a challenge, and at other times, they would be trying to spar. Everyone tried to hide from them, especially Ji Juechen. As his sword intent became more powerful, even Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi found it hard to beat him.

Huo Yuhao was no longer scared of the two of them. With his current condition, Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan would not ﬁght him!

Huo Yuhao looked at Bei Bei, who thought for a while, and then said, “Alright, the two of you can follow us. However, I need to make some things clear. The two of you can’t just spend all your time looking for ﬁghts. I hope that you two can shoulder the responsibility of looking after Yuhao. His body now faces severe limitations, so I’ll need the two of you to look after him.”

Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan nodded.

Bei Bei thought it through in a short span of time. If the two of them stayed, there would be no one for them to spar with. They might run over to the Academy and cause trouble. They would be like ticking time-bombs if they were left behind, so it was better to bring them along.

This time, no teacher was accompanying them. They would be doing this by themselves. Shrek Academy could not send powerful soul masters to accompany them, and could only let the teacher in charge of the Shrek team protect them discreetly. With Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan, the strength of the team increased. As long as they did not meet Titled Douluo, they should be safe.

------

Shrek Academy, Sea God’s Pavilion, Inner Courtyard.

Boom!

A golden light ﬂashed past like a dragon turning itself mid- ﬂight. It blasted Dai Huabin straight-on.

Wang Qiu’er retrieved her Golden Dragon Spear and stared harshly at him as she said, “With your current condition, you want to beat Huo Yuhao? Even with one hand, he can still take care of you.”

Dai Huabin grit his teeth and climbed up from the ground. There was no rage in his eyes, only pure determination. He roared, “Once more!”

Chapter 269: Powerful Spiritual Power

As he said that, he activated his soul skill once more as he rushed toward Wang Qiu’er.

It was not just him who was present. Other than Ning Tian, the other team members of Shrek Academy’s team, which included Wu Feng, Xie Xuanyue, Zhou Sichen, Cao Jinxuan, Lan Susu, Lan Luoluo, and Zhu Lu, were all injured.

After Wang Qiu’er had returned, Shrek Academy started to conduct special training for this bunch. Since they had no teacher, Wang Qiu’er had become their demonic training instructor over the ﬁrst few days. Her method was simple and violent; they fought.

One-on-one sparring, and then, team matches.

At the start, many of them were unwilling to listen to her. However, after Wang Qiu’er was able to defeat the entire team by herself, they were all convinced. In two months, under Wang Qiu’er’s leadership, everyone’s combat ability increased exponentially. In particular, their will to ﬁght had been greatly strengthened. Among them, Dai Huabin and Wu Feng showed the greatest increase. The two of them had a single-minded obsession with Huo Yuhao, and hence, Wang Qiu’er continually used Huo Yuhao to stimulate them. She even told them that Huo Yuhao was paralyzed because of his accident, but even so, he only needed one hand, and just one hand, to thrash them. Wu Feng and Dai Huabin were naturally provoked by this statement. They did not believe it!

Then, they were defeated by Wang Qiu’er, who stood still and used only one hand. From that moment, the two of them started to train like crazy. They seemed to experience no fatigue. Under such torturous training, their cultivation improved tremendously, and they showed improvements in every aspect.

It was almost time to leave. While they knew that in the face of Shrek’s Seven Monsters, their hopes of victory were still slim, they had undergone two months of hellish training under Wang Qiu’er. This made them much more resilient and determined to ﬁght. After she defeated Dai Huabin once more, Wang Qiu’er put away her Golden Dragon Spear and said in a low voice, “That’s all for today. Go back and rest, we’ll set off tomorrow.”

When she said that, everyone could not help but sigh in relief. Dai Huabin, who lay on the ground, was gulping in big breaths of air. His body ached all over. However, he still felt a sense of accomplishment. He forced himself off the ground and looked at Wang Qiu’er’s disappearing form. An intensely hot light ﬂashed in his eyes.

“Elder sister, wait,” Zhou Sichen said as he ran after Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er stopped, turned her head and looked at him and said, “What?”

Zhou Sichen giggled, “Elder sister, are we leaving with our class monitor’s team?”

Wang Qiu’er’s face turned cold, and she said, “Do you want to leave with them?” Zhou Sichen coughed. His perceptive abilities were strong. He instantly felt that there was something amiss about Wang Qiu’er’s emotions, and he hurriedly said, “No, no, I’m just asking casually. I heard that Huo Yuhao has been severely injured. We want to visit him, but the Sea God’s Pavilion is off- limits to us!”

Wang Qiu’er snorted coldly, “He is he, and we are we. We’ll go by ourselves.”

After she said that, she turned to leave without turning her head.

When he looked at Wang Qiu’er’s disappearing form, Zhou Sichen could not help but feel slightly depressed. In the past few days, whenever they mentioned anything about Huo Yuhao, Wang Qiu’er would become extremely temperamental. No one knew why, or what the relationship between their class monitor and her was!

After two months of hell, they both feared and respected Wang Qiu’er. With her powerful skills and abilities, she had completely dominated them. However, this elder sister of theirs was too ferocious. Every day, they had to undergo countless torturous training sessions under her. Wang Qiu’er did not show mercy at all! Once, her Golden Dragon Spear had pierced through Dai Huabin’s thigh. Fortunately, he received timely medical treatment, which prevented it from worsening. Of course, they did not know that Wang Qiu’er did not use the terrifying life-absorption skill of the Golden Dragon Spear. If not, that blow would have almost killed him.

They were about to leave. Zhou Sichen’s eyes slowly betrayed a fanatical gaze. They were competing on behalf of Shrek Academy! Even though their prospects were dim, and they were facing extremely powerful opponents, he thought of the previous tournament, and how Huo Yuhao, Bei Bei, and the rest were able to emerge as champions despite only being three-ringed and four-ringed soul masters back then. His heart brimmed with conﬁdence. Miracles are made by men. If my class monitor can do that in the previous tournament, why can’t we do the same here?

Pa! Someone tapped his shoulder, jolting Zhou Sichen from his reverie. He turned his head to see Cao Jinxuan looking at him with a half-smile.

“What are you looking at?” Zhou Sichen said in an unpleasant tone.

Cao Jinxuan sniggered, “I’m looking at someone who’s dreaming. Be more realistic. Try and make your way to the main team before thinking of anything else. What’s the point in having unrealistic dreams? Conﬁdence is built on the foundation of actual abilities.”

“Why is this a dream?” Zhou Sichen refused to admit it.

Cao Jinxuan’s voice changed. All of a sudden, he sounded very similar to Zhou Sichen. “Champion, I must be the champion. Wahaha! What a beautiful thing it is! Beauties, beauties, haha, come to me! My embrace is wide indeed!!”

Zhou Sichen’s eyes widened as he stammered, “What are you… you saying?”

Cao Jinxuan slapped his shoulder lightly and said, “I’m learning from someone’s sleep talk. I’ll leave ﬁrst.” With that, he turned to leave calmly.

“Hahaha…” An uncontrollable laughter sounded from the back. Zhou Sichen turned his head to look and realized that everyone, except Dai Huabin and Wu Feng, who had already left, were looking at him. Their faces were all mirthful. Lan Susu and Lan Luoluo could not control their laughter.

“Cao Jinxuan, I’m going to beat you up!” Zhou Sichen shouted in fury. He turned and wanted to run after him. However, when he turned back, Cao Jinxuan had already disappeared…

-------

Dawn, Shrek City, the Tang Sect...

Shrek’s Seven Monsters, all of whom were clad lightly, and Na Na, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan left through the main door. Xuan Ziwen, who was in charge of looking after the sect in their absence, did not accompany them, he was still busy with the secret factory. Under this rather unceremonious atmosphere, the entire group headed toward the west gate of Shrek Academy.

Huo Yuhao sat in the wheelchair made from the Golden Tree. The wheelchair was extremely simplistic, but Elder Xuan’s craftsmanship was decent. It was simple, but efﬁcient. There was a special cushion near the waist, and the entire wheelchair was made from a few pieces of wood glued together. It was extremely smooth, and one would not get tired of sitting in it.

One should not underestimate the materials used. The Golden Tree in Shrek Academy was one of the last Golden Trees on the entire continent. While it was not the only one left, it was the biggest. A thousand years ago, the school ruled that no one was allowed to cut the tree down. It was the center and treasure of the Academy.

The materials that were used to make Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair came from branches of the Golden Tree that fell off naturally, as well as some raw materials from the Sea God’s Pavilion. Its value could not be understated.

The Golden Tree brimmed with pure and warm light-type energy. Within the smooth glow of the wheelchair, Huo Yuhao’s legs and arm, which he had used to store the Ultimate Ice origin power, would not be damaged as easily. Furthermore, under the nourishing glow of light, his body would recover faster. This was beneﬁcial to his absorption of the origin energy. At this moment, Ji Juechen was the one pushing the wheelchair. While Wang Dong’er would normally be the one doing it, Ji Juechen was very stubborn. That day, he had promised to push Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair for him. This morning, he had waited unwaveringly for him at the gate. Wang Dong’er had no choice but to let him do so. She cared for him from the side.

As she looked at Huo Yuhao, who was seated calmly on the wheelchair with his arm and legs immobile, Jing Ziyan could not help but ask, “Yuhao, look at your state, why are you so insistent on taking part in the competition?”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “I still have some energy to spare! Hehe.”

Jing Ziyan sighed and said, “I miss the days when we sparred.”

Huo Yuhao looked bewildered as he replied, “I never imagined that Sister Ziyan was a masochist? You like being beaten by me?” “You…” Jing Ziyan said in anger, “You heartless bastard, I’m showing you care and concern right now! How dare you make fun of me! Dong’er, keep him in check.”

Wang Dong’er smiled slightly and said, “He’s already in this state, what else can I do? Sister Ziyan, he’s mentally well, please don’t worry so much.”

Jing Ziyan looked in surprise at this smart lass as she nodded and said, “Actually, I was just thinking of when we could ﬁght again.”

Huo Yuhao sighed and replied, “Actually, even with one hand, I can still give you the thrill of being tortured.”

Jing Ziyan snorted, “I shan’t talk with a cripple anymore.” With that, she walked away, leaving a stunned-looking Huo Yuhao behind.

A huge hand pressed down on Huo Yuhao’s shoulder, and a low voice sounded, “Get well soon, I’m waiting for you.” Huo Yuhao did not turn his head around. However, he could feel a rare tinge of emotion in Ji’s voice, which was usually reserved for his sword. A bitter smile emerged on his face as he said, “Brother Ji, don’t you think Dong’er should be the one saying that to me?”

Wang Dong’er laughed. Ji Juechen’s face froze over. The muscles in his face twitched. Then, he continued pushing the wheelchair silently.

In fact, when everyone saw Huo Yuhao on the wheelchair, they all felt waves of intense emotion. Xiao Xiao and Jiang Nannan could not but exclaim out loud.

In the past, Huo Yuhao was youthful and dashing. With what he had learned, he continually created miracle after miracle. He was named as the most powerful genius Shrek Academy had seen in a thousand years. However, right now, he was only a cripple with just one moveable right arm.

However, Huo Yuhao’s gaze was still resolute. No one prevented him from taking part in this tournament. Even his elder brother, Bei Bei, did not try to convince him otherwise. Over the past few days, Huo Yuhao’s emotions had been steady, and he seemed much happier than before. Now, he tried to poke fun at others to make the group laugh. He appeared much more relaxed.

Everyone knew that this was his way of letting everyone around him feel better. How could he not be upset that he had been reduced from an able-bodied person to a cripple? However, he never once showed it. Sitting in the golden wheelchair, he was still full of hope.

Wang Dong’er gently touched Huo Yuhao’s right hand and asked in a low voice, “Do you want some water?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “Didn’t we drink some before we left? Dong’er, I’m ﬁne, really. When will you guys believe that I’m still capable in spite of my disability?”

Jing Ziyan, who was ahead of him, turned around. Her face showed contempt as she said, “A cripple is a cripple. How can you be capable? Other than Spiritual Detection, what else can you do?”

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “Actually, I can do many things. Do you know what it means to turn misfortune into fortune?”

Jing Ziyan wanted to rebut him immediately. However, her words stopped at the tip of her tongue. Her eyes widened, and she stared at shock at what was happening in front of her. Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er, and Ji Juechen, all of whom were walking behind her, suddenly disappeared in a ﬂash of light. They appeared to have vanished completely.

“Ah? What’s going on? Where’s Huo Yuhao and the rest?” Jing Ziyan exclaimed in surprise. This caught the attention of the rest. Everyone turned their heads. The three of them were indeed gone.

At this moment, the air distorted, and Huo Yuhao and the three of them appeared once again. They were walking forward normally. It was as if Jing Ziyan had been momentarily blinded.

“What trick is this? I don’t recall you having any soul skill that allows you to camouﬂage others!” Jing Ziyan exclaimed in shock.

Concealing oneself was no big deal. Many soul masters had similar soul skills. However, for Huo Yuhao to conceal two other people along with him, that was rather unbelievable. Group concealment was a powerful soul skill that no one had ever heard of. Huo Yuhao looked into the sky, sighed, and said, “This is called skill.”

Jing Ziyan looked at him coolly and said, “Huo Yuhao, stop acting big. We’re still friends.”

“Ke! Ke!” Huo Yuhao appeared to have choked on his spittle as he coughed non-stop. Wang Dong’er rushed up to him and patted his chest.

Huo Yuhao said, “It’s ﬁne, we’re still in the city. Once we leave the city, I’ll show everyone what else can I do. If not, you’ll just treat me as a cripple. I want to contribute to this tournament!”

Bei Bei looked at Huo Yuhao and said, “Little brother, don’t force it.”

Huo Yuhao said seriously, “Elder brother, I’m not forcing it. Even with just one arm left, I’m deﬁnitely still better than those who can just turn themselves into smoke and fog.” “What crap! I’ll, I’ll…” Normally, Jing Ziyan would have charged up at him. However, what could she do now that Huo Yuhao was in this state?

Huo Yuhao said conﬁdently, “Let’s see once we leave the city.”

By doing so, not only was he trying to improve the atmosphere and not let everyone get distracted by the fact that he was crippled, he was also reminding himself that he had to show off some of his skills. If not, what if everyone really treated him like a cripple? He really wanted to compete in the tournament!

They did not move too quickly, taking an hour to leave Shrek City. They walked out of the west gate and continued headed west, toward the Sun Moon Empire. It was fastest for them to use a ﬂying-type soul tool. Yesterday, they had planned it all out. Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, He Caitou, and Wang Dong’er would ﬂy ahead with Huo Yuhao ﬁrst. Among them, Wang Dong’er was responsible for helping Huo Yuhao block the incoming wind. The rest of them would rely on their ﬂying-type soul tools.

Furthermore, Xuan Ziwen had made a large ﬂying-type soul tool that could carry many people at once, made to Huo Yuhao’s speciﬁcations.

“Alright, we’ve left the city. Sister Ziyan, let’s spar, let’s spar.”

Ji Juechen, who was pushing his wheelchair from behind, froze. “Yuhao, are you serious?”

While Jing Ziyan was weaker than Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, and the rest, she was still a Soul Emperor in her own right! Her martial soul might not be terribly powerful, but when combined with her soul tools, her battling abilities could not be underestimated. If Huo Yuhao was uninjured, there was a chance that he could still beat her. However, in his current state, movement was difﬁcult, so how could he ﬁght her?

Huo Yuhao nodded and he looked at Jing Ziyan and said, “Of course I’m serious. Sister Ziyan, are you scared?”

Jing Ziyan said unkindly, “Scared of you? How can I be scared of you in this state? I don’t want to bully a cripple!” Huo Yuhao said angrily, “A temporary cripple, not a cripple!

Come, hurry up, don’t waste everyone’s time.”

“Has anyone placed bets? I’ll be the bookie,” Xu Sanshi rushed forward excitedly, almost bouncing.

Jiang Nannan followed next to him. When she heard what he said, she pinched his waist hard. “You’re heartless indeed! Yuhao is in this state, and all you can do is stir up even more trouble! Yuhao, stop fooling around. We’ll set off now. We all know you’re capable.”

Huo Yuhao smiled bitterly and said, “Fourth sister, from your words, I know that you don’t expect much from me! Look, I think third brother understands me better.”

In fact, since his recuperation had begun, he had not cultivated with his teammates. All he had been doing was recovering by himself at home. Coupled with the fact that only one of his four limbs could move, it was normal for his teammates to doubt his abilities. This was why he was set on challenging Jing Ziyan. If my teammates don’t trust me, then, what if something goes wrong during the competition? Even Bei Bei won’t let me compete!

Jing Ziyan said unpleasantly, “You’re not joking! Dong’er, take good care of him.” She completely ignored Huo Yuhao’s provocation and turned to leave.

Huo Yuhao sighed helplessly. Following that, he narrowed his eyes, and a ray of purple light ﬂashed from his pupils.

Just as Jing Ziyan was about to leave, she suddenly realized that the people around her were gone. She felt an immense pressure in her heart as she discovered, to her shock, that her surroundings had turned white. Nothing could be seen, and it resembled the end of the world. She was alone.

“What’s going on? Juechen, Bei Bei, where are you?” Jing Ziyan called out. At the same time, she released her martial soul. A layer of fog started to spread from her body, and all six of her soul rings rose. A pair of short knives appeared in her hands.

“What’s going on, Ziyan?” An extremely familiar shape appeared. It was Ji Juechen. When she saw Ji Juechen, she sighed visibly and said, “What’s going on? Why can’t I see anyone else?”

Ji Juechen looked at her in confusion and said, “I don’t know either! I heard your shouts and came over. You’re right! Where is everybody?”

Jing Ziyan naturally lowered her guard around him. She looked around her suspiciously. At this moment, an icy-cold sensation appeared at her neck, and a cruel, killing intent manifested itself.

Jing Ziyan’s body froze as she stood immobile. She could clearly sense the blade that was pressed against her neck. If she moved, she would die.

At this moment, the blurry scene around her disappeared. They returned to the west gate of Shrek City. Everyone was not far from where she stood. However, they all looked at her in shock.

The icy-cold feeling disappeared, and a tone of jest sounded, “Ay, it’s so simple! No wonder you don’t want to ﬁght with me. This is why you can’t match me.”

Jing Ziyan turned around to look. She realized that the person next to her was not Ji Juechen, but Huo Yuhao instead. He slowly retracted a dark-golden blade that had emerged from his ﬁnger. The blade was six meters long. Under the bright sunlight, it was exceptionally terrifying.

“How, how did you do that?” Jing Ziyan asked in shock.

Huo Yuhao looked into the sky and said, “I can’t reveal this secret, no, no, no.”

Jing Ziyan said angrily, “Rubbish, I was ambushed by you. If you have the guts, let’s have a one-on-one ﬁght!”

Huo Yuhao’s reply shocked her. “Ok.”

As he said that, he lifted his right hand at Jing Ziyan once more. This time, Jing Ziyan did not dare to be careless. She leapt back, and as she did so, her entire body turned into a ball of smoke in mid-air, which slowly started to expand.

Everyone else who had thought that Huo Yuhao was just joking now looked at him solemnly with varying expressions in their eyes. With only one arm, how could he beat Jing Ziyan?

The moment the ﬁght started, Jing Ziyan had disappeared into smoke. However, everyone else could clearly see that Jing Ziyan’s eyes suddenly clouded over, and she released her martial soul while surveying the area around her cautiously. Then, Huo Yuhao made Ji Juechen let go as he turned his wheelchair in her direction. He released his Darkgolden Terrorclaw and gently placed it on Jing Ziyan’s neck. Throughout the entire process, Jing Ziyan did not even react. What did this mean? This meant that she was completely under Huo Yuhao’s spell! This was a terrifying and mystical sight, which many refused to believe. However, it had taken place before their eyes. Jing Ziyan might be confused by the whole thing, but even the other six of the Seven Monsters who understood Huo Yuhao, including Wang Dong’er, did not know how he won.

Right now, as he faced Jing Ziyan in her smoke form, Huo Yuhao’s face turned serious. He then turned his head. While facing off against her, he turned his gaze toward Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er asked slightly worriedly, “Yuhao?” At this moment, she realized that Huo Yuhao’s gaze had turned warmer. His eyes brimmed with adoration and a warm love. In his eyes, Wang Dong’er could see her own ﬁgure. Just by noticing this, Wang Dong’er could clearly sense that her heart was slowly connecting with that of Huo Yuhao. An unspeakably deep bond encircled the two of them.

Why was Huo Yuhao looking at Wang Dong’er? Everyone was thinking the same thing in their minds. Then, the answer revealed itself.

The wheelchair under Huo Yuhao started to shine, and a dazzling golden light ﬂashed. Thick light-type energy started to permeate his surroundings. Following that, a golden ﬁgure started to appear behind him. Huo Yuhao was bathed in a golden light.

Wasn’t the ﬁgure behind him Wang Dong’er? Here, he formed a Wang Dong’er purely from his spiritual power. Her facial expression and the look in her eyes resembled Wang Dong’er perfectly.

Then, Huo Yuhao gently reached out with his palm, and the projection of Wang Dong’er behind him did the same. The two ﬁgures instantly merged into one.

A terrifying intention was sent ﬂying to the front. The purple clouds which had spread apart slowly came together. It was as if someone was throttling them. Then, they vanished, and Jing Ziyan appeared before everyone with a pale face.

Huo Yuhao’s hand remained in mid-air, but he did not continue reaching out. An intense golden light started to form in the center of his palm. “Do you still want to continue?” Huo Yuhao asked softly.

Jing Ziyan’s forehead was laced with sweat. The short knives in her hands were trembling. She could not ﬁnd the guts to ﬁght Huo Yuhao. This was the ﬁrst time she had experienced something like this. It was similar to facing Ji Juechen’s sword intent. However, while Juechen’s sword intent was in a continual process of betterment, which showed that there were still ﬂaws, the intent that Huo Yuhao released appeared perfect to her.

This intention was used completely on her. At this moment, Jing Ziyan felt as if ten thousand tsunami waves were hurtling toward her. Her soul rings lost their functionality in that moment, and she felt her heart being squeezed by a huge hand. This moment of tightness caused her to abandon her soul skill. Before Huo Yuhao, as she looked at his palm, she only felt immense fear.

What… power is this? Why does it exert such a powerful suppression?

Furthermore, he had yet to release the energy stored in his hand. What if he did? In terms of spiritual power, this palm seemed capable of shocking heaven and earth, provoking spirits and gods!

Jing Ziyan had never expected Huo Yuhao, who had lost use three of his four limbs, to still be so strong.

This palm shocked everyone else present, including Ji Juechen.

Ji Juechen looked blankly at Huo Yuhao. “This intent, this ultimate intent, it’s what I’m after.” As he said that, he rushed toward Huo Yuhao. When he was in front of him, he grabbed Huo Yuhao’s shoulders tightly and said, “Yuhao, how did you… accomplish this? Such a perfect intent, how did you do it?”

Huo Yuhao smiled slightly as he looked at Wang Dong’er, who was in the distance and said, “Extreme love forms ultimate intentions. When I was on the verge of death, my heart was ﬁlled with Wang Dong’er, and I realized that this was a thought that I possessed completely by myself. Unlike the Sovereign’s Descent, this is something that belongs to me and me only. Actually, this palm is not as powerful as you think. Its strength lies in my thoughts, which have increased and become stronger. Its existence has almost elevated from the concrete-immaterial realm to the concrete-material realm. However, as my cultivation is too low, I must wait until I’m a seven-ringed soul sage before my spiritual power can match this thought.

“As it comes from love, it manifests into an ultimate intent, the extremity of love. The extremity of your love is stronger than my dedication to my sword intent. Indeed, I never expected that you’d reach what I’ve been after quicker than me.” Ji Juechen’s eyes brimmed with an intense passion. There was no envy, simply passion and appreciation. Wang Dong’er now looked at Huo Yuhao more gently. Everyone could see how crazy Ji Juechen was over his sword intent. However, his passion for his sword could not compare to Huo Yuhao’s love for her. That simple line was enough to encapsulate the ocean-like love Huo Yuhao had for Wang Dong’er.

Huo Yuhao did not say that when Wang Dong’er was present, his Goddess of Light’s power would increase by 30%. After all, this required no thought, only a blissful sentiment. Only then could the power of Goddess of Light reach its maximum. If not, wanting to use an illusory spiritual thought to break Jing Ziyan’s Soul Emperor-level soul skill would be impossible.

Everyone started to crowd around next to Huo Yuhao. Bei Bei said nothing, he just smiled and give Huo Yuhao a thumbs-up.

He Caitou sighed in admiration, “Little brother, you are our secret weapon indeed!”

Xu Sanshi said pensively, “Your spiritual power has increased exponentially. Not bad, not bad. Hehe, your invisibility ability is derived from your second soul skill, right?” Huo Yuhao laughed, but said nothing.

Jiang Nannan asked curiously, “What’s its radius?”

Huo Yuhao thought for a while and replied, “The bigger the radius, the faster my spiritual power will deplete. I can maintain a 50 meter radius for about 10 minutes. For every half meter radius less, I can maintain it for one more minute.”

Xiao Xiao said in shock, “Doesn’t this mean that when our opponents ﬁght us, they won’t be able to see us at all?”

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “It’s not that strong, but it can affect their judgment.”

Jing Ziyan then asked, “Just now, what ability did you use to blind me?”

Huo Yuhao scratched his head and said, “Let me keep some secrets to myself. Like this, when we face our enemies, we can surprise them.” Bei Bei smiled and said, “Yes, everyone, stop asking. Prepare to depart. Yuhao, you have given us all a big surprise.”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “Elder brother, if I were useless, why would I still want to compete? I don’t wish to be a burden.”

The origin energy of heaven and earth in his body greatly restricted his freedom of movement. It also restricted his second martial soul, the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion. After all, he could not even move. The Ice Jade Empress Scorpion’s skills were meant for close-combat. Naturally, in his state, it was greatly weakened. Furthermore, he still needed to use a portion of her soul power to absorb the origin energy of heaven and earth. Hence, the only skill he could rely on was his Spiritual Eyes. As a control-type soul master, Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Eyes had undergone a fundamental change compared to before he had left for the Setting Sun Forest. While his soul power was only about 80% of what it had been, his actual ﬁghting abilities were much stronger. His powerful Spiritual Eyes could let him do many things that he previously could not.

For example, his ability to control Jing Ziyan’s senses was an evolved form of Spiritual Interference. His Spiritual Interference had now almost become a domain! With his Spiritual Eyes martial soul, Huo Yuhao could easily surpass other soul masters of the same level. Furthermore, he still had the power of his soul bone, and he could still use a bit of Ice Empress’ powers.

The ﬂying-type soul tool was activated. Huo Yuhao’s seat was attached to the soul tool. He released a Class 6 protective soul barrier to prevent his body from being buffeted by the wind. Wang Dong’er was seated next to him, and she carried a ﬂying- type soul tool on her back too. If something went wrong, she could respond instantly.

Everyone took to the skies simultaneously. Their destination was Radiant City!

------

The theme of the new Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was “Return“. This was because a long time ago, this historic tournament only allowed sects to take part. In the past millennia, its scale had decreased, to the point where it only allowed schools to take part. This time, the Sun Moon Empire, the tournament’s organizer, suggested the change, and the other countries agreed to it, deciding to restore the original criteria for the tournament. They increased the number of participating sects and changed the rules of the tournament. Doing so massively

increased the scale of the competition.

In the continent, there were considerably more sects than schools.

For the schools, by doing well in the tournament, they could make a good name for themselves and recruit more students. This was also good for their future development. The same logic applied to the sects.

The development of any sect required talents. The more talented an individual was, the more likely it was that they would join a top-notch sect. After the tournament’s rules changed, almost two-thirds of the sects on the continent chose to take part!

Chapter 270: The Competition in Radiant City!

If the tournament committee hadn’t restricted the age of the competitors to below twenty and demanded that at least ﬁve members of each sect had to have at least four rings, there would have been ten times more teams competing in this tournament then last time!

Even with such restrictions, there were still a total of one hundred and seventeen teams, many more than last time!

As the wealthiest empire on the Douluo Continent, hosting this tournament was nothing for the Sun Moon Empire. Even so, they took three months to prepare for it. As the biggest city on the continent, Radiant City constructed several hotels and guesthouses to receive guests coming for this grand event. They beneﬁted greatly from businessmen coming from foreign lands.

The Sun Moon Empire also invested a lot in this tournament, since they were the top soul engineering empire on the continent. The top prize wasn’t just soul bones anymore; they were soul tools. The winning team could obtain a Class 9 soul tool, while the runner-up and third place teams would receive Class 8 and Class 7 soul tools respectively.

The values of these soul tools were much higher than soul bones. This was especially true for the champions. Currently, a Class 9 soul tool was priceless, and only the Sun Moon Empire possessed Class 9 soul tools. At the same time, Class 9 soul tools were also the biggest threat to the other two empires on the continent.

Every competing team was itching to obtain the prizes and working hard to perform better in the tournament. This wasn’t just an opportunity for them to gain fame, it was an opportunity for them to proﬁt greatly!

Modern soul masters had to rely on soul tools in addition to their own cultivation if they wanted to gain greater abilities. However, the astronomical costs of advanced soul tools limited most soul masters. It was impossible to become the best without money.

------ Radiant City, Sun Moon Empire’s Imperial Palace, a backyard garden...

A wheelchair was moving slowly on the quartzite path in the garden. There were different types of plants planted here, every region of the garden was perfectly designed. There was a small waterfall atop a sculpted hill, an imperial painting of a bouquet of ﬂowers, and huge, tall trees. The entire backyard garden felt like a beautiful forest.

“How’s my father?” Xu Tianran’s eyes were shut. There was a blanket on his thighs, and he appeared very relaxed.

Ju Zi was the one pushing his wheelchair.

Ju Zi was clad in a long, yellow dress today, which accentuated her delicate white skin. She looked classy and elegant. She exuded a much more mature aura than before. A wise look ﬂashed across her eyes.

“I’m afraid he’s nearing his end. The imperial physician said that he often passes out and loses consciousness these days,” Ju Zi said softly.

Xu Tianran continued to close his eyes. It was as if he was unrelated to the ailing old man that Ju Zi was talking about.

“My father has always been very cautious and conscientious. He does not aim to acquire merit, but only hopes to avoid mistakes. He has missed out on great opportunities! When we look back in the future, he will only be regarded as an ordinary emperor. What’s the reaction of the military?”

Ju Zi said, “They are very calm. Ever since we took control of the garrison, opposition from the military has disappeared. At least two-ﬁfths of the empire’s military is directly under our control now. Out of the other three-ﬁfths of the military, around two-thirds of them are still monitoring the situation, or are loyal only to the emperor. Once you succeed the throne, I believe they will join your side. As for the last ﬁfth, they are military ofﬁcers at the borders. Some of them have been brought over by other princes, while some were your enemies in the past.”

Xu Tianran gave a half smile. His smile was very nice, but for some reason, Ju Zi felt very cold in her heart when she saw this smile. That was because she was clear that Xu Tianran was ready to kill when he revealed such an expression.

Xu Tianran smiled as he said, “No rush. When I succeed the throne, you can make a trip if they are still unwilling to budge.”

Ju Zi shuddered a little, but still nodded and said, “Okay.”

Xu Tianran turned around and looked at her. He said, “Ju Zi, you don’t have to be so reserved around me. When I succeed the throne, the ﬁrst thing I’ll do is make you my queen. You are always so reserved. You lack the grace of a queen.”

Ju Zi revealed a slight smile on her face and replied, “Your Highness, I’m not with you because I covet fame or status. I only have two wishes. First, I just want to be with you. Second, I want to destroy the Star Luo Empire.”

Xu Tianran nodded and said, “Your two wishes will come true. Your performance in the military was better than I had expected. Even the hard-headed old generals are impressed by you. If this continues, you’ll be my commanding general when we start our war against the Star Luo Empire.” “Thank you, Your Highness.” Ju Zi knelt down beside Xu Tianran’s wheelchair.

Xu Tianran used his hand to lift her up and said, “I told you that we don’t have to be so formal with each other. If you hadn’t saved my life, I wouldn’t be here now. I have many subordinates who are more capable than you. However, you are the only one that I feel at ease with.”

Ju Zi’s eyes were ﬁlled with gratitude, Xu Tianran didn’t realize that there was also a feeling of indifference behind them.

Can I really do what I want in front of you? In the past, there was an ofﬁcial who you owed gratitude towards. However, he was killed in his house after he acted a little more freely than usual. I was the one who carried out the kill order for you.

Ju Zi understood Xu Tianran’s character very well. He was very ambitious. There was only one goal in his life: to rule the entire Douluo Continent. Furthermore, he was intelligent, had great tolerance, and was quite vicious. Although he was disabled, he had all the qualities needed to succeed. However, he became colder and more merciless after he lost his legs and his manly ability. Even Ju Zi didn’t dare to get close to him when he revealed his violent and hostile aura sometimes. He wasn’t just an anti-hero; Ju Zi even believed he was a maniac at times. However, he was an extremely intelligent maniac!

But she wanted revenge, and thus she needed the support of a maniac like him. However, she didn’t want to follow in his footsteps. That was why she acted very cautiously in front of him, concealing her true feelings very well.

Furthermore, there was another person in her heart along with her true feelings. This person was a youth who had once suffered grave injuries because of her.

“The preparations for the tournament should be done, right? Did Hallmaster Hongchen report back?” Xu Tianran continued asking. Ju Zi had become his most important intelligence ofﬁcer. There was one thing that Xu Tianran didn’t exaggerate, and that was his trust towards Ju Zi.

Ju Zi nodded and said, “We are already prepared and ready to go. Everything is progressing according to plan.”

Xu Tianran said, “A ﬁne fowl only perches on a ﬁne tree. I hope that they are wiser. Otherwise, it’ll really be a pity. Have Shrek Academy’s team arrived? They are the current reigning champions. If the intelligence is right, it’s the same bunch who became champions the other time competing this time. If this

is the case, it’s likely that they will become champions again! It’s a pity that it’ll be very difﬁcult for me to use them!”

Ju Zi seemed to be jolted. She clearly remembered that Huo Yuhao was part of the team from Shrek.

Xu Tianran said, “It’s better not to touch Shrek Academy for now. Let them leave. I shall give this face to Shrek. I’ll see what kind of sparks will be created between Shrek Academy and our people. Oh yes, please invite Mister Zhong Li here. Tell him I have something important to discuss with him.”

“Yes.” Ju Zi stood up and hurried out.

Xu Tianran shut his eyes again and once more wore the leisurely smile on his face. He seemed like he was napping. The quiet and peaceful comfort in the garden was mesmerizing. ------

The group from the Tang Sect landed about a hundred kilometers from Radiant City. If they ventured any further forward, they would enter the borders of Radiant City. As the capital of the greatest soul engineering empire, they might become practice targets of the city’s defense system if they dared to violate the airspace of the city.

They didn’t meet with any danger on their journey here, and had arrived after only half a day of travel.

They started a ﬁre for cooking. Although everyone missed Huo Yuhao’s cooking, they couldn’t let a ‘disabled person’ cook for them. Jiang Nannan, Xiao Xiao, and Wang Dong’er took on the responsibility as cooks. As for Jing Ziyan, even though she was also a lady… Besides wielding blades and spears, she didn’t know anything about cooking! She could only act as an assistant to the three chefs.

Jiang Nannan was the best at cooking among the three. Although Wang Dong’er had learned from Huo Yuhao for a few days, she didn’t pick up much. Huo Yuhao had heard Xu Sanshi mention that Jiang Nannan was from a poor family. She had thus matured young, and was good at carrying out household chores. It turned out to be true.

They had prepared sufﬁciently before they set out for this tournament, bringing quite a lot of ingredients. With Huo Yuhao around, they weren’t worried about the freshness of the ingredients, since he was the owner of Ultimate Ice soul power.

Huo Yuhao was fed by Wang Dong’er. Of course, she fed him with a spoon, and not through her mouth. After all, there were many people around!

Huo Yuhao could only use his right hand. It was difﬁcult for him to eat on his own. Wang Dong’er didn’t want him to tax himself, and thus she took over this role. Everyone was envious and jealous when they saw this.

Xu Sanshi was looking at Huo Yuhao as Wang Dong’er fed her. He whispered to Jiang Nannan, “My love, please feed me too.”

Jiang Nannan snapped, “How old are you?”

“Three…” Xu Sanshi said bashfully.

“Scram!” Jiang Nannan roared at him and gave him a shock.

He quickly escaped and avoided her ﬂying kick.

On the other side, the same thing happened more intimately due to character differences. He Caitou looked at Xiao Xiao with a gentle gaze in his eyes, “Why don’t I feed you too? You are eating too little. Look at you, you are getting thin.”

Xiao Xiao laughed and said, “I’m not that weak. I can feed myself. Go and eat. You are getting thin.”

Jing Ziyan rolled her eyes as she eavesdropped from the side. Thin? This guy is thin? Isn’t he at least three hundred catties? He’s as big as a mountain, but she calls him thin. How did she bring herself to say that? Those in love really have extremely low intelligence!

In fact, Jing Ziyan felt very depressed. As the ﬁrst test subject of Huo Yuhao’s self-created spiritual-soul fusion skill, she was traumatized. Without dealing with this trauma, she knew that she couldn’t challenge him in the future!

Ji Juechen was even more silent. His eyes never shifted away from the front, and he was in a perpetually pensive state. At times, he would start gesturing with his right hand, as if he were trying to imitate something. Everyone enjoyed their lunch in a very relaxed mood. They didn’t rush to move off. There were still two days to the registration deadline of the tournament. After entering Radiant City, they had to be completely wary at all times. Here, they were still able to relax and rest!

Just as everyone was about to ﬁnish their lunch with delicious meat soup, the rapid clatter of horse hoofs could be heard coming in.

---

Before everyone got up to take a look, the familiar power of Huo Yuhal’s Spiritual Detection was unleashed. An image surfaced in everyone’s minds.

While Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection presented a detailed image to everyone, it was still unable to project any color. While they were far away, the image in their minds was still very clear.

It was a cavalry regiment. There were fourteen people in total, and they were all dressed in black warrior robes. Their steeds weren’t ordinary, either. They were taller than most horses, and more than four meters in length, with a shoulder height around one meter and eighty centimeters. They were extremely large and muscular. The strange thing was that these steeds didn’t have hair, only a layer of ﬁne scales. Every steed also had a bulging protrusion on its head.

Jing Ziyan couldn’t help but say, “Eh, those are Hornscale Horses. They’re really rich!”

Hornscale Horses weren’t related to normal horses. They were soul beasts. They weren’t good at offense, but their defensive strength was rather high. They possessed two innate soul skills, Blackscale Armor and Heavenly Horn Barrier. Such soul beasts usually appeared in herds, because they weren’t good at ﬁghting. That was also why they rarely appeared in soul beasts’ forests. They mainly lived in the grasslands.

Their lack of ﬁghting strength meant that they were compensated in other areas. Hornscale Horses had great endurance, around three times that of ordinary horses. They were also very quick. When they moved, even at a full gallop, they could also unleash their Heavenly Horn Barrier to protect themselves and reduce wind resistance. As they could be tamed by humans, the nobility of the various empires kept them as pets. One Hornscale Horse could be sold for between ﬁve thousand and ten thousand gold soul coins. If they were hundred-year Hornscale Horses, they could cost ten times more. It was even more expensive for thousand-

year Hornscale Horses. These prices were so astronomical that demand became almost zero. As for those that were at least ten thousand years old… they barely existed at all. They usually couldn’t evolve to that level due to their ancestry. Even though there was a legend that they possessed a shred of the Unicorn bloodline, that little amount of heritage was barely signiﬁcant. A Unicorn was a Transcendent Soul Beast. Furthermore, Unicorns were rumored to be at the same level as the Divine Giant Dragon, but their existence was also seen as a myth.

All of the men were riding Hornscale Horses. Their leader, who was an elder, was even riding a hundred-year Hornscale Horse. It wasn’t exaggerated to claim that they were rich.

Hornscale Horses were indeed very quick. In a matter of seconds, the cavalry regiment quickly appeared in front of Shrek’s Seven Monsters.

Shrek’s Seven Monsters had chosen a good spot to rest. The ground was level, but elevated. The view was great, and there were even a few huge trees around. It was very cool as they took shade under the trees. The fragrance from their meat soup also made the entire atmosphere feel more rustic.

The cavalry regiment quickly discovered them, and the elder lifted his hand, stopping the others behind him. The entire team was evidently very organized. The riders also coordinated well with their horses.

The elder slowly rode up to them and smiled. He asked, “Greetings all. Are all of you going to compete in the tournament?”

Seeing that the other party was being very ceremonious, Bei Bei stood up and walked a few steps forward before replying, “Yes, we are from the Tang Sect. We are going to Radiant City for the tournament.”

“The Tang Sect?” The elder was stunned. He didn’t seem to have a deep impression of the sect in his mind. It took him some time before he recalled, “Oh, it’s a very ancient sect! We are from the Heavenly Armor Sect. We are also here for the tournament. We are tired from rushing on our journey. May we rest here too? Don’t worry, we won’t disturb all of you.”

Bei Bei smiled and replied, “Of course you can. We still have some meat soup that we cooked. If you don’t mind, we can share it with all of you.”

The elder laughed and said, “That would be great. Everyone, dismount!” As he spoke, he leapt off from his horse ﬁrst.

Not only was the size of a hundred-year Hornscale Horse different, but the bump on its head was also larger, with a patch of brown scales at the center of its forehead. After the elder dismounted, it obediently went to one side to graze. There weren’t many soul beasts that fed on grass. This Hornscale Horse had great endurance, and it wasn’t very troublesome to feed. This was also a reason why the nobility loved them.

When the elder jumped off from his horse, the rest of the riders also dismounted. Their actions were neat and tidy, even rhythmic. No one made any noise, but they knew their roles. Hornscale Horses were quite intelligent, and didn’t need to be instructed. They walked off on their own to graze, but didn’t venture too far away. The riders started to get busy as they camped close to the group from the Tang Sect. Some of them retrieved dry rations, while others grabbed their water pouches. Someone was in charge of starting a ﬁre and cooking. In a while, the smell of their meal drifted over.

The elder led two youths over and scanned everyone from the Tang Sect. Eventually, he ﬁxed his gaze on Bei Bei. From how Bei Bei had reacted earlier, he could tell that he was the leader of their group. However, he underestimated Tang Sect because of this discovery. This ancient sect doesn’t even have an experienced leader. What’s going on?

“Young man, how are you? I’m Han Zhanhu from the Heavenly Armor Sect. I’m the leader of my sect. I’ve brought these youths along to gain some experience.”

Jiang Nannan led two youths to get some of the meat soup. These two youths were very cautious. Their faces turned red when they saw Jiang Nannan’s ravishing looks. After that, they didn’t dare to look at her anymore. Jiang Nannan almost burst out in laughter when she saw their shy looks. These two youths were really amusing! Xu Sanshi was watching carefully from one side. He chortled when he saw their faces turn red, and stopped them monitoring further. They were really inexperienced!

Bei Bei was already conversing with Han Zhanhu, “I’m the eldest senior of the Tang Sect. Greetings to elder.”

Bei Bei’s reﬁned appearance was very likable. When Han Zhanhu discovered that he was the leader of the Tang Sect, he was stunned.

“So you are Master Bei. Apologies for the disrespect.” No matter how strong the Tang Sect was now, it was still an ancient sect. Han Zhanhu became more formal with his words. Han Zhanhu had to be a senior ﬁgure from the Heavenly Armor Sect. He was a tall and mighty man. His aura was pressing too. As he gestured, he seemed awe-inspiring.

Huo Yuhao sat on the Golden Tree Wheelchair and observed these people. Although they only just interacted, he managed to make some deductions. First, the Heavenly Armor Sect was obviously not from the Sun Moon Empire. That was because they were riding horses. One of the tournament’s stipulations was that the competing teams needed to have at least ﬁve members who had four or more soul rings. Four-ringed soul masters could use ﬂying-type soul tools. If they were from the Sun Moon Empire, it wouldn’t make sense that they didn’t use soul tools. From the Hornscale Horses they rode, it was more likely that they came from the Heavenly Soul Empire. That was because the Heavenly Soul Empire was famous for producing such soul beasts.

Besides this, Huo Yuhao could also tell that the Heavenly Armor Sect had very strict rules. The young cavaliers were ﬁlled with fear and respect as they looked at Han Zhanhu. They were also very organized. In addition, they rarely spoke to one another. Even when they conversed with one another, they whispered. Such a disciplined sect was quite admirable!

Bei Bei’s brief conversation with Han Zhanhu veriﬁed Huo Yuhao’s guess: the Heavenly Armor Sect indeed came from the Heavenly Soul Empire. The Heavenly Soul Empire was furthest from the Sun Moon Empire. They had been on a long journey for twenty days and were now about to arrive at Radiant City. After brieﬂy greeting the rest, Han Zhanhu thanked the Tang Sect for the meat soup and left with the two youths. The two shy youths stole glances at Jiang Nannan only when they were returning to their own campsite.

Wang Dong’er squatted down beside Huo Yuhao at this moment and whispered, “They are so shy! From their looks, it seems like they hardly leave their sect. That’s interesting.”

Huo Yuhao chortled, “This Heavenly Armor Sect appears quite impressive. Their abilities should be quite decent, seeing how disciplined they are. Elder Han must at least be a Soul Sage. The rest probably possess at least four rings each. A few of them should even have ﬁve rings. Their abilities are quite good!” The ﬁrst requirement of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was that the competitors couldn’t be above twenty years of age. It was very rare for one to become a Soul King before he was twenty even through the use of herbs. Through his observation, Huo Yuhao was certain that this Heavenly Armor Sect team could rival a top eight team in the previous edition of the tournament in terms of overall abilities. This showed how competitive this edition of the tournament would be.

The team from the Heavenly Armor Sect was eating and resting quietly. Those from the Tang Sect were also enjoying a rare relaxed moment. It was noontime, the hottest time of the day. According to Bei Bei, they should continue their journey after noon passed.

Wang Dong’er lifted Huo Yuhao from his wheelchair and let him lie down on a mat that she laid on the grass. This was more comfortable for him.

She sat beside him and used her thighs as his pillow.

Huo Yuhao could smell Wang Dong’er’s fragrant scent as he laid on her soft, springy thighs. Huo Yuhao let out a long breath and reached out his right arm to hug Wang Dong’er’s waist. He had blissful look on his face.

There was a big tree behind Wang Dong’er. She leaned quietly on it. She was also enjoying the peaceful atmosphere. She was combing Huo Yuhao’s hair and occasionally massaged his head to help him relax.

Very soon, Huo Yuhao fell asleep in this sweet and comfortable environment.

The rest of the Tang Sect members all unwittingly surrounded Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er in the center. Jiang Nannan and Xu Sanshi leaned beside a huge tree. Xu Sanshi wanted to hug her, but Jiang Nannan only allowed him to hold her hand. Things were the opposite for Xiao Xiao and He Caitou - Xiao Xiao’s head was on He Caitou’s muscular arm as she closed her eyes for a brief bit of shut-eye. Occasionally, He Caitou would watch her with a doting look and caress her long hair. There was a blissful and gentle look in his eyes.

Ever since he had established his relationship with Xiao Xiao, He Caitou had pampered her even more. They were together every day. He Caitou didn’t even dare to touch Xiao Xiao’s hands easily. However, she was very nice. Xiao Xiao was like a ceramic doll in his eyes, he was afraid of hurting her. Xiao Xiao took the initiative to get close to him, and He Caitou accepted her advances in embarrassment. Every time Xiao Xiao tried to hold his hand, he would look very happy. Xiao Xiao loved his expression every time this happened.

Bei Bei, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan sat together. They were conversing. From how they kept on glancing at Huo Yuhao, it was evident that they couldn’t forget his immense spiritual power. Ji Juechen looked excited. It was obvious that he had developed some ideas after being inspired by Huo Yuhao today.

The disciples from the Heavenly Armor Sect didn’t rush to proceed on their journey either. They returned the pot that they had brushed clean and also rested beside the trees after expressing their gratitude once again. It was evident that they were quite exhausted after traveling quickly for twenty days. They didn’t even bother to meditate. Apart from the few who were standing guard, the rest went to sleep.

Although there were more than twenty people in this forest, as well as several Hornscale Horses, it seemed very quiet at this point in time. It was so peaceful that it looked like material for a beautiful painting.

---

It was a pity that this didn’t last. Just as everyone was enjoying the peace and quiet, a hooting sound came from afar. The piercing howls seemed to get closer and closer. Those who were awake started to look into the distance.

There were more than ten people, but they were descending from the sky. Their wide ﬂying-type soul tools started to retract as they landed on the ground. They landed on the side of the Tang Sect’s campsite opposite the Heavenly Armor Sect.

This group of people wasn’t as disciplined as those from the Heavenly Armor Sect. They made a lot of noise as soon as they landed.

“I’m beat. I’m beat. This place isn’t bad. We should rest here.”

“Oh look, there’s quite a number of people here! Look, are those Hornscale Horses? They look great! It’s a pity that they can only gallop on the ground. Compared to ﬂying-type soul tools, they’re much inferior.”

“Eh, they should be country bumpkins who are here to compete too. It’s already a feat to ride Hornscale Horses. Guys, let’s rest quickly. Who brought dry rations? I’m a little famished.”

“There aren’t any dry rations. Radiant City is not far from here. We can eat when we reach the city. No one brought dry rations because we are so close to the city! There are many delicacies in Radiant City.”

“No, I’m too famished. Let me have a bite ﬁrst. Those country bumpkins should have brought food since they came from afar. Let me ask them for some.”

Everyone from the Tang Sect and the Heavenly Armor Sect furrowed their brows as they heard the noises that came from this bunch of soul masters that had just landed. The environment and atmosphere here were very quiet and peaceful, but their arrival disrupted everything. These newly-arrived soul masters were clad in yellow warrior robes. All of them had ﬂying-type soul tools behind them, which they removed after landing. They were led by two middle-aged men, who were conversing with one another. The noises came from the youths who were under them.

It was a plump youth who had mentioned that he was famished. With his small nose and small eyes, he looked like a contemptible fellow.

Since they landed nearer to those from the Tang Sect, he naturally went to ask for food from those from the Tang Sect. This plump youth started to walk towards them.

“Hey brothers, do you have food? Can you spare some for me?” The plump youth looked very slipshod. His hands were on his waist, and he was asking them to be charitable towards him with his eyes.

No one from the Tang Sect spoke.

Huo Yuhao was in a deep sleep. Wang Dong’er continued to brush his hair, while Xu Sanshi and Jiang Nannan were still seated together while holding hands. He Caitou was caressing Xiao Xiao’s hair, and Bei Bei and the other few were still engaged in their discussion. No one listened to the plump youth’s words, and he didn’t elicit a response.

“Hey, are all of you deaf?” He shouted unhappily. “Give me some food, or else I’ll deal with all of you! Stop pretending!”

Wang Dong’er furrowed her brow and twisted her head before saying, “Lower your volume.”

The plump youth looked over as he heard her words. When he saw her, his mouth opened wide. His facial fat jiggled, and his bean-sized eyes shone with a greedy look. He had uneven yellow teeth, and let out intense bad breath. His saliva was even dripping out of his mouth. Even his tone of voice changed.

“Beauty! Beauty! What a beauty!” As he spoke, he couldn’t help but walk towards Wang Dong’er.

“Beauty, my name is Feng Ling. I’m the most outstanding young talent from the Heaven’s Gate. You are, you are too beautiful!”

The bad breath from his mouth was even poisonous. His saliva even caused the plants and grass to fume as it landed on the ground.

Wang Dong’er wore a cold expression on her face as she saw him walking over. Her gentleness was only for Huo Yuhao. However, she wasn’t a gentle person by nature!

“Scram!” Wang Dong’er shouted.

Feng Ling glared at her. “What? Did you just tell me to scram? Do you know who I am? I’m the young sect leader of the Heaven’s Gate. My father is the current sect leader!”

Wang Dong’er lifted her head slowly, and also lifted her right arm. At this point, a huge ﬁgure blocked the view in front of her. A cold aura left Wang Dong’er stunned. In the next moment, she lowered her head again and continued to brush Huo Yuhao’s hair. Feng Ling wasn’t tall. He felt a shadow appearing, and Wang Dong’er was blocked just like that. When he lifted his head to look, he saw a cold-looking, handsome face in front of him.

“Scram.” Ji Juechen’s voice wasn’t very loud, but it was very sinister.

Feng Ling shuddered and felt goosebumps rising on his skin.

He subconsciously retreated a few steps.

“Who, who are you guys?” Although Feng Ling was ugly and lecherous, he wasn’t stupid. He had already mentioned his identity as the Heaven’s Gate young sect master, but the person in front of him didn’t seem to care. He was immediately alarmed. Furthermore, those who were strong had their own special characteristics. Such a special characteristic was very evident on Ji Juechen. He knew this person wasn’t to be triﬂed with, and he was also not alone.

Ji Juechen didn’t say anything else. He was someone who didn’t like to speak. He lifted his hand and retrieved his Judgment Sword. His love for swords was like Huo Yuhao’s love for Wang Dong’er. He never left his sword in his storage-type soul tool. It was always by his side. That was why he was called a Sword Fanatic.

Seeing that Ji Juechen had retrieved his sword, Feng Ling turned around and ﬂed. “All of you need to watch out!” he cursed as he ﬂed.

Chapter 271: Sword Fanatic's Sword

Ji Juechen didn’t stand down. He wielded the Judgment Sword and followed Feng Ling towards the rest of the Heaven’s Gate disciples. Since when were Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan afraid of anything? They loved trouble! Ji Juechen’s competitiveness came to the surface as he was provoked. Initiating an attack was in line with his personality.

Jing Ziyan didn’t follow him. She had been greatly agitated by Huo Yuhao earlier, and hadn’t recovered yet. Furthermore, she also felt something from the immense spiritual pressure that Huo Yuhao had brought upon her. She needed some time to digest everything.

Feng Ling quickly rushed back to his own territory. Everyone from Heaven’s Gate naturally heard his confrontation with the Tang Sect. The entire sect, including the two middle-aged men, gathered immediately.

Ji Juechen lifted his sword and walked over. Bei Bei wanted to follow him, but he was stopped by Jing Ziyan. “Let him have his ﬁll. Otherwise, he’ll vent it all on us.”

Bei Bei immediately sat down. He sighed slightly, and his eyes were ﬁlled with empathy for those from Heaven’s Gate.

Jing Ziyan’s lips moved slightly. “What kind of person are you?”

Bei Bei smiled and revealed his set of white teeth, “I’m a good guy.”

Jing Ziyan looked over and shrugged her shoulders. Ever since she came to Tang Sect, she had smiled far more often.

“Who are you? What do you want?” one of the middle-aged men shouted at Ji Juechen as he walked over.

Ji Juechen was holding the Judgment Sword. As he moved forward, his aura was changing tremendously. It was as if he and his surrounding environment had assimilated. However, the environment didn’t assimilate with him. On the contrary, he assimilated with the environment. Everything surrounding him became extremely quiet. Even the birdsong that could be heard earlier disappeared. The colorful and radiant world turned dim and grey.

The two middle-aged men started to turn serious.

Ji Juechen ﬁnally stopped. “Either you beat me or I’ll beat you.” As he spoke, he lifted his Judgment Sword and grabbed it with both hands. He lifted it high above his head.

A weird glow extended from the sword hilt. Two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings quickly rose from Ji Juechen’s feet. However, these soul rings turned grey in the next moment. His entire body turned grey too.

Solitary Sword Domain.

The layer of grey started to expand at a frightening speed.

The surroundings were dyed grey all around him.

Huo Yuhao ﬁnally opened his eyes. He was impressed. “Brother Ji’s domain is getting more and more complete.”

Those from the Heavenly Armor Sect naturally noticed the confrontation that was going on. Han Zhanhu stood up and watched what was happening.

When he saw Ji Juechen walk towards the Heaven’s Gate disciples and unleash six soul rings, his expression changed. Although Ji Juechen looked older than twenty, he was deﬁnitely not older than thirty! For him to become a Soul Emperor at that age meant that he was the best among everyone of the same age. When Ji Juechen lifted his Judgment Sword and his soul rings turned grey, Han Zhanhu’s expression also turned serious.

He must possess great abilities given these strange things I’m seeing. This young man is extraordinary!

The Heaven’s Gate disciples wouldn’t allow Ji Juechen to bully them, either. They quickly spread out. The two middle- aged men also unleashed their soul rings. Just like Ji Juechen, they were six-ringed Soul Emperors. However, the color of their soul rings was slightly different. One of them had three yellow and three purple soul rings, while the other had three yellow, two purple and one black soul ring. Evidently, it wasn’t their ﬁrst time teaming up with together. The Soul Emperor with the three yellow and three purple soul rings retreated quickly. At the same time, he lifted a soul cannon to his shoulder. The soul rings on his body ﬂashed, and his soul power undulations increased signiﬁcantly. He was an orthodox soul engineer.

The other middle-aged man stood in place without moving. As a clanging sound rang out, a thick suit of armor appeared on his body. The pitch-black armor carried a little silver light. Evidently, it was created using some form of special metal. This armor, including a helmet, covered his body from head to toe. Not only that, but this close-combat soul engineer even had a shield in his hand.

The Heaven’s Gate Sect was a soul engineering sect. Besides these two middle-aged men, the rest also unleashed their soul tools. Feng Ling also wore a suit of armor and carried a shield. Furthermore, his armor seemed stronger than the middle-aged man’s. However, he only had four soul rings. Bearing his shield, he protected himself like a turtle in its shell. It seemed as if he was afraid that no one would know he was fearful of death. Boom!——

An intense ball of white light was unleashed from the middle-aged man’s soul cannon. The aggressor always possessed the advantage. Ji Juechen appeared in front of them, and his soul rings were the best combination a Soul Emperor could possibly have. These two middle-aged men from the Heaven’s Gate acted very cautiously. They had unleashed the cannon strike to test Ji Juechen’s abilities. The rest of the Heaven’s Gate disciples were spread around them. Although they retrieved their soul tools, they didn’t attack.

Ji Juechen was alone! He had many compatriots who were resting. When the Heaven’s Gate disciples saw his six rings, they were dumbfounded. Most of the people they interacted with only had four rings. There were even those who only had three rings! Just having the soul tools they did was considered quite decent already.

Ji Juechen stood in place and slashed his Judgment Sword forward. His actions were simple and direct. The Judgment Sword turned black and accurately struck the soul cannon shell. The middle-aged man who had ﬁred the cannon was stunned. Not only did Ji Juechen not avoid the cannon shell, he even struck it directly. What was going on? This was a Class 5 soul tool! Its explosive strength was tremendous!

However, he was stunned in the next moment.

The pitch-black sword and burning white cannon shell contrasted each other. However, the cannon shell seemed to stall slightly as it made contact. It seemed to be on the verge of blowing apart, but it was swallowed by the black that came from the sword in the next instant. None of its energy was released.

Ji Juechen was very conﬁdent. As he stepped forward with his left leg, he continued to slash with his sword.

The previous black turned into a blinding brightness. In that instant, his entire person seemed to have turned into a silver sun. The intense brightness blinded the Heaven’s Gate disciples temporarily. The silver light retracted amidst their groans. The close- combat soul engineer holding the shield had already shifted from his position, retreating three meters.

Ji Juechen stood where he was quietly. His Judgment Sword had lost its glow by now.

A crisp clang resonated from the soul engineer that retreated. Following this, an astonishing scene appeared.

A streak of silver light was released from his shield. It expanded like the patterns on a turtle shell. A crackling sound followed as the shield was turned into a pile of debris on the ground. Not only this, but the expanding silver light even appeared on his armor. It started from his helmet all the way down his body. His entire suit of armor cracked and fell off. The weird thing, however, was that he wasn’t hurt at all.

There were nearly forty people on this empty patch of land. However, the entire patch turned eerily silent at this instant. Even the sounds of birds chirping couldn’t be heard in this domain. The greyness seemed to be spreading ceaselessly. Everyone from the Heaven’s Gate was engulfed. Ji Juechen’s gaze was as cold as ever. However, he appeared much more disappointed this time. He gently shook his head and turned around. He placed the Judgment Sword on his shoulder and walked back towards the Tang Sect. The grey domain followed him back. He was already very handsome, but in this brief ﬁght, his suaveness had shocked everyone.

He was a sword fanatic, and only lived for ﬁghting and swords. He wasn’t an executioner. Moreover, that instantaneous control was something that he pursued. In his eyes, the Heaven’s Gate disciples weren’t ﬁt enough for him to truly unleash his sword.

Han Zhanhu was astonished. There was only one thought in his mind – if I were the one standing in front of him, what would I do against his sword?

Ji Juechen’s ﬁghting method was one of a kind. He was neither a soul master, nor a soul engineer. However, he was very strong, especially in control. If he could tear his opponent’s shield and armor apart, he could deﬁnitely tear his opponent’s body apart as well. However, he didn’t harm the man. He only threatened him with his sword, and caused everyone from the Heaven’s Gate to freeze in place.

Feng Ling was shivering and something wet could be felt at his crotch. Who did I just offend?

The middle-aged man who unleashed the long-range strike took two steps forward and came up beside his partner. He asked softly, “Senior, are you okay?”

He only saw his senior’s pale face.

His body shuddered, and he twisted his head to look at his compatriot. He whispered, “Let’s leave.” He quickly removed the remaining parts of his helmet and gestured towards the Heaven’s Gate disciples.

At this point, everyone from the Heaven’s Gate moved away in a disciplined fashion. They were extremely quick, as if they were scurrying off. The fastest to ﬂee was Feng Ling. His fat seemed to be ﬁlled with new strength now.

Ji Juechen had already returned to Huo Yuhao’s side. He turned to look at Huo Yuhao as if he were asking him something.

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “Obliteration of darkness, instant brightness. You are really impressive. You’ve merged with your sword!”

A smile was revealed on Ji Juechen’s cold face. It was a rare smile. “If you could move at all, I wouldn’t be able to beat you.” Huo Yuhao chortled, “That’s hard to say. I’m only stronger than you in terms of my spiritual power. However, the sword intent formed from the combination of your spiritual and soul power is becoming more and more sturdy as you slowly grow. If this continues, you’ll be stronger than me, at least in that aspect.”

Ji Juechen’s eyes brightened. He seemed to understand something, and nodded towards Huo Yuhao.

“Let me sleep awhile.” Huo Yuhao was still laying on Wang Dong’er’s lap.

“Okay.” Ji Juechen acknowledged his words and returned to his original position.

---

After those from the Heaven’s Gate left, the Heavenly Armor Sect also started to move off. Before they left, Han Zhanhu went over to speak to Bei Bei again. However, his tone of voice was rather different from before. He didn’t dare to underestimate the Tang Sect anymore.

Those from the Tang Sect also didn’t stay much longer. After Huo Yuhao woke up from his nap, they embarked on their journey again, proceeding towards Radiant City. At the same time, Wang Dong’er dressed like a guy again for safety precautions. As Huo Yuhao was in a wheelchair, they were moving much slower than before. It was already sunset by the time they arrived at Radiant City.

Among all of them, Huo Yuhao, He Caitou, Wang Dong’er, Na Na, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan had been to Radiant City before. They weren’t unfamiliar with this place. However, the rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters were all astonished. Radiant City was the largest city on the continent! When they saw the tall buildings, they were even more shocked. Their expressions also turned more serious.

All of them came from the three empires of the continent. As the biggest threat on the continent, a thriving Sun Moon Empire put great pressure on the other empires. Even Huo Yuhao didn’t know how strong the Sun Moon Empire was. They hadn’t seen the truly great soul engineers from the empire yet. According to the information they were given, they had to complete their registration when they reached Radiant City. Although the previous registration had been completed, they still had to go through this round of registration to verify their arrival. The empire would then arrange for their temporary residence, as well as provide them with the tournament schedule.

As they had competed in the last edition of the tournament, Shrek’s Seven Monsters were all profoundly moved as they arrived at the city. Compared to the congested streets of Star Luo City, Radiant City looked much more orderly. Although the crowds on the streets had increased, it didn’t feel packed. This was the beneﬁt of a huge city. Soldiers in iron armor patrolled the streets occasionally. Every squad was made up of twelve soldiers, all extremely disciplined.

Although Huo Yuhao had stayed in Radiant City for quite some time, he wasn’t very familiar with the buildings here. He had been extremely invested in soul tools every day, and didn’t have time to stroll around. However, there was someone else who was familiar with the area. Na Na had grown up in this city, and was quite familiar with things around here. She was easily able to lead everyone to the registration area. ---

It was a huge eight-story hotel. It was in the city center, and was called the Ming Yue Hotel. It was entirely silvery-white, and could be seen from a good distance away. Every story was quite high. Even though there were only eight stories, it was still considered an extremely tall building in Radiant City.

The lobby of the hotel gave off a metallic feel. Its internal decoration was identical to its external decoration, completely silvery-white. Various streamlined decorations resembled exquisite soul tools and gave one the urge to touch them. The ﬁrst feeling the hotel gave those entering was that it was simple, yet grand.

At this moment, there were many people gathered in the lobby. When Huo Yuhao and the others entered, they were immediately greeted by a young lady in a long silver dress.

“Greetings. Are all of you here for the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament?” The young lady was tall and slender, and also very beautiful. Her long silver dress ﬁt her body to a tee, and extended all the way to her calves, looking quite elegant. She wore a light smile on her face and seemed very amiable.

“Yes! Yes!” Xu Sanshi was walking in front, and he hurriedly acknowledged her words.

The young lady smiled at him and said, “I’ll need all of you to wait because many teams have also just arrived. Follow me.”

As she spoke, she led everyone into the lobby. Before they moved off, she subconsciously glanced at Huo Yuhao. This is weird. They are here for the tournament! Why did they bring someone in a wheelchair?

Huo Yuhao appeared to be very calm. He wasn’t affected by the young lady’s gaze. After everything that he had been through, he was more mature than most adults.

However, he easily attracted attention as he sat in the wheelchair. As they proceeded to the bar in the lobby, many people appeared stunned when they saw him. The other members of the Tang Sect subconsciously surrounded Huo Yuhao, trying to block him from the limelight.

The bar was at the east side of the hotel and covered a thousand square meters. The bar was ﬁlled with white sofas made from genuine leather. They were led to one sofa, and the young lady left after greeting them. Immediately, a waitress in a short white dress walked over and served them some snacks and drinks. The service was exceptional.

After the waitress left, Xu Sanshi said to Bei Bei, “Little Bei, don’t you ﬁnd this an eye opener?”

Bei Bei snapped, “Call me eldest senior. What eye opener?

Look at you. You are turning lecherous again.”

Xu Sanshi immediately sat up straight and said, “Don’t spout nonsense. Who doesn’t know that I’m the most honest and reliable person? There’s only Nannan in my heart. Besides her, I won’t even take a look at any other girls. Of course, that’s excluding Dong’er, Xiao Xiao, Nan Na, and Sister Ziyan!” Everyone grinned when they saw his honest expression. Huo Yuhao also laughed. “Third senior, are you really sure you are talking about yourself? Are you certain about that?”

Xu Sanshi was embarrassed. “Yuhao, don’t embarrass me! I’m working in that direction. This is all because of Nannan! Although I attracted many girls with my charm in the past because I was too ﬂirtatious, all I can do now is appear less lecherous.”

Bei Bei shook his head and sighed, “How dare you call yourself charming in front of Brother Ji? Brother Ji! I’m not one who picks on others, but I think that Sanshi has made new discoveries in terms of his soul skills, seeing how brazen his words are. When we settle down later, you must really spar with him to improve your cultivation.”

Xu Sanshi was furious. “Bei Bei, you! Brother Ji, don’t listen to his nonsense. I heard from him yesterday that his Holy Light Dragon has awakened, and he has learned a new move. You should spar with him instead!”

Ji Juechen’s expression didn’t change. He only nodded at Bei Bei and said calmly, “Alright.” After that, he turned to Xu Sanshi and also nodded at him before saying agreeably, “Alright.”

Both Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi were stunned. Bei Bei said helplessly, “Harming others without helping yourself. Is there any point in that?”

Xu Sanshi laughed coldly, “What do you think? You were the one who started everything.”

He Caitou was watching the two of them from one side, and was amused. He didn’t make a sound, though. The ladies behind him were also smiling. When Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi were together, they always mocked each other less than three sentences after their conversation began.

Huo Yuhao shut his eyes as he heard his seniors bickering. It seemed like he was about to sleep again. However, Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi quieted down when they saw him shutting his eyes. They knew it represented something.

Indeed, a weird scene was presented in everyone’s mind at this moment.

The image that surfaced in their minds was from a high point of view looking down at the hotel lobby. Everyone could be seen. They were presented in colors this time, but the colors were only limited to black, purple, yellow and white. The number of people was also gradually decreasing.

Huo Yuhao’s thoughts rang out in everyone’s minds, “I’ve excluded those without any soul power undulations.”

Black represented a cultivation of at least seven rings, purple represented four or ﬁve rings, yellow represented three rings and white represented two rings and below. From the looks of it, there were thirty-four people in black, two hundred and sixteen people in purple, seventy-eight people in yellow, and less than ﬁfty people in white.

Everyone was shocked as they studied everything with the help of Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection. With Huo Yuhao around, they didn’t need to use their eyes to see. They could just sense all the information!

There were many teams competing in this tournament, and these people weren’t all of them. However, there were more than thirty Soul Sages among those who were registering right now. Undoubtedly, they were the teachers and leaders of teams that were here to compete in the tournament. It also proved that many sects and academies treated this tournament very seriously. It was important to know that Soul Sages were a big deal everywhere on the continent!

For this tournament, at least one-ﬁfth of all the outstanding soul masters on the continent would be gathered in Radiant City!

After brieﬂy observing everyone in the lobby, Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection started to change perspective. It was moved upwards, and quickly saw through the main structure of the hotel.

The Ming Yue Hotel was made using a mixture of reinforced steel and concrete. Some of the more important areas were constructed using extra-high tensile steel.

There were rooms of varying sizes. The higher up they went, the larger the rooms were. Huo Yuhao estimated that there were close to two thousand rooms in this hotel, which itself covered more than ﬁfteen hectares. There were close to two hundred rooms on each story, and more than ten corridors. It was only such a huge hotel that could accommodate the number of people attending such a large-scale tournament. All the competing team’s members were staying in this hotel. Although it seemed a little packed, the hotel could accommodate everyone as long as two people shared one room. If it were any other empire, at least three to ﬁve hotels would be needed. This fact alone demonstrated how big and powerful the Sun Moon Empire was.

After ten minutes, Huo Yuhao re-opened his eyes. In these ten minutes, he had used his Spiritual Detection to show his teammates the ranks of the soul masters registering in the lobby, the structure of the hotel, and the condition of the rooms. His Spiritual Detection managed to reach ﬁve hundred meters in radius, with him as the center. “Oh, a familiar face.” Huo Yuhao looked slightly stunned.

Everyone looked over as they were guided by Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection. There was a group approaching them, and all of them recognized their leader. She was the Star Luo Empire’s princess, Her Imperial Highness Xu Jiujiu, who had given them a lot of trouble in the last tournament.

They didn’t recognize the others behind her. After all, those who had competed in the last tournament were more than twenty now, and had to be replaced for this tournament. Xu Jiujiu’s personal visit was shocking enough. However, the bunch of youths following her were evidently top opponents too. They were selected by the Star Luo National Academy, and thus they were naturally the best of the best. The Star Luo National Academy had been one of the top four academies in the last tournament.

Xu Jiujiu was astonished right now. She was only looking at one person – Huo Yuhao.

Yes, she only walked over because she saw him. She didn’t expect him to be in such a state. “Huo Yuhao?” Xu Jiujiu walked in front of everyone. All of them stood up to greet her, with the exception of Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao smiled as he faced Xu Jiujiu. He said, “Your Highness, it’s been a long time.”

Xu Jiujiu was shocked, “I was curious when I saw the wheelchair. I was wondering which team brought along a disabled person. After that, I realized it was you. What happened to you?”

Xu Jiujiu respected Huo Yuhao immensely. In the last tournament, Huo Yuhao had led Shrek Academy to the end even though his cultivation was weak. In the ﬁnal duel, he had defeated the strongest pairing from the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, the Hongchen siblings, and won the championship.

At that point in time, the Emperor of the Star Luo Empire had appraised Huo Yuhao highly. After the tournament ended, he even sent someone to investigate Huo Yuhao’s background. He even knew that Huo Yuhao entered the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy as an exchange student. The imperial family of the Star Luo Empire had also monitored Huo Yuhao closely, as he developed quickly.

When they realized Huo Yuhao had entered the Sea God’s Pavilion, they placed more attention on him than ever.

The Emperor of the Star Luo Empire, Xu Jiayin, had once told Xu Jiujiu that Huo Yuhao was Shrek Academy’s future.

However, he was sitting in a wheelchair now. Was he really the one-of-a-kind talent who possessed twin martial souls, an Ultimate Martial Soul, great ﬁghting abilities, and almost limitless potential?

Xu Jiujiu’s investigations had revealed that Huo Yuhao was from the Star Luo Empire. Although his background was unclear, it was a fact that he was from the Star Luo Empire. While Shrek Academy was huge, it was only an academy. Even if Huo Yuhao took on an extremely important role in the academy in the future, he wouldn’t be at the academy forever, and would have to venture out occasionally. That would be the Star Luo Empire’s chance. Xu Jiayin had personally instructed her that Huo Yuhao had to be pulled over to the empire once he ventured out from the academy. If he could serve the empire, he would become a pillar of the empire in the future! Every one of them knew that Huo Yuhao could become a Transcendent Douluo in the future with his potential.

Furthermore, he could even reach the level of an Ultimate Douluo.

What did an Ultimate Douluo represent? A strategic existence!

Shrek Academy only became an existence that no empire dared to triﬂe with because of Elder Mu. If a Titled Douluo could obliterate a city, an Ultimate Douluo could change the outcome of a war.

Although there was an unspoken rule that a soul master of a certain level couldn’t attack ordinary people, the threat that a strong soul master brought to his enemies was already quite terrifying. Over the past few years, the Sun Moon Empire’s military had been very active. The Star Luo and Heavenly Soul Empires were under great pressure. This was especially true for the Star Luo Empire, the second strongest empire on the continent.

If they could pull Huo Yuhao, and even Shrek Academy, over to their side, the Star Luo Empire would become strong enough to challenge the Sun Moon Empire.

After the last tournament ended, why did the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion’s Left Arm Bone end up in Huo Yuhao’s hands as if it were a gift? It was bait by the Emperor of the Star Luo Empire. It was just that they didn’t have a chance to interact after that.

Today, Xu Jiujiu was shocked to ﬁnd out that Huo Yuhao was seated in a wheelchair. His face was pale, which revealed that he was suffering from some kind of sickness. As she had been monitoring Huo Yuhao, she was clear on how important he was to Shrek Academy. He had ended up in such a state even though he was protected by Shrek Academy’s Titled Douluo. What exactly had happened? Xu Jiujiu was sharp enough. She could tell that there were indeed problems with Huo Yuhao’s legs. Furthermore, his left arm also seemed very stiff. They were drooping and not in line with his body. He didn’t seem to be acting.

“Thanks for your concern, Your Highness. I only ran into some problems.” Huo Yuhao answered her calmly. Huo Yuhao was impressed by how the Emperor had tried to pull him over to his side. He also had a deep impression of Xu Jiujiu.

It was a pity that Xu Jiayin and Xu Jiujiu didn’t know that Huo Yuhao had a close relationship with the White Tiger Duke. It was also precisely because of the White Tiger Duke that Huo Yuhao had his own plans. He couldn’t be pulled over to their side.

It couldn’t be any small problem since he was in a wheelchair. Xu Jiujiu furrowed her brow, but she couldn’t possibly point this out. She hesitated for a moment. She greeted the rest of his team politely before asking Huo Yuhao, “Since you are already in this state, can you still compete? Furthermore, all of you are the reigning champions. Why are all of you waiting to register? According to the rules, the top eight from the previous tournament have registration priority. We just completed our registration.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “We are not representing Shrek Academy this time.”

As he said this, Xu Jiujiu’s expression changed again in astonishment.

They aren’t representing Shrek Academy? She scanned everyone, and saw the complete lineup from the last tournament! None of them were missing. Why aren’t they representing Shrek Academy? As the princess and leader of the intelligence department, Xu Jiujiu started to overthink things. When she took into account Huo Yuhao’s body condition, she immediately believed that Shrek Academy was in huge trouble.

Bei Bei could tell that she was thinking too much from her expression. He hurriedly said, “Your Highness, you are overthinking. We aren’t representing the academy because of the new rules. However, we are still a part of the academy. The academy sent another team over.”

Xu Jiujiu was stunned for a moment. Her expression was then restored, and she said in shock, “If all of you aren’t representing the academy, then…”

Bei Bei smiled and replied, “We are representing the Tang Sect.”

“Tang Sect?” Xu Jiujiu didn’t have a deep memory of this ancient sect that had disappeared for years. However, the Tang Sect had once been famous on the continent. That was why she quickly reacted.

“All of you have joined the Tang Sect?” Xu Jiujiu asked.

Chapter 272: Tang Ya

Bei Bei nodded and replied, “Yes, we are from the Tang Sect. The Tang Sect was down once before, but our goal is to make it great again.”

Xu Jiujiu took a deep look at him before studying the rest of them. She nodded and said, “All of you can do it.” She wasn’t being merely polite. These people in front of her had managed to become champions during the tournament even though they were only Soul Ancestors and below! Each of them possessed great potential, and they were all top students from Shrek Academy!

A sect was quite powerful if they had a Titled Douluo holding the reins. While the few of them weren’t very old, they all had the potential to become Titled Douluo in the future!

After pondering for a moment, Xu Jiujiu immediately said, “The history of the Tang Sect goes back a long way. The ﬁrst generation Tang Sect leader also contributed greatly to the world of soul masters. If your sect needs the help of the empire in the future, we’ll do anything to help.” As she spoke, she retrieved a pure gold token and gave it to Bei Bei.

“If the Tang Sect requires any help from the Star Luo Empire in the future, any one of you can use this token and ﬁnd me at Star Luo City. I’ll do my best to help, if it’s within my means.”

The token was heavy, and was carved with hollow tulip patterns on the front. On the back, there was an image of a tiger’s head. It represented the imperial family’s remembrance of the White Tiger Dynasty.

This token had great signiﬁcance. Bei Bei immediately turned serious and said, “Thank you for this gift, Your Highness. The Tang Sect will always remember our friendship with the Star Luo Empire. I believe we’ll have a chance to work together in the future.”

If the Tang Sect’s development only relied on Shrek Academy, it would mean that they were content to only exercise their inﬂuence over a certain region. However, this wasn’t what Bei Bei wanted to see. He had promised Tang Ya that they would become the top sect on the continent! Right now, he was also working hard in this direction. Collaborating with the Star Luo Empire was very important to Bei Bei’s plans. He didn’t reject Xu Jiujiu’s offer.

Xu Jiujiu revealed a smile on her face as Bei Bei accepted the token. “I hope that the day we work together will come soon.”

After she said that, she turned her attention to Huo Yuhao, “Huo Yuhao, are you planning to compete in this state?”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly, “Disabled people also have their rights. Your Highness, you can't judge people based on their looks!”

Xu Jiujiu’s gaze changed slightly, and she smiled, “I can’t sense any bitterness from your voice. It seems like I worried too much.”

Huo Yuhao was a little stunned as he looked at her. Acute observation! Indeed, he felt very blissful, as he was immersed in Wang Dong’er’s care every day even though he couldn’t move his arms and legs. Naturally, he wasn’t bitter at all. “Your Highness, don’t poke fun at a disabled person!” Huo Yuhao said helplessly.

Princess Jiujiu smiled and said, “We’ll wait and see whether I’m really mocking you. If we meet in the tournament, you must show some mercy. Although I never thought that the Star Luo National Academy would become champions, we can’t be eliminated too soon, either! I’ll make a move ﬁrst!”

After she ﬁnished her piece, she left with the bunch of youths behind her.

As she slowly walked away, Huo Yuhao appeared a little pensive. Bei Bei whispered as he asked, “What did you see?”

Huo Yuhao gently shook his head, “I only feel that I shouldn’t be troubling this famous princess, since I’m not even a competitor.”

It wasn’t too exaggerated to use the word ‘famous’ to describe Xu Jiujiu. In the Star Luo Empire, she was an authoritative ﬁgure that everyone knew. She was also very beautiful, and everyone in the empire loved her.

Bei Bei nodded slightly and said, “Let’s counter changes with no changes. No matter what goal she has, she won’t be targeting us.”

Huo Yuhao said, “Eldest senior, do you remember that I mentioned that the Illustrious Virtue Hall was ambushed by the Body Sect?”

Bei Bei was stunned, “What do you mean? She’s involved?”

Huo Yuhao squinted and said, “I’m not sure. However, the hundred-thousand year soul beast embryo was auctioned off at the Star Luo City. After that, there was a rumor that someone offered a hundred million gold soul coins to obtain the embryo. Who’s wealthy enough to offer such an astronomical ﬁgure? I believe the Sun Moon Empire would have noticed this, too. Whether it’s direct or indirect, the Body Sect’s ambush on the Illustrious Virtue Hall must somehow be related to the Star Luo Empire.”

Bei Bei said softly, “I wonder if the Body Sect will be here for the tournament. They have always been very mysterious. Surely the Sun Moon Empire isn’t targeting the Body Sect by allowing sects to take part in the tournament?”

Xu Sanshi groaned and said, “Don’t underestimate the Sun Moon Empire. This is a renowned tournament that involves the entire continent. The Sun Moon Empire can’t possibly use the tournament to target the Body Sect. Their goal isn’t that simple. However, there must still be a degree of targeting involved. If the Body Sect doesn’t come, it shows that they are scared of the empire. I believe it’s still possible that they’ll come.”

Xiao Xiao’s expression changed, and she said, “If the Body Sect comes, they’ll be a threat to us.”

Jiang Nannan said, “It’s not just the Body Sect. There are many strong sects on the continent. We’ll have to take this tournament step by step. Let’s be steadier.”

Bei Bei commented, “Indeed. Yuhao, don’t compete unless it’s necessary.” Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow and said, “Eldest senior, I have the exact opposite thinking as you. I hope to be the ﬁrst to compete in every round of the tournament.”

“What?” Everyone was shocked when he said this. Wang Dong’er also exclaimed like a lady, even though she was dressed in a man’s attire.

Bei Bei creased his brow, “Yuhao, you…”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Don’t panic, listen to me ﬁrst! The greater the pressure, the more likely my potential can be inspired to fuse with the origin energy of Ultimate Ice in my body. Just by cultivating as a means to fuse this energy, I’ll take years. However, I believe it’ll be faster if I’m constantly ﬁghting. Don’t worry, I’ll concede defeat if I can’t take it. With my current cultivation, it shouldn’t be difﬁcult to win one round.”

Xu Sanshi smiled and said, “Yuhao, you can’t say that. You are our secret weapon. We shouldn’t use our secret weapon ﬁrst. Isn’t it good to hide it ﬁrst?” Huo Yuhao chuckled, “I’ll hide some of my abilities. It’s not easy to see through the soul skills that my Spirit Eyes possess.”

Wang Dong’er said, “No, you can’t compete. You can’t be the ﬁrst to compete, either. No matter how strong your Spirit Eyes are, you can’t move or dodge because of your body. If someone unleashes a long-range strike at you, what can you do? You already lack the ability to attack from long-range. Without your entire body to coordinate, you’ll be unable to unleash your potential even with soul tools. It’s too dangerous.” No one knew Huo Yuhao better than her.

Huo Yuhao said, “This isn’t a problem. I have my own ways. Let me compete ﬁrst in the ﬁrst elimination round. If I can’t make it, I won’t make such a request again. Furthermore, I guarantee that I’ll only ﬁght three single rounds. Yes?”

Bei Bei looked at Wang Dong’er. In such matters, he needed to seek Wang Dong’er’s approval ﬁrst.

After pondering for awhile, Wang Dong’er nodded lightly and said, “Alright, I’ll let you try in the ﬁrst round. However, your safety takes priority. This is for everyone, and for me!” Huo Yuhao held her hands and smiled, “Don’t worry, I can’t bear to die. With my current state, it might not be a bad thing.”

Xu Sanshi coughed twice. “The two of you can’t always be so immersed in yourselves. It’s too provocative. Furthermore, Wang Dong’er is now Wang Dong. Aren’t you afraid that others will misunderstand you?”

Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao were stunned. Indeed, a few resting teams shot them weird glances.

Wang Dong’er pulled her hands from Huo Yuhao’s grasp and said as she glanced left and right, “Eh, why aren’t they letting us register yet? Their efﬁciency is really low.”

Compared to ﬁve years ago, all of them had changed greatly. It was very difﬁcult for anyone to recognize them even though they had competed in the last tournament. After all, the changes from puberty were substantial.

This was especially true for Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er, and Xiao Xiao. They weren’t even thirteen when they competed last time, but they were seventeen now. Xiao Xiao was already a ravishing beauty. While Huo Yuhao was seated in a wheelchair, he was still a tall and large youth. He was two heads taller than he was ﬁve years ago. If Princess Jiujiu hadn't been monitoring him, she wouldn’t have recognized him. That was why no one came to greet them even though they had been waiting for quite some time. Huo Yuhao noticed a few familiar teams. Of course, he only recognized their leaders. Although these teams had had preparatory squad members during the last tournament, he hadn’t really noticed them too much. Over the past ﬁve years, he wasn’t the only one who had changed. They had all been youths. Everyone else had changed greatly too!

After waiting for an hour, they were ﬁnally led to the registration area.

The registration area was at the center of the lobby. There was a long table that faced the doors, and there were ten people in charge of registration.

There was also a neat row of empty tables to one side. They were instructed to ﬁll in a form.

Bei Bei was in charge of ﬁlling out this form.

Once he received the form, Bei Bei understood why they had had to wait so long. There were many things that he had to ﬁll out. Detailed information on every ofﬁcial and preparatory squad member had to be written down – their name, age, sect, etc. It took ten minutes just to ﬁll out the form.

After ﬁlling out the form, everyone had to take a photograph at the registration table.

The camera was a special, auxiliary-type soul tool. It captured everyone’s appearance. After the photographs were taken, they were directly printed on the registration form. This also demonstrated the leading position the Sun Moon Empire possessed in terms of technology.

After the photography segment was over, they still had to undergo body and physical tests. This was to ensure that every competing member was twenty years old or younger.

They were then led into a huge room in the hotel. There was already a queue in this room, but it was much simpler for the Tang Sect there. After all, Na Na was their only preparatory squad member. As they were overage, Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan couldn’t compete as preparatory squad members.

Huo Yuhao wasn’t a stranger to the equipment used to measure his body. It was just that he was wondering what kind of result would be produced as he was measured in his current state?

It was their turn soon. Suddenly, Huo Yuhao felt petriﬁed. A weird feeling caused him to turn to a corner of the measuring room. When his gaze landed on someone, he couldn’t shift his eyes anymore.

Huo Yuhao’s voice cracked as he shouted, “Teacher Xiao Ya!” This attracted the attention of everyone in the measuring room.

After hearing Huo Yuhao exclamation, Bei Bei’s body trembled violently. After that, he also turned in the same direction.

There was a young lady in the corner of the room. She still possessed a slender ﬁgure, and was as ravishing as ever. She looked taller than she had been a few years back, but there was an unhealthy paleness to her face. Her sharp eyes seemed to have changed color. There was a hint of dark blue in her beautiful eyes. As she stood in the corner, she seemed to have assimilated with the shadows. If not for Huo Yuhao’s acute senses, no one would have noticed her.

Yes. She was Tang Ya. Compared to a few years ago before, when she had disappeared, her appearance hadn’t changed much. Bei Bei’s body stiffened when he saw her. After that, he started to tremble violently. He even had to grab hold of Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair to stabilize himself.

“Xiao Ya, Xiao Ya…” Only those who were familiar with him knew that Bei Bei had had a hard time not ﬁnding Tang Ya over these past few years. They hadn’t expected to see her here.

Huo Yuhao wasn’t any less agitated than Bei Bei. To him, Tang Ya and Bei Bei were his benefactors! Furthermore, Tang Ya was the true sect leader of the Tang Sect. After the Tang Sect was re-established, Bei Bei had mentioned that he was only a temporary substitute for her. When she returned, she would be reinstated as the sect leader. Everyone agreed with his proposition too.

He actually met Tang Ya here. He was extremely emotional right now.

Tang Ya also looked over. She ﬁrst saw Huo Yuhao in his wheelchair before she saw Bei Bei. She seemed a little lost, and didn’t move from her position. She gave off the feeling that she had lost her soul. Bei Bei moved at this point. He was like a gust of wind right now as he burst towards Tang Ya. How long had it been? Tang Ya had gone missing just after the previous tournament had ended. It was close to ﬁve years now! They had turned from teenagers into youths. As he saw Tang Ya again, Bei Bei felt that

his heart was about to jump out of his chest. His heart was only ﬁlled with his boundless love for her. Right now, he wasn’t as calm as before. There was only Tang Ya in his heart right now.

He came in front of Tang Ya instantly and grabbed her shoulders forcefully. His voice was trembling as he said, “Xiao Ya, where, where have you been all these years? Did you know how hard a time I’ve had searching for you?”

She was still in a daze even though he had grabbed her. She let him shake her body.

At this point, Huo Yuhao sensed something amiss. He shouted, “Eldest senior, be careful!”

After hearing Huo Yuhao’s words, he would have been cautious and wary of his surroundings if he were acting normally. However, he was too emotional now. Five years of yearning! His lover who had occupied his entire heart had ﬁnally appeared. He couldn’t be bothered with anything else.

At this point, Tang Ya ﬁnally moved. She lifted her hands and pressed them against Bei Bei’s chest. It was as if she was resisting him. However, her dark-blue eyes started to light up as she lifted her head in the next moment.

Bei Bei was stunned. He only felt that he had seen two deep valleys, and he was sucked into these valleys. In the next moment, a huge force struck his chest. He ﬂew backward like a broken kite.

Fresh blood sprayed from his mouth. His entire body was engulfed by a dark-blue glow, which was swallowing his life power maniacally.

After Huo Yuhao told Bei Bei to be cautious, the rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters acted too. Xu Sanshi was the ﬁrst to burst out. While he had always bickered with Bei Bei, they actually shared a close relationship. He unleashed his martial soul as he stepped out. It was a pity that Tang Ya’s action was too sudden. Who would have expected her to make a move on Bei Bei? Xu Sanshi’s Mysterious Underworld Displacement was too late. He leapt up as he saw Bei Bei in the air and cushioned his fall. At the same time, a pitch-black light engulfed Bei Bei’s body and resisted the violation of the dark-blue glow.

Xu Sanshi’s expression changed the moment their soul power met. It was very strong. The soul power that Tang Ya had left on Bei Bei’s body was too dense and consolidated, and it even possessed an extremely dominant, corrosive force. Xu Sanshi couldn’t gain an advantage over it even with his cultivation. Fortunately, Bei Bei’s cultivation wasn’t weak. He unleashed his own soul power and strongly resisted the invasive soul power. Tang Ya had only pushed him, she hadn’t unleashed an attack. She had unleashed the soul power that poured into his body, but didn’t directly attack his chest. As a result, Bei Bei’s bones were ﬁne even though he was slightly injured.

“Xiao Ya, are you crazy?” Xu Sanshi shouted at Tang Ya as he tried to resist her soul power.

At this point, a few men in black stepped in front of Tang Ya. One of the elders looked in the direction of group representing the Tang Sect. Huo Yuhao’s body shuddered as he saw this elder. His expression also turned dismal.

He recognized him. That was because he was one of the assassins who had intercepted Huo Yuhao’s return to Shrek Academy a few months ago.

Zhang Peng; Scorpion Tiger Douluo, and half evil soul master. He was a Rank 96 Transcendent Douluo. He wasn’t inferior to Dean Yan Shaozhe in a ﬁght!

Now he had appeared here, and in front of Tang Ya. What did it mean?

Furthermore, Tang Ya’s soul power evidently contained the aura of an evil soul master!

Na Na was very pale right now. There were only three words going through her mind right now – Holy Ghost Church. It was the Holy Ghost Church! The rest of the Tang Sect also came up beside Bei Bei. Wang Dong’er pressed her hands on Bei Bei’s shoulders and poured in her pure power of light. Along with Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu soul power, the dark-blue aura was expelled from his body.

Bei Bei’s expression was extremely pale, and there was fresh blood ﬂowing from his nose. Tang Ya’s strike didn’t just hurt his body; it also broke his heart!

He didn’t expect Tang Ya to give him such a huge ‘gift’ after ﬁve years without seeing her!

Zhang Peng wore a cold look as he looked towards everyone from the Tang Sect. He was stunned when he saw Huo Yuhao in his wheelchair. He squinted his eyes and appeared pensive.

Tang Ya acted like she didn’t see all of them. After hitting Bei Bei, she turned around and left. A few other men in black followed beside her. Even Zhang Peng did the same thing.

Bei Bei struggled, but he couldn’t get up! There was also blood in his mouth. His voice was hoarse as he said, “Xiao Ya...”

Tang Ya didn’t stop. She quickly left, as if she hadn’t seen anything. However, there was a slight quiver of emotion in her eyes.

Huo Yuhao arrived beside Bei Bei in his wheelchair, with Ji Juechen’s help. He grabbed onto Bei Bei’s wrist and softly said, “Eldest senior, calm down.” His gaze was gentle, and a slight wave of spiritual power engulfed Bei Bei’s head. Yuhao used the gentle and spiritual aura to soothe Bei Bei’s turmoil.

Wang Dong’er continued to pour her soul power into Bei Bei’s body and helped him expel Tang Ya’s soul power from his body. However, it wasn’t to great effect. Tang Ya’s soul power was too domineering, and continued to run riot in Bei Bei’s body, whereas Bei Bei wasn’t able to control his own soul power to resist Tang Ya’s soul power. Just Wang Dong’er’s strength alone didn’t seem to be enough.

Tears started to stream down Bei Bei’s face. He was normally very tough, but his tough exterior was torn down after he saw Tang Ya again.

Huo Yuhao said softly, “Eldest senior, don’t be sad. That wasn’t Teacher Xiao Ya’s intention. She’s with a bunch of evil soul masters. If I’m not wrong, she must have been abducted by evil soul masters. Do you remember the Holy Ghost Church that I mentioned before? It must be them. She must be under their control. Eldest senior, you are our pillar. You must remain strong. It’s only in this way that we can think of a way to save Teacher Xiao Ya from those devils!” After hearing Huo Yuhao’s words, Bei Bei calmed down a little. He was a little lost as he looked at Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao nodded his head heartily at him, “If Teacher Xiao Ya were clear-headed, she wouldn’t have done that to you! Eldest senior, you are confused because you are too concerned about her! No matter what it is, we’ve seen Teacher Xiao Ya. It’s better than not knowing where she is. Don’t worry, we’ll do our best to save her.”

Bei Bei was in a daze. As the eldest senior of the sect and one of the most outstanding young talents from Shrek Academy, he managed to regain his focus with Huo Yuhao’s help after momentarily losing control.

He shut his eyes, and a blue glow was released from his body. Fine scales also started to surface on his skin. The strong side of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon was revealed. He expelled the violent soul power with Wang Dong’er’s help.

The room also descended into chaos from what had happened. Very soon, soul masters from the Sun Moon Empire entered the room to maintain order and interrogate the Tang Sect.

Xu Sanshi represented the Tang Sect and answered their questions. He only said that there was a misunderstanding which led to a conﬂict. Whether it was because of Tang Ya or Bei Bei, he didn’t wish to escalate this matter.

They performed their body measurements after this. Although Bei Bei underwent the measurements, his injuries were still quite bad. After he ﬁnished his measurements, Xu Sanshi carried him to his room to rest.

The rest also went through their measurements smoothly. After all, it was just to verify their age. To keep the abilities of the competing teams a secret, there weren’t any measurements to test their soul power and cultivation. It was different from the tests that Huo Yuhao went through when he ﬁrst entered the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

Huo Yuhao was the last to take his measurements. He was lifted onto the scale by Wang Dong’er. When she did that, everyone’s expression turned weird, including those who were from the Sun Moon Empire. Is this disabled man here to compete too? “Is there a mistake?” The staff in charge of the measurement scale asked Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er raised her brows. She couldn’t stand it when others looked down on Huo Yuhao. However, Huo Yuhao interrupted just before she ﬂared up, “There shouldn’t be a rule that restricts a disabled person from competing, am I right?”

“There isn’t… it’s just that there’s a limited quota!” The staff answered subconsciously.

Huo Yuhao said, “There are only eight members from our sect, and only one preparatory squad member. There isn’t any wastage. Just take it that I’m here to make up the numbers.”

Since they didn’t violate any rules, the staff didn’t stop them. He activated the measurement scale and helped Huo Yuhao with the test.

A streak of dim blue light rose from the scale and scanned Huo Yuhao’s calves. It was using his bone age to calculate his actual age. It was one of the most efﬁcient methods.

However, he was soon stunned. That was because there wasn’t any response from the scale. There wasn’t any feedback after the scan.

What was going on? After so many tests, this was the ﬁrst time something like this had happened.

The output was increased, and the blue light became stronger. Huo Yuhao’s legs were scanned once again.

Huo Yuhao was a little annoyed as he said, “Brother, I’m a cripple. My legs are different. You should scan my right hand. My right hand is the only limb that’s ﬁne.” As he spoke, he bent his body forward and extended his right arm beside his leg.

Indeed, the measuring scale responded to this. It evidently showed that Huo Yuhao’s bone age was seventeen.

Huo Yuhao completed the measurements as the staff watched with weird looks in their eyes. Wang Dong’er lifted him back into his wheelchair before pushing him towards the exit. After they left, there was a huge commotion in the room.

“What sect is he from? Why did the sect send a cripple?”

“I think that it’s called the Tang Sect. What kind of sect is the Tang Sect? Has anyone heard of it before?”

“No. It must be a small sect. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be so pathetic. He’s really pitiful – losing the use of his legs and left arm even though he’s only seventeen.”

“Because of this, we should respect his courage for choosing to compete in this tournament!”

“Hai, can he really compete in that condition? Is he going to sit in a wheelchair to compete?”

All types of discussions were going on right now. Wang Dong’er clenched her lips tightly as she pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair. Her eyes were already tearing up. Although Huo Yuhao couldn’t see behind him, he could sense Wang Dong’er’s emotional turmoil. He gently tapped her hand and smiled, “Don’t you think this is interesting? If I become the eventual champion, won’t their eyes drop out?”

Wang Dong’er held onto his hand tightly. Huo Yuhao sighed as he felt her icy cold hand. “Dong’er, do you want me to be happy, blissful and always wearing a smile on my face?”

Wang Dong’er was stunned for a moment. She replied, “Of course.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “In that case, you must be happy so that I can sense your smile every minute and second. You must smile in the face of everything.”

Wang Dong’er’s ﬁgure shuddered a little, and her face turned red. Her voice was trembling slightly, “Yuhao, I…”

Huo Yuhao tapped her hands again, “Let’s go. We should return to our rooms to rest too. I wonder how eldest senior is. Teacher Xiao Ya has ﬁnally appeared, which is a good thing. We should also quickly discuss how we should deal with this matter.”

“Okay.” Wang Dong’er calmed herself down and pushed Huo Yuhao out of the measurement room.

According to the arrangements made by the Sun Moon Empire tournament committee, the competing sects and academies were segregated. For example, Shrek Academy’s team was ranked at the top, and stayed in the best rooms and received the best treatment. This was also the same for all the sects. The more reputable a sect was, the better the treatment they received.

As for the Tang Sect, those in charge of registration didn’t know that they were the members of the team that won the tournament the last time around. They only knew that the Tang Sect wasn’t reputable, and their members were given the most ordinary rooms. The Tang Sect was at the bottom of the hierarchy.

The inferior rooms were located at the lower stories of the hotel. The ﬁrst story consisted of the lobby, the wellness center and a few restaurants etc. The Tang Sect team was assigned rooms on the second story.

The Ming Yue Hotel was the largest hotel in the Sun Moon Empire. Even their most ordinary rooms were not bad. They were just a little small. Each room was around twenty square meters in size, but there was a toilet in each room. The internal decorations were simple, and there were two single beds in each room.

Although twenty square meters wasn’t considered very spacious for two people, it wasn’t cramped either. However, all ten contestants from the Tang Sect were squeezed into one room right now. There wasn’t even space for them to walk.

Bei Bei was lying on the bed. His face was pale, but he was clear-headed. Furthermore, it seemed like he had regained his composure.

Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao in his wheelchair as they were the last two to enter the room. The rest looked very serious as they surrounded Bei Bei. After Huo Yuhao entered, Xiao Xiao and He Caitou moved away, and let Wang Dong’er push Huo Yuhao in front of the bed.

“Eldest senior, are you feeling better?” Huo Yuhao asked concernedly, and extended his right hand to take Bei Bei’s pulse.

Bei Bei’s injury was quite serious. Tang Ya’s soul power had shaken his internal organs. Although his organs were put back into their original position when they did emergency treatment on him, his vital energy was still greatly affected. But Bei Bei had a strong foundation, and thus he wasn’t seriously ill. Even so, he would have to lie in bed for eight to ten days.

However, the tournament wouldn’t wait for him to recover. In another three days, the tournament would begin. Before it even started, Huo Yuhao was already crippled, and Bei Bei was already seriously injured. The entire team was in a bad shape right now.

If Huo Yuhao was the soul and brains of this team, Bei Bei was the backbone. Now, neither of them were in their best state, which affected everyone else.

Chapter 273: Shadows of the Holy Ghost Church

Huo Yuhao released Bei Bei’s hand after a while. He looked up at the rest of his companions and smiled as he said, “What’s happening, everyone? Even though we are in dire straits right now, are we worse off compared to the last big competition? Eldest senior brother is quite heavily injured, but fortunately, his origin energy is still intact.

"What happened during the last big competition? What were our cultivations ﬁve years ago? I only had two rings, while eldest senior brother, second senior brother, and third senior brother had but four soul rings, even though they were the strongest amongst us. We still made it through, didn’t we? Are we in a better situation now, or were we in a better situation back then? We should return with a landslide victory to welcome Bei Bei’s return. According to the competition’s proceedings, we only have to win ﬁve rounds in a row until Bei Bei’s injuries recover. We only have to win two more before he can return to top condition."

Everyone looked a little better after they listened to Huo Yuhao’s words. Bei Bei was lying on the bed as he heaved a sigh and said, “I’m sorry, everyone. It’s my fault for being too careless. I’m not worthy of being your eldest senior brother! From now on, Huo Yuhao will be assuming command, and he will be the one arranging our battle strategies and tactics.”

The company nodded their heads, and nobody had any objections to this arrangement at all. Huo Yuhao was held in high regard within the Tang Sect, as everyone had seen what he had given for the sect.

Bei Bei lowered his voice and said, “What I’m worried about is the Holy Ghost Church. They are an organization of evil soul masters, yet they can come to this place as if it’s their right to do so, and they can even participate in the big competition. What does this mean?”

A pained look overcame his face after this statement, and his breathing became a little short and rapid. Wang Dong’er hurriedly came forward and released her light-type soul power to stabilize his condition. Bei Bei’s Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon could evolve into the Radiant Holy Dragon, and that meant he was relatively more compatible with light-type soul power. Bei Bei’s condition stabilized a little with Wang Dong’er’s help. He nodded in her direction as a sign of gratitude before he continued. “This means that Yuhao’s speculation is right – the Sun Moon Empire are in cahoots with that organization of evil soul masters. Their alliance is simply too terrifying.”

Nobody here was stupid, and everyone grew a little solemn as they listened to Bei Bei speak.

The Holy Ghost Church had been full of secrets and mystery ever since they appeared until now, and nobody knew how much depth or background they had. The strength that they had placed on public display was enough to prove how frightening this sect was – it was possible that they were even stronger than the Body Sect.

The Dragon Emperor Douluo, Long Xiaoyao, was an Ultimate Douluo, and also possessed the Darkness Holy Dragon martial soul. This person had once shared the same reputation as Elder Mu, and this meant a lot of things – the Holy Ghost Sect became a lot more frightening with Long Xiaoyao holding down the fort. Furthermore, the Scorpion Tiger Douluo, Zhang Peng, had also appeared before. He was a half-evil soul master, and he was also a Rank 96 Transcendent Douluo. He could hold his own against Yan Shaozhe.

This was all that had been placed on display for the public to see. Then, how much more did they have hidden from sight and knowledge?

The Sun Moon Empire’s most prominent strength was their rapid development in soul tools, and this gave them an astronomical technological advantage against other countries. The Sun Moon Empire’s advantage in this respect had become increasingly obvious over time, and the greatest weapon the native three countries had against the Sun Moon Empire were soul masters.

Every country had several Titled Douluo anchoring things down, and these Titled Douluo were bred for battle. If any one of them could break through into an army’s inner circle that was equipped with soul tools, the destructiveness and bloodshed that these Titled Douluo could cause would be incredibly horrifying.

According to the soul masters’ unspoken rules, high-level soul masters were not allowed to attack normal citizens, while those that could use soul tools were also soul masters in some sense. Furthermore, if push came to shove, those unspoken rules would mean nothing, as what was more important than a country’s survival?

This was the main reason why the Sun Moon Empire hadn’t been doing much over the years. They had lost their Sun Moon Continent title ever since the Holy War, and they didn’t dare to lose a second time – if they did, the Douluo Continent’s three native countries that had been threatened by the Sun Moon Empire would never let them go. They would deﬁnitely give everything they had to invade the Sun Moon Empire, so that the Sun Moon Empire wouldn’t have the breathing space they had all those years ago.

The impasse between soul masters and soul engineers had led to the current equilibrium. The Douluo Continent’s three native countries were collectively stronger than the Sun Moon Empire, as they were three countries against one, after all. On the other hand, the ﬁrst nation to move against the Sun Moon Empire would undoubtedly sustain the greatest losses, and this was the reason why nobody had done anything. This equilibrium had been maintained throughout the years.

However, this equilibrium was becoming increasingly unstable over time. The Sun Moon Empire had enjoyed rapid development and expansion in recent years, while evidence of their shady alliance with the Holy Ghost Church had also surfaced.

The Holy Ghost Church had dared to come out in broad daylight – what did this mean? This meant that they were unafraid of being discovered. They were not afraid of being discovered by the Douluo Continent’s three native countries or by Shrek Academy, as these entities no longer meant anything to them. This probably also meant that the Sun Moon Empire was about to make a move, and they couldn’t control themselves anymore.

The Holy Ghost Church was composed entirely of formidable evil soul masters, and these evil soul masters had formed a symbiotic relationship with the Sun Moon Empire, who were adept with soul tools. If a war broke out, how could the Douluo Continent’s three native countries defend themselves?

Ever since the Dragon Emperor Douluo had appeared, the Sea God’s Pavilion had decided that Shrek Guardians would devote all their energy and attention towards the Holy Ghost Church’s movements, as they couldn’t just let their students and teachers give up their lives for nothing. The Sea God’s Pavilion had already hosted multiple meetings and conferences to discuss the Holy Ghost Church – what did the appearance of an Ultimate Douluo represent? No matter how much the Tang Sect’s members didn’t want to admit it, they were all extremely clear that the Dragon Emperor Douluo himself could suppress the entire Shrek Academy.

Elder Xuan was cultivating twice as often as he used to. Huo Yuhao even heard from Xiao Xiao that Elder Xuan almost went insane because he was too hasty. The current Master of the Sea God’s Pavilion wanted to break through and become an Ultimate Douluo as fast as he could, so that he could match up to Long Xiaoyao.

However, could he really challenge the Dragon God Douluo? Even if Elder Xuan did become an Ultimate Douluo, the Dragon God Douluo had been at this level for much longer, and it would be an incredibly challenging task for Elder Xuan to defeat him. Elder Xuan had once said that Long Xiaoyao was possibly stronger than the Body Sect’s sect leader, Du Busi. Nobody would dare to argue if someone claimed that Long Xiaoyao was the number one individual on the entire continent.

The atmosphere in the room felt a little stiﬂed. The Holy Ghost Church’s appearance was no longer just a problem for the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament – their appearance had affected the entire continent’s political balance. Shrek Academy was located in the center of the Douluo Continent’s three native countries, and the Great Star Dou Forest was behind them. However, could Shrek Academy avoid participation if war eventually broke out? That didn’t seem very likely at all.

Xu Sanshi lowered his voice and said, “If only we had been born twenty years earlier.”

Everybody concurred with his statement. Even though they were all exceedingly outstanding members of the younger generation, they were still too young after all, and that meant their cultivations were still limited. They were still a far, far cry from the powerful individuals that could actually affect the direction of a war.

Color returned to Bei Bei’s face with Wang Dong’er’s help. He struggled to lift his hand and took out the golden medallion that Princess Jiu Jiu had given him, which he passed to Huo Yuhao.

“Yuhao – go and look for Princess Jiu Jiu, and tell her what we think. I trust that she is smart enough to understand the gravity of the situation, and then we will continue with our original plan. Time is of the essence, so it can’t be helped if we have to be a little hasty.”

They were here to represent the Tang Sect in this season’s competition, but they had other intentions besides simply promoting the sect. A sect’s development was tied to two things: how strong the sect was, and the sect’s ﬁnances.

The Tang Sect couldn’t be considered powerful at all, but Shrek Academy was behind them, and they were located in Shrek City, so they didn’t have to worry about their sect’s safety. That also meant that the most crucial thing they needed so that their sect could develop stably and quickly for a long time to come was money.

Xuan Ziwen’s soul tool research and purchasing of all sorts of exotic metals required money, and that meant the Tang Sect would need more friends and allies under such circumstances. Shrek City was powerful, but they were very deep inside the Continent, and that meant it was unlikely that they would participate in a war. Shrek Academy was helping the Tang Sect develop as much as they could, but they couldn’t purchase too many soul tools in the end. However, while Shrek Academy might not need much, other people needed them.

The company was here to participate in this competition to ﬁnd people to work with, besides promoting their sect’s name, so that they could sell their products. The Star Luo Empire and the Heavenly Soul Empire were the Tang Sect’s optimal targets. They had already met Princess Jiu Jiu as soon as they arrived today, and gotten off to a great start. This was originally a fantastic beginning for the Tang Sect, and Bei Bei had originally wanted to ﬁnd Princess Jiu Jiu for another round of detailed negotiations after they had obtained a decent result in the competition. However, the Holy Ghost Church’s appearance interrupted their initial plans. On the other hand, and from another perspective, the Holy Ghost Church’s existence was beneﬁcial for their efforts to promote the Tang Sect’s products.

Bei Bei hadn’t been in the right state of mind ever since Tang Ya appeared, but he was still the Tang Sect’s eldest senior brother in the end. He immediately decided which path led to the greatest proﬁt and beneﬁt, and relaying information about the Holy Ghost Church to the Star Luo Empire would undoubtedly buy them a better friendship and camaraderie with Princess Jiu Jiu. This also meant that pushing out the Tang Sect’s products afterwards would be a lot easier than before. A deeper cooperation wouldn’t be easy, but a good start for their ﬁrst encounter would be enough. Huo Yuhao took the golden medallion and nodded. “Alright, I’ll head over right now. Get some rest, eldest senior brother.”

Xu Sanshi said, “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of him.”

Bei Bei snapped, “I’ll be happy if you don’t piss me off.”

Strangely, Xu Sanshi didn’t bicker with him and said, “Alright, that’s enough – get some sleep. Everyone should return to their rooms to take a break. This room is so small and there’s so many people gathered here, to the point where the air isn’t so good anymore.”

Everyone left Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi’s room one after another. Bei Bei watched everyone leave before he shut his eyes tiredly, and images of Tang Ya’s blank eyes surfaced over and over again in his mind.

Xiao Ya…

A faint smile appeared on Bei Bei’s pale face, but nobody knew what he was thinking about at this moment.

------

It wasn’t difﬁcult to ﬁnd the rooms where the Star Luo National Academy were staying. With Princess Jiu Jiu’s status, and in addition to the Star Luo National Academy’s exemplary results in the previous competition, they were arranged in the relatively higher levels. However, they weren’t at the highest level.

Huo Yuhao held onto the golden medallion, and the Star Luo National Academy’s team members escorted him to Princess Jiu Jiu. The princess was looking a little upset, and she was sitting on the sofa. Her expression returned to normal only when she saw Wang Dong’er push Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair into the room.

“Why are you here?” Xu Jiujiu nodded at Huo Yuhao as a greeting, but her eyes were a little doubtful.

Huo Yuhao didn’t answer her question. Instead, he changed the topic and said, “The Star Luo National Academy can only stay in the second-tier rooms. I wonder who’s staying in the ﬁrst-tier rooms?”

Xu Jiujiu’s face turned black as she said, “Huo Yuhao, are you here to piss me off?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Why should I? Compared to you and your company, the Tang Sect and I are a lot worse off – we are staying in the worst rooms, and we have received the worst hospitality. I’m here today to tell you something important.”

“Eh?” Xu Jiujiu was a little surprised, but she had great temperament and composure, and regained her calmness in no time. The truth was that she was just upset about being assigned to second-tier rooms – she was the princess of the Continent’s second-biggest country, and it wouldn’t have been right if she didn’t feel upset about it. The only difference was that she didn’t express her feelings outwardly.

Huo Yuhao said, “Even though I’m not sure which sects reside in the top-tier rooms, I have seen one of them – this sect is intimately connected to the Star Luo Empire. Even though I’m at Shrek Academy, I’m from the Star Luo Empire after all. This is the reason why I’m here to tell you this piece of information.” Xu Jiujiu said, “And you’ve discovered what this sect is? Are they the Body Sect?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “Of course not – I haven’t seen anyone from the Body Sect. I’m not sure if you’ve heard of the Holy Ghost Church.”

“The Holy Ghost Church?”

Huo Yuhao reacted in surprise, as all he could see in Xu Jiujiu’s eyes was blankness and cluelessness. According to the intelligence that Shrek Academy had accumulated, this princess was in charge of the Star Luo Empire’s intelligence works, yet they knew nothing about the Holy Ghost Church. This meant that the Holy Ghost Church were hidden deep, and it was likely that they had only been moving around inside the Sun Moon Empire.

Huo Yuhao tilted his head and said, “I didn’t expect you not to know anything about the Holy Ghost Church. That means I haven’t come here for nothing,” he paused, and his tone became a little solemn, “The Holy Ghost Church have the Sun Moon Empire behind them, and they are a powerful sect that consists of evil soul masters. They possess a Transcendent Douluo, and an Ultimate Douluo as well.”

Huo Yuhao’s statement wasn’t long, but every word crackled in Xu Jiujiu’s ears like ﬁreworks. This calm and casual princess could no longer maintain her composure, and she sprung up from the sofa as if something sharp was poking her buttocks. She exclaimed in fright, “What did you say?!”

Chapter 274: A Big Customer

Princess Jiu Jiu bounced off the sofa after listening to Huo Yuhao’s statement, and she stared at him with eyes overcome with fear.

The news that Huo Yuhao had just relayed to Princess Jiu Jiu was simply too astounding, and this was the same for the Star Luo Empire, A sect formed by evil soul masters, a sect that possessed an Ultimate Douluo, and a Transcendent Douluo, and a sect that was under the protection of another nation hostile to them. Xu Jiujiu’s typical stability and composure began to waver as she panicked after listening to this piece of incredibly bad news.

“Are you for real?” Princess Jiu Jiu stared at Huo Yuhao as she subconsciously clenched her ﬁsts.

Huo Yuhao heaved a faint sigh and said, “How can I lie about something like this, and how can I even succeed in doing so? You can observe when the competition begins, and you will see things for yourself.” Princess Jiu Jiu’s face changed as she stumbled backwards, and her calves pressed against the sofa. She lost her center of gravity and collapsed back onto it.

“That’s impossible, just impossible. How can evil soul masters possess a Transcendent Douluo, and even an Ultimate Douluo? That’s absolutely impossible. Have you seen it with your own eyes?”

Huo Yuhao knew that this piece of news was hard to believe. Furthermore, he was practically telling the Star Luo Empire that disaster had befallen them.

Huo Yuhao lowered his voice and asked, “Have you ever heard of the Scorpion Tiger Douluo, Zhang Peng?”

“Scorpion Tiger Douluo? Are you talking about the half-evil soul master, that Scorpion Tiger Douluo? He… hasn’t he been missing for many years?” Princess Jiu Jiu had already reconciled with this piece of news, but she would rather be in denial of what she believed to be true. Huo Yuhao answered, “The Scorpion Tiger Douluo has already appeared in Radiant City, and we just met him in the measurement room. Furthermore, eldest senior brother has been hurt by people from the Holy Ghost Church, and he’s barely hanging on. I hope that you can calm down, princess, and that you can treat this substantial problem seriously. You have to relay this information back to the Star Luo Empire as quickly as possible, so that the Star Luo Empire can be prepared to respond.”

Xu Jiujiu was a lady, but the fact that she had such a status within the Star Luo Empire meant she had to have some outstanding qualities. She tried her best to control her emotions after hearing Huo Yuhao’s reminder, and she nodded her head. “Alright, please go on.”

Huo Yuhao said, “The Sun Moon Empire can be considered our mutual enemy. The war hasn’t begun, but anyone can see that the day will come when the Sun Moon Empire cannot hold themselves back anymore. Furthermore, the Holy Ghost Church is made up of evil soul masters and can be treated as the collective enemy of all other soul masters in the world. The Scorpion Tiger Douluo, Zhang Peng, is the Transcendent Douluo that I have seen. I obliterated one of the Holy Ghost Church’s branches when I was on exchange at the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, and that episode gave me proof that this sect exists.

“We were ambushed by the Scorpion Tiger Douluo on our way back to Shrek. I wouldn’t be here today if there hadn’t been powerful individuals from Shrek Academy there with me during that episode. The Scorpion Tiger Douluo wasn’t the strongest one in the force that came to ambush me, however. There was another name that I’m sure you’ve heard before, princess: the Dragon Emperor Douluo, Long Xiaoyao.”

Xu Jiujiu’s eyes became a little slack after she heard that name. She had barely managed to calm herself down before this, and her expression drastically changed once more in the next moment. “The one who possesses the Darkness Holy Dragon, and the one who was once known as one of the Twin Holy Dragons of Black and White; the Dragon Emperor Douluo, Long Xiaoyao? But isn’t he more than two hundred years old if he’s still alive? He hasn’t appeared on the Continent in the past hundred years. This… how is this possible?”

Huo Yuhao forced a laugh and said, “I wish that this was all impossible, and that nothing like this had ever happened. However, the truth is right in front of us, and we cannot force ourselves not to believe it. Our academy’s Elder Xuan was there that day, but even Elder Xuan was one generation beneath Long Xiaoyao. I trust that you know that my teacher was the Radiant Holy Dragon of the Twin Holy Dragons of Black and White, and he was the Dragon God Douluo. Long Xiaoyao shared a reputation with my teacher when he was still alive, and now that my teacher has passed, nobody in Shrek Academy has the ability to single-handedly hold back the Darkness Holy Dragon. Even though the Dragon Emperor Douluo isn’t an evil soul

master, he’s still part of the Holy Ghost Church. Furthermore,

he’s not the sect leader, he’s only one of the sect’s elders. There’s someone out there who can command people like the Dragon Emperor Douluo and the Scorpion Tiger Douluo; it’s not hard to imagine how powerful the Holy Ghost Church is.”

Xu Jiujiu’s face was a little pale. This piece of news was just too important, yet she had had no idea about it before today. This was far too important for the Star Luo Empire.

“Thank you, Yuhao. Thank you for telling me everything. This is just too important, and I will immediately send someone to verify these things. The empire will not forget this contribution and favor if we ﬁnd this information to be true, and we will deﬁnitely reward you accordingly.” Xu Jiujiu’s thoughts were a little messed up and she wasn’t in her right state of mind, but she didn’t forget about her promise. Even though Huo Yuhao was far less valuable in his current crippled state than he had been back then, she could guess that Huo Yuhao wouldn’t remain like this from the look on his face.

Huo Yuhao lowered his voice and said, “This isn’t that much of a contribution. From our perspective, the Sun Moon Empire and the Holy Ghost Church can possibly become an enemy that we have to face together. Perhaps, that day is inevitable. You should be able to tell from my description, princess, that nobody has the ability to challenge them alone. We can only forge as many alliances as we can in order to have the strength to challenge them.”

Xu Jiujiu nodded her head silently. If the Sun Moon Empire possessed an Ultimate Douluo that had been around for two hundred years, that person alone could be apocalyptic for the Star Luo Empire. An Ultimate Douluo had enough power to take down more than ten Titled Douluo at a whim, and once the Star Luo Empire’s top-level individuals had fallen, there would no longer be anything they could do against the Sun Moon Empire, and they would be rolled over.

Xu Jiujiu asked, “Do you have other information, Yuhao? If you have other important intel, I can purchase it directly from you. You can ask for any price you want.” Her impression of Huo Yuhao was a lot better than before. Just as Bei Bei had said, it would be a lot easier for them to obtain the princess’ trust with the information about the Holy Ghost Church as their main game.

Xu Jiujiu didn’t even consider whether Huo Yuhao was deceiving her. First, he hailed from Shrek Academy. Secondly, this piece of news was simply too astounding. Furthermore, Huo Yuhao mentioned that the Holy Ghost Church had sent people to participate in the competition, and it would be too easy to expose a lie. Therefore, she completely believed him. She would immediately send people to obtain evidence once Huo Yuhao left, and then she would relay this information back to her empire.

Huo Yuhao said, “I don’t have other intel. We’ve only developed these speculations after we just realized that the Holy Ghost Church is also participating in the competition. We’re here to ﬁnd you because we can’t afford to delay any longer. The Holy Ghost Church dares to parade around in broad daylight, and that goes to show that they’re unafraid of threats from any other force. That also means that the Sun Moon Empire won’t be holding back for much longer.”

Xu Jiujiu nodded and said, “You’re right, this is too important. Let’s do it this way, Yuhao. You guys can return for now, and I will immediately settle this and pass this information back to the empire so that my brother can make a decision. If this is true, I’m afraid we’ll have to pay a personal visit to Shrek Academy.”

Huo Yuhao said, “Don’t be hasty, princess. I have something else for you. If you’re interested, our cooperation can begin right away.”

Huo Yuhao gestured to Wang Dong’er behind him as he spoke.

Wang Dong’er raised her left hand. The Starlight Sapphire ring that Huo Yuhao typically wore was now on her left hand, and six streaks of starlight glowed on the ring’s surface.

Xu Jiujiu was momentarily stunned, and a tinge of vigilance immediately appeared in her eyes.

Right at this moment, a human ﬁgure appeared soundlessly behind Xu Jiujiu. Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er only discovered her existence when she appeared, and Huo Yuhao had completely failed to sense her appearance before this, even with his current spiritual power.

“A Titled Douluo?” Huo Yuhao asked in surprise.

An old woman had appeared behind Xu Jiujiu. She looked like she was at least eighty years old, and her hair was all white. She was clad in a ﬂowing red dress that radiated in tandem with her snowy-white hair, but her eyes appeared exceptionally dark and sinister. Greenish-blue light burst from her eyes in all directions, and she unleashed a forceful and stiﬂing aura from the moment she appeared. This aura wasn’t targeted at Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er. Instead, it ﬁlled up the entire room.

Huo Yuhao’s expression didn’t change at all in the face of such immense pressure. Faint purple light sparkled in his eyes as gentle spiritual undulations ﬂowed outward and enveloped both him and Wang Dong’er inside.

“Eh?” The old woman gasped in surprise, and there was now a hint of astonishment in her eyes as she stared at Huo Yuhao. She could tell from his soul power undulations that this youth had but ﬁve soul rings, give or take, yet he could defend himself against her stiﬂing aura. He didn’t cower away or back off at all, and she couldn’t even lock onto him. How could this be something that a ﬁve-ringed Soul King could achieve?

The old lady increased the pressure in the air after her initial ﬂash of astonishment, and this pressure poured towards Huo Yuhao from all directions.

Huo Yuhao didn’t show any weakness at all, nor did he say a single word. Purple light circulated, and a diamond-like radiance gradually began to sparkle in his eyes. The purple light layer that was protecting them immediately became like the night sky, while stars dotted its surface. This Titled Douluo didn’t stiﬂe Huo Yuhao’s formidable spiritual power at all. Instead, it seemed as if Huo Yuhao was pushing back against her!

Huo Yuhao’s ﬁghting strength paled in comparison to when he wasn’t injured. However, his aura hadn’t been weakened at all. Even Elder Xuan had been astounded by his spiritual power, while the old woman was still quite a distance from Elder Xuan’s abilities. A virtual golden projection began to glimmer into view behind Huo Yuhao’s back. It was Wang Dong’er’s look in girl’s clothes, and the Goddess of Light immediately caused Huo Yuhao’s eyes to grow gentle and tender as they were ﬁlled with overwhelming love. His Goddess of Light’s power was boosted by thirty percent as long as Wang Dong’er was beside him.

“That’s enough, senior,” Huo Yuhao sighed calmly.

The old woman grunted coldly as she took a step forward, and she was just about to attack when Xu Jiujiu reached up to hold her back.

“Don’t be like this, Grandma Yi Man. Yuhao is our guest.”

The old woman squinted as she said, “This fellow is a little abnormal, his spiritual power is far stronger than it should be. It’s at a level that a Soul King shouldn’t possess. Let me take him down, Jiujiu, and then you can interrogate him.”

Xu Jiujiu said hurriedly, “Grandma Yi Man, he really is our guest, we can’t treat our guests like that! I’m sorry, Yuhao. Grandma Yi Man has been protecting me since I was a child, and she must have felt something dangerous from your storage-type soul tool, and that’s the reason why she…” Huo Yuhao smiled faintly and said, “It’s alright. Since you have no interest in seeing what we have to offer, then we will take our leave so that we can prevent any misunderstandings. Let’s go, Dong… ahem, Wang Dong.”

Huo Yuhao nearly forgot that Wang Dong’er was currently dressed in a guy’s clothes, and calling her “Dong’er” now would sound extremely weird.

Wang Dong’er glanced coldly at Xu Jiujiu before she began to push Huo Yuhao away in his wheelchair.

Xu Jiujiu’s expression changed, and a hesitant and unsure look ﬂashed across her face. The old woman in the red dress gave Xu Jiujiu an inquisitive look.

Xu Jiujiu didn’t hesitate for too long. She walked forward briskly and said, “I’m sorry, Yuhao. I was being too suspicious and oversensitive. I am deeply apologetic about what just happened, and I hope that the two of you can stay.”

Xu Jiujiu had felt an acutely dangerous aura when Wang Dong’er ﬂashed the Starlight Sapphire ring, and the aura did come from that ring. That meant that even the Starlight Sapphire’s quality couldn’t mask the dangerous aura contained within, and the aura immediately ﬂowed out the moment Wang Dong’er infused some soul power inside. That was the reason why both she and the old lady in red had immediately reacted like they had.

Thoughts ran through her head, and Xu Jiujiu ﬁgured that Huo Yuhao had no reason to harm her. It was just as he had said: everyone was standing on the same line, they shared the same enemy, and the enemy of her enemy was her friend. What Huo Yuhao wanted to show her was possibly dangerous, but it was unlikely that it was targeted towards her. Furthermore, Huo Yuhao had just given them such important intel, she couldn’t just turn him away just like that. The entire Shrek Academy was behind Huo Yuhao, after all!

Huo Yuhao gestured to Wang Dong’er to tell her to stop, and turned his head around to look back at Xu Jiujiu. “I just want to remind you, princess, that all kinds of collaboration and teamwork has to be built on both parties trusting each other. If you don’t trust me, then there’s no need for any further cooperation, don’t you think?” Xu Jiujiu stared at this youth who could only move one hand, and she felt as if she were staring at a sly and cunning negotiator. Why is he so difﬁcult to deal with? His words were neither hot nor cold, and neither was he too gentle or too pushy. Huo Yuhao’s controlled and moderated rhythm made her feel as if she were being drawn in. It’s no wonder that Shrek Academy has placed so much emphasis on him! Indeed, it’s not just because of his ﬁghting abilities...

Xu Jiujiu’s thoughts stopped there, and she immediately readjusted herself. A sincere smile appeared on her face as she said, “I’m sorry, Yuhao. I’ll apologize to you one more time... we were wrong about what happened just now. Please come back, and we can discuss our cooperation in further detail. What do you think? You’re right to say that cooperation means we have to trust each other. I can tell from the important information that you’ve just relayed to me that you trust us. Don’t worry, we will reciprocate no matter how we decide to cooperate in the future.”

How beautiful was that speech? Huo Yuhao heaved a sigh of admiration inside as he gestured towards Wang Dong’er, and only then did Wang Dong’er turn his wheelchair back around. Huo Yuhao said, “Show it to her. Don’t worry, princess. We are also here, and you have this Titled Douluo to protect you. If something that can threaten your life shows up, won’t we be burying ourselves, too? I may be in a bad state, but I’m not ready to leave this world yet.” A teasing smile appeared on his

face as he said that.

Xu Jiujiu blushed as she made a gesture to Wang Dong’er. She stole a few more glances at her at the same time.

Wang Dong’er was still Wang Dong ﬁve years ago. Even though she had been extremely stunning back then, she was still a child. Five years later, she had grown into an extremely “handsome” youth with a long and slender ﬁgure. Flowing pinkish-blue hair draped behind her back, and she was so “handsome” that she didn’t have any imperfections at all. Princess Jiujiu was still full of awe even though she had seen uncountable good-looking men before throughout her entire life. Wang Dong has a face that is so attractive that even girls will be envious of him, and Huo Yuhao just gave him a strange look. Can they be…?

The look in Princess Jiujiu’s eyes became a little strange, and she cursed inside. What a waste! If such a handsome boy swings that way…

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er didn’t know that the princess was silently criticizing them. Wang Dong’er took two steps forward, and she reached out with her left hand toward a relatively spacious spot inside the room.

This was only a second-tier room, but it was a lot better than the rooms Huo Yuhao and others were staying in. The spacious living room was several hundred square meters in surface area, and there were bedrooms inside that weren’t much smaller. This room was better in terms of both decorations and amenities than their room, and the place that Huo Yuhao and the others were living in weren’t even on the same scale.

Brilliant blue light ﬂickered, and a large item appeared before Xu Jiujiu. Even though she sounded very trusting, she still took a few steps back subconsciously so that she could keep her distance from it, while the red-dressed Titled Douluo stood in front of her, prepared to react against anything.

They quickly saw what the item was. It was a strangely- shaped metal item, and Xu Jiujiu could feel that this was a soul tool. Even though the Star Luo Empire’s soul tool research paled in comparison to the Sun Moon Empire, the Star Luo Empire had been placing a lot of effort on soul tool research over the years after they realized the gap between them. The only difference was that they lacked top-tier soul engineers, and their research standards were also greatly inferior, so there was no way they could catch up to the Sun Moon Empire. Even so, Xu Jiujiu had seen quite a few soul tools, yet she had never seen nor heard about the thing before her.

The entire soul tool took up about ten square meters of space. There was a square metal base beneath it, and this base was the thing that took up ten square meters. There was a belt beneath the metal base, and it seemed as if this soul tool could be pushed around. One could tell that it was quite heavy just by looking at it.

There was a thick cylinder on top of the metal base, located in the center. This cylinder connected the base to another rectangular metal piece above it, and this rectangular metal component was about two and a half meters long, about one and a half meters wide, and quite ﬂat, with eighteen black holes on one side. It seemed like an enormous metal box, and gave people an extremely peculiar feeling. The metal box’s dark body was nowhere close to being visually appealing.

“This is…?” Xu Jiujiu glanced at Huo Yuhao with inquisitive eyes.

Huo Yuhao answered, “This is a weapon that the Tang Sect produces. We have named it the Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon.”

“Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon? Is it a soul tool?” Princess Jiujiu was clearly unfamiliar with this name.

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “More accurately put, it’s a stationary soul tool. It can only be considered a Class 4 soul tool, but the effects that it can achieve on the battleﬁeld cannot be matched by normal Class 4 soul tools, the reason being that it’s a stationary soul tool. You should know something about stationary soul tools, don’t you?”

Princess Jiu Jiu nodded and said, “The force of stationary soul tools mainly comes from their shells. The cannon itself can only determine the ﬁring distance and accuracy. Does your soul tool ﬁre eighteen shells at the same time?”

Huo Yuhao said, “There are different settings. You can ﬁre everything at once, or you can them ﬁre one by one. Our Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon has several salient features, please allow me to introduce them to you. Firstly, even though it’s just a Class 4 stationary soul tool, it can reach a distance comparable to a Class 6 soul tool, because it contains some of the Tang Sect’s secret techniques. You can carry out your own ﬁeld tests after this.”

Princess Jiujiu’s eyes sparkled. A Class 4 soul tool that had the same propulsion force as a Class 6 soul tool! This was quite an impressive invention. It also meant that this soul tool only required a Class 4 soul engineer to operate it, and Class 4 soul engineers were on a completely different levels than Class 6 soul engineers. It was comparable to the gap between a Soul Ancestor and a Soul Emperor. A thousand Soul Ancestors were probably still weaker than a hundred Soul Emperors, and this point alone had already attracted the princess.

Huo Yuhao continued, “Our Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon can carry forty-eight shells, and they’re all under the base. It can automatically chamber shells during the ﬁring process, and you will only need to reload the weapon after all forty- eight shells have been ﬁred. Reloading is simple. Wang Dong, please demonstrate for the princess.”

“Alright.” Wang Dong’er pressed on the cannon’s side with her right hand, and a capo-like holder sprang out. She shook the holder rapidly, and a magazine gradually slid out from beneath the holder’s base. The magazine opened up from behind, and everyone could see the forty-eight soul cannon shells chambered inside.

Every cannon shell was about a meter long, and every shell was about twenty centimeters in diameter. The entire magazine was withdrawn from the holder, using the four wheels beneath the magazine, so one didn’t need to use too much force to push the magazine around. She quickly pushed the magazine back to its original position, before she closed it and returned the holder to where she took it from and concluded the reloading process. The entire effort took about two minutes.

Xu Jiuiju calculated mentally, A stationary soul cannon that can ﬁre forty-eight rounds before reloading, and a Class 4 soul tool with a Class 6 soul tool’s ﬁring range. Forty-eight continuous rounds packs quite a punch! Just as Huo Yuhao said, this soul tool is deﬁnitely a powerful weapon on the battleﬁeld! The Sun Moon Empire’s army is only equipped with Class 5 stationary soul cannons...

The biggest difference between a stationary soul cannon and a normal soul cannon was ﬁring range. Normal soul cannons had extremely limited ﬁring range, because the soul cannons were powered purely by soul power, which was converted into force to launch the cannon shells. However, stationary soul cannons were different. They relied on the stationary soul tool to launch their shells.

A Class 4 soul tool was worth about a hundredth of a Class 6 soul tool.

Xu Jiujiu calculated continuously in her head, and her eyes began to glow brighter and brighter, beginning to understand more about this metal object’s practical uses and effects.

Huo Yuhao continued, “The Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon that we have devised as of now is more suitable for installation upon city walls to defend the city, or it can be installed to defend fortresses; both uses will be extremely effective. If you wish to equip your army with this item, we will come up with a mobile version.”

Princess Jiujiu immediately proposed the question that she was most concerned about. “So, what about the price? How much is it?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “This has power comparable to a Class 6 soul tool’s power, so it should be valued like a Class 6 soul tool. Truthfully, it can be considered a Class 6 soul tool, except it doesn’t take as much to use it.”

Xu Jiujiu smiled and said, “I’m sure that’s not it. I believe it doesn’t take that many resources to craft it, either. Furthermore, stationary soul tools have always been known to burn holes through our wallets. This cannon can ﬁre forty- eight stationary cannon shells, so every round will bring me a lot of heartache. Yuhao, your Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon is a little too expensive. You guys are also from the Star Luo Empire; are you trying to reap proﬁts from war? That means this will no longer be a cooperation.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and shook his head. “No, princess. We are already very sincere. Stationary soul tools are indeed expensive, but they are also most important in the wars that we will have to face in the future. The Tang Sect has always been fair, so this price will never change. The price will be the same even if we are selling to Shrek City. Our sincerity lies in the supply priority we give our clients. If you’re willing to complete the deal, you will become our ﬁrst client outside Shrek City, and you will receive supply priority from us for one year.”

Xu Jiujiu was momentarily stunned. She couldn’t help but laugh as she said, “I didn’t expect you to be such a good businessman, and you even know about supply priority. Do you really believe that this soul tool will receive excessive demand? There must be a limit to the number of soul tools like this we can purchase, because we have to ensure that we have enough cannon shells to make sure that these expensive soul tools can unleash their full potential. Furthermore, we need to have enough soul masters. The truth is that the Star Luo Empire doesn’t lack soul masters. Since this soul tool is also considered a Class 6 soul tool, we might as well directly purchase Class 6 stationary soul tools. There are quite a few Soul Emperors within the Star Luo Empire.”

The smile on Huo Yuhao’s face didn’t change. He wasn’t worried at all. If the princess wasn’t interested in his Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon at all, she wouldn’t be negotiating with him. The harder she haggled, the more interested she was in the soul tool.

“But can you ﬁnd a Class 6 stationary soul cannon that can ﬁre forty-eight times continuously? I’m afraid it’s difﬁcult to ﬁnd one that can ﬁre even three in a row. Both our magazines and our ﬁring mechanisms are exclusive to us, and this soul tool comes with a self-destruct mechanism as well, so it can’t be replicated. One Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon can rival the ﬁring efﬁciency of four Class 6 stationary soul cannons. Of course, we have to admit that this cannon can only be considered a Class 4 soul cannon in terms of material quality, and thus its durability cannot compare to that of a Class 6 stationary soul cannon.”

Xu Jiujiu stared at Huo Yuhao in astonishment. This was the ﬁrst time she had seen a seller openly discussing the product’s weaknesses and shortcomings. Huo Yuhao said, “Integrity always comes ﬁrst for the Tang Sect, no matter who we’re dealing with, and we will never hide any weaknesses or cons that our products have. Furthermore, you could be considered one of our biggest clients.”

Xu Jiujiu smiled and said, “Then aren’t you afraid that I’ll lowball you? The price you have quoted isn’t considered low at all. Furthermore, from a business perspective, there has never been a rule where the seller will always get the ﬁrst price that he or she quotes.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “I’m not sure how other people do their business, but upholding our integrity and providing top- quality products has always been of the utmost importance to the Tang Sect.”

Xu Jiujiu stared deeply into his eyes. There was a look on regret on her face as she said, “That’s a pity. We can only think about this a little more.”

Huo Yuhao wasn’t worried at all. He smiled and said, “Of course. I believe this deal will be a big one if it comes through, so it’s natural for you to put in a little more thought, princess. We’ll take our leave, then. We will give this Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon to you, and you will understand after ﬁeld- testing it that I haven’t exaggerated anything at all. However, if you miss this opportunity today, and if other clients step into the picture, I’m afraid we cannot reserve purchase priority for you anymore. I need to make this clear so that I can absolve myself and so that you won’t hold that against me when it happens.”

Xu Jiujiu was very familiar with the art of negotiation. She thought to herself, “Do you think I’ll fall for your tricks?” She stood up and placed her palms on top of one another on her abdomen. She tilted her head towards Huo Yuhao, and there was no denying her nobility and elegance as a princess. “That’s alright. If we decide that this soul tool is something we need, we will contact the Tang Sect as soon as possible.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “Okay! There are two things that I wish to remind you about. You can attach Milk Bottles to this soul tool when you want to use it, and you can use it directly. Class 4 Milk Bottles are enough. Otherwise, a soul engineer can use it by infusing soul power from the left side of its base, where the two palm grooves are located. The second thing I wish to remind you about is that I have installed a self-destruct mechanism into this Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon so that we can protect our technology. If anybody attempts to take it apart, then there will be a formidable explosion. Please watch out for that, princess.”

Xu Jiujiu took exception to his words and said, “Seems like your sect has placed a lot of emphasis on this soul tool. If you’re worried, you can take it back, and you can send someone into the Star Luo Empire to carry out experiments and ﬁeld-tests for us. Don’t you think it’s a bit too excessive to use Milk Bottles to operate a Class 4 soul tool like this?” Milk Bottles were considered one of the most valuable and expensive soul tools amongst those of the same level, and this was the same for all soul tools beneath Class 7.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Perhaps. I have already given this soul tool to you, so how can I take it back? Dong’er, take back our Milk Bottle, and we can bid our farewell to the princess.”

“Alright.” Wang Dong’er took a few steps towards the Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon’s base and pressed on a spot. A metal box sprang out, and Wang Dong’er retrieved a peculiarly- shaped Milk Bottle that resembled a cannon shell and stored it inside her Starlight Sapphire storage ring. Wang Dong’er wasn’t doing everything very quickly, so Xu Jiujiu could clearly see that she had never seen a Milk Bottle like that before. She could tell from its size that it wasn’t as simple as a typical Class 4 Milk Bottle. This was a soul tool that came attached with a mechanism speciﬁcally meant to attach Milk Bottles, and the Milk Bottle had also been specially crafted for this purpose. Was there a need for this? There must be something wrong if things weren’t normal or typical.

Xu Jiujiu was still escorting them out when she asked subconsciously, “Will the Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon have any special effects if it’s is used with a Milk Bottle?”

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong were already at the door, and Princess Jiujiu’s servant opened it for them. Huo Yuhao said plainly, “There won’t be any special effects, except you don’t need soul masters to operate the soul tool.”

“Oh. Goodbye, then,” Xu Jiujiu answered and sent Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er out of the room. She deﬁnitely wouldn’t go any further to send them off with her status, and her servant closed the door behind them. Huo Yuhao’s words echoed in Xu Jiujiu’s mind as she muttered under her breath, “You don’t need soul masters to operate the soul tool? What does that mean? You don’t need soul masters to…” The princess’ body suddenly froze as if a thought burst into her head, and an astonished look came over

her face while her face lost all color.

“That’s… not possible…”

Wang Dong’er wasn’t pushing Huo Yuhao very quickly outside, and Huo Yuhao was slowly withdrawing his extended ﬁngers as if he were counting down.

“Five…

“Four…

“Three…”

“Wait!” A high-pitched exclamation echoed through the corridor, and Princess Jiujiu suddenly raced out from her room and blocked their path in a few brisk steps.

Wang Dong’er stared at the concerned look on her face with amusement and thought to herself, Huo Yuhao is so cunning…

Xu Jiujiu’s breathing was clearly a little rushed as she stared at Huo Yuhao with her charming blue eyes. “You…you said that you don’t need soul masters to operate this soul tool! What does that mean?”

Huo Yuhao seemed a little blank as he replied, “That’s... what it means.”

Xu Jiujiu took a deep breath. “Are you saying that…?” For some reason, her heartbeat began to race, and an indescribable premonition coursed through her mind. However, this premonition was just so immense, to the point where she could barely control herself anymore.

Chapter 275: The Art of Negotiating

“Wait.” Huo Yuhao raised his hand to interrupt any further questions from Xu Jiujiu and asked quietly, “Princess, do you think it’s appropriate that we are negotiating this out here?”

Xu Jiujiu bit down on her lower lip as she stared at this innocent and harmless-looking fellow with a faint smile at the corner of his mouth. She really wanted to pounce on him and strangle him. This bastard brought up what is perhaps the most important point at the last moment to wake me up. Seriously…

Many large sects and reputable academies currently resided in this building, so it was true that this place wasn’t suitable or appropriate for discussing such top-secret things.

Those thoughts did run through her head, but it was clear that there was no way she could put them into practice. She calmed herself down and regained her elegant posture and composure as she said apologetically, “It’s my fault for overlooking that. I invite the two of you to come back, so that we can discuss this deal in further detail. What do you think?” Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Of course. It would be even better if you could give us a cup of tea.”

Damn it! She felt resentment bursting in her mind, but she didn’t dare to reveal even a single ounce of it on her face. Her heart was still beating very quickly, and the possibility that had just occurred to her was far too important for the Star Luo Empire.

“I’m sorry, I was being discourteous before. I was too pleasantly surprised to see the two of you – please come back, and I will personally make some tea for you two of you.” She made a gesture for them to kindly proceed back into her room as she spoke.

“Alright, we’ll have to trouble you, then.” Huo Yuhao didn’t push around too much. He had to play this just right, as going too far was as bad as not doing enough. He was dealing with a big customer, after all!

They returned to the princess’ room, and Xu Jiujiu personally brought them two fragrant cups of tea as she invited Wang Dong’er to sit down on the sofa before turning towards Huo Yuhao with an eager look on her face.

One had to admit that the princess was extremely pretty, and she could be ranked along with Jiang Nannan and Wang Dong’er as a top-tier beauty. If the princess had been staring at someone else with the same look on her face, they might possibly stop at nothing to give the princess whatever she

wanted.

It was a pity then that Wang Dong’er was the only person in Huo Yuhao’s heart. Furthermore, Huo Yuhao had seen quite a few top-class beauties. He possessed immense spiritual power, and his mind was steadfast and unwavering. He was naturally unaffected by Xu Jiujiu’s small psychological move.

“Do you have any questions or doubts, princess? Please ask, and I will tell you everything I can.” Huo Yuhao’s face was cool and collected, and the sincerity in his eyes was no less than the look in Xu Jiujiu’s eyes.

The red-dressed old woman felt a twitch at the corner of her mouth as she stood to one side. She thought to herself, The new generation is taking over from the older generation after all, and everyone seems to be as sly as a fox. Jiujiu has met her match today. Xu Jiujiu’s graceful and charming look ﬁnally froze momentarily, and she suppressed the impulsive desire in her heart to strangle this fellow before her as she replied, “I wish to ask about something you said before this. What did you mean when you said that soul masters aren’t needed to operate this soul tool? Are you trying to say that if these Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons have Milk Bottles, normal people can also operate them?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “Normal people deﬁnitely can’t.”

Huo Yuhao’s simple statement immediately caused Xu Jiujiu’s eyes to ﬁll with disappointment. Her eyes quickly turned unfriendly. Is this fellow deliberately trying to mess around with me?

Xu Jiujiu was on the brink of erupting, and she grit her teeth as she said, “Then what do you mean when soul masters aren’t needed to operate this soul tool?”

Huo Yuhao didn’t seem rufﬂed at all. “That just means soul masters aren’t needed to operate this soul tool!” Xu Jiujiu planted her hands on the desk in front of her and took a deep breath. She didn’t mince her words, pausing slightly as she enunciated each one. “Will you die if you make yourself clearer?”

Huo Yuhao had a forced smile on his face and an innocent look as he said, “My words are very clear! It means the Tang Sect’s Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon no longer requires a soul master to operate it after attaching a Milk Bottle to it. Normal people deﬁnitely don’t meet the requirements, as they are not strong enough, and they will struggle with reloading and switching magazines. Only soldiers that are relatively stronger can operate this soul tool, and it’s even better if they’ve been trained before. Can you understand my explanation now, princess?”

The redness that was on Xu Jiujiu’s face due to her fury immediately vanished, and she said eagerly, “Are you for real? Even soldiers that are not soul masters can operate a Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon?”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Of course! Otherwise, how could I claim that our Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon has excellent value for the money? If not, how could I sell you a Class 4 soul tool for the price of a Class 6 soul tool? Wouldn't that just be a rip-off?”

Xu Jiujiu leaned against the sofa, and her eyes changed continuously as her brain began to spin with ideas and thoughts. Her ﬁsts were clenched slightly from all her intense and riled-up emotions.

Huo Yuhao picked up his cup of tea and ﬁnished it with a gulp. This was good tea, indeed… it was aromatic, and its fragrance lingered in his mouth, while it was fresh and quenched his thirst at the same time.

Five minutes passed before Xu Jiujiu suddenly stared at Huo Yuhao and asked, “Can you give us a promotional price if we order in bulk?” She was extremely clear about the value of Class 6 soul tools.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “No can do. I’ve said it already, that our product is excellent value for the price, and the price will not change. The price will remain the same whether we’re selling the cannons to you or to other clients, and we will be fair to everyone. The only beneﬁt I can give you, princess, is purchase priority. There’s an upper limit to our production speed, after all.”

Xu Jiujiu took a deep breath and said, “But we can only validate your words after ﬁeld-testing this soul tool and experimenting with it. Can you reserve purchase priority for us?”

Huo Yuhao contemplated momentarily, then said, “You have three days. I hope you can give us a decisive response before the competition starts.”

Xu Jiujiu said angrily, “We’re inside the Sun Moon Empire, not the Star Luo empire. Where do I ﬁnd a place to test it?”

Huo Yuhao glanced at the red-dressed old woman beside them and said, “Technology is advanced today, and we can use ﬂying-type soul tools now. It doesn’t seem difﬁcult to return to the Star Luo Empire within a day. Princess, if I wasn’t from the Star Luo Empire myself, I wouldn’t have pleaded with my eldest senior brother time and time again, and perhaps you wouldn’t have been our ﬁrst big customer. Three days is already the maximum allowance that our sect can give. I hope you can understand. How about this… we will give the Milk Bottles that are specially crafted for our Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons to you as an expression of sincerity.”

Huo Yuhao gave Wang Dong’er a look as he spoke.

Wang Dong’er nodded and passed the Milk Bottle that she had taken back before this to Xu Jiujiu.

Xu Jiujiu felt a little strange as she held onto the strangely- shaped Milk Bottle that was at least twice as heavy as a normal Class 6 Milk Bottle. The materials used to craft this Milk Bottle didn’t seem ordinary or typical.

Huo Yuhao said, “Princess, I’ll pass another piece of secret intel to you for free.”

“Speak.”

Huo Yuhao said, “You’re in charge of intelligence. Are you aware that the Illustrious Virtue Hall has devised technology to seal Milk Bottles? That means, the soul power contained within Milk Bottles will no longer leak outside.”

Xu Jiujiu felt her heart skip a beat. “Are you sure?”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “The Tang Sect has also mastered this technology. The Milk Bottle you’re holding in your hands is sealed, which you will know once you give it a try. The truth is that the cost of crafting one of these Milk Bottles is equivalent to purchasing ﬁve Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons. With this sealed Milk Bottle, you can reload a Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon ten times without switching Milk Bottles. Ten magazines mean you can ﬁre four-hundred and eighty stationary cannon shells in one go. I’m sure you understand what this means.”

---

Xu Jiujiu was left sitting motionless on the sofa even after Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er left her room. Her enchanting eyes sparkled with sophisticated light, and “Tang Sect” had been deeply imprinted on her.

All her complicated emotions and thoughts gradually became disappointment and a sense of loss. Bitterness began to surface at the corner of her lips as she said, “We are still so slow, Grandma Yi Man. We are trailing the Sun Moon Empire in soul tool research, and we are even lagging behind Shrek Academy. The Tang Sect is undoubtedly representing Shrek Academy. Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon, sealed Milk Bottles... impressive indeed!”

The old woman sat down beside her and gently caressed Xu Jiujiu’s ﬂowing hair. “Don’t put too much pressure on yourself, child. You’re just a girl, and you have enough burdens on your shoulders. That boy is extraordinary. I studied him closely, and I’ve never seen spiritual power like his in my entire life. His spiritual power is both unique and powerful at the same time, and it’s on an entirely different scale from his soul power. Furthermore, his eyes were calm and collected from beginning to end, no matter what expression he was wearing. Even you are a little inferior to him in this respect. If you can’t have a person like that as a friend, then…” The old lady squinted a little as a look of hostility and murder ﬂashed across her eyes.

Xu Jiujiu’s expression changed as she exclaimed, “No, Grandma Yi Man!”

Grandma Yi Man stared at her amusingly and said, “What? You can’t bear to see anything happen to him? He seems a lot younger than you are.”

Xu Jiujiu blushed and leaned into Grandma Yi Man’s embrace disapprovingly. “What are you talking about, Grandma Yi Man? There’s nothing between the two of us. That guy is one of the most outstanding individuals of Shrek Academy’s younger generation, and the academy places great emphasis on

him. My elder brother has already prepared a plan to pull him close, and this guy is likely to become the link between us and Shrek Academy. Therefore, we can’t touch him, and we have to protect him.

“Grandma Yi Man, what do you think about the Holy Ghost Church that he spoke of?”

Yi Man’s face turned black as she said, “That’s a tough one. If he’s right about the Dragon Emperor Douluo being used by the Holy Ghost Church, then the Star Luo Empire will be in some real trouble. We need to act, and we need to do it now.”

Xu Jiujiu tilted her head and glanced at the massive Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon resting on the ﬂoor. “Time is of the essence, Grandma Yi Man. I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble you this time.” Yi Man heaved a faint sigh and replied, “What trouble is there? I should do more for the empire while I can still move. I’ll take this back to the empire for ﬁeld-testing and experiments right away.”

“Yes. I trust you the most, and I won’t be able to be at ease unless you’re the one doing it. I can tell from Huo Yuhao representing the Tang Sect to promote their soul tools that Shrek Academy’s inner circle seems to have changed. We have to buck up on our intelligence work.”

Xu Jiujiu had believed from beginning to end that the Tang Sect was chosen by Shrek Academy as their spokesperson, and it was because of this misconstrued understanding that she placed a lot more emphasis on the Tang Sect.

Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao back into his room, and it was only at this moment that an exhausted look came over Huo Yuhao’s face.

Wang Dong’er lowered her voice and said, “Yuhao, why did you keep beating around the bush with Princess Jiujiu?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “That’s so I can give her a stronger impression, and it’s also because I wanted to catalyze this deal and agreement with the Star Luo Empire and ﬁnalize it as fast as possible. If the Sun Moon Empire launches an invasion, the Star Luo Empire cannot avoid being the vanguard and bearing the brunt of their attack. Therefore, they feel the most urgency, and I believe they will come to a decision fairly quickly.”

Wang Dong’er asked, “How about the Heavenly Soul Empire and the Dou Ling Empire?”

Huo Yuhao said, “We can take it a little slower with them. One reason is because we don’t know anybody in these empires’ higher levels with a status like Princess Jiujiu. The second reason is because these empires may not send one of their high-ranking ofﬁcials to us. Furthermore, our production speed is limited, and we may be hit with overwhelming demand if the Star Luo Empire chooses to take us up on this deal.”

Wang Dong’er supported him and laid him down on the bed. She smiled as she said, “I think you’re becoming more and more like a businessman.”

Huo Yuhao forced a laugh and said, “It’s not my wish for that to happen. However, the Holy Ghost Church’s appearance has given us too much threat and danger.”

Wang Dong’er gently combed and tidied the hair on his forehead and said, “You can rest for a little while. I’ll buy dinner for you, and we should rest early after eating. Are you tired from hustling around all day?”

Huo Yuhao said nothing as he stared at her.

Wang Dong’er blushed as she felt his piercing gaze. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Huo Yuhao smiled faintly and said, “Ever since I returned after sustaining these injuries, I’ve become the luckiest and most fortunate person in the world.”

Wang Dong’er grunted and said, “Are you trying to say that I wasn’t nice enough to you before this?”

“Uh… of course not. The truth is that I’ve always been a little lost ever since we established our relationship during the Sea God’s Fate, as you’ve always been my brother in my heart. I only suddenly discovered how important you were in my heart when I read the letter in the pouch that uncle Niu Tian gave me. I felt a little attracted to you even when you were dressed like a guy, except I wasn’t so sure why I felt that way. I only realized afterwards that your eyes would always be the same no

matter what you wear. There’s a big difference between a guy and a girl’s eyes after all. Don’t worry, Dong’er – I will recover very soon.”

“Alright,” Wang Dong’er nodded her head lightly and said, “You should rest while I grab dinner.”

“Okay.”

Wang Dong’er left the room, and Huo Yuhao was the only person that remained. He didn’t close his eyes to rest, instead silently pondering things in his mind. He was repeatedly consolidating everything that he had seen and heard ever since they had arrived in Radiant City.

The Sun Moon Empire seems like they really are going to make a move. However, are the Heavenly Soul Empire and Star Luo Empire prepared for that? It’s hard to say, and even if they’ve made their preparations, the Holy Ghost Church entering the fray will undoubtedly cause disarray and mess up their plans. The Sun Moon Empire must have ulterior motives for hosting this competition. How can we delay as much as possible before the Sun Moon Empire takes action?

The Tang Sect has just begun our multifaceted expansion. The Tang Sect needs time to expand, and I also need time to recover. Once the war begins, we will need sufﬁcient time to prepare if the Tang Sect wants to make a difference in the war and take this opportunity to expand and become stronger, and if the Tang Sect wishes to help the three native empires of the Douluo Continent against the Sun Moon Empire.

Yes! We have to devise a plan to slow the Sun Moon Empire down and delay their plans for war as much as possible during this competition. But how do we go about accomplishing that?

The goal had changed, but he couldn’t really think of a proper plan, so he could only play things by ear and wait and see. The Sun Moon Empire wasn’t just targeting the Star Luo Empire and Shrek Academy, and the other big sects, the Heavenly Soul Empire, and the Dou Ling Empire could form an alliance. Dinner wasn’t very sumptuous, but Wang Dong’er had returned quickly, and it was clear that she was worried about Huo Yuhao. No matter what he ate, everything that entered Huo Yuhao’s mouth was as delicious as ever with Wang Dong’er beside him.

The night was upon them. Huo Yuhao didn’t dare to lie in bed and indulge himself in the warmth of Dong’er’s companionship like before, and he immediately started to meditate.

Wang Dong’er sat beside him and also began to meditate.

It had been a long time since they had cultivated together with the Haodong power. Huo Yuhao’s body was ﬁlled with the origin energy of Ultimate Ice, and that meant his soul power became extremely cold and icy. This also meant that Wang Dong’er would be adversely affected if they connected through the Haodong power. Furthermore, Huo Yuhao’s legs and his left arm’s blood circulation were blocked, so he couldn’t complete a major circulation. He would drag Wang Dong’er down with him, so he might as well cultivate by himself. Huo Yuhao had strong foundations in his Mysterious Heaven Technique, and his Mysterious Heaven Technique was also ﬁlled with vitality. Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power was in the Mustard Seed Domain, and he could use his intricate and ﬁne spiritual power with this technique. He released a thread of the origin energy of Ultimate Ice from his left arm and absorbed it with every circulation.

The reason why he chose his left arm and not his legs was because the origin energy stored inside his left arm was comparatively thinner, and thus easier to extract. He had already managed to absorb some of the origin energy of Ultimate Ice from all the work and effort that he had put in over the past few days. Huo Yuhao couldn’t ﬁnish a major circulation, but his soul power wasn’t increasing any slower at all. The origin energy of heaven and earth had given him a lot of trouble, but it was still pure ice-type energy in the end.

Huo Yuhao had already made accurate predictions about the state of his body. If he followed his current cultivation method, he would need at least three years before he could absorb every ounce of origin energy of Ultimate Ice in his body, and this was a conservative estimate where he assumed nothing went wrong. He would undoubtedly break through to become a Soul Emperor once he ﬁnished absorbing everything, and if he had enough soul rings, he had the possibility to break through to become a Soul Sage. Three years of being crippled in exchange for speedy improvement – this deal wasn’t that bad or disadvantageous for him in the end.

After all, neither Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, nor Wang Dong’er could possibly become Soul Sages within three years even if they wanted to.

Therefore, Huo Yuhao wasn’t that worried about his cultivation. He could only avoid mistakes and problems if he maintained a calm mind during his cultivation. Otherwise, if he went down the wrong path and went insane in his current state, he would face mortal danger.

The night went by peacefully, and Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao into Bei Bei’s room when dawn arrived after they ﬁnished breakfast.

Bei Bei was strong, and his injuries had stabilized. The only thing was that his wounds were far too severe, so he still had to rest in bed. Huo Yuhao recounted the negotiation he had conducted with Xu Jiujiu on the previous day. Bei Bei told him delightedly after listening to his description that Huo Yuhao could decide on other similar issues in the future.

Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi were the only ones who were truly in charge of things. The other members still prioritized their studies within Shrek Academy. He Caitou participated in the Tang Sect’s soul tool production and design, but the others spent most of their time on Sea God’s Island.

Huo Yuhao and He Caitou had taken quite a burden off Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi’s shoulders ever since they had returned from their exchange program. This was especially so because Huo Yuhao had returned with voluminous blueprints, and even brought back a soul tool expert in Xuan Ziwen. This immediately brought the Tang Sect to another level, and their most important Soul Tool Hall was subsequently perfected. The Tang Sect’s expansion was ﬁnally on the right track, and Bei Bei could ﬁnally heave a sigh of relief. He had completely no worries at all about Huo Yuhao – Huo Yuhao was their designer, and he was extremely familiar with all the Tang Sect’s soul tools. Furthermore, Huo Yuhao was meticulous and careful, and rarely made mistakes. Xu Sanshi was an all-rounded individual, but he didn’t understand enough about soul tools, while he was too playful at the same time. Bei Bei didn’t feel assured at all about him, so he passed command to Huo Yuhao after he was wounded. Xu Sanshi didn’t have any objections to this at all, and he was even elated about the decision, as he didn’t want even a little bit of this added trouble and responsibility.

“Eldest senior brother, I predict that we will have a response from Princess Jiujiu by tomorrow night at the latest. With her knowledge and her experience, I trust that she won’t pass up this wonderful opportunity. It seems like we will be busy very soon.”

Bei Bei was lying down on the bed. He smiled and said, “Teacher Xuan will be busy, you mean. Your Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon managed to tame Teacher Xuan back then, so how can Princess Jiujiu not bend to your will? We can actually lower the price, as the cost of our production is…”

Huo Yuhao shook his head, and a mysterious smile broke out across his face. “Eldest senior brother, we don’t place excessive emphasis on money, but we can’t afford not to charge a high price for the Tang Sect’s development.” Bei Bei’s eyes sparkled. He immediately understood what Huo Yuhao was trying to say, and said, “You’re thinking about…”

“Yes.” Huo Yuhao could tell that his eldest senior brother understood him, and he immediately nodded.

A knock sounded at this moment. Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er, Bei Bei, and Xu Sanshi were the only people in the room, and everyone thought the Tang Sect’s other members had arrived. Xu Sanshi walked over and pushed open the door, but he was momentarily stunned once he opened the door.

“Why are you here, eldest senior sister?” The eldest senior sister of Shrek Academy’s inner courtyard, Zhang Lexuan, was standing outside the room. Wang Qiu’er was also with her.

Zhang Lexuan shot a glare at him and said, “Why can’t I be here? I’m the academy’s team leader. Why have you guys been put in a place like this? Is the Sun Moon Empire unaware that you guys are the champions from the previous tournament?”

Xu Sanshi invited them in as he said angrily, “It doesn’t matter if they know that or not. Even if they know, what can we do if they pretend that they don’t?”

The room wasn’t that big, so Zhang Lexuan immediately saw Bei Bei lying on the bed when she walked in, as well as Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er beside him.

She was aware of Huo Yuhao’s circumstances, but her face immediately changed when she saw Bei Bei lying down on the bed. She walked up concernedly and said, “What happened to you, Bei Bei?”

Huo Yuhao, Xu Sanshi, and Wang Dong’er were slightly taken aback as they watched the worry and anxiety in their eldest senior sister’s eyes. Huo Yuhao and Xu Sanshi exchanged a look, and they immediately felt the peculiarity in each other’s eyes. The concern that their eldest senior sister displayed towards their eldest senior brother seemed a little out of the ordinary.

Bei Bei forced a smile and said, “Calm down, eldest senior sister. I’m alright.” Zhang Lexuan seemed to realize that she had lost her composure. She withdrew her emotions a little as she pinched Bei Bei’s wrist to check his injuries.

Wang Qiu’er walked in together with Zhang Lexuan. However, she walked up next to Huo Yuhao, and glanced down at him before her eyes turned away very naturally, as if she were looking at a stranger.

Wang Dong’er looked on steadily, and sighed to herself. The colder Wang Qiu’er was to Huo Yuhao, the more Wang Dong’er could tell that Huo Yuhao was still very important to Wang Qiu’er. Qiu’er, Qiu’er... why do you do this to yourself?

Wang Dong’er had thought long and hard when Huo Yuhao disappeared without a trace back then. She was ready and willing to share Huo Yuhao’s love with Wang Qiu’er if she had to, and it was because of this thought that she was a lot less hostile towards her now. This was especially so after she felt the entirety of Huo Yuhao’s love for her. All she felt toward Wang Qiu’er now was sympathy, and not a single hint of envy or jealousy. At this moment, she was being very generous by standing on Huo Yuhao’s other side. “How have you been, Qiu’er?” Wang Qiu’er didn’t bother greeting him, but Huo Yuhao had to greet her, as she had saved his life more than once. Furthermore, he had long sensed the feelings that she had for him, and he couldn’t help but feel a little guilty about them, as he couldn’t help but feel as if he owed her something.

“I’ve been very well,” Wang Qiu’er answered coldly. It didn’t seem like she had been “very well” from the way she responded...

“Oh.” Huo Yuhao didn’t know what else to say, and he gave her a simple response.

Zhang Lexuan concluded her scrutiny of Bei Bei’s body with a solemn look on her face.

“Your organs are almost in different positions, and you’ve been hit with an intense and strange soul power. It’s dark, evil, and eerie. Did you encounter evil soul masters?”

Everyone couldn’t help but be impressed as they listened to her words. Zhang Lexuan’s analysis was concise, accurate, and to the point. She lived up to her name as the inner courtyard’s eldest senior sister.

Bei Bei nodded as he lowered his voice and said, “I was just about to look for you guys. This matter has to be reported to the academy as quickly as possible, so that the academy can make the necessary preparations. That Holy Ghost Church has appeared…” He recounted the events from the previous day in detail, and he pointed out the Scorpion Tiger Douluo’s existence. However, the Tang Sect members were a little surprised that Bei Bei didn’t mention Tang Ya, and he only talked about how he sensed something was wrong about a soul master that he had run into, and how the other person had managed to ambush and catch him off guard, and how he had thus been injured.

“This is very important. We have to report it to the academy immediately. You are severely injured, should I send you back to the academy?” Zhang Lexuan spoke with a very concerned look on her face.

Bei Bei forced a laugh and shook his head. “You’re the academy’s representative team leader, so how can you walk away? Furthermore, my condition has stabilized, so I might as well rest and recover here. Don’t worry, there’s no way I can participate in the competition. I’ve passed command over to Huo Yuhao.”

Zhang Lexuan stared at Bei Bei before she glanced at Huo Yuhao on his wheelchair. She couldn’t help but feel a little helpless and exasperated. “You guys! What can I say about the two of you? Bei Bei, you’re not a typically careless person, why did you…?”

Bei Bei gave her a look, and Zhang Lexuan was momentarily stunned before she recognized that she seemed to have said too much this time. She stood up and said, “Please rest well. I will report this matter back to the academy at once. Let’s go, Qiu’er.”

Wang Qiu’er said nothing, and she didn’t even greet the other Tang Sect members as she followed behind Zhang Lexuan and departed the room.

The room descended into silence once Zhang Lexuan and Wang Qiu’er left, while Xu Sanshi, Huo Yuhao, and Wang Dong’er all stared at Bei Bei. Bei Bei felt goosebumps break out over his body from their stares. He cleared his throat and said, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Xu Sanshi looked up at the ceiling and heaved a long sigh. “I initially believed that girls would only crush on a person like me – incredibly handsome, romantic and elegant, natural and unrestrained. I never thought that you, Bei Bei, you who has a small nose and tiny eyes, had a secret like this. If you hadn’t been injured such that our eldest senior sister revealed her true feelings as a result, I wouldn’t have been able to tell. I didn’t know that you and our eldest senior sister had a complicated relationship.”

An awkward look ﬂashed across Bei Bei’s face. “Bullshit. Don’t spout nonsense and taint eldest senior sister’s clean name and reputation.”

Xu Sanshi laughed coldly and said, “Do you think I’m as clueless as the others who don’t know you as well as I do? It’s obvious that the look in her eyes wasn’t right the instant she walked in and realized that you had been injured. When has eldest senior sister ever looked at someone else from the inner courtyard like that? The look in your eyes in that moment seemed like everything that was happening was right and within expectations. This proves that you had already predicted this response from the moment you saw her. Is that not enough to prove the secret relationship between the two of you? Wow, Bei Bei, you’ve hidden something like this from your best brothers! Even I had no clue about this, that you’ve done something to even our eldest senior sister. Tell us everything, right now! If not, I won’t show you any mercy even though you’re hurt.”

Bei Bei stared at the falsely indignant look on Xu Sanshi’s face, and turned towards Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er, who were also staring at him with a strange looks in their eyes. “Oh, my reputation! Eldest senior sister messed up because she’s too concerned.”

Xu Sanshi leaned in by the bedside with a gossipy look on his face. “Quick, tell us. What’s going on between you and our eldest senior sister? You have always been so dejected and concerned about Xiao Ya, so when did eldest senior sister enter the picture?”

Bei Bei could tell that he couldn’t hide this secret any longer. He adjusted the expression on his face and said, “I’ll tell you since you guys have already realized something is going on. However, you guys have to keep my secret, as this concerns our eldest senior sister’s name and reputation. Whoever leaks this out will no longer be my brother.”

“Okay.” Wang Dong’er was the ﬁrst to agree, and without any hesitation at all.

The corner of Bei Bei’s mouth twitched as he said, “It’s the same even for my sisters!”

Wang Dong’er giggled and said, “Eldest senior brother, we should always enjoy blessings and endure misfortunes together. Why don’t I call everyone here? Do you think third senior brother can hide something like this from fourth senior sister?”

“I… I have chosen terrible friends!” Bei Bei exclaimed in defeat.

He Caitou, Jiang Nanna, and Xiao Xiao were quickly gathered. Na Na, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan were ultimately not as close to them. Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao’s beautiful eyes sparkled when they heard that there was some secret between Bei Bei and their eldest senior sister that they had to know about. This was the classic gossipy and nosy look, and even the typically simple and straightforward He Caitou was full of surprise.

“You can’t tell anyone else!” Bei Bei exclaimed painfully.

“Really, nobody else can know about this.”

“Why don’t we just let this go? You guys can just pretend you don’t know anything at all.”

“……”

“Alright, alright. I’ll say it.” Everyone’s eyes seemed like they were about to erupt with ﬁre. Bei Bei felt all the pressure, and he had no choice but to tell them about his story with Zhang Lexuan.

“Actually, eldest senior sister was arranged to marry me…” The six other pairs of eyes in the room widened with this one sentence. The apple that Xu Sanshi was holding in his hands dropped and hit He Caitou, who was beside him, on the face. He Caitou clenched his ﬁngers in shock, and his enormous strength left a row of grooves on the bedframe.

Huo Yuhao felt his body quiver, and he almost slid out of his wheelchair. Wang Dong’er covered her mouth with her hands to keep from exclaiming out loud.

Jiang Nannan screamed and gasped in astonishment, while Xiao Xiao grabbed He Caitou’s arm as tightly as she could. It was clear that she was as astounded as everybody else.

“Arranged marriage?!” Xu Sanshi’s mouth was open so wide that a goose egg could be stuffed into it.

Who dared to think that the Shrek Academy’s inner courtyard’s chief disciple, the person that everyone referred to respectfully as “eldest senior sister”, the person that joined the Sea God’s Pavilion at the age of thirty to become one of the council members, Zhang Le Xuan, was actually arranged to marry Bei Bei. This could no longer be described as unbelievable, this was simply something that could only exist in fantasies!

Bei Bei pulled a long face. “Yes, all of you heard that right, and I didn’t say anything wrong. Eldest senior sister was arranged to marry me. It’s a long story, and I’ll have to start from twenty years ago.”

Xu Sanshi pulled over a chair and sat down beside his bed. “That’s alright, we’re not rushing things. You can take your time.”

Huo Yuhao stared at Bei Bei with his eyes wide open and his jaw hanging slack. What he was feeling inside was similar to the awe and astonishment that Princess Jiujiu felt when she discovered that his Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon could be operated by normal soldiers.

Bei Bei shot a glare at Xu Sanshi and said, “My mother passed away on the day I was born due to a difﬁcult birth. My father was too depressed, and he took a nearly impossible task from the Shrek Guardians against Ancestor Xuan’s wishes and departed. He hasn’t returned since, and I became an orphan.

“My family only had a single son, and my ancestors have ruled that all sons will follow their mother’s surname. My parents’ death adversely affected Ancestor Xuan, and he treated me like his own son during that period of time, as if I were the most important thing in the world.

“Eldest senior sister was actually brought back by one of the academy’s teachers, and Ancestor Xuan ran into them by accident. Eldest senior sister had a blank look in her eyes back then, as if she had lost her soul and her spirit. She is from one of the Heavenly Soul Empire’s aristocratic families, but they were ambushed and attacked by another aristocratic family, and her entire family was annihilated. She had been underneath her bed, as she was playing hide-and-seek with her mother when disaster struck, so she managed to avoid certain death. Her mother crashed onto the ground beside the bed, and even used her own body to cover the bed as she was drawing her last breaths, even placing her hand behind her to cover her daughter’s mouth.

“Ancestor Xuan checked her body after hearing about her circumstances, and he discovered that eldest senior sister had great talent in terms of her martial soul. She had congenitally full soul power, something that was rarely seen, and she also possessed a hundred year soul ring, while she had already broken through to Rank 20. He guessed that our eldest senior sister was the future of her family, and the person that her family wanted to do everything they could to nurture.”

Chapter 276: Child Bride...

“Eldest senior sister was only about eleven or twelve years old, but she knew about Shrek Academy. She knelt down before Ancestor Xuan and begged him to avenge her. Ancestor Xuan was still reeling from my parents’ deaths, so he agreed to her request, and he told her that Shrek Academy would nurture her and unleash her potential. He had one condition, and that was she had to guard Shrek Academy for the rest of her life, and she had to become my bride. Eldest senior sister made the vow without hesitating at all.”

Bei Bei paused for a moment and said, “I think you guys can guess what happened afterwards. Ancestor Xuan avenged her, and eldest senior sister remained at the academy to cultivate as hard as she could, and managed to get where she is today. As I grew up afterwards, Ancestor Xuan began to calm down, and he regretted forcing eldest senior sister to make that vow. He mentioned more than once that eldest senior sister didn’t have to uphold her vow. After all, she’s more than ten years older than I am, and waiting for me isn’t practical or realistic at all.

“However, eldest senior sister insisted on keeping her vow. She told Ancestor Xuan that she would still be my bride no matter what choice I might make in the future. If I didn’t like her, then she would be single for life, and she would commit her entire life to Shrek Academy so that she could repay Ancestor Xuan’s benevolence.”

Jiang Nannan’s face seemed a little unfriendly as she said, “You’ve already had a bride since you were a child, and you still went for Xiao Ya…”

Bei Bei forced a laugh and said, “But I didn’t know about all that! Ancestor Xuan only told me about this vow after I got together with Xiao Ya. I felt everything was just unbelievable. I was only fourteen or ﬁfteen back then, and eldest senior sister was already twenty-seven or twenty-eight, so our ages made us entirely unsuitable for each other. Furthermore, I’m sure you guys are aware of the feelings I have for Xiao Ya. All I could do was argue with Ancestor Xuan, and it was then that I decided to move out of the inner courtyard. Afterwards, Ancestor Xuan implicitly gave me the green light with Xiao Ya because the academy owed the Tang Sect. Ancestor Xuan talked to me about this one more time before he passed away, and he asked me to be nicer to eldest senior sister if I could help it, and he said that he had let her down.

“I once sought her out so that we could set things straight. There were many talented suitors within the academy who had a crush on her, and I would hate to see her remain single for the rest of her life because of some outrageous vow that she made all those years ago. But eldest senior sister was extremely stubborn, and she said that I didn’t have to take her, but she would never go back on her vow. She waved her sleeve and

walked off after that.

“The truth is that even though I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong, I still feel a little apologetic towards her. However, I have no clue what to do so that she will forgo that vow. Over the years, even though Xiao Ya has never been by my side, there’s no space left in my heart to accommodate anyone else.”

Bei Bei’s expression was a little awkward, ﬁlled with conﬂict and difﬁculty.

Wang Dong’er asked, “Eldest senior brother, do you not feel anything at all for eldest senior sister?”

Bei Bei answered without hesitation. “Of course I do. She was the one who took care of me as I grew up, and I’ve never had a mother. Eldest senior sister is like a mother or like an elder sister to me, and she’s the second-most important woman to me in my heart after Xiao Ya. The only problem is that this feeling that I have isn’t a romantic one, and there’s only kinship between eldest senior sister and I. You guys have to help me ﬁgure this out! What exactly can I do so that I won’t hurt her, yet still give her the great future that she deserves?”

Bei Bei looked around at everyone, eager and hopeful. Everyone’s eyes became a little strange. How could this conundrum be solved?

Huo Yuhao cleared his throat and noted, “The competition is coming up in two days. What suggestions do you have, eldest senior brother?”

The corners of Bei Bei’s mouth contorted, and he surveyed the rest, and realized that their eyes were drifting around at everywhere, but him. He snapped, “The lot of you have no loyalty at all!”

He Caitou chortled and said, “It’s not for outsiders to resolve family issues. How are we supposed to help you with this, eldest senior brother?” Bei Bei was exasperated. “Alright, alright. Let’s not talk about that anymore. But you guys can’t speak a word about this to anyone, as it concerns our eldest senior sister’s reputation. Tell me, Yuhao, what plans do you have for the competition?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “I don’t have an actual plan yet, but I have some ideas. This competition will have one hundred and sixty-seven participating teams because sects are allowed to participate, and the ﬁrst few rounds will be elimination rounds, all the way up till the last thirty-two before the group stage begins. The organization committee hasn’t declared how the elimination rounds will be carried out for now. Compared to the group stages that come afterwards, we have to clear the elimination rounds before anything else.

“We are representing the Tang Sect, so we aren’t a seeded team. That also means the competition’s rules won’t be in our favor. We aren’t sure what teams we’ll run into at this point. If we encounter any formidable sects, we will be faced with quite a challenge. Therefore, we have to hide our abilities as much as possible during the elimination rounds.”

“Hide our abilities?” Bei Bei was slightly taken aback. “Aren’t you contradicting yourself, Yuhao? You just talked about how important the elimination rounds are. So why should we hide our abilities?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “It’s not contradictory, eldest senior brother. What I’m trying to say is, we have to hide our abilities as much as possible provided we can emerge victorious in the same round. Our appearances are quite different compared to ﬁve years ago, and there are so many more sects in this competition, so there won’t be many who still recognize and know about us. We can put on some makeup or something to change our appearances a little, so that the people who might recognize us from the previous tournament will no longer recognize us. At least, they won’t be sure that we are who they think we are. If we don’t get too unlucky, and as long as we don’t meet the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy in the ﬁrst rounds, it’s unlikely that we’ll be recognized.”

Bei Bei’s eyes sparkled and said, “That’s a great idea. The people that will have an impression of us from the previous tournament will have been the reserve team members, who have become the main team members in this season. Everyone’s become quite different after ﬁve years, and after we make some adjustments, and the fact that we are representing the Tang Sect, will be quite effective in hiding our abilities and identities.” Xu Sanshi frowned and said, “We can change our appearances, but we can’t change our martial souls! How can they not recognize us once we unleash our martial souls?”

Huo Yuhao smiled mysteriously and said, “That’s what I mean when I said that we have to do all we can to hide our abilities and identities so that they can’t recognize us. We can do it this way…”

Their discussion on battle tactics continued for a little more than two hours, and was concluded so that Bei Bei could get some rest.

Huo Yuhao and his companions conducted a few more discussions and drills the following day, and conﬁrmed how the starting rounds were going to be carried out.

------

At the highest level of the Brilliant Delight Hotel... Wang Qiu’er stood quietly on a spacious semicircular balcony and gazed into the distance. The view was enchanting from this spot, she could see almost half of Radiant City.

There were only eight similar rooms on the Brilliant Delight Hotel’s highest level. They were known as the Villas in the Sky, and they were exceedingly extravagant and luxurious. It was claimed that one night cost three thousand golden soul coins, an exorbitant price. This place could be said to be the most expensive hotel on the Continent.

Every Villa had an arched door, as if the room were a castle. There was a hall for hosting guests, a living room, a large conference room, and twenty rooms of different sizes that consisted of bedrooms, gyms, and tearooms. There was a garden in the sky that was more than two hundred square feet in surface area, and there was a swimming pool that was twenty meters on each side at the center of the villa. There was a curved dome above the greenish-blue water, and one would be able to see gentle and faint blue sparkles around the swimming pool at night. Looking up at the dome at night felt as if one were staring at the boundless starry sky, and that beauty was truly enchanting. There was even a miniature sparring arena in the villa, which was built with special materials and defense-type soul tools. It could sustain most soul skills beneath a Soul Sage’s rank.

Shrek Academy’s team had all been astounded when they ﬁrst entered this villa. Dai Huabin was the Duke’s son, but this was even his ﬁrst time staying in a hotel as luxurious as this one. Twenty rooms was more than enough for a team that consisted of a little more than a dozen, and it allowed everyone to have their own room. They could order anything they wanted to eat, and everything would be free of charge, courtesy of the hotel.

This was the best possible arrangement and service for the participating teams, and only eight teams could have this luxury. Shrek Academy’s team stayed in the ﬁrst Villa in the Sky. The Sun Moon Empire was clearly extremely generous about this, as the ﬁrst villa wasn’t just the most extravagant one, it also represented the fact that they were the champions from the previous season.

Wang Qiu’er turned around and stared at the luxurious and spacious villa. There was a blank look in her eyes as she muttered under her breath, “Is this the gift for Shrek’s glory? Is this what they achieved from the previous season?”

“Yes, that’s true. We wouldn’t be staying here if not for their perfect performance last season! The truth is that they are the ones that are worthy of staying in this place, and not those cramped and narrow rooms in the lower levels.” Zhang Lexuan walked over from not far away. She was holding a delicate wine glass in her hands, and there was some amber-colored aged white wine inside. A faint aroma ﬂoated around the glass’ opening but didn’t drift out. The glass was specially crafted by the Sun Moon Empire’s chamber of commerce, and was considered a top-tier wine instrument.

“Do you want one?” Zhang Lexuan asked plainly.

Wang Qiu’er shook her head and said, “I don’t wish for such things to affect my mind.”

Zhang Lexuan sipped on the white wine in her glass. The wine was ﬁlled with a thick and rich fruity aroma that was tinged with a little sourness, and the faint taste of pickled plums lingered in her mouth. “Sometimes you have to learn how to relax, you’re wound up too tightly. I was like you before, but I realized afterwards that it isn’t the way to go, and it would negatively affect my cultivation. You are a lot worse than I was all those years ago; your emotions are tightly wound, and extremely tense. Something is bound to go wrong if you continue like this.”

“I’m not!” Wang Qiu’er’s denial was cold and crisp.

Zhang Lexuan stared at her, amused, and said, “You’re not? I’ve been there and done that, and I’m all too familiar with how you are right now. You’re just like me all those years ago. Ever since you returned with Huo Yuhao, I haven’t seen a smile appear on your face. You’re always daydreaming when you’re not pushing everyone during training. It must be because of Huo Yuhao, am I right?”

Wang Qiu’er froze a little, but remained silent. She didn’t attempt to argue the point.

Zhang Lexuan said plainly, “Do you think you stand a chance?”

Wang Qiu’er still said nothing, but unwittingly clenched her ﬁsts.

“You have no chance, eh? I didn’t expect you to be so much like me. Heh!” Zhang Lexuan laughed. She seemed to be laughing happily, but tears appeared deep within her beautiful eyes.

“Like you?” Wang Qiu’er stared at her with a doubtful look.

Zhang Lexuan smiled and said, “That’s right! That’s because we both love someone that we can’t possibly be together with. Perhaps you still have some hope, as you are quite a match for him, after all. But me… heh.” She ﬁnished the wine in her glass one gulp and began to walk back into the villa.

Wang Qiu’er watched her subtly trembling and dejected ﬁgure and began to follow her subconsciously.

Zhang Lexuan suddenly paused in her tracks. Her back was still facing Wang Qiu’er as she asked, “Tell me, Qiu’er, do women have to rely on men for life?”

Wang Qiu’er answered without hesitation, “Of course not!”

Zhang Lexuan turned around, and her eyes became as sharp as ever. “Then you have to show him that you are stronger than he is. Even if you can’t obtain his love, you can’t let him see how fragile you are, and you can’t let him see your weak side. This is the last dignity that we can have.”

Wang Qiu’er focused, and could see Zhang Lexuan’s stubbornness, and even a little craziness in the middle of everything. She nodded her head forcefully and replied, “Yes!”

------

The competition’s rules were ﬁnally announced the following day, and every participating team received some instructions from the organization committee.

Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but frown when he received the instructions. The rules were indeed different, just like Elder Xuan had said.

According to the competition’s rules, the entire competition would be split into a preliminary segment and a ﬁnal segment. Teams representing sects and academies would be competing in the same pools.

The preliminary segment would consist of elimination rounds, but these elimination rounds seemed a little different. The arena was designated in a spot outside Radiant City, and not right in the city center like they were originally supposed to be. There was a clause that caught Huo Yuhao’s attention. Both the preliminary rounds and the ﬁnal rounds placed a limit on the arena’s diameter, but a maximum height wasn’t speciﬁed.

This was a very simple instruction sheet, but Huo Yuhao began to feel a lot more alarmed than before. What did not setting a maximum height imply? Could there be Soul Sages among the participating students? That was quite impossible, as becoming a Soul Emperor was the limit for people at twenty years of age. This also meant that the lack of a maximum height meant nothing at all to soul masters, as most of them couldn’t ﬂy, except for some soul masters that possessed martial souls that could. However, this would be drastically different when soul engineers came into the picture.

Even four-ringed Soul Ancestors soul engineers could soar through the skies as long as they had ﬂying-type soul tools, and they could launch attacks on the ground from the sky. There was no doubt that this clause was extremely beneﬁcial for soul engineers.

The Douluo Continent was divided into four nations: the Sun Moon Empire, the Star Luo Empire, the Heavenly Soul Empire, and the Dou Ling Empire. The only nation that possessed masses of soul engineers was the Sun Moon Empire, and this competition rule practically meant they were being openly biased. The Sun Moon Empire was being excessively dominant.

Of course, the Sun Moon Empire didn’t dare to be too outrageous. There were other changes to how the elimination rounds’ results would be calculated. Among them, the points would be allocated according to the number of people left in the team. That implied that if one party could defeat all seven members from another party with just one of their own in the single elimination match, then they would be allocated seven points, as their party would have seven people left, and they wouldn’t even have to go through the group battle afterward. The reason was because the group battle only gave ﬁve points, and there was no way the other party could turn the tables around. Of course, it was nigh impossible for one person to defeat seven opponents in a row in a competition like this.

Therefore, if the team that emerged victorious during the single elimination matches didn’t obtain more than ﬁve points, they would have to go through the group battle, and the other side would have a chance to turn it around. Of course, minor scores were also important, and every round’s accumulated points would be recorded. These minor scores would be decisive if a unique and unforeseen circumstance cropped up.

For example, if there were one hundred and sixty-seven teams participating in the competition, and there were only twenty teams who made it through the single elimination rounds during the round of thirty-two, the remaining teams that were needed to ﬁll the slots would be chosen with their

minor scores, and these accumulated scores would become

even more important once they entered the round robins. The teams would be ranked according to their accumulated points during the group stage. The quarter-ﬁnals would revert to an elimination format, while these minor scores would determine the loser’s rankings.

This change in how the points were calculated was a good thing, and it made the entire competition system more complete and organized.

The change in competition rules would deﬁnitely change how the competition would unfurl. Knocking sounds could be heard just as Huo Yuhao closed his eyes to ponder.

Boom, boom, boom! The hurried and forceful knocking clearly announced how frustrated and anxious the arriving party was. Wang Dong’er was still washing clothes for Huo Yuhao in the bathroom, and she hurriedly came forward and asked, “Who’s there?”

“It’s me, Jiujiu!” the Star Luo Empire’s princess, Xu Jiujiu, could be heard from outside.

Wang Dong’er turned around and glanced at Huo Yuhao. Their gazes met, and their eyes ﬂowed with faint amusement. The princess hadn’t taken too long to give them a response, in the end!

Wang Dong’er opened the door and invited Princess Jiujiu inside.

Xu Jiujiu was wearing a ﬂowing pale-gold dress today, and had tied her hair into a bun that brought out her noble and graceful qualities. However, her face seemed a little ﬂushed. Even though she was trying her best to hold it down, there was no way she could hide the dash of excitement in her eyes.

The red-dressed old woman followed closely behind Xu Jiujiu. Huo Yuhao had sought out Zhang Lexuan to ﬁnd out more about this old woman. It turned out that she had made a name for herself a long time ago, and people only knew that she was called Yi Man, but nobody knew her surname. Her martial soul was the Cloud Fan, and she was also the Titled Douluo Starcloud! According to Zhang Lexuan’s information,

the Starcloud Douluo hadn’t reached Rank 95, so she wasn’t a

Transcendent Douluo yet. Rank 95 wasn’t that easy to breach, and going beyond Rank 95 was a level that was far superior to the one that normal Titled Douluo reached.

“Greetings, princess. Please, have a seat.” Huo Yuhao was sitting on his wheelchair, and he tilted his head towards Xu Jiujiu courteously.

Xu Jiujiu knew that she had to be as calm as she could be in a time like this, but there was no way she could calm herself down, no matter how hard she tried. The Starcloud Douluo had returned in the morning, and Xu Jiujiu thought she might go crazy when the ﬁeld-test results were reported to her. What she was feeling inside could no longer be described as astonishment, and she eagerly headed to Huo Yuhao’s room immediately afterwards.

Xu Jiujiu took a deep breath and forcefully suppressed the emotions that were roiling in her heart, and she looked at the youth before her that could only move one arm.

Huo Yuhao was all smiles, and he seemed as harmless as ever, as if he had no idea what the princess was doing here.

“Huo Yuhao, I’m sure you know why I’m here.” Princess Jiujiu had seen and experienced many different situations after all, and she ultimately managed to force her emotions back even though she was stirred up inside.

Huo Yuhao nodded, and he swiftly withdrew the smile on his face. He said angrily, “You must be here because of the competition’s new rules. The Sun Moon Empire is too outrageous, they didn’t set a height limit for the competition! This is a rule that’s almost specially created to beneﬁt the Sun Moon Empire’s soul engineers!”

Xu Jiujiu was slightly taken aback. “What did you say?”

Huo Yuhao handed the instructions in his hands to her. Even though Xu Jiujiu was thinking about something else, the big competition was still extremely important, and she still had to pay attention to it.

Xu Jiujiu brieﬂy scanned the instructions and immediately understood what Huo Yuhao was trying to say. Her eyebrows locked together as she said, “What do you think we should do?”

Composure took over the indignant look on Huo Yuhao’s face. “We should collectively protest against it.”

Xu Jiujiu grunted and said, “And you think that will work?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “We still have to try. At least, we have to give them some pressure, so that they won’t add anything else afterwards.”

Xu Jiujiu tiled her head and said, “We’ll discuss this later. We’ve experimented and ﬁeld-tested your Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon and the Milk Bottle that you’ve given us.”

Huo Yuhao’s expression remained unchanged. “How did it go?” Xu Jiujiu stared at the casual smile on his face… she really wanted to pinch him as hard as she could! She muttered coldly, “Are you very proud?”

Huo Yuhao reacted in shock. “Am I?”

“Then what are you smiling about?” Xu Jiujiu answered angrily.

Huo Yuhao didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. “Isn’t smiling a form of respect for you, princess? If you’re not willing to see my smile, then I won’t.” He withdrew his smile as he spoke, and he put on an upright and solemn look and posture.

“……” Xu Jiujiu looked on as this guy in front of her put on a serious and professional look, and she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. The awkward indignation in her heart dissipated a little.

“We’ve experimented with and ﬁeld-tested your Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon, and that sealed Milk Bottles of yours. They’re very good. Do you think you can give us a discount if we purchase them in bulk?” Princess Jiujiu regained her composure in an instant, and she leaned back on the sofa gracefully as she spoke.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “I’m afraid that’s not possible.”

“Not possible? Do you know how many of these we’re going to purchase?” Princess Jiujiu sounded a little more high- pitched than before.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “I don’t know how many you wish to purchase, but I imagine it must be quite an amount. All I know is how much the Tang Sect can produce. As of now, our soul tool manufacturing department is undergoing a second expansion, and much of our labor has gone toward that endeavor. Therefore, we are very limited in the amount that we can currently produce. Furthermore, even though I feel a little embarrassed to say this, I have another piece of news for you – I’ve just received news from the Tang Sect that the price of our products might be inﬂated by about thirty percent due to resource scarcity and a lack of materials. Please forgive me, princess.”

“What? Huo Yuhao!” Xu Jiujiu was immediately riled up, and she leapt to her feet as her perky chest pumped up and down. She gritted her teeth and said, “It hasn’t even been two days, and you’re playing me already?”

Huo Yuhao shivered all over and said, “I wouldn’t dare to think of it. You can’t say things like this, princess! I still have to ﬁnd a wife.”

“You…” Xu Jiujiu felt as if she were going insane – this guy was just too hateful.

Wang Dong’er was behind Huo Yuhao, and she discreetly pinched him in the back. This bastard – he’s twisting her words, and yet he’s making himself sound so logical, as if he’s right. She was also a girl, and Wang Dong’er was starting to sympathize with Princess Jiujiu. Of course, she was dressed like a guy at the moment, so she couldn’t express anything that resembled a girl’s emotions, so she could only lower her head and force back her amusement. The Starcloud Douluo immediately became a little unfriendly. She lowered her voice and said, “Do you know what you’re doing? Karma will ﬁnd you if you go back on your word.” It was obvious that her words were hostile and threatening.

Huo Yuhao heaved a faint sigh. He forced a laugh and said, “I’m so sorry – I don’t wish for this to happen either. But you guys also know the Sun Moon Empire has monopolized seventy percent of the Continent’s rare metals, and they’ve prohibited exports. The Tang Sect has just been reestablished, so how can we have any channels or avenues to purchase resources and materials in bulk? Thankfully, Shrek City is developed and wealthy enough. Otherwise, we might not even be able to guarantee delivery and supply of our goods. The lack of resources and materials will undoubtedly lead to a rise in price. There’s nothing I can do about that.”

Xu Jiujiu said angrily, “Enough with that nonsense. The few of you make the decisions within the Tang Sect anyway. Furthermore, do you dare to claim that the Tang Sect is not related to Shrek Academy in any way? How can you guys lack materials and resources with Shrek Academy redirecting resources from Shrek City? Furthermore, all you need to craft your Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon is some relatively high- density steel.”

Xu Jiujiu was responsible for the Star Luo Empire’s intelligence, so she wasn’t that easy to deceive.

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “Since that’s the case, then you can ﬁnd out how many customers we have at the moment. Both the Heavenly Soul Empire and the Dou Ling Empire are both important business partners for us. You’re right – our Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon’s outer body only requires tough steel. But what about its formation arrays? Can we actually craft these formation arrays without rare metals?”

Xu Jiujiu laughed coldly and said, “We can’t take apart its formation arrays anyway. It will explode if we do that, so you can say whatever you want about it.”

Huo Yuhao frowned and said, “Princess, if you keep negotiating with me with such a rejecting attitude, I believe there’s no need for us to continue this negotiation. If we want to be partners, we have to build this partnership on mutual trust and beneﬁt as the foundations. I’m really sorry about the rise in price, but there’s really nothing we can do about that. How about this – you can go back and cool off, and you can calculate how much our Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons and our sealed Milk Bottles are worth after the inﬂation before we continue any further negotiations.”

“Hmph!” Xu Jiujiu grunted furiously before she started walking out of the room. She seemed enraged, but she was extremely calm inside – she was clear that she had been completely defeated by Huo Yuhao in this negotiation, and there was no other possible outcome than accommodating his demands if they continued with the negotiation. But she was absolutely unwilling to do that! She believed that Huo Yuhao and the Tang Sect would never give up a customer as big as the Star Luo Empire.

Right at this moment, knocking sounds could be heard once more, and Princess Jiujiu halted in her tracks as she was walking to the door.

Wang Dong’er walked over to open the door, and there were two pretty girls and a middle-aged man standing outside.

The person standing in front of the group was a young girl in a long white dress. She had a certain cold and crisp quality about her, and her features were very attractive. This girl was also mildly surprised when Wang Dong’er opened the door, and her eyes seemed to be searching her memory as she mumbled, “You… Who are you?”

Wang Dong’er smiled and said, “What? Don’t you recognize me, Mu Xue? I’m Wang Dong. We’ve been acquainted for some time.”

Dong’er dressed like a guy was something that most girls couldn’t resist. Even though Wang Dong used to have short hair, her unrivaled good looks were enough to enchant every single girl.

Mu Xue cleared her throat, and the iciness on her face melted a little. “Oh, it’s you. When I last met Huo Yuhao, the girl beside him looked a lot like you.”

Wang Dong’er answered plainly, “Her name is Wang Qiu’er, and she’s part of the team representing Shrek Academy. I believe you will meet her soon during the competition.”

“She’s your sister?” It was clear that Mu Xue’s eyes sparkled with curiosity and the desire for gossip. Wang Dong’er smiled. “Are you here today to ask me about such things?”

Mu Xue froze, and she shot a faintly resentful look at her as she said, “Can we go inside now? Is Huo Yuhao around? We’ve already conducted experiments and ﬁeld-tests with the item that he’s given us. We’re here today to talk about becoming business partners.”

Wang Dong’er opened the door and made a gesture to invite them inside.

The three of them entered the room, and they ran straight into Princess Jiujiu, who was just standing there. Xu Jiujiu’s eyes didn’t pause on Mu Xue, and she looked beyond her at the second girl behind her.

This girl was wearing a long yellow dress, and she seemed extremely gentle. Water seemed to meander within her beautiful eyes, and Xu Jiujiu could still feel that subtle tenderness even though she was looking her from afar. This girl was even prettier than Mu Xue. “Wei Na?” Xu Jiujiu exclaimed.

The young girl looked at her and said, “Why are you here, Jiujiu?” The yellow-dressed girl’s pleasant voice could be heard as she took a few steps forward. She had a look of pleasant surprise on her face.

Wei Na and Mu Xue were part of the company from the Heavenly Soul Empire that Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er had run into when they were inside the Great Star Dou Forest. The middle-aged man that had accompanied them here today was Mo Feiyun, the same man that led the group back then.

Huo Yuhao turned his wheelchair with one hand, and he smiled at Mo Feiyun. “Greetings, Uncle Mo. It’s been a while.”

Mo Feiyun was astonished when he saw the state that Huo Yuhao was in. “Yuhao, you…”

Huo Yuhao forced a laugh and said, “I was in an accident. I can only move this arm at the moment.” He moved his right arm as he spoke. Mu Xue and Wei Na looked over when they overheard Huo Yuhao and Mo Feiyun’s conversation. Mu Xue was also momentarily stunned when she saw Huo Yuhao sitting in a wheelchair.

“You… what happened to you? Why are you like that?” It wasn’t too long ago that she had met Huo Yuhao and Wang Qiu’er. She had never expected that this energetic and fearsome youth from before would be a cripple when they met again.

Huo Yuhao laughed mockingly at himself. “Perhaps this is my punishment for trespassing over the airspace of the Heavenly Soul Empire’s capital city. Greetings, Mu Xue. Hello, Wei Na.”

“Hello.” Wei Na stared at Huo Yuhao, and it was clear that her eyes ﬂowed with faint pity and sympathy. It was a terrible thing for a soul master to be able to move only one arm, but he seemed very open-minded about it.

The organizing committee had allocated the lowest-tier room to the team from the Tang Sect, and there were now so many people standing around inside that it felt a little packed.

Huo Yuhao looked at Xu Jiujiu and said, “Aren’t you going back to think about this, princess? I won’t escort you out, then.”

Xu Jiujiu stared deeply into his eyes. She grunted coldly and said, “I haven’t seen Wei Na in a long time. I’m going to accompany her for a little while more.” Her eyes gradually became aglare as she spoke. There was no question that Huo Yuhao had planned this seemingly coincidental encounter.

Huo Yuhao naturally understood what she was trying to say. He laughed bitterly and said, “Would you believe me if I said this was all a coincidence?”

“What do you think?” Xu Jiujiu raised her chin.

“Alright. Then think of it as if I’ve planned it, then,” Huo Yuhao said exasperatedly, “My place is a little small, everyone. Please have a seat however you like.”

Huo Yuhao was a little surprised as the person that spoke to him amongst the three of them wasn’t Mu Xue or Mo Feiyun – it was Wei Na, the seemingly fragile and gentle girl.

She stepped forward with a smile on her face and arrived before Huo Yuhao. “Hello, Yuhao. Can we discuss this in private?”

Huo Yuhao sounded a little helpless. “Look, the room is only so big. I’m afraid that speaking in private will be quite difﬁcult.”

Wei Na said, “If you don’t mind, I can push you into my room. I’ll send you back once we ﬁnish our negotiations.”

“No!” Two different female voices could be heard exclaiming at the same time.

Wang Dong’er wasn’t one of them – the voices belonged to Mu Xue and Princess Jiujiu. Urgency and hastiness returned to Xu Jiujiu’s eyes, while Mu Xue’s eyes ﬂowed with vigilance and wariness. Wang Dong’er was smiling to one side, and her smile was a little strange and sinister. However, nobody else but Huo Yuhao paid any attention to her. Huo Yuhao said exasperatedly, “Please, everyone. I’m just a cripple.”

Mu Xue grunted and said, “It doesn’t matter – I have to be present. I’ll accompany Wei Na for the negotiations, and then I’ll send you back.”

Xu Jiujiu’s face turned black as she said, “No way. Can’t you see that we’re discussing ofﬁcial business? I should have priority since I came here ﬁrst.”

Mu Xue glanced at her and said, “You must be the Star Luo Empire’s Princess Jiujiu. If I’m not wrong, you were just about to leave when we arrived. This means that your negotiations are over, and it’s our turn now.”

The two girls stared into each other’s eyes, and intense sparks seemed to ﬂy. Wei Na glanced at Huo Yuhao rather apologetically, and then she turned towards Xu Jiujiu.

Did Huo Yuhao deliberately plan this meeting? Actually, he didn’t. Huo Yuhao had guessed Mu Xue’s status, and he had tried to ﬁnd out more about the Heavenly Soul Empire when he was still at the Tang Sect. The Heavenly Soul Empire also shared a border with the Sun Moon Empire, and their situation wasn’t that much better than the Star Luo Empire, while their national strength was actually far inferior. It was likely that the Heavenly Soul Empire would be in much more danger.

Huo Yuhao had been investigating further through Shrek City’s intelligence agency when he realized to his surprise that the gentle and beautiful girl, Wei Na, was the Heavenly Soul Empire’s princess. Even though her status still couldn’t compare to Xu Jiujiu’s status in the Star Luo Empire, she was still a princess.

Chapter 277: Regent Concubine

Huo Yuhao let Na Na observe everyone in the lobby who came to register. She realized there wasn’t anything difﬁcult about Mu Xue and Wei Na. As a result, she sent a letter that came from the Tang Sect, along with a storage-type soul tool containing a Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon and Sealed Milk Bottle over.

No matter how intelligent Huo Yuhao was, he couldn’t possibly manipulate time so well that both parties would meet. It might even not be a good thing for them to meet. That was why he was also very helpless.

Xiu Jiujiu suddenly turned her gaze to Huo Yuhao, “Tell me, what do we do?”

Huo Yuhao looked at both parties, and everyone’s attention was drawn to him. After thinking for a moment, he said, “I’ll need everyone to suffer here in my humble abode for a while. I’m clear on your goals. Let’s do it this way. Since both parties representing the Star Luo Empire and Heavenly Soul Empire are here, we’ll carry out an open discussion. Both of you are Tang Sect clients, and we’ll do our best to be fair. What do the two of you think?”

“Wait a minute.” Xu Jiujiu interrupted Huo Yuhao suddenly. At such a timing, she revealed her strong character. “Huo Yuhao, let’s follow the price that we agreed on earlier. However, we’ll need to take priority. I won’t bargain with you either, but this sum of money is too astronomical. If you need it, we can make an exchange with some rare metals totaling to the same value.”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes brightened. To him, rare metals were better than gold soul coins. What he said before wasn’t a lie. More than seventy percent of the rare metals in the continent had been taken by the Sun Moon Empire and stored for potential use in a war. Even the Illustrious Virtue Hall had to seek approval from the imperial family and military if they wanted to use some for research.

If the Star Luo Empire could retrieve some rare metals to exchange for the cannons, it would undoubtedly be great for the future development of the Tang Sect’s Soul Tool Hall. However, Huo Yuhao didn’t rush to agree at this moment. After everything that he had been through, his mindset had transformed greatly. He was calmer in dealing with things.

“Priority? Sister Jiujiu.” Wei Na called softly.

Xu Jiujiu twisted her head to look at her and revealed an apologetic look. She said, “Wei Na, I won’t hide it from you since we are all here for a reason. We are under great pressure from the Sun Moon Empire. It concerns the survival of the empire. While we are good sisters, there are some things that I can’t give in to you on.”

Wei Na nodded gently and said, “I understand. Huo Yuhao, the Heavenly Soul Empire is willing to increase our bid by ten percent. We want priority.”

Huo Yuhao was in a momentary daze. He didn’t expect her to be so decisive. Furthermore, the purchasing price of the Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon and Sealed Milk Bottle wasn’t small. She actually initiated an increase in her bid. This wasn’t just about how bold she was. It also signiﬁed her position in the Heavenly Soul Empire. Xu Jiujiu was also stunned for a moment. After that, she looked dismal as she said. “Wei Na, you are very good at concealing yourself!”

Wei Na smiled and appeared as gentle as before, “Sister Jiujiu, you are right. There are some things that I can’t help if I’m representing my empire. I just hope this doesn’t affect our relationship.”

Xu Jiujiu gritted her teeth. In terms of wealth, the Star Luo Empire wasn’t inferior to the Heavenly Soul Empire. However, would the increase in bids stop if they continued like this? After the experiments, she was determined to get these two soul tools that could greatly increase the ﬁghting strength of the empire’s military. What should she do? This was a question that popped up in Xu Jiujiu’s head.

“Hmph!” A cold snort caused the temperature in the room to dip. A strong aura spread from the Starcloud Douluo Yi Man and suppressed the people from the Heavenly Soul Empire. Mo Feiyun, who was standing at the front, subconsciously retreated and unleashed his soul rings as he was pressured. Even though Mo Feiyun was already an eight-ringed Soul Douluo, his face still turned serious against a Titled Douluo. Princess Jiujiu was shocked too. Just as she was about to stop the Starcloud Douluo, a cold aura spread from Wei Na’s body. The temperature in the entire room dipped signiﬁcantly, and a majestic aura surged. The Starcloud Douluo’s expression changed, and she quickly blocked Princess Jiujiu.

There was one more person beside Wei Na. This person’s body was engulfed by a deep blue cloak, and thus it was difﬁcult to see what she looked like. However, it was possible to tell that she was a lady.

The aura came from her body. It swallowed the aura that the Starcloud Douluo unleashed. How strong was it?

“Transcendent Douluo?” Man Yi’s expression turned dismal. Even she didn’t realize when this person had entered the room. This showed that there was a gap in their cultivations. This gap also signiﬁed that she couldn’t challenge this person. There was only one possibility – that person was a Transcendent Douluo. As Wei Na lifted her right hand, the aura retracted, and she sighed. “Sister Jiujiu, do we have to do this? We shouldn’t be opponents.” Xu Jiujiu also sighed and said, “We were reckless. I apologize. Alright, I’ll follow your raise. We’ll add ten percent to our bid too.”

“Ladies, please don’t do this.” Huo Yuhao suddenly made his move.

The two ladies looked at him at the same time. They didn’t appear very friendly as they looked at him. Adding another ten percent to their bids made the price of the soul tools even more costly! Whichever empire purchased the soul tools would experience a fall in their wealth.

“Ladies, please hear me out.” Huo Yuhao said.

“I don’t need either of you to raise the price.” Huo Yuhao’s words dissolved some of the enmity between the two ladies.

“The Tang Sect requires money and resources to grow. We don’t belong to any empire, but we don’t want lives to be lost because of a war. We are also part of the continent, and we have a common enemy. I hope that our appearance can help the Star Luo, Heavenly Soul and Dou Ling empires, and not cause a rift. That’s why we won’t raise the price of the soul tools to increase the burden on any empire.”

As he spoke until here, he turned his attention to Xu Jiujiu and said, “Princess Jiujiu, I’m very sorry that the two of you met. I really didn’t know Princess Wei Na was coming. It’s really just a coincidence. Since both of you are here, however, allow me to say that competing will only lead to greater problems and allow our common enemy to succeed. Let’s do it this way. You can use whatever gold soul coins and alloys you have to exchange for the Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon. With sufﬁcient resources, our production can increase. I promise to supply ten sets of Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons and Sealed Milk Bottles every month. This number will increase once every month to meet your demands. I’ll give both empires priority. I’ll supply both of your empires before I supply any other partners in the future. That’s because both your empires are our ﬁrst line of defense against the Sun Moon Empire. I think this is the best way to settle the problem.”

This fellow! The unfriendly look in Xu Jiujiu’s eyes disappeared. Although she wasn’t pleased with this, she appreciated Huo Yuhao’s rejection of a price increase and attempt to resolve their conﬂict. At least he understood what was important. Mu Xue furrowed her brow, “Ten sets, isn’t that too little? Why don't you set an asking price, and we’ll buy the blueprints for these two soul tools? We’ll try to satisfy your asking price for these two soul tools.”

She was very bold! It seemed like Mu Xue wasn’t ordinary either. Huo Yuhao thought for a moment, but then immediately shook his head and said, “Apologies, it involves secrets of the Tang Sect. We deﬁnitely can’t sell our techniques. Ten sets is a conservative estimate. From what I know, each of the Sun Moon Empire’s Soul Engineering Divisions is equipped with around a hundred long-range cannons. They are around the standard of Class 4 soul cannons. There are less than ten cannons that are of a Class 6 standard. Although I’m not really sure, I believe there are no more than ten such divisions. This also means that it will only take one year for your empires to build up pretty strong defenses given our current rate of supply.”

Xu Jiujiu snorted and said, “How is it so simple? The Sun Moon Empire isn’t just about those few soul engineering divisions.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “Alright, I am really not sure how strong they are. However, what do the two of you think about my proposition? This is the best resolution I can ﬁnd for now.”

Xu Jiujiu looked at Wei Na, and discovered that Wei Na was looking back at her. After pondering for a while, both princesses nodded their heads without hesitation.

“It’s a deal.”

“It’s a deal.” Huo Yuhao also revealed a smile on his face. Of course, he was clear that this matter wasn’t just so simple. These two princesses weren’t ordinary people!

“Let’s sign a contract then.” Xu Jiujiu knew exactly not to take things as they were. Wei Na’s actions earlier had already put her on alert.

They took some time to discuss the details of the contact before they ﬁnished, which took around two hours.

One of the most important clauses was that the Star Luo and Heavenly Soul Empires couldn’t contact the Tang Sect privately and go against the contract. Whenever either party purchased soul tools from Tang Sect, they had to inform the other party. The Tang Sect also had to prioritize both empires whenever they were selling new types of soul tools. If the Tang Sect could produce a sufﬁcient number of Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannons and Sealed Milk Bottles, they had to supply both empires as best they could.

When the room was ﬁnally quiet again, Huo Yuhao’s eyes were already ﬁlled with fatigue.

Wang Dong’er carried him to his bed and gave him a simple massage.

“I’d rather compete and face a strong opponent than negotiate with them,” Wang Dong’er sighed. “You must be very tired, Yuhao.”

Huo Yuhao nodded lightly and said, “This is what the Tang Sect has to go through in order to develop. Not only have we received our most important order, but we have also developed a greater understanding of the management of both empires at the highest level.”

Wang Dong’er lowered her voice and said, “Do you know what Princess Jiujiu referred to when she mentioned the strength of the Sun Moon Empire?” Huo Yuhao lowered slightly and said, “I can roughly guess. It should be the advanced-level soul engineers and soul tools. Truly strong soul tools will not be given to the soul engineering teams. Although Xu Jiujiu didn’t mention it, I can tell from her expression that it’s something scary.”

Wang Dong’er nodded and revealed a lost look. She said, “Yuhao, do you think a war is really coming? What should we do then?”

Huo Yuhao squinted and said, “We can’t avoid a war. I only want to protect the people around me. If my body has recovered by the time the war starts, then I will…”

------

To every empire, the tournament was very prestigious. It was held once every ﬁve years, and the host would alternate between the four empires. It wasn’t easy to host the tournament.

Although the Sun Moon Empire’s proposed change to the tournament regulations received resistance from many sects and academies on the continent, it eventually still passed. There was a simple reason why the Sun Moon Empire didn’t restrict the difﬁculty of the tournament.

As soul tools continued to develop, future battles would be a challenge of soul masters and soul engineers’ control of soul tools. If one couldn’t excel in this area, how could he be called an elite?

Although this was an advantage for the Sun Moon Empire, every rational person had to admit it was true. The Sun Moon Empire wasn’t wrong.

Finally, the tournament was about to begin.

No matter what games were played between the Sun Moon Empire and the various parties involved in the tournament, the empire decided to hold the tournament in a vast plain at the outskirts. This was a good thing for the empire. They could accommodate more spectators in this way.

The lot-drawing ceremony was held on the eve of the tournament. Xu Sanshi was the one who represented the Tang Sect for the lot-drawing ceremony. There were a total of one hundred and sixty-seven competing teams. The fortunate team that drew an empty lot didn’t have to compete in the ﬁrst round of the tournament. Xu Sanshi’s luck wasn’t so good, and thus Tang Sect still had to compete in the ﬁrst round. The empire decided to give the empty lot to Shrek Academy, and thus Wang Qiu’er’s team managed to proceed to the next round. They were awarded twelve full points.

No one raised any objections to this preferential treatment. After all, Shrek Academy was an established academy in this tournament. This was what they deserved.

------

Morning...

As the ﬁrst ray of sunlight shone from the east, the streets of Radiant City were already greeted with a weird scene.

Soldiers clad in silver armor stood in two long parallel rows. They extended from the doors of the Ming Yue Hotel all the way to an unknown destination. The path they formed was also restricted from public access, and everyone was asked to stay thirty meters away from this path.

Radiant City could hold more people than Star Luo City, so the empire had activated a large portion of its military to maintain order. This arrangement alone required more than twenty thousand soldiers! There was a very austere aura in the air of the streets.

---

Everyone from the Tang Sect had already prepared in the morning. Bei Bei was in better shape, but he still couldn’t walk. He didn’t have too many instructions regarding today’s competition. However, Huo Yuhao still went to his room in the early morning.

“Eldest senior, are you feeling better?” Huo Yuhao asked the pale-looking Bei Bei.

“Oh, I’m much better. With my healing speed, I should be able to compete in ten days.” Bei Bei smiled as he spoke. He had already regained his elegant composure.

Huo Yuhao said, “We are going to compete. Eldest senior, do you have any instructions for us?”

Bei Bei shook his head and said, “What’s there to instruct? I believe in all of you. Go! This time, we are ﬁghting for the Tang Sect’s glory and ourselves! While we are still young, it’s time for us to shine. I’m waiting for all of you to return victorious!”

“Deﬁnitely!” Huo Yuhao nodded forcefully.

With Wang Dong’er’s help, everyone from Tang Sect put on some light makeup. This didn’t change their appearance too much. However, there were slight changes to everyone’s facial features, even on closer observation. Along with their own development, it was difﬁcult for others to tell that they were the Shrek’s Seven Monsters that had once created miracles in the last tournament. Of course, this would only last until they demonstrated their powers in this tournament. After all, they couldn’t conceal their martial souls.

Huo Yuhao still wanted Ji Juechen, Jing Ziyan, and Na Na to stay and take care of Bei Bei. However, Bei Bei didn’t let him do so. No one wanted to miss such a great event!

As Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan were already more than twenty, they could only tag along as ‘teachers’. Everyone from the Tang Sect changed into the same warrior robes.

Their warrior robes were specially designed. There were silver embroidered lines on their white warrior robes, and these lines eventually gathered at the back, forming the words Tang Sect.

---

Although there was a thirty meters restriction on the public, there were still many people who gathered to watch the competing teams as they exited the hotel.

When the Tang Sect team appeared, they immediately caused a huge uproar.

“Eh, look at this. This team is so weird! Why is there someone in a wheelchair? Is he allowed to compete in a wheelchair?” “Tang Sect? It seems like a sect. Has anyone heard of them before?”

“They seem to be an ancient sect. However, I heard that they’ve already collapsed. They’ve even sent a team with a cripple. Haha, this is funny! Can a cripple also be considered an elite?”

No one from the Tang Sect bothered with the commotion. Since Huo Yuhao dared to come in a wheelchair, he of course expected all this to happen. His abilities were the best way he could shut their mouths.

Huo Yuhao shut his eyes as he sat in the wheelchair. However, his spiritual power followed the path and extended forward into the distance. He was sensing the conditions of all the teams that had come to compete in this tournament, and sent this information to his teammates.

Huo Yuhao was already getting used to his disability. He had also discovered that this wasn’t really a bad thing for him. While his abilities were restricted, being disabled also made him more reliant on his spiritual power. Over this short period of time, Huo Yuhao had already begun to grasp many concepts that helped him to evolve his Purple Demon Eyes and the spiritual level of his concrete-immaterial realm. He was starting to use his spiritual-type abilities more and more efﬁciently.

There were more than two thousand people from the one hundred and sixty-seven teams. All of them left Radiant City.

---

The tournament venue was on the outskirts of the city. Once they passed the buildings in the city, they could see it from afar.

Right now, the area was crowded with people, with more than thirty thousand soldiers maintaining order. The crowd was divided into different regions, segregated from the grandeur of the main arena. To the north, there was a high platform made that looked like it could accommodate a thousand people.

The platform was more than ten meters high, and more than a hundred meters across. The wide platform shone with a silvery-white glow, and appeared to be made from metal. Even though it was just a platform, it was an extremely huge one! There weren’t any seams or breaks in it at all.

The weird thing was that there seemed to be a groove around the platform. There was a transparent barrier stained with dim yellow that rose into the sky coming out of that groove. The ends of the barrier couldn’t be seen. How high did one’s soul power have to be to support this barrier!?

Furthermore, it was possible to tell this was different from the last tournament. At least, no one could be struck off the stage and end up as a loser so easily. One had to completely defeat their opponent to win.

Beside the platform, there were huge soul screens extending a hundred meters from the center of the tournament stage. These soul screens were held in the air by tall scaffolding, and every screen was more than twenty square meters in size. Only the Sun Moon Empire possessed such soul tool techniques!

There were more than a hundred such screens set up around the tournament stage!

The resting area was on the east side of the stage, and was divided into two regions. The region closer to the stage was a pergola, and could hold close to twenty teams. The rest were just chairs that weren’t shaded. These chairs were lined up in a row to the sides of the pergola, slightly behind it.

From how the Sun Moon Empire hosted this tournament, their attention to detail reﬂected their superiority. The resting area with the pergola was undoubtedly left for the more prestigious academies and sects.

---

After registering at the registration point and providing the administrative details for the tournament, the Tang Sect team was led to a region with all wooden benches. It was even in a dilapidated corner.

Everyone from the Tang Sect looked very gloomy upon being awarded such poor treatment. Xiao Xiao and Jiang Nannan were also furious.

“This is too much!” Xiao Xiao hissed furiously.

He Caitou comforted her by patting her shoulders and smiled, but he didn’t say anything.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “This is nothing much. I’ll use my abilities to tell them that they are wrong. That’ll be enough, right?”

The sun had already risen at this point. As rays of sunlight shone on everyone from the east, every competitor seemed to be layered with gold. There were simply too many competing teams, and it took a whole hour for every team to settle down. The rapturous cheers from the public could also be heard in the distance.

Huo Yuhao was jolted suddenly, and turned in a certain direction. It was an extremely mysterious team. Zhang Peng was leading them, and there was a group of people behind him. They were all in black warrior robes, and wore headdresses with veils. These veils concealed their appearances. There was a lady with an excellent ﬁgure behind Zhang Peng. A weird aura was coming from her that seemed as if it were drawing all light towards her. When Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power got close to her, it was distorted and unable to get within a foot of her. Naturally, he couldn’t use his Spiritual Detection on her.

Tang Ya was following behind this lady. Even though Tang Ya was wearing a veil, Huo Yuhao could still tell that it was her.

The Holy Ghost Church? Huo Yuhao squinted. It was indeed them! The Holy Ghost Church was here to compete!

Teacher Xiao Ya, what should I do if I meet you in the tournament?!

Who was the lady in front of her? Her abilities were very weird. However, Huo Yuhao found the sense of distortion vaguely familiar for some reason.

Zhang Peng stopped in his tracks just as he was about to proceed towards the pergola. He turned around and faced Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao quickly retracted his spiritual power. Even though his spiritual cultivation was great, his soul power cultivation was still limited. Since Zhang Peng was a Transcendent Douluo, there were many ways he could deal with Huo Yuhao.

Zhang Peng scanned him with a cold look before he led the men in black towards the pergola.

Huo Yuhao saw a few familiar faces after this. There was the Star Luo National Academy’s team led by Princess Jiujiu, as well as the team with Mu Xue and Wei Na. They didn’t seem to be from any academy of the Heavenly Soul Empire. From their uniforms, they seemed more likely to have come from a sect. Mo Feiyun was the one leading the team. However, the Transcendent Douluo that had appeared the previous day did not make an appearance.

Apart from these few teams, there were many unfamiliar faces, especially those sects that had rushed out from the various other empires on the continent. Huo Yuhao knew nothing about them. He could only use his Spiritual Detection to observe and ascertain their cultivations. “Look. What is that?” Jiang Nannan’s voice caught Huo Yuhao’s attention.

A company of special soldiers were proceeding over quickly from the north of the main stage. These soldiers were wearing golden warrior robes, but they weren’t equipped with any weapons. With Huo Yuhao’s vision, he could even read their expressions clearly. These golden-clothed guards were all at least thirty years old. They all restrained their expressions, but there were deﬁnitely soul power undulations coming from them. There were around ﬁve hundred of them, but they didn’t make a sound as they proceeded over. As the sun shone down on them, they glittered, and were almost blinding.

These soldiers quickly dispersed as they reached the foot of the main stage, surrounding the entire stage. Around ﬁfty of them stood in position without moving. As metal clanging sounds were heard, they brandished soul cannons and pointed the cannons outward. The rest of the soldiers also unleashed different types of soul tools and entered a weird formation. At least ten of the heavy cannons caught Huo Yuhao’s attention. He could tell that they were at least Class 7 soul tools!

He Caitou told everyone, “Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Division. This is one of the true core strengths of the Sun Moon Empire.”

“Oh? How many of them are there, second senior?” Huo Yuhao suddenly recalled what his and He Caitou’s identities were. He looked over towards He Caitou.

He Caitou was also looking back at him. He didn’t seem as simple as before anymore. His eyes were ﬂashing with a radiant glow.

“There are only a thousand people in the division. Half of them are here now. They are all at least Class 5 soul engineers, equipped with the best soul tools. Their leader is a Class 9 soul engineer, and only accepts orders from the Emperor himself. They are the trump card of all trump cards. Their importance to the imperial family is only inferior to the Imperial Shrine.”

“Isn’t the Emperor seriously ill? Has he recovered?” Huo Yuhao was stunned.

At this point, a group of people arrived. They were escorted by the Soul Engineering Division on chariots and horses to the main stage. There was a small imperial chariot pulled by thirty-two horses. There were also many guards and ofﬁcials decked in luxurious court wear behind this chariot.

The chariot stopped in front of the main stage. Two maids pulled open curtains embroidered with silver lotuses, and a wheelchair was pushed out. There was a handsome youth in the wheelchair.

“It’s him!” Huo Yuhao was stunned to see that it wasn’t the Emperor coming out from the chariot. It was the Crown Prince, Xu Tianran!

Only the Emperor could sit in such a chariot! Since Xu Tianran dared to sit in this chariot, everyone knew what it signiﬁed.

Following this, Huo Yuhao focused his attention again. He saw that the person pushing the wheelchair was Ju Zi.

Ju Zi was still as beautiful as ever, her complexion even more delicate now. Compared to before, her beautiful eyes had a more digniﬁed look, and she was extremely elegant, like a queen.

There was one person walking beside Ju Zi... Jing Hongchen. He was an extremely powerful Class 9 soul engineer who held a respected status in the Sun Moon Empire.

“Greetings to Prince Regent and Regentess.” Aside from the Soul Engineering Division, all the ofﬁcials present knelt down and greeted Xu Tianran.

Regent? It seemed like the Sun Moon Empire’s Emperor wasn’t dead yet...

Regentess? Ju Zi, Ju Zi, she actually… Indescribable emotions ﬁlled Huo Yuhao’s heart and made him short of breath. She has married him and become his legitimate wife? Ju Zi, why are you doing this just for revenge?

A smooth and delicate hand reached out for Huo Yuhao’s shoulder. Huo Yuhao turned around and saw Wang Dong’s clear, powdery-blue eyes.

“I’m ﬁne.” Huo Yuhao gently shook his head. Wang Dong’er smiled and said, “It’s great that you are ﬁne.” As she said that, she grabbed Huo Yuhao’s right hand.

Huo Yuhao’s sadness slightly dissipated when he felt Wang Dong’er’s soft palm. Perhaps it wasn’t love between him and Ju Zi, but they were deﬁnitely more than ordinary friends. He would deﬁnitely be happy for Ju Zi if she could ﬁnd a good spouse. However, would she be happy with someone like Xu Tianran?

Furthermore, Xu Tianran was an aggressive person. Once he ruled the Sun Moon Empire, the war might really come soon!

Right now, he couldn’t help but think of what Ju Zi said before; if there was a day that they met on the battleﬁeld...

Just as Huo Yuhao was overthinking things, Ju Zi had already pushed Xu Tianran into a soul elevator. Jing Hongchen and four elders followed him into the elevator. As the elevator rose, everyone could see the regent. Their cheers started to ring out. This Crown Prince was actually able to win the hearts of the people! The ofﬁcials couldn’t follow him up the elevator. They used the stairs to one side of the main stage to ascend.

Xu Tianran’s arrival also meant that the tournament was about to begin.

Ju Zi pushed Xu Tianran to the center of the main stage. She didn’t sit down, but stood beside him. Since she didn’t sit, the ofﬁcials who were panting after climbing the stairs also didn’t dare to sit, and could only remain standing.

Xu Tianran nodded at Ju Zi, who then slowly walked forward to a sound amplifying soul tool. Her moving voice soon rang out to everyone.

“Silence.” A low voice sounded, and a strong suppression ﬁlled the entire place. After the voice sounded, everyone felt that everything in front of them had turned dark. Even their breathing sped up. Any commotions disappeared after it spoke. The entire tournament venue turned silent instantly, to the point where even a dropped pin would ring out. What abilities did she have? How was she able to exert such terrifying suppression? She had used her own strength to terrorize more than hundred thousand people! Was this really achievable by a soul master?

Huo Yuhao was horriﬁed, and he blurted out almost instantly, “Darkness Holy Dragon, Dragon Emperor Douluo Long Xiaoyao!”

Chapter 278: First Battle

Others might be unfamiliar with that voice, but he was extremely familiar with it. It sounded old, yet was ﬁlled with might. The owner of this voice was the one who had intercepted him back then and left Elder Xuan terriﬁed.

He was the Dragon Emperor Douluo Long Xiaoyao; a Rank 99 Ultimate Douluo, and the only one left from the Twin Holy Dragons of Black and White.

He was actually here, and had personally paid a visit to boost the Sun Moon Empire’s presence. Huo Yuhao was now certain that the Holy Ghost Church and Sun Moon Empire were very close with each other.

Ju Zi cleared her throat at this moment. Her moving voice resonated through the sound-amplifying soul tool, and everyone heard her. If Long Xiaoyao’s voice was a demonstration of his strength, Ju Zi’s voice was a demonstration of the Sun Moon Empire’s cutting-edge technology. “Citizens of the Sun Moon Empire and distinguished guests from afar, I’m here to welcome all of you on behalf of the Prince Regent! At the same time, I announce on his behalf that the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament has ofﬁcially begun!”

Her opening speech was very straightforward. She didn’t ramble about superﬂuous stuff. That was Xu Tianran’s style. Everything was about one’s abilities. To him, talking more was only a big waste of time.

“Long live the Prince Regent.” The citizens of the Sun Moon Empire knelt down towards Xu Tianran, the likely successor of the current Emperor.

Xu Tianran continued to wear a smile on his face as he sat in his wheelchair. He reached out his right hand towards Ju Zi.

Ju Zi placed her right hand on his palm before sitting beside him as she leaned on him. She wore a light smile on her face.

Xu Tianran patted her hand and didn’t say anything. He gazed calmly at the tournament stage below.

“My beloved subjects, take a seat,” Xu Tianran said calmly. The ofﬁcials only dared to sit at this point. Every seat was tagged according to their statuses in the empire, so they couldn’t sit in the wrong seat.

The person sitting on the other side of Xu Tianran wasn’t Jing Hongchen. It was a middle-aged man wearing a long black robe with golden sleeves. This person was expressionless, and had a pale look on his face. The weird thing was that there seemed to be a hazy layer around his face, and it wasn’t possible to see his face clearly. Jing Hongchen was sitting on the other side of Ju Zi.

“The tournament rules and regulations will be read out now,” a sonorous voice sounded. After this, the tournament’s rules and regulations were read out. They were unchanged from the instruction booklets disseminated to every team.

---

After the reading was done, an elder walked up to the sound- amplifying soul tool and said loudly, “First battle of the preliminary round: Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy against the Dragonslayer Sect. The members of both teams, please proceed to the waiting area.”

The waiting area was a special region in front of the pergola. Seven chairs were placed on each side, and the two rows of chairs were separated by a horizontal distance of twenty meters.

Huo Yuhao revealed a smile on his face. No wonder Shrek Academy was given the empty lot. It was on purpose!

According to the tournament rules, the ﬁrst battle should involve the current title holders. Since Shrek Academy was given the empty lot, the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy would replace their spot, as they were the runners-up of the previous tournament. This was undoubtedly a trick played by the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

Very soon, Huo Yuhao saw someone familiar. Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were in front, and behind them were ﬁve young soul masters that he had never seen before. They directly entered the waiting area. The unfortunate Dragonslayer Sect also sent seven members into the waiting area. However, Huo Yuhao was surprised that the seven members from the Dragonslayer Sect were very conﬁdent. They weren’t fearful because their opponents were the runners-up in the previous tournament. They were quite imposing!

However, Huo Yuhao didn’t know that most sects didn’t look up to academies. After all, the instructors and students in academies were limited by time. Apart from some special cases, the students from academies and disciples from sects were vastly different.

A disciple remained in their sect for his entire life. For most sects with rich histories and legacies, they had something special about them.

In the ﬁrst Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournaments, sects had been included. However, they were subsequently removed for some reason. The Dragonslayer Sect was a sect that had a legacy of more than ten thousand years. They came from the Heavenly Soul Empire, and were a traditional soul master sect. They discriminated against soul tools, and were scornful towards the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s team. They didn’t think they were going to lose.

“Referee, please enter the stage. The ﬁrst competitor for each side, please enter the stage too,” the elder who was emceeing instructed them.

Huo Yuhao compared this tournament with the last one. Although he didn’t want to admit it, he was certain that he preferred this edition of the tournament more. It was simpler, less ﬂowery, and more practical for ﬁghting. This was the true meaning of a tournament! It was a way to increase the sparring, interaction, and learning between soul masters and soul engineers.

The referee was an elder more than ﬁfty years old. It was impossible to tell his cultivation before he unleashed his martial soul. The ﬁrst competitor from the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy was Meng Hongchen. She was the only one on the team that was inferior to Jing Hongchen, and was the ﬁrst to compete. This showed how much the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy wanted to win the ﬁrst battle. This wasn’t just about victory; it concerned the face of the Sun Moon Empire! A young man from the Dragonslayer Sect was ﬁrst to compete. He had a somewhat special appearance. His head was a little ﬂat, he wasn’t tall, and he looked a little thick. His palms were extremely large. As he opened them wide beside his body, they looked like fans.

At this point, the spectators maintained their silence. They hadn’t recovered from the Dragon Emperor Douluo’s suppression, as only a short period of time had passed.

“In this individual elimination round, I will decide who’s the winner once either of you loses your ﬁghting strength, or concedes defeat. You must not harm your opponent. Understand?” the referee instructed both parties.

“Yes.” The youth representing the Dragonslayer Sect appeared full of energy. After acknowledging the referee’s words, he turned around and walked towards his own side. He didn’t even carry out the formalities. According to the rules, both parties had to be a hundred meters apart from each other before the ﬁght started. This was fairer to some soul masters and soul engineers who were skilled in long-range attacks. Meng Hongchen had experienced great transformations and become a lady. Her slender ﬁgure was proportionate, and she was very charming. Although she wasn’t as good-looking as Wang Dong’er or Jiang Nannan, she was still a beauty. However, the other party didn’t even glance at her before walking away. Meng Hongchen was greatly displeased by his attitude, and a vicious look ﬂashed across her eyes. She snorted and turned to the other side of the stage.

Very soon, both parties were in position.

The referee lifted his right hand high. When his palm swiped down, the ﬁrst battle of the tournament began.

Bang!

There was a boom that resonated from the youth’s leg just as the referee’s right hand swiped down. The tough, metal ﬂoor was dented as he leapt out. His short and stocky body burst towards Meng Hongchen like a ﬁred cannon shell.

While he appeared to look down on Meng Hongchen, he didn’t truly underestimate her. When a soul master fought against a soul engineer, it was important to close the gap. His soul rings lit up as he burst forward. It was easy to tell that he was an assault-type soul master from the power that he unleashed. The sudden burst of strength allowed his cultivation to temporarily rival that of an agility-type soul master.

Two yellow, two purple and one black soul ring – the best combination – lit up on the youth’s body. In this tournament, a ﬁve-ringed soul master was considered quite strong. There were only a few six-ringed soul masters and soul engineers from a few outstanding academies.

The Dragonslayer Sect didn’t have a high standing, but they sent a ﬁve-ringed Soul King right from the start. This showed how solid their foundation was. The expression of many leaders from the various academies changed when they saw this.

Meng Hongchen didn’t rush forward, and didn’t even retrieve the soul tool that she always used. She walked forward leisurely, and only an icy-blue halo slowly spread from her feet. Two yellow, two purple and two black soul rings slowly rose up, and caused the spectating Dragonslayer Sect team members to change their expressions.

As sects weren’t allowed to compete in the last tournament, and each edition was ﬁve years apart, the Dragonslayer Sect knew very little about the Sun Moon Soul Engineering Academy’s team. They felt that they had bad luck after drawing the previous runners-up, but didn’t think they would lose.

However, they felt pressured when they saw Meng Hongchen’s soul rings. Six rings of the best combination! Was that even possible for soul engineers? There was an age limit of twenty years!

The youth had already reached Meng Hongchen as they were thinking of all this. He was the second strongest member of the Dragonslayer Sect’s team. Furthermore, his ﬁghting style was that he would never retreat! Even when he saw Meng Hongchen’s six soul rings, he wasn’t afraid. His ﬁrst and third soul rings lit up as he charged her.

“Moo——” The youth let out a low-pitched groan, and his stocky body suddenly ballooned in size. His increase in size wasn’t proportionate; he only stretched horizontally. A pair of thick, twisted and sharp horns poked out from his shoulders. They were almost two feet long. His muscles were about to tear his shirt and reveal his naked, burly body.

It was his ﬁrst soul skill, Strength of Barbaric Bull.

The martial soul of this youth was a Charging Bull. It didn’t sound very impressive, but it was one of the top-ranked bull- type martial souls. Although the Strength of Barbaric Bull only came from his ﬁrst soul ring, it was quite dominant. Not only was it extremely strong and impactful, but it also made him temporarily lose any sensation of pain, and increased his defensive strength greatly. Among all the strengthening skills that came from ﬁrst soul rings, the Strength of Barbaric Bull was one of the top three, and was even stronger than Dai Yueheng’s White Tiger’s Shield.

His eyes turned blood-red at the same. Two streaks of bloody light shot out from his eyes straight towards Meng Hongchen. Meng Hongchen was given a shock.

Meng Hongchen shuddered in her heart. Not only this, but she also found out that everything around her had seemed to slow down.

There was even a control-type soul skill?

It came from the third soul ring of the Charging Bull, Glare of Barbaric Bull.

He had locked onto his opponent, allowing him to track her while she tried to dodge his attack. At the same time, he slowed her dodging speed.

Compared to academies, sects were much better in some areas. For example, their research in some special martial souls was much better. In every sect, there was a certain martial soul that was passed down from generation to generation. After years of legacy, their research on that speciﬁc martial soul would have become very profound. This was something that academies couldn’t compare to. Simply put, the research of academies only scratched the surface, but the research of sects managed to get to the crux. After countless attempts, they found the most suitable martial soul that they could pass down for generations.

This was the case for this youth from the Dragonslayer Sect. His Strength of Barbaric Bull and Glare of Barbaric Bull came from soul rings that were the most suitable for the Charging Bull. They were also soul rings that formed the best combination.

However, he felt a chill as he burst into the icy-blue region.

He actually shivered, and slowed slightly.

At this point, he was already very close to Meng Hongchen. There wasn’t any time for him to think, and thus he continued his charge towards Meng Hongchen.

Meng Hongchen smiled and blew gently towards his direction. Her ﬁrst and third soul rings lit up at the same time, causing the smooth, icy surface beneath their feet to extend. The youth’s sharp horns were already in front of Meng Hongchen. It was a coincidence, but his horns were directly in front of Meng Hongchen’s chest because he wasn’t very tall.

Meng Hongchen looked a little vexed, and in the next instant, she appeared behind the youth.

His body ﬂashed past Meng Hongchen quickly, and he didn’t manage to strike her. However, he managed to stop himself from instantly using his Glare of Barbaric Bull before he turned around and burst towards Meng Hongchen again.

However, two Meng Hongchens appeared on the icy surface. His Glare of Barbaric Bull tried to lock onto both ﬁgures, but it lost its effect instantly. He was stunned.

This was Meng Hongchen’s third soul skill, Ice Reﬂection. The ﬁgure that she reﬂected looked exactly like her. Through various reﬂections, she kept on conjuring projections of herself. As a result, she then gave the youth the feeling that three of her had appeared even though his Glare of Barbaric Bull was still locked onto her body, as she kept on changing her position using her soul skill. Another intense chill engulfed his body. The youth revealed a look of horror, and his ﬁfth soul ring lit up without any hesitation.

It was a pity that it was too late. Compared to ﬁve years ago, Meng Hongchen’s Icetoad Venom was even stronger now. Furthermore, she wasn’t simply at Rank 61 now that she possessed six soul rings!

A layer of blue spread across the youth’s face. Before his ﬁfth soul ring even lit up, he groaned and trembled before he collapsed to the ﬂoor.

All the other competing members from the Dragonslayer Sect in the waiting area all stood up suddenly. They couldn’t believe the scene in front of them. They didn’t understand what was going on.

The light from Meng Hongchen’s soul rings retracted, and she lifted her chin arrogantly. She turned to the referee and said, “I’ve won. Next competitor please.” After saying this, she retrieved a Milk Bottle to restore her soul power. In this individual elimination round, there weren’t any rules that stated she couldn’t use soul tools to aid her recovery.

The referee rushed to the youth and checked his condition. He nodded at Meng Hongchen after ascertaining that her opponent had completely lost his ﬁghting strength.

“You’ve won, but your martial soul is poison-type. Please help him neutralize the poison to prevent endangering his life.” The referee said.

Meng Hongchen twisted her lips and said, “Referee, have you forgotten? There’s still the team round later.” Yes! According to the rules, no substitutions could be made in the team round after the individual elimination round was over. This also meant that the members in the waiting area had to compete in the team round.

The referee furrowed his brow and said, “However, his life will be in danger if this continues.”

Meng Hongchen shouted towards the waiting area where the Dragonslayer Sect’s team members were, “Promise me that he won’t compete in the team battle, and I’ll help him neutralize the poison.” Poison!

The rest of the Dragonslayer Sect team only now understood how Meng Hongchen managed to defeat her opponent. They all looked at one another. Eventually, they focused their attention on one person. It was a tall and huge youth, who was also their team leader for this tournament.

“Please neutralize the poison. He won’t compete in the team round later.” This team leader didn’t hesitate at all, and immediately made his decision. Of course, that was because none of them specialized in neutralizing poison or were healing-type soul masters.

Meng Hongchen squatted down without hurry and pressed her hand on the youth’s chest. She sucked back her Icetoad Venom.

Wang Dong’er said to Huo Yuhao softly in the resting area, “Meng Hongchen’s abilities have increased signiﬁcantly!”

Huo Yuhao said, “After two years of exchange, they have learned something from Shrek Academy. Did you interact with the two siblings? What standard has Meng Hongchen’s abilities reached?”

Wang Dong’er twisted her mouth and said, “I did interact quite a fair bit with Meng Hongchen. However, it’s because she harassed me every day. I don’t know what rank her soul power is. She conceals her abilities very well. However, I estimate that her cultivation is above mine. The two of them already had ﬁve rings ﬁve years ago. I’m sure they are above Rank 65 right now.”

“Harass you?” Huo Yuhao’s expression turned weird, “My Dong’er is a male and a ladykiller! Impressive, impressive. If you meet her, you can trap her with your beauty.”

Wang Dong’er blushed. “I didn’t…”

Huo Yuhao chortled and changed the topic. He said, “As a soul engineer, Meng Hongchen used the methods of soul masters to win the ﬁght. This shows how conﬁdent she is in her own cultivation. Her opponent wasn’t weak either. His martial soul and soul skills are quite strong. I used my Spiritual Detection to sense the youth from the Dragonslayer Sect. He has invigorating qi. With strengthening skills, he managed to resist Meng Hongchen’s venom for some time. He might have caused some trouble for her if he used his strongest soul skill immediately. These sect teams are indeed quite extraordinary! This edition of the tournament will be quite cracking.”

Meng Hongchen’s dominance cast a shadow over the Dragonslayer Sect. The second to compete was a thin and tall youth. When he stood in front of Meng Hongchen, he looked at her with a more cautious look.

The referee repeated the rules again. This Dragonslayer Sect competitor took the initiative to say, “Dragonslayer Sect. Feng Shèn.”

“Feng Shén?” Meng Hongchen was stunned.

Feng Shen’s lips moved slightly, and he replied, “It’s Feng Shèn, not Feng Shén.”

Meng Hongchen twisted her lips and said, “It’d be best if you were called Feng Shén. It sounds mightier.”

ED: This is related to tones in CN. Said in the fourth tone (which is said in a higher pitch that falls sharply), Feng Shèn is just a name. However she misheard it in the second tone (said in a rising tone similar to asking a question) as Feng Shén, which literally means ‘Caution’. Hope that this clears up any confusion.

A furious look ﬂashed across Feng Shen’s eyes. “Don’t be too arrogant. Don’t think that you’ll win against me just because you won against my vice team-leader.”

Meng Hongchen threw him a scornful look, “I’ll try. I think he had the same thought as you. He didn’t even touch my sleeves before I defeated him.” Her self-conﬁdence was one of a kind! She wasn’t depleted from the ﬁrst battle. Furthermore, she took the opportunity to replenish her soul power as the vice team-leader from the Dragonslayer Sect was poisoned. She was basically still in her peak condition right now. Naturally, she wasn’t too bothered by Feng Shen.

Feng Shen nodded at her and walked towards his position expressionlessly.

The two of them quickly drew their distance from each other and went to their respective positions. Everyone watched as the referee lifted his right hand before swiping it down. The second battle began!

As the referee’s hand swiped down, a loud eagle call sounded. Following this, a bolt of dim purplish electricity instantly shot into the sky. It was extremely quick, such that Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection couldn’t even capture it.

It was Feng Shen who had shot into the sky. He was too quick. Two yellow, two purple and one black soul ring shone on his body. Right now, he had already unleashed his soul rings. A pair of deep blue wings that didn’t seem too wide extended from his arms. His entire body released a strong dim purplish glow. In a matter of seconds, he was already thirty meters high in the air, and was far away from Meng Hongchen.

“It’s very targeted!” Huo Yuhao was stunned as he commented. Feng Shen was using speed to curb Meng Hongchen’s venom. Undoubtedly, he had to be very explosive in terms of his offensive power.

Meng Hongchen’s live experience was rather rich. Seeing that her opponent had burst into the sky, she was also shocked. However, she didn’t panic. Her six soul rings lit up. Her Icevenom Ring and Ice Reﬂection specialty skills were unleashed concurrently.

In mid-air, Feng Shen’s wings ﬂapped open to both sides. His dim purplish glow started to turn darker, and his ﬁrst and third soul rings shone concurrently. When his ﬁrst soul ring lit up, his wings also increased one foot in size. The dim purplish glow became increasingly darker.

When his third soul ring lit up, the glow from his body became even more intense. Everything within a ten-meter radius turned purple. Following this, his ﬁfth soul ring lit up, too. The pitch-black soul ring expanded out before converting into rings of light that revolved around his body. His body started to distort, and became a little unclear.

Xu Sanshi, who was sitting beside Huo Yuhao, squinted and said, “He wants to end this battle in one strike!”

Huo Yuhao smiled and asked, “Third senior, what’s your take on this guy’s attack?”

Xu Sanshi replied without any hesitation, “Very strong! From the looks of it, his martial soul should be the Lightning Falcon. The Lightning Falcon has always been recognized as a predator of eagles. It’s an extremely quick martial soul. It’s a third the size of other falcons, but is extremely vicious. It feeds on the internal organs of other falcons. Even an eagle ten times its size is scared of it. It’s not just quick; it’s able to alter its direction at high speed in the air. Among agility-type martial souls, it’s one of the best. Of course, its strengths and weaknesses are evident. I don’t think I need to explain what it’s weakness is with high speed and a quick offense, right? Xiao Xiao and Jiang Nannan said at almost the same time, “Defense!”

Xu Sanshi chuckled and said, “If I were his opponent, he’d collide with my shield and die.”

Jiang Nannan glared at him and snapped, “Would it kill you not to boast?”

Xu Sanshi’s expression turned from arrogant to deep. He was ﬁlled with passion as he looked at Jiang Nannan and said, “I won’t die from not boasting. However, I’ll die without you.” As he spoke, he held onto Jiang Nannan’s hand and caressed it.

Jiang Nannan’s face turned red. She made a spitting sound before turning her attention back to the stage. However, she didn’t pull her hand back.

A dim light ﬂashed. Huo Yuhao revealed a pensive look on his face. He was also observing how Meng Hongchen was going to resist the Lightning Falcon’s quick offensive strike. Just like Feng Shen, Meng Hongchen’s weaknesses and strengths were also very evident. Without a doubt, her strength lay in her venom. Even opponents with a greater cultivation than her might ﬁnd it difﬁcult to win against her. This was the case with Dai Yueheng back then. However, her offensive and defensive strengths weren’t very impressive even though she was poisonous.

Back when she only had ﬁve rings, her only true offensive soul skill was her ﬁfth soul skill, Iceﬁre Venomdragon’s Corkscrew, and she had relied on her Ice Reﬂection as her defensive soul skill. When she faced a domain-type, long-range attack, it was difﬁcult for her to counter.

However, the difference Meng Hongchen had with her opponents was that she wasn’t just a soul master, she was also a soul engineer! Huo Yuhao and the few of them could discern her weaknesses, so she naturally knew what her weaknesses were too, and she relied on soul tools to make up for her weakness. As for what she could do, it wasn’t something that they knew yet. They could only learn by observation.

Feng Shen took quite a long time to prepare his ﬁfth soul skill. As the glow around his body distorted, it slowly disappeared. The dim purplish glow in mid-air slowly turned dark purple. A purple eagle with three-meter-long wings slowly took form.

This resembled a Martial Soul True Body! Meng Hongchen could sense that she was being locked on to. She had no way of differentiating whether her opponent’s attack was domain- type or omnidirectional. Under such an unfavorable circumstance, Meng Hongchen still managed to keep herself poised, and appeared very calm. There were no emotions on her face, and no one knew what she was thinking.

At this point, the purplish ﬁgure up in the air ﬁnally moved. It formed an arc in the air that came straight towards Meng Hongchen.

He was too quick, and caused a piercing sonic boom as he was halfway there. This only happened because he was traveling almost at the speed of sound!

Meng Hongchen instantly understood that his attack would be omnidirectional. However, he was so quick that it was impossible for her to unleash her Ice Reﬂection. This terrifying speed was beyond her comprehension. She’d never even seen a seven-ringed Soul Sage reach that speed before.

The purplish glow appeared right in front of her as it was unleashed and the sonic boom sounded.

However, a dim pinkish glow was suddenly released from Meng Hongchen’s chest. This glow changed into a barrier that blocked her body.

At the most critical moment, she still relied on a soul tool. It was in her nature.

Boom——!

Meng Hongchen’s entire body was swallowed by the frightening purple glow. The tremendous impact caused the metal ﬂoor to cave in. Even the icy surface formed by Meng Hongchen’s Ice Reﬂection started to crack. The strike was truly powerful!

All the spectators held their breath. This strike was too terrifying! Although they knew soul masters were strong, it was very rare for them to personally witness the supernatural abilities of a soul master. The frightening strength of impact generated balls of cyclones that caused ripples in the defensive light barriers surrounding the stage.

Everyone’s attention was caught by the purplish glow. For a Soul King to unleash such a strike, he was close to the standard of a Soul Emperor! In fact, another soul master wouldn’t have given Feng Shen so much time to prepare. He had used too much time to accumulate his power.

Regarding this, the Dragonslayer Sect must have had judged that Meng Hongchen wouldn’t take the initiative to close the gap, and so Feng Shen was instructed to use his strongest attack immediately. Events proved that that they had been right. At least, Feng Shen managed to successfully unleash his strongest strike.

However, had he actually won?

The purple slowly faded away, and two ﬁgures appeared in front of everyone. Meng Hongchen was still standing in her initial position, completely unmoved. Her entire body was engulfed by the dim pinkish light barrier. Feng Shen was ten meters away from her, one of his knees on the ﬂoor. His arms that had changed into wings had drooped down, as if they had lost a bone, and he was panting hard.

Meng Hongchen hadn’t unleashed an Invincible Barrier, but it seemed like the protective barrier that she had used was at least Class 7! If it were Class 6, she couldn’t possibly remain in her position after suffering such a violent attack.

Plop! Feng Shen collapsed to the ground and went unconscious. After completing his strongest strike, his arms were fractured, and he had also suffered from the Icetoad Venom’s poison.

However, Meng Hongchen also looked to be in bad shape. She didn’t expect her trump card to be revealed to all her opponents. Feng Shen’s attack had been too strong, such that her soul power was depleted by forty percent. She was only able to tap into the backlash of a Class 7 soul tool to gravely hurt her opponent.

This was extremely targeted. If Meng Hongchen only had ﬁve rings and didn’t have such a strong defensive soul tool, she would have lost. “We concede defeat. He won’t compete later either. Please neutralize his poison,” the team leader of the Dragonslayer Sect’s team decided immediately.

Cheers also exploded out at this moment. Meng Hongchen wasn’t just representing the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, she was also representing the Sun Moon Empire! Here, she didn’t have any lack of fans, and she had won two ﬁghts consecutively! They were cheering for her victory!

In the succeeding rounds, the Dragonslayer Sect didn’t have anyone that could curb Meng Hongchen. Four people fell to her poison. However, her own soul power was also being increasingly depleted. After all, this was a ﬁght between two teams. Although her cultivation was greater than Rank 65, her soul power was still limited. If not for the fact that her ﬁrst two opponents were Soul Kings, she wouldn’t have been able to survive more than four rounds.

To prevent her from suffering any injuries, Meng Hongchen conceded defeat when the Dragonslayer Sect’s team leader stepped up to compete. Eventually, she didn’t manage to defeat the entire Dragonslayer Sect’s team. Even so, the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy demonstrated their worth.

Their second competing member was a Soul King and Class 5 soul engineer. As he fought the team leader of the Dragonslayer Sect’s team, he eventually managed to eke out a victory.

The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy thus became the ﬁrst side to win the ﬁrst round of the tournament. They didn’t even compete in the team round, and managed to advance from the ﬁrst round with six points.

Chapter 279: A Competing Cripple?

Since the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy eliminated all their opponents in the individual elimination round, they had obtained the points needed for the team round, according to the tournament rules. So, they gained eleven points.

The Tang Sect team members had various feelings after they ﬁnished watching this ﬁrst round of battles.

Xu Sanshi looked at the calm Huo Yuhao and softly asked, “Yuhao, who do you think is the best equipped to deal with Meng Hongchen if we face the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy?”

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “Of course it’s me.”

Xu Sanshi thought for a moment before saying, “It can only be you. However, she’s not just about her poison. In my opinion, her improvement in the area of soul tools might even surpass her soul master cultivation.” Huo Yuhao said, “That’s for sure. After all, this is only the ﬁrst round. She has been holding back throughout. Even at the end, she didn’t use her sixth soul skill or any offensive soul tools. I estimate her main soul tools are already at Class 7, and she is using a special production method to reduce their usage requirements. She is the granddaughter of Jing Hongchen, after all.”

Xu Sanshi said, “If we meet them, what do you think our chances are?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “Eighty percent chance of winning.”

Xu Sanshi was stunned as he asked, “So conﬁdent?”

Huo Yuhao chortled, “Of course. We have you. You can defeat half their team on your own.”

Xu Sanshi furrowed his brow and said, “No, no. How can I take on half their team?” Jiang Nannan took a curious look at him and said, “Since when have you learned to be humble?”

Xu Sanshi blinked and said, “What I mean is that I can take on their entire team!”

“Shameless!” Jiang Nannan snapped at him.

“There’s a trumpet in the sky. Who blew it?” Xiao Xiao lifted her head to look at the sky.

He Caitou was sniggering to one side.

“If there’s a chance, I would like to try.” a cold voice sounded from afar. Everyone turned in the direction of this voice.

It was the Sword Fanatic. Ji Juechen’s face was very serious, and his gaze was burning. He seemed like he was about to draw his Judgment Sword to challenge Meng Hongchen to a ﬁght right then and there! ------

The tournament continued. There were too many teams. Even if it was just the ﬁrst elimination round, there were more than eighty of them. If the schedule wasn’t followed, the planned three days might not even be sufﬁcient to complete the ﬁrst elimination round.

There were many exciting performances in the ﬁrst elimination round. Since it was an elimination round, every team gave their best. Some horrifying scenes even occurred. Team after team went up to compete.

Among the familiar teams that Huo Yuhao knew, Wei Na and Mu Xue appeared as part of a sect called the Snowdemon Sect. Wei Na didn’t compete, but Mu Xue demonstrated her extraordinary abilities. She conceded after beating three opponents consecutively. This was to protect herself and keep her available for the team round. Wei Na wasn’t part of the competing team. She was only a spectator.

The ﬁghts in the morning stopped at noon. Nine teams had made it to the next round, which also meant that nine teams had been eliminated, and heir journey in this tournament had ended.

The ﬁghts in the afternoon carried on until the evening. A total of twenty-six rounds were fought over the course of the day.

There were teams that were vastly different in terms of skill level. However, there wasn’t anyone who defeated an entire team on their own. After all, it was difﬁcult to beat seven people consecutively . Even the weaker teams had at least a few four-ringed Soul Ancestors. Different soul masters had different characteristics. The difﬁculty level of winning seven consecutive ﬁghts was very high.

The Tang Sect team was due to compete on the second day. After watching the ﬁrst day of ﬁghts, all the teams came to a simple conclusion. They picked out some opponents that they had to be wary of and analyzed them.

--- The atmosphere in the Ming Yue Hotel became more tense after the ﬁrst day of ﬁghts, as those who had not competed watched the eliminated teams leave the hotel. Some of the members of these teams had even died tragically during the course of the tournament!

While the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament could make one famous, it could also take one’s life away…

---

The sky was slowly getting dark. After eating their dinner, Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao back to his room.

Although they hadn’t competed today, it was still tough on Huo Yuhao. Bei Bei was seriously injured, and thus Yuhao had to take on the responsibility of leading the team. He had to unleash his Spiritual Detection to observe his opponents, and had to draw up his conclusions from an entire day’s worth of ﬁghts after returning. His mind was tired.

“Dong’er, let’s get a drink!” Huo Yuhao said suddenly. “What?” Wang Dong’er was stunned as she asked, “Are you not tired?”

Huo Yuhao chortled, “I should relax because I’m tired! This was what you taught me.”

Wang Dong’er didn’t reject his proposition, “Alright. However, you must rest once we get our drink. We still have to compete tomorrow.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and replied, “Alright!”

Wang Dong’er pushed him into the soul elevator and took it all the way down to the ﬁrst story. The sky was already completely dark by now. The hotel was extremely peaceful.

Wang Dong’er pushed his wheelchair down to the lobby, where there were very few people. Furthermore, the lighting in the lobby was dimmed at night. Every spot seemed to have its own privacy. The two of them sat in a corner. They didn’t drink alcohol, so they ordered two glasses of soft drinks.

As she sat on the sofa and sipped on her sweet drink, Wang Dong’er felt much more relaxed. She asked him, “Yuhao, do you want me to carry you to sit on the sofa?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “There’s no need. I feel more comfortable in a wheelchair.” Although his lower limbs couldn’t move, he still had some feeling. He might feel uncomfortable if he was sitting on something too soft.

Wang Dong’er asked softly, “Are your legs and left arm ﬁne?

It’s been so many days. Have there been any problems?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and smiled. “Am I so weak? Don’t worry, things will be ﬁne. I know my limits. I feel very comfortable hugging you to sleep every night.”

“Naughty!” Wang Dong’er rolled her eyes at him. Even though she was dressed as a guy, they were still ﬂirtatious. As she was talking, she looked over to a corner of the lobby. Over there, a ﬁgure slowly stood up and walked towards them.

Wang Dong’er glanced at Huo Yuhao. There was a reason why he had come down to have a drink at this time?

This person was getting closer and closer. Wang Dong’er was stunned, and stood up. “Eldest senior sister?”

Was it really Zhang Lexuan? Right now, she was clad in deep blue warrior robes. She didn’t appear very clear, as the lighting was too dim.

Zhang Lexuan nodded at Wang Dong’er. After that, she sat down opposite Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao smiled, “Eldest senior sister, you left a mark for me to meet you. What’s up? We are competitors now.”

Zhang Lexuan smiled back and answered, “So be it. Yuhao, what’s your take after watching today’s ﬁghts?” Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly. “What else can I feel? It’s not going to be easy.”

Zhang Lexuan asked, “Even you don’t have any conﬁdence in winning?” Shrek’s Seven Monsters were no longer the preparatory squad members like they were in the previous tournament. Among the seven members, four were Soul Emperors and three were Soul Kings. All of them also had strong martial souls. In terms of their soul engineering abilities, He Caitou and Huo Yuhao weren’t weaker than the students of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, either. Even though Bei Bei was gravely injured and Huo Yuhao was temporarily crippled, their competitive abilities weren’t in question. They were still superior to Shrek Academy’s team.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “I don’t think anyone is really conﬁdent. The situation is very complex. Meng Hongchen almost sank in today’s ﬁght. If not for her strong protective barrier, she would have lost her second ﬁght. The sects are stronger than I had imagined. All of the teams held back on their abilities, since the tournament has only just started. Under such a situation, it’s very hard to tell.”

Zhang Lexuan sighed and said, “Shrek’s pride and glory is likely to end in this tournament. I feel like Elder Xuan shouldn’t have let all of you compete for the Tang Sect.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned, and said, “Isn’t Wang Qiu’er there? Eldest senior sister, you should know how strong she is. In a duel, I don’t have any conﬁdence of beating her even when I’m at my peak condition.”

Zhang Lexuan said, “If Qiu’er was on the same team as all of you, I’d be fully conﬁdent. However, Qiu’er will ﬁnd it difﬁcult on her own.”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “It’s difﬁcult to tell. Qiu’er’s ﬁghting will is much stronger than you imagine. Her abilities are also much stronger than you imagine.”

“Oh? It seems like you understand her very well?” Zhang Lexuan looked at Wang Dong’er.

Huo Yuhao’s lips moved slightly. “Eldest senior sister, you are picking trouble here!” Zhang Lexuan snapped, “What picking trouble? Guys are the ones who always hurt the hearts of women!”

Huo Yuhao could only laugh bitterly at her words.

Zhang Lexuan also seemed to realize she had gone slightly overboard, and immediately changed the topic. “Yuhao, I have a few things to tell you. We’ve received news that the Body Sect is also in this tournament.”

“What? The Body Sect is also here?” This news was well beyond Huo Yuhao’s expectations.

Some time ago, the Body Sect had attacked the Illustrious Virtue Hall and inﬂicted heavy losses on them. They had also given Huo Yuhao the opportunity to leave with the Snow Lady and the huge human-shaped soul tool. That soul tool had already been given to Xuan Ziwen for research purposes.

This tournament was being organized by the Sun Moon Empire, but the Body Sect actually had the guts to come here. Weren’t they scared of being trapped in the Sun Moon Empire?

Zhang Lexuan said, “Not only are they here to compete, a few of the senior members of the sect have also snuck into the city secretly. No one knows what they’re plotting. Maybe they’re here to protect their disciples, or they might have ulterior motives. It’s nothing bad for us. I’m telling you this so that you’ll be in the loop. If you meet anyone from the Body Sect, don’t provoke them.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “The enemy of our enemy is our friend. I understand this logic. Don’t worry. Is there any other news?” Zhang Lexuan said, “Another thing is, please don’t be too conservative in the tournament and in your daily routine. It’s not just us from Shrek Academy who are here.”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes brightened. Zhang Lexuan was very clear with her words. There were also some strong individuals from Shrek Academy who were here. Evidently, they were worried about the Sun Moon Empire!

“This is good news.” Huo Yuhao didn’t ask who was here.

Just knowing they were out there was already enough.

Zhang Lexuan revealed a look of hesitation in her eyes, and asked softly, “Is Bei Bei feeling better?”

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s expressions suddenly turned weird. They already knew about the secret between Bei Bei and Zhang Lexuan. As they saw the look of worry that ﬂashed across Zhang Lexuan’s eyes, they had the same thought in their mind. She was still brooding over her promise in the past, but was it really just about the promise?

“He’s much better. However, he can’t compete for now.”

“Let him rest then. Alright, the two of you should rest early, too. Your team will compete tomorrow, right? I wish you all the best.” Zhang Lexuan quickly ended the conversation. She stood up and left after bowing slightly to the both of them.

Wang Dong’er laughed after Zhang Lexuan left. She said, “If anyone from the inner courtyard learns that eldest senior sister has someone in her heart, do you think eldest senior will be in trouble?”

Huo Yuhao laughed lightly and replied, “I don’t know. Her news came just in time. If the Body Sect has really entered Radiant City in such large numbers, it also means that they will try to do something. However, they are in the open this time. Can they even escape? The Sun Moon Empire and Holy Ghost Church are more worrying. I feel like there’s something amiss about this tournament, but I can’t tell what it is yet.”

Wang Dong’er grabbed his hand and said, “You are already exhausted enough. Don’t think so much. In fact, we’re already the reigning champions of the tournament. Even if we don’t win this time, it’s nothing. The future is more important. Do you understand what I mean, Yuhao?” Huo Yuhao nodded slightly before shaking his head. “I’ll try my best. If not for Teacher Xiao Ya and eldest senior, I wouldn’t be here today. I wouldn’t have been able to enter Shrek Academy either and gotten to know you. In my heart, I’ll always be eternally grateful to both of them. Teacher Xiao Ya isn’t in good shape now. It feels like she’s being controlled. Her greatest wish was to rebuild the Tang Sect and reinstate its former glory. I must help eldest senior fulﬁl her wish!”

Wang Dong’er nodded slightly and said, “I understand. Let me help you.” It was just a few words, but there was an indescribable feeling in them.

The two of them smiled as they looked at each other. Just as Wang Dong’er was pushing Huo Yuhao back, someone burst out from the side and exclaimed in surprise, “I’ve ﬁnally found you!”

A wind swept across their faces, and Meng Hongchen blocked their path. She was wearing a long, light blue dress. She was excited as she saw Wang Dong’er. No, it was Wang Dong in her eyes. Furthermore, she completely ignored Huo Yuhao. “It’s you.” Wang Dong’er furrowed her brow. Meng Hongchen had been harassing her for far more than one or two days. Meng Hongchen would ﬁnd her whenever she had time during the two years of the exchange. She couldn’t avoid her at all, but she couldn’t reveal her true identity, either!

Meng Hongchen leapt in front of Wang Dong’er and said, “Why aren’t all of you representing Shrek Academy!? I took some time to search for all of you. I knew that you’d be here!”

Wang Dong’er was a little annoyed. “Is there something you want?”

Meng Hongchen rolled her eyes amorously and said, “Can’t I ﬁnd you for no reason? I found out that all of you were competing on behalf of the Tang Sect from the tournament’s organizing committee. Are you trying to take everyone by surprise or something?”

Wang Dong’er replied, “What do you mean? We’ve joined a sect and are representing our sect. Is there a problem? It’s not early anymore. If there’s nothing else, go back and rest early. We still need to compete tomorrow.” Meng Hongchen pursed her lips and said, “It’s still early. This is only a preliminary round. With your abilities, what are you so scared of?”

Wang Dong’er twisted her lips and answered, “Why not? There are sects involved in this edition of the tournament. It’s different from before. You almost lost today too.”

Meng Hongchen’s eyes brightened, and she said, “You were concerned about me?”

“I…” Wang Dong’er was speechless by how she interpreted things.

“I knew that you’ve always been very concerned about me.” As she spoke, Meng Hongchen took a step forward and held onto her wrist. She looked very blissful.

Huo Yuhao coughed. “This, Dong… Wang Dong, I’ll go back ﬁrst. The two of you can have a chat.” Huo Yuhao was amused, but he tried to control his laughter. He pushed his wheelchair along with his one hand. “Hey! You, you’re…” Meng Hongchen only realized there was someone else present at that moment. Following that, she stared at him. “You’re Huo Yuhao? How did you get get into this state?”

Huo Yuhao rolled his eyes and thought to himself. What kind of look is that? You’ve just noticed me now? He laughed bitterly and said, “I got into a sticky situation.”

Meng Hongchen said, “Can you compete in that state? Weren’t you just ﬁne when you returned from the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy a few months ago? Why…?”

“Alright, don’t be gossipy anymore.” Huo Yuhao was afraid that she might make Wang Dong’er sad if she continued talking. He quickly interrupted her and said, “Aren’t you here for Wang Dong? The two of you can chat ﬁrst. I’m returning to my room to rest. Wang Dong, this is also considered fate. Just accompany her for a while.” As he spoke, he threw her a look.

Wang Dong’er was a little frustrated as she glared back at him. “You can’t cope on your own. Let me follow you back.” Huo Yuhao hurriedly said, “I’m ﬁne. I’m ﬁne. I can cope on my own. I’m not that weak. Even with only one hand, I can still take care of myself.” As he spoke, he immediately pushed the wheels of his wheelchair towards the soul elevator.

Meng Hongchen’s eyes broke into a smile when she saw how cooperative Huo Yuhao was acting. She muttered softly, “This guy is not that annoying after all. Wang Dong, are you trying to bewitch us?”

“What are you talking about?” Wang Dong’er’s expression suddenly changed. She wrenched her wrist away, and a ﬁerce look appeared in her eyes. Huo Yuhao had landed in his current state because of her. She was heartbroken, and kept on convincing herself to be strong so that she could take care of Huo Yuhao. In her heart, there was still guilt, pain, and affection. Meng Hongchen’s words hit her where it hurt the most. How could she not be angry?

Meng Hongchen was shocked by her reaction. She would have acted up if someone else had dared to react like this to her. However, Wang Dong was different. In her heart, Wang Dong was perfect. In the last tournament, Wang Dong and Huo Yuhao had teamed up together to create a miracle. His unyielding spirit and handsome looks had greatly moved her heart. Her exchange at Shrek Academy also gave her more time to interact with him. She was fearful when she saw Wang Dong acting up so suddenly.

Meng Hongchen was a little panicky as she asked, “I’m, I’m sorry, Wang Dong! Why did you react so greatly? Did I say something wrong?”

Wang Dong’er looked at her coldly and said, “Huo Yuhao is in his current state because of me.”

Meng Hongchen was jolted awake, and looked apologetic, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. My grandfather told me to be wary of him. That’s why I said everything out of fear.”

Wang Dong’er was stunned, and she asked, “How did your grandfather appraise him?”

Meng Hongchen replied, “Intelligent, cunning, tolerant, and talented!”

------

“Intelligent, cunning, tolerant, and talented? I didn’t expect Jing Hongchen to appraise me so highly!” Huo Yuhao smiled as Wang Dong’er recounted her conversation with Meng Hongchen.

Wang Dong’er was a little annoyed. “I almost told her I was a girl. You don’t know how torturous it is to be with her.”

Huo Yuhao chuckled, “You are attractive. It’s better not to tell her and continue to act like a guy. Otherwise, you’ll invite a lot of pursuers during the tournament. Watch and see. I believe Qiu’er will cause some trouble.”

Wang Dong’er said, “Speaking of Qiu’er, I haven’t seen her in days. Has she been cultivating?”

Huo Yuhao remained silent for a moment and replied, “She’s a stubborn person. For this tournament, I’m afraid she will…” His voice trailed off, and he couldn’t help but shake his head. With Wang Qiu’er’s competitive personality, she only had one goal, even if her teammates weren’t strong enough.

“Come here, my love. Let’s sleep.” Huo Yuhao threw all his worries aside and gestured to Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er blushed and asked, “Are you not cultivating anymore?”

Huo Yuhao blinked, then replied, “I feel like skiving today.”

Wang Dong’er said, “I feel that your mindset has changed greatly after your injuries.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “When I opened my eyes that day and saw you again, I suddenly realized that this world is actually very beautiful. Life is very fragile and valuable. However, it’s short. It lasts less than a hundred years. I want to spend as much time with you as I can and feel your gentleness.”

Wang Dong’er was stunned for a moment. She removed her outer coat and switched off the light before crawling underneath the blanket. She got close to Huo Yuhao’s body. As Huo Yuhao’s lower limbs and left arm contained the chill of Ultimate Ice, she only stuck close to his upper body.

Huo Yuhao hugged her soft and petite ﬁgure. He kissed her forehead and suddenly said, “What do you think Meng Hongchen would think if she found out that her crush is currently lying in my arms and was even given a peck on her forehead?”

Wang Dong’er lifted her head and looked at him with a mysterious gaze. She muttered, “She would think of… castrating you!”

Huo Yuhao’s butt clenched, and he felt a chill around his groin.

……

It was the second day of the tournament. The atmosphere was still as tense as the ﬁrst day. After ﬁve rounds, six people were already gravely injured, and two people had already died. This showed how intense the competition was. “Next round, The Tang Sect versus the Earthdragon Sect. Both sides, please enter the waiting area. The ﬁrst competing member from each side, please come up on stage.”

They were about to ﬁght. Everyone from the Tang Sect became extremely focused. Six people stood up. They were He Caitou, Xu Sanshi, Jiang Nannan, Xiao Xiao, Wang Dong’er and Na Na.

Wang Dong’er went behind Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair and pushed him into the waiting area.

“What?” On the main stage, Xu Tianran focused his gaze. “Why is there someone in a wheelchair?”

No matter how ambitious Xu Tianran was, he was still very young. He was very eager to watch this tournament. He had sat on the main stage all day yesterday and watched all the ﬁghts that went on. He also came with Ju Zi and his ofﬁcials early this next day to watch the second day of ﬁghts.

He was in a wheelchair himself. When he saw someone in a wheelchair going to compete, it naturally caught his attention.

Ju Zi’s attention turned in the direction where Xu Tianran was looking. As she was too far away, she could only roughly see who it was. Furthermore, only Huo Yuhao’s proﬁle could be seen. However, she had a feeling that something was going to happen. It was a feeling that came for no reason.

All seven of the Tang Sect’s competing members entered the waiting area. Xu Sanshi asked, “Yuhao, do you really want to ﬁght?”

Huo Yuhao nodded slightly and said, “It’s the best way of concealing our overall abilities. Even if someone ﬁnds out, he won’t know what level your cultivations are at. Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing.”

Xu Sanshi nodded and didn’t say anything else. Wang Dong’er bit her lips and pushed Huo Yuhao onto the stage.

All the spectators were already cheering at this moment. A cripple in a wheelchair had actually appeared on the big stage where soul masters and soul engineers exhibited their abilities. This was beyond their expectations. Those who had seen Huo Yuhao before were also shocked. They initially thought Huo Yuhao wasn’t a competitor, but who knew that he would the ﬁrst to compete? This was completely unimaginable.

Even the referee was a little dumbfounded. He quickly walked over and doubtfully asked, “What’s going on, Tang Sect team? Are you sending a cripple to compete?”

Wang Dong’er answered, “Who says he’s a cripple?” She hated it when others called Huo Yuhao a cripple.

The referee thought to himself, “Why is he in a wheelchair if he’s not a cripple? Is this some kind of trick?”

“I’m just ascertaining whether you are sending him to compete ﬁrst.” The referee’s expression also turned gloomy. To qualify as a referee, his cultivation wasn’t weak either. He naturally wasn’t bothered about these young people in front of him. Moreover, the Tang Sect wasn’t that reputable. He didn’t have to show them any face. Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “That’s right. I’m the one competing. Sorry for troubling you.”

The referee furrowed his brow and didn’t say anything else. He only nodded. On the other side, the Earthdragon Sect team’s ﬁrst competing member had also entered the stage. It was a youth with a very proportionate ﬁgure. He was also stunned when he saw Huo Yuhao. He mumbled, “The Tang Sect is really interesting – sending a cripple to compete!”

Wang Dong’er glared at him and said, “I’ve said that he’s not a cripple.”

The youth expressed the inner thoughts of the referee earlier. “If he’s not a cripple, why is he in a wheelchair?”

“You…” Wang Dong’er was about to act up, but she was stopped by Huo Yuhao. He smiled and said, “Dong’er, you can go ﬁrst.”

Wang Dong’er held in her anger and looked at Huo Yuhao concernedly as she lowered her head. Huo Yuhao gave her a reassuring glance before she left the stage.

The referee said, “Since you should be clear on the tournament rules, I won’t repeat them again. Please retreat to your positions. The ﬁght will begin once I give the signal.”

“Yes.” Huo Yuhao smiled as he nodded at the referee. He pushed his wheelchair with one hand as he proceeded to one side of the stage.

“Hey!” The youth from the Earthdragon Sect shouted.

“Oh?” Huo Yuhao was confused as he turned to look at him, “Is something the matter?”

The youth replied, “Aren’t you going to at least report your name?”

“Apologies, I forgot.” Huo Yuhao gave an apologetic smile and said, “I’m Huo Yuhao. What about you?”

“My name is Xu Shenshu. Remember me, as I’m going to defeat you.” After he ﬁnished speaking, he turned around. As his right foot stomped on the ground, he ﬂew several tens of meters away and reached the opposite side of the stage.

“Haha.” Huo Yuhao laughed. After this, he turned his wheelchair around and slowly pushed it to his own side.

Xu Shenshu was indeed inexperienced. He was blatantly telling Huo Yuhao that he was an assault-type soul master. Interesting.

Everyone’s focus was on Huo Yuhao as he pushed his wheelchair. There were very few people who knew he was a part of the champion team in the last tournament. However, it was also these few people who were the important ﬁgures to watch in this edition of the tournament.

Xiao Hongchen furrowed his brow and asked his sister, “Meng, is he really crippled?”

Meng Hongchen nodded and replied, “I think so. Wang Dong’s expression couldn’t have been fake. Wang Dong was very furious then, and almost acted up. If I wasn’t quick to change the topic, he would have thrashed me.” As she spoke, she pouted her lips and revealed an indignant look on her face.

Xiao Hongchen sighed. “It’s a pity then. I thought of ﬁghting him properly in this tournament. According to grandpa, he should be my match. It’s really a pity. It’s difﬁcult to ﬁnd a good match!” As he spoke, he placed his hands behind his back and revealed a cold and arrogant look on his face as he looked at the stage.

Meng Hongchen snorted and said, “It’s better that he’s crippled. It’s less trouble for us. This Earthdragon Sect is also stupid. They must be underestimating the Tang Sect. Can’t they tell that those people in the waiting area are the main ones they have to beat?”

Xiao Hongchen chuckled and said, “This is called karma. Even though they can’t possibly beat us in this tournament, they are still the reigning champions! They’ve actually been underestimated. Oh yes, Meng, you should stop ﬁnding Wang Dong. You should know that the two of you are impossible.”

Meng Hongchen said furiously, “Why not? Why not? If he’s willing to join the Sun Moon Empire, can’t we be together? I don’t care. If we meet the Tang Sect later on, you must not hurt him. Otherwise, I’ll take your life.”

Xiao Hongchen revealed a sad look on his face, “Girls always side with outsiders! We must meet them ﬁrst. According to my investigation, the Earthdragon Sect isn’t considered weak, even though they aren’t that strong. Let’s see what improvements this bunch from the Tang Sect have made. Why isn’t Bei Bei here?”

Meng Hongchen shook her head and said, “I don’t know. I’ll ask someone to check it out when we return.”

They weren’t the only ones discussing the Tang Sect team. Princess Jiujiu and Princess Wei Na were also focused on Huo Yuhao at this point. They hadn’t expected Huo Yuhao to be the ﬁrst to compete on behalf of the Tang Sect. They were also interested to see how much energy he still had after he was crippled.

Xu Tianran gestured, and a middle-aged man came to him.

The middle-aged man bowed and said, “Your Highness.” Xu Tianran said, “Go and ﬁnd out the background of this guy in the wheelchair, and why he’s here to compete even though he’s in a wheelchair. If he wins the ﬁrst round, ask someone to instruct the referee to preserve his life no matter what happens next.”

“Yes.” The middle-aged man acknowledged his words and quickly went on his way.

Ju Zi was in a daze now. She was even on the verge of tearing up.

It’s him. It’s him. Why is it him?

When Huo Yuhao turned his wheelchair around, Ju Zi saw his face clearly. She hadn’t expected him to be the one in the wheelchair.

Chapter 280: The Cute Yet Powerful Snow Lady

Why is he in a wheelchair? Why? He was ﬁne the last time I saw him. What happened?

Considering how proud he was, it was deﬁnitely impossible for him to act like he was disabled to trick others, unless he was really incapacitated.

Even though Ju Zi had warned herself many times to forget him, there were some things and people that couldn’t be easily forgotten. Ju Zi hadn’t expected Huo Yuhao to be in a wheelchair the next time she saw him.

Before the tournament had started, she had sent someone to investigate Shrek Academy. However, she hadn’t discovered Huo Yuhao among the students from Shrek. She was still feeling very weird, but her emotions started to ﬂow when she saw Huo Yuhao. If not for Xu Tianran beside her, she would have rushed over to him and demanded an explanation. Besides these people, there were two more ﬁgures in the pergola that trembled slightly when they saw Huo Yuhao in his wheelchair.

---

The referee lifted his hand up high and looked at both parties, especially Huo Yuhao. After ascertaining that they were ready, his right hand swiped down, and he announced the start of the tournament.

Huo Yuhao moved. However, his soul rings didn’t appear. He only turned the wheels of his wheelchair and moved forward slowly. It was as fast as it was when he went into position earlier.

On the other side, Xu Shenshu’s aura soared!

He looked into the sky and roared. After that, he burst out like a cannon shell. His right foot stomped on the ground, and his body lifted into the air. As he was in the air, his bones crackled. Two yellow and three purple soul rings appeared concurrently from his body. His body also grew in size as he unleashed his martial soul.

Earthdragon Sect! It was exactly as its name suggested. Soul masters of this sect had varied versions of the Earthdragon as their martial soul. As Xu Shenshu’s body expanded in size, his skin also bulged with a layer of black keratin. Bulges also started to surface from his back. As the bulges burst open, several sharp dorsal ﬁns poked out of his back.

His martial soul was a Sabertooth Earth Dragon, a pure strength-type martial soul. It was good at both attack and defense. Its weakness was that it wasn’t adept at long-range attacks.

As his body burst forward, Xu Shenshu’s arms extended to his sides, and he revealed his developed chest muscles. On the outside of his arms, a layer of curved claws poked out.

His ﬁrst soul ring lit up. Xu Shenshu’s layer of keratin exuded a black glow at this moment, and his strength seemed to have increased, too. In a few steps, he was less than twenty meters from Huo Yuhao. There was only one thought in everyone’s minds right now; they believed he didn’t have to be so ferocious against a disabled person.

Empathy for the weak. This was almost the same mindset that everyone possessed. Moreover, Huo Yuhao seemed too weak!

Huo Yuhao stopped pushing his wheelchair forward. After that, an orange glow lit up from his body. A small and petite ﬁgure crawled out from his forehead and blocked the way in front of him.

This ﬁgure wasn’t more than three feet tall, and seemed around two years old. She wore a deep blue belly wrap, which accentuated her powdery-white skin. Under the illumination of the orange glow, this small lady looked extremely beautiful.

Xu Shenshu’s aura was still very scary when he leapt over. However, he was wondering what was going on when he saw the small lady between him and Huo Yuhao just as he was about to reach him. Xu Shenshu was in a daze, and frantically changed directions. He was here to compete, not to kill, especially not such a cute little lady. How could he bear to!?

“Uncle!” The young lady called. Her voice sounded like a baby, and it even sounded a little unclear. He could only roughly hear what she was saying.

“Yes, yes…” Xu Shenshu lost a little of his balance as he changed directions because of the great power that he exerted. After hearing such a cute lady call to him, he acknowledged her words subconsciously. Her big, beautiful eyes were even ﬁlled with a sense of closeness. His heart softened when he saw her.

After that, he saw her delicate ﬁnger pointing towards him.

What happened next?

Xu Shenshu felt a gust of chill engulﬁng him, and everything turned deep blue in front of him.

All of this happened instantly. From the Snow Lady’s appearance to Xu Shenshu’s directional change to being called and pointed at by the Snow Lady to the deep blue glow that surfaced in front of Xu Shenshu, everything happened in just a matter of seconds. After that, he was frozen into an ice sculpture and collapsed to the ground.

The Snow Lady turned around and ﬂew back to Huo Yuhao.

She sat on his shoulder and called out in delight, “Daddy!”

Every time she called him that, Huo Yuhao would shudder in his heart as he remembered how strong the Snow Empress was. However, he absolutely adored this Snow Lady.

This was the end?

The entire grounds went silent.

No one had expected this result. Absolutely no one. Even the Tang Sect team didn’t know that Huo Yuhao would unleash the Snow Empress’ Spirit the moment he appeared.

Everyone from the Earthdragon Sect was also dumbfounded.

They could have never expected such a result!

The referee rushed over and checked on Xu Shenshu’s condition. After that, he immediately announced that Huo Yuhao had emerged victorious. The referee’s eyes never left the Snow Lady. He had clearly heard her calling Huo Yuhao her father.

He had never even heard of anyone bringing their kid to compete in the tournament before. Was that really his daughter? No, that was impossible! She was such a small kid, but she was very powerful. Was it his soul skill? However, he didn’t even unleash his martial soul. Or perhaps that was his martial soul?

Even the referee, who was pretty strong, had his own doubts. The rest of the competitors were in greater doubt. They were all confused when they saw the Snow Lady. All sorts of guesses started to surface.

When the Snow Lady came over to Xu Shenshu to help him melt the ice, Xu Shenshu was shivering as he looked at her. “You, you, you…” The Snow Lady unleashed her most lethal weapon – she pointed her two index ﬁngers forward and lowered her head, revealing an indignant look on her face.

Xu Shenshu’s pupils dilated, and he quickly said, “Little girl, don’t cry! Don’t cry, I’ve lost! I’ll leave the stage!”

As he spoke, he started to leave the stage in low spirits. After walking past Huo Yuhao, he shot him a furious look and said, “You are too despicable. How can you bring a kid to compete? Aren’t you scared of hurting her?”

Huo Yuhao was a little helpless, “Thanks for your reminder.

I’ll keep her safe. Oh, you are a good guy.”

“You don’t have to play this card!” Xu Shenshu quickly made his way off the stage.

Victory! The guy in the wheelchair had actually won. From the looks of it, he didn’t do anything either! However, where did the young lady come from? No matter how confused the spectators were, the tournament still had to continue. The second competitor from the Earthdragon Sect entered the stage. As he looked at the Snow Lady, he cursed in his heart. However, this was a tournament! He kept on telling himself that he couldn’t be

bewitched by her. He clearly saw how the Snow Lady had

defeated the unwary Xu Shenshu with her ﬁnger earlier. She was far more than just cute on the surface!

Both parties set their distance from each other. As the referee’s hand swiped down, the second ﬁght ofﬁcially started.

The second competing member was called Feng Jue. His martial soul was also a type of Earthdragon, but it was no longer a strength-type, it was an agility-type. This was also a decision that the Earthdragon Sect made after they saw the ﬁght between Huo Yuhao and Xu Shenshu. The Snow Lady was too cute, and it was difﬁcult for them to lay their hands on her. However, Huo Yuhao was the one controlling her. He couldn’t be very mobile, as he was in a wheelchair. As long as he was restrained, the ﬁght would be over.

Feng Jue’s martial soul was called a Wind Dragon, a type of Earthdragon. As he unleashed his martial soul, green scales started to cover the left side of his body. Two yellow and two purple soul rings were unleashed… he was a four-ringed Soul Ancestor! The ﬁrst two soul rings shone concurrently, and Feng Jue was like a gust of wind as he rushed towards Huo Yuhao. His hands turned into sharp dragon claws as he stared at the Snow Lady. Once she moved, he would avoid her and deal Huo Yuhao a lethal blow! This was his strategy.

Seeing that the two parties were closing the distance, the Snow Lady also ﬂew out.

She’s indeed coming!, Feng Jue thought, and immediately reacted. His ﬁgure ﬂashed, and he quickly leapt to one side. He was trying to make his way around the Snow Lady.

However, a deep blue ice wall appeared in front of him without any warning.

At this point, Feng Jue was racing forward at full speed, and it wasn’t possible for him to stop. He shrank his body in panic and reached forward with his dragon claws as he prepared for a collision. The spectators who were watching from the side could clearly see that the ice wall was unleashed by the Snow Lady. She mimicked the action of holding the moon, and an ice wall three meters high and one meter thick appeared out of nowhere to block Feng Jue.

It was actually a meter thick! And it was ice formed from Ultimate Ice too, much tougher than reinforced steel! If he collided with it…!

Bang!

Feng Jue struck the wall as he burst forward at full speed. His dragon claws were really sharp and managed to pierce through the wall, but his body was also stuck to it.

The Snow Lady laughed and pointed with her right ﬁnger. Another streak of deep blue light struck out and ended the second ﬁght.

The ﬁrst two ﬁghts were very easy, and the ﬁrst two members of the Earthdragon Sect had been defeated. The expressions of the rest of the members changed greatly. Not only was there a disabled person, but the Tang Sect had used a cripple to win two consecutive ﬁghts. How was the Earthdragon Sect going to cope in the future ﬁghts to come? The most depressing thing was that they couldn’t change their competing members once they entered the waiting area. The few remaining ones could only watch, and couldn’t do anything to change reality.

The third competing member from the Earthdragon Sect didn’t last longer than the ﬁrst two members. Once he entered, he burst towards Huo Yuhao and the Snow Lady like the ﬁrst two. However, he was much more intelligent this time. He attacked the Snow Lady directly.

However, the Snow Lady made a dancing motion with her hands when he closed to around twenty meters from her. After that, a white ice ring appeared in front of him.

This Earthdragon Sect member reacted quite quickly. As he ﬂipped his body, he avoided the ice ring. However, the ice ring formed a thick ice pillar which blew apart instantly. The crushed ice trapped his body, and he was turned into an ice sculpture after the explosive force disappeared. The rest of the Earthdragon Sect team couldn’t keep their cool anymore as the tournament reached this stage. They were truly impressed by the Snow Lady’s ﬁghting strength. It wasn’t just luck, Huo Yuhao was truly strong! No wonder he dared to compete even though he was in a wheelchair!

The Snow Lady ﬂew back in front of Huo Yuhao and sat on his thigh. She grabbed his sleeve, and her eyes were ﬁlled with an innocent look. The soul power that she had depleted was instantly restored.

Huo Yuhao was full of the origin energy of Ultimate Ice, so he let the Snow Lady ﬁght. On the one hand, he could remain mysterious to his opponents. On the other hand, the Snow Lady could absorb origin energy from him if she used up hers. The Snow Lady sucked away the chill on the surface of his skin, but the essential origin energy was absorbed by him. When she returned to his body, they could share this essence.

Huo Yuhao had thought of this before, but the Snow Lady had sucked away too much origin energy the last time. It was only recently that she had ﬁnally managed to completely absorb her share of the origin energy. As her powers greatly increased, she became more telepathically connected to Huo Yuhao, too. That was why she could now come out to ﬁght.

Chapter 281: I'll Marry Whoever Kills Him!

After three rounds of battle, Huo Yuhao still felt pretty good. While the amount of cold air the Snow Lady could absorb was limited, this was because Snow Lady was still a part of him. After the cold air was absorbed, the origin energy of Ultimate Ice would form new cold air. He also made his body absorb some of the origin energy when the Snow Lady took away the cold air. While the speed was slow, it was an alternative form of cultivation, and much easier than him trying to absorb it by himself.

The biggest beneﬁt for this competition was that Snow Lady could maintain her momentum after she absorbed the cold air from his body. This was why Huo Yuhao said to Wang Dong’er that his temporary paralysis might not be a bad thing.

The other four members of the Earthdragon Sect could no longer sit still. After the ﬁrst three members had been frozen into ice sculptures by Ice Lady, Huo Yuhao did not ask them to not take part in the upcoming group round. However, according to this tempo, they would soon ﬁnd themselves unable to take part anyway. Among the four remaining members of the Earthdragon Sect, the only female soul master stood up and walked to the stage with a serious expression.

“Hello, I’m Nan Qiuqiu.” The Earthdragon Sect member took the initiative to greet Huo Yuhao.

“Hello,” replied Huo Yuhao with a gracious smile.

Nan Qiuqiu looked at Snow Lady in Huo Yuhao’s arms and said, “I know that she is an ability of your martial soul. Hence, I won’t show mercy like my comrades.” With that, she nodded at Huo Yuhao and turned away.

---

On the main podium, Xu Tianran, who was watching the scene interestedly, turned to Ju Zi and asked, “That should be the captain of the Earthdragon Sect, right?”

Ju Zi replied respectfully, “Yes, Your Highness. She’s called Nan Qiuqiu, and she’s the captain. While the more powerful members of their sect did not take part this time, she’s still one of the most powerful members of their sect. She’s probably competing to ensure that they don’t do too badly.”

Xu Tianran said, “Eh, not bad. While you’re no longer in charge of intelligence anymore, you’re still very well-informed! So, tell me, who do you think will win this round?”

Ju Zi was stunned. Then, she shook her head and said, “I don’t know.”

Xu Tianran said, “Huo Yuhao was a former exchange student in our Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. He had the same teacher as you. How can you not know his prowess?”

Ju Zi was shocked, but her expression remained calm. She subconsciously looked at the middle-aged man who stood behind Xu Tianran. He had just passed the Prince a piece of paper.

“I interacted with Huo Yuhao for less than a month, and my knowledge of his abilities is limited. I just knew that he was a four-ringed soul ancestor, but he possessed twin martial souls. Now that he’s in a wheelchair, I don’t know how powerful is he anymore, nor do I know how much progress has he made in the past two years. Hence, I don’t dare to make a judgment.”

“Oh… then let us see,” Xu Tianran smiled.

“Yes,” replied Ju Zi politely.

Jing Hongchen, who sat next to Ju Zi, said, “Your Highness.”

“Eh?” Xu Tianran looked at him inquisitively.

Jing Hongchen said solemnly, “We can’t let this person go back. After the competition, we must make him disappear.”

Xu Tianran looked in shock at Jing Hongchen and asked, “Hallmaster, why are you so interested in him?”

Jing Hongchen said bitterly, “Please don’t laugh at me, Your Highness, but this person has made me suffer terribly. Not only is he exceptionally gifted, but he’s almost as crafty as the Devil. He knows how to analyze the situation and make use of limited resources. I’ve only recently heard from my grandson that he’s not competing on behalf of Shrek Academy, but instead on behalf of the Tang Sect.”

Xu Tianran said interestedly, “What did he do to make you afraid of him?” For him to take part in this competition, he had to be younger than 20 years old. If someone so young could scare the Hallmaster, he must be extraordinary in some way.

Jing Hongchen said, “Huo Yuhao was the champion of Shrek Academy’s team in the last tournament. At that time, he did not even have three rings, and yet was able to compete alongside his teammates. Furthermore, he showed off his skills in that tournament. He has twin martial souls, one spirit-type and the other ice-type. Furthermore, his ice-type martial soul is the rare Ultimate Ice. The fact that he can compete twice is a testament to his strength. Furthermore, on his way back to Shrek Academy the last time, he was even able to escape Senior Long’s pursuit.”

Hearing this, Xu Tianran was dumbfounded. “How can this be possible? With his cultivation, how can Senior Long…?” “So this is one who made a bet with Uncle Long.” On Xu Tianran’s other side, the person clothed entirely in black opened his mouth to speak. His voice was weird, and one could not tell his age from his voice. Even his gender was indistinguishable. He looked demonic, and everyone couldn’t help but turn to look at him when they heard his voice.

“Imperial Tutor, you know about this person?” Xu Tianran asked the person in black.

From the order of the seating, one could tell that the person in black was ranked even higher than Jing Hongchen.

“Yes. Hallmaster Hongchen asked for our help…”

---

In the arena, Huo Yuhao, who had started to battle, did not know that even in his crippled state, he had still caught the attention of the Sun Moon Empire’s leadership. His attention was completely on his opponent. Nan Qiuqiu from the Earthdragon Sect was no easy opponent. As the judge announced the start of the competition, Nan Qiuqiu released her martial soul. Two yellow, two purple, and one black soul ring appeared, showing off her rank as a Soul King, appeared.

A pink, chestnut-shaped crystal appeared on her forehead as she released her martial soul. Following that, her body started to grow. She seemed to have grown a head taller.

She pointed into the sky with her ring ﬁnger, and bright pink dragon scales started to grow from her ﬁngertip. Unlike the other Earthdragon Sect soul masters, her scales were bright pink. With the growth of her scales, her right hand appeared to have turned completely bright pink. A faint pink light shone and instantly burned her entire right sleeve off to reveal an arm covered entirely in scales.

Then, she pointed in Huo Yuhao’s direction. Her ﬁrst soul ring lit up, and a ray of pink light shot toward Huo Yuhao. It was able to cross 100 meters in an instant as it appeared before Huo Yuhao.

This speed was almost as fast as a ray shot by a Class 4 soul engineer!

Huo Yuhao did not ask the Snow Lady to block it. He had to ﬁnd out what kind of power this was.

He raised his right hand too, which was covered with a layer of ice crystals. He made a grabbing motion, and blocked the pink light ray.

The pink light ray was instantly destroyed. However, Huo Yuhao was deeply shocked. While it did not appear very powerful, since it had just crossed such a wide distance so quickly, its power exceeded his expectations.

It was not about the offensive power of the ray or its destructive strength. Instead, it was its specialty.

When the pink light ray came in contact with the Ice Empress’ Pincer that was formed from diamond-like ice crystals, Huo Yuhao felt the ice in the center of his palm melt. That was unprecedented!

As a wielder of Ultimate Ice, he had yet to see anyone whose ﬁre could beat him. Even after Ma Xiaotao formed his Dark Phoenix, Huo Yuhao was unable to judge the effects of its ﬁre on him because they had never fought.

However, Nan Qiuqiu’s ability was not Ultimate Fire! The soul power she released was extremely warm, and yet this soul power was able to melt Ultimate Ice.

This was…

The only ability this could be was…. annihilation? A power which could destroy all other types?

In the lessons of Shrek Academy, there was a special course that explained all types of soul power to the students. Annihilation was mentioned during that course.

Annihilation was extremely powerful. After it hit its opponent, it was able to destroy its target based on the target’s type.

There were two things one had to watch out for when dealing with annihilation-type soul power or attacks. Firstly, it could not be countered by any type. Secondly, after it hit its target, its target’s soul power would be depleted quicker than normal.

Huo Yuhao could not feel the depletion of his soul power just yet, as he possessed an Ultimate Ice martial soul. No matter how powerful annihilation was, it would have to expend a lot of soul power to disintegrate an Ultimate martial soul. If they continued to ﬁght like this, the effects of its second trait would not be as obvious on Huo Yuhao.

Even so, Huo Yuhao was shocked. The teachers of Shrek Academy had mentioned that Ultimate martial souls were only slightly rarer than Annihilation martial souls. Just like Huo Yuhao’s spirit-type, it was also difﬁcult for them to form soul rings. He had never expected to meet one in this tournament.

Annihilation-type… Looking at her, could her martial soul be the rarely-seen Rogue Dragon of the First Dragons? That would be bad!

Other than being Annihilation-type dragons, Rogue Dragons also specialized in long-range attacks! Nan Qiuqiu watched Huo Yuhao react to her ﬁrst soul skill, the Light of Annihilation. A cold smile crossed her face. As Huo Yuhao assessed her abilities, how could she not assess his?

She had been observing the Snow Lady’s ﬁghting style all this while. To her, Huo Yuhao should be a soul master who could tap into the power of his martial soul. However, this martial soul was exceptionally powerful. The fact that one could not see his soul rings meant that they were being deliberately concealed.

Her objective in using her Light of Annihilation was simple, she wanted to deplete his soul power. Using the accelerated depletion nature of annihilation, she hoped to obtain victory.

When Huo Yuhao blocked her ﬁrst Light of Annihilation, she had already sent her second one out. However, her target was no longer Huo Yuhao, but the Snow Lady, who had ﬂown into the air.

Everyone could see that Snow Lady was an Energy Body. However, to them, Snow Lady should just be a special soul skill of Huo Yuhao, and likely his most powerful soul skill. The tiny Snow Lady moved in mid-air. She easily dodged Nan Qiuqiu’s Light of Annihilation and then made a face at her.

Nan Qiuqiu was stunned. While they were 100 meters apart, her Light of Annihilation could move at a stunning speed. How could Huo Yuhao instruct Snow Lady to dodge her Light of Annihilation after he had just blocked another of her attacks? She did not believe that the Snow Lady was capable of independent thought. Like Zhou Sichen’s summoning abilities, she thought that everything Huo Yuhao summoned was controlled by him.

However, she did not know that while Huo Yuhao could control the Snow Lady, she was a spirit that was one-of-a-kind in the world. She did possess her own life and independent thought!

Huo Yuhao moved. He pushed his wheelchair at a ‘stunning’ speed and advanced toward Nan Qiuqiu. At the same time, his Spirit Eyes started to shine. The golden light was not intense, but Nan Qiuqiu instantly felt disoriented. Her third Light of Annihilation missed its target by quite a fair bit, and landed on the light screen far away, creating a ripple. Eh, what’s going on? Nan Qiuqiu’s heart missed a beat. She calmed herself down and looked in the direction of Huo Yuhao and Snow Lady. However, what shocked her was the fact that she was now seeing double. No matter how hard she tried, she could not see straight.

What is this power? Nan Qiuqiu would never believe that her eyes had gone bonkers in such a short time. Doubtless, it was a trick of her opponent! However, what exactly did he do?

Spiritual Interference was the right answer!

One of the most powerful attacks that the Skydream Iceworm gave Huo Yuhao was the ability to effectively use Spiritual Interference at a distance. Huo Yuhao released this power, which was already in a weaker form, but it was still sufﬁciently powerful to make Nan Qiuqiu miss.

However, as the captain of the Earthdragon Sect, Nan Qiuqiu was no pushover. After she lost concentration momentarily, she quickly regained her senses. Her right hand was still pointed at the sky. This time, she extended three ﬁngers, and her body slowly ﬂoated off the ground. She was now about sixty cm off the ground.

A sharp dragon roar rose from around her body. A blurry pink shape ﬂashed behind her back and then disappeared. Following that, a ball of pink light started to congregate around her three ﬁngers. In the blink of an eye, it became as big as a human head.

Nan Qiuqiu waved her right hand, and the pretty ball of pink light ﬂew into the sky. While she could not see Huo Yuhao and the Snow Lady exactly, she could make out their general direction.

The ball of pink light expanded at an astonishing pace as it ﬂew the sky. Thirty meters away from the ground, it stopped. Then, like a meteor, it came crashing down to the ground.

Boom!

An explosion rang out, and balls of pink light exploded all over the place. Each explosion had a radius of ten meters, and that was not the end. Following that, there were two more sounds of explosions. The successive chain of explosions caused the radius of the pink light to increase by at least ﬁfty percent.

Chained Annihilation Explosions! This was Nan Qiuqiu’s third soul skill, a domain attack. In the domain, the target might not necessarily be injured, but they could still be hurt by the explosion. It would cause a soul master’s soul power to deplete at a shocking rate. Nan Qiuqiu liked this soul skill a lot!

Sadly, no matter how powerful Chained Annihilation Explosions was, it had to hit its target to be effective. Its continual explosions were able to produce so much strong Annihilation-type energy that even Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Interference was momentarily eliminated by it.

Nan Qiuqiu now realized that the person in the wheelchair was not in the domain of her attack. The power from the explosion had not affected him at all!

How… how can this be possible? Did he really distort my vision to this extent?

As she thought about it, she released her second Chained Annihilation Explosions. Nan Qiuqiu had always been resolute. While she missed the ﬁrst time, Huo Yuhao had revealed his position. This opportunity was too good to let pass!

At this moment, the Snow Lady wriggled out of Huo Yuhao’s arms. A ray of deep-blue sword radiance turned into a startling rainbow in the sky as it ﬂashed out and disappeared. The light of the pink Chained Annihilation Explosions was instantly cut in half in mid-air. While the explosive power of the Chained Annihilation Explosions could still be felt, they all detonated harmlessly in mid-air.

Huo Yuhao pushed his wheelchair forward without any sign of haste as he advanced. The expression on his face did not change.

Accurate and powerful, was how Nan Qiuqiu would describe the power of that sword. She immediately thought of those two words. The little girl’s battling abilities were so strong! Now she understood why her teammates had lost!

Her expression turned even more serious, and she no longer remained still. The tips of her feet touched the ground, and she turned into a pink ray of light hurtling towards Huo Yuhao. As a wielder of the Rogue Dragon martial soul, did she really specialize in long-range attacks? Just as everyone thought so, she surprised them all!

Huo Yuhao stopped his wheelchair. As his enemy was approaching him, he naturally did not need to move forward anymore. The Snow Lady ﬂew toward Nan Qiuqiu, but stopped only ten meters away from Huo Yuhao. The eyes of the soul masters spectating the match lit up. Was this the maximum

distance she could stay away from Huo Yuhao?

She lifted her tiny hand, and a round, icy halo appeared on the path that Nan Qiuqiu had to take to reach Huo Yuhao.

The tip of Nan Qiuqiu’s foot touched the surface of the ground as her body twisted unbelievably to the side, and she actually started to move sideways before continuing her charge forward. In mid-air, she formed a ‘Z’ as she continued toward Huo Yuhao and Snow Lady.

“Eeeeyaa!” the Snow Lady cried out in shock. She lifted her hand and ﬁred a ray of deep-blue light at the approaching Nan Qiuqiu.

Nan Qiuqiu did not dodge. She lifted her right hand, and her second soul ring ﬂashed with light. Her body gave off a pink glow, and the pink in the palm of her hand became even more intense. The blue light disappeared as if it had been eaten by the pink light.

Annihilation Barrier. It could block everything!

At the same time, when Nan Qiuqiu straightened her body again, she was only ten meters away from the Snow Lady. She grabbed out with her left hand, and her fourth soul ring started to glow. Instantly, a huge pink dragon claw appeared in mid-air as it made a grab at Snow Lady.

Hand of Annihilation! She even possessed this soul skill! No wonder she was so conﬁdent. This was the best soul skill to use against the Snow Lady!

Hand of Annihilation, like its name would suggest, was a huge hand that brimmed with the power of Annihilation. Once you were caught by it, your soul power would be utterly depleted. With Nan Qiuqiu’s current cultivation, soul masters with fewer than ﬁve soul rings would have at least half of their soul power depleted by her once she touched them. It was the best skill to use against an Energy Body like the Snow Lady. However, the Snow Lady was controlled by Huo Yuhao. Naturally, she would not give up without a ﬁght. Her cute little face turned icy-cold, and an intimidating look appeared in her deep-blue eyes. She lifted her right hand and cried out in a childish voice. She too thrust a palm out at her opponent.

When her tiny palm was sent ﬂying out, the huge Hand of Annihilation had already wrapped itself around her tiny body.

I win! Surfaced in Nan Qiuqiu’s mind.

Any summoned creature would disintegrate quickly after it was caught by the Hand of Annihilation! While she found the Snow Lady cute, she was still a summoned creature! This was a competition, and nothing was more important than winning!

However, this thought only stayed in her mind for a short while. In the next instant, the huge pink hand turned icy-blue. Then, it turned into many specks of icy-blue light as it disappeared in mid-air.

The Snow Lady remained suspended in mid-air. However, her big pretty eyes were closed. She appeared to be sensing something. Huo Yuhao, who was not far from her, had the same expression.

“Oh!” The Snow Lady turned into a ray of blue light and ﬂew back toward Huo Yuhao. She entered through the center of his forehead and disappeared.

She… resisted it? My Hand of Annihilation could not overcome a summoned creature?

Nan Qiuqiu stared at the disappearing blue light around Huo Yuhao in shock. She even stopped charging towards him.

Only she knew that the Hand of Annihilation was not just used to wear her opponent down. At the same time, it had a second, almost god-like ability. It could restore her soul power!

Around 20% of the soul power that the Hand of Annihilation took away would go back to her. The power of the Hand of Annihilation was built on the basis of strong soul power. As a thousand-year soul skill, it would deplete as much of Nan Qiuqiu’s soul power as a ten-thousand year soul skill. However, since it helped to restore her soul power, it was still bearable for her. After all, her enemy would suffer the greater depletion.

However, she did not regenerate any of her soul power from that blow. This also meant that her soul skill had been broken. It was destroyed by a summoned being. One had to know that the most powerful ability of the Hand of Annihilation was its ability to destroy summoned creatures! This was something Nan Qiuqiu had never imagined could happen.

“A powerful Hand of Annihilation!” Huo Yuhao complimented Nan Qiuqiu. It was indeed powerful. The palm that the Snow Lady thrust out was one of Ice Empress’ Three Ultimate Techniques, Snowless Glacier! Just as Nan Qiuqiu had expected, her Hand of Annihilation was very adept at ﬁghting summoned creatures. While a spirit was not a summoned being, these two were highly similar. Hence, she was able to constrain the Snow Lady by quite a bit.

Without Huo Yuhao’s assistance in summoning Snowless Glacier, she would still be able to resist the Hand of Annihilation. However, the powerful Annihilation in it was something that the Snow Lady could not take. Huo Yuhao feared that in the subsequent battle, she would face more of this Annihilation. Thus, he recalled her.

Nan Qiuqiu looked coldly at Huo Yuhao and said, “Your summoned being is the most powerful one I’ve seen, as well as the most agile. Not only can it use its own soul skills, but it can even destroy its natural nemesis, the Hand of Annihilation. This is something inconceivable to me. However, without her, you’ll lose for sure.”

Huo Yuhao suddenly smiled and said, “Are you bullying a cripple?”

Nan Qiuqiu paused momentarily. Only then did she realize her opponent was in a wheelchair. However, she said resolutely, “A cripple? Are you an ordinary cripple? If you couldn’t summon such a powerful being, would you still be in this tournament?”

“Yes!” Huo Yuhao replied without any hesitation. “Don’t think that you’ve won. The competition is not yet over.”

Nan Qiuqiu’s right hand glowed with the Light of Annihilation as she said, “Then, I’ll end it for you.”

“Wait, wait,” Huo Yuhao’s eyes betrayed signs of panic as he said, “Don’t you feel shame when you bully a cripple like me?”

Nan Qiuqiu said harshly, “Don’t waste time! While your summoned being is powerful and is able to destroy my Hand of Annihilation, it took quite a toll on you. I can see that this summoned being has a close tie with you. While it’s powerful, it’ll take quite some time for it to regenerate after it has taken too much damage. There’s no point in you stalling.”

Huo Yuhao grit his teeth and said, “Isn’t your type my exact weakness? I’ll still beat you, though!” When she saw Huo Yuhao’s determined and pained look, a cruel smile crossed Nan Qiuqiu’s face as she said, “Fine! Let’s see how you’ll beat me!” As she said that, she advanced toward Huo Yuhao slowly, step by step.

The judge watched the two of them chat. At ﬁrst, he wanted to remind them to treat the tournament seriously. However, when he saw Nan Qiuqiu approach Huo Yuhao, he stopped. He was also surprised that she was an Annihilation-type soul master.

Huo Yuhao sat in the wheelchair with an uneasy look in his eye. His right hand gripped the wheels of his wheelchair. While he appeared calm, panic rose in his eyes.

“You, wait!” Huo Yuhao shouted.

Nan Qiuqiu stopped and said, “What? What else do you want to say? You’re really full of crap.”

Huo Yuhao said angrily, “Don’t think that you’ve won. I, I still have a trump card.” Nan Qiuqiu grinned. This time, she grinned in joy. She suddenly realized that torturing her opponent psychologically made her very excited. This was akin to telling her opponent, “Resist me! The more you resist, the more excited I am!”

“Well done! I want to see you what your trump card is. I thought you said you could win? So what if you can’t win? Your summoned being is decent, why not join the Earthdragon Sect? I’ve never even heard of your Tang Sect before. The Earthdragon Sect is one of the top sects of the Dou Ling Empire.”

Huo Yuhao said angrily, “Rubbish, how can I join your Earthdragon Sect? Does this mean that if you lose, you’ll join the Tang Sect?”

Nan Qiuqiu said, “Yes! If a cripple who has lost his main offensive capability can beat me, that will mean that your Tang Sect is powerful indeed. So what’s wrong with joining you?”

“These are your words? How can I know if you’re trustworthy?” Huo Yuhao asked. As he spoke, he slowly pushed his wheelchair back. To Nan Qiuqiu, every single action of his reeked of fear.

“Of course I’ll live up to my words!However, you’ll have to live up to yours, too! There’re many beneﬁts to joining the Earthdragon Sect. Let’s stop wasting time and end this!” As she said that, the tips of Nan Qiuqiu’s feet touched the ground as she charged toward Huo Yuhao. She lifted her right hand, and

her fourth soul ring lit up once again. Another Hand of Annihilation appeared. However, this time, it was making a grabbingfor Huo Yuhao!

The wheelchair’s wheels stopped spinning because Huo Yuhao had lifted his right hand. The look of terror on his face was wiped clean off. What replaced it was a smile.

He raised his right hand and waved it slightly. A huge dark- golden claw suddenly appeared. This razor-sharp claw was almost 8 meters long, and several times bigger than the Hand of Annihilation. It was terrifyingly sharp, and seemed capable of tearing the world apart. Wherever it touched, the air would be torn into ﬁve, long, black lights. Space itself was being torn apart!

The Hand of Annihilation was itself annihilated instantly. As the dark-golden claws slapped downward, they enveloped Nan Qiuqiu entirely.

Instantly, Nan Qiuqiu, who had thought victory was at hand, was dumbfounded. The terrifying dark-golden claw had not reached her, and yet, she could feel that the protective layer of soul power around her was being torn apart.

I’m screwed! Nan Qiuqiu’s brain went blank. At this moment, all she could think about was survival and the smile on Huo Yuhao’s face.

At this moment, an emerald light suddenly surrounded Huo Yuhao. Following that, a huge pillar of light suddenly shot out from behind him. It aimed itself at Nan Qiuqiu’s body, enveloped her, and then moved her back 10 meters. The dark- golden claw that seemed only inches away from her body suddenly disappeared. It was forcibly retracted.

Nan Qiuqiu had now turned into an ice sculpture. Huo Yuhao remained in his wheelchair. To everyone present, he still looked like a cripple.

Everyone was silent. This change in fortunes stunned everyone. No one thought that this youth, who sat in a wheelchair and who had only been battling with his summoned being, was able to attack with so much power. When the dark-golden claw appeared, the spectators, who were protected by a barrier from the arena, could still feel a terrifying aura. It was like a ferocious beast had appeared!

As he looked at the pink light glowing from within the ice sculpture, Huo Yuhao pushed himself up before Nan Qiuqiu. With his right hand, he tapped the ice and said, “Judge, I’ve won.”

Doubtlessly, with the sharpness of his claws, he could have pierced through Nan Qiuqiu’s body if he had wished to.

“Individual elimination Round 4, victory: Tang Sect,” announced the judge numbly, staring at Huo Yuhao in shock.

Yuhao retracted his Darkgolden Terrorclaw and tapped on the ice sculpture that contained Nan Qiuqiu. At the same time, he hit the ground with his right hand. His entire body and wheelchair ﬂew a few meters into the air. The pink light suddenly brightened, and Nan Qiuqiu broke free from the Ultimate Ice. Protected by her Protective Annihilation, the Ultimate Ice did not affect her as much as it did the others, and she had still been able to move. If she was given enough time, she could break out. However, this was because Huo Yuhao controlled the energy he had placed in Ice Empress’ Wrath. He did not want to hurt her.

“Stop!” The judge turned around and blocked Nan Qiuqiu. “The round is over, you’ve lost. Get off now. If you want to ﬁght, you can do it in the team section.”

“I, I didn’t lose. You liar!” The last bit was aimed at Huo Yuhao.

The judge was perplexed as he said, “He has already shown mercy. If he really smacked you with his claws, you wouldn’t be alive.”

Rage made Nan Qiuqiu’s chest rise and fall vigorously. Of course she knew that Huo Yuhao had shown mercy. However, she could not accept it! How… How terrifying is he? All that earlier was a show. With such a terrifying move, why would he be afraid of her?

Huo Yuhao smiled at her and said, “It’s time for you to honor your word. The Tang Sect welcomes you. If you learn our Secret Techniques, the Annihilation power of your Rogue Dragon will increase greatly.”

“Pft! Who wants to join your Tang Sect, stop dreaming!” Nan Qiuqiu cursed as she walked off the stage.

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “Trust is all a man has. If you don’t live up to your words, this incident will be in your heart forever. Your progress in cultivation will be harder.”

Nan Qiuqiu’s body froze. She turned around and said, “I made a bet with you. If you die, I don’t have to honor it.”

As she said that, she turned to the waiting area and shouted, “I’ll marry whoever kills this bastard!”

Her voice was loud indeed. Not only did her teammates hear it, but those in the main podium heard it too! Huo Yuhao’s conversation with Nan Qiuqiu during the round had been inaudible to them. When she shouted that, a question surfaced in everyone’s mind. What exactly did Huo Yuhao do to her?

Chapter 282: Nan Qiuqiu and Nan Shuishui

Huo Yuhao’s expression was frozen. He had never expected her to have such a bad temper…

While he admired her, he only admired her annihilation- type abilities. This type was too rare, and under some circumstances, it could have unthinkable effects. It could even be useful in making high-level soul tools. Hence, he put on a show, and she fell for his ruse.

However, she would rather kill him than live up to her promise! My character is too awful. Had it been Dong’er, the results might have been different. After all, her face can charm both guys and girls.

Indeed, when the ﬁfth member of the Earthdragon Sect jumped onto the arena, the ﬁrst thing he said to Huo Yuhao, through gritted teeth, was, “Bastard, what did you do to my elder sister? If I don’t kill you, I’m not worthy to be a human!” As he said that, he made a rush straight for Huo Yuhao. The referee blocked him and said, “The round hasn’t started!”

The ﬁfth competitor appeared to not have heard him.

Instead, he attacked the referee with a soul skill.

What happened next was totally expected. The young man was immediately sent ﬂying by the eight-ringed Soul Douluo referee.

“Attacking the referee is a violation of the competition’s rules. You are out. Next!” The referee said emotionlessly and coldly. He was probably the only competitor who had dared to attack the referee so far in this tournament. If not for the referee’s status, he would probably have killed him there and then.

The sixth member of the Earthdragon Sect controlled his emotions. Unlike his predecessor, he was not as brash. Even so, he still gnashed his teeth as he looked at Huo Yuhao. Immediately after the referee declared the start of the round, he rushed toward Huo Yuhao without hesitation. Offstage, Nan Qiuqiu sat in the waiting zone. The rage in her eyes gradually disappeared, and instead, was replaced by pensive thought.

Defeat, is my defeat really unjustiﬁed? While that guy has a powerful summoned creature, he himself is also powerful in his own right. With his claws, even if I had prepared for them, could I really resist them? What soul skill was that? It was so terrifying! If he’s an ice-type soul master, that soul skill should come from a soul bone...

How much of his soul power was depleted in the previous four rounds? Can our remaining guys defeat him, or even kill him?

Before she could get an answer, the ﬁfth competitor had been knocked down. The sixth competitor rushed onto the arena without waiting for her instructions.

Nan Qiuqiu’s face turned pale. She knew that the Earthdragon Sect was going to lose for sure. As the captain, she had lost her cool, and now so had her teammates. She was a proud maiden, and hence, she had allowed some key members of her team to rest during the elimination round. While the Earthdragon Sect team was not the strongest one that could have been assembled, they still had four Soul Kings. According to her original estimate, it was completely possible for them to enter the ﬁnals. However, this was just the ﬁrst

round! Also, their opponent had only sent one guy out. She did

not even know the level of his cultivation! It was a humiliating defeat!

However, what else could she do? Defeat was defeat! If the sixth member of her team lost as well, any further competition would be meaningless.

Reality proved her tragic prediction right. When the Snow Lady appeared once again, as if she had never been touched by the Hand of Annihilation, the result of the ﬁghting was sealed.

Aided by Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, the Snow Lady revealed the full extent of her power and defeated the sixth member of the Earthdragon Sect, who only had four rings. Right now, Huo Yuhao rivaled Meng Hongchen’s success from yesterday, as he managed to single-handedly beat six opponents. Of course, he had a much easier time compared to Meng Hongchen, as the wheelchair had made his opponents underestimate him.

“Keep calm, you must keep calm. Much of his soul power is depleted. Don’t ﬁght him head-on, but instead, slowly wear him down. Only then can you deliver the killing blow, do you understand?” Nan Qiuqiu suppressed the uneasy feeling in her heart as she instructed her last teammate.

“Yes, elder sister. Don’t worry, I’ll win.” With that, the last member stepped onto the arena.

“I’m Xiao Ye, please guide me.” The last member of the Earthdragon Sect looked rather decent. Unlike the previous two members, he was not brash. He even took the initiative to greet Yuhao.

“Hello, I’m Huo Yuhao!” Huo Yuhao replied with a smile. Actually, from start to end, other than the time when he made Nan Qiuqiu fall for his trick, his face was perpetually plastered with a smile. The two combatants retreated to the edges of the arena.

From afar, they watched one another.

Huo Yuhao clearly understood why Meng Hongchen was unable to hold on until the end. This round-robin style was draining indeed. Furthermore, his opponents were not weak!

If he were at full strength and not paralyzed, he would naturally not be afraid. After all, he had made a name for himself during his time at the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy by taking on many opponents at once.

However, right now, he could only move his right arm. It was a massive handicap! He could not use many of his abilities. In the previous six rounds, he had used the Snow Lady throughout, and while the origin energy of Ultimate Ice in his body helped in his regeneration, his soul power was still massively depleted. After all, he had been using his Spiritual Detection the whole time too!

A faint golden light ﬂashed, and Huo Yuhao released the Snow Lady once more. As the referee’s right hand came down, Xiao Ye ran lightly toward Huo Yuhao. As he ran, he also released his martial soul. Two yellow, two purple, and one black. It was the same as Nan Qiuqiu’s, the ideal combination for a powerful Soul King.

“Not an easy opponent!” Huo Yuhao mumbled to himself.

However, the smile on his face showed no sign of fading.

Xiao Ye’s martial soul was the Night Dragon. When he was about ﬁfty meters from Huo Yuhao, he suddenly stopped, before releasing a black layer of light from his body. It instantly swallowed up every single strand of light in the arena. Then, the darkness moved toward Huo Yuhao, about to engulf him!

Control-type soul master! Huo Yuhao reacted to it instantly.

Then, an apologetic smile crossed his face.

A control-type soul master was normally much more difﬁcult to defeat than an assault-type soul master. Furthermore, if he could completely control his opponent, then he would have no difﬁculty facing multiple opponents.

However, this control-type Soul King’s power had something to do with darkness. He had to control his opponent’s vision. Huo Yuhao’s martial soul was the Spirit Eyes, but how could his vision be so easily controlled? With his Spiritual Detection, he did not even need his eyes to see! Hence, the audience watched as Huo Yuhao dumbly pushed his wheelchair into the patch of darkness.

The competition ended faster than anyone could have imagined. The darkness lasted for no more than ten seconds before it faded. Huo Yuhao remained standing, or rather sitting, onstage. Xiao Ye, however, had fainted, and was lying on the ground unconscious.

Huo Yuhao turned and smiled at Nan Qiuqiu as he said, “Thanks for going easy on me. The Tang Sect welcomes you.”

“This is impossible!” Nan Qiuqiu jumped up from the waiting zone. “He-he probably used some illegal method! If not, how could he defeat Xiao Ye?” Xiao Ye was their squad’s main control-type soul master. In terms of cultivation, he was only slightly weaker than her! His Night Dragon was powerful indeed, and it deﬁnitely did not just obscure his opponent’s vision with darkness, it had some control elements in it too! In the darkness, Xiao Ye’s full repertoire of powers would be revealed. Nan Qiuqiu had to use her annihilation-type power to overcome his darkness-type power to achieve victory. However, Huo Yuhao was able to beat him in a matter of seconds. Furthermore, he did not even freeze Xiao Ye over.

This was beyond her comprehension!

The referee looked coldly at Nan Qiuqiu and said, “Silence, the competition has ended. Between the Tang Sect and the Earthdragon Sect, the Tang Sect has won. It accumulated 12 out of 12 points. May the two sides please vacate the premises!”

Nan Qiuqiu did not hesitate as she rushed into the arena. She did not rush toward Xiao Ye, but instead, she made straight for Huo Yuhao. She had lost, completely and utterly. This was unacceptable to her at such a young age. While she understood that Huo Yuhao was much more powerful, she was still unwilling to admit defeat!

At this moment, a shadow silently blocked her.

“The competition has ended, what do you want to do?” The person who had blocked her was Wang Dong’er. Nan Qiuqiu roared in rage, “Scram!” As she moved, her palm came toward Wang Dong’er as she released her annihilation- type power.

Wang Dong’er frowned. She raised her right hand too, and slapped over as well. Intense, golden ﬂames rose.

Peng-!

The golden ﬂames appeared slightly muted under the Light of Annihilation. However, Nan Qiuqiu stumbled back three, then four steps, and almost fell to the ground.

“You…” She raised her head to look over. Then, she saw a dazzlingly handsome “man” with light-blue hair pulled back in a ponytail.

Like all women who ﬁrst saw Wang Dong’er, Nan Qiuqiu’s gaze froze. Wang Dong’er’s handsome face was like a magical cure. Instantly, her anger, unhappiness, and will to battle dropped by half. He’s so handsome! Nan Qiuqiu swallowed a mouthful of spit as she said in a hoarse voice, “Soul Emperor?”

To beat her back with one palm without releasing their martial soul was a feat only Soul Emperors could achieve. However, Wang Dong looked so young! Earlier, “he” had been in the waiting zone! Nan Qiuqiu’s heart instantly turned cold.

So-so this was how powerful the Tang Sect was! They actually had Soul Emperors who had yet to take part in the competition! Is that guy in the wheelchair a Soul Emperor too? If so, this defeat was not without reason!

I have to join the Tang Sect… However, they are so powerful… If I join the Tang Sect, my life won’t be as painful. Then again, how can I answer to my mother…?

Just as Nan Qiuqiu was having this internal argument, Wang Dong’er came over to Huo Yuhao’s side and asked in a low voice, “Yuhao, how are you?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Excellent! Did you see how cool I looked when I beat seven of them?”

Wang Dong’er covered her smile and said, “Yes, you’re very cool. Enough is enough. You almost tricked the other team’s captain into joining us. This is a resounding victory! However, why do you always seem to have some issue with a person called ‘Qiu’? Is it deliberate?”

“Keke…” Huo Yuhao said with an awkward look on his face. “As for that, Dong’er, you know… I…”

Wang Dong’er smiled and said, “It’s ﬁne, we’ll talk about it later.” As she said that, she pushed his wheelchair with one hand as she placed her other hand on Huo Yuhao’s shoulder. Their Haodong Power fused and helped Huo Yuhao replenish his soul power.

After examining his body and ascertaining that he was ﬁne, Wang Dong’er relaxed.

“Qiuqiu, get down now!” an angry voice rang out.

Nan Qiuqiu trembled. She turned around to look, and realized that a pretty woman, who shared a sharp resemblance with her, was speaking to her. However, her face was icy cold. Only then did Nan Qiuqiu leave the arena with a dejected look on her face as she made way for the next round.

“Mom!...” Nan Qiuqiu said in a low voice.

The middle-aged woman said angrily, “Don’t call me ‘mom’! The Earthdragon Sect has been utterly humiliated because of you! I put you in charge of the tournament, and yet, you did not send a single strong team member out. Instead, our opponent thrashed all seven members of our team with just one guy! You, you, you…”

The chest of the woman rose and fell rapidly in her rage.

Nan Qiuqiu lowered her head and said, “Mom, I know I’m in the wrong. However, they are indeed powerful. The one in the wheelchair is at least a Soul Emperor. The one who blocked me just now is also a Soul Emperor.”

“Soul Emperor?” The middle-aged woman paused momentarily, but her face still betrayed an ugly expression. “So what if they’re Soul Emperors? You sent seven people out, but none of you could defeat a single one of them. In some rounds, your teammates lost without any reason. In particular, you, as the captain, not only led your team to defeat, but continued to holler afterward. What kind of behavior is this? This time, when we get back, you shall go to the Dragon Suppressing Cliff and cultivate alone for a year! If you don’t

become a Soul Emperor by then, don’t even think of coming

out!”

Nan Qiuqiu suddenly knelt in front of her mother. “Mom, I’m sorry!”

The middle-aged woman was momentarily stunned. Her eyes betrayed a tinge of heartbreak. Nan Qiuqiu was her daughter, after all! And she was indeed exceptional enough. However, because of how exceptional she was, she had become arrogant. Among her fellow sect members of the same generation, she was the most cherished one of them all. Her seniors liked her, and not only did her peers like her, but they even let her do whatever she wanted. This time, after she made such a huge mistake, the middle-aged woman was determined to take this chance to discipline her. If not, no one knew how she would screw up in the future.

“Get up! What are you doing in front of all these people?” The middle-aged woman shouted. This was the resting zone, and there were many other sects watching this spectacle. From the start, she did not count on the Earthdragon Sect to obtain good results here. Instead, her objective was to show them the world. However, they were eliminated after only the ﬁrst round! Of course, defeat was just defeat. The more important

thing was for them to learn their lessons! She did not ﬁnd defeat to be particularly humiliating. However, she would not tell these youths these things.

“Mom, I don’t think I can go back with you. I…,” Nan Qiuqiu fumbled with her words as she tried to speak with her head bowed. A cunning look ﬂashed in her eyes.

The middle-aged woman was stunned. Then, she bellowed in rage, “You dare to defy my orders? Don’t forget, I’m not only your mother, but I’m also the sectmistress of the Earthdragon Sect! You know what the rules of our sect are!”

Nan Qiuqiu shook her head vigorously, and then lifted her head once more. At this time, tears streamed uncontrollably down her face. “Mom, I’m sorry but… but it’s too late. In the round just now, I made a bet with Huo Yuhao and I… I lost myself to him.” “What?” At this point, the middle-aged woman was truly stunned. “What… what are you saying? You lost yourself to a cripple? You… you are really infuriating! Are you going to spend the rest of your life with a cripple? Even if he’s powerful, he’s…” She could not speak anymore. Her entire face was red.

What was a tournament in comparison to her daughter’s happiness?

When Nan Qiuqiu heard that, she realized that her mother had misunderstood her. She quickly explained herself, “No, no, mom, it’s not like that. I lost myself, yes, but I lost myself to the Tang Sect. We bet that if I won, he’d join the Earthdragon Sect, but if I lost, I’d join the Tang Sect.” As she said that, her voice became softer and softer as she lowered her head once more.

When the woman recovered from her shock, she asked about the details of the bet once more. Nan Qiuqiu did not dare to hide anything from her as she recounted the entire process once more.

“Mom, I know I made a mistake, and I fell for his trick. However, if I’m willing to bet, I should honor it. Furthermore, he’s right. If I don’t honor my bet, it’ll be difﬁcult for me to make any sort of breakthrough once my cultivation reaches a bottleneck.”

At this point, Nan Qiuqiu’s tears ﬂowed freely.

The leader of the Earthdragon Sect was stunned. Not only did she lose the competition, but she had also lost her own daughter, too? As the sect leader, she could certainly forcibly bar her daughter from joining the Tang Sect. However, if she did it would prove problematic for Nan Qiuqiu’s future!

She inhaled deeply and calmed herself down. She glared at Nan Qiuqiu, but at the same time, she pulled her up.

“Come with me.” As she said that, she pulled Nan Qiuqiu toward the resting zone where the Tang Sect sat.

------

Over on the Tang Sect’s side, Huo Yuhao had already told everyone his story about how he had made a bet with Nan Qiuqiu.

Everyone had an odd expression on their face. In the end, only He Caitou said something honest, “That girl is too silly!”

Xiao Xiao looked at him coldly and said, “She’s just innocent, alright? Yuhao is too devious. He tricked her completely, so pitiful! However, it’s not a bad thing for our sect to have more girls too. Hehe!”

As they spoke, the woman pulled Nan Qiuqiu over to them.

“Who’s in charge of the Tang Sect?” The woman asked plainly.

Everyone from the Tang Sect looked at Huo Yuhao. The woman was stunned. Her eyes turned cold. Can this young man in the wheelchair be their leader, as well?

“Hello senior, what do you seek from us?” The woman resembled Nan Qiuqiu, so Huo Yuhao could guess their relationship. He felt awkward too. He had tricked her daughter over from right under her nose! This was a dishonorable move!

“You’re called Huo Yuhao, right? I heard about your bet with Qiuqiu. I’m the leader of the Earthdragon Sect, Nan Shuishui, and her mother. State your price, and I’ll buy her back,” the woman said plainly.

Nan Qiuqiu coughed, “Mom, I’m not a commodity…”

Nan Shuishui glared at her, and she shut up.

Huo Yuhao said with an awkward smile, “Senior, the Tang Sect does not lack money. Just now, in the competition, you know that words are weapons too. While we did make a bet, there’s no need to treat it so seriously. It’s alright if you take her back.” In front of her mother, he could not just tell her to live up to what she had promised in the bet and leave her life behind.

Nan Shuishui said, “While the Earthdragon Sect is not an inﬂuential sect on the continent, it’s still one of the top-ranked sects in the Dou Ling Empire. How can our words count for nothing? Since she made a bet with you, there’s nothing I can say. If you want her to join the Tang Sect, I’m ﬁne with it, on two conditions.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned. What kind of mother would give her own daughter to the Tang Sect? While he did want to recruit Nan Qiuqiu, he was not conﬁdent that it would actually happen. After all, he had made the bet casually. He did not expect the opportunity to truly arise!

“What are they?” Huo Yuhao replied calmly.

Nan Shuishui said, “First, while my daughter did lose her bet to you, she’s still a disciple of the Earthdragon Sect. There’ll be a price to pay if she wants to leave my sect! For you, I’ll give you a discount! She can join your Tang Sect for a certain period of time. Afterward, if she wishes to stay, she can stay. If not, she is free to return. You can’t stop her.”

“Second, Qiuqiu is a girl. You can’t force her to do things that she doesn’t want to do. Promise me these two things, and I’ll agree to let her leave the Earthdragon Sect. If not, I’d rather she break her promise and remain in the Earthdragon Sect.” Huo Yuhao looked at his friends. This mother was easy to negotiate with. These two conditions were like nothing.

“What’s a suitable time frame?” Huo Yuhao asked.

Nan Shuishui thought for a while, and then said, “Three years. If the Tang Sect can allow her to become a Soul Emperor in three years, you can extend the timeframe for another 2 years. However, after 5 years, it’ll be time for her to get married. By that time, we would have lived up to our promise. How about it?”

“I agree!” Huo Yuhao replied without hesitation. In these few years, there would be many changes to the continent. The Tang Sect needed talents to grow. With her current cultivation, it would not be difﬁcult to get Nan Qiuqiu to rise to a Soul Emperor in three years. All she had to do was get six rings and rise a few more ranks!

However, Huo Yuhao was conﬁdent. In the next ﬁve years, the Tang Sect would grow exponentially. He did not dare to say how strong the Tang Sect would be in ﬁve years’ time, but it would not be hard to keep Nan Qiuqiu.

Nan Qiuqiu was stunned. She had not expected her mother to give her up so easily. The two conditions were almost meaningless! Five years! She would soon become a disciple of the Tang Sect for at least ﬁve years!

Nan Shuishui looked Huo Yuhao deep in the eyes, nodded, and said, “Alright, then I shall hand Qiuqiu over to you. As long as you don’t deliberately bully her, it’s alright for you to be slightly strict with her. I’ve spoiled this girl. This time, she has to pay for her own mistakes to learn a lesson. Oh right, where is the Tang Sect? After this competition, I wish to pay your sect a visit!”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “We welcome you wholeheartedly. The Tang Sect is located in Shrek City. As long as you are there, it won’t be hard to ﬁnd us. The Tang Sect has a long history, but it has also had a period of decline. We’re rebuilding the Tang Sect, and we are conﬁdent that we’ll turn it into an even more powerful sect.”

“Shrek City?” Nan Shuishui’s eyes betrayed a look of shock. She dismissed some of the thoughts she had instantly. She turned her head to look at Nan Qiuqiu and said, “Alright, you’re now part of the Tang Sect! Five years from now, in the next tournament, you make the call as to whether you want to return or not. It’s settled!” With that, the sect leader of the Earthdragon Sect turned to leave.

While Nan Qiuqiu had planned to join the Tang Sect to avoid punishment, she could not help but feel wronged when her mother gave her away so easily. Tears streamed down her face.

Wang Dong’er approached her and said, “Qiuqiu, the Tang Sect is not a bad place. By joining the Tang Sect, we promise that it will not affect your future development negatively. We welcome you.” As she said that, she extended her hand out.

Ever since Wang Dong’er got together with Huo Yuhao, she decided to give up her cross-dressing charade. Hence, she fell into her role as a girl, but she forgot about the dangerous impact of her cross-dressing.

When Nan Qiuqiu heard Wang Dong’er’s words, she lifted her head to look at her perfectly-formed face. She nodded and not only did she stop her tears from ﬂowing, but she reached out and grabbed Wang Dong’er’s hands. Wang Dong’er led her to the resting area.

------

There was nothing wrong with Wang Dong’er holding Nan Qiuqiu’s hand. However, it made someone else immensely jealous.

“She-she actually dares to hold Wang Dong’s hand. I’ll kill her…!” Meng Hongchen said with gritted teeth as she walked out of the resting zone.

“Be calm! Sister, you must be calm!” Xiao Hongchen rushed toward to hold her. A helpless look crossed his face. He did not know why his sister would lose a few IQ points everytime Wang Dong was mentioned.

Nan Shuishui returned to the Earthdragon Sect’s side and sat down. A smile crept across her face as she thought, “Tang Sect. What a sec! Shrek Academy’s Tang Sect. That is the perfect place to train Qiuqiu!”

The Earthdragon Sect had a mysterious secret technique that originated from its ﬁrst sect leader more than a thousand years ago. They were able to determine the personality of a person just by looking at his/her face. Just now, she could see the righteousness in the faces of the Tang Sect disciples. If not, as a mother, how could she entrust her daughter to strangers? Furthermore, after she heard that the Tang Sect was in Shrek City, she was even more relieved.

Among the group of youngsters, at least two of them were Soul Emperors! What did that mean? Before they signed up, Nan Shuishui had deliberately researched past tournaments. Any team with a Soul Emperor would be able to enter the top eight! For them to have soul masters at that level, and for them to establish their sect in Shrek City, how could anyone believe that they had no ties whatsoever with Shrek Academy?

Due to her assessments, Nan Shuishui had enough assurance to make her decision. She abandoned her plan of bringing a few men to kick up a fuss at the Tang Sect. Of course, she would still pay a visit to the Tang Sect! She had to see if her daughter had a future in the sect. All mothers were the same in this aspect. No matter how tough they seemed, their kids could melt their hearts.

------

While the competition had ended for the Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao his team did not return to the hotel. Instead, they stayed to continue watching the tournament. He was waiting to see a particular sect ﬁght.

Soon, his wait paid off.

As noon approached, the morning rounds for the second day were coming to an end. Soon, it was the last round.

“Holy Ghost Sect versus Heavenly Capital Academy.

Participants, please approach the arena.” Huo Yuhao was resting with his eyes closed, but when he heard the name ‘Holy Ghost Sect’, he opened his eyes immediately. He looked toward the resting zone.

Indeed, he saw a youth clad in black walking out. The tips of his feet touched the ground, and soon, he was in the arena. His attire was exactly the same as Tang Ya’s.

Holy Ghost Sect, Holy Ghost Church. It was indeed them.

They really decided to take part in the competition!

Huo Yuhao’s expression turned serious. He stared intently at the youth in black.

Wang Dong’er sat next to him, looking slightly vexed. Right after she asked Nan Qiuqiu to sit down next to her, she realized that something was wrong. She had made the same mistake once more. Nan Qiuqiu ﬁnally calmed down and then, she continually asked ‘him’ about the Tang Sect. Then, she started to ask more personal questions. Undoubtedly, she had her own secret objective! Wang Dong’er had experienced too many of these types of situations already. “Wang Dong, where do I stay once I’m at the Tang Sect?”

“What method did Huo Yuhao use to defeat the last member of my Earthdragon Sect?”

“Wang Dong, you are really handsome, but your shoulders are slightly narrow. Eh, your feet aren’t big either! What’s your size!?”

Nan Qiuqiu blurted out a whole bunch of crap in just a short while.

The other members of the Tang Sect pretended to not hear. They sat there rigidly, but the mirth in their eyes could not be concealed. Evidently, another girl had become infatuated with Wang Dong’er!

Nan Qiuqiu was no romantic. However, when she met this handsome young man who had managed to reach Rank 60 before he was 20, how could she not be attracted to him? Perhaps she did not even realize it herself. Just like Huo Yuhao said, Wang Dong’er could charm both guys and girls.

At this moment, Huo Yuhao’s attention was completely focused on the tournament. The youth from the Holy Ghost Sect in black looked plain, his face slightly pale. However, when Huo Yuhao cast his Spiritual Detection over him, he felt something eerie.

The Sun Moon Empire led the continent in terms of soul tools. For such a huge arena, the protective barrier was over ﬁve hundred meters high, and its protective abilities were amazing indeed. Hence, Huo Yuhao, with his current spiritual cultivation, had to expend a lot of spiritual power to penetrate the barrier. However, he had to ﬁnd out more about the Holy Ghost Sect, so he did not mind making the sacriﬁce.

Earlier, when he ﬁnished off the Earthdragon Sect, Huo Yuhao had relied on his Spiritual Shock. Unlike before, he could now completely control the intensity of his attack. He could render his opponent unconscious without actually hurting him. If he wished, even a Soul Emperor could not resist a blow from his Spiritual Shock. Actually, this was his trump card, and hence, he had only revealed it when he was shrouded in darkness. He would not use it easily.

Huo Yuhao was not a real cripple. As his spiritual power increased, he realized that his soul power and his body could not match it.

For example, he would not dare to use his Eye of Destiny to release his Spiritual Shock. If he did so, his brain would be unable to take it, and it might very well explode. As for this problem, he tried to ask Elder Xuan what he should do. Elder Xuan gave him a simple answer. If a soul master wanted to make an all-around improvement, his soul power would serve as his foundation, as well as the most important measure. With a rise in soul power, other aspects of the soul master’s body would increase as well. In the long run, his cultivation would become stronger and stronger. Regardless of whether it pertained to one’s tenacity in terms of spiritual power or soul power, the pre-condition was that one had to have a strong body ﬁrst!

Huo Yuhao’s body was indeed more exceptional than other soul masters of his rank. Furthermore, with the vast life energy from the Life Gold and his twin martial souls, his body’s caliber easily rivalled that of a six-ringed Soul Emperor! However, that was his limit, as he still only had ﬁve rings. Right now, his spiritual power astounded even Elder Xuan. One could only guess the improvement he had experienced in terms of his spiritual power. Elder Xuan told him directly that if he wanted to capitalize on his concrete-material realm spiritual power, he had to reach the stage of a Titled Douluo. Only then could his body reach a level that allowed him to release his spiritual power without reservation.

Of course, there was a more superﬁcial method. He could also retrieve a powerful soul bone that would allow his Spiritual Sea to stabilize. Like that, when he released his spiritual power, his attack would be more powerful. Of course, he would still be unable to maximize his full strength, and hence, the best way to overcome this problem was to rely on simply increasing his cultivation!

Chapter 283: Team Holy Spirit

However, he still could not use his immense spiritual power to its fullest extent. Chieﬂy, he could not use explosive-type abilities. As for Spiritual Detection, Spiritual Interference, Spiritual Sharing, and other pseudo-soul skills, they had all experienced a tremendous increase in power. This was why Huo Yuhao was still the main control-type soul master on the team.

As a faint light ﬂashed, a cold look crossed Huo Yuhao’s face. He narrowed his eyes and his spiritual power was locked onto the youth from the Holy Ghost Sect. From his target’s soul power, he could sense that he was a ﬁve-ringed Soul King. He could not be said to be strong. However, the eeriness he gave off told Huo Yuhao that he was an evil soul master. There was no other possibility.

The Heavenly Capital Academy was an old, well-established school. Like the Earthdragon Sect that the Tang Sect had just encountered, it was from the Dou Ling Empire. The ﬁrst person it sent out was also a youth. He was tall, sturdy, and clearly energetic.

The judge noted that both competitors were in their respective positions. His right hand came down swiftly, and the two competitors acted at the same time as they charged toward each other.

The Holy Ghost Sect youth’s body started to shine with a pale, white light. His body seemed to remain normal, but his two hands, under the glow of the light, turned ghastly pale. As he lowered his head, his eyes turned white too.

What kind of martial soul was this? Even Huo Yuhao could not detect the martial soul this youth released instantly.

This was the ﬁrst round of the tournament, and every team wanted to start their ﬁrst rounds off with a bang. The youth from the Heavenly Capital Academy was not weak either. As he roared loudly, his body emitted a powerful energy.

Two long knives appeared in his hands. A total of ﬁve soul rings, two yellow and three purple, circled around his knives. Without a doubt, they were his martial soul! The two sides quickly approached each other. When they were just inches away, the Heavenly Capital Academy youth leapt into the air. The ﬁrst soul ring around his body started to shine and in mid-air, he sliced down toward the Holy Ghost Sect competitor in a crescent-shaped arc.

Yellow jolts of electricity shot out from the blades of his knives, and crackling sounds rang out as they arced through the air.

This martial soul was impressive indeed. On the battleﬁeld, it was more powerful than normal assault-type martial souls! Huo Yuhao silently assessed the situation. At the same time, he began to concentrate harder as he observed how the Holy Ghost Sect youth would react.

The Holy Ghost Sect youth had ﬁve rings too. However, he had the ideal soul ring combination. As he noticed his opponent’s crescent-shaped attack coming toward him, his body suddenly twisted oddly. Everyone felt as if he had turned into a shadow, causing his opponent to momentarily lose his target. The crescent-shaped attack landed on the metallic ground, leaving a deep scar behind. At the same time, a black tornado rose up from the ground. As the tornado shrieked, it charged toward the Heavenly Capital soul master.

The Heavenly Capital student was still in mid-air. In this position, his strength was maximized. His third soul ring started to shine, and the knives in his hands formed three rays of faint shadow. This time, the three rays, which seemed more powerful than the light from the knives, came rushing out. As the rays of blade light ﬂew out, the body of the Heaven Capital

Academy youth shone with an intense yellow light. It was as if

the sun had descended.

Triple Sun Moon Slash, a powerful thousand-year soul skill!

Instantly, the tornado that was about to encircle him was sliced to pieces by the knives. The three rays of blade light then turned inward, and quickly afterwards, they exploded into countless smaller rays that shot outward.

Regardless of whether it was in terms of strength, control, or power, this attack had them all. The other teams in the resting zone could not help but nod their heads in approval. This student from the Heavenly Capital Academy was extraordinary, indeed! Just when everyone thought that the Holy Ghost Sect youth could not continue this ﬁght anymore, the black smoke, which had just been sliced apart, suddenly spread outward. Following that, its color became paler, and soon, it turned purple before reforming itself.

With Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, he could hear wailing and crying. From the inside of the thick purple smoke, a purple skull ﬂashed and then quickly disappeared.

It all happened too fast. As it was too fast, almost everyone on-scene could not even react. The Heavenly Capital Academy youth had already been devoured by the purple smoke.

In the next instance, the smoke retracted itself and turned into an arrow as it ﬂew into the distance. Over there, the Holy Ghost Sect youth’s body reformed as he landed on the ground.

The Heavenly Capital Academy youth re-appeared in mid-air. However, he appeared to have lost control over his body. At that moment, his skin was deathly white. The knives in his hands disappeared, and his body fell from the sky, unmoving. Oh shit! Huo Yuhao closed his eyes. He had been using Spiritual Detection to observe this competition. He had the best view and understanding of this entire ﬁght. The soul of the Heavenly Capital Academy youth had been completely devoured. While his body was intact, it was just an empty shell!

The fourth soul skill! The combatant from the Holy Ghost Sect had used his fourth soul skill from the smoke. His soul skill was akin to an insect, a very odd insect. It was small and like a needle. If not for Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power, accompanied with the evolution of his Purple Demon Eyes to the Sumeru Realm, he would not have been able to discover it.

The black smoke was a manifestation of countless insects from his martial soul. When the black smoke turned purple, it was because these insects opened their wings, which were purple. Then, their bodies entered a half-energy realm as they forced their way into the head of the youth from the Heavenly Capital Academy. They entered him from his seven oriﬁces. Not only did they devour his soul, but they even ate his brains.

Such a cruel evil soul master! The Holy Ghost Sect youth, who had just devoured a Soul King, brimmed with energy. His icy-cold eyes betrayed a look of joy. Evil soul masters were not only strong, but they were able to improve rapidly at a certain cultivation level. However, after they accumulated more than ﬁve rings, their cultivation would gradually slow down, depending on how powerful their evil martial souls were. The more powerful their evil martial souls

were, the faster they would improve. At the same time, they required other forms of assistance. If not, why would they be called ‘evil soul masters?’

“Heavenly Capital Academy, dead. Next.”

When they heard the word ‘dead’, the waiting zone for the Heavenly Capital Academy instantly went into an uproar. Everyone stood up as they stared angrily at the Holy Ghost Sect competitors.

The ﬁrst competitor from the Holy Ghost Sect rushed out from the waiting zone. After he ran out, the other members of the Holy Ghost Sect sauntered out. According to the rules, there should have been six members. However, only three of them walked out. Tang Ya was nowhere to be seen, there were just three cold youths. They all had different physiques. However, their eyes were all icy-cold and treacherous. Including the one on stage, there were only four people on their team. This also meant that they were conﬁdent in winning this competition with just four members. What level of conﬁdence was this?

The Heavenly Capital Academy sent two of its students to retrieve the corpse of their schoolmate. When they lifted his corpse, a huge amount of blood gushed out from his oriﬁces, staining the arena red.

Over on the Holy Ghost Sect side, a youth licked his lips and mumbled to himself, “What a waste, such fresh blood.”

“How can you kill?” The teacher in charge of the Heavenly Capital Academy stood up in rage as he made an angry protest.

“In previous tournaments, people died too. If you are capable, you can kill us too!” a cold, clear voice retorted from the resting zone.

The Heavenly Capital Academy had no right to enter the pavilion in the resting zone. The face of the teacher in charge changed rapidly. Suddenly, he strode toward the waiting zone.

“Stop, the teacher in charge can’t enter the waiting zone to direct the battle. If not, you’ll be disqualiﬁed.” The organizing team of the tournament naturally sent someone out to block him.

“We aren’t going to ﬁght. We admit defeat,” the teacher said angrily. “This is a competition, not a life-and-death ﬁght. That was pure murder! Everyone can see that it was blatant murder! It was not an accident from the competition. The Heavenly Capital Academy withdraws from the competition. Everyone get back, we aren’t doing this anymore.”

When they heard the teacher’s words, the remaining members of the Heavenly Capital Academy team sighed in relief. The youth in black was too mysterious! They had sent their captain out just now, and if even he died under such mysterious circumstances, how would the rest of them fare? Everyone feared death. They were here to compete, not to die!

On the main podium, Xu Tianran frowned and said, “Imperial Tutor, tell your guys not to go overboard. This is just a competition. There are other places for them to show off their skills where they won’t be subjected to such criticisms.” “Okay,” the man in black next to him said plainly.

In just one round, the Holy Ghost Sect was able to scare its opponent off. Likewise, they progressed to the next round with 12 full points. When the youth in black walked off the arena, he was booed intensely by everyone. His cruel methods not only provoked the other teams in the resting zone, but also earned him the displeasure of the crowd.

------

Huo Yuhao sat there stunned in his wheelchair. His eyes were blank. Slowly, his blank eyes betrayed an incredulous look.

Wang Dong’er was the ﬁrst to notice this. “What happened, Yuhao?”

“That voice, did you hear it? From the pavilion in the resting zone,” Huo Yuhao said dazedly.

Wang Dong’er paused for a while, and then said, “I heard it.

It sounded familiar. Was that Teacher Tang Ya?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “No, no. It… it sounded like sister’s voice!”

“Sister?” Wang Dong’er looked at shock at Huo Yuhao. Then she quickly got over her shock. Huo Yuhao had told her that he was an orphan. She was familiar with his background. There was only one person he would call ‘sister’.

“You mean to say that that was Sister Xiaotao’s voice? That… that can’t be real,” Wang Dong’er said in shock.

Huo Yuhao turned his head to look at her seriously and said, “Why can’t it be real? If this is true, it would make sense. Sister Xiaotao’s disappearance has something to do with Jing Hongchen. This is undeniable. He probably used some trick when he was observing her, which allowed her to leave so easily. Furthermore, when Sister Xiaotao disappeared, the Academy was under attack, too. Teacher told me that the attackers were a group of evil soul masters. The Holy Ghost Sect is the only sect formed from evil soul masters that I know of. If they captured Sister Xiaotao, then everything would make sense. Sister Xiaotao and Teacher Tang Ya have been captured by them. These bastards…!” As he said that, Huo Yuhao clenched his ﬁsts and became more and more emotional. Despite how reasonable his prediction was, he would have never expected to see Ma Xiaotao here until he heard her voice.

“The competitions for the morning end now. For the teams that are competing in the afternoon, please don’t be late. The teams who have ﬁnished competing may return to their hotels to rest and prepare for the subsequent rounds.”

The competitions for the morning of the second day ended. However, Huo Yuhao could not help but stare at the pavilion in the resting zone.

He saw the group of black-clothed Holy Ghost Sect disciples quickly leaving the pavilion. Other than Tang Ya, his gaze instantly fell on a female disciple of the Holy Ghost Sect.

Like Tang Ya, her face was covered with a veil. Huo Yuhao closed his eyes brieﬂy, and as his spiritual power vibrated, he was able to implant his own voice into her head.

“Sister.”

The black-robed woman paused momentarily. However, she appeared to not have heard Huo Yuhao’s voice as she continued walking forward with her teammates.

Evidently, the other youths in black respected her greatly.

She and Tang Ya were in the center as they walked out.

Huo Yuhao paused momentarily as a look of confusion crossed his eyes. The result of his probe was not what he had expected. Could this mean…?

“Yuhao,” Wang Dong’er called him gently.

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Let’s go.”

---

Circled by everyone, they also left the resting zone as they proceeded toward the Brilliant Delight Hotel. On their way there, Huo Yuhao fell into deep thought. Nan Qiuqiu appeared to have calmed herself down. She was much quieter, but she still kept close to Wang Dong’er. When she saw Wang Dong’er pushing Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair, the expression on her face changed. She harbored no good feelings toward Yuhao. If not for his tricks, she would not be in the Tang Sect.

After obtaining victory in the ﬁrst elimination round, they had ample time to rest. Before the competition started in the morning, the organizing team had announced that the ﬁrst elimination round would last four days because there were just too many teams. This also meant that they had two more days of rest.

It was not early, so the ﬁrst thing they did upon returning to the hotel was to head for the cafeteria to eat.

In terms of dining, there were clear differences. For teams like them who resided on the fourth level, they could only have their meal in the common cafeteria. For teams who resided above the fourth ﬂoor, they could order their meals directly, and the hotel would try to fulﬁll their every request. As they sat around the round table, dishes that had already been prepared were quickly served. While their treatment was not as good as the treatment accorded to more famous sects and schools, the food was not too shabby either. After all, the Brilliant Delight Hotel was one of the best in Radiant City.

Xu Sanshi took some food out to send to the injured Bei Bei. Huo Yuhao looked at Nan Qiuqiu, who sat next to Wang Dong’er, lifted the cup of warm water in front of him and said, “Come, let us all raise our cups. Qiuqiu, welcome to the Tang Sect. Now, I’ll introduce everyone to you.”

As he said that, Huo Yuhao introduced his teammates to Nan Qiuqiu one-by-one.

Nan Qiuqiu’s mouth twitched as she glared at him and said, “Liar.”

An awkward expression crossed Huo Yuhao’s face as he said, “You can’t blame me for this. At that time, you were too arrogant. I thought that no one would fall for such a trick…” “What do you mean by that?” Nan Qiuqiu, who had just regained her calm with much difﬁculty, was incensed once again.

Huo Yuhao shook his head helplessly and said, “Let’s eat.”

“Explain this to me clearly before you eat.” Nan Qiuqiu stood up suddenly. The anger she had been suppressing on her way here was only suppressed because of Wang Dong’er. However, on the way here, the more she thought about how she had ended up here, the angrier she got. How could she lose herself so easily? In the Tang Sect, she could not enjoy herself as much as she used to in the Earthdragon Sect. She also did not know how the others would treat her. Her panic and rage were all concentrated on Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao looked at her in pity and said, “Now I ﬁnally understand why your mother was so willing to send you over to us.”

“You…” Nan Qiuqiu was already upset with her mother because of this. When Huo Yuhao said this, this ‘princess’ was so triggered that she could almost explode. Her soul power was pulsating violently.

“What do you want to do?” Wang Dong’er turned her head over to glare at her.

Among everyone from the Tang Sect, Nan Qiuqiu disliked Wang Dong’er the least. Her face contorted with rage, she said, “Forcing me to join the Tang Sect is just a way for you to humiliate me. If you can, kill me now. I’ll rather die than surrender!”

He Caitou said in a stunned voice, “Is it so serious? Sister, we are good people.”

“Who’s your sister, baldie?” Nan Qiuqiu said angrily.

“How can you say that?” Xiao Xiao could take no more. She slammed the table and stood up. A ﬁght was on the verge of breaking out.

At this moment, Jing Ziyan chortled and stood up. She pressed Xiao Xiao and said, “What are you doing? What are all of you doing? Aren’t you hungry? I’m hungry. Sister Qiuqiu, don’t worry so much. Now that you’re in the Tang Sect, everyone welcomes you. No one will target you for anything. Sit down and eat. Once we get back, I’ll accompany you. Don’t worry, if anyone dares to bully you, I’ll stand up for you. I am like their teacher in charge. They’ll listen to me.”

No one reacted to what Jing Ziyan had just said. Everyone stared at her with an odd gaze. She sounds like a wolf in disguise…

When Nan Qiuqiu looked at Jing Ziyan, who was smiling, the expression on her face changed for the better. Finally, someone was speaking her language. Furthermore, now that her mother had allowed her to join the Tang Sect, she knew that her own abilities could not take so many of them on at once. Hence, she decided not to say anything, but instead ate her meal angrily.

Huo Yuhao looked at Jing Ziyan and then at Ji Juechen, who sat next to her emotionlessly. In his heart, he thought, It’s not a bad decision to let these two train Nan Qiuqiu’s temper.

No one from the Tang Sect took kindly to Nan Qiuqiu’s temper. Hence, no one bothered her too much. They ate their meal in silence. “Where does everyone want to go in the afternoon?” Huo Yuhao asked his friends after he wiped his mouth clean with a white cloth.

Xu Sanshi, who had returned from delivering Bei Bei his meal, said, “It doesn’t matter. Haven’t you seen all the teams that you’re interested in?”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “I’ve seen the most important one, yes. As for the others, there are too many things that can’t be seen clearly now. I recommend that everyone rest in the hotel for now and get ready for the next round.”

Everyone nodded in agreement with Huo Yuhao’s suggestion. They still had quite some buffer time afterward. This would beneﬁt Bei Bei in making a full recovery.

“Alright, let’s go back and rest.” Huo Yuhao made the decision after he sought everyone’s opinion.

Everyone stood up and prepared to leave the cafeteria. A displeased voice sounded, “Eh, wait a moment, where will I stay?”

Nan Qiuqiu looked upset as she stared at everyone. She felt as if they had all forgotten about her.

Before Huo Yuhao could open his mouth, Jing Ziyan walked up to her with a smile and said, “You can stay with me. While our living conditions aren’t ideal, it won’t be too much trouble to have one more person.”

Xiao Xiao and Jiang Nannan stayed together. Wang Dong’er stayed with Huo Yuhao. Jing Ziyan and Na Na stayed together. If Nan Qiuqiu stayed with them, the three girls would share one room.

Na Na said, slightly peeved, “Sister Ziyan, what will I do?”

Jing Ziyan said, “It’s ﬁne! If we combine two beds, it should be enough for three people to sleep together.”

“What? We have to combine beds?” Nan Qiuqiu looked at them in shock. “No, I must have my own room. Get the organizing team to give me my own room.” Xu Sanshi chuckled and said, “Beauty, who do you think we are? We’re just a small, unknown sect. Will the organizing team listen to us? When in Shrek, do as the Shreks do. Since you’ve already joined our sect, stop making so much trouble for us.” With Jiang Nannan present, he was much more reserved.

Under other circumstances, he would have made fun of her far more mercilessly.

“That’s… that’s not possible,” Nan Qiuqiu said deﬁantly.

Huo Yuhao said, “How about this? You can go and rest with the Earthdragon Sect for now. After the tournament ends, we’ll bring you back to the Tang Sect. After all, you signed up as an Earthdragon Sect disciple, and you can’t compete on our behalf.”

Nan Qiuqiu glared at him and said, “You eliminated the Earthdragon Sect. Do you think we still have rooms?”

“Er… then there’s no choice. Third brother is right. I don’t think the organizing team will give us a new room. How about you pay for your own room?”

Nan Qiuqiu’s face turned green as she said, “Are you pretending to be stupid or are you really stupid? Is there even a hotel with an empty room during the tournament? Furthermore, now that I’m part of the Tang Sect, shouldn’t you arrange for a place for me to stay?”

Everyone looked at Huo Yuhao with schadenfreude. Xu Sanshi tapped his elbow and said, “Yuhao, you brought this upon yourself. Solve it yourself.” With that, he casually walked off with Jiang Nannan.

Huo Yuhao replied, “Nan Qiuqiu, the situation as you see it. The Tang Sect had ten members before you joined. In total, we have ﬁve rooms. You can pick any room you want. However, regardless of who you stay with, someone will have to squeeze. So?”

Nan Qiuqiu rolled her eyes. Suddenly, she had a plan as she said, “Then I shall room with you.”

“Ah?” Huo Yuhao looked at her in shock. “Guys and girls shouldn’t room together, ma’am!”

Nan Qiuqiu said, “We’re all soul masters, what’s there to be ashamed of? There’s no need to think so much, I’ll sleep on the sofa. Let’s go, bring me to your room.”

With that, the maiden turned to leave.

Huo Yuhao looked at her disappearing ﬁgure in shock. Then, he turned to Wang Dong’er, who was next to him and said, “Does she wants to room with me, or does she want to room with you? She probably guessed that we’re rooming together. Dong’er, you are really too attractive.” Wang Dong’er smiled slightly and said, “That’s right, you are getting smarter.”

Huo Yuhao suddenly ﬂew into a full-on panic mode. “No, no, she can’t room with us. Let’s go.” He suddenly realized that with Nan Qiuqiu around as a third wheel, how could he be intimate with Dong’er?

---

When they were back on their ﬂoor, Nan Qiuqiu was already waiting for them outside of their door, guided there by Xu Sanshi.

“Qiuqiu, listen to me, we’re all guys. It’s really inconvenient to have a girl like you around. It’s much more normal for you to room with Sister Ziyan or Xiao Xiao. For a young lady like you, don’t you care about your honor?”

Nan Qiuqiu looked at the troubled expression on Huo Yuhao’s face and her heart swooped in delight. “How can I not care about my honor? I’m not sleeping with you. I trust you. Look at you. While you’re strong, I don’t think you’ll do anything bad.”

“You, you, you…” Regardless who it was, all guys would react the same way when their ability in a certain aspect was questioned. Huo Yuhao was so angry he could not say anything for quite some time. With much difﬁculty, he spurted out, “What about him? He’s normal!” He pointed at Wang Dong’er.

Nan Qiuqiu replied without hesitation, “How can you compare to him? You’re a liar. Anyone can see that Wang Dong is a true gentleman who won’t take advantage of others. Am I right, Wang Dong?”

“Yes, you’re right,” Wang Dong’er said with a dazzling smile. While she did not want another girl in the room, she found Huo Yuhao’s current state extremely amusing. Her childish desires were piqued as she went along with Nan Qiuqiu’s ﬂow.

“Open the door,” Nan Qiuqiu said as she pointed at it.

Wang Dong’er opened the door and Nan Qiuqiu walked in ﬁrst. While the room was not big, it was very clean. Wang Dong’er had cleaned the room herself. After they checked in, she had told the hotel reception that there was no need to clean their room for them. She liked to take care of Huo Yuhao herself.

Nan Qiuqiu sat on the sofa and said, “Right, I’ll sleep here temporarily. I won’t ﬁght for a spot with a cripple. Eh, why do you two guys share one bed?”

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s room only had one double bed, and not two single beds like most rooms.

Wang Dong’er said naturally, “So I can take care of him. It’s hard for him to move around.”

Nan Qiuqiu’s eyes gleamed as she sighed in admiration, “Wang Dong, you’re so kind! You treat this despicable, pretentious, and shameless guy so well.”

“I…” Huo Yuhao felt that before he could correct this girl’s bad habits, she would make him die from anger. “What’s wrong?” Nan Qiuqiu said gleefully. As she looked at Huo Yuhao in this state, she was happy beyond words!

Huo Yuhao’s eyes ﬂashed, and a smile appeared on his face once more as he said, “Wang Dong, carry me onto the bed, I want to rest for a while. I’ve been busy for the entire morning and I’m tired.”

“Alright,” Wang Dong’er said. When she heard that he was tired, her heart ached. Normally, with Huo Yuhao’s resilience, he would not throw the word ‘tired’ around easily. Immediately, she bent over to lift him from the wheelchair and carry him toward the bed.

“Wait a moment,” Huo Yuhao suddenly said.

“What’s wrong?” Wang Dong’er asked.

Huo Yuhao stared deeply into her light-blue eyes and said dramatically, “Dong’er, I love you.” “Eh?” Wang Dong’er paused momentarily. Soon, she melted in front of Huo Yuhao’s gaze as she replied softly, “I love you too.”

Huo Yuhao wrapped his only movable right arm around her neck as he lifted his head. Then, he kissed her tender, soft, red lips. After a brief kiss, he let go.

Wang Dong’er had already gotten used to his sneaky kisses after all this while. She also started to view herself as Huo Yuhao’s wife, and hence, she did not mind being kissed by him. However, because of that dramatic ‘I love you’, she almost completely forgot that there was someone else in the room with them.

“Ah!” A piercing scream sounded. It rose a few dozen decibels instantly, and seemed capable of bringing the entire Brilliant Delight Hotel down. Even those on the top ﬂoor could hear this scream clearly.

Wang Dong’er was so alarmed by the scream that she almost threw Huo Yuhao out of her arms. At this moment, she realized that Nan Qiuqiu was still in the room. At this moment, she was still in disguise as a guy!

“You, you, you, you two, you two…” Nan Qiuqiu pointed at Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er as her red lips trembled. An incredulous look appeared in her eyes.

Huo Yuhao looked at her in pity and said calmly, “In this world, there are many types of love that you wouldn’t understand. I was angry just now because you intruded into Dong’er’s and my private space. However, we have thought this through. Since you aren’t afraid of having needles in your eyes and you insist on watching us, then watch away. We don’t care anyway.”

“Wang Dong, Wang Dong, you’re actually…” Nan Qiuqiu pointed at Wang Dong’er as her voice trembled more and more.

Wang Dong’er looked at Huo Yuhao, who was smiling helplessly. She continued his charade for him and said, “Qiuqiu, you can’t discount homosexual love. Actually…”

“Shut up!” Nan Qiuqiu screamed. She turned and ran out of the room. She pulled the door open and disappeared instantly. She did not forget to close the door, but slammed it with such intensity that it made both Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er tremble.

“You're too naughty,” Wang Dong’er carefully placed Huo Yuhao on his bed, and a helpless smile crossed her face.

Huo Yuhao did not let go of her neck as he chuckled and said, “She pissed me off ﬁrst. She questioned my ability as a man, that’s unforgivable. Furthermore, I’m helping you solve a problem too! If not, she’ll bother you non-stop.”

Wang Dong’er stiﬂed a laugh and said, “However, you’re affecting her worldview.”

Huo Yuhao said, “With her temper, it’s alright to shock her every once in a while. I suspect that she’s going to ﬁnd Sister Ziyan and the rest, though I wonder if they’ll tell her that you’re a girl.”

Wang Dong’er bit her lips gently and said, “With Sister Ziyan’s troublemaking personality, what do you think she’ll say? Poor Qiuqiu! She’s right, you are a bad boy.” Huo Yuhao pulled her into his embrace and said, “So what if I’m bad? I’m your bad boy, and your silly boy, so good! All guys will have to be these two ‘boys’. Hehe, nap with me.”

------

Huo Yuhao did not know what happened to Nan Qiuqiu afterward. After they ate, the pale-faced maiden sat as far from them as possible. All she did was eat. She did, however, appear much more docile. Jing Ziyan could not help but look meaningfully at Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

The ﬁrst elimination round of the tournament ended after two days. In total, half of the 167 teams were eliminated. Instantly, the Brilliant Delight Hotel became much emptier.

Every single team that made it past the ﬁrst round was assigned new rooms. The Tang Sect was sent to the third ﬂoor, which was much more spacious than the second ﬂoor. Furthermore, since they passed the ﬁrst round, the organizing team agreed to their request for one more room. Hence, Nan Qiuqiu was given an additional room. Among the 167 teams, there were still 84 left. Shrek Academy did not take part in the ﬁrst round. In the past few days, Huo Yuhao and the Tang Sect did not see anyone from Shrek Academy. Wang Qiu’er and Dai Huabin seemed to have disappeared.

------

As faint light ﬂashed, a cold light appeared on Huo Yuhao’s face. His eyes ﬂashed with light, and the air around him distorted.

“Whoosh!” He swallowed the purple light and cultivated its essence. With this, he ended his morning cultivation.

Wang Dong’er stood next to him. She was cultivating her Purple Demon Eyes too, but her eyes were much weaker than Huo Yuhao’s. After all, she did not have a martial soul like the Spirit Eyes that was helpful in cultivating her Purple Demon Eyes.

“Round Two. Shrek Academy will be competing today, right?” Wang Dong’er asked Huo Yuhao.

“Yes,” Huo Yuhao nodded in conﬁrmation.

Chapter 284: Seven-Man Fusion Skill

He had an indescribable feeling towards Wang Qiu’er. He was sure that it wasn’t love. He had given all his love to Wang Dong’er. But he couldn’t break away from Wang Qiu’er. It was an affection that seemed to bind their blood together. It was something that Huo Yuhao couldn’t understand.

The second elimination round started. As the ﬁrst elimination round took too long, there wasn’t a break between it and the second elimination round. After the duels ended yesterday, the lot-drawing for the second round commenced immediately.

The Tang Sect would be competing tomorrow. Today, Shrek Academy was going to compete. As the legendary team in the tournament, many people were waiting for them to compete. In the previous tournament, they had managed to create a miracle even though the circumstances were unfavorable for them. Could they do the same in this tournament? No one knew the answer. The inclusion of sects made the tournament more worth watching, but also made it much more unpredictable. After the ﬁrst round, ﬁfty-six of the remaining eighty-four teams came from sects. That was two-thirds of the teams left in the tournament. This showed how powerful sects were. However, there were some traditional academy teams which were true powerhouses, such as the Star Luo National Academy and the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

The resting area was much more spacious now. The seats had also been re-arranged. The Tang Sect, which had obtained full twelve points in the ﬁrst elimination round, was guided to the pergola. This was the VIP resting area. Only the strongest teams could rest here.

------

“The second elimination round is about to commence. Everyone, please stay silent. The reigning champions and and winners of all of the previous editions of the tournament, Shrek Academy, will be competing today.”

The Sun Moon Empire’s citizens didn’t have a good impression of Shrek Academy. It was because of Shrek Academy that the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy always came in second in the tournament. When they heard the words ‘Shrek Academy’, many of the spectators started booing.

Huo Yuhao could see many things much more clearly as he entered the VIP resting area. Although the Tang Sect had managed to gain access into this area due to their impressive performance in the previous round, they could only sit at the sides.

Shrek’s Academy team was in the center of the VIP resting area. They were next to the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, the Holy Ghost Sect, and other strong teams.

Huo Yuhao also noticed another team. They were on the other side of the VIP resting area. He had noticed this team on the second day of the tournament. They had seemed to be very average, but their martial souls couldn’t be concealed. They were from the Body Sect. However, they were doing their best to conceal their abilities.

Apart from these few teams he had taken note of, Huo Yuhao’s expression suddenly changed as he unleashed his Spiritual Detection. Almost every team in this VIP resting area was extraordinary. From what he sensed, there were very few competing members that had less than ﬁve rings. Most of them were at least Soul Kings. Huo Yuhao was only a Soul King himself. Although his Spiritual Detection was great, his judgment of the aura of those beyond his cultivation wasn’t fully accurate. However, it was still good enough for him to tell how strong or weak a team was.

Wang Qiu’er was sitting on a chair at the very front of Shrek Academy’s team. Huo Yuhao discovered that Dai Huabin, Ning Tian, Zhu Lu, Wu Feng and the others behind her appeared very resolute. After not seeing them for some time, they seemed to have matured greatly. At the very least they were less impatient.

It seemed like the pressure from the tournament wasn’t entirely a bad thing! Huo Yuhao was impressed.

“Second elimination round. The ﬁrst ﬁght will be between Shrek Academy and the Heavenly Armor Sect. Both parties, please enter your waiting areas.” The voice coming from the main stage announced the beginning of the second elimination round. Heavenly Armor Sect? Huo Yuhao felt that this name was very familiar. He immediately recalled how he had met the disciplined Heavenly Armor Sect before they came to Radiant City. They were all riding Hornscale Horses from the Dou Ling Empire. The Heavenly Armor Sect had even left a deep impression on him. He hadn’t expected them to have to face Shrek Academy in the second round.

Both parties entered their respective waiting areas. As expected, the seven from Shrek Academy were Wang Qiu’er, Dai Huabin, Zhu Lu, Ning Tian, Xie Huanyue, Wu Feng, and Cao Jinxuan.

Zhou Sichen, Lan Susu, and Lan Luoluo were seated beneath the stage as substitutes. They weren’t able to compete today.

The Heavenly Armor Sect wasn’t in the VIP resting area, they were still in the resting area outside. Huo Yuhao unleashed his Spiritual Detection, and immediately sensed Han Zhanhu choosing the competing members for the Heavenly Armor Sect. He could sense the tense nerves of the Heavenly Armor Sect’s competing members. Shrek Academy was extremely reputable. They had built that reputation with their ability for thousands of years. The Heavenly Armor Sect was simply too unlucky to have drawn Shrek Academy! After making it through the ﬁrst round, they had met Shrek Academy in only the second round.

Han Zhanhu was helpless. Since they had met Shrek Academy, what could they do? They could only go all-out against them. This was the idea that he planted in his disciples’ heads after the lot was drawn. It was a rare opportunity for them to ﬁght Shrek Academy. At least they could have a taste of the abilities and ﬁghting strategies of the top academy on the continent!

The seven competing members from both sides entered the waiting area.

The referee said loudly, “Individual elimination round. First members from both teams, please enter the stage.”

A muscular youth from the Heavenly Armor Sect jumped onto the stage as the spectators watched. Dai Huabin was the ﬁrst from Shrek Academy to compete. “What!?” Huo Yuhao gently exclaimed. As he watched Wang Qiu’er’s back, the look in his eyes changed.

“She’s not the ﬁrst to compete? This is unlike her!” Wang Dong’er also muttered under her breath.

Huo Yuhao clapped his hand against hers and said, “They’re really smart. It seems like she really values this tournament. To conserve her abilities and ﬁght in a balanced manner, she’s managed to remain patient. It won’t be easy for us either, if we meet them!”

Wang Dong’er said, “It’s better not to meet them. It’s not good for us to go against one another.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “Let’s see how our luck is. If we don’t meet them in the next round, we should be able to last until the ﬁnals.”

Dai Huabin was much ﬁtter than before. He entered the stage conﬁdently. Both parties greeted each other in front of the referee.

“Shrek Academy, Dai Huabin.”

“Heavenly Armor Sect, Han Yu.”

The referee repeated the rules of the tournament once more and emphasized that neither of them should intentionally kill their opponent. Otherwise, they would be punished. After that, he let the two of them retreat and prepare for the ﬁght.

While Dai Huabin appeared very calm, he was actually very anxious.

He was ﬁnally here at the tournament. Even though he was a substitute, he was still ﬁnally here! After years of tireless cultivation, he ﬁnally had a chance to display his prowess. Dad, elder brother, wait and see. I’ll deﬁnitely show how good I am!

He bumped his ﬁsts together in front of his chest. A strong competitive intent was exuded from his body. He cracked his knuckles and stared at his opponent. Right now, he was like a famished and ferocious tiger.

“Match, start!” The referee swiped his right hand down.

Dai Huabin shot out like a ferocious tiger. However, he didn’t unleash his strengthening skills like he always did. He only unleashed his martial soul.

Two yellow, two purple, and one black soul ring, the best combination. White hair grew from his body, and he expanded in size as he unleashed his White Tiger.

If someone else had such a cultivation, everyone would be terriﬁed. However, it was apt that Dai Huabin possessed such a martial soul, since he was representing Shrek Academy.

The youth from the Heavenly Armor Sect didn’t rush forward. Han Yu looked very calm, and also unleashed his own martial soul. Two yellow, two purple, and one black soul ring also appeared, once again the best combination for a Soul King! A pitch-black, hexagonal piece of metal ﬂew out from his body before it condensed to form a hexagonal shield. The shield was dense and heavy, and formed from proportionate pieces of scales.

After unleashing his martial soul, Han Yu took big strides towards Dai Huabin as his aura continued to soar.

With a roar, Dai Huabin’s speed increased rapidly. His thick and strong legs unleashed great force. The speed at which he was moving was so fast that an illusory projection seemed to drag along behind him. He slammed his tiger palm towards Han Yu.

Han Yu did the opposite. As he was bursting forward, he suddenly stomped his left leg and came to an abrupt stop. As he stopped, he unleashed his Heavenly Armor Shield.

The Heavenly Armor Sect was a family sect. All of its disciples were descendants and relatives, and they possessed almost the same martial soul, the Heavenly Armor Shield!

Bang——!

It was only the ﬁrst strike, but Dai Huabin demonstrated how powerful he was. Their cultivations were at the same level, and his opponent had used a shield to defend against him, but his palm strike forced Han Yu back more than three meters.

Han Yu’s feet even made sparks as he slid across the metal surface. Dai Huabin’s sharp tiger claws had left ﬁve deep marks on the shield!

This was a direct collision, a probing attack and defense. Neither party used soul skills. In terms of strength, the winner was clear.

Dai Huabin didn’t stop moving. At the same time as he struck his opponent, he opened his mouth wide, and a streak of white light shot out of it. It was his second soul skill, White Tiger’s Fierce Light Wave!

A loud boom resonated, and Han Yu retreated once again. His ﬁrst and second soul rings lit up, and the surface of the Heavenly Armor Shield shone like a mirror. As the White Tiger’s Fierce Light Wave shone on it and the scales of the armor undulated in a weird fashion, many small streaks of white light were reﬂected away, immediately diverting a large portion of the Wave’s impact. At the same time, the Heavenly Armor Shield shifted, and sixteen hexagonal scales ﬂew out of it towards Dai Huabin. The sides of every scale were like sharp blades!

Defense and counterattack! Han Yu was very steady in front of Dai Huabin. In terms of abilities and psychological mindset, he was excellently trained!

Dai Huabin acted like he didn’t see the armor scales. He burst forward again, and his ﬁrst soul ring lit up. A layer of white surfaced on his body. Just as the shield’s scales were about to cut into him, a white light spread out and deﬂected all of them away. Although they turned and ﬂew back towards him, Dai Huabin had already reached Han Yu in this short span of time.

Dai Huabin roared again, and everything in front of Han Yu turned black. Following this, his tiger palm struck the Heavenly Armor Shield forcefully again.

Han Yu’s Heavenly Armor Shield was adept at countering long-range energy attacks, just like how it dealt with the White Tiger’s Fierce Light Wave earlier. However, it was helpless against such physical attacks. However, he was still a defense- type soul master. Noticing that something was amiss, he immediately squatted down, and the sharp base of the shield stabbed into the metal ﬂoor. He leaned the entire shield back and used it to resist Dai Huabin’s attack at an angle. At the same time, his third soul ring lit up. The sixteen pieces of shield scales in the air turned ﬁery red, as if they had been heated in a forge, and ﬂew towards Dai Huabin with a piercing screech. It was Han Yu’s third soul skill, Meteoric Fire Armor!

He had to attack his enemy at a vital spot. Han Yu was very conﬁdent in his thousand-year soul skill, the Meteoric Fire Armor. In his opinion, Dai Huabin would ﬁnd it difﬁcult to deal with his double-pronged attack even though he was very strong as a close-combat soul master.

However, he didn’t expect Dai Huabin to ignore the Meteoric Fire Armor and continued to reach for the Heavenly Armor Shield with his right palm.

A terrifying and huge force was exerted on the Shield. It was different from the forceful push earlier. This time, it was an intense jerk that came from Dai Huabin’s tiger palm.

Han Yu was so shaken that he almost spat blood. He could feel that his shield was about to be crushed. He even heard painful sounds coming from the armor scales that formed the shield. However, Han Yu was also very excited now. That was because his Meteoric Fire Armor had already reached Dai Huabin. It was impossible for him to resist or dodge at this moment. The sixteen scales had blocked off his escape route. Did he really not realize it?

Dai Huabin answered his doubt instantly. His white hair released an extremely intense golden light. His body expanded, and his tiger palm seemed to stick to the Heavenly Armor Shield. As he lifted his palm up, he used his right elbow to hit the shield with incredible force.

Dang, dang, dang, dang, dang, dang…

Boom——!

Two different sounds could be heard at the same time. When the scales struck Dai Huabin’s body, they were bounced away again. He didn’t even seem to feel their impacts at all, and resisted the blows easily.

The tremendous boom that sounded was caused by his right elbow as it struck the shield.

Han Yu didn’t expect Dai Huabin to use such a method to resist his attack. He was completely unprepared for this strike.

The Heavenly Armor Shield was blown apart. Dai Huabin continued to burst forward in a dominant fashion, and slammed into Han Yu’s chest with his shoulder.

As his shield was crushed, Han Yu’s defense was crippled, and he was bleeding profusely. His arms were in great pain. Everything happened too quickly, and he couldn’t use a stronger soul skill anymore. He also needed time to retract his scales! Right now, he was like a turtle that had lost the protection of its shell. He was in front of Dai Huabin in his weakest state.

The only thing he could do was raise his soul power and push his palms out towards Dai Huabin.

Boom——!

From the spectators’ view, Han Yu was like a ﬁred cannon shell as he was knocked back. He ﬂew more than ten meters and struck the protective barriers surrounding the stage before he was bounced back to the ﬂoor. He couldn’t get up after that.

Dai Huabin stopped and calmly turned around. He walked back towards the center of the stage.

From the start until the end, this was a very short ﬁght. Dai Huabin had demonstrated his great ﬁghting strength.

Han Yu had the same number of soul rings as he did. As a defense-type Soul King above Rank 50, he didn’t even have the chance to unleash his fourth and ﬁfth soul skill before he lost. This was the gap in their abilities! Dai Huabin gave off a very barbaric and ruthless air. Many people were stunned by his performance.

---

“This…” Wang Dong’er was in shock as she noted, “He has been greatly affected by Qiu’er!” Huo Yuhao’s lips moved slightly, “His actual combat ability has greatly increased. Although his ﬁghting style is very simple and violent, he’s much calmer than before. He also aptly used his White Tiger’s Vajra Transformation.”

Wang Dong’er nodded agreement and said, “Yes! However, this is also a good thing. After all, they are representing Shrek. Qiu’er has brought about great change to them.”

---

Shrek Academy didn’t slip up against the Heavenly Armor Sect in the second elimination round. They used their dominant abilities and ruthless ﬁghting style to win. Dai Huabin overwhelmed his opponents yet again.

There were fewer and fewer boos from the spectators. What was the use of boos in front of them, since they were so strong?

However, Dai Huabin conceded defeat before he fought the third competing member from the Heavenly Armor Sect and left the stage. ---

“Oh, what kind of momentum is this?” Xu Sanshi muttered to himself, curious about what was going on.

Wu Feng was already on the stage, and walking towards the center of it.

“Dai Huabin can obviously still ﬁght. Why did he concede defeat? Is it because he’s not conﬁdent? Impossible! With his character, he won’t know when to stop.” Xiao Xiao was also confused.

Huo Yuhao squinted. “This must be a strategy Qiu’er arranged. She’s training them so that they can get used to the tempo of the tournament. After all, it’s their ﬁrst time.”

Huo Yuhao was right. This was her strategy, helping them gain experience so that they could ﬁght better. It was only through continuous ﬁghting that they could increase their abilities and demonstrate what they had learned over this period of time. This also made them more conﬁdent. Otherwise, Wang Qiu’er would have been able to defeat the entire Heavenly Armor Sect on her own.

Wu Feng’s opponent was also using the Heavenly Armor Shield.

-----

“Match, start!” As the referee shouted, Wu Feng’s eyes lit up. Burning dragon scales started to surface throughout her entire body. As she leapt out, the air around her started to form ripples from the heated air around her.

This member from the Heavenly Armor Sect had learned from the lessons of the two previous competitors, and immediately unleashed his offensive skills.

He unleashed two soul skills at the same time. His Meteoric Fire Armor was sent ﬂying towards Wu Feng.

The hot-tempered Wu Feng didn’t choose to directly resist the armor, her petite ﬁgure blurring as she dodged the attack. She didn’t move as swiftly as Tang Sect’s Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track, but she was quick. Dragon roars could be heard rising from her body. Every time her body twisted, supernatural changes started to occur. From the looks of it, her body only seemed to distort slightly before she dodged the

Meteoric Fire Armor scales ﬂying at her. However, her body moved countless times in that instant.

Huo Yuhao turned his attention to Wang Qiu’er, who was in the waiting area. He had seen such a similar dodging movement from her. Wu Feng must have had been taught by Wang Qiu’er, as they both had dragon-type martial souls. As a possessor of Ultimate Strength, there were many things that Wang Qiu’er could teach Wu Feng. It seemed like Wu Feng had improved as much as Dai Huabin!

Wu Feng let out a deep dragon’s roar. After dodging the attack, her speed soared again as she burst towards her opponent.

The youth from the Heavenly Armor Sect was already prepared. Without any hesitation, he unleashed his strongest fourth soul skill. Yes, he was a Soul Ancestor just like the second competing member from the sect. The outward bulge on the Heavenly Armor Shield turned into an inward bulge. Several streaks of red light started to reﬂect from the mirrored surfaces of the armor. They were reﬂected towards a single point, converting into a beam of ﬁre that shot towards Wu Feng.

Heavenly Armor Needle, a single-target offensive soul skill. It was as strong as a ten-thousand year soul skill. Its penetrating abilities perfectly demonstrated the strength of the Heavenly Armor Shield!

The Heavenly Armor Needle was unleashed at the correct moment. It was at the instant when Wu Feng dodged the Meteoric Fire Armor scales, so it was impossible for her to dodge anymore. She hadn’t expected the Meteoric Fire Armor scales to be a trap!

In fact, Dai Huabin had defeated the Meteoric Fire Armor twice already. No one in the Heavenly Armor Sect was conﬁdent in this soul skill anymore. Without a special method, there was no chance of victory against a ﬁve-ringed soul master, especially since he was only a four-ringed soul master. The Heavenly Armor Needle was his only chance.

However, Wu Feng had been through tough training, and was “tortured” by Wang Qiu’er mercilessly almost every day. It wasn’t that easy to defeat her. Even though she couldn’t compare to Huo Yuhao, her advantage over other soul masters was still very evident.

As Wu Feng opened her mouth, she spewed ﬂames to counter the Heavenly Armor Needle. Her third soul ring lit up as she slowed the needle down, and she punched out at it.

The space around Wu Feng distorted furiously and turned dark red. It felt as if she it had collapsed after she unleashed her ﬁst. Her entire ﬁst also turned scarlet red.

Boom!

A scarlet-red ball of light blew apart. Undulations of terrifying ﬁery soul power spread for more than ten meters before they dissipated. Intense ﬂames spread everywhere, and the youth from the Heavenly Armor Sect was blown more than ten meters back, his Heavenly Armor Shield cracked.

While the Heavenly Armor Needle was strong, he only had four rings. Against Wu Feng’s ﬁve rings, it wasn’t at all easy for him to achieve victory.

Wu Feng’s third soul skill, Explosive Dragonmouth, crushed the Heavenly Armor Shield with its immense destructive force, and also forced her opponent into helpless retreat. Shrek Academy won the third round. Her next opponent was another four-ringed Soul Ancestor. His martial soul was also the Heavenly Armor Shield. Wu Feng didn’t slip up.

Just like Dai Huabin, Wu Feng left the stage after she won two consecutive rounds, ending her participation in today’s elimination round.

By conceding defeat, it meant that Shrek Academy couldn’t progress directly into the next round through the individual elimination round. They had to go through the team round, too.

---

The third from Shrek Academy to compete was Xie Huanyue. He also announced his defeat after winning two consecutive rounds.

Shrek Academy lost three rounds at this stage after sending three competing members up, whereas six from the Heavenly Armor Sect had been eliminated. They were only left with one member.

“We admit defeat for the individual elimination round!” The youth sitting in front of the entire Heavenly Armor Sect’s team in the waiting area exclaimed. He was the team leader of their squad, Han Jian.

There wasn’t much meaning in continuing the individual elimination round. Rather than lose again, it was better for them to risk everything during the team round.

The few competing members of the Heavenly Armor Sect were all injured from the previous few ﬁghts, but they would still be able to compete in the team round.

“The individual elimination round is over. Shrek Academy is left with four members. They have four points, while the Heavenly Armor Sect has zero points. After a two minute break, the team round will be conducted. Both parties, please prepare.”

Even though most of the previous teams had only emerged victorious in the team round, many people were still disappointed with Shrek Academy. After all, there were a few teams that managed to qualify after dominating their individual elimination rounds.

----

Right now, the rest of the six members of Shrek Academy’s team were in front of Wang Qiu’er. Twelve eyes were now focused on her.

Wang Qiu’er nodded and said, “We’ll ﬁght in the team round like we practiced. Triangular formation. Do all of you understand?”

“Yes!” the rest of them acknowledged her order.

---

After two minutes, the team members from both sides lined up along the center of the competition stage. The referee said, “This will be the same as the individual elimination round. Both teams will retreat to the sides and wait for my order. Anyone who loses his ﬁghting strength will be considered eliminated, and he can’t continue to attack either. We’ll try our best to minimize injuries and deaths. Understood?”

“Yes.”

The team leaders from both sides acknowledged the referee’s words. Right now, Han Jian seemed to be in a daze. It was because Wang Qiu’er was too pretty.

Although Wang Qiu’er was wearing a white veil right now, her powdery-blue hair, perfect body ratio and bright eyes could still be seen.

Han Jian felt his heart beating faster even though he had only glanced at her. He hurriedly lowered his head and didn’t dare to continue looking at her. Wang Qiu’er didn’t have any expression in her eyes. She took her team members and withdrew to one side of the stage, standing in the forefront. Slightly behind, and to her left and right were Wu Feng and Dai Huabin.

Zhu Lu was behind Dai Huabin, while Xie Huanyue was behind Wu Feng. Cao Jinxuan and Ning Tian were behind Wang Qiu’er. It was an accurate triangular formation formed by the seven of them.

The Heavenly Armor Sect took on a different formation.

They formed an arc, which was very rare in a team ﬁght.

Even though an arc-shaped formation could be regarded as a half-encirclement, its single line of defense made it very vulnerable to exploitation. Once the competing members were separated, they would lose. Since they had formed up in this manner, it showed that they had some special ﬁghting method.

---

In the VIP resting area, Huo Yuhao was pensive as he said, “The Heavenly Armor Sect team looks conﬁdent. Along with their weird formation and similar martial souls, they must possess some kind of special ability.”

Jiang Nannan was a little worried as she said, “They won’t lose, right? After all, they are representing the academy.”

Shrek Academy’s glory was very important to all of them!

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “All plans are futile against an absolute power. At a certain level of cultivation, using special methods might not be enough to change the situation of a ﬁght. Let’s see. Since the Heavenly Armor Sect is so conﬁdent, I’m sure they must have some way of competing.” His conﬁdence in Shrek Academy arose from Wang Qiu’er’s presence.

----

On the tournament stage, the seven Heavenly Armor Sect team members were lined up neatly. Although some of them looked pale, as they had been injured, they didn’t appear weak. Their gazes were ﬁlled with an unyielding desire for victory. “Match, start!” The referee swiped his right hand down and retreated quickly at the same time.

On Shrek Academy’s side, seven people moved at the same time. They burst towards their opponents together. Not only were they neatly arranged, but they were also extremely quick!

Wang Qiu’er lifted her right hand. Two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings rose from her feet. Although she was wearing a veil, her moving ﬁgure and long, swaying hair still left a deep impression.

---

Xiao Hongchen was in a daze as he looked at the stage. He muttered to himself, “Why do I ﬁnd this team leader from Shrek so familiar? Have I seen her before? It’d be great if she could take off her veil.”

Meng Hongchen snorted. “You always ﬁnd pretty girls familiar.” He coughed quickly. “Give me some face in front of the rest!” Xiao Hongchen snapped at his sister.

---

On the tournament stage, once Shrek Academy’s team burst off, the Heavenly Armor Sect team also acted immediately. However, they didn’t burst forward, but only unleashed their Heavenly Armor Shields at the same time.

Seven shields appeared at the same time. Following this, the seven of them shouted at the same time. Then they threw the shields in their hands out.

The seven shields ﬂew through the air, and a series of metallic clanging sounds rang out. Their seven shields were broken down and converted into hexagonal scales.

Was this an attack of scales converted from shields? Most people had the same thought. However, the expressions of everyone from the Tang Sect changed at this moment. Huo Yuhao blurted out almost instantly, “A seven-man fusion skill?”

As he was speaking, the scales started to gather at the center of the stage. Suddenly, a huge Heavenly Armor Shield was formed and drifting in mid-air. The entire shield exuded a sinister aura. Following this, the hexagonal scales started to turn red, so brightly polished it resembled the surface of a mirror.

The fourth soul rings of the Heavenly Armor Sect disciples lit up. Every one of them released intense soul power undulations.

A seven-man fusion skill and martial soul fusion skills were completely different. More accurately speaking, a seven-man fusion skill was formed by overlaps. They were usually overlaps of identical martial souls, gathering the strength of all these martial souls to unleash an attack. They required the martial souls and soul skills to be the same, so that they could be unleashed together once a sufﬁcient level of coordination was achieved. Compared to the qualitative changes of martial soul fusion skills, seven-man fusion skills were slightly weaker. However, it was a killer move for sects that had certain types of martial souls.

As the seven shields gathered to form a huge shield, unleashing the same type of skill, it was equivalent to a combination of seven identical soul skills tied together to form one soul skill. Its strength was incredible!

Something as magical as this hadn’t appeared in the tournament for ages, as sects had not been allowed to compete in earlier editions of the tournament. This was also the reason why the Sun Moon Empire proposed that sects be recognized again.

Only sects possessed many soul masters with the same martial soul. This was very difﬁcult to ﬁnd in an academy, and most academies wouldn’t bother trying to develop such a fusion skill, either. Many years had passed, but such a fusion skill had ﬁnally appeared in the tournament again after sects were once again allowed to compete! The entire Shrek team, even Wang Qiu’er, felt a sense of crisis once the Heavenly Armor Shield was fully formed. It was as if a formidable, savage beast had appeared in front of them, and was baring its teeth at them!

Chapter 285: Team Shrek's Improvement

Wang Qiu’er squinted. If one looked carefully, her pupils seemed to have stretched vertically. Not only this, but her ﬁrst and second soul rings also lit up. A layer of bright light suddenly shone from her body. A primitive aura that seemed to originate from ferocious, prehistoric beasts ﬂowed out of her. The team members behind her felt the pressure on them dropping.

Everyone from the Heavenly Sect Armor’s team was horriﬁed. They felt a sense of fear as they watched Wang Qiu’er, who hadn’t even competed yet. She was actually capable of taking on their seven-man fusion skill on her own! The most frightening thing was that her aura didn’t pale in comparison to theirs.

All of this happened within a short span of time. After their Heavenly Armor Needles were combined, Han Jian unleashed their terrifying skill just as Wang Qiu’er’s aura started to soar.

A thick beam of light shot up from the center of the Heavenly Armor Shield. The spectators outside of the stage only saw the lights dim before a huge patch of ripples appeared on the stage. It seemed like the air had been set on ﬁre!

A dark-red light shot out through the distorted air. The target of the red light was Wang Qiu’er!

Wang Qiu’er quickly rushed to the center of the stage. Just as the Heavenly Armor Shield was unleashed, she felt an intense suffocating feeling, like her body was on the verge of melting.

However, her response was instantaneous. A streak of golden light lit up in front of her body as she let out a sonorous dragon roar. Following this, she stepped on the ﬂoor with her right leg. Her Golden Dragon Spear turned into a ball of golden light that resisted the attack of the combined Heavenly Armor Needle.

Just as Wang Qiu’er burst out, two others from Shrek’s team also unleashed their soul skills.

Ning Tian mimicked a lifting action with her right hand, and a dazzling rainbow-colored treasure pagoda surfaced above her palm.

“There are seven levels of this Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda. First – speed. Third – strength. Fifth – soul.” Shrek Academy’s inner courtyard students were obviously very strong. She used three soul skills at the same time, and they were all used on Wang Qiu’er. The golden light from Wang Qiu’er’s body was beyond dazzling!

Everyone had to admit that the number one auxiliary tool soul was the Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda, and this title had never been snatched away before.

Besides Ning Tian, Cao Jinxuan also moved. His ﬁrst and third soul rings lit up.

A huge illusory projection of a clock surfaced behind Cao Jinxuan. The time on this clock reﬂected the real time. However, a blinding silver light then lit up on the dial of the clock. Following this, the second hand stopped for a moment before it moved back by a second.

The entire stage seemed to have paused for an instant after the clock appeared. At this instant, two streams of blood ﬂowed out from Cao Jinxuan’s nostrils. His body shook, and he looked a little dizzy.

In the air, the Heavenly Armor Needle that was about to reach Wang Qiu’er stopped, and strangely moved back half the distance that it had already travelled. A gap of more than ten meters had been created between it and Wang Qiu’er. Everyone was stunned by this strange scene.

Even Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but open his eyes wide, and he focused his gaze.

Wang Qiu’er had expected this from the start. As the Heavenly Armor Needle moved back, Wang Qiu’er leapt up using this one second of delay. She made a half-turn in the air, and her sonorous dragon roar changed to a piercing pitch. She raised her right arm behind her before she ﬂung her Golden Dragon Spear out. Her target was the beam of red light from the Heavenly Armor Needle.

Gold and red intersected in the air. The ripples in the air started to undulate more thickly. It was like a huge rock had been thrown into a lake... The red light from the Heavenly Armor Needle continued to shoot forward. However, the streak of golden light tore through it as it did.

A second streak of red light ﬂashed past Wang Qiu’er and collided with the red light from the Heavenly Armor Needle. Although it dissipated instantly, it also stalled the red light from the Heavenly Armor Needle for a slight moment. Following this, the approaching red light converted into a huge dragon head that seemed like it was about to swallow the Heavenly Armor Needle. Even though it was dissipated in the next moment, the light from the Heavenly Armor Needle was also weakened by more than twenty-ﬁve percent.

On the other side of Wang Qiu’er, a huge ball of white light was unleashed, and accurately blocked the path of the Heavenly Armor Needle. A series of noises dissipated another quarter of it. When it reached Wang Qiu’er, only a third of its remaining strength was left.

Wang Qiu’er’s third soul ring lit up. The golden light that she released was gathered on her right ﬁst instantly, and turned into a golden dragon head. This was her third soul skill, Golden Dragon Head! Boom——!

Boom——!

Two booms sounded at the same time. One of them came from Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁst, while the other came from the Heavenly Armor Shield.

Wang Qiu’er stopped in mid-attack only for a brief moment before her right leg slammed down on the ﬂoor again, making an indentation several square meters wide on the metal- layered ﬂoor. She was like a golden cannon shell as she burst forward.

On the other side, the combined shield was broken into seven pieces after the Golden Dragon Spear drilled past the Heavenly Armor Needle. The seven pieces revolved in the air, trying to combine once again.

However, Wang Qiu’er was too fast. Before they could do so, she was already close, and her right hand grabbed onto the Golden Dragon Spear that had ﬂown back to her. She swept the air before her with her spear.

A golden light ﬂashed, and three of the shields were instantly shattered. Three of the Heavenly Armor Sect disciples screamed pathetically. They were gravely injured as their martial souls were destroyed.

Wang Qiu’er didn’t seem to stop at all. Her Golden Dragon Spear turned into lights that ﬁlled the sky. As these golden lights shone down, the remaining four disciples felt as if Wang Qiu’er was attacking with all her might.

The four shields didn’t have a chance to recombine before they were forced back. Wang Qiu’er’s body ﬂashed again before she landed beside two of them on the left. On the right side, Xie Huanyue and Dai Huabin had already arrived.

The Heavenly Armor Sect’s team was completely dismantled after their fusion skill failed. Team Shrek didn’t go too hard on them, either. They only defeated the Heavenly Armor Sect’s team in the fastest way possible and ended this team ﬁght.

--- Beneath the stage, Han Zhanwu was completely shocked when he saw this. He couldn’t believe that their fusion skill had been overcome so easily. It was too much.

To many people, Wang Qiu’er was the one who had done everything on her own. From the ﬁrst step she took, everything seemed to have been decided. The entire process couldn’t have been any faster. Wang Qiu’er was like a goddess who controlled the entire proceedings, defeating her opponents with the simplest ﬁghting strategy. The Heavenly Armor Sect’s team’s fusion skill seemed very weak. If not for the fact that it was astonishing the moment it was unleashed, everyone would have forgotten about it.

Wang Dong’er was a little pensive as she softly said, “They’re much stronger than we thought!”

Huo Yuhao nodded gently and said, “Let’s hope we don’t meet them.” He knew better than anyone else, since he was the one with Spiritual Detection. He was also the clearest on what happened in the entire process.

That’s right. Wang Qiu’er had appeared to be extremely strong throughout the ﬁght. However, she wasn’t the decisive factor. Her two teammates behind her were the decisive factors.

Why was Wang Qiu’er able to easily defeat her opponents even when they unleashed their fusion skill? It wasn’t because her opponents weren’t strong. It was because the Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda was behind her to enhance her strength in all aspects, allowing her cultivation to soar to the level of a seven-ringed Soul Sage. Cao Jinxuan’s Time Elapsing Clock had also reversed their opponents’ skill and created sufﬁcient time for her. It wouldn’t have been easy for Wang Qiu’er to deal with the fusion skill alone, even though she was extremely strong.

Their coordination right now wasn’t the same as it was when they sparred with Shrek’s Seven Monsters earlier. Whether it was their individual ﬁghting strength or team ﬁghting strength, they were much better than before. They were like a complete unit now, and Wang Qiu’er was the core of their unit.

Huo Yuhao was very familiar with those from Shrek. Whether it was Dai Huabin, Wu Feng, or Ning Tian, they were all talents in the younger generation. However, they possessed a very deﬁning trait of a talent: arrogance! However, it seemed like they had retracted a little bit of their arrogance. It was almost impossible to spot that arrogance anymore. It was also precisely because of this that they could come together as a unit.

It was also why Huo Yuhao’s expression had turned serious.

With Huo Yuhao’s understanding of Wang Qiu’er, he knew that she would give her best if they met in the tournament. They were bound to compete against one another in terms of their abilities. However, Huo Yuhao wasn’t very willing to meet them in the tournament. His team was both familiar with them, and they were very strong. Before Bei Bei recovered, he was even more unwilling to meet Shrek’s team!

The ﬁrst ﬁght of the second elimination round ended. Although Shrek Academy didn’t win by a landslide, they still demonstrated their strength. This was especially true for Wang Qiu’er. Her performance in the team round caused all the other team leaders to turn dismal. Of course, the expressions of the Holy Ghost Sect’s members couldn’t be seen, since they concealed their faces.

The tournament continued, and the next few ﬁghts were very intense. In order to qualify, every team gave their best. There were many casualties in this second elimination round. The bloody smell coming off the stage also grew stronger and stronger.

“Let’s return,” Huo Yuhao said to his teammates after looking up at the sky.

“You are not watching anymore?” Xu Sanshi was a little stunned as he glanced at Yuhao. Huo Yuhao shook his head and replied, “We’ve seen what we need to. There’s nothing much left to see. No matter who our opponents are, we’ll have to give our all, right? Let’s return to rest.” As he spoke, he gestured for Wang Dong’er to push his wheelchair.

Although Huo Yuhao wasn’t the oldest among them, he was the stand-in team leader since Bei Bei wasn’t around. No one questioned his words. Everyone stood up and left the venue silently, returning to the Ming Yue Hotel.

They were competing tomorrow. Their opponents weren’t well-known, and were from a sect too. They didn’t have any information regarding this sect, and they didn’t notice this sect in the ﬁrst elimination round either. However, that didn’t mean that their opponents were lousy.

------

After returning to the hotel, Huo Yuhao called his teammates to his room. In the the tournament, they had had a meeting room they could use. However, they had to make do with this for this round.

“I’ll talk about tomorrow’s strategy brieﬂy,” Huo Yuhao began.

Xu Sanshi laughed, “Are you planning to compete ﬁrst and continue all the way until the end?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head as he smiled and replied, “It’s different from the previous round. There were many competing teams then, and we had sufﬁcient time to rest. From this round onwards, the time between each successive round will be shorter. We must try our best to conserve our ﬁghting strength. After all, we don’t have many substitutes. In fact, we should learn from Shrek’s strategy today. None of them depleted too much of their energy, but they still fought to warm up their bodies. They kept themselves in their best physical condition for the team round. Tomorrow, we shall follow their strategy. Third senior, you’ll ﬁght ﬁrst tomorrow. What do you think about this arrangement?” Xu Sanshi’s eyes brightened, and he said, “Great idea!

However, don’t you want us to conceal our true abilities?”

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “You only have two opponents to defeat before you concede defeat. Are you really going to reveal your trump card in those two ﬁghts?”

“Of course not!” Xu Sanshi said proudly.

Huo Yuhao laughed, “That’s great! Second senior, you’ll be the second to compete. You’ll ﬁght two of them also. Xiao Xiao, you’ll be the third to ﬁght. You’ll only need to ﬁght one. Fourth senior, you’ll ﬁght one person only too. Dong’er will be last, and she’ll take care of the last person.”

Na Na looked a little pitifully at Huo Yuhao. After hearing that she had no role, she lowered her head.

Huo Yuhao chortled, “Na Na, haven’t you realized that we’ll have to lose a few ﬁghts in the individual elimination round with such an arrangement? The ﬁnal ﬁght will be in the team round. You’ll have your chance then. In the team round, I’ll have to rely on everyone else. I’ll only be the main controller of the team.”

Na Na lifted her head again and subconsciously said, “Master, I have no objections to any of your arrangements.”

After hearing the word “Master”, everyone’s expressions turned a little weird.

Huo Yuhao also felt very helpless. He had corrected her many times, and struggled to get her to call him by his name. However, there were times when she wasn’t careful, and still called him Master. Na Na didn’t ﬁnd anything wrong with this, since she was very grateful to Huo Yuhao. Not only did Huo Yuhao save her parents’ souls, but he also gave her a new life! He was her benefactor!

Huo Yuhao coughed and said, “Seniors, please return to rest.

Na Na, stay behind.”

Xu Sanshi stood up and patted Huo Yuhao’s shoulder. He shot him a weird look and softly said, “Yuhao! You must control yourself since you’re already in this state!” Wang Dong’er could hear him clearly even though he was trying to speak softly.

Besides laughing bitterly, what else could Huo Yuhao do?

Everyone else left, but they wore weird smiles on their faces.

Only Wang Dong didn’t smile. She walked to one side and poured a glass of water for Na Na.

“Thank you, Mistress.” Na Na received the glass respectfully.

Wang Dong’er felt very helpless too, “Sister Na Na, please don’t call me that. I can’t take it. We are senior and junior from the same sect. Yuhao has helped you before, but everything’s already in the past. Don’t tell me that you won’t help us when we are in trouble? Don’t be too bothered…”

“Okay.” Na Na acknowledged her words naturally, but it was evident that she didn’t take them in.

Huo Yuhao knew that there was no point trying to convince her. He didn’t bother doing so. “Na Na, how’s your progress on the matter that I wanted you to investigate?”

Na Na turned serious, and a look of fear ﬂashed across her eyes. She nodded gently and replied, “Yes, you’re right. It’s them, I’m sure of it! I wouldn’t forget their aura even if I turned to ashes. It’s them! It must be them!”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Right. You’ve veriﬁed my guess. The Holy Ghost Sect is the Holy Ghost Church. Don’t be afraid, everyone will protect you as long as you remain with us. What about the other thing? How’s the contact?”

Na Na said, “I went to three black markets, and only the biggest one says that there are goods available. However, the details have to be discussed. Furthermore, their asking price is very high, and they are difﬁcult to deal with.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “It’s okay if the price is high, as long as the goods are available. Before the war starts, we must prepare. Continue to maintain contact with them and bargain. After that, set a time to meet. I’ll meet them. Let’s do it this way; continue to contact them a further three times and let them sense our sincerity. After that, purchase some samples.” “Alright.” Na Na acknowledged his words.

Huo Yuhao said, “You should return to rest, too. Take care of your safety when you are alone at night. If you can’t handle it, ask for help from Sister Ziyan or Brother Ji. After all, they are people who can’t handle loneliness.”

“Alright!” Na Na regarded herself as Huo Yuhao’s servant.

After acknowledging his words, she turned around and left.

She closed the door behind her after she left. Wang Dong’er asked curiously, “Who did you ask Na Na to contact? Why don’t I know about it?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Have you forgotten that my spiritual power has reached the concrete-immaterial realm? I instructed her a few days ago. Since we are here at the Sun Moon Empire, we can’t leave empty-handed. We’ve found some big clients.

“At the same time, we are going to purchase some goods.” Wang Dong’er was intelligent. She immediately thought of something, and asked, “Rare metals? You asked Na Na to search for rare metals for sale on the market?”

Huo Yuhao nodded, “My love, you are really intelligent.

Come here, I’ll reward you with a kiss.”

Wang Dong’er’s face turned red, and she said, “Stop fooling around. Let’s get back to proper business ﬁrst.”

“Alright. Since you’ve agreed, I’ll wait until we are done with proper business ﬁrst.” Huo Yuhao said with a serious look on his face.

“Since when did I agree?” Wang Dong’er asked in embarrassment.

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “You said that we should get back to proper business ﬁrst. Naturally, that means that we’ll get to improper business after that.”

“You…”

“Let’s get back to proper business. You’re right. I want to buy some rare metals.”

Seeing Huo Yuhao’s serious face, Wang Dong’er snapped as she pulled his hand toward her. She bit the back of his hand. However, she bit very gently. This was evident from how Huo Yuhao enjoyed her bite.

“Can you buy rare metals in the Sun Moon Empire? They’re war resources now.” Wang Dong’er asked doubtfully after she ﬁnished biting him.

Huo Yuhao smiled gently and asked, “Why not? As long as you have the money, nothing is impossible. It’s because rare metals are considered war resources that they’re very expensive. But this also means that selling them is very proﬁtable. Some people will be interested in such proﬁts. Furthermore, they are bound to be authoritative ﬁgures. This time, our two clients have accepted very expensive deposits. Gold soul coins are only useless, expensive metals. What we need are rare metals that can be continuously converted into wealth. Storing metals is better than storing money. That’s why I plan to purchase rare metals. Before we left, eldest senior brought all our liquidated money. That includes the funds we gained by selling the Zhuge Divine Crossbow to the academy. Along with the payments that Princess Jiuju and Princess Wei Na gave us, the money that we have is quite substantial!”

Wang Dong’er was a little worried, “However, I’m afraid it’ll be very troublesome to purchase rare metals here. What if we don’t get the goods even after paying up? Even if we get the goods, can we return safely?”

Huo Yuhao patted her hand and said, “There’ll always be a solution. Trust me.”

“Alright.”

Huo Yuhao said, “We are done with proper business.”

Wang Dong’er naturally stood up and said, “I’m going to wash my clothes.”

Huo Yuhao wouldn’t let her go just like this. He pulled with her right hand, and she landed on his thigh.

She didn’t struggle, and only buried her embarrassed head in his arms. She didn’t struggle because she was afraid of hurting him. After all, only his right arm out of his four limbs could move!

“My love, just a while, alright?”

Ten minutes later…

“Didn’t you say it would only be a light kiss?”

“I’ll consider it a kiss after I’m satisﬁed.”

“When will you be satisﬁed?”

“I’m unsure of that…”

------

After the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament entered its second elimination round, it became more and more intense. The remaining eighty-four teams went all-out against one another. After the ﬁrst day of the second elimination round, twenty-one teams had already successfully qualiﬁed for the next round. After this successful qualiﬁcation, they already had one foot in the round-robin stage.

That was because forty-two teams would emerge after this second elimination round. Although the next round was still an elimination round, the bottom twenty-one teams had to compete with one another in terms of points so that the best ten teams out of these twenty-one teams could be selected for the next round-robin stage. It was already very prestigious for a team to enter the round-robin stage, as it wasn’t an easy feat!

------

The second day of the second elimination round...

The Tang Sect’s ﬁght was arranged for the afternoon. They didn’t go to the tournament venue in the morning, instead remaining in the hotel to rest. Bei Bei’s injuries seemed to relapse and become more serious. This also cast a shadow on the Tang Sect’s match.

After eating lunch, they rested for a while, and then embarked on their journey to the venue as it came closer to the time of their ﬁght. The resting area was much less crowded, and it no longer felt packed. But the number of spectators continued to rise. These last few days of intense competition had left them more and more excited.

Huo Yuhao had set their strategy yesterday, and thus he had nothing to tell them today. In the VIP resting area, his attention was drawn to the other teams that were in the area with them. He was surprised to ﬁnd that he couldn’t ascertain which team was representing the Body Sect.

The team that he had been monitoring had been eliminated yesterday morning. With the Body Sect’s abilities, it wasn’t possible for them to make such a low-level mistake, so he had to search for a new target to monitor.

The Holy Ghost Sect’s team weren’t there in the afternoon. They had competed in the morning, and had already advanced to the next round. Although no one from the Tang Sect watched their ﬁght, they could roughly guess that it didn’t last too long.

In contrast, Shrek’s team came to the VIP resting area to watch the ﬁghts even though they had already qualiﬁed for the next round. Undoubtedly, they were here to watch the Tang Sect’s ﬁght.

Huo Yuhao could sense Wang Qiu’er’s cold and level gaze looking at him when she sat down.

He smiled and nodded at her. However, he was greeted by a cold expression. He couldn’t help but touch his nose, feeling that he had been sharply rebuffed by her.

On the other hand, Wu Feng, Dai Huabin, and the others were watching the Tang Sect very closely. Their expressions weren’t very friendly. It was easy to see their intense competitive spirit from the look in their eyes.

Huo Yuhao shook his head helplessly. Is there a need for this?

We are all from the same academy.

He was in a good state right now. Of course, he hadn’t forgotten the deep hatred that he concealed in his heart. The Holy Ghost Sect didn’t come. Huo Yuhao sat where he was and rested his eyes. He circulated his Mysterious Heaven Technique and fused with the origin energy of Ultimate Ice in his body. Even though he could only strip off some of the origin energy, it was still better than nothing. Such a

continuous fusion was also the safest and most stable method.

It was ﬁnally the Tang Sect’s turn to compete after the fourth ﬁght in the afternoon had concluded.

“Tang Sect versus the Ironsword Sect. Competing members from both teams, please enter the waiting area. The ﬁrst competing member from each team, please enter the stage.”

Everyone from the Tang Sect stood up as the referee called for them. Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao in front of everyone and entered the waiting area with the rest.

Even though Huo Yuhao had defeated all his opponents on his own in the previous round, the Tang Sect was still an unknown sect. The attention they received wasn’t much. The deepest impression the Sun Moon Empire’s citizens had of the Tang Sect was probably Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair. Xu Sanshi leapt up and ascended the stage, walking briskly to the center.

Ironsword Sect. This was an extremely unfamiliar name to the Tang Sect, but they deﬁnitely possessed some quality if they were able to pass the ﬁrst elimination round.

The ﬁrst competing member from the Ironsword Sect was a young lady. She had a slender ﬁgure and a refreshing appearance. Her long black hair drooped behind her back. Her charm wasn’t lost amid her beauty and gentleness.

Xu Sanshi’s eyes widened as he saw that his opponent was a lady. He subconsciously swallowed his saliva.

Beneath the stage, Huo Yuhao muttered, “Did this Ironsword Sect research us? How did they know that the best way to deal with third senior was by sending a beautiful lady to ﬁght him?”

“Hmph!” Jiang Nannan’s cold voice caused Huo Yuhao to shudder. He quickly shut his mouth and prayed as hard as he could for Xu Sanshi. After a brief moment, Xu Sanshi’s expression regained its normalcy. He walked to the center of the stage. Before the referee even said anything, he reached his hand over and said, “Beautiful lady, how are you? I’m Xu Sanshi from the Tang Sect. I’m usually called, usually called…”

He wanted to tell her about some mighty nickname that he had, but he was as speechless as he usually was when he saw a lady.

This lady didn’t expect her opponent to be like this. Seeing his awkward look, she couldn’t help but laugh. In terms of looks, Xu Sanshi and Bei Bei had different styles. However, they were both handsome.

The lady reached out with her right hand to shake his hand and said gently, “What are you usually called? I’m Wang Chengxi from the Ironsword Sect. Please have mercy on me, senior.”

Xu Sanshi was still aware that Jiang Nannan was here, and so didn’t grab her hand tightly. However, his face was still ﬁlled with a grin. “Of course, of course I’ll have mercy on you. What do you think I should be called? Hmm, let me think. Eternal Defense? What do you think?”

“Eternal Defense?” Wang Chengxi was stunned, but she revealed a smile after that, “Great! It sounds impressive.”

“Are the two of you still competing?” The referee shouted, as he felt that the two of them didn’t care about his presence. He took a step forward and separated them. After that, he skipped the explanation of the rules and pointed to the two sides of the stage.

“I’ll see you later.” Xu Sanshi made a sneaky gesture at Wang Chengxi. He used his right hand to sweep his medium-length hair before turning around suavely.

Wang Chengxi was still wearing a smile on her face. She was apologetic as she nodded at the referee. After that, she turned around and walked towards her end of the stage.

Xu Sanshi felt his body turning rigid as he walked towards his side of the stage. He immediately turned in the direction of the cold intent that was being projected towards him. He saw a pair of big, beautiful eyes.

“Oh shit… I got too immersed!” Xu Sanshi shuddered. As he walked to his side of the stage, his expression turned very cool. After that, he gave Jiang Nannan a thumbs-up and softly said, “I was bewitching my opponent earlier so that she would be unable to see my true self.”

Jiang Nannan didn’t say anything. The defensive light barrier was soundproof…

Xu Sanshi turned around in a cool manner. After that, he saw the referee lifting his right hand up before swiping down.

He stopped fantasizing and quickly rushed in Wang Chengxi’s direction. Dazzling rings started to rise from his legs.

Yellow, yellow, purple, purple, black, black. When his six soul rings rose, the spectators around started to exclaim.

Six rings. He actually had six rings.

Even the most clueless spectators knew what six soul rings represented. The abilities of a Soul Emperor!

It was very rare to ﬁnd soul masters that were Soul Emperors. Since he was on this stage, it meant that he wasn’t twenty yet. For him to achieve such a cultivation at his current age, it must mean that he was a great talent and a truly strong competitor in this tournament. A team with at least one Soul Emperor should be able to reach the quarterﬁnals in this tournament.

Who would have expected the unknown Tang Sect to possess a Soul Emperor? In the previous round, the ﬁve-ringed Huo Yuhao took down seven opponents single-handedly. In this round, the Tang Sect sent a six-ringed Soul Emperor to compete ﬁrst. Everyone saw the Tang Sect differently now! Wang Chengxi hadn’t expected the guy ﬂirting with her to be a Soul Emperor. However, her smile didn’t disappear. She took small steps as she advanced towards Xu Sanshi. However, no one could see the coldness in her eyes.

As she lifted her right hand, a pitch-black iron sword appeared in the air. Rings of light also appeared on the iron sword. There were two yellow and three purple rings. This was a rather good combination of soul rings for an ordinary soul master. Furthermore, she was also a Soul King. However, this was nothing in the eyes of a truly strong soul master.

The two of them got close to each other very quickly. To make amends for his mistake earlier, Xu Sanshi shouted, “This is a duel between sword and shield. Come on.” As he spoke, he lifted his Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle and swept it towards Wang Chengxi.

Wang Chengxi smiled, and she stopped for a moment. After that, she jumped to one side, and her sword ﬂashed with a light. Suddenly, a streak of black sword light was formed and shot towards Xu Sanshi’s shoulder. Xu Sanshi wasn’t too bothered. His footsteps became faster, and he made a simple turn. At the same time, he pulled his shield back and blocked the sword light.

A crisp ringing sound rang out as the sword light struck his shield.

Chapter 286: The Other Tournament

Xu Sanshi leapt forward quickly and pressed his shield forward. He didn’t unleash a soul skill, but instead used his dense soul power and physical strength to knock into Wang Chengxi. He was very sudden, such that Wang Chengxi was unprepared. Her sword was lifted into the air as she was pushed. From the looks of it, she was about to be struck by the shield.

Wang Chengxi reached her left hand forward. She grabbed her sword with two hands now and pressed it against the shield. She tapped into the forward momentum of the shield to lift her body into the air. Her movements were very elegant. As she exerted strength with her hands, she leapt into the air. At the same time as she passed Xu Sanshi, she ﬂexibly turned her body and reversed direction.

The sword light from her sword started to shine very brightly. The sharp sword aura engulfed Xu Sanshi’s body from the back.

She pressed her sword, leaping into the air and launching a counterattack. It was an eye-opener.

Xu Sanshi turned from the active to the passive party. However, he was very experienced, and had seen many types of situations before. He didn’t panic at all. Wang Chengxi saw things blurring in front of her before Xu Sanshi miraculously used his shield to block his back. All the sword lights were deﬂected away, and none of them struck him.

Those who were watching the ﬁght intently noticed that Xu Sanshi’s shield turned along with Wang Chengxi as she leapt into the air, even though he hadn’t turned himself. However, it appeared very abrupt because his shield was scooped up from the bottom.

Wang Chengxi’s sword lights struck nothing again. However, her smile seemed to become wider. Her sword started to shine very brightly, and a layer of icy-blue started to engulf Xu Sanshi, coming from the third light ring that lit up on the sword.

The icy-blue glow quickly engulfed Xu Sanshi. At the same time, a black glow started to spread from the Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle. It spread out like exhaust gas, dispelling the icy-blue glow. Wang Chengxi was also engulfed by this exhaust gas.

It was Xu Sanshi’s ﬁrst soul skill, Mysterious Underworld Quake.

The difference this soul skill had from the past was that it now seemed to have its own intelligence. The strongest quake wasn’t unleashed at the ﬁrst moment, but covered Wang Chengxi’s body instantly. It was only after this that the immense force of the quake was unleashed.

Wang Chengxi was stunned. She suddenly felt very restrained ﬁghting against Xu Sanshi. Her outstanding ﬁghting experience didn’t seem to be useful here. Even her most conﬁdent skill had been seen through by her opponent! Xu Sanshi gave her a lot of pressure as he unleashed his soul skill.

The ﬁfth soul ring on her sword suddenly lit up. Wang Chengxi grabbed her sword with both hands, and her body started to squirm. She was even calling out softly, “Painful!”

However, who knew that Xu Sanshi wasn’t moved at all. The immense force from his Mysterious Underworld Quake was instantly unleashed. Not only that, but a pitch-black glow shone from his body. The surface area of his shield doubled, and the strength of the Mysterious Underworld Quake suddenly soared.

Thousand-year soul skill, Mysterious Underworld Force!

A light ﬂashed from Wang Chengxi’s hand. It was destroyed as a tremendous vibration struck her. Her ﬁfth soul ring, which was on the sword, seemed to have been completely destroyed, and she was ﬂung away by the strong quaking force. The lights on her sword suddenly turned much dimmer.

Xu Sanshi didn’t follow up his attack. However, Wang Chengxi could hear him muttering, “Screaming in such pain, but your soul ring is still bright. That was too hypocritical!”

A pale glow was released from Wang Chengxi’s body, which she used to resist the quaking force. As she supported her body with her right hand, she bounced straight back up.

“You really don’t know how to take care of girls!” a whining voice sounded out. Xu Sanshi was displeased as he said, “What do you mean, I don’t know how to take care of girls? I’m only protecting myself. Even if I want to take care of girls, I’ll need to prioritize my own life ﬁrst! Am I right, beauty? Are you still attacking? If you aren’t, you can leave the stage. I don’t want you to complain that I’m not taking good care of you.”

Wang Chengxi pursed her small lips and replied, “You haven’t won. If I leave just like this, how can I account to my sect? Let’s go again!”

As she spoke, she burst towards Xu Sanshi again. This time, she seemed even more elegant, and was also much faster. Her long, black hair danced with the wind.

Xu Sanshi didn’t rush forward. He actually retreated one step, then lunged forward. There was a smile on his face.

He was indeed very fond of ladies. However, they would be in trouble if they thought that he was brainless and tried to harm him. Wang Chengxi suddenly leapt into the air when she was ﬁve meters away from Xu Sanshi. She made a turn in the air and stabbed out towards him both hands on her sword. Her long swaying hair followed the movements of her body, appearing like a full, black moon.

Xu Sanshi didn’t retreat or advance. He stood where he was and focused his gaze on Wang Chengxi’s body. Her ﬁfth soul ring lit up again, and the blinding lights from her sword were very clear. A black sword light was directly separated from her iron sword. It was completely black, but it released an intense silver light. Before the sword was even unleashed, its aura was already cracking the air with its sharpness.

At the same time, Wang Chengxi’s black hair started to transform. It grew longer, and turned into black snakes that whipped towards Xu Sanshi. Not only this, but she also lifted her head suddenly, giving Xu Sanshi a shock.

While she had appeared very gentle and ravishing earlier, she was now very pale. Two fangs poked out from her mouth, and her eyes were completely white. Two streaks of pale white light instantly shot from them towards Xu Sanshi. The spectators couldn’t see these two streaks of light clearly, as they were masked by the snakes. They could only see Xu Sanshi’s body being engulfed by countless snakes.

Sword light, snakes, white lights! Three different attacks were unleashed at the same time!

Xu Sanshi was astonished as he shouted, “Twin martial souls?!” At this point, the white lights from Wang Chengxi’s eyes had already shot towards him.

Xu Sanshi squatted down and used his shield to protect his entire body. He allowed the two streaks of white light to hit his shield.

Suddenly, he felt his shield becoming heavier, as it had turned into a massive rock! Following this, the countless snakes started to converge towards him from all directions. The sword lights were already in front of him too!

--- Beneath the stage, everyone from the Tang Sect couldn’t help but get nervous. Wang Dong’er exclaimed at almost the same time as Xu Sanshi, “Twin martial souls?!”

Huo Yuhao shook his head, and his expression didn’t really change.

---

Just when everyone thought Xu Sanshi was in deep trouble, something weird happened. The air distorted, and suddenly Xu Sanshi was displaced from his position, and Wang Chengxi replaced him in his original position. None of her attacks managed to strike him.

It was his fourth soul skill, the Mysterious Underworld Displacement! It was this skill that had created several miracles in the last tournament.

Xu Sanshi wasn’t merciful anymore. A ball of black light was unleashed from his shield, a snake on its surface. White lights shot out from its blood-red eyes, which reconverted his shield back to its original state. Following this, his shield turned into projections in the air. The snakes that came towards Xu Sanshi were once again forced away by these projections.

Xu Sanshi followed his shield. His speed soared as he burst forward. He held the main body of his shield and was about to ram into Wang Chengxi!

At this point, there were ﬁve more soul rings on Wang Chengxi’s body. Two were yellow, two were purple and the last one was black. The two purple soul rings were still shining brightly. As her snakes continued to burst forward, her body also turned soft like cotton. Her skin was even replaced by a layer of scales. She retreated quickly.

Her ﬁfth soul ring also lit up again at the same time. A pale white color covered her eyes once again.

Medusa! This was Wang Chengxi’s stronger martial soul. Her ﬁfth soul skill was called Medusa’s Gaze.

It was a pity that she was facing Xu Sanshi. His martial soul wasn’t just simply his Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle. His shield had undergone a mutation.

The Xuanwu was a combination of a turtle and a snake, and it was the most outstanding water-type martial soul. Her Medusa’s Gaze was completely curbed by the aura of his shield. As long as it didn’t directly strike Xu Sanshi, it was impossible for her to have any effect on him. Her cultivation was also inferior to his, and he wouldn’t turn to stone just because she gazed at him.

“Trying to escape?” Xu Sanshi snorted coldly. The shield projections in the air started to converge.

If the Heavenly Armor Sect’s team hadn’t left, they would have been embarrassed by how Xu Sanshi used his shield.

The shield walls formed by Xu Sanshi’s Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle turned into a cage under his control, and Wang Chengxi was trapped within!

Two streaks of blood-red light shot out from the snake’s eyes on the surface of his shield. As they struck Wang Chengxi’s Medusa’s Gaze, they destroyed it. He was also moving forward again at this point. Wang Chengxi’s body jerked back as she retracted all her snakes, but she then burst forward again and collided head-on with him.

It was a pity that her abilities were still far from his. Her snakes were destroyed, and she was completely trapped by Xu Sanshi. She groaned in discontent.

He watched Wang Chengxi from close-range and used his shield to block off her Medusa’s Gaze. Xu Sanshi shook his head in loathing and said, “You look really good, but why do you have to make yourself appear so disgusting? It’s a pity. I almost thought that you had twin martial souls. It seems like that isn’t the case! You are quite smart, but it’s a pity that you met me. Don’t worry, I take good care of ladies. Concede defeat now!”

“No!” Wang Chengxi looked at Xu Sanshi stubbornly. She used all her soul power and struggled to escape.

Xu Sanshi was a little helpless as he shook his head. Black lights were released again, his Mysterious Underworld Quake!

This time, his Mysterious Underworld Quake was unleashed as his shield was in its shield wall state. The quake was directed inwards instead of out.

By the time Xu Sanshi withdrew, Wang Chengxi had already regained her original appearence as she collapsed softly to the ground.

Xu Sanshi nodded his head in satisfaction and muttered to himself, “That’s right, you look much better now. You should thank me.”

The referee appeared gloomy as he rushed over and heard his words. Are all young people nowadays so shameless?

Xu Sanshi turned around in a very showy manner. He extended two ﬁngers towards the others in the waiting area to signal his victory. After that, he suavely turned to his opponents and shouted, “Next!”

The referee couldn’t stand him anymore, and said furiously, “Why are you shouting? Do you think you are me? You are even carrying a speaker-type soul tool. Let me tell you. No one’s voice except mine can be heard within this protective barrier.”

“Uh…” Xu Sanshi recalled what he had said to Jiang Nannan and was stunned. When he was just about to turn around, two people from the Ironsword Sect hurried over and carried Wang Chengxi away.

She wasn’t hurt, but she was unconscious after suffering his quake. It was unlikely that she would wake up anytime soon.

Although Xu Sanshi loved to show himself off, it hadn’t been an easy ﬁght for him. Given that he had to conceal his true abilities, Wang Chengxi’s explosive abilities had put a lot of pressure on him.

---

Wang Dong’er smiled as she said, “Oh, he’s ﬁnally won.

Third senior is impressive!”

Huo Yuhao laughed, “Third senior can’t be stopped by this small wave. However, that lady was quite scheming.”

Wang Dong’er replied, “She doesn’t seem to possess twin martial souls. Otherwise, how could she bear to promote her soul rings to the same level for both martial souls? That wouldn’t be very good for her future development.”

Huo Yuhao answered, “Of course she doesn’t have twin martial souls. They aren’t that common.”

Jiang Nannan rolled her eyes and said, “Aren’t that common? There are already three of you who have twin martial souls among the seven of us.” Huo Yuhao chuckled, “That’s because we are from Shrek! Fourth senior, third senior fought very steadily. Don’t put him in a difﬁcult spot later.”

Jiang Nannan let a cold smile onto her face and replied, “I don’t believe I can’t change his bad habit.”

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er looked at each other, and started to pray for Xu Sanshi in their hearts.

---

The second competing member of the Ironsword Sect quickly entered the stage. It was a young man this time, who wore a furious look on his face. When he entered the stage, he immediately interrogated Xu Sanshi, “What did you do to our senior?”

Xu Sanshi looked at him sincerely, “To prevent her from harming herself, I let her sleep. Don’t worry, she’ll wake up within a day.” The young man was stunned and said, “A day? What about our team round? She’s our team leader! Without her, we’ll...”

Xu Sanshi was shocked.“Brother, are you acting in front of me?”

“Acting? What nonsense! I’ll ﬁght it out with you!” The young man reacted quickly and burst towards Xu Sanshi.

It was a pity that he was stopped by the referee in the next moment.

The referee righteously said, “Although I detest him too, you’ll still need to observe the rules. Stay back.”

Xu Sanshi wasn’t going to be merciful on this young man…

There were only ladies, beauties, and small animals in his heart. There wasn’t such a thing as guys. As long as they weren’t his close friends, they were automatically categorized as small animals. He wouldn’t be merciful to them! After Wang Chengxi’s defeat, this young man, who was a four-ringed Soul Ancestor, lasted less than two minutes before he also lost.

Xu Sanshi’s ﬁghting style was very simple. There weren’t too many ﬂowery tricks, but he managed to use his shield exaltedly, and his soul skills ﬂexibly. To others, he used one soul skill as if he were using three. Everyone could tell that he hadn’t given his all yet.

However, he conceded defeat after he ﬁnished his second ﬁght. He exited the stage and his teammate took over for him.

The Ironsword Sect’s prowess seemed to have mainly come from Wang Chengxi. After her defeat, it was smooth sailing for the Tang Sect, there wasn’t any real resistance for them. As for the team round, it was an overwhelming victory for them as well. Among the seven of them, He Caitou, Huo Yuhao, and Wang Dong’er didn’t even make a move in the team round.

Xu Sanshi led Jiang Nannan, Xiao Xiao, and Na Na as they settled the ﬁght in the team round. The Tang Sect advanced, and the Ironsword Sect was eliminated.

Wang Chengxi’s physical body was quite strong, and she woke up after the team round ended. However, there wasn’t any hint of a smile on the face. From the looks of it, she wasn’t any less furious than Nan Qiuqiu, who had lost to the Tang Sect in the previous round.

Nan Qiuqiu had followed the Tang Sect over to the tournament venue today. However, she remained in the resting area. She hadn’t registered as a member of the Tang Sect, and thus she couldn’t compete. However, she was much more honest now. She sat beside Jing Ziyan and shot clownish looks at everyone from the Tang Sect from time to time.

Over the past few days, Nan Qiuqiu had spent time with Jing Ziyan and Ji Juechen. Her hatred had shifted…

The Tang Sect didn’t meet any strong opponents. After the next round, they would be in the round-robin stage.

------

After their ﬁght ended, they didn’t stay in the resting area. Huo Yuhao and the rest directly returned to their hotel to rest, where they also told Bei Bei about their victory.

Bei Bei was still in a bad condition. His condition didn’t seem to have improved over the past two days. His injury couldn’t be healed through healing-type soul masters. His body was invaded by an evil aura, so he could only use his own soul power to dispel the evil aura. At the same time, he needed to recover his vital energy.

Everyone returned to their rooms to rest, while Na Na left the hotel silently, continuing the mission that Huo Yuhao had delegated to her.

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er returned to their room and started to cultivate. Huo Yuhao made full use of this time to absorb the origin energy in his body. It was only after night fell that a knock sounded at their door.

Wang Dong’er was jolted awake by the sounds of knocking on the door. “Who is it?” Wang Dong’er asked.

“It’s me,” Na Na’s voice came back quietly.

Wang Dong’er crawled out of the bed and walked towards the door before opening it

Na Na was apologetic as she said, “Mis… Dong’er, sorry for disturbing the both of you at such a late time. I’m really sorry.”

Huo Yuhao’s voice rose. “Dong’er, let her in.”

Wang Dong’er brought Na Na into the room. Huo Yuhao had already ended his cultivation, and he was sitting by his bedside. His lower limbs still couldn’t move. Even when he was seated, he could only rely on his right hand to shift himself. At this point, he grabbed onto the bed and tried to turn around.

“Was there any progress?” Huo Yuhao asked Na Na. She replied, “Master, things aren’t going too well. I’ve contacted some of the black market sellers over these few days. They aren’t that willing to sell to us. They claim that their production is too little and the metals that we want are too precious.”

Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow and asked, “Is it because of money, or some other reason?”

Na Na said, “I asked, and heard that they are exploiting this tournament to organize an underground tournament. The rewards of this tournament are very substantial. As rare metals are a very important hard currency in the underground world, they are being used as stakes. It will be very difﬁcult for us to buy any of them.”

Huo Yuhao was doubtful, “They are organizing their own tournament even as they bet? Isn’t the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament enough for them?”

Na Na said, “Master, there are some things you don’t know. The Sun Moon Empire has a very strict law that prohibits anyone from betting on this tournament. No one is allowed, no matter whether it’s on the surface or in the black market. Otherwise, punishment will be meted out.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned and asked, “Why is this so? I recalled that you could do so in the Star Luo Empire.”

Na Na replied, “I heard that the current Prince Regent detests gambling. That’s why the underground black market has no choice but to organize its own tournament.”

Huo Yuhao said, “Where do they ﬁnd people to compete if everyone’s in the legal tournament? Without sufﬁcient competitors, the tournament will be meaningless.”

Na Na said, “They aren’t organizing a ﬁghting tournament, but one on creating soul tools. This is the specialty of Radiant City, it doesn’t happen in other empires. The only requirement is that the competitors have to be under thirty. Soul engineers of any class can compete. The entire tournament is purely about elimination. The rules of every round seem to be different.” Huo Yuhao thought of something, and asked, “Can you tell me what this tournament is like? Also, what are the rewards and gambling system with regards to this underground tournament?”

Na Na had been living in Radiant City since her youth, and was very familiar with this place. She was also very good at obtaining such news. She thoroughly recounted the details of the tournament to Huo Yuhao.

The three biggest black markets had decided to organize their own tournament and exploit the opportunity of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament to earn proﬁts without angering Xu Tianran. To make it sound nice, they claimed that they were furthering the development of soul tools in the Sun Moon Empire.

The tournament wasn’t very strict. The only two requirements were that the soul engineers had to be under thirty, and they had to create Class 4 soul tools in the qualiﬁers. If they passed, they could advance to the next round, where they could truly compete.

One could bet on the qualiﬁers. The bet was very simple: the number of people who could pass the qualiﬁers. One could bet on an absolute number, or whether it would be an odd or even number of people who qualiﬁed. The returns were a few multiples, and varied depending on the selections.

The qualiﬁers were being held right now. Creating soul tools wasn’t as quick as a ﬁght, so the soul engineers were given three days for the ﬁrst round. The future rounds in the tournament would also be elimination rounds, but the topic for each round would change.

The three black markets even specially invited a member of the imperial family, a powerful Class 9 soul engineer, to be the chief referee. Twelve Class 7 and above soul engineers were also chosen to be the referee committee in this tournament, so as to ensure the fairness of the tournament and betting system.

The things they had to do were simple. They wanted to draw in the ordinary citizens, nobles, and wealthy individuals who wanted to gamble by exploiting the hype of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. Their aim was to make as much proﬁt as possible.

So far, they had been very successful in this aspect. More than a hundred thousand people had bet in their tournament already, and the amount of money involved was undoubtedly very great.

To draw sufﬁcient numbers of outstanding soul engineers to compete, the rewards of the tournament were all rare metals.

From the ﬁrst round, those who qualiﬁed for the next round would be rewarded. This even applied to the qualiﬁers. As the rounds progressed, the rewards would increase.

Soul engineers could ignore money, but they had to have rare metals. They could create soul tools to earn money, but rare metals might not be available even if one had money. This was especially true in this tournament, since the rare metals were all being used as rewards for the competitors.

There was even competition between the three black markets. That was why there were three competing venues for the tournament. The winners in each venue would compete against one another. When that happened, the wager between the three black markets would also involve rare metals.

All this was why Na Na couldn’t obtain any rare metals even though she was willing to offer a high price.

After listening to Na Na, Huo Yuhao sank deep into thought. He asked, “Na Na, are there any requirements to register for this tournament?”

Na Na shook her head and said, “It’s very simple. One cannot be above thirty years old, and must be conﬁdent in competing in the qualiﬁers. Finally, there’s a registration fee of a hundred gold soul coins.”

Wang Dong’er’s expression changed, and she said, “Yuhao, don’t tell me you’re thinking of competing. No, it’s too dangerous! This is Radiant City! There are also many powerful soul engineers there.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Won’t it be a pity if I don’t compete since the rewards are so good? Don’t worry, I won’t take any risks. I’m sure it’s safe since they dare to organize such a tournament. The competitors are all soul engineers, the group of people with the greatest authority in the Sun Moon Empire. If they dare to do anything in the tournament, will the soul engineers tolerate such behavior? Deﬁnitely not! That’s why we don’t have to worry about the safety aspect. Furthermore, I won’t compete using my true identity. Your disguise and my Imitation will make it easy for me to scam everyone, won’t it?”

Wang Dong’er furrowed her brow. “But we still have the tournament!”

Huo Yuhao said, “The underground tournament is mainly held at night. It won’t affect anything. Dong’er, I must compete in this tournament for the development of the sect. Gambling is a good opportunity for us, but I won’t be assured if I’m placing a bet on someone else. I’m a soul engineer, and this is a good opportunity to test my abilities. At the same time, I can learn a lot of things from others in the same line. I’ll get second senior to follow me.”

He paused for a moment and turned very serious, “Dong’er, the ofﬁcial tournament will help to build the Tang Sect’s reputation, while the underground tournament will help to build the Tang Sect’s future. They are both important!”

Wang Dong’er thought for a moment before saying, “You can go if you want, but on two conditions. First, you must seek eldest senior’s approval. Second, I must follow you. However, are you really going to compete? Hasn’t it begun already?”

Huo Yuhao said, “Na Na mentioned that there’s still one day left in the qualiﬁers. It’s not too late. I agree to your conditions. Let’s go and ﬁnd eldest senior before registering for this tournament!”

At such a time, he was very quick and decisive. Purchasing rare metals was one of his most important goals for coming here. It took on a signiﬁcant meaning for the Tang Sect’s future development and his own improvement in his soul engineering abilities.

Huo Yuhao asked Wang Dong’er to push him to He Caitou’s room before they went to Bei Bei’s room.

------

An hour later...

The sky had already turned dark. Perhaps everyone’s energy was depleted because of the tournament in the day, but the night seemed very quiet. There were very few people roaming the streets, and most people had already retired to bed.

At a street corner around three hundred meters from the Ming Yue Hotel, the light seemed to distort at a pitch-black corner. Following this, four ﬁgures surfaced.

Huo Yuhao was still in his wheelchair, but his wheelchair was covered by a black cloth, and his appearance had changed greatly. Compared to before, he was much more handsome, and there were many changes to small details. Even if there were familiar faces around him, they wouldn’t be able to recognize him unless they could deduce his identity using the wheelchair he was in.

Wang Dong’er was still dressed like a man. Her appearance was very cold and tough, and she also looked much more ordinary. On the whole, she seemed like an extremely normal and aloof young man.

The greatest change in He Caitou was his hair. He was wearing a brown wig that helped to cover his bright and shiny bald head. His wig reached his shoulders, and there was a black mask on his face. His complexion was also paler. Along with a thick, black robe, he seemed very mysterious.

Na Na’s transformation was the simplest. She put on makeup to look like a maid. Her simple transformation made her look very pitiful. She stood beside Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair, her deference towards him didn’t need to be faked.

He Caitou was impressed. “Junior, your Imitation is getting stronger and stronger. We were completely unrecognizable just now as we left the hotel. No one will suspect us.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Second senior, let’s refer to ourselves differently from now on. I’m in a wheelchair, so I’ll have no choice but to take advantage of all of you. We are brothers now, and I’ll call you big brother. You can call me second brother. Dong’er and Na Na are my servants. They’ll call me Master. I’ll call the two of them Little Dong and Little Na.” Wang Dong’er snapped and said, “You are intentionally taking advantage of us!”

Huo Yuhao chortled, “No! Isn’t that just logical? Call me Master.”

Wang Dong’er pursed her lips as she saw his sly look. She snorted, and her voice turned very manly as she said softly, “Mas… Master…”

Huo Yuhao chuckled, “Be more natural. Come on, one more time.”

“You…” Wang Dong’er lifted her hands, as if she wanted to do something. However, she couldn’t bear to lay her hands on him seeing that he was in a wheelchair. She turned her head and ignored him.

“Let’s go. It isn’t early anymore. Let’s follow the plan.”

Wang Dong’er was pushing his wheelchair while Na Na followed to one side, He Caitou walked on the other. The four of them proceeded towards the center of the city as they took advantage of the darkness.

------

There was an underground world everywhere. Whether it was the Heavenly Soul, Dou Ling, Star Luo or Sun Moon Empire, it was all the same. There were many types of underground worlds. The lowest level involved sex, murder, and human trafﬁcking. The higher-class ones involved arms trafﬁcking, underground political trades, and the sale of rare resources. Whether it was the lowest level underground worlds or the higher-class ones, they were all controlled by powerful ﬁgures. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be any way for them to survive.

In Radiant City’s Underground World, there were three main organizations. They were the Duskwater Alliance, the Common Alliance, and the Alto Chamber of Commerce.

The Common Alliance controlled the sex industry in Radiant City, and was probably the shallowest underground power. The Alto Chamber of Commerce controlled assassin and thieves’ associations, as well as some evil powers. They made a living by collecting protection fees and committing murders and theft, as well as through other illegal means.

The Duskwater Alliance was more advanced. They sold the most proﬁtable medicines and arms, and trafﬁcked people.

The Common Alliance and Alto Chamber of Commerce shared a very close relationship, teaming up together to oppose the Duskwater Alliance. However, they weren’t as well-backed as the Duskwater Alliance. They weren’t very interactive either, and only ensured a peaceful working relationship through agreements between their backers.

All three underground organizations were involved in the sale of rare metals. After all, it was a very proﬁtable trade. As long as they were given access to mining channels, they could obtain rare metals at a low cost. However, these rare metals were in very high demand, and helped them make the most proﬁts.

For example, there was a rare metal called Soulforging Silver. It could fuse with any type of metal and increase its afﬁnity towards a soul master’s soul power. At the same time, it increased the tensile strength and hardness of the metals it was fused with. It was used in almost all advanced soul tools.

It was only produced in the Sun Moon Empire, and was produced in average quantities. Around ﬁve hundred gold soul coins were needed to mine one kilo of it, but on the market, it was worth around a hundred gold soul coins per hundred grams. This was a two hundred percent proﬁt if it was sold! How could anyone not go crazy over it? Even with the great exploitation of the mining channels, the proﬁts were still very great.

The proﬁts that could be reaped from Soulforging Silver were only considered average among rare metals. The prices of rarer metals were even more unbelievable!

Chapter 287: The Newbies Compete

Such enormous proﬁts were too alluring, and the inﬂuence of Radiant City’s three main underground organizations’ reached every corner of the country, so it was natural that they could reap the rewards. Every year gave them immeasurable proﬁts, and this was even under the circumstances where the country monopolized the industry, while ruling rare metals as strategic resources. The country had even prohibited exports!

The three underground organizations named this competition the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineer Tournament, and it piggybacked on the reputation of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament.

---

Huo Yuhao decided to choose the strongest underground organization out of the three, because this organization was also being discreetly marginalized and clamped down on by the other two: the Duskwater Alliance. He was the only one who knew the rationale behind his decision. The Duskwater Alliance’s preliminary rounds were designated to be carried out at a luxurious hotel in the city center. One of the reasons this place was picked was because this hotel was not far from the Brilliant Delight Hotel, so the participants wouldn’t have to travel too far away. Huo Yuhao wasn’t that mobile after all, and a long journey would be a burden on him. He couldn’t just let Wang Dong’er push him around inside the city…

The Green Hotel had a unique and characteristic name. It was a little more than a kilometer away from the Brilliant Delight Hotel, and was but two kilometers away from the Sun Moon Empire’s royal palace, located in a very prime and proﬁtable location. However, people often mispronounced its name, and so people easily misunderstood this place as the Romantic Love Hotel… and yet, it was because of this fact that it became quite well-known. This property belonged to the Duskwater Alliance, but nobody knew if the Duskwater Alliance’s headquarters were also located here.

The Green Hotel was built on a smaller scale than the Brilliant Delight Hotel. There were only ﬁve levels above the ground, but those who were familiar with this hotel understood that its true substance was beneath the ground! ---

There were four muscular men clad in black warrior robes standing outside the hotel’s main door. They were all more than two meters tall, and they surveyed the throngs of people walking by with ice-cold eyes.

Huo Yuhao and his group hadn’t even come near when one of them stepped up and blocked their path.

“The hotel isn’t open for business today. Please leave.”

Huo Yuhao was still sitting in the wheelchair. He smiled and said, “We’re here to participate in the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineer Tournament.”

The man in black was stunned for a moment, but his expression then became a little gentler. Soul engineers were held in high regard within the Sun Moon Empire compared to other empires, and offending a soul engineer wasn’t a smart choice even if the other party had a modest rank. “I’m sorry, soul engineer. The preliminary rounds have already begun, and they’re about to end soon. You’re too late.” The man in black spoke with a look of regret on his face, but his expression contained a little more respect than before. Perhaps his change of attitude was also because the mysterious aura from He Caitou affected his state of mind.

Huo Yuhao also seemed a little rueful. “That’s a pity. I originally believed that I could represent the Duskwater Alliance to participate in the ﬁnal round, and perhaps help you guys claim the championship. How about this? I’ll use a hundred thousand golden soul coins, and I’ll wager that I can pass the preliminary rounds today. There isn’t much time left anyway, so you guys will win a large sum of money even if I don’t. But if I do, it also means that the Duskwater Alliance will have another relatively outstanding soul engineer to participate in the ﬁnal round. This is a win-win situation for you guys, am I right?”

The man in black was slightly taken aback. “A hundred thousand golden soul coins,,, are you sure?” This underground wagering business wasn’t a secret. The underground organizations wouldn’t be able to host a competition as large as this without implicit approval from the authorities. Therefore, the man in black didn’t dodge the question, but he was still astounded by the sum that Huo Yuhao had just quoted. Even aristocratic families were rarely able to quote sums like that, and this guy was betting on himself. Was he not afraid that the Duskwater Alliance would play some dirty tricks to win his money?

Huo Yuhao nodded seriously and said, “I believe that the Duskwater Alliance will be just. If you can’t make this decision, please bring it to your superiors.”

“Please wait here.” The man in black seemed even more respectful than before. He bowed to Huo Yuhao courteously before he walked briskly back to the Green Hotel’s main door and said something to his companions before swiftly entering the hotel.

It didn’t take long before a middle-aged man dressed in a long and elegant white gown stepped out from the Green Hotel’s main door. He immediately saw Huo Yuhao, and he took a few quick steps forward before he smiled radiantly and said, “I’m sorry, my subordinates are too immature. Please follow me, my honored guests.” He made a gesture to invite them into the hotel as he spoke. Huo Yuhao was a little surprised at how candid this person was. He nodded in acknowledgement before Wang Dong’er pushed him into the Green Hotel.

The Green Hotel was quite rustic, indeed. Its layout was extremely simple, and there was no way one could tell from its appearance that this place was the number-one location that symbolized the underground organizations’ inﬂuence. Furthermore, this was also one of the Duskwater Alliance’s important strongholds!

The hotel’s layout felt smooth and sleek. There were white porcelain decorations and ornaments everywhere, and even the ﬂooring and the walls were made of white porcelain. White and red were the main colors.

Wang Dong’er surveyed her surroundings as she pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair. She thought to herself, Are those red decorations foreshadowing fresh blood? What does all this white porcelain signify? Fresh blood amongst all the pure whiteness?

The middle-aged man stopped walking once they entered the hotel and said, “My valued guests, may I know who the one that’s going to participate in the competition is?”

Huo Yuhao said, “My big brother and I will both join the competition.” He pointed at He Caitou beside him as he spoke.

The middle-aged man nodded his head and said, “How do I address the two of you?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “My big brother is called Tang Si, and I am called Tang Wu.”

The middle-aged man’s eyes sparkled. He could obviously tell that the two of them were patronizing him, and that these deﬁnitely weren’t their real names.

However, he didn’t know that Huo Yuhao hadn’t come up with these names at random. The Tang Sect’s original ancestor was named Tang San, so he deﬁnitely wouldn’t coin an identical name for himself. Therefore, he came up with Tang Si and Tang Wu. The man didn’t pursue the matter any further. Many soul engineers had their own preferences and reservations, and many people were still relatively cautious. Since they were participating in an underground competition, there were quite a few contestants who used fake names. These underground

organizations also deﬁnitely didn’t keep their hold on these soul engineers based on their names. It was important for these organizations not to probe into these soul engineers’ private information, as these organizations could only keep them here if they provided beneﬁts.

“The competition has already been underway for quite some time, and will end soon. Time is of the essence. Why don’t the two of you verify that you guys are soul engineers ﬁrst, and I will immediately arrange your entries into the competition. Also, about the wager that you just mentioned…”

Huo Yuhao raised his hand, and Wang Dong’er passed a dark- golden card forward from behind him.

“This is the Auspicious Gold Bank’s black gold VIP card that can be used across the Continent. Xiao Na, follow this mister afterwards to place our bet.” Huo Yuhao spoke plainly as he raised his right hand, and the middle-aged man saw a ﬂash before his eyes before a short dagger appeared in Huo Yuhao’s right hand. A white beam of light shot up as a razor-sharp sword aura soared into the air and howled shrilly at the sky.

He Caitou’s method was even simpler. He raised his hand and unleashed an enormous soul cannon, which he pointed at the middle-aged man.

Cold sweat erupted from the man’s forehead, and he hurriedly said, “Calm down, guys. You have been veriﬁed, completely veriﬁed!”

Huo Yuhao smiled faintly and said, “Since you said that we are tight on time, then bring us there as quickly as you can.” He gradually withdrew his White Tiger Dagger as he spoke.

Huo Yuhao always carried around the only item that his mother had left him. He was no longer the immature youth that he had been, and he had done some research and investigation into his White Tiger Dagger. He realized that his White Tiger Dagger was a Class 5 close-combat soul tool, and it possessed a soul skill called Devour. As long as his opponent’s attack didn’t exceed his White Tiger Dagger’s absorption limits, the dagger could consume the attack and convert it into its own power, which would be released in the next attack.

Back when he had ﬁrst entered the Great Star Dou Forest all those years ago, he relied on the White Tiger Dagger’s special characteristics to survive after he was ambushed by that ten- year soul beast.

The manager wiped the cold sweat from his brow as he escorted Huo Yuhao and the others to some soul elevators in the hotel’s inner regions. He used a soul transmitter to pass a few messages before he directed the four of them into a lift.

The lift went all the way down, and stopped after about ten seconds. When the lift’s doors opened again, a cacophony of noise could be heard, along with a strong smell of paper and metal that wafted into their faces.

This scene was drastically different from the main lobby’s simplicity. The shiny magniﬁcence of the hotel’s underground world dazzled everyone. Everything was golden, even the mirrors! It felt as if this underground world was made entirely from gold...

The manager led them out of the elevator, and they crossed an extravagant circular hall before they entering through a door right in front of them.

There were two guards standing by the door, who immediately opened the large door when they saw the manager.

It felt like they had entered another world once they stepped inside. There wasn’t as much light in this place, and what light there was seemed a lot gentler. However, the sheer size of this place caused Huo Yuhao to react in astonishment.

They were inside a circular domed hall, where the hall’s ceiling seemed to be made of uncountable golden lines that were orderly and rhythmically intertwined together. The enormous dome provided enough light for the spacious hall, and rows of seats extended neatly down the aisle, while there were spiraling escalators that led upwards around the seats. There was a circular room hovering at the end of every ﬂight of soul escalators, and there was no way to tell with the naked eye how those rooms were just levitating in midair.

There were eight sets of these soul escalators and hovering rooms, and forming a circle about the place. There was a circular platform in the center of the hall at least thirty meters in diameter. It wasn’t as spacious as the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament’s competition stage, but it was spectacular enough. This was part of the underground world, after all!

There were numerous metal desks on the stage at the moment, and light ﬂickered from time to time. There were several metal desks around the circular platform, and more than a hundred metal desks on the central platform. Some metal desks were already empty.

There were row after row of sapphire velvet chairs around the competition stage, and they were packed with people. However, they were all extremely quiet, and they were intently watching the people hard at work at the metal desks. A conservative estimate would place the number of people in the audience at more than two thousand, and one could tell from their clothes and their accessories that they were all relatively well-to-do.

Huo Yuhao had discovered from Na Na that only the whales who had wagered more than ten thousand golden soul coins could watch the contest in person. The other normal citizens who had also placed bets could only watch from these underground organizations’ outer betting spots.

This was just one of the competition’s multiple regions, and there were already several hundred soul engineers below the age of thirty who were participating in the contest. The black market’s great contest was alluring indeed!

“Excuse me, how many people from the Duskwater Alliance are participating in the competition?” Huo Yuhao asked the manager, who was leading the way.

The middle-aged man replied respectfully, “We have a total of two hundred and sixty-four soul engineers participating in the competition. We will have two hundred and sixty-six if we include the two of you. Some of these soul engineers have already completed their projects. Today’s contest is only the qualifying round, so we only require participants to craft a Class 3 soul tool in order to pass the assessment. Of course, you have to ﬁnish the project within a certain period of time. Look there, every soul engineer’s desk has an hourglass. However, only half of the hourglass is remaining for the last few soul engineers who joined the contest, and that means you only have about an hour left. I wonder if the two of you will have enough time?”

Huo Yuhao smiled, and the corner of his mouth ﬂowed with subtle conﬁdence and pride. “That’s enough.” He was roleplaying as another person and not himself, so he began to make adjustments to his demeanor and his emotions from this moment onwards.

“Alright, then.”

Huo Yuhao asked, “What is this place used for normally? An auction?”

A wary look ﬂashed across the mnager’s eyes. “Have you guys never been to our Golden Hall?”

Huo Yuhao curled the corner of his lip apathetically and said, “Of course not. My family is so rich that…” He paused after this, and the same wary look came over his eyes. However, the wary look in his eyes made the middle-aged man look a lot more relaxed than before.

The manager smiled faintly, and a tinge of elegance could be seen in his expression. He said conﬁdently, “That’s a real pity, then. This place is an auction, and it’s the largest auction house in Radiant City. Let me tell you a secret... even people from the royal family have sent people to participate in our top-tier auction! If you have time in the future, you are very welcome to participate! You will be treated like honored guests.”

They arrived near the arena’s center as they spoke, but someone blocked their path.

Two people who were dressed the same way as the manager intercepted them. After some brief conversation, one of the two men that blocked their way said, “The participants can enter, but everyone else has to wait outside. Place your bets immediately.”

Wang Dong’er raised her eyebrows, but Huo Yuhao waved his hand and said, “Xiao Dong, Xiao Na, the two of you can go outside. Xiao Na will place the wager. I wonder what the odds are like today?”

The manager replied plainly, “If you bet on the exact number of people to qualify and you get it right, you will win ten times your wager. You can also place multiple bets, and the odds are different for every option.”

Huo Yuhao was surprised. “But we said before this that we were wagering on the two of us being able to qualify.”

The manager said calmly, “That wager is not possible, and this is but a qualifying round. However, the sum that you quoted must be wagered. Otherwise, you guys won’t be allowed to enter the competition.”

Huo Yuhao was momentarily taken aback. “You guys never mentioned that before.”

Chapter 288: The Fierce Genius Soul Engineer

The person that had blocked their path said coldly, “It’s not my problem that you guys are late. Time waits for no man – we’re getting closer and closer to the end of the competition.”

Huo Yuhao smiled, a very warm smile. “Alright then. Xiao Dong, Xiao Na, you guys can go ahead and follow his instructions. We’ll make the wager. However, I hope you have the courage to stay here until the end, mister. I’m a very stingy person, and you will have to pay with your life if I lose my money.”

The middle-aged man was momentarily stunned. He stared at the warm smile on Huo Yuhao’s face, but for some reason, he began to feel a chill run down his spine. But the sensation only lasted for an instant, and he returned to normal as he said indifferently, “You’re in the Duskwater Alliance’s territory. If you have the ability, my life doesn’t mean anything at all.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Very well. Show us the way.” Wang Dong’er didn’t feel very assured, but she went ahead with Na Na to make the wager anyway. Huo Yuhao and He Caitou followed the middle-aged man that Huo Yuhao had just threatened to the competition arena.

They weren’t qualiﬁed to participate in the competition on stage, so they were brought to two metal desks in the outer corners that belonged to participants that had already ﬁnished their part in the contest.

Huo Yuhao frowned and said, “You guys don’t even provide materials for crafting soul tools?”

The middle-aged man had just been threatened, so he shot Huo Yuhao a dark look and said, “We did have some originally, but there won’t be any for you because of what you said earlier. You can ﬁnd your own materials since you guys are late.” He turned around to leave after he ﬁnished talking, and another elderly man clothed in yellow walked over and stood behind the two of them. The other contestants were in a similar situation.

“What are the rules?” Huo Yuhao asked the old man in yellow.

The old man pointed to a desk not far from them that was being used for the contest. “There’s an hourglass over there – you guys will check the time yourselves. You have to craft a Class 3 soul tool before the last grain of sand drops down in the hourglass, and you will qualify for the next round once you

complete your soul tool within the stipulated time. You will be eliminated if you can’t complete the task. You may begin. I will be here to watch and to ensure that you don’t use ﬁnished or half-ﬁnished soul tools to cheat.”

Huo Yuhao turned around toward He Caitou, and then he looked at the metal desk that was well-equipped with crafting tools. He smiled and said, “Big brother, doesn’t this feel familiar?”

He Caitou was wearing a mask. He naturally knew that Huo Yuhao was referring to their days inside the Illustrious Virtue Hall, and he nodded.

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “Not giving us materials is just so harsh and unkind. I have to make use of what’s around me, I guess.” He raised his right hand as he spoke. The old man behind him saw a dark-golden ﬂash of light before one of the steel desk’s corners was lopped off. The piece was half a foot thick, and the old man also saw the ﬁve sharp blades that ﬂickered with dark golden radiance that extended from Huo Yuhao’s

right hand.

The Darkgolden Terrorclaw Bear was known as one of the most powerful species in the world of soul beasts. A unique and frightening aura could be felt once Huo Yuhao unleashed his Darkgolden Terrorclaw.

Huo Yuhao ﬂicked his claw upwards, and the metal piece ﬂew towards He Caitou. “We’ll have to make do with this, big brother.”

“Alright.” He Caitou decided to talk as little as he could, to avoid saying the wrong things. He took the piece of metal and immediately began to work on it with a carving knife from the crafting tools that were laid out on the table.

Huo Yuhao didn’t wait for the old man to stop him. The sharp blades ﬂickered once more, and another piece of steel was cut off, but he took it himself this time.

“This is a standard desk for crafting soul tools, and every table is worth ﬁve thousand golden soul coins!” The invigilator was shaken by the Darkgolden Terrorclaw’s aura for a little while.

“Oh.” Huo Yuhao answered casually before he began to work with his right hand. Five golden blades trembled at the same time, and it felt as if they were forming a dark golden layer of water that undulated on the metal desk’s surface. Metal powder and fragments drifted down, but they didn’t scatter all over the place. They actually spread around him in an orderly fashion.

Huo Yuhao wasn’t even looking at the tough steel that he had just retrieved. He turned around towards the invigilator and asked, “Are you a soul engineer as well? What’s your Class?”

The elderly man didn’t answer his question, because he was in a complete daze at the moment, his eyes ﬁxated upon Huo Yuhao’s rhythmic right hand.

That was a hand that could accomplish miracles! Huo Yuhao’s ﬁve razor-sharp blades continued to move rhythmically, and the irregular piece of steel quickly became rectangular, before strange and peculiar patterns began to appear on its surface. The steel piece was subsequently split into pieces and carved… the entire process was as smooth as a ﬂowing river.

Huo Yuhao’s ﬁngers seemed like they were just faintly quivering, and every movement was just so precise and accurate...

Just as Huo Yuhao had said, the old man in yellow was also a soul engineer, but he was only a Class 3 soul engineer. In the end, breaking through three rings was quite a drastic change for most soul masters, and many people couldn’t breach that barrier, even across an entire lifetime.

This elderly man was just a Class 3 soul engineer, but his eyes were quite ﬁne. He was part of the Duskwater Alliance, and he had seen multiple high-level soul engineers craft soul tools. What Huo Yuhao was doing at the moment was comparable to those high-level soul engineers. He was smooth, quick, and agile at the same time, and he was working at a speed that was almost impossible to believe. From a soul engineer’s perspective, steel was a relatively standard crafting material that was also easy to carve and engrave. However, working at such rapid pace was simply unbelievable, and the old man knew that he couldn’t do anything like Huo Yuhao. The youth before him was going through everything so casually, and he hadn’t even pulled out his carving knife. This youth was just using sharp blades from his martial soul, or perhaps from a soul skill, to craft his soul tool.

The silver-white steel gradually took shape. Huo Yuhao didn’t use a single crafting toolfrom the table, but an impeccable metal tube was produced just like that. He quickly assembled, crafted, and inserted the formation arrays.

Huo Yuhao used the ﬁve sharp claws of his Darkgolden Terrorclaw to cut, drill, slice, chisel, and whatever techniques he had to use to craft his soul tool, and he only used one hand from beginning to end. Of course, there was no way he could use his other hand even if he wanted to, but the old man didn’t know that. The elderly man felt as if he wasn’t watching a contest, but a performance, an incredibly spectacular performance in crafting soul tools. This process didn’t continue for too long. Five minutes, after just ﬁve minutes, Huo Yuhao’s undulating blades halted, and his body casually turned around as he signaled to the old man, who had a blank look in his eyes. “It’s done!”

The elderly man recovered from his astonishment, and quickly stepped forward to pick up the silver-white soul tool on the desk.

The silver-white metal tube was long and smooth. It was about a foot long, and there was an arm buckle beneath it, so it was most suitable for use when attached to the arm. The old man carefully infused soul power into the soul tool, and it immediately lit up. The old man gasped, as he could feel that this soul tool was consuming his soul power at an alarming rate, to the point where he couldn’t control it anymore. Afterwards, he could feel the formation arrays activating themselves from the soul power compressed in them. The entire silver-white metal tube sparkled, and intense soul power immediately began to radiate out of it. He realized that there was no way for him to stop it.

The contest was still ongoing at the moment, and this was the Green Hotel’s Golden Hall! The invigilator didn’t know what would happen if this soul tool was allowed to ﬁre. He went a little hysterical as he exclaimed, “Quick, make it stop! Why won’t it stop?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “That’s because you’re not operating it in the right way.” He raised his right hand as he spoke, and pressed down gently on the tube’s surface. The charging and compression instantly disappeared, and the entire soul tool powered down.

Huo Yuhao said, “Your soul power isn’t wasted. The energy- gathering formation array will still maintain its activity for two hours, and you can ﬁre it at anytime you wish.”

The old man wiped the sweat from his brow and stared at Huo Yuhao fearfully. “The soul tool that you have made is…”

Huo Yuhao grinned and said, “It’s a simpliﬁed energy- gathering soul cannon. It should be at least Class 3, but Class 4 soul engineers are typically more suited to operate something like this. It seems like you’re not a Class 4 soul engineer yet. The materials that I have had to retrieve on the spot were a little substandard, so this cannon can only be ﬁred thrice. If you want to play around with it, you’ll have to wait for me to complete the qualifying round. My part of the contest is over; have I passed?”

The old man’s expression was entirely different from before. He handed the soul tool back to Huo Yuhao respectfully and said, “Of course you have passed the qualifying round. You’re the one who has crafted this soul tool, please take it back. The soul engineers get to keep all the soul tools that they make within this competition. Of course, you can sell your productions to us if you wish.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “I’ll leave it to you then. Just treat it as compensation for damaging the table. That should be enough, right?”

“Yes, yes it’s enough.” A Class 3 soul tool was worth about three to ﬁve thousand golden soul coins, while Huo Yuhao didn’t destroy the entire table, so repairing the table probably wouldn’t require more than ten golden soul coins. Using a soul tool like this to compensate for the damage was more than enough. Furthermore, the crafting abilities Huo Yuhao had just displayed completely astounded this invigilator. The old man asked probingly, “If I may ask, what Class are you in?”

Huo Yuhao smiled faintly and said, “You will know eventually. However, you have to continue with your duties. You haven’t seen the soul tool that my big brother is crafting yet.”

The old man realized that He Caitou’s hands had stopped moving on the other side as well, and he had also crafted another soul tool from the piece cut off from the table. The soul tool that He Caitou had crafted was a broad bracelet, the kind intended for men. The old man quickly went over to check.

“This… is this a storage-type soul tool? A storage-type soul tool crafted from steel?! Oh, my goodness! That’s such a waste of your abilities.” The old man didn’t know what else to say. He discovered after inspecting and testing the soul tool that this broad bracelet had about ﬁve cubic liters of storage space, and it absolutely met the criteria as a Class 3 soul tool.

Storage-type soul tools and Milk Bottles were typically considered the most complicated soul tools among others of the same tier. This storage-type soul tool was made from steel, and that meant it wouldn’t be so durable, but its complexity and the difﬁculty of crafting something like this was the same as it would have been if another material had been used. It wasn’t worth much, but the craftmanship was undeniable. If there had been better metal available, this storage-type soul tool would be considered an exquisite item compared to other Class 3 soul tools.

Two Class 3 soul tools were crafted within such a short period of time. What did that mean? This meant that these two brothers, who had only joined the competition when it was nearing its end, were at least Class 4 soul engineers. It was likely that they were even better; could Class 4 soul engineers craft soul tools with such smoothness and agility? The old man knew the answer to this question very well.

“The two of you have passed the qualifying round, and we will begin the ﬁrst ofﬁcial round tomorrow. We will directly enter elimination rounds, and every elimination round will cut the total headcount by a third, until a champion is crowned. Here, these are your proofs for passing the qualifying round. The two of you can use them to claim your prizes for this round!”

The old man passed over two badges made from pure gold as he spoke. There were numbers on each badge; Huo Yuhao’s number was seventy-one, while He Caitou’s number was seventy-two.

He Caitou pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair and they departed under the old man’s watchful and respectful gaze.

---

“Eh? How can it be over so quickly? Have they withdrawn from the contest because they know they can’t pass?” Some people were annoying and irritating, especially if they were born with a snickering and sneering face. The middle-aged man that was throwing shade at Huo Yuhao before this took the opportunity and popped out of nowhere… Huo Yuhao smiled and opened his right hand. “I just want to know where I can redeem my prize.”

The middle-aged man noticed the golden badge in Huo Yuhao’s hand just as he was mocking him sarcastically. He seemed like a duck that was grasped by the neck, and his voice stuck in his throat.

“That… that’s impossible! How long did you guys take? You... you guys cheated!”

Huo Yuhao answered solemnly, “You have to be responsible for your words.”

The old man in yellow came over hurriedly at this moment. “I’m terribly sorry, my two honored guests. This is a misunderstanding. Hurry and apologize to them, Great King.”

“Great King? That’s a great name!” Huo Yuhao spoke with a faint grin on his face. The middle-aged man’s expression didn’t look so good, and it appeared to change color again and again. He grunted coldly and turned around to leave.

“Don’t go! There’s something else I want to discuss with you!” Huo Yuhao suddenly spoke to him.

Great King was momentarily stunned. He turned around and forcefully suppressed the complicated emotions riling up his mind as he asked, “What else needs to be said?”

Huo Yuhao continued, “I imagine I’m going to lose the wager that I’ve just made. Do you remember what I said to you before this?”

Great King’s face instantly changed. He hadn’t thought too much of it when Huo Yuhao had threatened him before with a smile on his face, as he didn’t believe that this fellow in the wheelchair could pass this round of the competition. However, the yellow-clothed old man had conﬁrmed that the two brothers had both passed this round within such a short period of time. He was very clear about what this meant; even though he was arrogant, sneering, and sarcastic by nature, he wasn’t a fool. He was sharply aware that Huo Yuhao wasn’t a person that he could afford to offend, and he himself was only a Soul Elder after all.

“The contest isn’t over. How… how do you know that you can’t win the wager?” Great King’s voice was a little shaky and fearful.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “I know I can’t win just by looking at your face. Are you telling me that you haven’t done something to my wager? I remember I saw you walk out before this.”

Great King took a few steps back subconsciously.

Huo Yuhao lowered his head instead as he muttered under his breath, “My best virtue is that I always honor my word.”

Huo Yuhao suddenly looked up as he spoke, and he pushed out his right hand towards Great King.

“Don’t do it, sir!” The old man called out hastily, but he was too late in the end.

Boom!

A ﬂower that resembled some of the red and white decorations around the Green Hotel bloomed, and Great King’s head instantly split open like an exploding watermelon.

Huo Yuhao was behaving as if he hadn’t done anything at all. He wore a pitiful and regrettable expression on his face as he said, “I hope you can be the king of Great Kings in your next life.”

The sudden incident immediately triggered intense and vigorous gasps of astonishment. This was one of the Duskwater Alliance’s strongholds, and it was unimaginable that anybody would have the courage to murder someone in a place like this. Furthermore, this murder was executed in such a brutal and barbaric fashion.

The other guests descended into hysteria, and numerous men dressed in black quickly surrounded Huo Yuhao. The yellow-clothed invigilator and the manager that led them from the hotel door were also part of this group. It didn’t take long before they surrounded Huo Yuhao and He Caitou, forming a very tight circle around them.

Huo Yuhao grunted coldly and said plainly, “Do all of you wish to die?” Huo Yuhao began to chant incomprehensibly as he spoke. He Caitou took a step horizontally, and a series of metal clanging sounds could be heard as he transformed into a frightening metal fortress. Several hundred soul cannons were coldly pointing all around him, and the aura he released was so terrifying that it immediately caused the thugs that were about to close in on them to retreat in fear.

“Stop! What’s happening?” A deafening shout broke the silence. A human ﬁgure descended from the sky immediately afterwards, three yellow and two purple soul rings sparkling as this person landed in the middle of everyone.

The wings from the soul tool on his back folded up. He drew a cold breath when he witnessed the soul cannon fort that He Caitou had transformed into. He was a Class 5 soul engineer, and he was all too clear as to what he was looking at. He realized that even typical Class 6 soul cannon forts weren’t as formidable as this one in front of him. “Calm down, everyone. I’m Chen An, the Golden Great Hall’s supervisor. Can someone tell me what just happened?”

The old man that had watched Huo Yuhao and He Caitou came forward hurriedly and whispered something into Chen An’s ear.

Chen An’s face turned black as he turned towards Huo Yuhao, and then his expression changed once more. He saw that Huo Yuhao’s eyes were ghastly grey in color, as if there wasn’t an ounce of life and vitality at all, and he felt as if his spirit was being sucked away when their gazes met. His body trembled vigorously as he took a few steps backwards in horror.

However, when he looked at Huo Yuhao again, he realized that his eyes had become clear once more, as if everything that he had seen in the previous instant was but a hallucination. A voice suddenly appeared in his head.

“If you want this place to be riddled with bodies, so be it.

Otherwise, you know what to do.” This voice disappeared as soon as it appeared. In the next moment, a scene surfaced in his head: Chen An saw the exploding heads of the men in black around him, and he seemed to descend into a mountain of corpses and an ocean of blood. The headless corpses slowly got to their feet, and swiftly transformed into zombies as they crazily assaulted everyone around them. It didn’t take long before there wasn’t a single

other living soul besides the terrifying youth in the wheelchair

and the muscular man standing beside him.

The intense fear caused Chen An’s body to quiver uncontrollably, but the image that surfaced in his mind receded in an instant. His eyes widened, but all he could see were his subordinates’ doubtful gazes, and the youth in the wheelchair that was still staring at him with a pair of bright and clear eyes.

“You are…” Chen An blurted.

Huo Yuhao answered plainly, “Great King went after my wager with underhanded methods, and his words were provocative and condescending. Did he bring his own death upon himself?” Chen An chomped down on the tip of his tongue and instantly cleared his mind. He had outstanding composure, mental quality, and stability to be able to direct the Golden Great Hall, and his expression changed once again. This time, he was a lot more respectful than before.

“You’re right, my dear guests. Great King violated the Duskwater Alliance’s rules, and he attacked you foolishly. He has committed a crime, and he cannot be forgiven. Someone take his body away and feed his corpse to the dogs. Don’t stand around, everyone! Go back and do what you’re supposed to be doing!”

Chen An withdrew the soul rings on his body as he spoke, but he didn’t dare to look Huo Yuhao in the eyes anymore.

The Duskwater Alliance was an underground organization, and these underground organizations were sometimes much more efﬁcient and versatile with their operations compared to other, more legitimate corporations. Chen An was the Golden Great Hall’s supervisor, and he was also a relatively powerful Soul King. He wielded extraordinary authority and inﬂuence in this place, and he was also the qualifying round’s chief judge. His subordinates began to move right after he ﬁnished his sentence, some people moving to keep things in order, while some other people went ahead to clean up the mess.

It didn’t take long before Great King’s body and the mess around it vanished without a trace.

Chen An lowered his voice and asked Huo Yuhao, “Can we speak somewhere in private?”

“Alright,” Huo Yuhao’s answer was simple and straightforward. “I have two other servants. Can you ask someone to call them over?”

“I’ll arrange for that immediately.” Chen An whispered something to one of his subordinates, and that person hurriedly turned around and left.

“Follow me, my valued guests.” Chen An turned around to lead the way as he spoke. Huo Yuhao nodded his head gently, and He Caitou pushed the wheelchair as they followed behind Chen An. Huo Yuhao’s eyes closed into squints, and his Spiritual Detection swiftly expanded around him and covered almost the entire place in an instant. There were several relatively formidable auras within the Golden Great Hall, but they were not enough to threaten his life. This was only the qualifying

round after all, and high-level soul masters and soul engineers couldn’t be found just anywhere. They weren’t inside Shrek Academy, after all.

---

Chen An led them to a small door at the side and exited the Golden Great Hall. They moved through a magniﬁcent walkway, but they didn’t have to travel for long before Chen An opened another door on the side and invited the two of them in.

The room was several hundred square meters in surface area, and the walls were covered in solid wood. The room’s golden style and layout was not at odds with this underground world.

“Please sit,” Chen An spoke as he stood beside a luxurious sofa. Huo Yuhao answered, “There’s no need for that. You can just say whatever you want to.”

Chen An’s eyes shifted as he lowered his voice and said, “If I may ask, are you guys from…?” He paused without ﬁnishing his sentence.

Huo Yuhao grunted coldly and said, “Is that something you should be asking?” A peculiar aura suddenly emanated from his body, and a contorted white projection subsequently appeared before him.

Chen An could vaguely tell that the white projection portrayed a human ﬁgure, but the room became a lot eerier and more sinister when it appeared. The projection was twisting and contorting vigorously, as if it were struggling against something.

Huo Yuhao said plainly, “This is the end of your life. Looks like you had it easy. Go, be puriﬁed.” White light lit up in his eyes as he spoke, and the twisting light projection immediately paused and became a lot clearer than before.

“The Great King?!” Chen An exclaimed; the projection looked exactly like King Wan! The light projection shone with white light circles as it gradually dissipated, and King Wan’s expression ﬁnally became one of peace and acceptance as he swiftly vanished into thin air.

Chen An’s face was ghastly pale at this moment, and his body quivered as well.

Huo Yuhao said, “Do you want to test me again?”

Chen An wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and he bent down as he replied respectfully, “No, there’s no need.”

Huo Yuhao continued, “You have to keep the two of us being here a secret. You can’t tell anyone at all. Do you understand? The truth is we are here of our own accord, since it’s nice to earn some money while claiming some rare metals for ourselves. Of course, you guys can make some money at the same time… we will only survive if we both reap beneﬁts at the same time, don’t you think?”

“Yes, yes!” Chen An hurriedly followed Huo Yuhao’s lead. Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Then you should give us what we are owed today. We will return for the next round.”

Chen An asked, “Do you need us to do anything else?”

Huo Yuhao waved his hand and said, “I don’t need you to do anything else. What we eventually achieve in the contest is entirely up to our own abilities. You’ve seen what happened to King Wan. If someone else tries to mess around with me or provoke me, that person’s outcome won’t be as easy as what happened to King Wan. I believe most people haven’t had their spirits tortured before. Whoever has to ﬁnd out will probably remember the sensation on their shattered spiritual imprint for eternity.”

Chen An shivered involuntarily and said, “Don’t worry, I will restrain my subordinates to the best of my ability, and I will deﬁnitely adhere to your requests. We won’t pass this on within the Duskwater Alliance, and everything will go according to your command.”

Huo Yuhao nodded his head satisfactorily. “Looks like you’re a smart one. Intelligent people tend to live longer.” “Thank you for the compliment, sir.” Chen An’s expression became a little more relaxed, but he was still radiating fear and trepidation.

Huo Yuhao said, “Alright, my people have returned. We’ll make a move ﬁrst.”

Knocking sounds could be heard before he ﬁnished his sentence. The door opened, and one of Chen An’s subordinates led Wang Dong’er and Na Na into the room. Wang Dong’er heaved a sigh of relief when she saw Huo Yuhao in the room.

Huo Yuhao said to Chen An, “We won’t claim our money today, but we will take everything when we return. I can reveal some things to you… my brother and I are both Class 6 soul engineers, and I believe we can be considered some of the very best in this wretched place. Therefore, you can do whatever you like with the wagers to make your proﬁts, but I want my share. I don’t care about the money, but those hundred thousand golden soul coins are my capital, and you will be responsible for changing my money into rare metals. The more the better.”

“Yes, yes!” Chen An acknowledged once more.

“Alright, let’s go.”

Wang Dong’er came forward hurriedly to take Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair from He Caitou’s hands, and began to push him outside. Huo Yuhao raised his hand for her to stop when they were almost at the door, and he said without turning around, “Chen An! If everything goes according to plan, and if you do everything properly, I will reward you after this contest is ﬁnished. If you’re willing, it’s even possible if you wish to become a part of us. Of course, there’s a price to pay, but the returns that you shall receive will be worth a lot more.”

Chen An was a little taken aback, but he became elated in the next moment as he took a few brisk steps forward and knelt down with one knee beside Huo Yuhao. “Thank you for the link-up, sir!”

“I will ﬁnd you again before the contest. You will collate the inventory of metals that will be used for rewards in every round, and you will also give me a list of the bets that have been placed.”

“Yes.”

Huo Yuhao waved his hand once more, and Wang Dong’er pushed him out at once. Chen An escorted him out personally, and he directed them all the way to a set of escalators that brought them back to one of the Green Hotel’s simpler levels.

“Alright, that’s enough. You don’t have to send me any further. Remember what I’ve told you. If my father ﬁnds out about me… you know the rest. If that happens, then you will become part of my strength.”

“Your wish is my command. I will deﬁnitely follow your orders!” Chen An acknowledged hurriedly.

“Let’s go.” Huo Yuhao waved his hand, and the company exited the Green Hotel.

---

Once they were past the main door, He Caitou couldn’t help but ask, “What were the two of you talking about so mysteriously back there?” “We’ll talk about it when we get back, brother.” Huo Yuhao hurriedly interrupted He Caitou’s words, and a voice appeared in He Caitou’s head.

He Caitou felt his heart skip a beat, and he quickly shut his mouth and said nothing more. The four of them gradually disappeared into the night.

Huo Yuhao relied on his Imitation and brought everyone back into the Brilliant Delight Hotel. His expression became a lot more relaxed, and Wang Dong’er helped everyone remove their makeup once they returned to his room.

He Caitou said, “You can speak now, little junior brother. You actually gave me a scare when you lashed out just now.”

Huo Yuhao said ponderously, “We didn’t waste our efforts today, and I’ve ﬁgured some things out. It’s no wonder that the academy could never ﬁnd traces of the Holy Ghost Church after they appeared. It seems like they’ve been hiding themselves like that.” He Caitou was momentarily stunned. “Are you saying it’s likely that the Duskriver Alliance has something to do with the Holy Ghost Church?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “It’s not just likely, they deﬁnitely have something to do with the Holy Ghost Church! Actually, their name had already aroused my suspicions. According to Elder Xuan’s description, one of the Holy Ghost Church’s most powerful individuals has a similar name. That’s the reason why I had my suspicions, and the probing that I did before was also because of that. I imitated an evil soul master’s abilities, and that frightened Chen An. You saw how reverent he was to me after that, and it’s obvious that he believes we’re from the Holy Ghost Church. That respect is also for the Holy Ghost Church, and this proves the Duskwater Alliance’s connection with the Holy Ghost Church. It’s no wonder that the Holy Ghost Church hid themselves so well, what with Radiant City’s number-one underground organization covering them. With the Duskwater Alliance’s power and inﬂuence, they are deﬁnitely one of the Holy Ghost Church’s most important branches, if they aren’t part of the Church’s core existence.”

Wang Dong’er frowned and said, “Doesn’t that mean it’s too dangerous for us to continue on in the competition?” Huo Yuhao shook his head with a smile on his face. “No, it doesn’t. This contest is aimed at raking in proﬁts, and it doesn’t mean much to the Holy Ghost Church’s core existence. The church is focused on the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. Haven’t you guys seen the people that

they’ve sent to participate in the tournament? Their energies aren’t channeled toward the Duskwater Alliance, so it’s natural that they aren’t paying much attention to their events. We are quite safe. Furthermore, the Duskriver Alliance is ultimately one of the church’s branches, and they are just a front for

earning money and covering their identities, so the Holy Ghost Church won’t send high-level individuals to watch over the alliance. The Green Hotel is quite important to the Duskriver Alliance, but the hotel’s supervisor is just a Soul King, and he’s not even an evil soul master.”

Wang Dong’er became a little more relieved as she listened to Huo Yuhao’s seamless analysis. She nodded and said, “So, we’re still participating in the subsequent rounds?”

Huo Yuhao tilted his head and said, “Of course. We have to get our rare metals from this contest, and we don’t even have to become champions. Isn’t it fun and interesting to stir things up within Radiant City’s underground organizations? Don’t worry, Dong’er, I will make sure that I return safely; not just for myself, but also for you guys.”

He Caitou stood up and patted Huo Yuhao on the shoulder. “It’s getting late, little junior brother. Your body isn’t in good shape, so you should hurry up and get some rest.”

Na Na also stood up to take her leave.

Wang Dong’er helped Huo Yuhao onto the bed after everyone left, and she brought some warm water to wash his hands and face. Huo Yuhao’s body was overﬂowing with ice-type origin energy of heaven and earth, so the parts of his body that were immobile didn’t get dirty at all, so there was no need for her to wash those areas.

“You’re too exhausted, Yuhao.” Wang Dong’er slipped into his embrace, and felt the chilly aura emanating from his body as she whispered to him.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “The main reason why you don’t want to me to continue on in the competition is because you’re concerned about me, right? Actually, how can you not tell how safe we are with your intelligence and our abilities?” “Yes,” Wang Dong’er agreed softly.

Huo Yuhao said, “I promise you, Dong’er, that I will have a good rest when we go back. I will make sure my body recovers completely before I set off to do anything else. However, our journey to Radiant City is very important to the academy, to the Tang Sect, and even to how the Continent’s political backdrop is going to turn out over the next few years. I need to be at my best to deal with everything, and it’s worth it even if I get a little tired in the process.”

Wang Dong’er was slightly taken aback. “I understand if you say that you’re doing this for the academy and for the Tang Sect. But aren’t you exaggerating a little about the Continent’s political situation?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “I keep feeling as if something’s not right. The Sun Moon Empire has expanded the people allowed to participate in the competition, and I’ve been feeling a little more stiﬂed than the last competition, as if something is about to happen. Ever since my spiritual power ascended into the concrete-immaterial realm, I’ve developed a sort of clairvoyance. If I’m not wrong, the Sun Moon Empire will deﬁnitely carry out some operation during or after the competition. The only problem is that I can’t tell anything yet at the moment, but I’m sure they will drop clues as the tournament progresses. I’m not sure what we can do for now, but anything that’s not good for the Sun Moon Empire is beneﬁcial for us.”

Wang Dong’er nodded and replied, “But… your body...”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “You don’t have to worry about my body. I have a secret weapon.”

Wang Dong’er was momentarily stunned. “Secret weapon?

What is it? Why don’t I know about it?”

Huo Yuhao grinned mysteriously and said, “That’s a secret.

I’ll tell you if you kiss me ten thousand times.”

“……"

Chapter 289: Tactical Surrender?

The second elimination round of the Continental Advanced Youth Soul Master Tournament had ended. Forty-two teams advanced to the third round. Among those forty-two teams, only thirty-two of them could enter the round-robin stage. That would be dependent on their performance in the third elimination round.

Victory would ensure progression into the round-robin stage. Even if they failed, they still had an opportunity to ﬁght for points in an additional qualiﬁer round. After the last two elimination rounds, some of the weaker teams were showing signs of fatigue even though they had made it through. Their team members were hurt, and there were fewer of them who could compete, along with other reasons that weakened their chances of progressing in future rounds. These constituted huge problems for them!

Such problems didn’t exist for the Tang Sect. However, the atmosphere within the sect became tenser after the lot- drawing for the third elimination round was completed. Xu Sanshi lowered his head to look at his right hand, and a weird expression appeared on his face.

Huo Yuhao patted his shoulder and said, “Third senior, it’s ﬁne. You can’t be blamed.”

Jiang Nannan looked gloomy. “You still dared to volunteer to draw the lot even though your luck is bad. Hmph!”

Everyone’s expression was also very weird and serious at the same time.

Huo Yuhao chortled, “It’s just Team Sun Moon. Years ago, we also defeated them even though we were just members of the preparatory squad. Don’t tell me that we are scared today even though we’ve improved signiﬁcantly since ﬁve years ago?”

Yes, Xu Sanshi’s luck was pretty bad, as he had managed to draw the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s team in the third elimination round. This was only the elimination round, it wasn’t the ﬁnals yet! There would still be many rounds and stages after this round. It was going to be tough no matter the outcome, which would affect their energy in the future rounds even if they won.

Fortunately, defeat didn’t mean direct elimination.

He Caitou nodded and said, “Yuhao is right. In fact, we can advance through the additional qualiﬁers. Even if we don’t risk everything against them, we can still enter the round-robin stage. At most, our ranking will become worse, but that’s all.”

Xiao Xiao was displeased. “Do we really have to give up against them? No, we mustn’t!”

Huo Yuhao turned his gaze towards his teammates, and all he saw were their determined faces.

Jiang Nannan said in a ﬁrm voice, “Yes, we must not give up! Even though it’s unwise, we shouldn’t bow down in front of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. Although we’re representing the Tang Sect, we are also from Shrek Academy! Shrek Academy never loses to the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy! It is especially true since we’re representing the Tang Sect in this edition of the tournament, and Shrek might not be able to last all the way until the ﬁnals. Yuhao, I wish to ﬁght to protect Shrek’s glory!”

“I’m willing too,” Xu Sanshi said dryly as he stopped looking at his hand.

“Get lost, you unlucky chap!” Jiang Nannan rolled her eyes at him.

Xiao Xiao said determinedly, “I also hope to ﬁght for Shrek and the Tang Sect’s glory.”

He Caitou immediately added, “I’ll give my best as long as everyone is willing.”

Out of the seven of them, four had already expressed their stand. Na Na’s status in Tang Sect couldn’t compare to Shrek’s Seven Monsters. Everyone’s gaze was focused on Wang Dong and Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao opened his mouth and wanted to say something. However, he was stopped by a gentle hand on his shoulder. Wang Dong’er took a step forward. She stood in front of Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair.

“Second senior, third senior, fourth senior, ﬁfth senior. I agree with all of your thinking. However, have you thought of one point? If we go all-out against them, we must treat victory as our goal. In that way, how much ﬁghting strength can we conserve even if we beat the Sun Moon team? We don’t have any substitutes. Eldest senior’s injury hasn’t recovered either. All of you know about Yuhao’s current condition too. Shrek and the Tang Sect’s glory isn’t completely dependent on this tournament. I would also like to give my all, but what if we sustain more injuries? We might even die if things go awry. We are without Shrek’s halo as protection this time, and we are also arch-enemies with the Sun Moon team. I understand all of your intentions, but I don’t agree that we should go all-out against them at such a time. If we give up on this round, we can still qualify. We’ll also have more time to rest. We’ll be able to ﬁght in the round-robin stage in our best state.”

After she established her relationship with Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er rarely opened her mouth in a discussion. Huo Yuhao’s words were usually more deﬁning. Her sudden speech left everyone a little stunned. There were four Soul Emperors and three Soul Kings among Shrek’s Seven Monsters. While Wang Dong’er was the youngest, she was a Soul Emperor that had twin martial souls. No one could neglect her presence!

Jiang Nannan furrowed her brow and asked, “Dong’er, are we going to give up our glory just like that?”

Wang Dong’er said, “Sister Nannan, true glory lies in being the champions. This is only an elimination round. Even if we give up, no one will underestimate us. This is purely tactical! It’s true that I’m partly selﬁsh, too. I don’t want Yuhao to go all-out against the Sun Moon team right now, while only his right arm can move. I’ve already struggled to accept his decision to compete in this tournament. He’s only in this state because of me! I don’t want him to get into any sort of harm again. If all of you choose to ﬁght the Sun Moon team, I’ll have no objections. However, my only request is that I be the ﬁrst to compete!”

Wang Dong’er revealed a cold and ferocious look in her eyes after she ﬁnished her last sentence. All this while, she had been labelled as Shrek Academy’s genius along with Huo Yuhao! However, Huo Yuhao had been shining too brightly, and made many important contributions to the academy. Along with her tendency to stay away from the limelight, her talents had been concealed.

Among the four who had suggested that they ﬁght the Sun Moon team, He Caitou was originally not very willing. His thinking was very similar to Wang Dong’er. Furthermore, he also knew that both he and Huo Yuhao had to compete in the underground tournament too! Xiao Xiao, Huo Yuhao, and Wang Dong’er came from the same class. The three of them had passed the academy’s test many years ago and they shared a close relationship with one another. Right now, Xiao Xiao’s gaze became gentler as she saw how Wang Dong’er stood out for Huo Yuhao.

As for Xu Sanshi, he only followed Jiang Nannan’s wish. Jiang Nannan was the key ﬁgure out of the four of them, and so Wang Dong’er directed all her words to Nannan.

Jiang Nannan bit her lip lightly, and looked at Wang Dong’er with a stubborn look in her eyes. She eventually sighed and said, “Alright. However, we must never give up if we meet Team Sun Moon again, no matter the circumstance. We must give it our all.” Wang Dong’er heaved a sigh of relief, and took two steps forward to hug Jiang Nannan. “Sister Nannan, thanks.” Her nose was getting a little runny, and tears almost ﬂowed.

Jiang Nannan hugged her back and said as she smiled, “I didn’t consider the facts thoroughly. There’s no need to thank me. Dong’er, it’d be great if you were a guy.”

Xu Sanshi started coughing tremendously to one side. He was watching Wang Dong’er with a more alert look in his eyes.

“Yuhao, you let your wife court my wife. Is that very interesting for you?”

“Who’s your wife? It’s all because of your unlucky hand. From now on, you won’t be allowed to draw lots anymore!” Jiang Nannan glared at him, and he turned honest-looking and selﬂess once again.

Huo Yuhao didn’t speak from the start until the end. However, his gaze was ﬁlled with softness as he watched Wang Dong’er. Rationally speaking, it wasn’t the best time to ﬁght the Sun Moon team. However, he wasn’t going to object if everyone wanted to go all-out against them.

“I still need to ask eldest senior regarding this matter before we decide,” Huo Yuhao said.

Bei Bei agreed with Wang Dong’er. After that, Huo Yuhao told the tournament organizing committee that they had decided to give up the ﬁght during this elimination round.

------

“What? The Tang Sect has given up against us?” Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were astonished when they heard the news.

Xiao Hongchen muttered, “Does this mean we’ve beaten Shrek? They are Shrek Academy’s stronger team! Besides the team leader, the rest of Shrek’s team isn’t that strong this time around!” Meng Hongchen pursed her lips and said, “Brother, don’t lie to yourself. How are you shameless enough to claim that we’ve beaten them without ﬁghting them at all? Aren’t you embarrassed? However, isn’t it a good thing that they’ve given up? If we ﬁght them, we won’t have it easy either. The future rounds will also be closer and closer together, which will affect

our chances.”

Xiao Hongchen laughed bitterly. “Just let me feel good in my heart, alright? Champions? Are you still thinking of becoming the champions right now? Don’t you know that…” As he spoke to that point, he paused for a moment, and his eyes were ﬁlled with resentment.

Meng Hongchen laughed coldly and said, “Why not? Will they necessarily win? I don’t believe we can’t beat them if we go all-out. Brother, with your lack of conﬁdence, I’m afraid that you’ve already…”

Xiao Hongchen covered her mouth and stopped her from speaking. “Secret. This is a secret!”

Meng Hongchen groaned at him and said, “Alright, I won’t say anything. The Tang Sect didn’t give up because they were scared. Didn’t you realize that they have no substitutes? They are more afraid than us that their abilities will be depleted. That’s why they chose to give up! We’ll win if we face them. Since they conceded defeat once, there’s no way they can beat us again.”

Xiao Hongchen caressed his sister’s head and said, “I’m only praying that you won’t meet Wang Dong. Are you conﬁdent that you won’t be merciful on him when you meet him?”

Meng Hongchen’s face turned red, and she retorted in embarrassment, “So what? One ﬁght doesn’t say anything. I like him, so what? Compared to him, all other guys are trash!”

Xiao Hongchen was speechless as he touched his nose. He replied, “Your criticism is too broad. I’ll tell grandpa.”

Meng Hongchen snorted at him and said, “I’ll just add these four words, ‘of the same age’. Anyway, you are nothing compared to him in my eyes!”

Xiao Hongchen was angry. “It’s hard to keep a woman at home! I’m your biological brother after all. How can you say something like that about me?”

------

The third elimination round of the tournament was too tragic, and was beyond the expectations of most people. The ﬁghts were very intense, as every team wanted to book their place in the round-robin stage. In this round, ﬁve people were killed, and more than twenty people were seriously injured. On average, every clash between competing teams involved some form of casualty. With regard to the situation, many teams also pointed out their doubts about the referees to the tournament’s organizing committee.

The Sun Moon Empire was also vexed over this issue. They could only promise everyone that their referees would try to control the rhythm of the ﬁghts in the future rounds so as to reduce the number of casualties.

Although the Tang Sect conceded defeat in this round, they were able to qualify for the round-robin stage because of Huo Yuhao’s dominant performance in the ﬁrst elimination round and the stable foundation they had set in the second round. The only downside was that their ranking was quite low.

------

After the third elimination round ended, there was a one-day break before the lot-drawing ceremony for the round-robin stage was held. The Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament organized by the underground world also ofﬁcially commenced on the same day.

When Huo Yuhao and the other three arrived at the Green Hotel, Chen An was already at the door to welcome them. Now that they had the exact time, they didn’t arrive late.

“You are here!” Chen An looked at Huo Yuhao and hurriedly stepped forward before bowing respectfully.

“Yes,” Huo Yuhao snorted, “Have you done what I asked you to do?”

Chen An hurriedly said, “Don’t worry. It’s all prepared. I didn’t reveal that you’re here to compete to anyone, either! Follow me to the VIP room to rest ﬁrst. I’ll pass the materials that I’ve sorted out to you.”

“Please lead the way.” Huo Yuhao maintained his cool look.

Chen An brought them to a room in the basement before instructing his subordinates to serve them fruits and drinks. He retrieved a document before passing it to Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao received the document and glanced at it before saying, “Explain it to me.”

“Yes!” Chen An replied. “This tournament was organized to facilitate the participation of ordinary people by exploiting the massive crowds currently in Radiant City. As a result, we’ve already opened the betting tables, starting from the qualiﬁers. This round of betting is very simple. As there are too many soul engineers – one hundred and nineteen! – betting on single individuals can be very troublesome. It’s better to bet on the number of people remaining, or whether there’ll be an odd or even number of people remaining. There are also multiple bets. The smaller the number of multiples, the lower the payout. The greater the number of multiples, the higher the payout. For example, your payout will be one point three times your wager if the number of soul engineers who qualify for the next round is a multiple of two. If you bet directly on the number of soul engineers who qualify, your wager will be multiplied by this number to generate your returns.”

As he spoke, he passed a black-gold card to Huo Yuhao and said, “This is the money from your previous bet. We’ve already generated your payout. Don’t worry, I’ll be the only one who knows everything related to you, and I won’t report to any superiors. However, I need to warn you that I’ll only be the chief referee for the ﬁrst two rounds. From the third round onwards, there’ll be a more authoritative ﬁgure here to referee.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and replied, “Please tell me about the rewards.”

“Yes! If you pass the qualiﬁers, your reward will be ﬁve thousand gold soul coins. I’ve already added it into your card. The winner of today’s round can choose one of the twenty- eight rare metals that we have on offer as rewards. You can take one kilo of it. If you win in the next round, you can take three kilos. Every round will see an increase. When there are fewer than ten people left, we’ll introduce ﬁve very rare metals. We haven’t decided what the detailed quantities will be though.”

“The main show will be our ﬁnal ﬁght against the other two powers. At that time, all three parties will send their victorious soul engineer to compete in the ﬁnals. The eventual champion will obtain one percent of our revenue made in this tournament. At the same time, the champion can leave with one hundred kilos of rare metals. He can choose whatever amount of each rare metal to leave with, as long as the ﬁnal number comes up to one hundred kilos maximum. In addition, he’ll also be rewarded with one kilo each of ﬁve special and rare metals. Altogether, it will be worth more than ten million gold soul coins. It’s because of these rewards that many outstanding soul engineers have been drawn to this tournament. Since you and your brother are both Class 6 soul engineers, it’s highly likely that you can win this tournament! I rate the both of you highly.”

Huo Yuhao sighed slightly and said, “It’s a pity that we can’t bet on a single individual today. What are we competing in today?”

Chen An looked gloomy. He thought to himself. While you’re a huge ﬁgure, isn’t it a little ludicrous that you don’t know what the tournament is about even though you’re here to pit your skills against the others?”

While he thought of this, he didn’t dare to voice it out loud. He hurriedly said, “In this round, soul engineers are required to create a soul tool based on the given topic. The higher the quality, the better it is. As this is the ﬁrst round, we are providing all the resources ,and all the soul engineers can leave with their created soul tools, but the requirements are a little stricter. There’s a slightly more difﬁcult obstacle to overcome.”

Huo Yuhao was a little impatient. “Let’s cut the crap. I want to know what this topic is about.”

He was trying to go through the back door. However, Chen An found it normal for him to act in this manner. He hurriedly said, “This round is about the creation of a Milk Bottle. It has to be completed within six hours. The Milk Bottle must at least be Class 3 and above. Anyone who can’t complete this task will be eliminated.”

It was a Class 3 soul tool, but creating a Milk Bottle was very complex. It was comparable to an ordinary Class 4 soul tool. It was a much tougher test than the qualiﬁers.

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Interesting. You can leave ﬁrst.

Inform us when the tournament begins.”

“Yes.” Chen An acknowledged his words and left the room. He Caitou was afraid that there were soul tools being used to eavesdrop on them, and only shot Huo Yuhao an inquisitive look. Huo Yuhao’s thoughts suddenly surfaced in his mind. “I want Chen An to be more convinced that we are from the Holy Ghost Sect. Elder brother, let’s do it this way later…”

------

Chen An was the chief referee, and still had to arrange many things for the tournament. He was naturally very busy. His assistant was the one who came to notify Huo Yuhao and He Caitou that the tournament was about to begin.

Wang Dong’er and Na Na remained in the resting area. He Caitou pushed Huo Yuhao into the hall.

They were no longer underestimated by the others now. At the end of the qualiﬁers, many people were astonished by the killing. Fortunately, it was only the qualiﬁers, and there weren’t any important ﬁgures who came to watch. Otherwise, Chen An couldn’t conceal the truth even if he wanted to. Everyone turned their attention away from Huo Yuhao when they saw him, and didn’t dare to look at him. Although they didn’t know how he did it, the way he had casually made a man’s head explode was still too cruel.

It wasn’t just those VIP gamblers who showed more respect towards Huo Yuhao and He Caitou. Even the working staff in the hall became more respectful when they saw the both of them. The Great King’s death had happened only a few days ago. Although they didn’t know who Huo Yuhao and He Caitou were, Chen An had issued a gag order. No one wanted to be the second Great King!

Under Chen An’s guidance, Huo Yuhao and He Caitou were led directly to the middle of a circular stage, a slightly more eye-catching spot. Two metal tables were moved together, and their silvery-white surfaces didn’t reﬂect any light even under the illumination of the bright lamps.

Apart from the various standard equipment used to create soul tools, there were more than ten different types of metal on the stage. Three of them were rare metals that were suitable for making the formation arrays of a Milk Bottle. The other seven weren’t that rare, but they were still high-level metals that commanded pretty high prices, and were also present in sufﬁcient quantities. There were more than three kilos of these seven metals, while there was more than one kilo of each of the three rare metals. It was a clear demonstration of the Duskwater Alliance’s wealth.

He Caitou pushed Huo Yuhao behind one of the metal tables before he went to the other one.

At this point, all the other competing soul engineers had already arrived. Chen An had deliberately arranged for the two of them to arrive last. Chen An’s intentions was very kind, he didn’t want them to wait around for others. However, the two of them also became the focus of all the gamblers.

“Silence! The tournament will ofﬁcially begin in ﬁve minutes! I am the chief referee of this tournament. Let me reiterate the rules once again! To all visitors, no one is allowed to make a sound when the soul engineers are busy creating their soul tools. Anyone who ﬂouts this rule will be kicked out!

“Please don’t be worried. After this round, all the remaining soul engineers will be allowed to compete on the stage in successive rounds. We can use soul soundprooﬁng barriers to block out any sound then, and all of you will be able to speak freely when that time comes. But I’ll need all of you to exercise patience in this round!

“All soul engineers, please take note! I am going to announce the goal of this round. In this round, all of you will be required to create a soul tool based on a certain topic: you need to create a Milk Bottle that is Class 3 or above! If you can create a Class 4 Milk Bottle, you’ll be exempted from the next round and advance directly to the third round. You will be given six hours for this round! Whoever can’t complete this task will be eliminated! Please get ready!”

Five minutes passed very quickly, and the tournament began with another shout from Chen An. The entire hall went silent, and all the soul engineers started to get busy.

He Caitou looked at Huo Yuhao. “Yuhao, we can skip the next round if we make a Class 4 Milk Bottle. Should we try?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “Follow the plan. We can’t catch too much attention. Chen An is an idiot, he made us the center of attention. We can only earn money if we remain low-proﬁle. If we are in the spotlight, it’s going to be hard to bet!”

Huo Yuhao didn’t unleash his Darkgolden Terrorclaws this time. He only simply used his right hand to pick up a piece of suitable metal and used the equipment on the table to build the shell of a Milk Bottle. He wasn’t quick, but he was accurate. If someone watching wasn’t experienced or skilled enough, he wouldn’t be able to tell what Huo Yuhao was doing. He Caitou proceeded with his work just like Huo Yuhao did. The two of them maintained a steady progression as they created their Milk Bottles.

For other soul tools, the outer shell was used for protection and decoration. However, it was different for Milk Bottles. Every part of a Milk Bottle was designed to prevent the leakage of soul power, so requirements for making the outer shell were very strict. It had to be fully sealed, and most parts of a Milk Bottle had to come from one entity. They couldn’t be separate parts that were joined together to form an outer shell.

The standard crafting table that the Duskwater Alliance provided was of decent quality. There was stamping equipment that could shape soul tools, which helped to expedite the process of creating a Milk Bottle.

Very soon, an outer shell crafted from the Sun Moon Empire’s specialty metal, Spiritmagic Bronze, appeared in front of Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao looked at the rest of the busy soul engineers and calmly chose a piece of Skyspirit Silver, which was the most valuable and costly among the three types of rare metals. He placed it in front of him and use a cutting-type soul tool to cut four square-shaped pieces of the metal. Every piece was around two hundred grams in weight, and he placed each of the pieces in front of him.

It was complex to create a Milk Bottle because the requirements for its internal construction were as ﬁne as the requirements for constructing its outer shell. The primary reason was that two formation arrays were needed. The ﬁrst one was an energy-gathering formation array, and the other one was a storage-type formation array.

Huo Yuhao cut four pieces of the Skyspirit Silver for a reason.

He didn’t use his Darkgolden Terrorclaws, but retrieved a standard carving knife to hold one piece of the metal in a slot on the carving table. He could only use one hand, and thus it was a little inconvenient for him if he wanted to conceal his true abilities.

No one saw it, but Huo Yuhao’s eyes brightened as he lowered his head. The entire structure of the piece of Skyspirit Silver was presented in his spiritual mind. His Purple Demon Eyes had reached their most advanced stage, and he could use his spiritual power to display the ﬁnest details in his spiritual world.

Huo Yuhao was slightly inferior to He Caitou in terms of creating soul tools. Mainly it was because He Caitou’s cultivation was higher. It was also because He Caitou was more focused on specializing in soul tools compared to Huo Yuhao.

However, that was only true under one condition; if Huo Yuhao didn’t use his Spirit Eyes! When Fan Yu decided to accept Huo Yuhao as his disciple, he already knew that Yuhao’s Spirit Eyes were an unbelievable martial soul for a soul engineer. It was equally great in terms of creating soul tools or using them!

After two years of training in the Illustrious Virtue Hall, Huo Yuhao was able to fuse his Spirit Eyes and soul tool creation together.

The texture of the Skyspirit Silver was very ﬁne. More importantly, its texture was very uniform even while it was very tough. It wasn’t like other metals, which differed slightly in different areas. It was also why Skyspirit Silver was the ﬁrst choice in creating the formation arrays of lower-level soul tools.

Huo Yuhao couldn’t even bear to use it to create the formation arrays of the Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon! Huo Yuhao secretly sighed in his heart, and the carving knife in his hand moved.

While he could only use his right hand, it was very stable. His thumb and index ﬁnger were slightly to the front of the carving knife. He used the ﬁrst joint of his middle ﬁnger to press down on the knife, holding it steadily between his three ﬁngers. The bottom of the knife was shaped like a sharp cone. Most carving knives adopted such a structure, which was considered the standard by soul engineers.

The blade of the knife moved gently, and he poured his soul power into it. A dim layer of white light appeared on the surface of the blade. One corner of the piece of Skyspirit Silver was cut off. The knife moved in a gentle arc, and an arc-shaped mark was left behind on the piece of Skyspirit Silver.

Huo Yuhao’s three ﬁngers moved slightly and the knife was like a spiritual serpent that surrounded the piece of Skyspirit Silver. It moved up and down, carving off small bits of metal that fell onto the table. They were proportionally spread around the area in which Huo Yuhao was carrying out his work.

Quick, accurate and steady. Huo Yuhao didn’t seem any different from the rest of the soul engineers, but he captured the essence of a true soul engineer. If there was an advanced- level soul engineer watching him, he would be extremely impressed.

He Caitou adopted a different method from Huo Yuhao. The knife in Huo Yuhao’s hand moved very smoothly, and hardly ever stopped in the process of cutting the Skyspirit Silver. On the other hand, He Caitou stopped every time he made a cut. It was as if he needed time to think and judge.

On a closer look, every pause he made was equally long. Each pause only lasted for an instant. The continuous rhythm made his movements seem even more artistic than Huo Yuhao’s.

This was a rhythm that only an advanced-level soul engineer could achieve. Every advanced-level soul engineer would come to possess his own rhythm in the process of creating his soul tools. The short pause mustn’t be underestimated. He Caitou wasn’t as accurate as Huo Yuhao. He had to rely on his own experience and eyes to make his own judgment and achieve overall control during the process of creating his soul tool. The short pause provided him time to think. Once he attuned to his own rhythm, his spiritual power, soul power, and focus could follow it unerringly.

A Class 3 Milk Bottle was considered quite complex among Class 3 soul tools. Even as He Caitou tried to suppress his own rhythm, he only used one hour to form the two formation arrays. The rhythm couldn’t be broken. He couldn’t help it even if he was too quick. He could only try to delay his progress in assembling the components of his Milk Bottle. As for Huo Yuhao, he was still carving. However, he was already on his third piece of Skyspirit Silver.

He was very serious at this time. He controlled the details very well, which was a stark contrast to his carefree attitude during the qualiﬁers.

He was here today to show his might, hoping to draw out those that he wanted to and test them. As a soul engineer, Fan Yu had once told him that he had to respect his work. It was only by respecting his own work that his soul tool could have its own spirituality.

He Caitou managed to delay completing his tool for two hours. It was only after more than ten soul engineers had submitted their work that he slowly completed the creation of his Milk Bottle. Huo Yuhao also started to assemble the ﬁnal components of his Milk Bottle at this point.

Since he was using one hand, he couldn’t be as swift and ﬂexible as when he was using two hands. However, he wasn’t rushed or slow. He made great use of the carving table to aid himself. Finally, he managed to complete the creation of an exquisite green Milk Bottle.

Huo Yuhao let out a long breath as he lifted his head. He revealed a pleased look on his face. Among all the Class 3 soul tools that he had ever created, he was the most satisﬁed with this one. He had even completed it with an ordinary carving knife. He had carved it very meticulously, and even used some of the slight changes in the stable Skyspirit Silver to achieve his goal. Even though it was only a Class 3 soul tool, Huo Yuhao felt that it was something novel. He Caitou smiled as he asked Huo Yuhao, “Are you done?”

“Yes.” Huo Yuhao passed his Milk Bottle over to He Caitou. There were referees behind everyone. When the referee behind Huo Yuhao saw what he did, he shot him a look of disapproval. However, he acted like nothing had happened because of Chen An.

He Caitou placed the Milk Bottle that Huo Yuhao had created beside his own Milk Bottle. Both of them had used the same materials, but Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottle was slightly longer than his. After he touched Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottle, he revealed a stunned look on his face.

He Caitou was considered an advanced-level soul engineer. In Shrek Academy, he was one of the best. It was important to note that Fan Yu wasn’t a Class 9 soul engineer yet. This meant that Class 8 soul engineers were the strongest in Shrek Academy right now.

Of course, Xuan Ziwen wasn’t included. Xuan Ziwen was also a Class 8 soul engineer, but he was different from Fan Yu. He had been the chief researcher of Illustrious Virtue Hall! In terms of his theoretical knowledge and abilities in various areas, he was already at the Class 9 level, it was just that his cultivation wasn’t at that standard yet.

The higher the class of a soul engineer, the more demanding the requirements on their soul power when creating soul tools. At Huo Yuhao’s level, he could create Class 6 soul tools due to the fact that his overall soul power was greater than average due to his twin martial souls. As a result, he was considered a Class 6 soul engineer. Even so, he wouldn’t be able to create Class 9 soul tools when he became a Class 8 soul engineer. Without the abilities of a Titled Douluo, there was no way he could create Class 9 soul tools. Acting recklessly would only endanger his own life. Xuan Ziwen had warned Huo Yuhao more than once that he couldn’t overestimate his talents. Many soul engineers had perished at the hands of their own experiments. Huo Yuhao had also become very wary because of that.

Chapter 290: Team Sun Moon

He Caitou’s ﬁrst feeling when he grabbed Huo Yuhao’s soul tool was balance. It was an indescribable sense of harmony. It was as if this wasn’t a soul tool at all, but a piece of metal. Its texture felt very similar to that of solid metal.

Every part of the Milk Bottle gave him the same feeling. The weight and everything else felt like that. This feeling was too miraculous. He Caitou’s Milk Bottle was much less balanced compared to Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottle, even it was roughly similar to Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottle in terms of appearance.

“Little… second brother, your Class 3 Milk Bottle isn’t a Class

4 soul tool. It’s better than a Class 4 soul tool!” He Caitou couldn’t help but rave over Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottle.

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “I felt very good just now. It seems like the tense atmosphere of this tournament helps me to focus better.” There were outsiders around, and thus he naturally couldn’t say that it was his ﬁrst time testing out the spiritual power obtained from his concrete-immaterial realm by fusing it into the entire production process. He Caitou gestured and called for the referees behind them.

He passed his and Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottles to the referees.

The two referees held their Milk Bottles separately and said, “I’ll need the two of you to wait. We’ll need the chief referee to test your Milk Bottles out. When he’s done, we’ll verify the results.”

Huo Yuhao signaled for them to leave. He and He Caitou looked at each other and revealed light smiles of conﬁdence.

For some reason, Huo Yuhao felt that He Caitou’s eyes were very bright today. It might be because such a soul engineering tournament was what he was truly interested in. Huo Yuhao could even sense the excitement coming from him.

Very soon, Chen An walked over. He was holding the Milk Bottles that Huo Yuhao and He Caitou had made. He was completely astonished at this moment. He arrived in front of Huo Yuhao and asked softly, “Is this your work?” He handed the Milk Bottle that Huo Yuhao had made back over to him.

Huo Yuhao received his Milk Bottle and nodded.

Chen An took in a deep breath, and his eyes were ﬁlled with respect. “It’s perfect.” His admiration came from the bottom of his heart. He hadn’t respected Huo Yuhao the ﬁrst time he had demonstrated his evil soul powers, he had only feared him.

Huo Yuhao smiled and asked, “Have we passed, then?”

“Of course.” Chen An answered without any hesitation. “After seeing your work today, I’m more and more conﬁdent that you’ll be able to compete on behalf of the Duskwater Alliance. However, I won’t submit your Milk Bottle. This is a secret of the Illustrious Virtue Hall. Surely you didn’t install a self-destruction component, right?”

Huo Yuhao proudly said, “If I added such a component, it wouldn’t be perfect, am I right? I’ll give it to you. If you get into trouble because of this in the future, you’ll have to handle the responsibility.”

“You are giving it to me?” Chen An was shocked. Even though he knew it was a Class 3 Milk Bottle, he had tested it out, and knew that a Class 4 Milk Bottle was unable to handle the amount of soul power that it could contain! It was able to work like a Class 4 Milk Bottle with the structure of a Class 3 Milk Bottle. It was magical! He was even more shocked by the sealed-in system that the Milk Bottle contained.

Yes, Huo Yuhao had created a Sealed Milk Bottle. It was precisely because of this that he had had to complete two more sealed formation arrays compared to He Caitou. They even had to be separated by an exact distance. They were installed into the Milk Bottle using his acute senses, allowing the Milk Bottle to be completely sealed.

Although such a Milk Bottle was expensive, it wasn’t the reason why Chen An was shocked. He was shocked by Huo Yuhao’s technique! Huo Yuhao didn’t mark the Milk Bottle or install any self-destruction components. This also meant that he could dismantle this Milk Bottle to research how Huo Yuhao had managed to create it. To him, this was something that couldn’t be bought with money.

Huo Yuhao said, “Give us the veriﬁcation that proves we’ve advanced to the next round. We are returning.”

Chen An took in a deep breath. Apart from the admiration in his eyes, there were other emotions as he looked at Huo Yuhao.

“I can’t thank you enough for your generosity. Don’t worry, I’ll do anything you want me to.”

Huo Yuhao waved his hand and said, “Can you get as many rare metals as you can for me? I’m willing to buy them. You should know how soul engineers like us need rare metals. Without sufﬁcient quantities of them, we’ll be unable to carry out some experiments. It isn’t convenient for us to move around outside either.”

“Yes, yes! I’ll help you gather all types of rare metals!” Chen An answered without any hesitation.

Huo Yuhao lifted his hand and swept the remaining rare metals on the carving table into his Starlight Sapphire storage- type ring. After obtaining the veriﬁcation from Chen An, He Caitou pushed Yuhao’s wheelchair as they left the stage.

He Caitou didn’t stand on ceremony either. He also put the remaining rare metals on the table into his storage-type soul tool. Before leaving the hall, Huo Yuhao also passed on some instructions to Chen An. He only returned to meet Wang Dong’er and Na Na after doing so, before they left the Green Hotel and returned to the Ming Yue Hotel.

“Little junior, can we trust that person?” He Caitou whispered to Huo Yuhao as they were about to reach the Ming Yue Hotel.

Huo Yuhao smiled and answered, “There shouldn’t be any problems in the short-term. In his heart, he believes that I’m an important ﬁgure in the Holy Ghost Church. I’ve also given him a lot of beneﬁts. He won’t do anything harmful to us before those beneﬁts disappear. By helping us, he’ll also stand to gain tremendously, I’ve already proven that to him today. If you were him, what would you do? I believe Chen An is a clever person. Clever people will do clever things. Furthermore, if we take a step back and assume he reports us to the Duskwater Alliance, I’ll discover it once danger arises. It’ll be convenient for us to escape any problems. There won’t be any major obstacles.”

His body stiffened as he ﬁnished speaking. His expression also changed. Wang Dong’er’s gaze was ﬁxed on him. Seeing that his body had stiffened up so suddenly, she hurriedly asked, “Yuhao, what’s wrong?”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly. “I just received a premonition. I suddenly felt very surprised, as if something important was going to happen. Furthermore, it’s something that’s not good for us.”

Wang Dong’er, He Caitou and Na Na became more alert. They slowed down, and Huo Yuhao also unleashed his Spiritual Detection as he surveyed their surroundings.

He didn’t discover anything, and everything seemed very normal. However, the sensation didn’t seem to disappear.

They didn’t discover anything even when they reached their room in the hotel. They weren’t subjected to any ambushes, either.

He Caitou couldn’t help but ask, “Yuhao, are you being too sensitive?” Huo Yuhao shook his head lightly and replied, “That feeling was very sudden. I don’t know what’s going on, either. However, my premonitions are very accurate, considering my spiritual power. Everyone, please rest early. Be careful tonight. If there are any changes, we must inform one another according to our arrangement.”

“Alright.” He Caitou and Na Na acknowledged his words before returning to their rooms to rest.

------

As if He Caitou’s words were being proven, nothing happened the entire night. The sensation that Huo Yuhao felt also slowly disappeared.

He washed his face and ate his breakfast. Even he was doubtful at this point, and muttered to himself, “Was I really being too sensitive last night? I don’t feel so suppressed anymore. However, I feel like I’ve forgotten something.”

Wang Dong’er smiled and said, “It’s alright to be wrong occasionally. After all, it wasn’t a good thing, either. I wonder who we’ll be facing in the round-robin stage. It’s the lot- drawing ceremony today. Sister Nannan and third senior have gone for it. I’m sure she won’t let third senior draw the lot this time. Haha!”

Huo Yuhao shuddered when he heard the words ‘lot-drawing ceremony’. He lost his voice as he said, “Don’t tell me my premonition has something to do with the groupings in the round-robin stage?”

Wang Dong’er was stunned. Just when she was about to open her mouth, she heard a frantic knocking sound.

After the third elimination round, they had been moved to the fourth story of the hotel, and their rooms were bigger now than they were before. There were also more facilities they had been given access to.

“Who is it?” Wang Dong’er walked over to open the door.

Jiang Nannan and Xu Sanshi were standing outside.

Wang Dong’er couldn’t help but mutter to herself when she saw the both of them, “Don’t tell me that Yuhao was spot-on?”

“Dong’er…” Jiang Nannan was sobbing, and hugged Wang Dong’er. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I don’t know why it turned out like this.”

Xu Sanshi was standing to one side and appeared very helpless. “It’s okay, it’s okay. We can just ﬁght it out.”

Huo Yuhao pushed his wheelchair over. “What’s going on? Third senior, fourth senior, how’s the situation for our round- robin stage?”

Xu Sanshi laughed bitterly. “Not too good…”

Huo Yuhao was slightly tense. “How bad?”

Xu Sanshi replied, “We are meeting the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy again. In addition, Shrek’s ofﬁcial team is also in the same group as us. The tournament’s organizing committee must have rigged this. We are even meeting Team Sun Moon in the ﬁrst ﬁght. This means that we are ﬁghting them for two rounds straight. We’ve already conceded once. What should we do this time?”

“What?” Huo Yuhao lost his voice.

If there was a team that Huo Yuhao didn’t want to face in this tournament, it wasn’t Team Sun Moon or the mysterious yet powerful Holy Ghost Sect’s team. It was Shrek’s team!

This had nothing to do with Wang Qiu’er. It was because of Shrek! Elder Xuan had given them special permission to compete on behalf of their sect so that they could establish the Tang Sect. The duty of protecting Shrek’s glory had been passed on to the hands of Wang Qiu’er and the rest. If they met Shrek in the tournament, how were they going to deal with this conundrum? If they personally eliminated Shrek, they would forever feel guilty over it.

This was only the round-robin stage, but they were already in the same group as Shrek Academy. This was the worst news they could possibly receive.

Jiang Nannan lowered her head. Her eyes were red as she said, “I drew the lot today. I didn’t expect to be so unlucky, too. I’m sorry, Yuhao. It’s all my fault.”

After a brief moment of shock, Huo Yuhao calmed down and revealed a reassuring smile on his face. He said, “Fourth senior, don’t put it this way. You’ve drawn a good lot for us! How is it disastrous? I believe it’s the best lot that we could’ve drawn.”

Jiang Nannan was stunned for a moment before she laughed bitterly. “Yuhao, you don’t have to comfort me.”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and answered, “I’m not doing that. I really think so! Think about it. If we’re in the same group as Shrek, we can team up with them. According to the rules, we’ll never meet before the ﬁnal. Isn’t that the best situation that we could desire?”

Xu Sanshi was speechless. “Brother, did you hear us carefully? We’re also in the same group as Sun Moon. We’re even facing them ﬁrst!”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “Just get rid of them.”

The ﬁve simple words that he uttered left the other three in the room stunned. Jiang Nannan’s red eyes slowly revealed a determined look.

Wang Dong’er squinted and said, “That’s right. Let’s just get rid of them. We can even pave the path for Shrek. It’s best that we meet them ﬁrst. Let’s destroy them!”

Xu Sanshi gave Huo Yuhao a thumbs-up and said, “You are awe-inspiring!”

Huo Yuhao smiled and didn’t say anything else. Yes! They could just destroy the Sun Moon team. Did they really have to be scared of them? They conceded defeat in the last round for a tactical reason, but this time, they had to ﬁght. Since this was the case, then they should just give it their all. Why should the Tang Sect be afraid of the Sun Moon team?

“Third senior, I’ll have to trouble you to call everyone here. We’ll be competing tomorrow, so we need to discuss our strategy.”

“Alright.” Xu Sanshi turned around without hesitation and left. In a short span of time, he managed to gather He Caitou, Xiao Xiao, and Na Na, and even Nan Qiuqiu, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan.

Fortunately, Huo Yuhao’s room had been upsized. It wasn’t that packed anymore, even with everyone there. Huo Yuhao wore a serious expression and said, “We’ll be facing a strong opponent tomorrow, thus I’ll need to form our strategy today. We must win this ﬁght and try our best to bring them down so that Shrek’s team has a chance against them. First, I hope no one tells eldest senior that we are facing the

Sun Moon team. I don’t want him to worry and let him focus on recovering. With his current condition, he can only ﬁght when we reach the quarterﬁnal. If he worries too much, I’m afraid it might affect his condition.”

Everyone nodded as they agreed with Huo Yuhao’s opinion.

Huo Yuhao continued, “We have only one goal in the individual elimination round: weaken the abilities of our opponents! For Shrek Academy and the Tang Sect, let’s not hold back anymore. However, we must also watch our own safety. We only have seven of us left; not even one substitute. Once we lose a member, we’ll ﬁnd it difﬁcult against them in the later stages even if we win the ﬁrst ﬁght.”

Nan Qiuqiu pursed her lips and said, “If only I could compete.”

Huo Yuhao snapped, “There’s no point in saying that now.”

“You…” Nan Qiuqiu was angry the moment she saw him. Even though she had joined the Tang Sect to avoid being punished by her mother, she didn’t have a good impression of Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao didn’t bother with her and said, “The team round will decide which team will eventually win. However, it’s very important for us to weaken our opponents in the individual elimination round.”

“We need to arrange the order in which we compete carefully.”

“I’ll go ﬁrst!” Jiang Nannan said decisively. She was the one who had drawn the lot, and thus she blamed herself for it. She had even berated Xu Sanshi in the last round. Right now, she felt extremely guilt-stricken.

“No, Sister Nannan. Have you forgotten what I said? If we ﬁght the Sun Moon team, I’ll be the one to go ﬁrst,” Wang Dong’er said without any hesitation. Jiang Nannan furrowed her brow and retorted, “Dong’er, this is not the time to be emotional. Your cultivation is higher, so you should among the last few to compete. If you compete ﬁrst, your energy and power will be greatly depleted. When it comes to the team round, we’ll still need to rely on your martial soul fusion skills with Yuhao.”

Wang Dong’er replied, “Fourth senior, listen to me. Choosing to compete ﬁrst isn’t an emotional decision. Xiao and Meng Hongchen are undoubtedly the core of the Sun Moon team. In my opinion, Meng Hongchen’s venom is more difﬁcult to deal with, even though Xiao Hongchen’s abilities are greater. The venom from her Vermilion Clear Icetoad can greatly deplete one’s soul power. Once you are unable to unleash any soul power, you’ll be knocked out. Senior Dai Yueheng lost to her back then even though he was so strong. Once Meng Hongchen enters the stage, which one of you are conﬁdent of beating her? Only Huo Yuhao’s Ultimate Ice can curb her.”

“However, Huo Yuhao is our main control soul master. Furthermore, he can’t over-exert his body because of his physical condition. He’s also the one we need to achieve victory in the team round. Considering all this, no one is more suitable than me to ﬁght her.” Nan Qiuqiu was curious. “Why is that so?”

Wang Dong’er smiled and said, “It’s because my Fire of Light can curb her venom. At the same time, it’s also because of some special feelings that she has for me. I’m not trying to exploit her feelings, but at least I know she won’t try to kill me. This can tip the balance in my favor. At the same time, Yuhao can discover her weaknesses even if I lose through his control and detection.”

Nan Qiuqiu opened her eyes wide and said, “She-she likes you? She’s really shameless...”

Xu Sanshi slapped his forehead and shouted, “Qiuqiu! Your logic is really good. She’s shameless because she likes Wang Dong? Don’t you like him too?”

Nan Qiuqiu’s face turned red, and she turned around, refusing to reply to Xu Sanshi. Although she was quite willful, she was a very straightforward person, and said anything she wanted to. Over the past few days, she had slowly integrated into the Tang Sect. Huo Yuhao knew that it was time for him to express his opinion. He understood Wang Dong’er very well. He knew that she had said all that to compete ﬁrst and handle more of the pressure. Who could be sure that Meng Hongchen would be the ﬁrst to compete from the Sun Moon team? What if she wasn’t the ﬁrst? Wang Dong’er would still have to face her opponent, and her opponent might even be Xiao Hongchen!

Both parties were arch-enemies. They couldn’t be surprised by any tactics that the Sun Moon team used.

“Alright, Dong’er will be the ﬁrst to compete then.” Huo Yuhao made his decision. Even though he was gripping the handle of his wheelchair tightly at this point, he still made this difﬁcult decision.

They were a single entity. He couldn’t leave her behind to ﬁght just because of their relationship.

“However, eldest senior has instructed me to command the entire team in this tournament. Whether it’s Dong’er or anyone else, all of you must listen to my instructions. Whoever I choose to compete will compete, and whoever I choose to remain on the bench will remain on the bench. This is so that we can eventually achieve victory. Whoever doesn’t listen to my instructions will not compete anymore. Seniors, Dong’er

,and Na Na, I hope all of you understand where I’m coming from. There can only be one voice during the tournament.”

Huo Yuhao sounded very calm now, but he appeared much more awe-inspiring than he had been before. His eyes were ﬁlled with a look of determination. Even He Caitou and Xu Sanshi, who were both the oldest, were stunned when they saw the look in his eyes. Right now, they were impressed by his aura.

He Caitou was the ﬁrst to express his support. He said, “I agree. There can only be one voice during the tournament. I believe Yuhao will be able to lead us to victory.”

“Me too.” Xu Sanshi added without any hesitation. They were brothers, but they were also teammates. If their hearts were not in unison against a strong opponent, they would already have lost half the battle!

The rest didn’t object either. Huo Yuhao’s gaze eventually landed on Wang Dong’er. Wang Dong’er looked at his burning gaze before glancing at his immobile left arm and lower limbs and then nodded immediately. She knew that Huo Yuhao would do something crazy if something happened to her because she was being stubborn. He had landed in this state because of her. How

could she bear to see him hurt because of her again?

------

Morning. A cool and refreshing air blew through Radiant City under the illumination of the morning sun. It was chilly outside.

It was the most comfortable season right now. The weather today was especially good. Inhaling the refreshing air along the streets of Radiant City felt very soothing.

The entire city had been bustling with activity over the past few days. Whether it was day or night, the streets were packed with people.

The Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament had ﬁnally entered the round-robin stage. The confusion and mess from the presence of too many teams had ﬁnally ended. In the round-robin stage, more and more strong teams would face off against one another. It was early morning, and a huge crowd had already gathered at the suburbs where the tournament venue was. They were waiting excitedly for the tournament to

truly begin!

The rules of the round-robin stage weren’t as direct as they were in the elimination rounds. The thirty-two teams that had advanced to the round-robin stage were divided into four groups. The eight teams in each group would face off against each of the rest of the seven teams once.

On the ﬁrst day, four matches would be held in the ﬁrst two groups. On the second day, another four matches would be held in the next two groups. This would continue until all the matches were completed. The entire round-robin stage would last around fourteen days. The top two teams from each group would progress to the quarterﬁnals.

The last eight would compete in the quarterﬁnals, and the victorious four teams would advance to the semiﬁnals. The winners of each semiﬁnal match would then progress to the ﬁnals, where the eventual champion would be decided.

The Tang Sect, Shrek Academy, and the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy were arranged in the same group. Since the rest of the ﬁve teams could make it past the elimination rounds, they were naturally skilled too. Their group was the group of death! Furthermore, the Tang Sect and the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy were going to face off in the ﬁrst match of the round-robin stage.

---

“This format isn’t very good for us!” Meng Hongchen and Xiao Hongchen were walking together to the tournament venue.

“How is it not good for us? I think it’s pretty advantageous for us! Only one of the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy will enter the quarterﬁnals. Isn’t that great?” Xiao Hongchen said heartlessly.

Meng Hongchen rolled her eyes and said, “This is what you want, but not what they want. Do you really think the Tang Sect will give up this time?”

Xiao Hongchen was stunned, “Why not? Didn’t they do so in the last round? I think it’s only wise for them to make the same choice. While the rest of the teams aren’t that weak, they shouldn’t be our match, either. Isn’t it good for them to enter the quarterﬁnal with us before we meet in the ﬁnal? Of course, the condition is that either we or them have to beat the Holy Ghost Sect. Come to think of it, we haven’t discovered which team is from the Body Sect...”

Meng Hongchen was a little annoyed as she looked at her elder brother and said, “Elder brother, please grow up. Those people from the Tang Sect come from Shrek Academy. If you were in their shoes, would you be willing to progress with your arch-enemy, or progress with Shrek Academy by teaming up with them? I don’t think they’ll give up today. Even if they can’t beat us, they’ll try their best to deplete our powers. On the contrary, I think we should concede defeat in this match. As long as we beat Shrek’s team, we can progress. Compared to the Tang Sect, Shrek is weaker.”

“Concede defeat?” Xiao Hongchen opened his eyes wide. “Younger sister, is your brain damaged? Are you asking us to concede defeat to the Tang Sect in front of His Majesty and grandpa? Not everyone knows about the Tang Sect’s background, but grandpa knows. They might not even choose to ﬁght us. Even if they do, it’ll be a great opportunity to exact revenge on them. At most, we’ll just reveal our true abilities earlier. Huo Yuhao is crippled right now. If we concede defeat, how can we ever show our face in the empire again?” “Bro…” Meng Hongchen wanted to say something, but she was interrupted by Xiao Hongchen.

Xiao Hongchen looked much more serious all of a sudden. “Meng, I know that you’re smarter than me most of the time. However, do you know why grandpa made me the team leader instead of you?”

Meng Hongchen was stunned.

Xiao Hongchen said, “We are competing for glory. At times, it’s not good to be overly rational. We need to have a forward- looking spirit. Have you ever thought what the motivational impact would be on the team if we can defeat the Tang Sect? You don’t have to say anything else. No matter what, we must never give up on this match.”

Meng Hongchen sighed and said, “Elder brother, I know what the beneﬁts of winning are. However, if we lose…”

“Shut up. Don’t you know it’s extremely dangerous to undermine our chances before we even ﬁght? I’ve already made my decision. Since you lack ﬁghting spirit, I shall not let you compete ﬁrst. You’ll be the last. In the individual round, we still can make choices. Our ﬁght with the Tang Sect will be decided in the team round.”

Meng Hongchen sighed and didn’t add anything else. Xiao Hongchen wasn’t wrong, either. At times, a determined mindset was more important than rationality.

In the previous edition of the tournament, their overall abilities were greater than Shrek Academy’s, and they still lost. After they returned, they tried to summarize the reason why they lost, and they came to a conclusion… belief! Shrek’s Seven Monsters had been inspired to ﬁght for Shrek’s glory. Along with Ma Xiaotao and Dai Yueheng’s abilities, they eventually defeated the stronger Sun Moon team.

Xiao Hongchen was still bothered by that defeat. Over the past ﬁve years, he had cultivated tirelessly almost every day so that he could avenge his humiliation. He had sacriﬁced a lot, and no one was clearer about that than Meng Hongchen. That was why she stopped trying to convince him. In her heart, her ﬁghting spirit was also lit. The resting area at the side of the tournament stage had been renovated over the past two days, and only the original VIP resting area was left. The resting area was also re-decorated, and the original wooden benches were switched to comfortable sofas. After all, there would be at most be eight teams at once in the resting area. It wasn’t packed as tightly as before.

When Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen brought their team to the tournament venue, they immediately saw the Tang Sect in the resting area.

Bei Bei was still absent. The rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters were all seated. Huo Yuhao’s eyes were shut. It seemed like he was resting his mind, while the rest of them appeared to be very calm.

Meng Hongchen even suspected that she was wrong when she saw them. Were they really going to give up this match?

At this point, someone from the Tang Sect stood up and walked towards the Sun Moon team.

Xiao Hongchen squinted at him and stopped in his tracks.

Xu Sanshi was the one who had walked over. He walked in front of Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen and said, “It’s been a long time! How are the both of you?”

Xiao Hongchen’s facial muscles twitched. It’s been a long time? Were you blind over the past few days?

“Yes! Long time no see.” Xiao Hongchen revealed a foxy smile on his face.

Xu Sanshi sighed and said, “Time passes really quickly! I never expected us to meet ﬁve years later. In the previous round, we decided to surrender because we understand how tough it must be on the both of you. I wonder if you can return the favor today. It’ll be great if we can progress together!”

Xiao Hongchen snorted. “We are not so spineless.”

Xu Sanshi looked very sad. “I hope the few people who died back then are resting in peace now. If I can, I’d like go over to pay my respects. It’s hard to show mercy during the tournament. We’re really not being hostile.”

“You…” Xiao Hongchen was furious, and almost snapped.

However, Xu Sanshi had already turned around and left.

Meng Hongchen dragged him back, “Don’t be fooled. He’s trying to provoke you.”

Xiao Hongchen quickly calmed down. However, his eyes looked very cold, to the point that his expression was almost frightening. “Even if he didn’t remind me, I will never forget our vendetta from the previous tournament!”

---

The eight teams who were supposed to compete in the morning had already arrived. Shrek’s team was seated beside the Tang Sect. Wang Qiu’er was very close to Huo Yuhao, around three meters apart. Huo Yuhao’s eyes were still shut, and he didn’t move in his wheelchair. It was as if he were asleep.

Wang Qiu’er had seen him when she ﬁrst arrived. However, she didn’t ﬁx her gaze on him. The cold look on her face was even more intense than before. Her ferocious aura could be felt even if one got slightly close to her.

“Hi, Qiu’er.” Wang Dong’er was seated beside Huo Yuhao, and greeted Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er only nodded at Wang Dong’er and didn’t say anything back. Wang Dong’er was dressed like a man now, whereas Wang Qiu’er was wearing a veil. It wasn’t easy to tell they were identical.

Dai Huabin also looked very cold, not much different from Wang Qiu’er. Zhu Lu and Wu Feng were openly hostile towards the Tang Sect. Xie Huanyue and Ning Tian were expressionless. On the other hand, Zhou Sichen and Cao Jinxuan were winking at Wang Dong’er and Xiao Xiao occasionally. The Lan sisters who were substitutes wore smiles on their faces.

Up on the main stage, Ju Zi pushed Xu Tianran over to the main spot. After tidying up his shirt, she sat down beside him. Xu Tianran grabbed her hand and placed it on his thigh. He tapped her hand gently. Ju Zi smiled, and looked very cute.

Xu Tianran smiled as he said, “Today’s ﬁrst match is between the Sun Moon team and the Tang Sect. It should be quite interesting.”

Ju Zi smiled and asked, “Really? The Sun Moon team will surely win.”

Xu Tianran twisted his head to look at Jing Hongchen and asked, “Hallmaster Hongchen, what do you think?”

Jing Hongchen furrowed his brow as he replied, “I think it’s difﬁcult to tell. This is only the round-robin stage. Both parties won’t be eliminated even if they lose. It’s difﬁcult to tell whether they’ll give their best. If they do, it’ll also be difﬁcult to tell the outcome. The eventual victory will be decided in the team round. For teams like these two which are very close in terms of abilities, the elimination round is only a way to deplete each other’s power and increase their own advantage. It’s a way to ensure greater chances for the team round.” Xu Tianran smiled and asked, “Hallmaster Jing, have you arranged a strategy for the Sun Moon team?”

Jing Hongchen returned the smile and answered, “An eagle’s wings will always remain weak if it doesn’t learn how to ﬂy on its own. I let them do whatever they want. My grandson and granddaughter have been working hard over the past few years so that they can defeat the bunch from the Tang Sect in this tournament. I’m also eager to see what’ll go down, even though I hope that they won’t need to give it their all at this stage.”

Chapter 291: Wang Dong'er's Fifth Soul Skill

Xu Tianran said, “I’m even more fascinated and interested in this battle after listening to your analysis. Let’s just wait and see.”

The judge had entered the arena by now. He announced the rules of the round robin stage before he added a ﬁnal announcement. “Group one: the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy versus the Tang Sect. Participants, please enter the waiting area. Will the ﬁrst contestants of the single elimination phase please step on stage?”

Both teams stood up at almost the same time, with the exception of Huo Yuhao. Their gazes met, and sparks seemed to ﬂy in that instant. Huo Yuhao’s eyes were still closed, as if he were actually sleeping.

Wang Qiu’er’s eyes were ice-cold, but her eyes were locked on Huo Yuhao from the beginning to the end. She frowned involuntarily when she noticed that he hadn’t opened his eyes at all. The Tang Sect had forfeited the last round, and she was incredibly displeased with their decision. Will they give this round up as well? No matter what happens, I will lead Shrek Academy into the next round. We have to defeat the Sun Moon Empire’s team, and we will also have to defeat the Tang Sect. What should I do if they abandon this round once more?

Thoughts were still spinning around in Wang Qiu’er’s head while the contestants entered the waiting area.

Nan Qiuqiu whispered to Jing Ziyan beside her over at the Tang Sect’s camp. “Do you think we can win this round? That’s the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy! They came in second place in the previous round, and I’ve heard that they’ve been second place for two seasons in a row. They have never lost to anyone else besides the Shrek Academy team.”

Jing Ziyan answered mysteriously, “Does that mean you favor our opponents in this round?”

Nan Qiuqiu said, “Of course. We forfeited the last round, but why aren’t we forfeiting this one? It’s better for us if we conserve our strength and our energy to ﬁght the other teams. This is the ﬁrst round, and if we end up losing this round and we all end up wounded and exhausted, doesn’t that mean we’re going home?”

Jing Ziyan felt a little speechless. “Does that mean you believe we have the ability to defeat the Shrek Academy team? If we forfeit this round and we lose against Shrek Academy, how do we progress to the next round? Only two teams from each group can progress into the quarter-ﬁnals.”

Nan Qiuqiu widened her eyes. “What? You think the Tang Sect, a sect without any reputation at all, can progress into the quarter-ﬁnals? Are you sure about what you just said? Unless every single one of them is as powerful as you are, how can they progress into the quarter-ﬁnals? It’s just not possible. Their most optimal choice should be to try their best to win a few rounds in the group stage, so that they can have a good ranking at the end.”

Jing Ziyan chuckled and said, “I wouldn’t be so sure about that. How about, let’s have a bet?”

Nan Qiuqiu had always been rather stubborn and deﬁant. “What are we betting on? How’s that going to work?”

Jing Ziyan replied, “We can bet on who emerges victorious in this round. You favor the Sun Moon Empire’s team, right? I am betting that the Tang Sect will win this round. If you win, I will take you Radiant City’s most lavish and luxurious hotel for a delicious meal. But if you lose, you have to ﬁght against me one-versus-one over ten different occasions, and split over ten different days. Your annihilation element is quite interesting.”

The corner of Nan Qiuqiu’s mouth twitched, and it was evident that she was reminiscing about a certain unpleasant memory. She deliberated for a little while, and she nodded vigorously as she said, “Alright, it’s a done deal, then. You can’t cheat, though. I feel like I can already see a sumptuous meal in front of me.”

Jing Ziyan said arrogantly, “I will make this bet with you, in the name of the Tang Sect’s glory. If I lose, so be it, and all I have to do is spend some money to take you out for a meal. It’s a deal, neither of us can cheat.”

Ji Juechen was sitting on Jing Ziyan’s other side, and his mouth twitched, but his eyes were as calm as always. His gaze was ﬁxated on Huo Yuhao. This epic battle will surely inspire me in some way. It’s your show, Yuhao. But how much of your true abilities can you unleash with the state that your body is in? ---

Both teams were inside the waiting area at this point.

Xiao Hongchen gestured to one of the Sun Moon Empire’s team members, and the youth immediately leapt to his feet and jumped onto the competition stage. He was big and tall, and his shoulders were extremely broad. His eyes were cool and collected, and he seemed very calm to the people watching him. He could be considered very digniﬁed and rather dashing, with especially wide hands, with long and slender ﬁngers. The audience could tell that he was quite formidable as soon as he got onto the competition stage.

Wang Dong’er patted Huo Yuhao’s right hand gently over in the Tang Sect’s camp, and she stood up from her seat.

Huo Yuhao ﬁnally opened his eyes as she stood up. His eyes were cold, and could even be described as grim and unfeeling. Huo Yuhao gave a faint nod back to Wang Dong’er, but he didn’t say anything else. Wang Dong’er tapped on the ground with her foot and drifted onto the competition stage. The protective soul barriers rose from the ground the moment she stepped onto the stage and separated the contestants from the outside world.

“It’s Wang Dong!” Meng Hongchen was seated inside the waiting area, and she felt as if a bucket of ice-cold water had just splashed over her ﬁghting spirit and extinguished half of it.

A strange smile broke out across Xiao Hongchen’s face. “Looks like the heavens are on our side, and it was the right decision not to let you take point. If you accidentally lost to him, we would have had real problems in the subsequent rounds.”

Meng Hongchen bit down on her lower lip and mumbled under her breath, “If only I had known Wang Dong was the ﬁrst one, then I would have told Shi Xing to have some mercy and not land any killing blows. It’s too late now! What should I do?”

Xiao Hongchen was clearly exasperated, but he didn’t seem surprised by her reaction at all. “Whose side are you on? The question we should be thinking about is whether we can win this round!”

They were quarreling on their side, while Wang Dong’er and the youth from the Sun Moon Empire’s team walked to the center of the stage.

---

The judge glanced at them both as he lowered his voice and said, “This is the ﬁrst ﬁght of the round robin stage. Be careful, you two, and try your best not to wound or cripple your opponent. I will immediately separate the two of you once I deem one party to be victorious, and neither party is to continue attacking. Otherwise, I will declare the violator disqualiﬁed. Do you understand?”

There were too many people who were either wounded or dead from the elimination rounds, and the organizing committee had shouldered quite some pressure. It was natural that they would require the judges to be a lot stricter than before. The youth from the Sun Moon Empire’s team nodded and said, “My name is Shi Xing. Remember my name; perhaps it will follow you for the rest of your life.” He turned around towards the edge next to his camp as he spoke.

Wang Dong’er frowned and asked the judge, “Are youths nowadays all so ridiculous?”

The corner of the judge’s mouth twitched. “Prepare for battle. This competition relies on ﬁghting strength and abilities, not how powerful your mouth is.”

Wang Dong’er said plainly, “Don’t be biased. Otherwise, you will regret it.”

The judge was momentarily stunned. He had been the judge for quite a few rounds during the elimination round, and this was the ﬁrst time that he was encountering somebody that dared to threaten a judge! This fellow was a little outrageous!

Wang Dong’er was just about to turn around and return to her own side, but she suddenly saw someone waving to her from the other side... wasn’t that Meng Hongchen? Wang Dong’er glanced at her helplessly, and she waved back at the same time before she retreated to her own side.

Meng Hongchen instantly became excited as she turned towards Xiao Hongchen and said, “Did you see that, brother? He waved to me! Did you see how exasperated and helpless he looked? It’s clear that he doesn’t want to face us in battle. We have to get him into our academy after the competition, no matter what! I can be with him that way!”

“Shut up! You’re so hopelessly infatuated. I’ve had enough of you. Sit your ass down, you have utterly disgraced the Hongchen family.” Xiao Hongchen was practically growling as softly as he could.

Wang Dong’er’s eyes met Huo Yuhao’s eyes when she turned back around and walked towards her own camp. Huo Yuhao’s eyes were ice-cold at this moment, as if he was in an entirely different state altogether, and he made a gesture at her.

Wang Dong’er nodded softly to show that she understood. She walked all the way to the competition stage’s edge before she turned back around once more. However, she could see just as she was turning around that the judge’s arm had already swung downwards to signal that the ﬁght had begun.

Do you have to be so obviously biased? Wang Dong’er frowned faintly. She wasn’t hasty to charge forward, and her eyes sparkled as a pair of dazzling wings extended from behind her back.

Enormous blue wings covered her entire back, and she was immediately blanketed with a beautiful bluish-golden layer of light. Her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings ﬂickered with golden spots, and it felt as if these spots had come alive as a dense aura of light surged into the sky.

The ﬁrst person to make a move was Shi Xing, who was representing the Sun Moon Empire’s team. He took a step out and dashed forward as his ﬂying-type soul tool extended out behind his body at the same time. It took two accelerations before he surged into the sky and ﬂew high into the air. Four streaks of brilliant white light erupted from behind his ﬂying- type soul tool and propelled his body into the sky like a shooting star. A Class 4 scarlet-red explosive shell barreled toward Wang Dong’er as he soared through the sky.

This season was just like the last one, and soul engineers were not allowed to use stationary soul tools. Class 4 explosive shells had a similar reputation to Milk Bottles amongst Class 4 soul tools, and they were extremely powerful. However, a longer time was needed to charge them up. That Shi Xing could control his ﬂying-type soul tool to rise through the air while ﬁring an explosive shell so quickly meant he was quite adept with soul tools.

Wang Dong’er shifted her mouth indifferently as she ﬂapped her wings gently and rose into the sky along with him.

The reason why Huo Yuhao agreed to let her take the ﬁrst round was substantially related to the fact that she could ﬂy. Sects and academies that consisted mostly of soul engineers had a higher win rate in the elimination rounds before this because of the tournament’s new rules. The immense advantage that soul engineers had because they could ﬂy was just too evident. Wang Dong’er shot into the sky like an arrow, but a strange scene occurred immediately afterwards... the Class 4 explosive shell suddenly changed direction and followed closely behind her!

An explosive shell with tracking abilities? Then it’s not a Class 4 shell anymore. But why does its power look like a Class 4 shell? Huo Yuhao’s brain was calculating rapidly in the Tang Sect’s waiting area.

This round was especially important for the Tang Sect, and Wang Dong’er was the ﬁrst one to ﬁght. Huo Yuhao was afraid that he would lose his cool and his rationality because he was too concerned, and that he wouldn’t keep his calm to continue commanding his team in the tournament. Therefore, when his eyes were closed before this, he was using one of the skills of necromancy that he had learned from the Calamity Necromancer, Electrolux, which was called the Necromancer’s Silent Heart. This skill allowed him to enter a peculiarly calm state, and the skill also greatly boosted his senses. The only downside was that he would be incapable of any emotions at all over the next day, and he would only use the most rational and reasonable methods to think about things.

Wang Dong’er’s second soul ring sparkled, and a golden light burst forth from the light spots on her wings behind her. The sphere of light immediately collided with the explosive shell hurtling through the air.

Intense explosions could be heard, and sphere of scorching red light over ten meters in diameter instantly lit up the sky. The violent shockwaves that resulted from the collision caused the air in the sky to twist and contort.

This was a Class 5 explosive shell after all, and the shell possessed power close to a Class 6 soul tool’s attack. Shi Xing was sophisticated, indeed!

Shi Xing revealed ﬁve soul rings; two yellow and three purple rings, which contrasted with Wang Dong’er’s two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings. Wang Dong’er’s ring combination was the most optimal combination, and she was also a Soul Emperor. There was quite a gap between their cultivations.

However, since Shi Xing could unleash a Class 5 explosive shell with tracking abilities within such a short period of time, it was likely that he wasn’t far from his sixth ring even though he only had ﬁve rings at the moment. The vigorous shockwaves touched Wang Dong’er in the end, and forced her body upwards. On the other side, three more explosive shells whistled through the air and formed a triangular formation in the sky. This formation completely locked Wang Dong’er in and sealed everything off as she rose up through the air.

Wang Dong’er wasn’t hasty to soar upwards, but neither did she intend to meet these shells head-on. She withdrew her wings, and plummeted down through the air just like that. However, the explosive shells could lock onto her and track her down, and they immediately pursued her as she fell. Wang Dong’er didn’t seem like she was about to reduce her speed, and she plunged down right towards the ground. The location that she was going towards was actually where the judge was, and she began to shout as she continued diving through the air, “Watch out, please move away!”

The judge received a rude shock. They were only in the round robin stage, so they couldn’t send that powerful a soul master out to be the judge. He was a seven-ringed Soul Sage, but he still couldn’t take the force of three explosive shells detonating at the same time. What’s this dude from the Tang Sect trying to do? Is he trying to die together with me? The judge released his martial soul in his astonishment, and his body moved several dozen meters away in a ﬂash. He was actually an agility-type soul master!

Wang Dong’er had no intention of letting him go. She expanded her wings again, and switched directions gracefully in the air as she chased after the judge.

---

Back on the rostrum, Xu Tianran said plainly, “Relieve that judge of his duties after the competition. You have to be discerning even if you’re biased. He’s going to disgrace our empire by showing such bias when everyone’s watching. What an idiot.”

“Yes.” Cold light ﬂashed across Ju Zi’s eyes. However, the image of her and Wang Dong’er healing Huo Yuhao together surfaced in her mind at this moment.

He must know that she’s a girl by now. They… are they together now? Ju Zi could feel her heart starting to palpitate as this question appeared in her mind.

“Why are your hands so cold, Ju Zi?” Xu Tianran asked confusedly.

Ju Zi felt her heart skip a beat and said hurriedly, “The tournament is too exciting. Perhaps I’m just a little nervous.”

Xu Tianran smiled, “You can’t be crushing on that youth from the Tang Sect, can you? He’s the most handsome man I’ve ever seen, though. I couldn’t match up to him even if I could walk.”

Ju Zi couldn’t help but laugh. “Are you envious, your Highness?”

Xu Tianran chortled and said, “I’m also a man, how can I not be envious?” He was wearing a smile on his face, but the sparkle in his eyes was as cold as ever. He couldn’t please his women, so deep in his heart, he was quite afraid that his women wouldn’t be loyal to him. He couldn’t take it even if it was just emotional disloyalty. However, Ju Zi’s next sentence paciﬁed the fury that was just rising in his heart.

Ju Zi continued, “I’m glad that you’re envious for me, because that means you care about me. However, there’s no need to be envious about a girl, is there?”

“A girl?” Xu Tianran was momentarily stunned.

Ju Zi bent down beside his ear and whispered, “Can’t you tell that Wang Dong is a girl? How could a man be that good- looking?”

Xu Tianran was still shocked. “So, she’s a girl. How did you ﬁnd out?”

Ju Zi smiled and replied, “Didn’t you ask me to investigate the Tang Sect? My people made that judgment from their intel and observations. She’s not just a girl, I think she’s together with Huo Yuhao. They stay with each other every day, and she’s the one that takes care of him.” “A girl, huh. She would be very pretty if she were wearing women’s clothes.” Xu Tianran murmured to himself. However, his eyes suddenly became cruel and ﬁerce as he spoke.

If… if I hadn’t lost the ability to be a man, how many beautiful girls like that would I have for myself?

“You’re hurting me, your Highness!” Ju Zi exclaimed agonizingly.

Xu Tianran froze, and his eyes quickly returned to normal. “I’m sorry.”

Ju Zi grabbed his hand and said, “It’s alright, your Highness. Please don’t think too much about that. The empire’s technology is so advanced, it’s just a matter of time before we discover something that can heal your wounds.”

“Yes,” Xu Tianran nodded. “Let’s watch the competition.”

--- The scene on stage had changed drastically as they were talking. Wang Dong’er was right about to crash into the ground as she plunged through the air, and the judge was running away as quickly as he could. He wasn’t a seven-ringed Soul Sage for nothing, and it wasn’t that easy for Wang Dong’er to catch up to him even though she was ﬂying through the air.

The ground was right before her eyes. Wang Dong’er suddenly turned around, and her slender legs tapped lightly on the ﬂoor’s surface. She bounced off the ground at the moment the three explosive shells behind her were about to touch her, and she ﬂew back into the sky at lightning speed.

Boom, boom, boom!

Three violent explosions rang out at almost the same time. Even though the competition stage was reinforced by soul tools, it couldn’t take an explosion as forceful as this one. Metal pieces ﬂew in all directions, and intense shockwaves reached every corner of the competition stage. But those shockwaves only seemed to push Wang Dong’er’s away, and helped her rise even faster through the air. Wang Dong’er was covered by a golden light, and the shockwaves didn’t hurt her at all. However, a frightening pressure descended from the sky right at that moment.

Shi Xing naturally wasn’t idle when Wang Dong’er was falling through the sky with three explosive shells on her tail. The attack that he had just launched was meant to preoccupy her. Xiao Hongchen had already shared his ﬁndings regarding the Tang Sect with his companions before this, and Wang Dong’er was one of the people that they had to pay extra attention to. They were already aware that Wang Dong’er had six rings now.

Even Shi Xing himself didn’t expect his second round of explosive shells would force Wang Dong’er to tuck tail and run. Distance was extremely important in a ﬁght between soul engineers and soul masters, and soul engineers would reign supreme if there was enough distance between the two parties.

Shi Xing was decisive, and immediately withdrew the other soul tools that he was about to use to continue his suppression of Wang Dong’er. A ﬁery-red heavy cannon appeared on his shoulder. This heavy cannon was about two meters long, and is barrel about thirty centimeters in diameter. It began to release a dense and searing aura from the moment it appeared. It was made from Scarletsun Steel, and its formation arrays were sculpted from Scarletﬂame Crystals. The most important thing

about using crystals to create formation arrays was that one

couldn’t afford to make a single mistake or miscalculation, and one had to ﬁnish everything in one go. Otherwise, there was no way to change anything, as crystals weren’t as malleable as metal.

Shi Xing began to infuse as much soul power as he could into the cannon. This was clearly a Class 6 Scarletﬂame Cannon, and it was being charged up as high as possible. This charging process was almost complete when Wang Dong’er turned back around and rocketed upwards.

A cruel look ﬂashed across Shi Xing’s eyes. So what if you’re a Soul Emperor? Even Soul Sages won’t dare to meet my Scarletﬂame Cannon’s attack head-on! I wonder how you’re going to dodge this?!

A miniature metal tube rose discreetly from his left shoulder, and a ruby-red beam ﬁred out and landed directly on Wang Dong’er.

---

Is that… a positioning-type soul tool?

Huo Yuhao’s eyes became a lot more focused as he sat inside the waiting area. Positioning-type soul tools were typically used for stationary soul tools, as they were more practical, and they were equivalent to the stationary soul tool’s sights. It was apparent that the positioning-type soul tool that Shi Xing was using wasn’t that simple, and the Class 6 Scarletﬂame Cannon’s barrel shone with red light as soon as the ruby light beam ﬁred out from his positioning-type soul tool.

---

It was very taxing for Class 5 soul engineers to operate Class 6 soul tools, and this was still the case even though Shi Xing was nearing his sixth soul ring. Therefore, he couldn’t add any more tracking mechanisms to his Class 6 Scarletﬂame Cannon. However, he did pull a cheap trick to get around this. He used a Class 4 positioning-type soul tool and merged it with his soul cannon, giving his cannon shell a certain ability to track its target. Furthermore, the Scarletﬂame Cannon itself had certain abilities to lock onto its target. It was clear that he intended to smash everything onto Wang Dong’er without further ado, so that he could end the ﬁght right here and now.

Wang Dong’er could sense the immense pressure coming towards her, and suddenly halted in her upwards ﬂight. She spread out her wings, and looked up calmly at the frightening Scarletﬂame Cannon that was still charging up above her.

She glowed even more intensely, to the point where her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings, which were mainly blue, were blanketed with brilliant golden hues!

“Go to hell!” Shi Xing roared and ﬁred off the heavy cannon in his hands, and a frightening scarlet-red beam of ﬁre erupted from the Scarletﬂame Cannon. The ﬂames froze in midair for an instant before they instantly transformed into an enormous ﬁreball that contorted and undulated with wave-like patterns before arriving before Wang Dong’er in an eyeblink.

Every single person in the audience held their breath. The gigantic ﬁreball had swelled to the point where it was almost half again as large as Wang Dong’er’s body. Could she take the hit? Was she about to be consumed by the ﬁreball?

Everyone had a very intuitive judgment about beauty. Even though Shi Xing was representing the Sun Moon Empire, Wang Dong’er’s “handsomeness” and her good looks gave her quite a number of supporters. Many people subconsciously closed their eyes, as they couldn’t bear to see such a handsome youth perish just like that.

Only those who kept their eyes open witnessed something that was nothing short of a miracle. Wang Dong’er had no intention of evading the enormous ball of ﬂame. Instead, she opened her arms, and her entire body seemed to transform into transparent golden water crystals in that moment. Her ﬁfth soul ring lit up at the same time.

The tremendous Scarletﬂame cannon shell had already arrived. However, Wang Dong’er’s body was instantly covered by a golden ripple, and she burst with light that seemed like a reﬂection from the water crystals that enveloped the cannon shell in front of her. The cannon shell’s forward momentum was slowed, and Wang Dong’er actually opened her arms just like that and wrapped them around the huge cannon shell.

Yes, she hugged it. Furthermore, the incredibly unstable and reactive cannon shell didn’t explode at all…

“This is…” Even Xu Tianran gasped involuntarily from the rostrum.

Wang Dong’er’s eyes had become completely golden by now. There was a tinge of mockery in her eyes as she stared at the young man opposite her. “I’m giving it back to you.” Wang Dong’er raised her hands up into the sky and passed the cannon shell onto her right hand. The cannon shell shone with even more intense light as she raised it high into the air, and the scarlet-red ﬂames were converted into brilliant golden ﬁre. In the next moment, the cannon shell left a blazing and dazzling trail as it hurtled back towards Shi Xing.

Wang Dong’er muttered under her breath as she tossed the enormous cannon shell through the air, “How can you be willing to show me your trump card if I don’t give you enough time?”

The golden colors on her body receded as she threw the huge cannon shell away. Her wings opened behind her, and she chased after the cannon shell towards Shi Xing.

Shi Xing was completely rooted to the spot. A million possible outcomes had surfaced in his mind when he ﬁred off his heavy cannon, and the worst possible outcome was that Wang Dong’er had an Invincible Barrier to defend herself against this strike. But even so, he would still have time to continue attacking, and using an Invincible Barrier also consumed soul power. Furthermore, this was equivalent to him erasing one of his opponent’s trump cards... but never in his wildest dreams did he expect the attack that he had charged for so long to come back towards him.

The golden cannon shell was whistling through the air towards him, and it wasn’t any slower than before. Shi Xing immediately recovered as he slapped himself on the chest while he gritted his teeth. A golden barrier instantly rose from his body and shielded his entire body within.

The person that unleashed an Invincible Barrier wasn’t Wang Dong’er, it was him!

Boom!

A frightening explosion echoed through the sky, a golden ﬂower blooming with riveting and bedazzling beauty.

Shi Xing was at the center of this explosion, and he could feel that his soul power was being consumed at an excessively alarming rate. An Invincible Barrier could only be used once, and it began to make crackling noises, as if it couldn’t withstand the terrifying explosion. It took him immense effort before the explosion’s aftershocks ﬁnally disappeared. However, his soul power had diminished to less than ﬁfty percent because of this, along with the soul tools he had used before this.

What made Shi Xing even more terriﬁed was the fact that Wang Dong’er had completely vanished from his ﬁeld of view.

“Above you, fool!” Xiao Hongchen raged from the sidelines. It was a pity that Shi Xing couldn’t hear him at all from within the competition stage’s protective barrier.

An enormous golden hexagram hovered above Shi Xing’s head. Just as his eyes were darting around fearfully, a large golden beam descended from the sky and swallowed his entire body.

Shi Xing’s Class 5 protective soul barrier that he used to protect his body was immediately triggered, but nobody could see him anymore.

Wang Dong’er dove from high above the sky as she extended her wings, and a golden sphere quickly condensed and took form in front of her.

Clang!

Shi Xing’s protective soul barrier was ripped to pieces, and another Invincible Barrier rose from his body. However, Shi Xing had less than thirty percent of his soul power left, and he could do little more than watch as another brilliant golden sphere slammed against his second Invincible Barrier. Sharp and shrill sounds could be heard as uncountable golden sparks erupted into the air.

Shi Xing’s soul power rapidly dwindled, and his eyes were full of despair by now. Wang Dong’er was still very close by, and her wings were fully extended as she descended from the sky like the Goddess of Light. He knew that he had been defeated.

“I admit defeat!” Shi Xing shouted as loud as he could. He had learned of the Tang Sect’s identity from Xiao Hongchen long before this, and knew both parties were mortal enemies. He didn’t want to lose his life here because of any unwarranted stubbornness. Furthermore, there was still a group battle after this, and this wasn’t the time for him to give everything he could. He was the ﬁrst to ﬁght, so all he had to do was use Milk Bottles to recover his soul power, and he would be back in peak condition when it was time for the group battle.

Shi Xing felt as if he had lost this battle way too unconvincingly, and because he didn’t know anything about Wang Dong’er’s insidious ﬁfth soul skill. He still didn’t know exactly what Wang Dong’er’s soul skill had done even now.

Wang Dong’er’s eyes ﬂowed with mockery when she heard him admit defeat, the judge beneath her already hollering at her to stop.

Wang Dong’er extended her arms to signal that she wasn’t attacking anymore. She withdrew her wings and slowly descended to the ground.

The golden sphere that she had released continued rubbing against Shi Xing’s Invincible Barrier, but the radiance was getting weaker and weaker. The Butterﬂy Goddess Slash originally had an area of effect, but she had focused it into a single point, giving it an incredible destructive force. Shi Xing heaved a sigh of relief as if a huge burden were lifted off his chest. The Invincible Barrier that he was using was the strongest possible type, and he looked on as her attack gradually grew weaker to the point where it could no longer hurt him. His Invincible Barrier was enough to hold on.

Wang Dong’er drifted to the ground and turned towards the judge. She said mockingly, “Don’t worry, I’m not attacking him anymore. However, if I had been the one that was at a disadvantage, would you have been so worried?”

The judge shot a cold look at her and said, “Why don’t you try and ﬁnd out?”

Wang Dong’er raised her index ﬁnger and wiggled it at him. “You won’t get that chance. Can you declare that I have won this ﬁght?”

“Yes. The Tang Sect is victorious in the ﬁrst single elimination match.”

The judge hadn’t even ﬁnished his sentence when an agonizing howl echoed from the sky, and a body plummeted down in the next moment.

The judge was still a Soul Sage after all, so his reactions were extremely quick. He immediately caught the body falling through the air in a ﬂash of motion.

Shi Xing’s face was ghastly pale, and he was exhaling much more than he was inhaling, while his life energy was slipping away at a dangerous rate.

“You… you killed him.” The judge turned back towards Wang Dong’er, infuriated.

Wang Dong’er’s expression seemed as innocent as ever. “Which eye of yours saw that I killed him? I came down in the same moment that he admitted defeat, and I have been by your side this entire time.”

The ﬁrst match was over, and the protective barriers around the competition stage naturally receded and disappeared. Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen leapt onto stage at almost the same time as they raced over. They were also astounded when Shi Xing dropped from the sky for some unknown reason. They could clearly see that Wang Dong’er’s Butterﬂy Goddess Slash had disappeared before that. Did Shi Xing burn through every ounce of his soul power?

However, they could immediately tell when they came near that Shi Xing’s circumstance wasn’t as simple as him exhausting all his soul power. The judge caught him before he hit the ground, and even if he didn’t have any soul power left, he would only be exhausted and fatigued. But he wasn’t breathing anymore at the moment, and he was as dead as he could be.

Xiao Hongchen roared furiously, “Wang Dong! You dare to kill my teammate?”

Wang Dong’er wore the same innocent expression and replied, “I didn’t kill anyone. I have no idea why he’s dead. Are you blind?”

Meng Hongchen hesitated and said, “Brother, can it be that Shi Xing has some hidden problems? It’s true that Wang Dong didn’t do anything to him.”

“Bam!” Xiao Hongchen spun around and slapped Meng Hongchen across the face. “Shut up! You’ve become so disloyal because of your infatuation. You’re still defending your opponents even at a time like this. Get lost!”

Meng Hongchen felt her heart skip a beat as she stared at Xiao Hongchen’s bloodshot eyes. She felt extremely aggrieved, but she didn’t dare to say anything more. Meng Hongchen lifted her head and glanced at Wang Dong’er, before tears welled up in her eyes, and she turned and ran away.

Xiao Hongchen took Shi Xing’s body from the judge. He glared at Wang Dong’er and gritted his teeth. “I will not stop until I draw my last breath.”

Wang Dong’er smiled faintly and said, “Come, then. Are you up next? Or are you going to keep letting your teammates die?”

Xiao Hongchen took a deep breath, and his outraged expression gradually calmed down. Instead, he said nothing more as he stepped off the stage with Shi Xing’s corpse in his arms. Wang Dong’er took out a Milk Bottle as if she were demonstrating a magic trick, and she stood there quietly to replenish her soul power.

Wang Dong’er had won this battle. She had eliminated her opponent, to the point where he didn’t get to give everything that he had. It could be said that she had won this ﬁght absolutely and perfectly.

The Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ ﬁfth soul skill – the Goddess of Light’s Possession.

Wang Dong’er could transform herself into a light elemental form for three seconds, and this allowed her to develop an afﬁnity for every other element except the darkness element. This soul skill ampliﬁed the force of her other soul skills by one hundred percent, and this also allowed her to strike back at darkness elements with three times the original force.

Wang Dong’er relied on the Goddess of Light’s Possession’s special characteristic of developing an afﬁnity for other elements to control the enormous ﬁre-type Scarletﬂame Cannon shell. She was then able to throw it back, and thus clinch her victory.

Shi Xing’s death obviously had something to do with her. Her Butterﬂy Goddess Slash was discreetly charged up with the ability that her Broken Devil of Light right arm bone carried, the Devilbreaking Golden Light, which erupted only in the last second and directly pierced into Shi Xing’s heart. How could he survive an attack like that?

Wang Dong’er had murdered one of the Sun Moon Empire’s main team members, which meant that she had undoubtedly greatly weakened the opposing team’s overall strength. This was extremely beneﬁcial for the group battle that was to come afterwards, and towards Shrek Academy’s ﬁght against the Sun Moon Empire after today.

Chapter 292: An Astonishing Rainbow Crossing A Hundred Meters

Xiao Hongchen didn’t take the second ﬁght because of Wang Dong’er’s words. The next person to ﬁght was a stocky and muscular youth, who looked like a square box when he stepped on stage. His torso very wide, but he was only about a meter and sixty centimeters tall. His thick arms were bigger than some people’s thighs, and his short and needle-like hair complemented his intrepid aura, while his eyes seemed like they were burning with ﬂames. His feet made plonking noises on the ground with every step that he took.

“Judge.” Wang Dong’er spoke up right at this moment.

“What?” the judge replied with an enraged look on his face. His mood was horrible. Even though he was biased in this competition, one of the Sun Moon Empire’s team members had still lost his life!

Wang Dong’er continued, “Look at the ﬂoor – it’s so badly damaged. How can we continue the competition like this? Don’t you think we should ﬁx it up a little before anything else?”

That was true. The three explosive shells that had hammered into the ground had created an enormous crater that was more than ﬁfteen meters across. Metal fragments, stone, and gravel were scattered all over the place, and the competition stage seemed as wretched as it could be.

The judge glanced coldly at her and said, “Is this the outcome you were hoping for when you brought the three explosive shells down to the ground? What a sly little rascal! However, you’re going to be disappointed. I’m the judge for this round, and I have the authority to determine whether the competition stage should be ﬁxed or not. You can ﬂy, right? How will the ﬂooring affect you? The competition is to continue.”

The short and stocky youth had already walked over, and he was getting closer and closer. Wang Dong’er could distinctly hear that his entire skeleton was crackling incessantly.

“Are your bones going to break? Do you want go back and check it out ﬁrst?” Wang Dong’er said to him with a concerned look on her face. “Enough nonsense!” the short, stocky youth shouted angrily. “You killed Shi Xing, and I will force you to follow him into the grave!”

Wang Dong’er frowned and said, “What’s your name?”

The stocky youth glared at her and replied, “My name is Zhou Xinghao.”

Wang Dong’er’s large, pretty blue eyes widened as she said, “Is he your boyfriend or your girlfriend? Why are you so angry? You can eat anything, but you can’t just say anything you want. Which eye of yours saw that I killed him? And you still want to slander me?”

“You… bastard!” Zhou Xinghao wasn’t as good with words as Wang Dong’er was, and he darted forward and was about to attack her.

Wang Dong’er just stood there and didn’t move at all. Her eyes were ﬁxed innocently on the judge instead. The judge wanted to be biased towards the Sun Moon Empire’s team, but he couldn’t allow Zhou Xinghao to violate the rules and attack his opponent before the match had even begun. The judge hurriedly stepped in to block Zhou Xinghao, and he put on a serious look as he said, “The round has yet to begin. I will disqualify you if you violate the rules! Go back to your places and prepare for battle. You can only attack each other once I’ve announced that the competition has begun.”

Zhou Xinghao huffed and puffed as he glared at Wang Dong’er. “I will break you into a million pieces to avenge Shi Xing.” With that, he turned around and strode back to his spot.

Wang Dong’er smiled at the judge. She was currently dressed like a man, but her good looks still stunned the judge momentarily as he returned her gaze.

“You’re an honest and fair judge.” She walked away slowly after her remark.

The judge had recovered by now, and he almost vomited blood. What’s he thinking, calling me an honest and fair judge? This fellow… Huo Yuhao gave Wang Dong’er a thumbs-up from beneath the stage. Wang Dong’er gave him a smile in return as she put the Milk Bottle in her hands away, and turned around to face Zhou Xinghao.

Huo Yuhao’s mouth moved as he mouthed something to her. Wang Dong’er tilted her head to signal that she understood. With the chemistry that the two of them had, they could even communicate through soundless mouthing.

The judge wasn’t like before, and he waited for both parties to return to their rightful spots before he raised his right arm into air and swung it down forcefully.

Zhou Xinghao didn’t ﬂy into the air like Shi Xing had before. As the judge swung his arm down, he raised both arms into the air. A black ball of light began to light up, and a metal wheel that was more than half a meter in diameter appeared in his hands, which he tossed heavily in front of him.

The metal wheel dropped to the ground with a heavy plonk, and began to rotate vigorously. Ear-splitting clanging sounds could be heard, and the wheel rapidly transformed into a large and wide base.

Zhou Xinghao leapt onto the base, and at least twelve spots on his body shone with the light of storage-type soul tools.

This was the soul tool fortress, a classic opening. However, his soul tool fortress’ base was conspicuously bigger than that of typical forts.

However, it was it this moment that Zhou Xinghao found himself in a daze. His soul tool fortress was just entering its second assembly phase, and it hadn’t been more than two seconds since he took out the wheel to toss onto the ground… but a mass of golden spheres was already crashing toward him!

Two seconds ago, Wang Dong’er had made her move right when the judge swung his hand down. She didn’t even release her martial soul, but her entire body shot into the sky like an arrow as she rocketed towards Zhou Xinghao’s position. A powerful ray of light sparkled as she dashed out, and the blinding white light propelled her forward as she rapidly accelerated to about a hundred meters per second.

The competition stage was only one hundred meters in diameter. This also meant that one second was all it took for Wang Dong’er to reach her opponent.

Wang Dong’er only unleashed her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess when she was about ten meters away from Zhou Xinghao. Her dazzling wings extended to both sides, and she made use of that forceful propulsion force as she ﬂapped down with her wings. Air resistance allowed her to soar upwards, and her entire body shot into the sky just like that. She opened her wings, and was facing Zhou Xinghao as her second soul ring lit up, and her Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess rained down on Zhou Xinghao like a meteor shower.

It wasn’t just people from the Sun Moon Empire that knew how to use soul tools. Wang Dong’er had a Class 6 soul engineer with her, and how could Huo Yuhao not help the woman he loved “suit up”?

This was the force that a Class 6 soul thruster could emit within a short period of time. Wang Dong’er’s cultivation and physique was just enough to sustain the pressure from a soul thruster of this class.

The entire process happened way too quickly. The audience could only see a ﬂash across their eyes before two bluish-gold wings stretched out not far from where Zhou Xinghao was, and golden meteors that seemed to eclipse the sun rained down from the sky.

Zhou Xinghao’s soul tool fortress was still being assembled, and wasn’t operational at all. He had no other choice but to open his Class 5 protective soul barrier at once. He was also a Class 5 soul engineer, and he was a ﬁve-ringed Soul King as well. His cultivation was a little weaker than Shi Xing’s had been, but he was unnaturally talented, and he also possessed incredible strength. Zhou Xinghao had his own unique mastery of soul tool fortresses, and he could control certain immensely powerful and dense soul tools to assemble his very own fortress. He had a nickname within the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy; he was known as Heavy Cannon.

Zhou Xinghao used his protective soul barrier to defend himself against Wang Dong’er’s assault. He gritted his teeth as he pushed his soul tools to assemble as fast as he could.

However, Wang Dong’er didn’t continue her onslaught, instead descending from the sky. She folded her wings and raised them high into the sky, before they transformed into two enormous guillotine-like blades that slashed down from the sky. Her luminous wings seemed to make sparks as they slashed through the air, and dazzling golden ﬂames began to burn.

Zhou Xinghao’s protective soul barrier crackled and quivered amidst shrill and sharp sounds. In the next moment, Zhou Xinghao saw the same light sphere that took Shi Xing’s life erupt before him… and so, he subconsciously unleashed his own Invincible Barrier.

The Sun Moon Empire hadn’t even understood how Shi Xing perished before Zhou Xinghao entered the arena. He didn’t want to follow in his good friend’s footsteps!

“Stupid.” Wang Dong’er muttered with a smile on her face, and her footwork changed as she wrapped around behind him. However, she didn’t launch any further attacks.

Zhou Xinghao’s soul tool fortress was ﬁnally complete amidst a series of metal clanging sounds. At this moment, he seemed like a large metal porcupine, and more than a hundred and ﬁfty cannon barrels of various kinds protruded from his body, while he stood upon the metal base like a giant metal monster… and this was under the circumstance that stationary soul tools weren’t allowed! Otherwise, the much bigger stationary soul cannons would make him look even more valiant and fearsome!

Zhou Xinghao gritted his teeth, as he knew that he had been tricked. Everyone on their team had two Invincible Barriers, but soul power was still needed to use one. The user still had to use about one percent of his or her soul power even if their opponent didn’t launch another attack, while the most important component that he required for his soul tool fortress was soul power.

Zhou Xinghao activated one soul ring after another generously, and he unleashed all his soul skills that ampliﬁed his soul power. At the same time, the soul tool fortress began to spin on its base, and snapped around to track Wang Dong’er. Dozens of soul rays ﬁred off, and swung around as if they intended to slash the entire world into pieces.

However, he still couldn’t see Wang Dong’er anywhere even after he completed a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree turn. He looked up at the sky instinctively, but there was nothing in the sky.

“I love to beat fools,” Wang Dong’er’s voice sounded from behind him.

Zhou Xinghao couldn’t see, but the audience could. Wang Dong’er had been behind him this entire time. Soul tool fortresses could only cover about a hundred and eighty degrees around the user, because cannons wouldn’t be installed on the user’s back, as the body could rotate. Wang Dong’er picked up on this weakness, and she began to use Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track as the soul tool fort was rotating, and followed Zhou Xinghao’s rotation. She wasn’t too hasty to launch another attack, however.

Zhou Xinghao had his Invincible Barrier and his Class 5 protective soul barrier, so attacking her opponent would be highly inefﬁcient at this moment. However, both of these barriers required soul power to operate.

Cold sweat trickled down Zhou Xinghao’s forehead. However, the fact that he could represent the Sun Moon Empire in a tournament like this meant he had some outstanding characteristics. Nobody understood how Shi Xing had died in the previous battle, and he had perished without unleashing his full potential. Zhou Xinghao didn’t want to see himself in a similar situation!

The soul tool fortress was like a metal porcupine, and a ball of silver light suddenly rose up from its position behind the nape of his neck and instantly exploded above his head.

Wang Dong’er could clearly see a silver wave rippling out explosively.

She was still staying close to the protective barrier behind the fortress, so she was immediately repelled by an immense force. A look of astonishment ﬂashed across her pretty face as she extended her wings to compensate for the enormous pushing power.

Huo Yuhao frowned below the stage as he muttered to himself, “A shock bomb! Is he not afraid of the force shattering his own heart?”

Shock bombs were a special type of soul tool. Shock bombs were meant for offensive use, and they could produce powerful shockwaves to strike at opponents within a certain range. What Zhou Xinghao did was use a shock bomb to attack both himself and Wang Dong’er at the same time impartially, so that he could push Wang Dong’er away from him. He intended to hurt Wang Dong’er more, but he also hurt himself in the process.

“No, his Invincible Barrier hasn’t completely vanished yet.” Huo Yuhao immediately recovered after his momentary surprise. Zhou Xinghao used his own Invincible Barrier to withstand the shock bomb’s effects, and even though he had to consume soul power in the process, this was better than the shock bomb taking effect on his own body. Furthermore, he ﬁnally took the opportunity to spin around.

The several hundred cannon barrels on and around him ﬂared blindingly the moment Wang Dong’er appeared in his ﬁeld of view. At this point, he was no longer just a porcupine, he had turned into a terrifying metal blender!

All kinds of soul rays and soul cannon shells: explosive shells, incendiary shells, paralysis rays, freezing rays, shock bombs, decomposition shells, rupturing bombs, and various other frightening attacks covered an area of twenty meters around Wang Dong’er.

This metal hurricane that erupted so suddenly seemed to symbolize Zhou Xinghao’s emotions. His expression looked savage and ferocious, and his eyes were bloodshot with rage and fury. His eyes were as wide as they could be, and he wanted to watch his metal hurricane tear Wang Dong’er’s body to pieces.

They were so close together, and defense wasn’t Wang Dong’er’s forte, either. This was everything that he had, and it would be extremely difﬁcult for her to escape if she found herself locked in by this all-out assault.

Meng Hongchen covered her mouth beneath the competition stage. Several people from the Tang Sect camp stood up with nervous looks on their faces.

Huo Yuhao had just used his Necromancer’s Silent Heart, so his face was still as cold as before. His brain was still calculating at top speed.

Right in the moment that her opponent erupted, Wang Dong’er still felt goosebumps all over her body even though she was prepared. He lived up to the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s name after all, and their soul tools were very formidable. However, right when that metal hurricane was about to rip her to pieces, she vanished into thin air…

Yes, she disappeared without any warning at all.

Clang!

A powerful force appeared behind his back, and a sharp aura of light forced its way into the soul fort and poured inside. The entire cannon base began to shake with this attack.

“How can it be!? How can this be Instant Shift?” At this moment, Zhou Xinghao was facing his team’s waiting area, staring at Xiao Hongchen with a doubtful look in his eyes.

They didn’t have to talk about Wang Dong’er’s ﬁfth soul skill, the one that she used to defeat Shi Xing. The Instant Shift that she had just used was clearly not something that she released with her soul rings. How could she possess a skill like that?

Xiao Hongchen’s eyes froze as well. Who would have thought that Wang Dong’er had a trump card like that in a time as crucial as this?

Wang Dong’er’s dazzling bluish-golden wings slashed ferociously at his soul tool fortress. Zhou Xinghao no longer had his Invincible Barrier, and no matter how tough the fort’s metal was, it couldn’t be compared to a Soul Emperor’s attack.

Two deep gashes appeared behind the soul tool fort. Zhou Xinghao spun around hysterically, but Wang Dong’er kept herself close to him and used the Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track as she followed his rotation. Her wings resembled two heavy blades as they lashed out again and again.

Metal fragments broke apart and ﬂowed out continuously, and soul tool after mighty soul tool was rapidly being damaged.

Zhou Xinghao wanted to use his remaining Invincible Barrier along with another shock bomb to ﬁnd yet another opportunity. However, Wang Dong’er’s use of her Instant Shift made sure that he couldn’t even muster any self-conﬁdence at all. What difference will it make if I pull the same trick again? She can just use Instant Shift to evade everything... Zhou Xinghao understood that the key to his defeat was allowing Wang Dong’er to come near him. Her Instant Shift also had a range limit, and his soul tool fortress wasn’t suited for an opponent like her at all.

“Enough!” At this moment, a loud shout tore through the air, and a layer of silver light pushed Wang Dong’er away. The judge stood in front of Zhou Xinghao like a hen that was trying to protect her chicks.

“What are you doing?” Wang Dong’er exclaimed angrily with a cold look in her eyes. She was already preparing for a killing blow. The soul tool fortress was already cracked and breaking apart, and Zhou Xinghao was about to perish at her hands at any moment.

The judge lowered his voice and said, “He doesn’t have the ability to ﬁght back anymore. I’m the judge, and I rule that the Tang Sect is victorious in this round. I have the authority to stop the competition if one party is no longer able to ﬁght back.”

Wang Dong’er gradually calmed down. She grunted dispassionately as she gripped her Milk Bottle and walked back to the center of the arena.

“I haven’t lost yet! Go to hell!” Zhou Xinghou roared hysterically, and he arched his body backwards and revealed eight shining silver cannon mouths on his chest. Eight silver rays immediately ﬁred off toward Wang Dong’er with lightning speed in the next moment.

Wang Dong’er had her back to him, and she had not expected that Zhou Xinghao would launch another attack against her when the judge had already ruled this round as her win. Furthermore, the judge did nothing to stop him!

The truth was that this wasn’t because the judge was biased towards Zhou Xinghao; he also didn’t expect Zhou Xinghou to continue attacking after his ruling. However, he did feel an intense excitement and delight when those eight silver rays ﬂew toward Wang Dong’er.

“Watch out!” Huo Yuhao’s icy voice suddenly rang out in Wang Dong’er’s mind. Wang Dong’er always trusted Huo Yuhao’s words. Furthermore, she could also hear Zhou Xinghao’s hysterical voice behind her. She lunged forward towards the ground, and her ﬁfth soul ring lit up once more as intense golden light immediately covered her entire body.

Pop, pop, pop…Even though Wang Dong’er’s evasion was quick, the soul rays were travelling at breakneck speed, and three rays still hit her back.

Wang Dong’er grunted from the pain as she stumbled a few steps forward from the force. Even though she had the Goddess of Light’s Possession, three holes still appeared on her back, and she felt as if there was some terrifying force that was rapidly causing her body to break apart. If she hadn’t used her Goddess of Light’s Possession in time to defend herself, the rays would have tunneled right through her body.

“Bastard!” Several people from the Tang Sect leapt onto the competition stage in an instant. However, their movements couldn’t compare to how quick another beam of light was.

That light had a radiant golden color, and was tinged with deep purple hues. This beam seemed material, as if it could pierce through even time and space. The competition stage’s protective dome had receded the moment the judge declared that Wang Dong’er was victorious in this round, so there was nothing blocking this beam. Right when Wang Dong’er was lunging forward to lie ﬂat on the ground, the purplish-golden light that seemed to tunnel through reality and eternity arrived before Zhou Xinghao.

Zhou Xinghao howled and released his Invincible Barrier once more. He was excited at this moment; the silver rays that he had just used were forceful decomposition rays, and they possessed a special characteristic of breaking apart all kinds of matter. These rays were considered one of the most destructive soul rays. He could imagine Wang Dong’er’s body breaking apart, and drawing her last breath from the decomposition.

The moment he saw he saw that purplish-golden light appear, he felt as if his spirit was leaving his body, and he used his second Invincible Barrier that he carried around without any hesitation. He deeply believed that whatever his opponent unleashed couldn’t do anything to him with his Invincible Barrier around him, no matter what it was.

However, a sinister scene appeared on the competition stage the moment that purplish-golden light struck Zhou Xinghao’s Invincible Barrier. The people from the Tang Sect, along with the Sun Moon Empire’s team who were also rushing onto stage, and everything else that was moving seemed to freeze in that moment, as if time itself seemed to freeze.

A ray of golden light descended from the sky in the next moment and slammed brutally into Zhou Xinghao’s Invincible Barrier.

That golden ray disregarded his Invincible Barrier entirely, and it pierced right through it the moment it struck and landed directly onto Zhou Xinghao’s body. A golden light projection that resembled a skeleton immediately ﬂickered above Zhou Xinghao’s body, and his entire body seemed to freeze and go slack.

The purplish-golden beam drilled right through him, and Zhou Xinghao’s Invincible Barrier broke apart in an instant.

Boom!

Zhou Xinghao’s body was still inside his broken and tattered soul tool fortress, and he resembled a bursting balloon as his entire frame exploded violently, starting from his head. Flesh and blood ﬂew in all directions in that moment, and his damaged protective soul barrier was also blown into smithereens. Zhou Xinghao transformed into a tornado of ﬂesh and metal that whirled all over the place.

Time returned to normal, and the scene that everyone saw was this horrifying sight.

Astonished gasps resonated through the entire place. Jing Hongchen’s face was black as he stood up on the rostrum, and the petrifying atmosphere that resulted from the explosion that had occurred on stage caused even the Sun Moon Empire’s team to pause as they dashed onto the stage. Even Xiao Hongchen’s footsteps halted momentarily.

Xiao Hongchen’s eyes immediately found a person that was sitting down on the other side. That person was Huo Yuhao, who was still sitting in his wheelchair in the waiting area, and hadn’t climbed onto the competition stage.

A purplish-golden vertical eye that didn’t seem like it had any life at all was gradually closing up on his forehead. Xiao Hongchen felt a little dizzy even though this vertical eye was in the process of closing up.

One hundred meters! This attack was launched from one hundred meters away, and Zhou Xinghao also had his Invincible Barrier to protect him! Despite all that, this strike broke through his Invincible Barrier! What kind of power was required to achieve something like that?

The Sun Moon Empire team was about to go crazy after their temporary astonishment. All kinds of soul tools were unleashed one after another in that instant as soul rings sparkled alternately. A chaotic brawl was about to occur!

The Tang Sect team also began to move. Xu Sanshi’s face was dark and solemn as he stood at the very front, protecting Wang Dong’er behind him. He Caitou was right next to him, and he unleashed an enormous soul tool fortress just like that from nothing at all. His Zhuge Divine Crossbow Cannon’s sixteen cannon mouths condensed light, and one large cannon shell after another protruded from the cannon barrels as a terrifying aura permeated the skies. These cannons felt as if they could go off at any moment.

Xiao Xiao, Jiang Nannan, and Na Na were standing beside them, and they released their martial souls at the same time.

“Stop!” A deafening exclamation rang out, and a human ﬁgure descended from the sky in the next moment.

This person was an elderly man clad in a long green robe, and he landed right next to the judge. This person raised his hand, and a green light screen rose several hundred meters into the sky. This light screen forcibly separated the two opposing parties, and even the pressure that they released was separated.

Everyone from the Tang Sect camp grew stern, and this was especially true for He Caitou. He was a soul engineer, and he naturally knew what ability the old man before him had just used: that was probably a Class 9 soul tool, and even a Titled Douluo would have trouble breaking through a defensive barrier of that level.

The old man turned around and knocked the judge off stage with one slap, and the judge was dashed to the ground beneath the stage just like that.

“Stop, everyone! Calm yourselves. My name is Zheng Zhan, and I’m this tournament’s chief judge. Whoever dares to make another move will be immediately disqualiﬁed from the tournament!”

The corner of Xiao Hongchen’s mouth twitched. He naturally recognized Zheng Zhan. He was a powerful Class 9 soul engineer, but this man didn’t have a good relationship with his grandfather, and was instead an important ﬁgure from the empire’s Hall of Consecration. This man was as close as one could be to Xiao Hongchen’s grandfather in terms of cultivation, even if he didn’t actually have the same rank, and he was especially adept with defensive soul tools. Zheng Zhan was known as the Unbreakable King, and his title was Unbreakable... the Unbreakable Douluo, Zheng Zhan!

Xiao Hongchen raised his hand, and the Sun Moon Empire team reluctantly and grudgingly withdrew their respective soul tools. Their eyes looked like they were spitting ﬁre.

The Tang Sect camp didn’t do much, as Jiang Nannan helped Wang Dong’er up and whispered, “How are you feeling, Dong’er?”

Wang Dong’er forced a smile and said, “I’m alright, it’s just a little painful.”

It would be strange if she didn’t feel any pain after being struck by those decomposition rays, and three black spots could be seen on her back. If she didn’t have her Goddess of Light’s Possession that greatly weakened the force of those Class 6 decomposition rays, she would probably have been heinously injured by now. Even so, she had still consumed more than thirty percent of her soul power before she managed to stabilize her wounds, making sure her bones, ligaments, and her organs weren’t damaged. However, she was a top-tier beauty, and skin damage would infuriate her even more than if her bones and her organs were damaged.

“We need an explanation, chief judge Zhang.” A cold voice rang out from behind the Tang Sect’s people.

Ji Juechen was pushing Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair, and Jing Ziyan and Nan Qiuqiu stood guard beside them as they walked onto the competition stage.

The Tang Sect company parted to create a path, so that Huo Yuhao could come all the way out in front. His eyes were so cold at this point that they seemed like they could freeze through everything. Huo Yuhao stared quietly at Zheng Zhan, who was a Titled Douluo and also a Class 9 soul engineer, and his aura seemed to match even Zheng Zhan’s.

Zheng Zhan said in a deep voice, “I’ve seen everything that just happened. This happened because of the judge, and I will immediately relieve him of his duty. I will personally oversee this round until the end.” “That’s not what I’m talking about.” Huo Yuhao shook his head.

Zheng Zhan focused his eyes. It had been many years since someone dared to speak to him like that. Strangely, he wasn’t angry at all as he lowered his voice and said, “Zhou Xinghao attacked Wang Dong after the outcome of this round has been ruled, and he brought his own death upon himself. However, he has already paid for it with his life. This issue is considered resolved. As the chief judge, I will give Wang Dong ﬁfteen minutes to rest before the competition will continue.”

Huo Yuhao stared at Zheng Zhan deeply before his eyes turned towards Xiao Hongchen in the distance, but he said nothing. However, his gaze was like a sharp knife. Zheng Zhan thought about the incomprehensible and unfathomable purplish-gold beam that just appeared, and even he felt a little numb from Huo Yuhao’s piercing stare.

“Let’s go back.” Huo Yuhao spoke plainly, and he didn’t push the issue any further. They were inside the Sun Moon Empire, and he wouldn’t have gotten a better explanation or ruling even if this competition wasn’t in the Sun Moon Empire. Everything could only be resolved on stage. Ji Juechen continued pushing Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair as they returned to their waiting area. Huo Yuhao glanced at Wang Dong’er quietly as he passed by, and he reached out and grasped her hand. However, his expression was still as cold as before.

Wang Dong’er glanced back at him discreetly. She thought to herself, “Thankfully, he used that ability that allows him to keep calm and composed. Otherwise, otherwise…” She couldn’t even imagine what would have happened.

---

Inside the resting lounge, Wang Qiu’er’s eyes sparkled as she silently stared at Huo Yuhao. Her eyes seemed to glow with something, and her right hand unwittingly gripped her chair’s armrest.

Only she could feel that the beam that was ﬁred from Huo Yuhao’s Eye of Destiny carried a certain crazy sense of exhaustion, and even she felt a little dazed at that moment. She didn’t know if she could take an attack like that had she been the target. If Huo Yuhao was a dragon, then Wang Dong’er was his reverse scale!

---

Wang Dong’er immediately retrieved her Milk Bottle to replenish her soul power when she returned to the waiting area.

Huo Yuhao grasped her hand tighter, and Haodong power immediately began to circulate through the most important parts of Wang Dong’er’s body.

Huo Yuhao lowered his voice and said, “The next battle is up to you now, second senior brother.”

Wang Dong’er opened her eyes forcefully. “I… I can keep going.”

Huo Yuhao shot a cold look at her and said, “Shut up. You were careless before your adversary, and you weren’t on guard against an enemy that still had the ability to ﬁght. Won’t you be sending yourself to your own death if you go again? I’ve said this before: there can only be one voice in this team. I’m the leader, and you must listen to my orders.”

Wang Dong’er pouted, and tears started welling up in her eyes. Huo Yuhao had never spoken to her with that tone and attitude. That was just so, so annoying!

He Caitou chortled and said, “Don’t worry, Dong’er. Let your second senior brother handle this. I will make their heads pop one after another.”

Wang Dong’er nodded softly. Even though she was a little displeased with Huo Yuhao’s attitude, he was still her man after all, and this wasn’t the time for her to throw a tantrum. That would undoubtedly affect the inﬂuence and command that her boyfriend had as team leader.

The ﬁfteen minutes of rest were soon over, and Wang Dong’er didn’t continue on with the battles. The Sun Moon Empire’s next participant that stepped onto the competition stage was a little shocked.

Zheng Zhan had been standing at the stage’s center since the moment he arrived. He looked at He Caitou and said, “If you switch, it means that Wang Dong has admitted defeat.” “Yes.” He Caitou walked up to the center of the stage and stared at Zheng Zhan as he nodded in acknowledgement.

Xiao Hongchen almost went insane beneath the competition stage. The person that he had just sent up was meant to counter Wang Dong’er’s ﬁghting style, but the Tang Sect switched someone else up! From his perspective, the Tang Sect wanted to conserve strength so that Wang Dong’er could come back in the group battle. Nobody from his side knew much about Wang Dong’er’s wounds, but the fact that she was still sitting beside Huo Yuhao meant that her wounds couldn’t be that severe.

Cunning! That’s just too cunning!

Huo Yuhao’s arrangement was intended to break up his opponents’ rhythm and momentum anyway, and it wasn’t just because he was upset about Wang Dong’er’s carelessness before her adversary.

Zheng Zhan lowered his voice and said, “Report your names.” “He Caitou, Tang Sect.”

“Xiao Ping, Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.”

Zheng Zhan continued, “Return to your places, and prepare for the ﬁght. Both of you must listen to my orders during the contest, and I have the authority to punish you accordingly if either one of you decides to continue attacking after I announce this round’s ruling.”

Nobody dared to disregard and underestimate a Class 9 soul engineer’s threats. He Caitou and Xiao Ping nodded before they returned to their respective sides.

This was the single elimination round’s third match. More accurately put, this was the fourth match, because Wang Dong’er gave one up. The current score was two versus one in favor of the Tang Sect. Furthermore, the Tang Sect had ensured their entry into the group battle because of the two points that they had secured.

He Caitou turned around and stared into the distance as he reached the edge of the competition stage. He took a step forward with his left leg, and he took a stance as if he were going to charge forward.

Xiao Ping’s eyes were as sharp and focused as ever on the other side. He was like a cheetah that was winding up.

Zheng Zhan looked at both parties as he raised his right arm high into the air before he swung it down to signal that the match had begun.

Xiao Ping’s soul thrusters behind his back glowed the moment Zheng Zhan swung his hand down, and he blasted towards He Caitou just like Wang Dong’er got close to Zhou Xinghao.

Yes, he was a close-combat soul engineer, and Xiao Hongchen had initially meant for him to meet Wang Dong’er head-on.

A long spear appeared in Xiao Ping’s hands as he dashed forward. There were two sharp points on his spear, and they began to shine with intense light as he moved forward. Three soul rings lit up one after another, greatly boosting his soul power.

He Caitou was in a sprinting stance, and he also began to move when his opponent did. Of course, he wouldn’t use his soul tool fortress and end up at a disadvantage like Zhou Xinghao did.

He Caitou raised his right hand, and a soul cannon immediately appeared on his right arm. A silver sphere was ﬁred and exploded less than twenty meters out, transforming into a silver web that enveloped Xiao Ping ﬂying toward him.

Xiao Ping eyes were overﬂowing with the desire to draw blood, but he still managed to retain his composure amidst all the bloodlust. A white light erupted from his chest, and his forward-moving body abruptly came to a halt as ﬂourishing soul power undulations rippled from his body. He propelled himself backwards right as armor covered his entire body with a clang.

This tiny forward and backward movement couldn’t be disregarded. Xiao Ping had forced himself backwards when he was charging forward at lightning speed, the reactive impact wasn’t something that normal people could withstand! Yet, it was this reverse propulsion force that gave him a chance to avoid that enormous silver web from trapping him at the last moment. The light web closed up, and Xiao Ping was about to charge forward once more when a violent and shocking explosion erupted. Silver-white shockwaves detonated from where the light web had closed, and forced Xiao Ping to pause as he was getting ready to renew his charge. Xiao Ping’s body unwillingly stopped for an instant!

Chapter 293: The Even-more Terrifying Xiao Hongchen

Zheng Zhan’s eyes lit up, and he tilted his head as he muttered under his breath, “This fellow from the Tang Sect is not bad indeed! He’s combined a luring net and a shock bomb. This can control, repel, and carries offensive effects all at the same time. This is a very innovative soul tool indeed, and it is meant to buy him enough time for something. If his opponent’s reaction is too slow, this soul tool can directly take them down.”

He Caitou immediately made his move at the same time that he ﬁred his luring net and shock bomb. He moved in the standard way that soul engineers typically did, and he followed the stage’s edge and rapidly shifted along as he lifted a heavy cannon on his shoulder. Large amounts of rupturing shells burst out and blasted towards his opponent, and he activated the ﬂying-type soul tool on his back at the same time, soaring into the sky as he ﬁred off his rupturing shells.

The shock bomb repelled Xiao Ping, and he displayed his own strengths as a wave of rupturing bombs followed immediately after. Soul thrusters shone on his palms, feet, thighs, and behind his back as soul thrusters of many different sizes complemented the ﬂying-type soul tool on his back and brought his body diagonally into the sky. Xiao Ping surged into the air with incredible speed, and raced towards He Caitou as he evaded those rupturing shells. He pointed the spear in his hands forward, and blinding white light erupted from the

spear’s edged tip right towards He Caitou.

He Caitou had been observing his opponent this entire time. The soul thrusters on Xiao Ping’s body were all hidden within and attached to that armor of his, which covered the most important parts of his body. Xiao Ping wasn’t wearing full- body armor, but a lighter and more ﬂexible style. He displayed how advantageous this agility was as he soared through the air, and all those soul thrusters allowed him to make some movements that seemed to defy natural laws.

He Caitou shifted three feet horizontally while he was still in the air, and evaded the light beam just like that. The wings behind his back turned down and allowed him to hover in midair. He Caitou switched out the weapon on his shoulder, and a strangely-shaped cannon appeared.

The back of this cannon was conical, but it was rectangular at the front when he placed it on his shoulder, and there were eighteen cannon mouths split into three rows. Dense and intense bluish-purple light began to shine out from it.

In the next moment, lightning that seemed to blanket the entire world poured towards Xiao Ping.

“What soul tool is that?” Even Zheng Zhan was taken aback. He had immersed himself in soul tools for almost a hundred years, but even he couldn’t recognize He Caitou’s soul tool with all the experience that he had. This meant that He Caitou’s soul tool was self-invented!

Every lightning streak that this strange cannon ﬁred was as thick as an arm. The most frightening part was that these lightning streaks detonated once they were ﬁred, and each streak split into even more lightning streaks. Eighteen streaks transformed into a web of lightning bolts in an instant and barreled towards his opponent, who was still charging towards him. This web had a large surface area, and there was no way Xiao Ping could dodge this no matter how agile and nimble he was.

He Caitou had an extremely calm look on his face, and there was some straightforwardness amid all that composure that had always been there. However, there was nothing straightforward about the soul tool in his hands.

Xiao Ping was equally astonished by this soul tool that he had never heard of nor seen before. He kept his spear pointed forwards, and his armor glowed all over as ray after ray of light condensed to form a white barrier that protected his body within.

He Caitou’s pupils contracted. That was a Class 7 protective soul barrier!

Xiao Ping only had ﬁve soul rings, and it was evident that he wasn’t strong enough to use something as powerful as a Class 7 protective soul barrier. The only possibility was that this soul tool had special characteristics that allowed him to operate it.

This soul tool probably made use of resonance technology and merged many soul barriers at the same time, which allowed it to erupt with such formidable power. It was the only way Xiao Ping could produce defensive capabilities that matched a Class 7 protective soul barrier, as Class 7 was the rank of a Soul Sage! Naturally, this was also because Xiao Ping was a close-combat soul engineer. If Xiao Ping had been a traditional soul engineer like He Caitou, he wouldn’t use this resonance soul barrier even if he had it, as it would consume far too much soul power. Attaching something like this to himself meant it would be

very difﬁcult to use other soul tools, because resonance technology had to be in tandem with the soul power undulations at every spot on his body. There was no way to switch out to other soul tools.

Xiao Ping released his Class 7 soul barrier and immediately shot forward like an arrow. He didn’t intend to avoid those lightning streaks anymore, charging straight for He Caitou.

Xiao Ping’s Class 7 soul barrier had impressive defensive capabilities, indeed! The soul barrier repelled every single lightning streak, and Xiao Ping didn’t slow down at all. He was about to arrive before He Caitou at any moment.

He Caitou could already see the murderousness and sinisterly evil expression in Xiao Ping’s eyes. Zheng Zhan had already risen into the air from ground, and he prepared himself to end this battle as soon as was needed. Boom!

A vigorous explosion erupted between He Caitou and Xiao Ping. Xiao Ping still had his Class 7 soul barrier up, but his entire body was sent hurtling through the air like a bullet. His Class 7 soul barrier broke apart from the impact, and if he hadn’t unleashed his Invincible Barrier, the crackling lightning streaks in the sky would have torn him to pieces.

He Caitou was still hovering in midair, as if he hadn’t moved at all. A cannon barrel with a mouth about the size of a bowl closed gradually near his chest, still ﬂickering with light.

He Caitou switched out the soul cannon on his shoulder once more, and a golden-red cannon that was about as thick as an arm and about three meters long appeared on his shoulder. The cannon’s sight swung into place before his eyes, and he locked onto Xiao Ping in the distance. There was a large burning cigar sticking out from the corner of his mouth, releasing wafts of green smoke. The cigar and the green smoke complemented his doughty look, and he appeared as valiant and fearsome as could be. Xiao Hongchen leapt off his chair in the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s camp once this long golden-red cannon appeared.

“A Class 7 stinger cannon! He… how can he have a Class 7 stinger cannon?!”

Stinger cannons were considered the most destructive single- target soul cannons. More accurately put, a stinger cannon should be considered a soul ray, and it was only called a cannon because it was just too forceful. Not many soul engineers used stinger cannons because they required manual aim and consumed a lot of soul power. However, stinger cannons had a very long range, and were typically used to assault fortiﬁed positions.

A stinger cannon’s greatest weakness was that it couldn’t lock onto its target, and it couldn’t track its target. However, its power was incredibly frightening. Xiao Ping wouldn’t be able to take a hit from this stinger cannon even if he had his Invincible Barrier activated; the best solution against a stinger cannon was to dodge its attack, exploiting the weakness that it couldn’t lock onto a target. But Xiao Ping was hurtling through the air after He Caitou had tossed him away with some unknown method, slamming against the competition stage’s protective barrier and bouncing back. Xiao Ping’s Invincible Barrier could protect him, but it couldn’t help him absorb the impact. Could he react in time to dodge the stinger cannon’s attack?

Nobody knew the answer to that question.

Therefore, Zheng Zhan grew hesitant. He knew that stopping He Caitou at this moment would mean that he was declaring He Caitou victorious. However, Xiao Ping would have another chance to get back in the game if he dodged this attack.

Zheng Zhan no longer believed that Xiao Ping had the ﬁghting strength to defeat He Caitou, who had already displayed a Class 7 soul engineer’s prowess. However, the Sun Moon Empire’s team was already down two to one; how could he let them lose another point just like that?

He Caitou naturally didn’t care what the judge was thinking about. He aimed, and he ﬁred, it was that simple for him. More than half of the cigar in He Caitou’s mouth disappeared when he ﬁred his stinger cannon, as smoke and ash billowed in all directions. A golden-red beam as thick as a ﬁnger cut across the air straight towards Xiao Ping.

This enormous pressure heralded mortal danger to Xiao Ping. Even though he was still dizzy and concussed from the collision, goosebumps began to break out all over his body, and his hair stood on edge from the sudden pressure, allowing him to recover within the blink of an eye.

Xiao Ping didn’t have time to look up to see what was happening, and neither did he have the time to make accurate judgments. He immediately activated his soul thrusters and attempted to ﬂy out diagonally in an attempt to dodge this attack.

However, he felt an intense numbness course over this body at this moment. Xiao Ping looked down subconsciously, and saw a tiny needle protruding from his chest, a needle that shone with bluish-purple light. The overwhelming numbness was coming from this needle! That’s… did he stick that into me before I opened my Invincible Barrier when my Class 7 soul barrier was blasted away?

But that should be considered a stationary soul tool even though it’s a needle! This was Xiao Ping’s ﬁnal thought before he watched a golden-red beam swallow that slender needle. The tiny needle was destroyed, and he himself could clearly feel that he had lost something as well.

A hole no bigger than a thumb appeared in Xiao Ping’s Invincible Barrier and his heart at the same time. His eyes grew slack and were ﬁlled with incredulity. Not in his wildest dreams did he expect to die this way.

A dash of cold light ﬂickered across He Caitou’s eyes, but he quickly returned to his simple and honest look as he withdrew the cannon in his hands and gradually descended from the sky.

Zheng Zhan caught Xiao Ping as fast as he could when the latter dropped down from the sky. However, Zheng Zhan quickly discovered that Xiao Ping couldn’t be saved, his heart had been shot straight through. How could anybody save him? “He… he…” Xiao Ping’s eyes were full of exasperation. There was nothing else he could say, and he puked out a whole lot of blood before he ﬁnally passed into the void.

Two combat deaths from three battles!

The audience erupted into furor when Zheng Zhan announced Xiao Ping’s death. They were inside the Sun Moon Empire, and not inside the Star Luo Empire like last season. The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s team was representing the Sun Moon Empire in this competition, and three people had perished, one after another, in this round. How could the citizens not be upset?

Huo Yuhao’s eyes betrayed a faint look of surprise despite his ice-cold expression beneath the stage, and he glanced at He Caitou on stage.

He Caitou turned around at this moment, and he nodded calmly at Huo Yuhao before he removed the cigar in his mouth and gave him a smile that seemed to contain a far deeper meaning.

Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but reminisce on the scene when He Caitou had conﬁded in him back then. Second senior brother, he…

Zheng Zhan’s expression was a little black. He was a Class 9 soul engineer, but he had failed to prevent another death in a match that he had personally refereed, so there was no way he didn’t feel bad right now. However, he had been faced with a tough choice just now, and the outcome proved that he made the wrong one.

Xiao Hongchen jumped onto the competition stage with a dark look on his face. “I’m up for the next round.” On the other side, Huo Yuhao also spoke up from the Tang Sect’s waiting area. “The Tang Sect will abandon the remaining single elimination rounds. We choose to enter the group battle directly.”

Both He Caitou and Xiao Hongchen were taken aback for a moment, and Xiao Hongchen’s expression grew even gloomier than before. He Caitou frowned for a moment before he grabbed a Milk Bottle and leapt off the competition stage to show that he was absolutely supportive of Huo Yuhao’s decision.

The Tang Sect had already won three matches. There were seven matches of the single elimination round, and the Sun Moon Empire couldn’t possibly overtake the Tang Sect by more than ﬁve points even if they won the remaining matches. The ﬁnal result had to be determined through the group battle. However, the Sun Moon Empire had already lost two in combat, and Huo Yuhao had slain another. Three of the original seven were dead. Substitutes weren’t allowed in this seven-man round, and this meant that the Sun Moon Empire would be at a great disadvantage in the subsequent group battle. The Tang Sect had an absolute advantage if they chose to go straight into the group battle, as they were seven against four. Zheng Zhan stared deeply into Huo Yuhao’s eyes before he lowered his voice and declared, “The single elimination round is over. Both parties can take some time to rest up, and we will commence the group battle after the break. The Tang Sect has accumulated three points, and the Sun Moon Empire has seven.”

------

On the rostrum...

Xu Tianran’s face became darker and darker, and Jing Hongchen’s eyebrows were also tightly knit together.

The Tang Sect’s prowess was far stronger than he had imagined. The ﬁrst two participants were both six-ringed Soul Emperors, and He Caitou had just displayed a Class 7 soul engineer’s strength. It was correct to say that the three members from the Sun Moon Empire were completely suppressed by their opponents, rather than they didn’t manage to unleash their full capabilities. The thing that worried and shocked Jing Hongchen the most was how powerful Huo Yuhao’s eruption was. Jing Hongchen was a Titled Douluo, and even he felt a little dizzy and lost the moment that purplish-golden light appeared. He had found himself unable to lock onto and determine the peculiar attack

that Huo Yuhao had unleashed. What kind of power was that? Even an Invincible Barrier couldn’t stop it! Furthermore, the Tang Sect was in the right during that incident!

The group battle was about to commence. Even though the Sun Moon Empire’s reserve team members weren’t that much weaker than their main team members, there was a rift. Furthermore, his granddaughter and his grandson were also part of this tournament. It was absolutely impossible for Jing Hongchen not to be worried or anxious.

Xu Tianran asked plainly, “Can they win the group battle?” He placed a lot of emphasis on this year’s tournament.

Jing Hongchen took a deep breath and said, “I have faith in those kids. However, I implore that you give me permission to keep those guys from the Tang Sect here forever after the tournament. They will grow up to become real problems in the future if they possess such prowess at such a young age.” Xu Tianran glanced at him and said, “Either you make them submit, or you make them disappear.”

Ju Zi was still sitting beside Xu Tianran, and her eyes shifted a little in response.

------

He Caitou sat down beside Huo Yuhao, but his expression was no different from before.

Huo Yuhao stared at him and whispered, “Are you alright, second senior brother?”

He Caitou shook his head and said, “I’m good. Hehe, I’m good.” He raised his head as he spoke, and he gazed at the rostrum in the distance with a calm look in his eyes, there at the seat that was high above everyone else.

The arena and the audience had settled down, and several earth-type soul masters hurried around as they attempted to repair the competition stage. The group battle was about to start, and even though the competition stage was a hundred meters in diameter and didn’t look small at all, it couldn’t be considered that spacious if it was to host fourteen people at once. The least that the organizers could do was the repair the stage’s surface.

“Dong’er, you will remain by my side later, and you’re responsible for protecting me,” Huo Yuhao said plainly.

Wang Dong’er was momentarily stunned. Her eyes darted around at the others, but she lowered her head in the end. She forced herself not to rebuff Huo Yuhao and ask if that was being unfair to the others.

Huo Yuhao looked at his other compatriots. “Please follow my guidance from my Spiritual Detection during the group battle after this. We have to win this round, and we can’t afford to sustain any losses or injuries at all.”

Everyone nodded in agreement.

Huo Yuhao closed his eyes once more, but his right hand was still holding onto Wang Dong’er’s left hand. Everyone closed their eyes one after another, and they took this opportunity to mentally prepare themselves so that they could maintain their peak condition and go into battle in their best state. The subsequent round was a showdown of life and death to them, and a single misstep could lead to injury, and perhaps even death.

Fortunately, that powerful soul engineer had taken over as judge, so this round would be a lot safer than otherwise.

------

There were commotions all around the arena. The citizens and aristocratic families alike were all discussing things amongst themselves.

Those who were more familiar with the competition rules originally expected that the tournament would be a little calmer after the initial elimination phase ended and the tournament progressed into the round robins. After all, the round robin stage didn’t directly determine the ﬁnal winner and loser. The point accumulation was related to whether the teams would get to progress into the next round, but one loss didn’t mean that a team would be eliminated right away.

Who would have thought that the round robin stage that they didn’t expect to be too intense was so epic, and this was only the ﬁrst round!

Nobody had ever heard of the Tang Sect before, and they were up against their own country’s Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. The Tang Sect ended up killing three of their own in a row... what exactly was going on?

The audience’s hearts were with the Sun Moon Empire’s team, but the disgraceful attack against Wang Dong’er earlier made the audience cheer conspicuously quieter than before. That was such a low blow, and was simply too disgraceful. It was also the reason why most of the audience didn’t feel bad or pity Zhou Xinghao after his head exploded from Huo Yuhao’s formidable strike.

Nobody expected that the Tang Sect would have a landslide victory like that. Those who liked to gamble couldn’t help but feel fortunate that their country prohibited gambling. Otherwise, they would probably have lost everything they had in this round. It was the truth! If the Tang Sect eventually defeated the Sun Moon Empire’s team, it would be the greatest upset since the start of this tournament!

Everyone couldn’t help but feel a thread of hope for the group battle that was about to commence. They naturally hoped that the Sun Moon Empire would emerge victorious, but the three consecutive losses before this shook their conﬁdence and their faith. The Tang Sect’s ﬁrst two participants were actually two six-ringed Soul Emperors!

For most citizens, Soul Emperors were already considered unassailable and highly respectable people that nobody could reach!

The competition stage’s ﬂooring was swiftly repaired. There was no time to re-install the metal boards, but at least that didn’t affect the tournament.

------

“Step on stage, everyone!” Zheng Zhan announced with a deep voice.

Wang Dong’er was the ﬁrst to stand up, walking behind Huo Yuhao as she slowly pushed his wheelchair forward. The others didn’t overtake them and followed behind, more than enough to prove Huo Yuhao’s status as team leader.

On the other side, the Sun Moon Empire’s four remaining members got to their feet and jumped on stage one after another. Xiao Hongchen was still wearing that solemn and insidious look, and he walked in front of everyone else as he glared at Huo Yuhao in the distance. Xiao Hongchen’s ﬁsts were tightly clenched, as if he were about to swallow him up.

This round was seven against four, and those that were truly familiar with the Tang Sect’s team members understood that the Tang Sect practically had an absolute advantage over their opponents. Unless some special circumstances cropped up, it was almost impossible for the Sun Moon Empire to turn the tables. This was also the beneﬁt of killing opponents in the single elimination matches, as it wasn’t difﬁcult to see how much pressure the team would have to sustain with three fewer people.

Something utterly unexpected happened right at that moment. Xiao Hongchen suddenly raised his hand and said, “Judge, we’re admitting defeat for the group battle.”

Zheng Zhan was momentarily stunned, and he asked again to be sure. “Are you saying that the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy is admitting defeat in the group battle, which also means that you guys have lost this whole round?”

“Yes.” Xiao Hongchen was gritting his teeth as he nodded heavily.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes sparkled as he sat in his wheelchair. His eyes closed into a squint as he stared back at Xiao Hongchen, and his right hand unwittingly gripped his wheelchair’s armrest tightly.

Zheng Zhan paused for a little while as he stared into Xiao Hongchen’s eyes. He lowered his voice and said, “Alright, the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy has admitted defeat in the group battle. The Tang Sect is victorious in this round!”

Zheng Zhan was a nine-ringed Titled Douluo, and his voice traveled to every corner of the arena so that every single person in the audience could hear. There was an immediate uproar.

---

Back on the rostrum, Xu Tianran was also taken aback. Jing Hongchen thought that Xu Tianran was about to erupt in a ﬁt of rage, but Xu Tianran’s face broke into a smile.

“He knows when to bend and when to give or take. Not bad, Hallmaster Hongchen. Your grandson has improved a lot over the years, and he’s not so headstrong and all about the ﬁsts anymore.”

Jing Hongchen lowered his head and forced a laugh. “He’s humiliated the empire, your Majesty. Please punish him.”

Xu Tianran smiled and said, “The round robin stage has only just begun, and this round is far from over. The ﬁnal result hasn’t been revealed, so nobody can say whether he’s disgraced us or not. Furthermore, I’m sure he will learn from this lesson, and he won’t repeat the same mistakes in the following rounds. However, the Tang Sect is quite interesting, and they seem quite powerful. Imperial Tutor, what is the ability that Huo Yuhao used before this?

The Imperial Tutor was sitting on his other side, and he was clad from head to toe in black. He lowered his voice and said, “I believe it was a spiritual-type attack. His martial soul is a pair of eyes, but that third eye should have come about from some mutation, and it’s likely similar to the Body Sect’s second martial soul awakening. This has allowed him to develop formidable spiritual power. That soul skill is incredibly powerful, and I’m afraid there’s nobody at the same rank as him who can withstand that attack. It would require special soul tools or soul skills that are speciﬁcally designed to counter that soul skill if one wished to deal with it, and I believe the Hallmaster is quite adept at things like that. I believe that the Hallmaster’s grandson opted to withdraw temporarily because he hasn’t found a way to deal with that skill, and he wishes to conserve his team’s ﬁghting strength so that they can keep on going in the subsequent rounds. There’ll always be another chance to take revenge.”

Jing Hongchen nodded. His expression seemed a lot better than before with the Imperial Tutor’s afﬁrmation.

The rostrum was calm and cool, but that didn’t mean the audience shared the same composure. Retreating without a battle was a cowardly act in their eyes, and the team that represented the empire’s dignity actually admitted defeat, just like that! Shouts and curses echoed throughout the arena, and some impulsive citizens would have rushed forward if there hadn’t been soldiers standing guard all around.

Xiao Hongchen threw a cold glance in Huo Yuhao’s direction after admitting defeat, before jumping down from the competition stage along with his sister and his two remaining companions. Nothing else was said.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes closed into slits. “The Sun Moon Empire will be a lot harder to deal with now.” Xu Sanshi frowned and said, “I wanted to take this chance to cripple them for good. I didn’t expect them to be so frightened.”

Jiang Nannan shook her head and said, “I don’t think they’re afraid. Look at Xiao Hongchen’s eyes... do you see a drop of fear? We would deﬁnitely be unable to emerge unscathed even if we met them head-on and beat them in the group battle. We’ve improved since ﬁve years ago, but I’m sure our opponents have improved, as well. Don’t forget that the two siblings were already Soul Kings ﬁve year ago.”

Xiao Xiao chimed in, “The Sun Moon Empire’s reserve team can’t be that weak. Even though we’ve won this round, we haven’t done much to weaken their overall strength.”

“Let’s go,” Huo Yuhao said.

---

Everyone got off the competition stage, and their expressions immediately became a lot more relaxed than before. No matter what, they had still managed to defeat the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy in front of the Sun Moon Empire’s crowd. They believed that the Tang Sect’s name would resonate through every single household within the Sun Moon Empire. Of course, the other teams would also begin to place a lot more emphasis on them...

“Huo Yuhao.” A voice rang out behind them just as they were about to head back to the Brilliant Delight Hotel, and someone blocked their path.

Huo Yuhao was momentarily stunned when he saw this person. “Do you need something, Qiu’er?” Wang Qiu’er, the Shrek Academy team leader, was the one who had stopped them.

Wang Qiu’er lowered her voice and said, “Shrek Academy doesn’t need your help. We will defeat them all the same.” Of course, she knew why the Tang Sect had decided to go all-out in this round. Her voice sounded tough and cold, but her eyes were ﬁlled with unbending will.

Huo Yuhao was still under his own spell, and thus his expression could only be cold as he said plainly, “We didn’t mean to help you guys, and we were only helping ourselves. We’ve won the ﬁrst round, and good luck to you guys.”

Wang Qiu’er grunted coldly as she turned around and left. Nobody saw it, but she was biting down on her rosy lips when she turned back, and her eyes were a little blank and vacant. A thought suddenly surfaced in her mind... Did he do all that for me?

The round robin stage continued, but the Tang Sect and the Sun Moon Empire’s team both decided to leave immediately.

------

Everyone returned to their respective rooms to rest once they were back in the hotel. Huo Yuhao followed Wang Dong’er back to their room.

Huo Yuhao suddenly said, “Take off your clothes.”

Wang Dong’er was momentarily stunned, but she quickly recovered and understood that he wanted to see her injuries. But she still pouted and said, “Yuhao, you’re not allowed to use that ice-cold spell anymore. I don’t like you this way.”

The corner of Huo Yuhao’s mouth twitched. “Do you think I’ll have the ability to direct a battle with you around if I don’t use this ability? I didn’t say it before this, but the truth is that we might not have won the group battle today. If I’m not wrong, Xiao Hongchen’s abilities have broken through into yet another level. I studied his blood circulation and his soul power undulations closely before this, and I believe that my judgment is right.”

Wang Dong’er was dumbfounded. “Are you saying that he’s already… how is that possible? He’s only twenty years old!”

Huo Yuhao answered, “Don’t forget that the Illustrious Virtue Hall is excessively wealthy, and they don’t lack resources of any kind. It’s not impossible to use exotic herbs and medicine to force out a Soul Sage at the age of twenty. Furthermore, the effects that his abilities have against soul tools are incredibly difﬁcult to deal with. I’m very worried about how Shrek Academy’s team will fare against them. They will never give up their combat against the Sun Moon Empire with our performance today, and with Shrek Academy’s glory at stake. They will undoubtedly choose to ﬁght until the end, but that’s not something that I wish to see.”

Wang Dong’er thought for a moment and said, “We’ve already done what we could. Don’t think too much.”

Huo Yuhao tilted his head and said, “It’ll be very difﬁcult for Shrek Academy to defeat the Sun Moon Empire’s team with Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen around. Eh, why haven’t you taken off your clothes yet?”

Wang Dong’er blushed. “You… you’re staring at me like that, how am I supposed to take them off…?”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes were as cold as ever. Wang Dong’er felt as if she were being scrutinized and interrogated by that pair of eyes, and it didn’t feel good at all.

Huo Yuhao forced a laugh and said, “I’ll turn around, then. Lie down on the bed after you’ve taken off your clothes, and I’ll help you inspect your body.” The corner of Wang Dong’er’s mouth twitched. “Your words sound very strange. You’re not allowed to touch places you’re not supposed to.”

“Ahem, am I that kind of person?” Huo Yuhao answered calmly.

Wang Dong’er grunted and retorted, “Yes, you are!”

It took ﬁve minutes, as Wang Dong’er took her time and reluctantly removed her clothes before she laid face down on the bed, and Huo Yuhao began to inspect the injuries on her back.

The Goddess of Light’s Possession’s defensive effects were extremely formidable. Even though the decomposition rays didn’t have their own element, the Possession withstood the brunt of the attack, and Wang Dong’er merely suffered surface abrasions and scratches. She also wielded the powerful element of light, and this continuously nourished her body and helped her recover. Huo Yuhao still wasn’t assured despite all that. He discreetly poked a hole in his own ﬁnger as he inspected her wounds, and he squeezed some blood onto her wounds. The Life Gold that he had ingested contained immense life energy, and even though there was little of it left because he had been continuously assimilating it, he still had ample life energy. Wang Dong’er’s recovery naturally accelerated because of his blood.

“Yuhao, the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Competition is happening tomorrow night, right? Lucky for us, it’s on a different day from our own tournament.” Wang Dong’er was a little panicky and anxious. Even though her relationship with Huo Yuhao had already been settled, this was the ﬁrst time that she had revealed her naked body before him. Huo Yuhao was just looking at her back, but she was still a virgin young girl, and it was incredibly embarrassing. She tried her best to talk about other things so that she could distract herself.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes were already slack at this point. He felt an intense heartache seeing the three wounds on Wang Dong’er’s back, but even so, her silky and smooth skin, the tender curves of her body, her thin and slender waist, and her perky buttocks were so fatally alluring and beautiful. He felt as if her body was inviting him to make a mistake. No spell could enable Huo Yuhao to keep his cool at a time like this. He took deep and forceful breaths again and again so that he could maintain his composure. It took a lot of effort before his quivering ﬁngers managed to smudge some of his blood onto all three of Wang Dong’er’s wounds.

“What are you doing, Yuhao? Why do my wounds feel so itchy?” Wang Dong’er suddenly shifted her body subtly.

Huo Yuhao felt his entire body freeze up. Right when Wang Dong’er was shifting her position, two semicircles that were squeezed out from underneath her chest entered his ﬁeld of view.

This… the proportion is just so good… even though she can’t compare to Xiaotao, she isn’t that far off...

“Why aren’t you talking, Yuhao?” Wang Dong’er turned around to look at him, and she coincidentally met his eyes that were ﬁxated upon a certain somewhere. She exclaimed in shock and immediately pulled up the blanket to cover her body, and tossed a pillow at him with her other hand. “What are you looking at, you idiot!”

Huo Yuhao wasn’t prepared at all, and the pillow almost knocked him dizzy. However, he still maintained his cool because of the spell and he answered calmly, “I’m staring at the most beautiful things in the world.”

Wang Dong’er poked her head out from underneath the blanket and said angrily, “Were they nice to look at?”

Huo Yuhao sounded very serious as he replied, “Yes, they were very nice.”

Wang Dong’er grunted indignantly and said, “You’re sleeping on the ﬂoor today as punishment.”

Huo Yuhao’s body suddenly trembled, and his face became ghastly pale as his head tilted back diagonally onto his wheelchair. “I’ve used too much spiritual power. I feel so weak.” He closed his eyes as he spoke. Wang Dong’er was truly startled by his behaviour, and she wrapped the blanket around herself as she sat up. However, she quickly realized that a certain shameless fellow had his eyes closed, but his eyelashes were still quivering faintly.

“You feel weak, huh. Then you can sit on your wheelchair and feel weak all you want. I’m going to take a nap, and you can forget about going for lunch after this. Just stay there and feel exhausted.” Wang Dong’er muttered coldly, and she rapidly put on her clothes with the blanket covering her body before she lay down comfortably on the bed.

Huo Yuhao opened his eyes exasperatedly. “I don’t want to be like this either, and this is all because of that spell. Yes, it’s all because of that. The spell will always make me deal with things in the way that’s most beneﬁcial for me. Look like I can’t use this spell anymore. You can’t blame me, Dong’er. You can’t punish me like that.”

Wang Dong’er still sounded a little upset. “You’re still under that spell, so I will not believe a single word you say. Furthermore, dealing with things is one thing, and your eyes looking at things you’re not supposed to is another. If I don’t punish you in some way… hmph!” Huo Yuhao droned on and said, “You’ve changed, Dong’er. You’ve always been so gentle and tender in recent days. Why are you like this today? I was just taking a look, it’s not a big deal.”

Wang Dong’er sat up and stared at Huo Yuhao seriously. “Tell me honestly, Yuhao. Do you like how I am like now, or do you like how gentle and tender I was?”

Huo Yuhao was taken aback. “I don’t know. Both seem pretty good. When you’re warm, I feel like I’m about to melt. However, I feel a little more familiar with the way you are now. What’s wrong, Dong’er? Is there something on your mind? If there is, you should tell me, you should never bottle things up in your heart. Have I made you angry somehow?”

Chapter 294: Awaken! Wang Dong'er

Wang Dong’er’s turned red. “I was afraid that you couldn’t take it when I ﬁrst returned to my female identity, and that you’d still treat me like a brother. I tried my best to be gentle and passive. Afterwards, you gave so much for me, and so I wanted to be better to you. That’s the reason why I have always been so gentle, because I’ve always wanted to be nicer to you. But when I saw Qiu’er today, I suddenly felt that the gentle me isn’t really me anymore. If you truly like the way I am when I’m gentle, perhaps you don’t like the way that I am as a person. Therefore, I wanted to try becoming myself again. Is that alright?”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes grew focused, and an intense pain snaked up from his chest. Yes! I’ve given so much for Dong’er. But what about her? She has also been giving back to me in silence. She’s changed her own personality for me, that’s an extremely difﬁcult thing to do! It’s no wonder that I’m starting to feel that she’s changed over the past days.

“Come here, Don’ger.” Huo Yuhao’s voice sounded a little stiﬂed. Wang Dong’er stood up and squatted down beside him.

Huo Yuhao extended his right arm and pulled her into his embrace. “I’m sorry, Dong’er. It’s me... I have neglected you, and I have neglected your feelings. You don’t have to be so foolish, because you will always be my Dong’er no matter what personality you have. Quick, return to yourself, because what I like the most is a happy you. I will like you if you’re happy, no matter what your personality is. How can you change yourself because of me? I won’t be happy if you toil so much just to be with me!”

Wang Dong’er opened her arms and hugged Huo Yuhao as tightly as she could. Tears welled up in her eyes as she said, “Yes! It really has been hard for me, especially when you disappeared back then. I thought I was about to lose you, and I didn’t dare to be jealous, I didn’t dare to overthink, and I didn’t dare to be angry at you. I was too afraid of losing you! When you came back to me as if you were already dead, I told myself that I would die with you if you didn’t survive. It was so very vexing, and I shouldn’t have suspected you of anything, I shouldn’t have been jealous in the ﬁrst place! I tried my best to keep my spirits up and toughen myself up during that time so that I could take care of you with everything I had. I would have died with you if you had died, and if you were to be crippled forever, then I would take care of you for the rest of your life. It was then that I truly saw myself as your woman.

“But over the recent weeks and months, there has always been a shadow in my heart... a shadow that originates from Wang Qiu’er, and it’s there even though I know I’m the only one in your heart. However, I can tell from Wang Qiu’er’s eyes that even though she’s cold to you on the outside, the pain she feels in her heart is the same as mine back then, and it’s likely that she feels more agony than I do... because she really likes you. But I can’t give you to her, because I can’t bear to let you go. This is the reason why I’m so conﬂicted. I want to do my best to be nice to you, to be gentler to you, so that you can enjoy everything that I am. But the deeper I go, the more guilty I get, to the point that I’m losing my self-conﬁdence. I discovered that I’m not the Wang Dong’er that I used to be, and I feel as if I’ve changed, and that I’ve completely become your appendant.

“I’ve been feeling this way until today, when I ﬁnally returned to the competition stage after such a long time. It was only then that I woke up, and I realized that I’m Wang Dong’er, the only one in the world. Why do I need to have such low self- esteem, why do I need to have such low self-conﬁdence? I’m very pretty, and you love me! There’s no reason at all for me to lack self-conﬁdence. I’m Wang Dong’er, and the person that I want you to fall in love with is the real me, and not the person that has become your appendant. Therefore, I wish to become myself again, and I don’t want to be like I used to be. I will do everything I can to lock your heart in forever. Love is selﬁsh, and it can’t be shared! Everything else can be shared, but a lover can’t be shared. No matter how much Wang Qiu’er loves you, I will do everything in my power and everything that I have to protect your love for me! Nobody can take that away from me!”

Wang Dong’er was sobbing uncontrollably at this point. She was still hugging Huo Yuhao as tightly as she could, and she didn’t want to let go for anything else in the world.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes had grown slack by now. The necromancy spell made sure that his mind was still calmly analyzing everything before him, but there was nothing he could do about this state no matter how much agony he felt in his heart.

“It’s all my fault, Dong’er. I’ve overlooked your feelings, and I wasn’t able to realize your circumstances in time. Dong’er, Dong’er…” Even though the spell had given Huo Yuhao calm and composure, he didn’t know what he had to say to console her. However, he could clearly feel that Wang Dong’er’s entire aura and disposition seemed to change as she was cathartically releasing her emotions.

“It’s not your fault, Yuhao. These are all my own problems, and they’ve happened because my mentality has been imbalanced. It’s alright now that I’ve thought it through. You’ve sustained such heinous injuries for me, and the fact that you’re still alive is already a miracle! How can you pay attention to so much when your body is in such a state? Don’t worry! I will adjust myself, and I will be back to normal. All you have to do is understand my feelings, and everything will be alright!”

Huo Yuhao caressed Wang Dong’er’s back, though he was careful not to touch her wounds. Wang Dong’er wiped her tears and sat up straight as she stared into Huo Yuhao’s eyes with her face right in front of his.

“Remember, you can’t use this spell anymore. I don’t like the way you are now. You can sleep on the bed by yourself today.” Wang Dong’er’s eyes were still a little swollen from all that crying as she spoke, but they seemed a little craftier than before. Huo Yuhao stared at Wang Dong’er with widened eyes and a slack jaw. “Uh… Dong’er, can I still take that back?”

Wang Dong’er shook her head without hesitation and said, “Of course not, it’s too late to regret. Alright, hurry up and cultivate. You have to recover as quickly as possible. Otherwise, I will always feel this heartache!” She picked up Huo Yuhao as she spoke and placed him down on the bed before she covered him with the blanket. She sat down by his side and crossed her legs as she started to meditate.

Huo Yuhao watched Wang Dong’er as she closed her eyes. Her long eyelashes were still quivering, and Huo Yuhao knew that there was no way she could calm herself down at a time like this. Dong’er… the truth is that I’m very delighted that you will return to the way that you’ve always been. It’s my fault, because I haven’t shown you enough care and concern. You will be the love of my life no matter how you are, as long as you’re happy.

Huo Yuhao smiled faintly as he reached out of the blanket with his right arm and gently touched Wang Dong’er’s kneecap. He closed his eyes and began to channel his soul power. Their Haodong power still couldn’t be used during cultivation. Huo Yuhao’s legs and his left arm’s vessels weren’t clear and smooth, and it was too easy to accidentally divert the ice-type origin energy of heaven and earth into Wang Dong’er’s body. It was too easy to hurt her, and so the Haodong power could only be unleashed on the battleﬁeld when Wang Dong’er was purely supporting him.

------

The round robins’ ﬁrst matches concluded successfully. However, nobody could ever forget the ﬁrst match that was the greatest upset of the entire tournament. The Tang Sect’s name swiftly became the talk of the city, and every street and alley within Radiant City was ﬁlled with discussions about them. The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s reputation had plummeted, to the point where many citizens began to gather and pace around outside the academy’s main gate.

Shrek Academy’s ﬁrst opponent wasn’t that powerful, and they followed the same style during the elimination rounds and eventually emerged victorious. The round robins had just begun, and every subsequent battle was exceedingly important for every participating team. This was especially true for those teams who were defeated in their ﬁrst match.

------

The second day of the round robins’ ﬁrst round was completed. The sky was getting dark, and everyone had returned to Radiant City. Many people decided not to rest up, and the restaurants, hotels, and bars were ﬁlled with people.

People weren’t just talking about the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. They were also talking anther tournament that they could also participate in and beneﬁt from: the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament!

The Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament’s three participating regions had already produced the name list of those who were progressing into the second round. There were many more things to bet on since the start of the second round.

A competition between soul engineers was different from one between soul masters. A competition between soul engineers wasn’t that intense and epic, since everyone was just crafting soul tools under a fair environment. However, it was a lot more uncertain. This was a black-market competition, and many soul engineers who came forth to participate were concerned about their reputation, and faked their own names.

Everyone had a nickname that they used in this competition, and the citizens could only see the soul engineers’ performances through the information passed down by the three underground organizations.

The Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament’s second round was going to start tonight. The most alluring wager was the amount of time needed for the ﬁrst person to complete this round. This wager was separated into different brackets; the shortest bracket was within one hour, and the next bracket was between one to two hours, then two to three hours, and so on. The longest times didn’t have the worst odds. Rather, the middle brackets had the worst odds, and the two extremes had much higher odds.

For example, the odds for betting that the ﬁrst person would ﬁnish the competition within one hour had one-to-ﬁve odds. The odds for between one to two hours was one-to-three, and the odds for between ﬁve to six hours had the lowest odds at ﬁve to six. The second round had a longer introduction than before. This round would take ten hours, and it would continue from tonight until the following morning. All participating soul engineers from all three underground competitions would have to craft an offensive Class 4 soul tool within ten hours.

Soul engineers who could craft a Class 5 soul tool would pass automatically without any testing. The soul engineers who could create Class 4 soul tools would have an extra segment for a soul tool showdown, in contrast to the previous round.

Every soul engineer would have to take his or her soul tool for test-ﬁring inside a Testing Range, and data would be collected after every shot. The ﬁve people with the weakest results would be eliminated, while those who couldn’t complete Class 4 soul tools within the stipulated time would also be eliminated.

This round didn’t eliminate that many people, but it was becoming a lot more cruel and brutal. Nobody could be sure that his or her soul tool would be stronger or more forceful than someone else’s soul tool of the same Class. Under such circumstances, everyone would naturally try his or her best to create a soul tool that was as strong and forceful as possible. Pressure from the subsequent showdown would give these soul engineers a better chance to unleash their true potential.

There were many other forms of betting, and the three underground organizations were relatively adept at understanding the psychology of people. They were able to ensure that almost every single gambler had a bet that he or she was satisﬁed with.

------

Inside the Green Hotel, back inside the simple and unornamented lobby...

Huo Yuhao and company arrived on the scene. This time, Chen An was a lot more low-proﬁle than before after Huo Yuhao had instructed him to be so. He didn’t come out to welcome them personally, instead sending one of his subordinates to meet Huo Yuhao outside before taking them into the guest lounge.

A set of information and data was quickly sent into Huo Yuhao’s hands. This data detailed the soul engineers that had qualiﬁed from the previous rounds and their performances, and some remarks about them.

The contestants’ numbering changed when the tournament entered its main phase. The numbering did mean something in this round: Huo Yuhao’s number was 66, while He Caitou’s number was 88. These were clearly numbers that Chen An had picked out to make them happy.

Huo Yuhao scanned through the data. The Duskwater Alliance was left with sixty-seven soul engineers who had managed to pass the previous two rounds. A little more than ninety had progressed from the qualifying round, which meant that the main phase’s ﬁrst round had eliminated over thirty people.

Chen An had made special markings for about a dozen contestants among the sixty-seven. Some markings represented skip-overs, while other markings meant they were suspected of hiding their abilities. These numbers were quickly memorized, as it was important for him to know his rivals in order to win. Huo Yuhao had attracted Chen An through his offers of rewards and his threats of punishment, and in addition to his astonishment at the unique technology of Huo Yuhao’s sealed Milk Bottle, Chen An was utterly convinced of Huo Yuhao’s non-existent identity that he claimed to have.

“Yuhao, I want to watch you compete after this,” Wang Dong’er said with a smile on her face.

Huo Yuhao was momentarily startled, but then nodded and said, “Alright, I’ll tell Chen An’s people to arrange it.”

Wang Dong’er stared deeply into his eyes as she bent down to his ear and whispered, “Why are you giving in to me like that?”

Huo Yuhao forced a smile and said, “Am I not helping you recover your personality? You are my queen. The truth is, I’m not sure if this is good or bad for me.”

Wang Dong’er rolled her eyes and said, “Since you’re so nice to me, tonight…”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes lit up, and he was just about to ask her what was happening tonight when the guest room’s door opened. A row of people walked in from outside. There were six of them, and the two walking in front were dressed like soul engineers, each having a soul engineer badge on their chests. However, there seemed to be a mist-like layer ﬂoating over their badges, so that nobody could tell what Class they

were.

The other four people were evidently their bodyguards...

Chapter 295: Ranked Carving Knife

The two soul engineers who were walking in front seemed cold and tough as they entered the guest lounge. There was a tinge of arrogance in their eyes, and they threw a glance at Huo Yuhao and his companions before they walked over to one side and sat down.

I haven’t seen these two before in the tournament. Could they have skipped over the previous two rounds?

Huo Yuhao glanced subconsciously at the name list in his hands. Neither of them were wearing number tags, so he couldn’t conﬁrm their identities.

The guest room was quite large. The two soul engineers didn’t bother with Huo Yuhao and his companions as they found a spot to sit down, and their four bodyguards positioned themselves behind them.

These two soul engineers immediately attracted Huo Yuhao’s attention. He could tell through Spiritual Detection that the bodyguards standing behind them were soul masters, and they didn’t seem weak at all. It seems like these two soul engineers are quite important people. They look like they’re around twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. Could they be from the Illustrious Virtue Hall?

Huo Yuhao tried his best to search his memory. He and He Caitou had spent quite some time inside the Illustrious Virtue Hall, and he had seen most of their members. Naturally, he had seen quite a few high-level soul engineers. However, these two soul engineers were deﬁnitely below thirty years old since they were participating in this tournament, and it wasn’t likely that they were high-level soul engineers.

The guest lounge’s door opened once more as he was calculating and analyzing things. Chen An walked in briskly, and gave Huo Yuhao a glance before he stepped over to the two soul engineers who had just sat down. Chen An said respectfully, “Greetings, my friends. Many thanks to you for coming forward to participate in the competition. These are your number tags.” He handed two number tags to the two soul engineers as he spoke.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes were extraordinary, and he could faintly tell that the two number tags read 96 and 98 respectively. These two numbers didn’t appear in the data that was given to him, and that meant that these two soul engineers hadn’t participated in the previous two rounds. Are they people that the Duskwater Alliance has speciﬁcally invited to participate?

“Alright. Let us know when it’s time.” The soul engineer with the 96 number tag answered plainly before closing his eyes to rest and mentally prepare himself. The soul engineer with the 98 number tag didn’t say anything at all.

Chen An greeted them once more before he turned around and walked briskly over to Huo Yuhao’s group. He came beside Huo Yuhao and asked respectfully, “Do you have any instructions for me?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “Arrange seats for these two inside the Golden Hall after this. It’s alright if they’re a little further away, as long as they can see me.”

Chen An was momentarily stunned. He glanced between the handsome-looking Wang Dong, and then at the cute-looking Na Na. He thought to himself, He really lives up to his identity as someone from the Holy Ghost Church! This arrangement was strange, and Yuhao actually had one male and one female servant with him. However, he had been utterly convinced after Huo Yuhao revealed the sealed Milk Bottle to him, as the sealed Milk Bottle was the Illustrious Virtue Hall’s newest technological breakthrough, and it was also a top-secret affair. The fact that Huo Yuhao could show it meant he was evidently one of the Illustrious Virtue Hall’s core members, and Chen An ﬁgured that Huo Yuhao was probably someone that the Holy Ghost Church had sent to the Illustrious Virtue Hall for special nurturing.

“Alright, I’ll arrange for it at once.”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes shifted to one side, and he made an inquiring expression. Chen An didn’t make a sound, and he mouthed a soundless response, “The Duskwater Alliance has specially invited these two to participate in the competition. I’m not sure where they’re from, but my superiors tell me that they’re formidable soul engineers.”

Huo Yuhao had a look of revelation on his face. It was clear that the Duskwater Alliance had invited these two to deal with the other contestants from the other two underground organizations. If that was the case, they couldn’t be that weak. Chen An didn’t dally around. He turned around and left, and it didn’t take long before some ofﬁcials came forward to announce that the competition was about to begin, and that the contestants could enter the arena.

Wang Dong’er began to push Huo Yuhao outside. However, two bodyguards who were guarding the two soul engineers opened their arms and blocked Huo Yuhao’s path right at this moment.

“Please wait. Let our masters go ﬁrst,” they muttered coldly at the same time.

Wang Dong’er’s eyes widened, and she was about to erupt, but Huo Yuhao smiled and raised his hand as he said, “Alright, let them go ﬁrst.”

One of the two bodyguards grinned mockingly and said, “Good for you, cripple, that you know what’s up.”

He hadn’t even ﬁnished his sentence when a golden beam of light sparkled behind Huo Yuhao like a waterfall. The bodyguard hurriedly channeled his soul power and released his martial soul as he raised his hand to block the golden beam.

Boom!

The bodyguard’s body was thrown backwards, and his entire body began to burn up in golden ﬂames.

Wang Dong’er was naturally the one who had lashed out. The Fire of Light from her Golden Light Left Arm Bone immediately covered her opponent’s entire body. The party with a soul bone when both parties had yet to release their martial souls had an absolute advantage over the other side.

But her attack seemed to have disturbed the hornet’s nest, and the two other bodyguards raced forward and gathered with the remaining bodyguard as they all released their martial souls at the same time.

All three bodyguards had the same combination of soul rings, two yellow and three purple ones. They were all Soul Kings, and it was clear that they had gone through proper training. They protected the bodyguard who was burning up in ﬂames as they combined their auras together and started toward Huo Yuhao and his companions.

“Stop!” The soul engineer with the 96 number tag shouted. He wasn’t tall or short, and his appearance seemed as typical as could be. However, his eyes were conspicuously cold and gloomy. He walked over with the other soul engineer, and Huo Yuhao watched them in amusement as he sat there in his Golden Tree wheelchair.

“My subordinates are immature and unruly, and I’m deeply sorry that they have offended you. After you.” The soul engineer with the 96 tag squeezed out a smile, and he spoke and gestured at Huo Yuhao courteously.

Huo Yuhao wore a faint smile on his face as well. “That’s alright. I’m quite sorry about all this. Let’s go.” Wang Dong’er surveyed the other three bodyguards coldly, her eyes ﬁlled with indifference and contempt. These three were Soul Kings, but they were still nothing much in her eyes. Wang Dong’er was from Shrek Academy, so how could other normal soul masters compare to her? Wang Dong’er’s current cultivation rank was no weaker than Ma Xiaotao’s when Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er ﬁrst met her after they entered the academy. ---

The soul engineer with 98 came up beside the other soul engineer, and they watched Huo Yuhao and his companions leave the guest lounge. He asked softly, “Big brother, the fellow on the wheelchair seems a little strange.”

96 nodded and said, “His servant seems so gentle and tender, but she possesses such formidable strength. I believe she has six soul rings, at least. Otherwise, she couldn’t have forced him back with a single palm. Her element is light. Are they members of one of the Sun Moon Empire’s large families?”

The golden ﬂames that were still burning on that bodyguard had been extinguished by now. However, his face was extremely pale, and soul power seemed to leak from his body, as if he were ﬁghting against something.

96 walked over to his side and placed one hand on his shoulder. A greyish-white light lit up and swiftly ﬂowed into the bodyguard, and only then did he gradually stop trembling. “Nobody is to cause any more trouble after this. Don’t forget our task. Let’s go.” The soul engineers departed the guest lounge after that.

------

He Caitou pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair after they entered the Golden Hall. Wang Dong’er and Na Na, under Chen An’s special arrangements, were led by some ofﬁcials along the arena’s edge and into a dark corner. There were no seats there, but they were in a better position to watch everything that was happening on stage. It was apparent that Chen An’s arrangements were quite thoughtful.

Huo Yuhao and He Caitou were given places in a corner once they stepped on stage. Chen An didn’t dare to let Huo Yuhao and He Caitou attract too much attention after what Huo Yuhao said to him the last time!

“Between one to two hours – we’ve placed three hundred thousand golden soul coins. One-to-three odds, heh.” Huo Yuhao whispered to He Caitou. He Caitou was wearing a metal mask on his face, and Huo Yuhao couldn’t see his expression. But He Caitou nodded in Huo Yuhao’s direction, and the two of them interacted with their eyes for a moment before they transferred their attention to the crafting desk in front of them.

96 and 98 were arranged in the seats that Huo Yuhao and He Caitou were last at. They were wearing long soul engineer robes, but their physical appearances were quite typical, so they wouldn’t draw too much attention to themselves.

Chen An’s voice quickly rang out across the arena.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I’m pleased to announce that the second round of the competition’s main phase is about to begin. Please remain silent so that our mighty soul engineers will have a quiet environment to craft their soul tools. There are still too many people in this round, so some soul engineers have to complete their tasks beneath the competition stage. Therefore, silence is to be maintained throughout the entire process, and anybody who makes a sound will be expelled from the arena. Alright, let me announce this round’s rules…” Huo Yuhao perused the information that the Duskwater Alliance had prepared on stage as he listened to Chen An’s announcement.

There were a lot more materials compared to the previous round. There were ten kinds of rare metals, and more than twenty kinds of normal metals. The only problem was that there were no more than two kilograms of each kind, which meant that the soul engineers couldn’t craft any large Class 4 soul tools unless they brought their own materials, no matter what they chose to create. Chen An added one more line after he ﬁnished his announcement. “In the interest of fairness, every soul engineer can only use the metals provided by the organizing committee for crafting. The ﬁnished soul tools will be weighed immediately after completion so that they can ensure that the contestants didn’t cheat!”

Huo Yuhao was quite pleased with how the Duskwater Alliance did things. They were an underground organization, but they were still able to maintain fairness in their tournament and their rules.

“Alright. Get ready, all soul engineers. This round begins now, and the countdown has begun! Get into position, referees!”

The timing was closely related to the bets placed, hence it was extremely important. There were more than ten people responsible for the timing, and there were normal citizens, aristocratic members, soul masters, and soul engineers among them, along with people from other professions who were more or less representative. The Duskwater Alliance was doing their best to make sure that nobody could cheat!

Huo Yuhao wasn’t in a hurry as he picked up a silver-white piece of metal and placed it in his soul tool model. He had already activated his Spiritual Detection, and the two soul engineers with the 96 and 98 number tags were his targets. Huo Yuhao didn’t need his eyes to see, and he could still monitor every single movement that they were making.

Huo Yuhao was already astonished even though he had just started observing them.

The two soul engineers were moving very quickly, taking one metal block apiece and getting to work right away.

Experts could always tell with one look. These two soul engineers were familiar, well-trained, and they moved with rhythm and unnatural calm. They seemed extremely composed, and their hands were so stable that it was almost frightening. Every movement was exceedingly accurate and precise, and they did things just like Huo Yuhao had in the ﬁrst round that he participated in. They didn’t use the tools provided on the crafting desk, each instead retrieving a carving knife each as they began to do their own carving and engraving.

Truly formidable soul engineers didn’t really believe in needing tools to help them, they would rather complete everything on their own.

What caught Huo Yuhao’s attention were the two carving knives in their hands.

Number 96 was holding a dark red carving knife. The knife didn’t seem like it was made from metal because it became thinner closer to the blade’s edge. Therefore, this carving knife had a gradient that slowly changed from dark red to ﬁery-red, to light red, and then down to transparency. The blade was extremely peculiar, and its entire body seemed to be crafted from some kind of jade.

There were patches of cloud patterns on one side of the carving knife, and these cloud patterns seemed to come alive when soul power was injected during the carving and engraving process. This made the carving knife’s sharp edges shine faintly with layers of blade light. The glow wasn’t intense, and one could only see it upon closer inspection. However, it was because of these lights that the carving knife was especially sharp. The carving knife easily sliced and cut through the tough metal as if it were dicing tofu.

The carving knife that Number 98 drew out wasn’t ordinary, either. His knife was dark green in color, and a little bigger than his companion’s. There appeared to be rusty marks on its surface, but it didn’t look to be made of iron. It seemed very old, even ancient, with dragon-shaped engravings on both sides. One could almost hear a dragon’s calls as the carving blade was being used, and every cut and move added a green layer to the metal block’s surface before the green hues rapidly disappeared. There seemed to be wind-type undulations contained within.

Ranked carving knives? Huo Yuhao was astonished.

The Carving Knife Leaderboard was the list that soul engineers paid the most attention to, and the list gradually took shape over the years. There were one hundred ranked carving knives, and the list consisted of the most outstanding carving knives on the continent. The list also had an order, but most carving knives were similar in capability and had their own unique characteristics. Huo Yuhao’s Soul-Devouring Carving Knife was ranked on that list, though it was ranked towards the bottom because it had a unique trait of lashing back at its owner. Ever since the knife became Huo Yuhao’s Life Guardian Blade, he had not brought it out to compete for a spot among the other ranked carving knives.

The ranked carving knives were assessed every ten years, and they would be compared with the previous one hundred carving knives on the Continent that were ranked ten years ago. The winners would be added to the list.

The Carving Knife Leaderboard was extremely authoritative, determined and judged by nine of the most inﬂuential and formidable soul engineers. One Class 8 soul engineer from each of the Continent’s three native countries were on this committee, while the six others were Class 9 soul engineers from the Sun Moon Empire. It wasn’t hard to see how dominant the Sun Moon Empire was in the world of soul engineers, and more than seventy of the current ranked carving knives were located inside the Sun Moon Empire.

It would be foolish to think that one hundred ranked carving knives was already one too many. How many soul engineers were there? Ranked carving knives were priceless treasures to any soul engineer, and it was glorious for any soul engineer to possess one such blade.

The most powerful thing about ranked carving knives was the fact that they had their own unique characteristics, and perhaps even their own sentience, so to speak. This was especially pronounced when creating formation arrays. Ranked carving knives would infuse their own unique attributes into the soul tools that they were used to craft, and these soul tools would possess special capabilities that made them superior to other soul tools of the same class.

Certain ranked carving knives made the crafting process a lot easier because they possessed an extraordinary ability to slice through metal. Some ranked carving knives could add elements to soul tools, and the advantage of using such a carving knife was extremely conspicuous in the circumstance that Huo Yuhao and the others were in now. Of course, the more powerful the ranked carving knife, the more complicated the workmanship required to create it, and the rarer the materials required to craft it. More than thirty percent of the current ranked carving knives were unable to be replicated, while another thirty percent were replicable in theory, but almost impossible to replicate in reality. The formula to craft the remaining forty percent had been lost throughout the generations, and one could tell from all this that a ranked carving knife was extremely valuable. It was hard to ﬁnd a ranked carving knife in an auction, even in any of the top-tier auctions on the Continent. Everybody would be ﬁghting for the ranked carving knife if it did appear.

At this moment, Huo Yuhao could already see two ranked carving knives with one glance. He felt a little strange, but he was more annoyed than he was surprised. He really wanted to slap himself across the face, as he only remembered when he saw their ranked carving knives that he had one of his own.

Huo Yuhao had kept his blade concealed even when he was on exchange in the Illustrious Virtue Hall all those years ago. He didn’t want people to know he had it, and he wanted to prevent it from being stolen, so he had never used it before. His Life Guardian Blade had been nourished within his Eye of Destiny this entire time, to the point where he had forgotten that it was even there…

Yes, he had forgotten entirely that he possessed a blade as powerful as the Life Guardian Blade. He only remembered that he had it when he saw the two soul engineers’ ranked carving knives! What a tragedy! Huo Yuhao exclaimed grievingly and indignantly inside. However, he didn’t retrieve his Life Guardian Blade right away. The Blade had been nourished within his Eye of Destiny this entire time, and he wasn’t sure what it had become. Taking it out now would only attract unwanted attention. I guess I’ll have to wait until I get back... I’m sorry, my precious darling carving knife!

Huo Yuhao’s exasperation and helplessness didn’t affect his movements. He began to use the most orderly and traditional methods to craft his Class 4 soul tool, as he didn’t want to stand out too much. According to his original plan, He Caitou was the one who had to ﬁnish his Class 4 soul tool within one to two hours so that they could win their bet. However, he was immediately rendered speechless as he watched the two men in black who were using ranked carving knives, because he was about to lose his wager… with their speed, they wouldn’t even need an hour to complete a Class 4 soul tool!

The truth proved that Huo Yuhao’s judgement was accurate. Half an hour passed, and the two soul engineers withdrew their ranked carving knives and submitted their respective soul tools. The countdown was momentarily stopped, and their submission times would be ofﬁcially counted as long as they passed the test for their soul tools’ force afterwards. “Yuhao!” He Caitou called out softly.

Huo Yuhao forced a laugh and said, “Three hundred thousand golden soul coins! Looks like I was careless.”

“That’s alright. We’ll see about that in the next round.” He Caitou smiled straightforwardly as he continued crafting the soul tool in his hands. However, his speed was conspicuously slower than before.

In the end, Huo Yuhao and He Caitou submitted their productions along with most of the other soul engineers after about three hours.

The two soul engineers who were the ﬁrst to submit their soul tools were already long gone. Their soul tools passed the test with ﬂying colors, and were far stronger than the other typical Class 4 soul tools. There was no doubt that they would progress into the next round.

Both Huo Yuhao and He Caitou’s Class 4 soul tools were small soul cannons. The force of their soul cannons was just like the time that they took to craft them, average. They qualiﬁed, but they weren’t outstanding at all.

There were only forty-eight people who remained after this round to participate in the subsequent rounds, and this group included Huo Yuhao and He Caitou, along with Numbers 96 and 98.

---

Chen An met up with Huo Yuhao one more time before they departed the Green Hotel. Chen An told him that the tournament would become a lot more competitive in the next round, and soul engineers would have to face off against each other one-versus-one. It would be a little antagonistic, but Chen An wasn’t exactly sure what it would be like. Furthermore, he would no longer be the chief judge in the next round, as his superiors would send higher level soul engineers to anchor things down.

Having a inside man like Chen An was extremely beneﬁcial for Huo Yuhao and He Caitou’s participation in the competition, and this slightly alleviated the pain of losing three hundred thousand soul coins. Thankfully, he hadn’t thrown everything into that bet. He hadn’t wanted to attract unwanted attention, but it did seem like a highly rational choice in hindsight.

“Yuhao, are you hiding your abilities again?” Wang Dong’er asked Huo Yuhao as she pushed him in the wheelchair and they departed the Green Hotel.

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly and said, “I don’t think so... I feel like a fool now! Three hundred thousand soul coins! That’s just painful. I will have to go back and apologize to everyone.”

He Caitou chuckled and said, “That’s alright. Just earn back what we’ve lost. If we don’t hide our abilities, we can ﬁnish our soul tools within an hour too! We would have gotten our money if we placed our bet directly in that bracket, but we just didn’t dare to do so. The next round is competitive, right? We’ll see about earning back what we’ve lost during the next round.”

Wang Dong’er giggled and said, “Looks like you’ve gambled before, second senior brother. You seem quite professional with your words.” He Caitou smiled and glanced at Wang Dong’er. “Why do I feel like you’re especially lively and happy today? Did something good happen?”

Wang Dong’er was a little taken aback. She smiled sweetly and said, “Of course something good happened! But I’m not going to tell you!...”

He Caitou looked at her, and then at Huo Yuhao. He smiled mysteriously and said, “I know what happened.”

Wang Dong’er stared at him in confusion and asked, “What do you know? That’s not possible! You will never guess it!”

He Caitou said, “How is that impossible? The good thing that you’re talking about, isn’t that the good thing that’s happened between you and Huo Yuhao? Are you expecting? We should help you two arrange your marriage as soon as possible when we return from the competition before your tummy gets big. Don’t worry, Yuhao. We’ll call eldest senior brother when the time comes, and we’ll all join you in your proposal.”

Wang Dong’er was still a little lost when He Caitou asked if she was expecting. Towards the end, however, she could tell that something was wrong, and when He Caitou ﬁnished the rest of his sentence, her face was ﬂushing red.

“What!? Don’t talk nonsense! Huo Yuhao and I didn’t do that!” She stomped her foot as she spoke, and she gave the wheelchair over to Na Na beside her before she took a few quick steps forward and walked out in front of everyone else.

Huo Yuhao was just laughing throughout the entire conversation, and said nothing at all. Yes! He did feel like Wang Dong’er’s liveliness had returned to her, even though that meant she was no longer gentle and soft. It also meant that she was probably a little more quirky and erratic, so it would be a little more difﬁcult to ﬂirt with her. However, Huo Yuhao was especially delighted to see her so happy.

---

Huo Yuhao used Imitation to bring everyone back into the hotel and closed the door to his room. He asked Wang Dong’er to push him over in front of his desk and draw the curtains.

“It’s getting late. Let’s get some rest.” The tournament had taken them almost four hours, and it was already very late. The next match of the round robin was tomorrow, and they didn’t have much time to rest. Huo Yuhao said, “Go and rest, Dong’er. There are some things that I need to handle.” He was a little too eager at this point.

“What do you want to do? Let me accompany you.” Wang Dong’er pulled a chair over, sat down beside him, and stared at him with a curious look. She had been together with Huo Yuhao for far too long, and she could tell from Huo Yuhao’s expression that he was extremely excited. He had just lost three hundred thousand golden soul coins, so it must be something big.

Huo Yuhao didn’t keep urging her to rest. He gradually closed his eyes, and a pale golden layer shone from his skin.

Gentle spiritual undulations permeated the room with a strange aura. Wang Dong’er smiled faintly as she watched Huo Yuhao with his eyes closed.

Huo Yuhao was still a Soul King, but no matter how much Wang Dong’er understood about him, she didn’t know how powerful he was now. He’d probably become a true high-level soul master once his body recovered and he was able to move. His spiritual power was just too strong.

The Fullmoon Piercing Autumn Dew greatly boosted Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power, and had allowed him to ascend into the concrete-immaterial realm. This was his also his true hidden weapon in the big tournament.

The soft spiritual undulations continued to ripple as a faint golden crack slowly appeared on Huo Yuhao’s forehead. The crack slowly opened up, and a strange vertical eye gradually appeared. Wang Dong’er was a six-ringed Soul Emperor, but she still felt her entire body quiver and a dizziness surface in her mind when the Eye of Destiny opened up. She didn’t feel balanced on her chair anymore, and had to hurriedly support herself by gripping the table. She focused her attention, calmed herself down, and withdrew her spiritual power so that she wouldn’t be affected.

What kind of eye is that?! The brilliant golden eye was transparent like a golden crystal, but its pupil was a deep and elegant purple color. Strange but intense spiritual undulations ﬂowed out, and the entire room was quickly ﬁlled with an aura of formidable spiritual power.

A bluish-green light suddenly erupted from the golden eye. The light rays in front of the golden eye became a little twisted when this bluish-green light appeared, as if it were opening a door into another world.

Bluish-green light ﬂickered, and a carving knife was hovering in front of Huo Yuhao.

“It’s beautiful!” Wang Dong’er couldn’t help but whisper. Huo Yuhao’s eyes opened. The Eye of Destiny on his forehead shone with faint golden light, and his eyes were ﬁxed upon his Life Guardian Blade.

Yes! It really was, it really was quite beautiful!

The Life Guardian Blade had undergone drastic changes over the many years that it had been nourished, and it now looked like a translucent emerald. It wasn’t just transparent, like a crystal; its colors were dense, positive, and even. The green hues were full of life energy, and the entire blade was just riveting.

There were no patterns of any sort on the Life Guardian Blade. It was so pure that it seemed like it had been naturally formed, and not man-made. The fearsome and ferocious aura that had once belonged to his Soul-Devouring Carving Knife was entirely gone. While rippling with ﬂourishing life energy, the blade also possessed peculiar spiritual undulations.

Huo Yuhao raised his hand and carefully pinched the Life Guardian Blade with his thumb and his index ﬁnger. A layer of green light immediately shone from within it and stained the entire room a jade-green color. Dense life energy ﬂowed backwards and followed Huo Yuhao’s right arm into his body.

It was just a small carving knife, but the life energy that it fed back to Huo Yuhao was continuous, and ﬂowed endlessly like a river. He felt as if his life energy was expanding with breakneck speed. Furthermore, this powerful life energy was automatically ﬁghting against the ice-type origin energy in his left arm and his lower limbs, as if it were melting ice into water.

Huo Yuhao’s entire body was ﬁlled with energy and vitality, to the point where he almost moaned out loud.

He subconsciously infused his soul power into the carving knife, and a strange sensation surfaced. A blurry green light lit up at the carving knife’s tip, and a foot-long blade light protruded from it.

This blade light was slender and shaped like a trapezoid, wide at the start and narrow at the back. Simply put, the carving knife seemed to have expanded.

Huo Yuhao was holding the carving knife diagonally. The blade light appeared and naturally stabbed into the desk before him.

A strange scene appeared – the table’s entire structure was immediately imprinted in Huo Yuhao’s mind. Afterwards, Huo Yuhao could feel that the table had been… annihilated.

Yes, annihilated.

Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao looked on in shock as the wooden table was soundlessly converted into ash and dust. The table slowly crumbled in front of their eyes into dust that drifted down to the ﬂoor. The Life Guardian Blade only ﬂickered once with green light.

Wang Dong’er raised her hand, and dense light-type soul power swept out. Her soul power swept up the ash and dust, and she opened the window so that she could throw it outside. Huo Yuhao controlled his Life Guardian Blade and withdrew the blade light, which also put a stop to the enchanting bluish- green light. Wang Dong’er cleaned up the mess, and turned around and gazed into Huo Yuhao’s eyes.

“This… what just happened?”

Huo Yuhao mumbled, “This is called the Life Guardian Blade. Have you heard about ranked carving knives?” He immediately briefed Wang Dong’er about the Life Guardian Blade’s identity. Of course, he skipped some things that were related to Electrolux.

“It’s been nourished inside my Eye of Destiny for such a long time that I’d forgotten all about it. I really deserve a beating for that. I never expected that it would come to possess so much life energy over the years. With this blade around, I can feel that my life energy can be permanently maintained at a ﬂourishing level, and even the speed at which my body can absorb the ice-type origin energy has become a lot faster.”

Wang Dong’er’s eyes sparkled. “That’s a good thing even if it could only help you recover more quickly. But what’s the deal with the table?” Huo Yuhao thought back to something Electrolux once said. “The Life Guardian Blade was forged from Life Gold. If the blade has an element, then its element is life. It can manipulate life energy, and this ability is known as Adjudication. It can adjudicate the life energy in all matter. This doesn’t include living matter, and can only take effect against metal and all other sorts of non-living matter. This blade can absorb life energy from these non-living things to boost itself, and it can also cause those things to crumble just from absorbing its life

energy. Of course, that also means it can give other metals its own life energy. I believe that if the committee redid the Carving Knife Leaderboard, the Life Guardian Blade would rank among the top ten.”

Wang Dong’er asked, “What do you intend to use it for? For that competition? You’ll pay a price for possessing something like this. Won’t you attract a lot of unwanted attention if you have a precious carving knife as glaring and riveting as this?”

Huo Yuhao smiled, and he proved to Wang Dong’er how powerful he was with his abilities.

The Eye of Destiny’s light contorted a little, and the bluish- green and transparent carving knife in Huo Yuhao’s hands transformed once more, becoming a black carving knife that looked as normal as normal could be.

“Uh… Imitation? Can you change everything with Imitation?” Wang Dong’er stared at him with wide eyes and a slack jaw .

Huo Yuhao nodded gently and said, “What you see now is just the tip of the iceberg. Do you remember? I said I have a hidden weapon, and it’s not this carving knife. It’s a soul skill combination that I’ve invented all by myself. You will see it when we meet an opponent that’s powerful enough.”

“Alright.”

“Help me onto the bed. I want to try using the Life Guardian Blade to support my cultivation and see if it can help me accelerate the absorption of the Ultimate Ice origin energy of heaven and earth inside me. I have a feeling that full recovery is waving to me now.” Huo Yuhao’s eyes ﬂowed with self- conﬁdence. He had this powerful life energy to protect him now, and this allowed him to do what he wanted as he absorbed the ice-type origin energy. “That’s great!” Wang Dong’er said delightedly.

------

The next morning...

The sky around Radiant City was a little dark, and the clouds were hanging low. There seemed to be a heavy and gloomy atmosphere in the air as light drizzles billowed in the sky. The rain carried waves of a crisp chill.

Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair as they exited the Brilliant Delight Hotel. Na Na held up a large umbrella for her and Huo Yuhao, and everyone proceeded towards the competition grounds. The second match of the round robin was about to begin!

The Tang Sect was facing off against a sect called the Clearjade Sect. According to the information that they had, this sect was very special, and they were quite powerful as well!

Chapter 296: The Clearjade Sect

The Clearjade Sect was as mysterious as the Tang Sect. Since the start of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament, their progression through the elimination phase and the round robins’ ﬁrst match could be considered smooth- sailing. Hardly any of their team members were hurt, and their team leader wore a conical bamboo hat with a veil that draped low over their face. The team leader had not fought yet, and had just been commanding and directing the battle from their waiting area. The Clearjade Sect only put six people on stage, even during the group battles.

If not for the fact that their ﬁghting style was very different from normal soul masters, Huo Yuhao would have suspected that they were part of the Body Sect, who had planted themselves within the tournament.

The Clearjade Sect consisted of soul engineers, and so were naturally all from the Sun Moon Empire. They were based inside Radiant City, and were a highly reputable group.

The Clearjade Sect’s disciples shared the same path, as close- combat soul engineers. They utilized close-combat soul tools to boost their own strength, and even some of the Sun Moon Empire’s representative team members couldn’t catch up to these guys in terms of close-combat techniques. However, the Clearjade Sect couldn’t compare to the Sun Moon Empire’s team with regards to soul tools, as the Sun Moon Empire’s team had the Illustrious Virtue Hall behind them.

The Tang Sect versus the Clearjade Sect. This was going to be another epic match to watch!

The spectator’s grandstand beneath the competition was packed with people early in the morning due to the Tang Sect’s dominant performance in the previous round. The spectators were already discussing the match among themselves. The Tang Sect was the tournament’s darkest horse at the moment, so they naturally became the main talking point.

They entered the guest lounge, and the pergola blocked off the light drizzle drifting down from the sky. The lounge was equipped with several soul tools that acted as heaters, and warm air wafted towards them once they walked in. The atmosphere was moderately warm and quite comfortable. The warmth didn’t last long, however, and the Tang Sect’s team members began to feel waves of chilliness coming from one side.

The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy’s team, with Xiao Hongchen at the helm, were staring at them. Their eyes were like icy blades, as if they wanted to cut the Tang Sect’s team open.

Xu Sanshi shifted his mouth disdainfully, and he reached out with both hands and pointed his middle ﬁngers.

Xiao Hongchen’s eyes closed into slits, and his right hand made a slicing movement across his neck.

“Losers,” Xu Sanshi grunted contemptuously. He didn’t look at them anymore and sat down with the rest of his team members.

--- The Tang Sect’s match was the ﬁrst one of the day, since they won their last one. The Sun Moon Empire’s team was pushed into the second segment.

The Shrek Academy team had also arrived. Wang Qiu’er was still the one leading the pack, but their eldest senior sister, Zhang Lexuan, was nowhere to be seen. Nobody knew where she had disappeared to.

“Dong’er will take the ﬁrst bout,” Huo Yuhao said with a faint smile on his face.

Everyone looked at him in surprise. Huo Yuhao smiled again and said, “Afterwards, Xiao Xiao will take the next bout. We will ﬁght with our female generals today, and everyone will take two bouts if you can defeat your ﬁrst opponent. We will request to enter the group battle directly afterwards. We haven’t been ﬁghting enough group battles since the start of the tournament, and our opponents will only get stronger and stronger. We’ll take this opportunity to practice.”

Everyone couldn’t help but laugh and smile as they listened to Huo Yuhao’s words. It was clear that Huo Yuhao didn’t think anything of the Clearjade Sect at all, and he treated them as target practice. His self-conﬁdence came from his abilities. Even though Bei Bei wasn’t there with them, they had still managed to force the Sun Moon Empire’s team to admit defeat in the previous round. That outcome boosted everyone’s conﬁdence. Everyone came from Shrek Academy, and every single one of them were among the best soul masters of their

respective ranks. It was within their rights to have such conﬁdence.

The Clearjade Sect’s team members arrived at the guest lounge about that time. A man clad in a long robe and a conical bamboo hat on his head took point. Or rather, it was difﬁcult to tell whether he was male or female. His clothes were wide and oversized, and big enough to cover his frame. This person looked extremely mysterious.

Roughly a dozen people followed closely behind him. The main team members were positioned towards the front, while the reserve team members trailed at the back.

The Clearjade Sect’s team uniform was pale yellow in color.

It was very eye-catching. The person walking in front of the Clearjade Sect’s company paused for a moment and turned towards Huo Yuhao. Perhaps he could feel the Tang Sect watching them. An eerie and chilly aura rippled towards Huo Yuhao without any warning. The intimidating pressure was ﬁlled with a razor-sharp aura, and even the air seemed to tear and crackle faintly, as if it were being torn apart.

A tall ﬁgure stood up in front of Huo Yuhao without waiting for him to react. This person was just standing there, but there was a feeling that he was about to split heaven and earth in half. This person’s eyes focused and immediately dispelled the sharp aura that emanated from the Clearjade Sect’s team leader. Sword intent surged through the air, and the entire guest lounge was immediately charged with hostility and murderous intent.

There was no question that the Sword Maniac, Ji Juechen, was the person that stood in front of Huo Yuhao.

They had been here for a long time, but both Jing Ziyan and he hadn’t found anyone else besides Nan Qiuqiu to spar with. They were part of the Tang Sect after all, so they had to try their best to avoid causing trouble for them. But somebody was trying to provoke them beneath the competition stage. Ji Juechen couldn’t hold himself back anymore, and the sword intent that had been suppressed for a long time erupted like a geyser.

A peculiar scene appeared inside the guest lounge: almost all the soul masters inside the guest lounge released their martial souls to ﬁght back against Ji Juechen’s sword intent.

Sword intent continued to surge relentlessly around the room, and everyone felt as if they were about to be struck by this sword maniac in the next moment!

“Brother Ji.” Huo Yuhao gently reminded him exasperatedly.

“Ji Juechen?!” A deafening shout rang out. Did this voice not belong to Xiao Hongchen?

Ji Juechen, Jing Ziyan and the others had been following the Tang Sect before this, but Xiao Hongchen and his sister had been too focused on Huo Yuhao and the others this whole time. Furthermore, they weren’t that familiar with Ji Juechen and Jing Ziyan. Xiao Hongchen ﬁnally recognized him after Ji Juechen unleashed his signature intimidating sword intent.

“Ji Juechen! You’ve deserted us and joined the Tang Sect?” Xiao Hongchun howled as he gritted his teeth.

Ji Juechen frowned, but said nothing. Jing Ziyan couldn’t take it anymore, and retorted, “You call that deserting? Can you not make it sound so horrible? We joined a sect after we left the academy. Are you saying that we were sold to the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy?”

“You…”

“What’s happening? Withdraw your martial souls. Do you want me to disqualify the lot of you?” A bright voice broke the tension, and the same person that had acted as judge for the match between the Sun Moon Empire’s team and the Tang Sect that day appeared: the Class 9 soul engineer, the Unbreakable Douluo! A powerful aura ﬂowed from his body and forcefully suppressed all the tension and disturbance in the guest lounge. Teachers typically didn’t enter the tournament’s guest lounge. Therefore, everyone here was a contestant. Everyone became a lot calmer once the formidable Titled Douluo appeared.

Everyone withdrew their martial souls. Ji Juechen just glanced coldly at Xiao Hongchen before he sat down with Jing Ziyan.

Xiao Hongchen’s face was frighteningly dark and gloomy. His eyes were closed into slits, and nobody knew what he was thinking about. His black face was enough to portray the extreme rage and fury that he was feeling right now.

The Clearjade Sect’s team leader sat down as well, as if nothing had happened at all. He appeared incredibly calm and composed.

Zheng Zhan surveyed the guest lounge authoritatively before leaving. He stepped on the competition stage directly; he was the judge today again! Huo Yuhao frowned faintly. Is this Titled Douluo, this Class 9 soul engineer, targeting the Tang Sect? It’s him again! But he does seem quite fair…

---

Time was up, and Zheng Zhan’s bright and crisp voice travelled to every corner of the arena. “The second match of the round robin... the Tang Sect versus the Clearjade Sect! Contestants, please enter your waiting areas and prepare for battle. The single elimination round’s ﬁrst contestant can step onto the stage directly.”

Everyone from the Tang Sect stood up one after another. Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao, and everyone walked towards their waiting areas.

Seven people from the Clearjade Sect stood up. Six people surrounded their mysterious team leader as they proceeded towards their waiting area on the other side. The atmosphere immediately became tense and antagonistic once they left the guest lounge. Wang Dong’er opened her umbrella and sheltered herself and Huo Yuhao against the light drizzle. Huo Yuhao turned his head around and glanced in the Clearjade Sect’s direction. The Clearjade Sect’s team leader seemed to be watching him as well, but their gazes couldn’t meet directly due to the veil

hanging from his conical bamboo hat. However, Huo Yuhao felt something in his heart.

Both parties quickly entered their respective waiting areas. There were no archways to shelter them against the rain in the waiting areas, so everyone could only use their umbrellas. Wang Dong’er passed the umbrella to Na Na before tapping on the ground with her foot and drifting gently onto the competition stage.

The audience in the distance erupted into a cacophony when she leapt onto the stage. Everyone shouted different things, but they were all jeering her. It was clear that this powerful contestant from the Tang Sect, that had defeated two of the Sun Moon Empire’s team members, wasn’t welcome at all. Even though Wang Dong was still as handsome as ever when dressed like a guy, this still wasn’t enough to offset the contempt the audience felt in their hearts. The ﬁrst contestant from the Clearjade Sect was a short and ﬁerce-looking youth. He wasn’t fat or skinny, but he was only about a meter and sixty centimeters tall. His movements were extremely agile, but he seemed a little indecent.

Both contestants quickly stood at the center of the competition stage, which had been repaired earlier, and faced each other.

Zheng Zhan glanced between them both. He wasn’t like other judges, and it felt as if he was trying to remember the tournament’s contestants. He lowered his voice and said, “Report your names.”

“Wang Dong of the Tang Sect.”

“You Chen of the Clearjade Sect.”

Zheng Zhan nodded and said, “I’m sure you guys are clear about the tournament rules, so I won’t repeat them again. But remember, this is just a competition, and it’s not a ﬁght to the death. Both of you have been raised by your parents, and you only get to live once. Whoever is out to kill his or her adversary cannot blame me for disqualifying you from the tournament. Do you understand?”

“Understood.” Wang Dong’er and You Chen acknowledged at once.

Wang Dong’er had been observing her opponent ever since he stepped on stage. She could clearly feel the hostility in her opponent’s eyes, and there was no question that this hostility stemmed from the previous round’s result. The Clearjade Sect came from Radiant City after all, and must be friendly towards the Sun Moon Empire’s team.

But so what?

Wang Dong’er lifted her chin slightly. She was taller than You Chen, and so it seemed like she was looking down on him.

You Chen shot a cold look at her. He turned around immediately and walked toward the stage’s other edge.

Wang Dong’er turned around and proceeded to her own side. They widened their stride and arrived at their respective corners while they prepared for battle.

Zheng Zhan raised his right hand high into the air. Once he could see that both parties were ready and in place, he swung his arm down forcefully and shouted, “Begin!”

Both of them began to move once his arm went down. Wang Dong’er tapped on the ground with her foot, and she seemed as light as ever as she charged forward. Her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings extended behind her back, while her soul rings sparkled dazzlingly at the same time. Pale golden light immediately covered her entire body.

Wang Dong’er was a lot more careful today after the painful lesson that she had learned from the previous round. She would never give her opponent the chance to ambush her, no matter what.

You Chen raised his arms from his sides, and two beams of light ﬂashed by before a spike-like weapon appeared in each of his hands. Two yellow and three purple soul rings rose from his body at the same time. The Clearjade Sect consisted of soul engineers, so Wang Dong’er wouldn’t underestimate her opponent because of his non-optimal soul ring combination.

You Chen’s body and soul rings suddenly looked a little virtual. He left a trail of afterimages in his wake as he darted forward, and he covered several tens of meters with one step.

What incredible speed! Surprisingly, he wasn’t a soul engineer that focused on boosting soul power – he was an agility-type soul master.

Wang Dong’er had ample ﬁghting experience. She was taken by surprise, but that didn’t slow her reactions at all. She tapped her left leg on the ground, and she spun in a circle as if she were about to dance. Her wings transformed into two huge blades and sliced towards the spikes in her opponent’s hands, which were clearly soul weapons.

“Ding, ding!” Two bright, crisp sounds could be heard. Two yellow circles rippled through the air, and Wang Dong’er accelerated in the next moment as her footwork became incredibly complex and mystical as she sidestepped You Chen’s attack.

Those with better vision realized that Wang Dong’er’s wings had two small holes in them. She moved fast and tried her best to mask this fact, but it was clear that she was the one at a disadvantage in this collision.

“Powerful offensive capability. These spikes should make up his entire arsenal of soul tools. This is the mark of a true agility-type soul engineer.” Zheng Zhan nodded lightly as he thought to himself. He was quite in awe towards this contestant from the Clearjade Sect, who was developing down a very focused and singular path. Soul masters who wanted to become something had to display their greatest strengths in their entirety; this was the only way to stand out from the rest, the only way to become stronger.

Wang Dong’er was also a little astonished. Her wings were tough, and in addition to her quick reactions, enabled her to push away those spikes in the nick of time. Otherwise, her opponent’s spikes would probably have stabbed right into her body.

Wang Dong’er had been defeated in battle before, but this was the ﬁrst time that her martial soul had been damaged. Martial souls were part of a soul master’s body, and it didn’t matter whether soul masters had beast souls or tool souls. Injuries to a soul master’s martial soul would undoubtedly affected the soul master’s own body. At this moment, the soul power within Wang Dong’er’s body became a little messy and disorganized.

Wang Dong’er was full of admiration inside. It was just as Huo Yuhao had said: every single team that could progress into the round robins wasn’t simple at all.

But this was the only thought that ran through her mind. You Chen was just too fast – his third soul ring lit up when Wang Dong’er sidestepped his attack, and his body seemed to split apart in the next moment as the afterimages that appeared from his incredible speed suddenly became material. His ﬁgure split apart into seven identical clones that surrounded Wang Dong’er at the same time. Everything happened way too quickly, and Wang Dong’er had no chance to dodge even if she wanted to. She was surrounded and trapped just like that.

But Wang Dong’er was a Soul Emperor, and she was a Soul Emperor from Shrek Academy. She wouldn’t be amongst the academy’s next-generation elites if she was stumped by her opponent’s speed.

Wang Dong’er’s fourth soul ring sparkled when her opponent and his shadows began to surround her. A beautiful yellow halo appeared on the ground with her body in its center. Wang Dong’er didn’t move at all as her opponent and his shadows closed in on her, and she just closed her eyes, as if she were using her ears to listen intently to something. She placed her hands together in front of her chest at the same time, and a sphere of light began to condense.

The seven images arched inwards before they bounced out like lightning bolts. You Chen’s reactions were quick, indeed. Right when his seven images bolted out, a gigantic pillar of light that was over two meters tall rose into the sky with Wang Dong’er at its center: her Hexagram Array! This soul skill had formidable offensive and controlling capabilities, but it required her to predict her opponent’s attacks and movements.

She wasn’t working together with Huo Yuhao for now, but she was still as powerful as she had always been.

You Chen didn’t seem like he could maintain those seven images for too long. His seven images bolted out and instantly collapsed back together, and it was then that he saw a blade of light that seemed to eclipse the sun sweep towards him.

Wang Dong’er’s third soul skill, the Butterﬂy Goddess Slash.

Her Butterﬂy Goddess Slash wasn’t a concentrated attack anymore. It was separated into one hundred and eight light blades, and they were like an enormous web under Wang Dong’er’s control as they rushed towards You Chen.

You Chen retreated explosively. At a time like this, the only way he could avoid this attack was to move backwards. You Chen possessed incredible speed and outstanding offensive abilities, but his defensive powers weren’t that impressive at all. He wasn’t willing to risk being struck by his opponent. The truth was that You Chen resembled an assassin, and he was most adept with hiding in the darkness and erupting all at once to give his opponent a fatal blow.

However, this was a tournament after all, and there was no way he could hide himself on the competition stage. He left another trail of afterimages as he dashed backwards at breakneck speed.

Wang Dong’er didn’t chase him, instead making a simple gesture with her hands, as if she were lifting something.

You Chen had been monitoring her movements this whole time. Once she raised her hands, he nearly subconsciously bounced away diagonally like a ﬁsh.

A golden pillar appeared in the path that he was trying to escape toward – it was another Hexagram Array. You Chen’s reaction was quick, but Wang Dong’er’s judgement was extremely accurate. This simple movement swept away two of his afterimages and caused You Chen’s body to tremble. His aura seemed a little weaker than before, and then he looked on as Wang Dong’er’s hands made another lifting gesture yet again.

Hexagram Array was a powerful offensive and controlling skill all at once. More importantly, it was a fearsome ability that could be released again and again. Hexagram Array was Wang Dong’er’s fourth soul skill, and it was a ﬁve-thousand year soul skill. It just didn’t look like it on the surface.

You Chen was taken aback as he watched her lift her hands once more, and he immediately lunged sideways. However, he could see the sly and cunning smile on Wang Dong’er’s face as he pounced horizontally, and her hands suddenly paused in midair. In the next moment, You Chen could only watch as his body slammed into a golden beam that had just soared into the sky.

A golden layer immediately erupted from You Chen’s body without hesitation. He didn’t dare let Wang Dong’er’s Hexagram Array touch him. The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy didn’t have exclusive rights to use the Invincible Barrier; the Clearjade Sect had some too. He was immediately enveloped by her Hexagram Array when he released his Invincible Barrier.

You Chen couldn’t be bothered with his soul power that was being rapidly drained away. He tapped on the ground with his foot, and unleashed as much speed as he possibly could. This time, he left nine afterimages in his wake as he lunged directly towards Wang Dong’er. He wanted to use what little time his Invincible Barrier provided to give Wang Dong’er a series of his most formidable attacks. This was the only way he had a shot at victory!

Wang Dong’er began to move when her third Hexagram Array appeared. Her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings ﬂapped vigorously and propelled her into the air. The Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess burst out like a meteor shower and rained down toward her unbelievably quick opponent.

At the same time, a heavy cannon appeared in her hands... a soul cannon! The silver-white cannon had very elegant lines, and its barrel was extremely large. The entire cannon was about one and a half meters long, and the cannon mouth was a stunning twenty centimeters wide. Wang Dong’er carried it on her shoulders, and it seemed as if there were beauty in the violence.

You Chen was exceedingly fast, indeed. He tried his best to dodge the attacks of the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess as much as he could. With his Invincible Barrier activated, the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess naturally couldn’t hurt him, but all those lights could greatly impede his forward momentum. He would be signiﬁcantly slowed if he allowed even one ray to touch him.

You Chen could clearly tell from their previous few collisions that this six-ringed Soul Emperor from the Tang Sect was incredibly powerful. Her soul power was more than one class above his own, and he would deﬁnitely lose this battle if he allowed her to regain her balance. His method was risky business, but it was clear that his Invincible Barrier was his last chance at victory. He was coming closer and closer to Wang Dong’er. He didn’t hesitate any longer, and his ﬁfth soul ring lit up as the two spikes in his hands shone with ghastly white light. The lights extending from the spikes were about half a foot long, and they were incredibly sharp as they whistled through the air.

These were high-frequency oscillating blades, and they didn’t possess any element at all. This attack relied on high- frequency oscillations for powerful destructive force, and was meant to counter Wang Dong’er’s Goddess of Light’s Possession that she had used in the previous round. The Tang Sect wasn’t the only one who was observing and analyzing their opponents

– the Tang Sect’s outstanding performance meant every single one of their opponents was also investigating and analyzing them.

You Chen tapped on the ground with his foot, and nine afterimages followed him as his ﬁfth soul ring lit up, and merged into his body one after another. You Chen’s body seemed to become transparent in this moment, and he appeared to transform into a specter while his speed increased explosively. His Invincible Barrier’s radiance was raised to the highest possible level, and his body seemed to integrate into his spikes as he barreled towards Wang Dong’er like a lightning bolt.

The Spectral Spear. His martial soul was similar to Na Na’s, but they weren’t entirely the same. Na Na’s martial soul leaned towards avoiding physical attacks, while his martial soul took a different path – he used his martial soul to boost his speed and destructiveness. You Chen’s ﬁfth soul skill was his strongest attack, and even seven-ringed Soul Sages wouldn’t have a good time facing him head-on when he was using a pair of Class 6 soul tools at the same time.

Vigorous soul power undulations erupted around him in that instant, and the air around him seemed to tear apart as he pierced through it. Thin, delicate cracks appeared continuously around him.

Wang Dong’er was faced with a threat so huge that her life was at stake, but she smiled. Yes, she smiled, and it was a very casual smile.

Everyone could hear a vigorous explosion in the next moment.

The heavy cannon on Wang Dong’er’s shoulder exploded, and intense silver light detonated in midair – it was a shock bomb. No, more accurately put, this was a combination of a shock bomb and a rupturing bomb. The incredible force from the explosion hindered her opponent and pushed Wang Dong’er’s body backwards like an arrow at the same time.

The Spectral Spear’s explosive speed was simply too quick. Even though You Chen was pushed back by the shock bomb, he was still a beat faster than Wang Dong’er’s backward momentum from the soul cannon’s recoil. He was about to catch up to her.

Wang Dong’er smiled faintly as she retracted the wings behind her back. Black light ﬂickered across her right hand, and a hammer appeared. This hammer was black all over, but it wasn’t eye-catching at all. However, the entire atmosphere seemed to become a lot more solemn and heavier when this hammer appeared.

A dark halo arose from beneath Wang Dong’er’s feet, and she placed the hammer in front of her in the next moment.

“Ding!” Wang Dong’er’s body accelerated once more as she ﬂew backwards amidst the bright ring from the collision. She quivered faintly before returning to normal, while the Spectral Spear’s quickest stab was already over. The Spectral Spear’s speed plummeted, and You Chen could only watch as Wang Dong’er ﬂew out and distanced herself from him. This… what kind of ability is that? Twin martial souls? You Chen was dumbfounded, and there was nothing else he could think off. Afterwards, he looked on as Wang Dong’er’s enchanting body spun halfway when she touched the ground, and she suddenly made a throwing action. The black hammer in her hands ﬂew out as it rotated through the air and came directly for him. She opened her hands by her sides and made a lifting action at the same time.

You Chen’s Invincible Barrier was gone, and he had just used his ﬁfth soul skill. This was an awkward moment. He had already completed his previous move, but he wasn’t ready for his next one.

He knew that there was no way he could win this bout. The only thing he wanted to do right now was to delay for as much time as possible, and to consume as much of this Soul Emperor’s soul power as he could.

You Chen wanted to evade this attack, but he realized to his intense fear that golden halos had appeared respectively on his left and on his right. These golden halos were two meters in diameter, and there was actually one more behind him. This also meant that he didn’t dare to dodge to his left, right, or backwards in that instant. This moment of hesitation was all it took for that black hammer to arrive in front of him.

You Chen had no other choice but raise his spikes and meet this hammer head-on.

The corner of Wang Dong’er’s mouth curled into a sneer. “Wang Qiu’er isn’t the only one who has strength – I’m strong, too.”

“Boom!” An intense explosion could be heard, and You Chen’s body could be seen hurtling through the air. The Hexagram Array behind him surged into the sky as he ﬂew backwards, and the array snatched him into its light and shot him up into the sky.

Wang Dong’er’s black hammer returned to her hands. Two sharp spikes were impaled into the ground where You Chen was previously positioned.

The Clear Sky Hammer, the number-one tool soul in the world! The Clear Sky Hammer was a pure strength-type tool soul, and it had been ranked amongst the six most powerful martial souls in the world more than ten thousand years ago. The Clear Sky Hammer was Wang Dong’er’s second martial soul, and this was where her true power lay.

You Chen wasn’t the only one who was astounded when he witnessed Wang Dong’er’s Clear Sky Hammer and the black soul ring that appeared along with it. Huo Yuhao himself was surprised; even he didn’t know that Wang Dong’er had added a soul ring to her second martial soul. She managed to defeat her opponent without using her Clear Sky Hammer’s soul skill.

This was pure might – this was the might of a Soul Emperor from Shrek Academy!

“Stop!” Zhang Zhan appeared before Wang Dong’er in time to stop her from pursuing her opponent. You Chen was entirely under her Hexagram Array’s control, and his soul power was slipping away at an alarming rate, while he didn’t seem like he had a chance to struggle out of it. This bout was over. “The Tang Sect is victorious in the ﬁrst round.” Zheng Zhan announced this bout’s result justly. He glanced at Wang Dong’er with an extra tinge of respect in his eyes.

“You… you’re from the Clear Sky Sect?” Zheng Zhan asked softly.

Wang Dong’er glanced at him. She had never been friendly at all towards anyone from the Sun Moon Empire. “So, the Sun Moon Empire also knows about the Clear Sky Sect.”

Zheng Zhan could feel her hostility. He felt a little exasperated as he replied, “Why can’t the Sun Moon Empire know about the Clear Sky Sect? I didn’t expect to see the descendant of someone that I’m familiar with. I know somebody from the Clear Sky Sect, and he should be your senior. We’ll talk about this after the tournament.”

Wang Dong’er’s expression became a lot warmer and more relaxed when she heard that Zheng Zhan knew someone from the Clear Sky Sect. She nodded her head as she took out a Milk Bottle to replenish her soul power. Wang Dong’er’s victory in the ﬁrst bout wasn’t that easy. She was far stronger than her opponent, but she didn’t like You Chen’s abilities at all. You Chen was focused on extreme offensiveness, and the tables would’ve been turned if she’d made even a single mistake and allowed her opponent to

ambush her. This was the reason why Wang Dong’er didn’t want to give him any more chances – she was willing to expose her second martial soul to ﬁnish the battle as quickly as possible.

Her Hexagram Array ended, and You Chen crashed to the ground. His entire body was scorched and burnt black from Wang Dong’er’s Fire of Light, and he was in terribly bad shape. However, he didn’t sustain overwhelmingly serious injuries, and he jumped off the stage after throwing a fearful glance at Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er didn’t like his ﬁghting style, but he didn’t like her ﬁghting style either. The Hexagram Arrays that could appear at any position gave him the biggest headaches, and this feeling was aggravated after he was enveloped by one Hexagram Array and had a taste of what it could do – he was in so much pain and agony that he wanted to die. The Hexagram Array possessed the formidable Fire of Light that could burn Wang Dong’er’s opponents, and it also contained incredible restrictive capabilities. Finding oneself inside a Hexagram Array was like entering a marsh swamp. You Chen’s cultivation rank was lower than Wang Dong’er in the ﬁrst place, and it seemed like an impossible task for him to escape from her Hexagram Array.

“Next.” Wang Dong’er turned towards the Clearjade Sect’s camp, and her eyes swept coldly towards their mysterious team leader. This fellow dared to stare threateningly at Huo Yuhao. She had been bottling up her anger about this for a while now, and she would be more than happy if their team leader would jump on stage to challenge her.

However, the Clearjade Sect’s team leader seemed exceedingly calm, and even the rest of his team were as such. They didn’t seem very affected by their defeat in the ﬁrst bout.

The Clearjade Sect’s team leader sat still and didn’t move. He didn’t give any instructions at all, but someone else from the Clearjade Sect’s waiting area stood up and jumped on stage with a ﬂash.

Wang Dong’er was momentarily stunned when this person got on the stage. Her opponent’s looks were a little strange – he had his head lowered this whole time, and he hid himself amongst his other team members and was very unassuming. However, it was clear that he could give anyone a lasting impression.

This youth had pale white skin, and his face was also ghastly pale and without color at all. His entire frame seemed sickly and ill, and his hair couldn’t be considered long. He used some special hair products to comb his hair into a swept-back hairstyle, and his hair seemed shiny and reﬂective. His eyes were light brown in color, and they looked very cold. His body was a little hunched, and he was very tall but very skinny. His arms were especially long as they swayed faintly by his sides. This youth gave everyone an eerie and chilly feel from the moment he stepped on stage.

This person wouldn’t have to put on any makeup at all if he was seen in the Holy Ghost Church’s camp.

Zhang Zhan stared at the youth from the Clearjade Sect. “Report your names.”

“Wang Dong’er of the Tang Sect.” “Adler of the Clearjade Sect.” This youth had a strange voice. He was soft-spoken, and his voice was extremely sharp. However, he had a very masculine disposition, which was in contrast to the chilly and eerie aura that emanated from his body.

“Move back to your corners and prepare for battle.”

Wang Dong’er wasn’t in a hurry at all. She was still holding a Milk Bottle in her hands, and she was making use of this short period of time to replenish the soul power that she had expended before. Both contestants retreated to their respective edges and stared at each other across the competition stage.

Wang Dong’er’s vision wasn’t as sharp as Huo Yuhao’s Spirit Eyes, but her eyes were still relatively good. She realized to her surprise that Adler’s eyes had become a different color when she gazed at him from afar. His eyes were originally an ice-cold light brown color, but they were now completely red, and frighteningly so – it felt as if his eyes had been tainted with fresh blood in an instant.

“Begin!” The Unbreakable Douluo, Zheng Zhan, swung his right hand downwards to announce that the match had begun.

The contestants moved at the same time. Adler tapped lightly on the ground with his foot, and he soared into the air as if he didn’t weigh anything at all. A faint red light emerged from his body as wings appeared behind his back – a martial soul that could ﬂy.

Chapter 297: The Vampire Bat

The wings expanded, and they were evidently very big. However, they seemed to be formed from skin. The color of blood in his eyes became even more intense, and two fangs emerged in his mouth. A thick smell of blood came from him.

On the main podium, the mysterious Imperial Tutor who sat next to Xu Tianran suddenly exclaimed, “Eh.”

“What’s the matter, Imperial Tutor? Are you interested in this disciple from the Clearjade Sect?” Xu Tianran noticed his reaction, and questioned him immediately.

The mysterious Imperial Tutor said plainly, “His martial soul should be the Vampire Bat. Your Highness, please take a look. His body has been inﬂuenced by his martial soul, and while the change does not appear to be very signiﬁcant, it’s actually rather extraordinary. If we cultivate him well, he’ll be someone with great potential. Xiaofeng.”

When she heard his call, a mysterious person suddenly appeared and stood silently behind him. It was a woman clad entirely in a long red robe. While one could not see her face, her body was evidently seductive, as all her feminine curves were brazenly displayed.

“After the competition ends, bring this disciple of the Clearjade Sect to me,” instructed the Imperial Tutor.

“Yes,” said a soft voice from within the red robes. She took a step back, and disappeared like a puff of smoke.

Just as they were discussing this intensely, the battle in the arena commenced.

Wang Dong’er made a decisive decision in the face of her opponent’s ﬂying-type martial soul. This had to be a close- combat soul engineer. Compared to her opponent’s jet-black skin-like wings, her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings were much more beautiful. Wang Dong’er’s deep-blue wings opened, and with the toes of her feet touching the ground, she slid over to her opponent.

The two of them ﬂew into the air simultaneously as they circled each other.

Adler raised his hands. On each of his hands, one could see ﬁve bright-red nails. Each nail looked vibrant and slightly wet, as if blood were about to ﬂow out. He roared in a low voice, and his speed increased rapidly in a short time. In mid-air, he made a rush toward Wang Dong’er.

Two yellow, two purple, and one black. This was the ideal soul ring combination for ﬁve rings. The third, purple soul ring gave off an intense light as his intense soul power was maximized.

However, in terms of soul rings, no one could compare to Wang Dong’er, much less him. Among Wang Dong’er’s six soul rings, one was yellow, two were purple, and three were black. This was superior compared to the ideal soul ring combination. At this moment, her second soul ring started to ﬂash.

The two of them chose different battling methods. Wang Dong’er used her Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess as a huge amount of golden light swamped her opponent. She tried to scout him out with this attack. However, Adler’s body increased exponentially in size. His muscles started to throb and grow quickly, and one could feel a powerful energy coming from his body. He tried to make a rush at Wang Dong’er. He raised his razor-sharp claws in the air. One could hear sharp shrieks.

Faced with Wang Dong’er’s Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess, Adler displayed his powerful evasive abilities. His entire body was like a ﬁsh in water. With his pair of wings, he dodged rapidly. He was able to ﬂy in the face of the numerous balls of light coming his way without getting hurt.

Is this the innate reaction speed of bats? Echolocation. Wang Dong’er, a high-ﬂyer from Shrek Academy, was able to make an accurate judgment. At this moment, she assessed that her opponent had a rarely-seen and difﬁcult-to-deal-with bat martial soul.

Adler was soon in front of Wang Dong’er. He reached out with his claws. One of his claws was aimed at Wang Dong’er’s face, while the other one made straight for her heart.

Those who were close enough could see that his claws gave off an intense red light. One could sense an intense, bloody smell from the sharp aura. If his claws were to land, it would be enough to rip metal apart.

Wang Dong’er, who was extremely close to him, could see that her opponent’s ‘claws’ on his nails were from actually ﬁnger sleeves he had on. This also meant that her opponent was using a close-combat soul tool.

Is the Tang Sect afraid of close combat? Wang Dong’er did not try to dodge. She used a golden light to protect her body as she sliced out with her left wing.

While Adler’s arm might be long, it could not be longer than Wang Dong’er’s wings! Faced with her razor-sharp wings, Adler roared in a low voice and he tried to grab it with his right claw.

“Peng!” It was a head-on clash. This was the result of a clash between two extremely resilient objects.

The two of them trembled slightly in mid-air. Wang Dong’er did not move, but Adler was sent ﬂying back by two meters. While he tried to control it, everyone could see that he would be at a disadvantage if there were more of such clashes. One had to know that he had already tried to maximize his own powers with the help of his third soul ring. This was the difference between a Soul Emperor and a Soul King. Furthermore, Wang Dong’er was a twin-souled Soul Emperor. Her second martial soul gave her an additional soul ring. In terms of soul power strength, even Bei Bei, who was a rank

higher than her, might not be as powerful.

With that one move, she was able to overcome her opponent’s assault. As Wang Dong’er had used one of her butterﬂy wings, her body naturally descended. However, she ﬂuttered the wing she had just used, and her other wing also rose along with her.

One could see that a golden blue ﬁgure was executing an eye- catching uppercut, enveloping Adler within.

The bat-like wings behind Adler suddenly opened up. A pair of sharp claws instantly formed countless other claw-like shadows. At the same time, the red light on his claws dimmed slightly. Following that, a 30 centimeter-long light shot out from each of his claws as they clashed with Wang Dong’er’s outstretched butterﬂy wings. Small explosions sounded non-stop in mid-air. Wang Dong’er was a dancing Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess. Her wings were not only fast, but they also moved elegantly. Every time she clashed with Adler, she was able to force him back a bit. Gradually, she was in pursuit of him. Evidently, she was using her overwhelming power to push him into submission.

However, Adler was no weakling either. While he was not as powerful as Wang Dong’er, he chose to clash with her head-on. He looked very stable. While he was in retreat, he still kept his cool. He showed no sign of weakness or defeat.

In the Tang Sect resting zone, Xu Sanshi nodded and said, “This guy from the Clearjade Sect is not bad! However, he must have some other plan in mind for him to do so without changing his ﬁghting style.”

Huo Yuhao smiled, nodded and said, “This will depend on Dong’er.” With his last lesson in mind, he became much more careful now. The protective barrier around the arena was troublesome, but Huo Yuhao could still overcome it. If Wang Dong’er was in danger, he would act immediately, even at the risk of penalties. However, as he looked at Wang Dong’er’s excellent performance in the past two rounds, a smile crept across Huo Yuhao’s face. Dong’er was right. Earlier, she had suppressed herself too much. Now, even when she dressed up as a guy, she became even prettier.

In mid-air, the two of them continued to ﬁght without using any soul skills. All they relied on was their reaction speed and battle experience. Gradually, they ﬂew higher and higher into the sky.

Adler’s disadvantage became more and more pronounced. Suppressed by Wang Dong’er, he found it harder and harder to resist. His third soul skill gradually weakened.

At this moment, suddenly, Adler let out a terrifying shriek.

The second soul ring on his body started to shine brightly.

Wang Dong’er, who was in mid-air, froze in the face of her opponent’s shriek.

Second soul skill, Terrorshriek. Adler appeared to have been waiting for this chance for a long time. His fourth soul ring started to shine, and a blood- red shadow, which resembled his ﬁgure almost exactly, appeared from his body as it rushed toward Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er’s body instantly started to shine with a golden light. However, it seemed incapable of resisting the blood-red ﬁgure. A blood-red light ﬂashed, and the blood-red ﬁgure appeared behind her. However, it had already taken her form.

Following that, Adler’s ﬁrst soul ring started to shine. He started to chuckle weirdly, making more of a creaking sound. The blood-colored shadow that had ﬂown toward Wang Dong’er started to rise into the sky. Then, it turned into a ball of red light as it ﬂew toward Adler and disappeared into his body.

Instantly, Adler looked much more powerful. Even his pale- white face had a rosy tinge to it. It was as if he had eaten some sort of supplement. With one move, he was able to keep Wang Dong’er’s wings from ﬂapping.

In all seriousness, Wang Dong’er did not deserve that blow. She had guessed exactly what Xu Sanshi had guessed. However, Adler’s abilities were too mysterious. The sudden explosion of power was too mysterious as well. It seemed capable of overcoming all defenses and instantly, he was able to seize it. In particular, his fourth and ﬁrst soul skills appeared to work in tandem.

At this moment, Wang Dong’er’s face looked much paler. She felt a strong sense of weakness. However, Adler’s power increased exponentially. They were still locked in close- combat, but the tables had turned.

Adler’s fourth soul skill, Bloodshadow Puppet, and his ﬁrst soul skill, Bloodsucking.

These were indeed two soul skills that were linked. His Bloodsucking ability normally required him to be near his opponent, where he could bite them with his fangs. Doing so would allow him to use his opponent’s blood to replenish his own soul power and strength. This was the innate soul skill of a Vampire Bat. Regardless of what soul beast he killed with this ability, he would only receive this soul skill.

However, his Bloodshadow Puppet was exceptionally powerful. Any form of energy defense was useless against this soul skill. It could only be blocked by physical defenses. Once someone became a target of this, a bit of the essence of one’s blood would be forcibly extracted. Doing so would render the target extremely weak. However, Adler could then use his ﬁrst soul skill to absorb this essence and replenish his own body. This combination was offensive, defensive, and regenerative at the same time. Coupled with his Terrorshriek, he was able to defeat many opponents. At this moment, Wang Dong’er too fell victim to him.

Fortunately, Wang Dong’er’s cultivation was higher than Adler’s. If it were a much weaker opponent, the Bloodshadow Puppet might have sucked him dry.

As they fought, Wang Dong’er was already completely suppressed by her opponent. However, Adler’s chain moves had yet to end. After he beat her back, his wings suddenly expanded massively. Following that, rays of red light started to appear mysteriously in the sky. They covered the area where he and Wang Dong’er had previously fought. All of the rays of light then turned into sharp blades as they slashed at Wang Dong’er.

Empyrean Bloodnet. This was not a soul skill, but instead an ambush from his pair of claws.

His sharp claws were a pair of Class 6 soul tools. The Clearjade Sect clearly invested a lot of money in preparation for this competition. The sharp ﬁnger sleeves were called Bloody Cuts. With each attack, it would bring out a razor-sharp line of blood that was as thin as a string. In reality, they were lines of energy shot from soul tools. They possessed extremely high cutting abilities.

This ability was akin to launching a second attack with each attack. In close combat, it was rather exceptional. What was even more terrifying was the fact that the Bloody Cuts were invisible. They could remain obscure until it was time to reveal them. They could remain hidden in the air they had just passed. When it was time, their user could then activate them. After they had been activated, they would be able to attack anything in 10 meters. When they attacked, they brimmed with a powerful offensive ability. They attacked at random, but they would not attack the person using the Bloody Cuts.

Adler had been placing these around for so long, and the power of the Bloody Cuts was maximized at this moment. Only then did he use this third soul skill to activate this immensely powerful soul tool. The objective was simple: he wanted a quick and simple victory.

If he had used Bloody Cuts straightaway, he would have surely made more trouble for Wang Dong’er. However, he wasn’t conﬁdent of defeating a Soul Emperor as a mere Soul King. Hence, he chose to bide this time as he quietly used his Bloody Cuts to form a Empyrean Bloodnet. He quietly waited for the right moment, and when it came, he activated them. While the lines of blood would attack at random, Wang

Dong’er, who was surrounded by them, would surely be entangled with the many bloody lines and be struck by them. As long as a few could land on her, he would be able to overcome her. This method was not only cruel, but also devious. If her defenses were insufﬁcient, she would be cut into mincemeat.

Wang Dong’er’s pale face revealed a cold look. Even when she was pushed to her limits, she did not betray any sign of panic.

Light ﬂashed, and she disappeared from where she was. She suddenly moved to 10 meters away. It was the soul skill of her left leg bone, Instant Shift.

Adler was dumbfounded. As there were too many teams in the tournament, the Clearjade Sect did not notice that Wang Dong’er had already used Instant Shift once before. The Empyrean Bloodnet’s area of effect was only ten meters across. Even if Wang Dong’er did not completely escape from it, she already left its most concentrated part.

Not only that, but Wang Dong’er’s body started to shine once again with light, blocking some of the bloody lines.

Protective soul barrier? This was a Class 6 protective soul barrier.

Adler re-focused his gaze. He once again used his second soul skill, and a terrifying shriek resounded in the air. He rushed toward Wang Dong’er at the speed of lightning. This time, the Bloody Cuts were no longer hidden. His razor-sharp claws held some of the bloody lines as he rushed toward Wand Dong’er.

The protective soul barrier appeared and disappeared. After it blocked the bloody lines, Wang Dong’er retrieved it. Terrorshriek was no longer effective on her. Her own fourth soul ring started to shine.

The soul skill that had once caused You Chen so much pain appeared in the sky once more. A huge, six-pointed golden star appeared behind Wang Dong’er. Instantly, the golden light swallowed her entire body. Then, it zapped Adler. The Hexagram Array can be used like this? Adler had not thought of this, but his movements were fast too. He quickly retracted his bat wings, and as gravity made his body plummet, he was able to dodge this blow.

Wang Dong’er raised her right hand, and a radiant golden ﬁre shone in it. The butterﬂy wings behind her back started to change too.

The two front wings and two back wings started to beat without rhythm. She descended as if she were dancing.

This was a secret technique of the Tang Sect, Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track. She used this skill in mid-air.

The two wings behind Wang Dong’er’s back and legs shone with white light. This made her even faster than before. Instantly, around 18 Wang Dong’ers appeared in the sky. They surrounded Adler. Her pair of wings conjured powerful rays of light, which she sent ﬂying toward her opponent.

How can this be possible? He was deﬁnitely hit by my Bloodshadow Puppet! At least one-third of his blood essence has been absorbed by me. Why does he still have such strong soul power? How much soul power does he have!? Adler was stunned. After a series of attack, he was indeed able to absorb Wang Dong’er’s blood essence, and he felt his powers grow. However, the blood essence in his body seemed uncontrollable.

It stopped regenerating him. Coupled with Wang Dong’er’s strong counterattack, he quickly sensed that something was wrong.

His ﬁfth soul ring started to shine as Adler’s plan immediately changed. He knew that he might not be able to win this ﬁght. However, even if he could not win, he had to wear her down as much as possible so he could create a chance for his teammate.

His ﬁfth soul ring was black. It was a ten-thousand year soul ring, and also his most powerful soul skill. Blood-colored light ﬂashed intensely from his body, and he was able to release a layer of intense bloody light. He planned on using brute force to make Wang Dong’er retreat. Following that, the intense bloody light started to rise and burn. Everyone could feel that he was using his most powerful attack.

Wang Dong’er’s ﬁfth soul ring started to shine too. Her body became as clear as a golden crystal. Goddess of Light Possession was not just a soul skill which could resist many types of elements. At the same time, it would greatly enhance all of Wang Dong’er’s light-type soul skills! A Hexagram Array ﬁve meters wide appeared behind Wang Dong’er’s back.

This clash would determine the winner. They were competing in terms of pure physical strength.

However, at this moment, something extraordinary happened.

The rapidly-increasing bloody light in mid-air suddenly stopped. Then, a hysterical scream emerged from the bloody light. “What… what exactly is in your blood?”

Adler’s voice was ﬁlled with terror. From the bloody light, rays of golden light shot out. Instantly, they broke through their blood-colored surroundings.

It was like a sun was about to emerge from the blood-colored light. A powerful light burst forth from the center, and the bloody light surrounding it started to disintegrate as golden rays pierced through the blood.

“Oh no.” The judge, the Unbreakable Douluo, cried out. His body ﬂashed, and he was instantly in the air. A layer of white light enveloped Adler’s body.

However, it was too late. He could block attacks from the outside, but how could he block attacks that came from the inside?

A terrifying explosion burst forth in mid-air. Instantly, blood and ﬂesh ﬂew all over, and the eye-catching golden light remained in mid-air for four to ﬁve seconds before it slowly faded. However, Adler was gone without a trace. His ﬂesh and blood had disintegrated under the golden light.

The captain of the Clearjade Sect who sat in the resting zone suddenly stood up. A powerful energy could be felt from his body, but in the face of the protective barrier, he was helpless.

In mid-air, Wang Dong’er looked dumbfounded. She did not know why Adler exploded. This had all happened too fast. She quickly retracted her attack.

The golden light gradually faded until it had diminished into several golden motes. Afterwards, it spread out in all directions, before slowly circling around Wang Dong’er and suddenly surging towards her. When the motes light touched her, they gradually disappeared one-by-one. Color returned to Wang Dong’er’s pale face as they did so.

This…

Everyone who saw this scene was dumbstruck. What was that golden light? What did Wang Dong’er do? She actually made her opponent explode. She did not seem to have used any powerful soul skill beforehand!

Her opponents, teammates, and even the leadership of the Sun Moon Empire who were watching from the main podium were all completely stunned. What had happened? Why did Adler explode?

“What’s in his blood?” The Imperial Tutor mumbled to himself.

The Prince Regent, Xu Tianran, frowned and said, “Can this person’s blood attack?”

The Imperial Tutor shook his head and said, “No! This isn’t an attack from the blood. Instead, her blood is too unique. It probably has some energy that the Vampire Bat martial soul was unable to devour. In other words, his blood was too nourishing, which caused the body that absorbed it to explode. This doesn’t seem to be a trick from the Tang Sect. Adler probably ingested his blood and then experienced some sort of side effect. Interesting. After this competition ends, I want to catch Wang Dong to do some research. Maybe I’ll make some sort of discovery. It’s a shame for the little bloodsucking bat though.”

Zheng Zhan stared at Wang Dong’er with a green face. He did not know what to say. No matter what, Adler’s death had something to do with her. What monsters are in the Tang Sect? Why is it that people die whenever they participate? Their opponents were not weak, but they were even more powerful. Wang Dong had already killed someone in two competitions. What a Soul Emperor.

“The round is over. The Tang Sect wins!” announced Zheng Zhan.

With his announcement, the protective barrier over the arena disappeared. Wang Dong’er felt that something was amiss. While this opponent did make quite a lot of trouble for her, she was not a bloodthirsty person, and she did not plan on killing her opponent. However, her opponent died just like that. Can it be because he sucked my blood?

Just as she was pondering this question, there was a sudden sharp scream. A shadow dashed onto the arena like a bolt of black lightning. A black light ﬂashed, and almost instantly the shadow was in front of Wang Dong’er. A long white hand suddenly appeared, and ﬁve thirty-centimeter long dark gold claws shot out as they came slashing down toward Wang Dong’er’s head.

With her previous lesson in mind, Wang Dong’er had become far more guarded against her opponents, especially since she had just killed someone. Hence, she did not panic in the face of this sudden attack. With her Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track, she quickly retreated out of range.

A layer of white light shone, and the two of them were separated. Zheng Zhan had intervened!

The Unbreakable Douluo was already controlling his temper. Now, in the face of another rule violation, he ﬂew into a rage. A milky-white light appeared and enveloped the black ﬁgure. In a deep voice, he said, “The Clearjade Sect violated the rules by ambushing their opponent! They lose this round!”

As he said that, he waved his right hand, and a powerful, shapeless energy sent the black-robed person, the captain of the Clearjade Sect, ﬂying off the arena.

The captain of the Clearjade Sect did not expect that Zheng Zhan would not only block him, but also disqualify him. The moment he landed on the ground, he jumped back onto the arena. “She killed my brother!” a raspy yet feminine voice could be heard from the black robes. While it sounded plain, the killing intent in it was evident.

A woman? The captain of the Clearjade Sect was actually a woman? So Adler was her brother!

When Zheng Zhan heard this sentence, his expression softened a bit as he said, “Regardless of your tie with him, his accidental death just now cannot be undone. However, you tried to ambush your opponent, and hence, you are disqualiﬁed. If you can still take part in the group round, you may ﬁght.”

“She killed my brother,” the captain of the Clearjade Sect coldly said once more. With that, she leapt off the arena and sat back down in her spot as if nothing had happened.

“The Tang Sect wins.” Zheng Zhan had to preserve the integrity of his role. Like this, Wang Dong’er had won three rounds. Furthermore, the captain of the Clearjade Sect was defeated just like that. Wang Dong’er’s eyes narrowed. She stared at the mysterious captain, and then said to Zheng Zhan, “Referee, I concede defeat in the next round. The Tang Sect will send someone else up.”

After two rounds of battling, her soul power was greatly depleted. While she had recovered some of her blood essence, she decided to follow Huo Yuhao’s plan. After all, she had fulﬁlled her role for this competition thus far.

“The Tang Sect concedes defeat and wishes to switch out. Can the next competitor from both teams please come forward?” Zheng Zhan announced after he acknowledged Wang Dong’er’s defeat.

Xiao Xiao walked into the arena to welcome Wang Dong’er.

She gave her a thumbs-up and smiled.

Wang Dong’er said quietly, “Xiao Xiao, be careful. The Clearjade Sect is mysterious. They use their close combat soul tools to support their martial souls, instead of using their martial souls to support their close combat soul tools.” “Got it!” Xiao Xiao replied quietly. Her beautiful eyes showed nothing but conﬁdence. Up until this moment, she had not really participated. In the previous tournament, she had been too weak, and thought that she could not contribute enough for her team. Now, she ﬁnally had a chance to engage in a one- on-one ﬁght. She was brimming with ﬁghting spirit.

---

Off the arena, Wang Dong’er instantly returned to Huo Yuhao’s side. In one hand, she clutched a milk bottle, and she held Huo Yuhao’s right hand with her other hand. Their Haodong Power fused, and she began the process of gradually recovering her soul power.

“The opponent’s captain is not someone to triﬂe with. Afterward, in the group round, you have to be careful of her,” said Huo Yuhao in a low voice.

Wang Dong’er frowned and said, “Yes, I can feel it too. Her energy resembles Adler’s, but it’s much stronger. If I’m not wrong, she should be a Soul Emperor like me. She’s evidently the core of the Clearjade Sect. Now, they’re one man down. Doesn’t she want to kill me? How about I distract her in the group round later, and the rest of you take care of the other members of their team?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “This is a good plan. Let’s see if she’ll fall for it.”

Wang Dong’er smiled too, and said, “You have so much conﬁdence in me!”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “Have you forgotten? We’re from Shrek. What’s our motto?”

“Invincible among those of the same level!” Wang Dong’er said, her smile brimming with pride.

Huo Yuhao did not reply. He thought in his heart, Also, I’ll always be by your side.

The third member of the Clearjade Sect was also a girl. Compared to the previous two, she looked more normal. Her face was clear, and she looked pre-pubescent. There was an innocent look about her, and yet she wore a heavy expression on her face. She did not seem to have been affected by Adler’s death.

“Report your names.”

“Tang Sect, Xiao Xiao.”

“Clearjade Sect, Qin Yueyue.”

The two competitors retreated to their respective corners. The Unbreakable Douluo appeared to have regained his cool as he let the two of them go to their corners.

“Begin!”

With his announcement, the two sides started to move. Xiao Xiao took small but light steps as she rushed toward her opponent. She was neither fast nor slow, but instead, she walked at a controlled pace. She appeared to be in no rush to release her martial soul. Qin Yueyue raised her hands in front of her, and as a ray of light ﬂashed, a weapon appeared in her palms.

It was a long chopping knife… one with a long grip.

The knife was about 3 meters long, and the head of the knife was about a meter wide. The back of the knife was wide, and its blade was extremely sharp. The entire knife gave off a layer of green light, and it seemed exceedingly sharp. However, it was wielded by a girl who was no taller than 1.6 meters. It looked like Qin Yueyue’s palms were not big enough to wrap around the handle of her own knife.

Soul rings started to appear from the top of this long knife. There were ﬁve soul rings: two yellow, two purple, and one black. This was an ideal soul ring combination. Furthermore, the long knife was evidently not a soul tool, but instead, her martial soul. No matter how heavy a tool soul was, it would always weigh nothing to its soul master. No wonder she appeared frail, but was actually able to wield this huge knife.

Evidently the three members of the Clearjade Sect all had immense ﬁghting potential. Until now, they had yet to send a four-ringed team member out, only all Soul Kings. Their overall strength was immense. They were no weaker than the Sun Moon team that had put so much pressure on the Shrek team in the previous tournament.

Very few people from the Sun Moon Empire knew much about the Clearjade Sect, much less the teams from the other countries. No one had known that such a powerful sect existed in Radiant City!

Neither competitor moved quickly, and the pace of this battle was unlike the previous one. Soon, they reached the center of the arena.

When Qin Yueyue was twenty meters away from Xiao Xiao, she suddenly stopped. She turned her body, and the huge knife in her hand slashed out towards Xiao Xiao. The ﬁrst soul ring on the knife started to shine, and a ray of green blade light shot out as it cut at Xia Xiao.

Darkness appeared have lit up in the next moment. A huge cauldron appeared in mid-air without warning, blocking the blade light. With a ringing of metal, the green light disappeared, and the cauldron stopped moving. Under Xiao Xiao’s feet, the ideal combination of ﬁve soul rings also rose. Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron!

When Xiao Xiao released her own martial soul, the judge Zheng Zhan thought, These two girls are so weird. One wields a huge knife, and other a huge cauldron. This will be interesting.

With her ﬁrst slash blocked, Qin Yueyue tried to cut out again. Her ﬁrst soul ring shone, but this time, the blade light only carved a solitary line in the ground.

Xiao Xiao retracted her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron. She quickened her footsteps as she rushed toward her opponent.

In terms of martial souls, Xiao Xiao appeared to be a control- type soul master, or maybe a control-defense type soul master. Her Ninephoenix Worshipping Flute added one soul ring, while her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron was good at both control and defense. If she wanted to defeat her opponent, she needed to get close to her. The green blade light was soon in front of Xiao Xiao. The Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron naturally appeared once more as it moved to block the green blade light. However, the blade light twisted and made another line in the ground. It actually circumvented her cauldron as it sliced toward Xiao Xiao.

Xiao Xiao’s Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron moved at that moment, too, touching the ground with one of its feet. As the blade light changed directions, the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron also rotated on that leg and hit the green blade light, shattering it.

In this short exchange, both sides were able to demonstrate their control over their martial souls. The audience who were far off could not see clearly, but those that were closer could not help but sigh in admiration. Both of them are so strong! This sentiment was shared by everyone watching this match.

Chapter 298: A Fake Martial Soul True Body!

When Xiao Xiao blocked her opponent’s blade light with the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, her opponent was only ten meters away. Suddenly, her left hand grabbed the cauldron, and she stepped forward with her left leg. She cried out in a girly voice, and her entire body made one rotation with the tip of her left foot as the axis. She lifted the 1.5-meter-wide and tall cauldron, charged it with a ghastly gale of wind, and threw it in Qin Yueyue’s direction.

So violent…

Even Huo Yuhao could not help but open his eyes wide in shock. Since when did Xiao Xiao, who was normally so gentle, become so violent?

Qin Yueyue cried out as she stepped forward with her left leg. She sliced forward with the knife in her hand as she slashed at the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron with her blade. For the ﬁrst time, the body of her blade came into direct contact with the cauldron. Clang!

This time, an ear-shattering sound like a bell being struck could be heard. The cauldron’s trajectory was interrupted by the huge knife, and suddenly, it started to drop vertically. Qin Yueyue was sent back three steps by the impact.

At this moment, Xiao Xiao had already rushed up. She pursued her falling Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron as she pushed forward with her hands. A layer of black light rose around her body as the cauldron continued its trajectory to smash into Qin Yueyue.

The distance was too close, and the cauldron was too big and heavy. It was impossible to even dodge it. Qin Yueyue could only place her knife horizontally before her as she tried to forcefully block the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron.

There was a bang as the blade of the knife bent slightly, and Qin Yueyue’s entire body was sent ﬂying backwards.

However, she was no weakling. After she was sent ﬂying back through the air, she lifted the knife high above her head. Her third soul ring started to shine, and as she swung her hands upward, she was already grabbing onto the bottommost portion of the knife. She chopped down with it forcefully.

Instantly, a blade light about ten meters long descended from the sky relentlessly towards Xiao Xiao. It brimmed with a reinvigorated aura that seemed capable of slicing the arena in two.

Xiao Xiao instantly felt as if there were nowhere for her to hide. The area around her appeared to have been tightly sealed off, but she remained fearless. Her second soul ring started to shine, and she lifted the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron up into the air, blocking the area above her head. The already humongous cauldron grew even bigger, and soon, it was three meters wide. A powerful black light shone around it once more and enveloped Xiao Xiao.

Clang!

Another deafening sound. Xiao Xiao’s body bent over slightly, and one could see that half of the green blade light had disappeared in the black light. The rest was blocked by the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron and disintegrated.

Following that, Xiao Xiao chucked the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron in her hands out once more. It went after Qin Yueyue, who had just landed unevenly on the ground. Xiao Xiao’s attacks were indeed forceful!

In the Tang Sect’s waiting zone, Huo Yuhao could not help but laugh. “Xiao Xiao is such a mace!” Ever since he had returned from his exchange program, he had yet to ﬁght her despite having trained with her many times. As a person, Xiao Xiao was not ﬂashy or ﬂamboyant. Huo Yuhao had not known that Xiao Xiao, whose style was mainly defense and control, had such a violent battling style. From her battling style, did she not resemble an assault-type soul master? She was indeed a pupil of Elder Xuan!

A sharp glint ﬂashed in Qin Yueyue’s eyes. Xiao Xiao was putting a lot of pressure on her, giving her no respite. She barely managed to stabilize herself before the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron came at her again.

She stabbed the huge knife into the ground, penetrating it. Qin Yueyue’s entire body started to shine with a green glow. With that, one could hear a series of metallic noises, and her entire body was quickly covered by a suit of armor.

It was a completely green full suit of armor, and was looked extremely heavy and thick. Qin Yueyue’s body became extremely sturdy, like a goddess of war. As the armor appeared, the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron was already in front of her.

Qin Yueyue used her right hand to push her knife outward. She had no intention of dodging, but instead attempted to face it head-on.

Boom!

The Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron was sent ﬂying back. Qin Yueyue pulled out her huge knife, and a light ﬂashed behind her back. She leapt into the sky, and came slashing down at Xiao Xiao with her weapon.

Such power! Xiao Xiao was startled. The increase in her opponent’s power evidently came from her suit of armor. This should be her close-combat soul tool. It was a wonderful combination. With the power of the armor, she increased the power of her blade. Compared to her ﬁrst two teammates, Qin Yueyue’s abilities were in no way weaker! The Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron returned to its original position. Xiao Xiao lifted it up with her hands and once more, it acted as a shield above her head. Despite a deafening clang of impact, she was unable to make Qin Yueyue retreat. Instead, she sank down into the metallic ﬂoor of the arena.

Now that she had the upper hand, Qin Yueyue showed no mercy. She sliced repeatedly and frantically down at Xiao Xiao, as if she had gone crazy. With each strike, an intense blade light shone. While Xiao Xiao was able to block her offense with the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, she was still forced into a retreat.

Qin Yueyue’s armor not only increased her strength, but also increased her soul power. As a close-combat soul master, she did not need to increase the power of her weapon and hence, her soul tool was this armor.

While Xiao Xiao was sent into a retreat, her ﬁghting capabilities were slowly being revealed. When she realized that she could not match her opponent in strength, she decided to change her strategy. She started to spin the cauldron in her hand and activated her Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track. She stopped trying to ﬁght her opponent head-on, but instead tried to stabilize her position by ﬁghting defensively.

By activating her martial soul and the soul armor, her opponent was deﬁnitely going to be more drained than her. This was the thought going through Xiao Xiao’s mind. Furthermore, she was a twin-souled soul master! While her soul power was not as good as Wang Dong’er’s, she was one of the top few soul masters with ﬁve soul rings. Hence, she was in no rush, and behaved even more calmly than Wang Dong’er had.

Xu Sanshi, who was watching the match, muttered to himself, “Why does Xiao Xiao resemble a defense-type soul master more than me?”

The ﬁrst two rounds had ended rather quickly. The third round ended in a defeat for the Clearjade Sect, as its captain had attacked prematurely. The current match was the most intense. The two sides clashed with unparalleled ferocity and intensity, exciting everyone in the crowd.

Clang!

Another blow from the blade was deﬂected by the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron. A sense of futility surfaced in Qin Yueyue’s mind. She suddenly felt that the cauldron before her was akin to an insurmountable mountain. Even with all her strength, she could not do much to it. It was not a good feeling.

Oh no, my soul power is being depleted too quickly. Amidst the helplessness, Qin Yueyue suddenly understood that this was because she lacked the energy to continue her offense.

Xiao Xiao had been waiting for this moment all this while. However, she did not try to beat Qin Yueyue back quickly. Instead, she hoped to train herself up and at the same time, conceal her true abilities.

Xiao Xiao instantly felt Qin Yueyue’s sudden loss in energy. Immediately after Yueyue clashed with her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron once more, Xiao Xiao took a step forward. She held onto one side of the cauldron with both arms. Then, she pushed forward with one arm and pulled with the other. She was using a secret technique of the Tang Sect, Controlling Crane Capturing Dragon.

Instantly, the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron started to spin. Qin Yueyue spun along with it as her blade was pulled to one side.

Xiao Xiao cried out, and then her hands went down, and the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron started to expand once more. Its ﬁrst soul ring started to shine and the huge cauldron dropped to the ground.

With a huge boom, a vast amount of black gas started to spread outward. Defenseless, Qin Yueyue was sent ﬂying back from this cloud of black gas.

She was, after all, a soul engineer, and even a close-combat soul engineer was still no soul master. In terms of soul skills, there was still some distance between her and a real soul master, as she relied more on her soul tools. After such a long ﬁght, Xiao Xiao had yet to use any soul skill. Even Qin Yueyue had forgotten that she was ﬁghting a soul master and not a close-combat soul engineer like herself.

The sudden soul skill hit Qin Yueyue when she least expected it. Thanks to it, her body was sent ﬂying into the air. She could feel a hum in her armor, and she suddenly felt nauseous from this blow. In her heart, she knew that something was amiss, but it was too late. Xiao Xiao pushed forward with both hands, sending the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron ﬂying forward. Her second soul ring started to shine. Cauldron Sweep!

The opportunity was only present for an instant, but Xiao Xiao made full use of it. Qin Yueyue had nowhere to run, and was sent ﬂying by this powerful move. In mid-air, she spat out a mouthful of blood.

Xiao Xiao leapt into the air. She grabbed the shrinking cauldron, and her body spun and sent the cauldron ﬂying out. It sliced through the air with a terrifying sound as it made its way toward her opponent.

“I admit defeat!” Qin Yueyue cried out in mid-air.

A huge ﬁgure appeared in mid-air and blocked the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron with one palm.

When he looked at the cauldron, which was still spinning against his palm, Zheng Zhan could not help but sigh in admiration at the Tang Sect’s strength. The Clearjade Sect was not weak, and they even had some unique abilities. However, they had been forced into a tight corner by the Tang Sect. No wonder they were able to beat the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy! If this went on, this team would be one of the favorites for the championship title.

A black light ﬂashed, and the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron disappeared. On his other side, Qin Yueyue fell to the ground, leaning on her knife. While her protective soul tool was able to absorb most of the impact from that blow, her innards were still shaking from the shock.

Qin Yueyue knew that if she tried to go on, she could still wear Xiao Xiao down. However, if she did that, she would be unable to participate in the group round later on. It was the ﬁfth round of the individual round, which also meant that her side had already lost four rounds. The only way to victory was in the group round. Furthermore, this was contingent on at least two victories in the individual round. She had to keep up her ﬁghting abilities, so she conceded defeat.

“The Tang Sect wins!”

At this moment, in the individual elimination round, the Tang Sect had four points, while their opponent only had one. The Clearjade Sect only had three members left.

Wang Dong’er, who was sitting next to Huo Yuhao, asked quietly, “Yuhao, shall we give them a chance for the group round?” Huo Yuhao looked her in the eye, smiled, and said, “Of course we have to give them a chance. If not, how will their team captain be satisﬁed?”

Wang Dong’er understood what he meant as she replied, “I understand.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and squeezed her hand. The others of Shrek’s Seven Monsters smiled slightly. Only Na Na didn’t know. What does she mean by ‘I understand’?

Jiang Nannan whispered in a low voice next to her, “Clear all obstacles for the glory of Shrek.”

Now Na Na understood. Her heart was ﬁlled with a sense of profound respect. They wanted to clear all obstacles for the team from Shrek Academy! The Clearjade Sect was powerful enough to threaten Shrek Academy. They were trying to weaken it as much as possible.

The Tang Sect could choose to advance or retreat, they had many options to choose from. However, this was not the case for the Clearjade Sect. Their captain, who had been sitting ﬁrmly in her seat, suddenly stood up. She stared coldly at Xiao Xiao and then at the youth next to her.

The youth stood up too. In a low voice, he conversed with the captain of the Clearjade Sect and then, he stood up and went on-stage.

“Tang Sect, Xiao Xiao.”

“Clearjade Sect, Xue Bing.”

“Let the round begin.”

With the Unbreakable Douluo’s announcement, the youth from the Clearjade Sect known as Xue Bing shot forward like an arrow. At the same time, two yellow, three purple, and one black soul ring rose around his body.

Soul Emperor! Was he actually a six-ringed Soul Emperor? When they noticed their opponent’s Soul Emperor-level cultivation, some in the Tang Sect frowned. If Xue Bing was a Soul Emperor, and if their captain was a Soul Emperor, this meant that their team had two Soul Emperors! In the last tournament, other than Shrek Academy and the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, there was no other team with this combination.

They had never expected to meet such a team in the pre-trials of the tournament. This meant that while the Clearjade Sect was not as powerful as the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, they were not too far off.

Xiao Xiao looked at her six-ringed opponent, but remained fearless. She maintained her previous tempo as she approached him.

As Xue Bing rushed toward her, an emerald-green light started to shine from metallic green rings on his body. In total, there were six metal rings. These six metal rings gave off a warm light. As the distance between Xue Bing and Xiao Xiao closed, his body started to undergo a sudden change.

Layers of green scales started to appear from underneath his skin. When he ﬁrst released his martial soul, he was able to use his soul power to suppress the change in it, so it only revealed itself now. Not only that, but his also body started to elongate, and as his body arched in mid-air, it extended by more than 10 meters. The six soul rings that surrounded his bucket-thick python-like body started to spin too!

His ﬁrst and third soul rings started to shine. His body surged forward as he came smashing down onto Xiao Xiao.

What kind of martial soul is this? Xiao Xiao looked stunned. This was evidently not a typical martial soul, and her opponent was not yet a Soul Sage. Naturally, he would not be able to reveal his Martial Soul True Body. However, in his current shape, was this not like a Martial Soul True Body? How could this be possible?

While she was shocked, Xiao Xiao’s movements did not slow. She retreated quickly, and her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron appeared. It suddenly enlarged as it came crashing down from the sky.

Xue Bing had no intention of dodging it. Instead, he used his huge python-like body and clashed head-on with the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron. What happened next shocked Xiao Xiao greatly. After her immense cauldron smashed into Xue Bing, it was actually sent ﬂying away. Xue Bing’s body continued to descend onto Xiao Xiao. He opened his mouth to reveal rows of fangs as he tried to swallow her whole.

That’s right, this is the power of a Martial Soul True Body. As she came from Shrek Academy, Xiao Xiao’s knowledge was wide. From the force of the crash just now, she was able to ascertain her suspicions.

If it were not a Martial Soul True Body, how could he knock her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron so far away?

Could her opponent be a seven-ringed Soul Sage instead of a Soul Emperor? How could this be possible? A twenty-year-old seven-ringed Soul Sage! In the entire history of the Douluo Continent, this had never happened before.

While Xiao Xiao was shocked, her body did not freeze. The Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, which had disappeared after it was sent ﬂying away, re-appeared next to her. Xiao Xiao’s gaze turned serious, and she stretched her hands apart. Instantly, the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron split into three. She was protected in the center by the three copies of the cauldron. At the same time, her fourth soul ring started to shine.

Each of the three cauldrons started to shine with an intense black light. Three rays of black light shot into the sky. They met in mid-air, and then crashed down onto the body of the huge python.

“Seal!” Xiao Xiao made an odd gesture with her hands. Her body started to ﬂoat upward from the center of the three cauldrons, and shine with dazzling runes. Her thousand-year fourth soul skill gave off an unparalleled aura of power.

The body of the huge python that descended from the sky was too enormous, so there was no way of dodging it. The moment the green light from its body touched the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron’s black light, it disappeared. Following that, an odd scene appeared.

Xue Bing’s huge body started to shrink quickly as it fell from the sky. The three cauldrons started to move away from each other as they formed the shape of an equilateral triangle. Xiao Xiao stood near one of the cauldrons. Her hands made an odd heart-like shape.

When Xue Bing’s body landed, it was only a third of its previous size. It was still in the shape of a huge snake, but it seemed it had been bound the black light, and was twisting about intensely.

Cauldron’s Seal! This was Xiao Xiao’s fourth soul skill, a very powerful control-type soul skill!

Xiao Xiao’s Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron was an ancient martial soul that had been passed down for many generations. In the past, a cauldron was an important symbol of the state. This skill was akin to Cauldron Quake, which Xiao Xiao could activate by combining her ﬁrst and second soul skills.

Xiao Xiao’s fourth soul skill came from a mystical soul beast. When the soul ring of this soul beast fused with her, an anomaly occurred.

This soul beast was an oddity from the past, known as the Xiezhi. It was a powerful soul beast that brimmed with a severe aura that could suppress evil. However, as pure Xiezhis had long been extinct, this soul beast only had some Xiezhi blood in it. The thousand-year soul beast Xiao Xiao had killed had looked more like a goat.

However, the Xiezhi blood in this goat-like soul beast was fully brought out in its fusion with the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, and an anomaly happened. This thousand-year soul skill now had an extremely powerful sealing ability, able to suppress auras and seal all beings. Once a being was sealed, two outcomes would arise. First, it would be sealed for three seconds. During this time, Xiao Xiao could not attack it, as she had to control the soul skill. However, in those three seconds, the opponent’s soul power would be suppressed by the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, and at least thirty percent of it would be eroded away. No matter how much more powerful the opponent was, as long as it was not two levels more powerful than Xiao Xiao, her Cauldron’s Seal would work.

The other situation arose when the opponent was unable to break free from Cauldron’s Seal. The result then would be even more terrifying. After it had been suppressed by Cauldron’s Seal, it would be sealed within the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, and only released upon Xiao Xiao’s command. Of course, the cauldron could only imprison one being at a time. If it wanted to imprison another, it had to release the ﬁrst one!

In other words, this fourth soul skill was Xiao Xiao’s killer move. As she faced off against a more powerful opponent, she ﬁnally decided to use it.

Xue Bing’s martial soul was not a huge python, but instead another primordial lord of the jungle, an anaconda!

Anacondas normally lived in the depths of jungles and swamps. As it was naturally powerful and could devour even lions and tigers, anyone that got trapped by one would be doomed.

Xue Bing was indeed a six-ringed Soul Emperor. The reason why he could reveal his Martial Soul True Body was because of the six metal rings that had appeared on his body. They were six Class 5 soul tools, but they belonged to a set. Together, they were powerful enough to activate the hidden strength of a soul master’s martial soul and give rise to an increase in soul power. Xue Bing, who was originally a Soul Emperor, could use the metallic rings to activate his Martial Soul True Body. How could he not delight in it? He had immediately abandoned his original close-combat soul tool and decided to cultivate this set of metallic rings wholeheartedly. By using it in this tournament, he hoped to achieve an earth-shattering success!

Who knew that he would have the foul luck of meeting Xiao Xiao’s Cauldron’s Seal!

Xiao Xiao’s cultivation could not compare to Xue Bing’s and hence, he was only trapped by Cauldron Seal for three seconds. However, in these three seconds, one could clearly see that the power of the anaconda had been severely weakened. This was the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron’s trademark ability to weaken its target’s soul power.

With much difﬁculty, Xue Bing was able to escape from Cauldron Seal. However, as he struggled, he felt a sense of disorientation. This was an inherent result of the suppressive power of the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron.

Xiao Xiao knew that her cultivation was not as good as her opponent’s. At this moment, there was no use holding back. The third, second, and ﬁrst soul rings on her body all started to shine.

The ﬁrst to activate was the third soul ring. The split Threelives Soulcrush Cauldrons suddenly grew massively, to the point where their diameters exceeded three meters. Following that, the ﬁrst soul ring kicked into effect. The three cauldrons were simultaneously lifted thirty centimeters off the ground and then, they came crashing down simultaneously.

As a huge tolling sound rang out, three black halos of light started to spread, fusing at the center of the three cauldrons… right where Xu Bing, in the shape of an anaconda, was located.

Xu Bing, who had just regained control of his body, froze as the intense tremor hit him. Following that, he saw three cauldrons, almost as big as three small mountains, coming straight toward him from three different directions.

The ﬁrst soul skill of the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron was Cauldron Quake, the second one was Cauldron Sweep, and the third one was Cauldron’s Might. After the fourth soul skill, Cauldron Seal, was activated, these three soul skills were used almost back-to-back by Xiao Xiao. Her control of her soul skills was godly.

With Cauldron’s Might, the three Threelives Soulcrush Cauldrons attacked. Even as a Soul Emperor, Xue Bing spat out a mouthful of blood after he was hit by the three cauldrons. Evidently, he was rather severely injured. At this moment, he saw Xiao Xiao make a face at him as she said, “I admit defeat!” With that, she turned and ran off.

I won? Even if it was a victory, he felt a profound sense of injustice! When Xue Bing returned to his human form, his face was so dark that it was no different than if he had lost. However, the Unbreakable Douluo was already in front of him, and he couldn’t do anything even if he wanted to. He remembered the example of his teammate earlier on.

Xiao Xiao jumped down from the arena and said, “Yuhao, I didn’t ﬁnish my task.”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “No, you have done it very well.” As he said that, he looked at the arena once more, and then said in a loud clear voice, “Referee, we decide to forgo the individual elimination round and hope we can progress straight into the group round, could you kindly allow it?”

Forgo the individual round? This is the perfect chance to score points! Are they afraid of Xue Bing, who can use his Martial Soul True Body? Many observers thought this way too, as they would never have imagined that they would be able to witness such power in a group of soul masters and soul engineers below the age of twenty. This was unbelievable!

Zheng Zhan nodded and said, “The Tang Sect forgoes the individual round. In the individual elimination round, the Tang Sect earns four points while the Clearjade Sect earns seven points. Both sides are permitted one minute of rest to prepare for the group round.”

Those in the crowd who did not understand thought that the Tang Sect feared their opponent’s Martial Soul True Body. However, those who were more discerning realized that Huo Yuhao had made an excellent decision.

With Xue Bing’s power, he could possibly win one or two rounds, but was the Tang Sect weaker than the Clearjade Sect? Xu Sanshi had yet to ﬁght, and he had also demonstrated the cultivation of a six-ringed Soul Emperor. Despite Xiao Xiao conceding defeat in the previous round, was it really defeat? She managed to massively drain Xue Bing’s power, and if they moved straight into the group round like this, it would be impossible for Xue Bing to recover all his power. Furthermore, only six members of the Clearjade Sect could participate. Among them, You Chen and Qin Yueyue had lost, and they were both drained. Under these circumstances, the Tang Sect would have a comparative advantage in the group round. Five of their team members had yet to take part, and were all fresh.

Points-wise, it was only a consolation for the weaker team. For a team that could dominate completely in this competition, it was nothing. When Huo Yuhao said that he wanted to abandon the individual round and move straight into the group round, it was clear that he no longer cared about these points. Coupled with the fact that they had already beaten the team from the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, they would be able to enter the top eight as long as they could beat the Clearjade Sect.

One minute was not a lot of time. Soon, the members of both teams went onto the arena. They looked at each other, and the atmosphere instantly turned severe.

The captain of the Clearjade Sect ﬁnally appeared. This was the ﬁrst time she had appeared since she took part in the tournament. She still donned her mysterious black robes and covered her face. However, an icy-cold aura was being emitted from her body in the direction of Wang Dong’er. Taking into account that Adler was her brother, this enmity was set in stone.

Huo Yuhao poked fun at Wang Dong’er next to him and said, “It appears that your charisma doesn’t always work for you. Look, this female captain doesn’t seem to like you that much!”

Wang Dong’er snorted and said, “That is because I have yet to use the thirty-six tricks I have up my sleeves! If not, who knows what may happen? After all, I didn’t kill her brother. He drank my blood to replenish himself and then blew up.”

Huo Yuhao chuckled. He too was curious. Why does Wang Dong’er’s blood have such power? In other words, if Adler dared to drink her blood, he should be able to break it down, so why did he die from it?

The Unbreakable Douluo stood at the center and beckoned both teams forward.

As they approached each other, the Tang Sect could clearly sense the chilling aura of the captain of the Clearjade Sect. Zheng Zhan said in a heavy tone, “The competition is about to start. Both of you have many people on your teams and hence, I can’t afford to look after every single one of you. Once again, let me remind you that this is only a competition. You only live once, so please cherish your own lives, as well as the lives of your opponents.”

As he said that, he turned to look at the captain of the Clearjade Sect and said, “It’s regretful that your brother died. At the same time, I wish to apologize to you for failing to protect him. However, he was not killed by Wang Dong’er. I think you know better than me why he exploded.”

The captain of the Clearjade Sect did not respond. She continued to give Wang Dong’er her death stare.

“Can the participants from both sides please state your names, starting from the Clearjade Sect.”

“Clearjade Sect, Qin Yueyue.”

“Clearjade Sect, You Chen.” “Clearjade Sect, Chen Jun.”

“Clearjade Sect, Qing Qing.”

“Vice-Captain of the Clearjade Sect, Xue Bing.” Xue Bing’s face was pale as he stared at Xiao Xiao. He knew the taste of being hit consecutively by four of Xiao Xiao’s soul skills!

The Clearjade Sect captain was the last to open her mouth. In her raspy, icy-cold and feminine voice, she said, “Clearjade Sect, Cain.”

Cain? What an odd name. Among the two other members of the Clearjade Sect who had yet to take part, Chen Jun was a tall youth and Qing Qing was a plain-looking girl with a nice body.

“Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao.”

“Tang Sect, Wang Dong.” “Tang Sect, Xu Sanshi.”

“Tang Sect, He Caitou.”

“Tang Sect, Jiang Nannan.”

“Tang Sect, Xiao Xiao.”

“Tang Sect, Na Na.”

The seven members of the Tang Sect reported their names. Before the match even began, the tension between the two sides appeared capable of igniting the very air.

For the Tang Sect, this was one of the strongest teams they had met since they took part in this Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. To them, this was a test, especially for Huo Yuhao as their captain.

“Both teams, step back.” The two teams slowly moved back. Wang Dong’er continued pushing Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair, and hence spoke to no one as she walked slowly away. They could clearly sense that Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection was joining all of them into a singular entity, like a huge net that enveloped the entire arena. In the mind of every member of the Tang Sect, they all had a bird’s-eye view of the entire arena.

When they approached their respective corners of the arena, the two sides started to line up.

On the Clearjade Sect’s side, Qin Yueyue, who had battled against Xiao Xiao, stood at the forefront. On Qin Yueyue’s left was Chen Jun, and on her right was Qing Qing. Behind her stood the powerful Xue Bing. Cain stepped behind Xue Bing, and You Chen stood behind Cain. Evidently, he was ready to attack with his astounding speed.

On the Tang Sect’s side, Xu Sanshi, who always played a defensive role, stood at the front. To his left stood Xiao Xiao, and to his right stood Jiang Nannan. Behind Xu Sanshi was He Caitou, and behind He Caitou was Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao. Na Na stood all the way at the back. The two formations both sides took up were not conventional, but they were well-coordinated.

Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, looked at both sides. Even with his cultivation, he felt a sense of pressure in his heart. After all, no one knew what the result of this competition would be. These youngsters were not only exceptionally strong, but devious as well! He could not manage the entire arena by himself. After all, ﬁve-ringed and six- ringed soul masters were already considered the crème de la crème!

He forced these thoughts out of his mind and looked at both teams. He raised his left hand and cried out, “Begin!” as he chopped down.

With this, both teams started to move immediately. While the Clearjade Sect only had six people, they were undoubtedly going on the offensive.

Qin Yueyue, who stood at the front, was now supported by her teammates. Her entire body brimmed with strength as she unleashed her Broadsword martial soul. She advanced rapidly, and almost instantly her entire body was covered with a thick layer of armor.

Chapter 299: Eye of Fear

When Qing Qing raised her hands, something weird happened. There was a ring on every ﬁnger of her hands. All ten rings lit up with a bright glow, making her look like a member of the nouveau riche. Following that, a scepter appeared in her hand, two yellow, two purple, and one black soul ring surfacing from it. The ﬁrst, second, and third soul rings lit up simultaneously. Although her control of her soul skills wasn’t as immaculate as Xiao Xiao’s, she could still be considered quite adept!

Three connected streaks of lights landed on Qin Yueyue. Her entire body started to shine with green light, and her entire aura immediately changed.

On the other side of Qin Yueyue, Chen Jun materialized a heavy shield in his hand. The top of the shield was rectangular, while the bottom was a triangular wedge. It reached almost two meters in height, a classic tower shield. He looked fearsome as he hoisted his shield. Chen Ju’s martial soul was unknown, but it seemed to enhance his strength and soul power. His shield was embedded with four huge gems, which soul engineers could tell formed the formation arrays of his shield.

Attack, defense, and enhancement! The combination of these three from the Clearjade Sect was rather strong. Furthermore, they defended the rest of their teammates as they appeared.

The Tang Sect was advancing less quickly. No one had unleashed any strong abilities. Xu Sanshi walked in front with the Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle before him. As he looked at Chen Jun’s shield, he even said, “Aiyo, I’ve ﬁnally met someone similar!”

Both parties were less than thirty meters apart now. On the Clearjade Sect’s side, Qin Yueyue lifted her blade up high. However, the Tang Sect’s formation broke apart just before she managed to slash her blade down. Three went to the left, while four moved to the right, creating a gap in their formation.

Qin Yueyue stopped her blade suddenly and spat out blood in extreme discomfort. The gap her opponents had created was supposed to be where her blade landed!

Just as she stopped, Wang Dong’er used Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair to propel herself into the air. In mid-air, the Goddess of Light’s pair of butterﬂy wings opened up, and the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess shot straight towards the Clearjade Sect like a glowing meteor shower.

Not only that, but a series of whizzing sounds also resonated out. Streaks and streaks of white light ﬂew into the air under the cover of the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess, and engulfed their opponents. The Origin of Destruction, He Caitou, ﬁnally attacked!

Apart from He Caitou, the rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters were most adept in mid or close-combat battle. Even Huo Yuhao wasn’t an exception. Although he was also a soul engineer, he didn’t specialize in long-range attacks.

He Caitou had always been researching stationary soul tools, and he had learned how to accurately attack his targets from a distance. Although he couldn’t use stationary soul tools in this tournament, he was still very good in terms of long-range and wide area-type attacks.

While Tang Sect’s movements to their left and right appeared very sudden, it was precisely these movements that immediately messed up the Clearjade Sect’s rhythm. When He Caitou’s wide area attack landed, Qin Yueyue still hadn’t slashed out with her blade yet.

Furthermore, He Caitou’s soul tools and Wang Dong’er’s Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess were guided by Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection. The level of precision was down to the millimeter! Huo Yuhao was even monitoring the formation of their opponents!

He Caitou wasn’t using a strong soul tool, only a Class 4 stinger cannon. Such soul cannons weren’t able to create explosions that covered huge areas, but the penetrative power of the attacks from such soul cannons were very high. They could potentially even punch all the way through someone and hit the person behind them!

The best way to deal with such soul cannons was to avoid them. As long as they were avoided, they were unlikely to cause much damage.

He Caitou ﬁred sixteen of these cannons. At least one of them was targeted at every Clearjade Sect disciple, and was even aimed at their heads. Their points of contact were precisely calculated using Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, and no mistakes would be made. The remaining ten cannons were aimed at one person, which wasn’t the team leader or Xue Bing. They were aimed at the weakest, but fastest, You Chen!

Wang Dong’er’s Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess seemed to engulf a huge area, but it only had two main targets, Xue Bing and Cain. The Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess surrounded both of them for only one reason: to affect them so that they couldn’t help You Chen!

As for the three in front, they couldn’t pose any threat to the Tang Sect, even though they were a good combination.

Everything sounded like it took a long time to complete, but in fact, this was all done very quickly. A tremendous boom shook the arena!

Wang Dong’er’s Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess was decently strong. She was a Soul Emperor, but her attack wasn’t considered extremely strong because she unleashed it over too large of an area. However, they still had to block her attack even if it wasn’t at its best! In contrast, the penetrative abilities of stinger cannons were much stronger. Out of the six Clearjade Sect disciples, Chen Jun, the one with the shield, was the ﬁrst to make a move.

He raised his shield into the air and covered himself, Qin Yueyue, and Qing Qing.

As the tremendous booms sounded out, the three of them stopped in their tracks, but weren’t hurt by the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess or the stinger cannons. The intense lights released by his shield blocked all the attacks.

Xue Bing continued to demonstrate his strong side. As he moved, a dominating aura was released from his body. A strong gust of gas rose into the air and destroyed the stinger cannon shell ﬂying towards him. After that, he also helped Cain block the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess. He also quickly revealed his martial soul, as he leapt up and jumped over the three in front of him, bursting straight towards the Tang Sect team.

Cain raised her right hand gently, and ﬁve long, dark-golden nails extended out. She used her nails to scratch the stinger shell, which seemed to be drained as it contacted her nails, and failed to explode, instantly turning into a piece of scrap metal. As for the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess, Cain used her nails to destroy it, too!

However, You Chen wasn’t so lucky. As an agility-type soul master, his role was to stay at the sides and lay an ambush for his opponents when the opportunity arose. It was the best way he could unleash his greatest ﬁghting strength. As a result, he was stuck behind as his teammates burst forward. He wanted to take a side route and secretly attack one of Tang Sect’s members. He had no ﬁxed target, but instead was ready to attack whoever was most exposed.

However, eleven stinger shells were crashing straight towards him under the cover of the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess before he even had a chance to move!

These cannons accurately took into account his trajectory, as well as how he circulated his soul power. He felt as if he were running straight into them!

He wasn’t as powerful as Cain, and was even defeated by Wang Dong’er badly in the ﬁrst round. After some rest, he had restored around ﬁfty to sixty percent of his power. However, he was taken aback by these eleven cannon shells. Out of pure reﬂex, he used a few soul skills and managed to deal with them.

However, a terrifying feeling caused his entire body to shudder. As he lifted his head to look into the sky, You Chen was horriﬁed to see a metal ball with a diameter of around half a meter in the air. This metal ball was facing him like a huge eye, an intense red glow undulating on its surface. As he lifted his head, a streak of red light had already shot straight down towards him.

At the same time, four familiar golden rings appeared around him. The four beams of golden light also rose and instantly locked him in place, there was no chance of escape.

A huge ﬁgure appeared in mid-air. A white barrier blocked You Chen’s head, and a loud boom rang out a few times before it stopped. You Chen was very pale as he stood very still.

“Clearjade Sect, You Chen, eliminated.” The huge ﬁgure was undoubtedly Zheng Zhan. When the streak of red light crashed down, he already knew that You Chen was helpless. In addition, You Chen had already used his Invincible Barrier. Even if he hadn’t used it yet, he might not even be able to block this attack even if he tried to use it.

He was facing a strong Class 7 soul tool called the Eye of Fear!

The Eye of Fear was a strange long-distance control-type soul tool. It could only take effect after being ﬁred into the air. How high the Eye of Fear was ﬁred was dependent on the level of the Eye of Fear. Such a soul tool could either be Class 7, 8, or 9. However, the difference in strength between each class was quite large.

A Class 7 Eye of Fear could be ﬁred up to a height of one hundred meters. From there, it could attack up to a distance of three hundred meters. Every ten seconds, it was able to ﬁre a terror ray. A terror ray could dissect, blast, penetrate, dispel, scorch, and corrode, among other effects. How long it could last depended on the charging capabilities of its energy- gathering formation.

A Class 8 Eye of Fear could be ﬁred up to three hundred meters up, and remain in the air. It could attack at a distance of up to a thousand meters, and could be ﬁred every ﬁfteen to twenty seconds. It was three times stronger than a Class 7 Eye of Fear. Additionally, it could explode! When it exploded, everything within a two hundred and ﬁfty-meter radius of it would die!

As for a Class 9 Eye of Fear, one was rumored to exist only in the Sun Moon Empire’s secret weapons vault. No one knew how strong it was, as it had never been used in battle.

Creating a Class 7 Eye of Fear was already very complicated, as difﬁcult as creating three ordinary Class 7 soul tools. While the offensive abilities of an Eye of Fear were quite strong, it had a great ﬂaw in that it couldn’t lock onto its target. It was dependent on the aiming of the person who used it. If its target moved, it would be useless. It was very important to predict the movement of one’s opponent in order to use this soul tool well. Conversely, it wasn’t easy to predict the movement of an opponent who had to be dealt with using an Eye of Fear!

Along with the fact that it was very expensive and complicated to create an Eye of Fear, most Class 7 soul engineers were unwilling to make one.

Another major ﬂaw of the Eye of Fear was that it was easily broken. It would break as long as it was accurately hit even once, and the strength required wasn’t high. Furthermore, an Eye of Fear couldn’t move once it rose into the air. It had gained a nickname after it was created. It was called the Terrifying Chicken Ribs!

However, this Terrifying Chicken Ribs managed to kick You Chen out of the team round. Otherwise, he would have been blown apart by its terror ray.

This attack along, with Wang Dong’er’s four Hexagram Arrays, was enough to defeat You Chen!

This was the teamwork of the Tang Sect team. After ﬁring his Eye of Fear into the air, He Caitou revealed a grin. It was like it had nothing to do with him. He had a second, outer helmet on for the moment, and a control button in his hands. The button enabled him to position the Eye of Fear. As for aiming at You Chen, it was something that he didn’t need to worry about. With Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection helping him, the powers of the Origin of Destruction were bound to be enhanced to the limit by the Eyes of the Asura.

Boom! The huge Anaconda fell from the air and knocked into one side of the wall. Xu Sanshi lunged forward to block before sliding his body back by a meter. He managed to deﬂect Xue Bing away in that moment, and prevented him from disrupting their formation.

Xiao Xiao also acted at this point. Her black Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron instantly grew in size until it reached three meters in diameter. It fell from the sky and crashed down onto the head of the Anaconda True Body.

Wang Dong’er had just completed her four Hexagram Arrays and returned to Huo Yuhao’s side. Jiang Nannan didn’t move, and remained at Xu Sanshi’s side.

Na Na shifted, moving behind Xu Sanshi.

The front three of the Clearjade Sect also adjusted their positions. Qin Yueyue raised her blade up high under Qing Qing’s enhancement, and an intense blade light shot out, more than thirty feet in length. The armor on her body was also like a burning green sun. Her aura was soaring at an alarming speed. Accumulation. She chose to accumulate her power now. While she only had ﬁve rings, the might of her attack would be extremely terrifying afterwards if given time to power it up.

But the Tang Sect seemed to be unbothered by this.

A streak of deep blue sword light appeared like a bolt of lightning and struck the Anaconda True Body.

The Anaconda let out a pathetic scream, and a deep wound surfaced on it. Light shot out in all directions because of this. As Xue Bing activated his Martial Soul True Body, it naturally didn’t possess any blood. However, it was surging with soul power undulations! The sword light that struck it carried the strength of Ultimate Ice. Xue Bing was being suppressed!

The cute Snow Lady drifted up into the air. As she saw the Anaconda True Body, she seemed very scornful. The Snow Empress’ Three Ultimate Techniques – Unparalleled Chill, Empress’ Sword!

The Tang Sect was undoubtedly even more terrifying when they fought as a team. With Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, they easily suppressed their opponents.

---

Zheng Zhan sighed as he watched everything. The Tang Sect is too strong. It seems like the Sun Moon team was right to give up in the team round! Five against seven. They wouldn’t have been able to beat the Tang Sect, considering how strong and coordinated they are…

---

At this point, the Clearjade Sect was at a complete disadvantage. They hadn’t given their all yet, but they were already down one member. The rest of them were also being suppressed. Their earlier formation, which was quite strong, was of little value at this point. This left them like headless chickens.

Cain ﬁnally acted. When her team members were all in disastrous situations, she burst out like a shadow. She was extremely quick, far quicker than You Chen. As they saw her ﬁgure ﬂash, she was already in the air above the Tang Sect team. As she lifted her hands, ten streaks of dark-golden light shot towards the Snow Lady. Not only that, but she also let out a high-pitched shriek.

“Ahhhhhhhh!”

Everyone in the Tang Sect jerked as one, and were slightly delayed as they tried to unleash their abilities.

Quick! Even Huo Yuhao hadn’t expected Cain to be so ferocious!

However, the Snow Lady wasn’t afraid. She wasn’t under Huo Yuhao’s control. She possessed her own intelligence, and the ﬁghting capabilities of the Snow Empress.

Against the dark golden rays, her body swayed a little, and she ﬂitted aside like a streak of deep blue light before brushing past them. At the same time, she moved to place her small palm on Cain’s chest. The Snow Empress’ Three Ultimate Techniques – Empress’ Palm, Snowless Glacier. She immediately used her killer move.

The roar might have been effective on the Tang Sect members. However, how could it have any effect on the Snow Lady?

Cain didn’t continue ﬁghting the Snow Lady. As her attack had no effect, she quickly shifted positions, too fast to be caught.

This time, she appeared above Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

She clawed down at their heads.

As the team leader of the Clearjade Sect, Cain knew that Huo Yuhao was the one commanding the entire team, even though he seemed like he was the weak link by being in a wheelchair.

If he was removed, the Tang Sect’s coordination would be messed up. Whatever crisis Zheng Zhan could see, Cain could also see. To win this team round, she had to get rid of the brains behind the Tang Sect. Dang, dang!

Two crisp sounds echoed out. Cain was stunned. Neither Huo Yuhao nor Wang Dong’er had blocked her attack! It was a big shield instead!

Cain’s ﬁghting style was to immediately shift her position after she attacked. Otherwise, she would be in trouble once she was cornered by the Tang Sect. She didn’t hesitate at all, her ﬁgure ﬂashing away as she returned to the air. This time, she opened up a pair of dark-golden wings behind her back, driving herself up towards the Eye of Fear above her.

At this point, the Eye of Fear had only charged for three seconds. She had chosen the perfect time. If she didn’t destroy it immediately, it could pose a threat to her entire team. None of them knew who its next target would be.

However, the weird thing was that no one from the Tang Sect stopped her. No one even tried.

After Xu Sanshi blocked Cain’s attack, he moved back in front of the entire team again. His shield was still in front of him, and he watched Qin Yueyue, who was almost done with her power accumulation. At this point, she was already targeting him.

Xu Sanshi had to be overcome ﬁrst, no matter whether it was because he was a six-ringed Soul Emperor or because he was a defense-type soul master. In their previous clashes, neither Xue Bing nor Cain managed to make any headway because of him.

A weird smile appeared on Xu Sanshi’s face. Jiang Nannan shook her head gently when she saw that smile, and also started to act. She moved with a ﬂash, and leapt forward diagonally. Her target was the Anaconda True Body of Xue Bing!

Huo Yuhao’s eyes shone with divine light. The Snow Lady returned to his side again, but she stopped behind Xu Sanshi’s back. She raised her small and delicate hands. Wang Dong’er could tell that rings and rings of icy-blue light were forming in the center of the Snow Lady’s right hand at a rapid rate. Was she… accumulating the power of her Snowless Glacier? What was she doing? The Snowless Glacier would only have sufﬁcient effect if it struck the opponent directly! However, Wang Dong’er was only a little doubtful. She was also drifting in the air under the guidance of Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection. Streaks and streaks of Hexagram Arrays rose into the air as both parties fought each other. Their target was the Anaconda True Body.

Xue Bing was unfortunate. He had already been struck once by the Unparalleled Chill as he was careless. Right now, he could only try to maintain his Anaconda True Body. The intense pain and the Ultimate Ice were greatly diminishing his ﬁghting strength.

While a Martial Soul True Body was strong, his was not a true Martial Soul True Body. As his abilities were diminishing, he also didn’t dare to face Wang Dong’er’s Hexagram Arrays directly. He was also afraid to rush forward. Xiao Xiao’s Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron coordinated with Wang Dong’er’s Hexagram Arrays to suppress him, preventing him from advancing any further.

At this point, Cain was already in front of the Eye of Fear. She reached out with her claws, about to destroy it. However, a weird feeling engulfed her body suddenly. Cain only felt the space surrounding her distorting furiously. Her claws found nothing. Following that, she realized a familiar yet frightening streak of green light was crashing down from the sky. Her head was its target!

How is this possible? Cain was astonished. However, she had no choice but to resist the attack. She clawed at the air, creating a dark golden light projection. Her wings also opened to their maximum span behind her.

However, a cool hand pressed against her back just as she was about to use her strongest defense to resist this attack.

None of her team had expected such a huge change to occur. They would still have had a chance if Cain managed to destroy the Eye of Fear. However, Cain and Xu Sanshi’s positions were suddenly switched at the perfect moment.

At this point, Qin Yueyue completed her accumulation and slashed down with her blade. Her target was now Cain, who was momentarily lost after she switched positions with Xu Sanshi.

The cool hand contained the Snowless Glacier! Cain knew she was in deep trouble.

Everything had happened too quickly. The Mysterious Underworld Displacement had the same effect as Instant Teleportation. Zheng Zhan thought he was seeing things as everything changed. There was no time to react.

Everyone from the Tang Sect knew that they had won. As this strike was unleashed, Huo Yuhao also completed another attack. Purplish-gold light ﬂashed in his eyes before Xue Bing screamed pathetically from afar. He was already weakened, but his Martial Soul True Body was immediately dispelled under the attack of Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Shock.

The Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron immediately divided into three separate cauldrons before the Cauldron Quake was unleashed on him. Xue Bing was locked in place. At this point, Jiang Nannan was already in front of him, and she kicked him in the chest. He was immediately overcome when Jiang Nannan got close to him.

Even Huo Yuhao believed that they had won this round. Furthermore, Cain was surely going to be killed under the combined attack of Qin Yueyue and the Snow Lady!

The Snowless Glacier could kill a Soul Sage, given enough time to accumulate. Cain was only a six-ringed Soul Emperor. The combination of the Mysterious Underworld Displacement and the Snow Lady was too strong.

However, something changed at this moment.

Cain’s body cracked as she was struck by the Snow Lady’s palm, before being hit by the blade lights. She instantly split into three parts, which ﬂew off in three different directions.

These three ﬁgures turned into three dark-golden bats in the air.

One of the bats turned a deep blue after ﬂying less than three meters. After that, it broke apart. The other two bats quickly ﬂew in two different directions. One of them headed for Huo Yuhao, while the other ﬂew towards Xue Bing, who was being restrained by Jiang Nannan.

What’s this? Huo Yuhao was also shocked. The bat ﬂying towards him had a wingspan of three meters. There was a dark-golden circular ring on its neck, and it screeched as it got close to Huo Yuhao. This screech caused Huo Yuhao to enter a momentary trance.

Following this, the back of the bat shone with a streak of bloody light. A projection that looked exactly like another bat appeared and plunged towards Huo Yuhao’s chest.

This skill was sixty to seventy percent similar to the Bloodshadow Human Puppet that Adler had used against Wang Dong’er!

Although Huo Yuhao was in a momentary trance, his reaction was still very quick. A huge, half-transparent light shield blocked his body.

The blood-red eyes of the bat seemed to be ﬁlled with disdain. Didn’t Wang Dong’er tell Huo Yuhao that the Bloodshadow Human Puppet was able to ignore any form of defense? However, the body of the bat turned rigid in the next instant. The bloody red projection collided with the shield. It didn’t manage to penetrate through, and even staggered after it struck the shield.

Milky-white glows surfaced on the shield, and seemed to form a smiley face. Following this, an exact copy of the blood- colored bat projection was deﬂected away directly towards the dark-golden bat.

The dark-golden bat screamed in pain before creating a dim golden light projection behind it. This projection changed into spots of golden light that surged towards the shield.

To both parties, their opponent was using very weird abilities. Neither of them expected the other party to possess such abilities.

Cain escaped death, but she didn’t feel very well after being attacked repeatedly.

Wang Dong’er and the Snow Lady were still beside Huo Yuhao. The dark-golden bat was stalled for a while after it was hurt by the shield. This momentary delay offered time for Wang Dong’er’s Butterﬂy Goddess Slash to cut towards the bat. A huge ball of light instantly changed into a hundred and eight blades that surrounded the bat.

Another strange scene appeared again. The dark-golden bat blew apart again and changed into countless smaller bats that absconded in different directions, managing to escape from the very concentrated attack of the Butterﬂy Goddess Slash.

However, not all of them managed to escape, as a few of the smaller bats were still killed.

On the other side, the other dark-golden bat was in a much better situation. The Bloodshadow Human Puppet changed its target to Jiang Nannan, and she had no choice but to escape. Xiao Xiao directly used one of her cauldrons to cover Jiang Nannan, which blocked off the puppet’s attack. However, in doing so Cain also managed to alleviate Xue Bing’s crisis.

All these changes happened extremely quickly. Qin Yueyue only managed to retract her blade after Xue Bing had already been saved. However, a streak of red light that exuded a terrifying aura descended from the sky at this moment. This time, its target was Qin Yueyue!

No matter how capable Cain was, she couldn’t save Qin Yueyue after she was repeatedly attacked and forced to save Xue Bing.

Zheng Zhan reacted again and blocked the attack for Qin Yueyue. At the same time, he announced her elimination. Two out of the original six members from the Clearjade Sect were eliminated!

It was the Eye of Fear’s turn to demonstrate its strength again, and after ﬁring, it started to accumulate its strength again.

He Caitou also unleashed his attack. Countless soul rays and cannon shells were ﬁred towards Xue Bing and Cain. On the other side, Xu Sanshi landed right in between Qing Qing and Chen Jun. This was going to be a clash between shields.

Boom!

Their shields collided with a startlingly loud impact.

While Chen Jun’s shield was much bigger than Xu Sanshi’s shield, he was much inferior in terms of strength. After the collision, he took several steps back, very unsteady on his feet.

Qing Qing was alert, and quickly retreated. The lights released from her scepter were now directed at Chen Jun.

Xu Sanshi snorted, and his shield shone with a layer of black light. His entire body was also dyed black as his third soul ring shone brightly.

“Let me deal with these two!” With his abilities as a Soul Emperor, it would be very embarrassing if he couldn’t deal with two Soul Kings. He was once regarded, along with Bei Bei, as one of the new-generation Gemini of Shrek Academy!

Huo Yuhao didn’t rush to attack. He exploited He Caitou’s wide area attack, and all of them gathered together into their formation once again. Wang Dong’er replaced Xu Sanshi, while Xiao Xiao and Jiang Nannan were at her sides. He Caitou and Huo Yuhao were now behind her. Lastly, Na Na was behind Huo Yuhao now as she pushed his wheelchair in place of Wang Dong’er. From the start until now, Na Na hadn’t made a single move.

In fact, Na Na was a little unfamiliar in terms of her abilities and coordination with Shrek’s Seven Monsters. Huo Yuhao’s mission for her was to cover for everyone. If their opponents crept around the back side, her job was to slow them down.

“What martial soul is that?” Na Na asked.

Huo Yuhao shook his head. He was also unsure what Cain’s martial soul was. However, the result of this team round had already been decided. The only thing was that they hadn’t fully accomplished their goal yet. The Clearjade Sect team was deﬁnitely stronger than they had expected.

“Dong’er!” Huo Yuhao called out gently.

“Yes,” Wang Dong’er nodded gently in reply. Their minds connected, and she understood what he wanted even as he spoke.

An intense beam of golden light rose from Wang Dong’er’s body. Her upper body bent back, her waist supported her as she formed a bow shape with her body. She grabbed onto Huo Yuhao’s shoulders with her hands and did a handstand on his body. The rest of the Tang Sect quickly separated to the side.

The air seemed to freeze at this point. Countless streaks of blinding light started to spew out from Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

Time seemed to stop at this moment too.

The Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ golden-blue wings expanded rapidly. Almost instantly, their size doubled.

Originally, she only had front and rear wings, but right now, there was an additional pair of jade-green wings in the middle. They were smooth, shiny, and dazzling. A strong aura of life came from this additional pair of wings, as if they were saying that the true meaning of life was light and water. Their aura of life complemented her aura of light.

As the dazzling wings opened up, blue, golden, and green lights seemed to shine with countless other colors. There seemed to be countless beads of gently rolling water on the wings. They refracted all the light shining from them. Countless streaks of light shone brightly, and layers and layers of frost were released as well, starting from the bottom of her feet. They made her slender ﬁgure appear even more elegant.

As the frost spread, everything around her seemed to turn into a world of ice and snow. As the chilly aura spread, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s fused body also started to shockingly transform. Huo Yuhao disappeared, and a slender ﬁgure quietly appeared amid the tri-colored glow.

It was a lady, a lady that seemed to have already matured, more than a hundred and eighty centimeters tall. Her slender ﬁgure was extremely captivating.

She had long, powdery-blue hair that ﬂowed all the way to her feet. Her eyes were a bright gold, and her ﬁgure was beyond perfect. Her ravishing looks made all the ladies present pale in comparison. Every streak of light and every curve on her body complemented the other. No one could describe how they felt when they ﬁrst saw her. However, everyone’s attention was captured by her the instant she appeared.

Chapter 300: Defeating Clearjade!

She moved in the next moment. She leapt gently forward with her left leg, and her slender ﬁgure was suddenly halfway in the air. Her tri-colored butterﬂy wings brought her skywards effortlessly.

Thick icy fog spread from her legs and turned into streaks surrounding her as she rose.

A ray of sunlight descended from the sky and landed straight on her like a spotlight from the heavens.

The golden glow accentuated her ﬁgure even further, and she seemed like a goddess, born amid the light.

As she danced in the air, every step she took was gentle and perfect. Her moving looks were covered by the glow of life and hope, and her six wings were the best accessories she could possibly have. The Raiment of Light was revealed as she was covered by the warm sunshine. The ravishing ﬁgure started to perform a solitary dance amid the icy fog. Her tri-colored wings extended and retracted, making her elegance even more dazzling.

A subtle golden talisman silently appeared on her forehead. As light ﬂashed from the talisman, it revealed a gentle glow. Intense spiritual undulations caused her to enter a miraculous state.

Solitary Dance Amidst the Frost, Raiment of Light!

Just like in the last round of the tournament in the Star Luo Empire, everyone was astonished when the Goddess of Light appeared. Everyone’s gaze was focused on her. They couldn’t believe that a person could be so beautiful.

As the dazzling, tri-colored wings opened up, the Goddess of Light took a step forward and seemed to shrink space about her. She advanced several dozen meters and appeared in front of the opponents that had survived the explosion.

The two remaining dark golden bats gathered together. A light ﬂashed, and they formed a larger bat. However, this bat had two heads! In fact, it was more accurate to say that it had three heads! It was just that one was only left with the stump of a neck, there wasn’t any head left. Evidently, it must have had been struck off by the Snowless Glacier!

Everyone from the Tang Sect ﬁnally realized what Cain’s martial soul was. It was an extremely rare but top-ranked martial soul, the Darkgolden Three-headed Batking!

It wasn’t only strong; it was a terrifying martial soul that only appeared after a mutation occurred. In the world of soul masters, it was a powerful martial soul that had previously only existed in legends!

Right now, Cain was deﬁnitely in her Martial Soul True Body. Her trump card was similar to Xue Bing. They both used soul tools to forcefully enhance themselves to reach their Martial Soul True Body state. However, they were both spent right now, and it was very difﬁcult for them to maintain their Martial Soul True Bodies anymore. After all, their Martial Soul True Bodies had been forced to manifest. Compared to real Martial Soul True Bodies, they could at most unleash sixty percent of their maximum abilities in such a state. However, sixty percent of Cain’s maximum abilities was enough to save her life. Otherwise, the combination of the Snowless Glacier and Executioner’s Blade would’ve killed her.

As the Goddess of Light opened her wings, an extremely chilly aura was released. Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao didn’t just possess two and three rings like they had the last time they unleashed the Solitary Dance Amidst the Frost in a tournament. They were very strong now!

Without any warning, a snowstorm was unleashed, with the Goddess of Light at the center of it. Three people were immediately engulfed by this snowstorm, and those on the outside couldn’t see what was happening.

Yes, it was the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice!

The Goddess of Light was Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s last martial soul fusion skill because it wasn’t an attack that could only be used one time. They could attack continuously and unleash their complete ﬁghting strength! They weren’t able to maintain such strength or use so much power in the past. However, the Goddess of Light was able to unleash all of their abilities now. It wasn’t their Martial Soul True Body; it was stronger than a Martial Soul True Body!

The referee, Zheng Zhan, cursed and immediately rushed in the direction of the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice. As he couldn’t see what was going on, he couldn’t tell what they were up to. It was a dazzling martial soul fusion skill! He didn’t expect them to have such a trick up their sleeves!

Inside the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice, Cain and Xue Bing felt as if they had entered an extremely chilly world. They even felt their blood solidifying in the cold. As their bloodﬂow slowed, they felt the circulation of their soul power also dropping signiﬁcantly.

Xue Bing had been thrown onto the ﬂoor several times by Jiang Nannan earlier, and could feel his body breaking apart. His soul power was almost depleted after two consecutive ﬁghts. Against the extreme cold, he could only forcefully circulate his soul power to resist the snowﬂakes that resembled sharp knives. Cain was in a better state. However, one of her bat heads had been destroyed. This hurt her martial soul, and she couldn’t recover from this in a day or two like normal. It was just like Xiao Xiao when her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron had been crushed; she might even not recover completely at all!

Cain let out a piercing scream. It was her Terrorscream again. She didn’t expect her skill to hurt the Goddess of Light, she was only trying to ﬁnd her opponent. She didn’t want to rush out blindly. In this snowblind world, she couldn’t possibly get her directions right. She didn’t know where her enemy was, and she still had to protect Xue Bing. Thus, she didn’t dare to act recklessly.

“Don’t waste your energy. Don’t worry, I won’t kill the two of you,” a moving voice sounded. The frost seemed to split, revealing a ravishing ﬁgure slowly walking toward them.

Even though they were in harsh conditions, Xue Bing’s eyes widened in shock when he saw the Goddess of Light. He couldn’t believe that there was someone so perfect in this world. The Darkgolden Three-headed Batking’s wings opened wide, and Cain burst towards the Goddess of Light like a bolt of lightning. She knew that their surroundings would return to normal as long as she could defeat the Goddess of Light!

It was a pity that she was engulfed by a beam of golden and blue light less than ﬁve meters after she moved. It was a Hexagram Array that now also carried the Ultimate Ice. Within this Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice, the aura that it released was entirely concealed.

The Darkgolden Three-headed Batking struggled indignantly. Xue Bing also tried to stand up and resist further. However, they were in very weak states right now.

Outside the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice, three huge cauldrons blocked the Unbreakable Douluo Zheng Zhan as he rushed out. One of the cauldrons was stacked on top of the other two cauldrons.

“Referee, you can’t interfere since victory hasn’t been decided yet,” Xiao Xiao spoke out. Right now, they had already gathered on the other side to aid Xu Sanshi in his formation. “Get lost!” Zheng Zhan shouted in fury. He clapped his hands, and a wave of dominant soul power swept the cauldrons to one side. However, the terrifying red in the sky appeared once again as he tried to burst towards the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice.

Zheng Zhan turned pale, and he was about to curse.

Even though he was a Titled Douluo, he couldn’t separate his body like the Darkgolden Three-headed Batking! On the one hand, he couldn’t tell what the situation was like inside the snowstorm. On the other, he was afraid of someone else dying if they were struck by the terrifying ray. He was left with no choice. His ﬁgure ﬂashed, and he blocked the attack on Qing Qing, also announcing that she had been eliminated.

Chen Jun was kicked out a few seconds after Qing Qing. Even though his shield had many special skills, he didn’t stand a chance with his inferior cultivation. Xu Sanshi’s Turtle God’s Strike helped him destroy his opponent’s shield directly. If not for Zheng Zhan’s intervention, Chen Jun’s body would also have been crushed. As this slight delay happened, the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice on the other side also spread out and began to vanish.

The Goddess of Light danced. Her wings opened and turned into a streak of ﬂowing light that moved straight towards the Golden Tree wheelchair. At this point, there were two ice sculptures left within the area covered by the Snowy Dance of Ultimate Ice.

Cain had already regained her original look. She was actually an attractive young lady with a weirdly pale complexion.

Xue Bing was in a more tragic state. There was huge wounds on his chest and belly. However, these injuries couldn’t be seen clearly, as he was frozen.

“Referee, we’ve won.” The Goddess of Light turned back into two people as a ﬁnal light ﬂashed. Huo Yuhao was quietly sitting in his wheelchair, while Wang Dong’er was standing in front of him. The two of them looked at each other and smiled.

Zheng Zhan quickly rushed in front of the two ice sculptures. After a few attempts, he realized he couldn’t melt them free. The two ice sculptures were very hard, and their temperatures were extremely low. He didn’t dare to forcefully break the ice. If he did so, the two of them would die very quickly.

“Quickly, defrost them.” Zheng Zhan quickly came over in front of Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

Huo Yuhao appeared very weak, “I’m sorry! Referee, my soul power isn’t sufﬁcient, so I can’t melt them. Don’t worry, their lives won’t be in danger, as the temperature of Ultimate Ice is very low. When my soul power recovers, I can help to melt them. Their pulse just has to be restarted before they can regain their life power. In this state, they won’t die even after a year.”

“Life…” Zheng Zhan was helpless as he looked at Huo Yuhao

Huo Yuhao smiled as he said, “Isn’t it great that we’ve removed one more strong opponent for the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy?”

Wang Dong’er added, “You should announce that we’ve won.”

Zheng Zhan took in a deep breath. He knew that there were some things that a referee like him couldn’t do. If they didn’t want to melt the two of them, what could he do? It was the Ultimate Ice. No one on the continent would dare to melt these ice sculptures!

“The Tang Sect wins the team round, and this match! Tang Sect - nine points. Clearjade Sect - seven points!”

Victory! The Tang Sect progressed to the next round!

“What have you done to our captain and vice-captain?” The substitutes for the Clearjade Sect, as well as You Chen, Qin Yueyue, Chen Jun, Qingqing and the rest, surrounded them as they descended from the stage.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “They will be ﬁne. After a few days, I’ll defrost them when my soul power recovers.”

“In a few days? Why does your soul power take so long to recover?” Qin Yueyue was furious as she glared at Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “I’m sorry! Can’t you see that I’m crippled? It’s already not easy for me to compete. Furthermore, I’m the only one who can defrost them. Please be nicer to me. Otherwise, I’ll leave them frozen forever.”

Chen Jun said, “How long will it take before you are willing to defrost them? If you take too long, their lives will be in danger.” Huo Yuhao said, “Three days. I’ll take at most three days before I defrost them. You must give me some time to rest.”

Three days? Won’t they miss the next round if it takes three days? Everyone from the Clearjade Sect looked extremely furious and resentful. However, they were helpless!

Jing Ziyan and Ji Juechen had already arrived at this point. Ji Juechen lifted his Judgment Sword and coolly said, “There’s still another way. If any one of you can beat me in a duel, he can also help to defrost your captain and vice-captain.”

After everyone from the Clearjade Sect heard his words, their eyes brightened.

Chen Jun asked, “Are you going to stay true to your promise?” He was staring at Huo Yuhao instead of Ji Juechen.

Huo Yuhao’s expression turned weird, and he nodded his head. He said, “Yes. He’s with us. If you can defeat him, I’ll defrost your captain and vice-captain.” “Let’s go. Let’s ﬁnd a place!” everyone from Clearjade Sect shouted quickly.

Jing Ziyan chuckled and responded, “We don’t have to go to too much trouble. It’s the suburbs, anyway. We just need to move a bit further from the tournament venue. If he loses, Yuhao will defrost them when we return to the Ming Yue Hotel. Let’s go!”

After seeing Ji Juechen off, Jing Ziyan left with everyone from the Clearjade Sect. Huo Yuhao shook his head helplessly.

Wang Dong’er was amused. “It’s my ﬁrst time hearing Brother Ji speak so much.”

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “He must have been holding it in for too long! Originally, I wanted to freeze those two fellows for a few days and let them off only after they ﬁnished their ﬁght with Team Shrek. However, it seems like they won’t even have seven members available for the ﬁght the day after even if I defrost those two now. Na Na, can you follow them and tell Brother Ji not to kill anyone? We have no enmity with the Clearjade Sect.” “Yes.” Na Na hurried after them.

------

After this ﬁght, the Tang Sect was recognized as a dark horse in this tournament. They managed to emerge victorious in two ﬁghts even though their opponents were strong. In addition, no one from their side was injured. This series of results made them one of the favorites to win their group.

There were a lot of people who were guessing how the Tang Sect would fare against Shrek Academy. However, it was still too early to say. That was because the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy were only facing off in the last match of their group.

Shrek Academy’s schedule was very kind to them. They were going to face Team Sun Moon in their penultimate match. Before that, they didn’t really have any strong opponents. The Clearjade Sect might have potentially hurt their chances, but their encounter with the Tang Sect greatly hampered their abilities. Everyone from the Tang Sect returned to the hotel to rest, not staying to watch the rest of the matches. Once they reached the hotel, they received a notiﬁcation that they were being moved to the second story of the hotel, into an extremely luxurious suite.

This was undoubtedly the result of their performances in the tournament.

“Eldest senior, this was what happened.” Huo Yuhao recounted the details of their ﬁght to Bei Bei.

Bei Bei nodded and said, “Good job. Yuhao, you are even better than me in terms of commanding the team. Continue to work hard!”

Huo Yuhao sighed in his heart as he saw that Bei Bei’s face was still as pale as ever. “Eldest senior, your condition doesn’t seem to be improving. The opponents we’ll be meeting in the later stages of the tournament are only going to get stronger and stronger. I’m under a lot of pressure!” Bei Bei chortled and said, “Since when were you scared of pressure? Don’t think too much, and strive forward. From what you said, our main opponents are Shrek, the Sun Moon Soul Engineering Academy, the Holy Ghost Sect, and the unknown Body Sect. Apart from these few teams, there are the other traditional powerhouses, as well! None of them will be easy to deal with! This tournament might be the most intense competition for the past few thousand years! You just need to remember to be steady as you take each step.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “I’ll do my best. Our advantage is still quite great. However, it’s difﬁcult to judge our opponents’ abilities. As the tournament continues, our opponents will also slowly learn about our trump cards. Their analysis and research of us will be more thorough, and it’ll become increasingly difﬁcult to advance further.”

Bei Bei smiled as he saw the mature look on Huo Yuhao’s face, “Yuhao, don’t put too much pressure on yourself. We are representing the Tang Sect this time. This means that we are representing ourselves too! We don’t have to be bothered about our ﬁnal ranking. I believe our name has spread far and wide from our last two performances. It won’t be difﬁcult to advance from the round-robin stage. We’ve actually already met our intended goals.” “In fact, Sanshi and the others drew a good lot this time! If Shrek can advance to the quarterﬁnals, we’ll meet them in the ﬁnals. We won’t have to worry about meeting them earlier. How’re things on their side?”

Huo Yuhao said, “Under Qiu’er’s guidance, their overall abilities have greatly increased. Qiu’er’s abilities seem to have become stronger too. Their ﬁrst few opponents in the round- robin stage were quite easy to deal with. They are facing the Clearjade Sect in their next match. We deliberately battered the Clearjade Sect today. I don’t think they’ll be a threat to Shrek anymore. If they want to advance, we’ll have to see how they fare against the Sun Moon team. It’s a pity that Xiao Hongchen was too cautious, and wasn’t willing to challenge us in the team ﬁght. Otherwise, we would’ve given them a good beating even if we had to pay a hefty price for it.”

Bei Bei chortled and said, “We’ve already tried our best. We don’t have to be too hard on ourselves, either. Yuhao, you still need to compete in the underground tournament tomorrow night. Quickly go and rest.”

“Alright.” Huo Yuhao nodded, “Eldest senior, rest well too. We’re looking forward to your leadership. The round-robin stage isn’t too tough. You don’t have to worry. However, I’m conﬁdent we can become champions if you can recover to lead us again.”

As he saw Huo Yuhao’s grin, Bei Bei patted Huo Yuhao on his shoulder, “I’ll try my best.”

“Okay. Dong’er, let’s go.”

Bei Bei sat up after Wang Dong’er left with Huo Yuhao. His eyes brightened, and he didn’t seem as fatigued as before. He sighed and said, “Yuhao, I’m sorry for putting you under so much pressure. However, I have no choice! Good luck! With you around, the Tang Sect will only become stronger and stronger no matter what happens to me.”

------

The Star Luo National Academy resting lounge...

Princess Jiujiu was quietly sitting in the main seat, the other team members of the academy in the room with her. They had just won in the afternoon and achieved two consecutive victories in their last two ﬁghts.

“I didn’t expect the Tang Sect to still be so strong, even though Huo Yuhao is in a wheelchair and Bei Bei hasn’t appeared. They were still able to defeat their opponents easily even though their opponents consisted of two Soul Emperors and ﬁve Soul Kings. They aren’t easy to deal with!”

One young man who was seated just beside Princess Jiujiu smiled and said, “Your Highness, they are the champions from the last tournament. It wouldn’t be right if they didn’t perform well. However, don’t worry. Even if we meet them in the quarterﬁnals, we might not lose to them.”

If the Tang Sect reached the quarterﬁnals, it was very likely they would meet the runners-up of Star Luo National Academy. Apart from the Star Luo National Academy, the Holy Ghost Sect was also in their group. As a result, the Star Luo National Academy was ﬁghting to ﬁnish as runners-up.

“You are so conﬁdent?” Princess Jiujiu looked across at him. The young man smiled and said, “In fact, every team should be able to tell that the Tang Sect is strong, but their weakness is that they don’t have a preparatory squad. This tournament is very intense. Who can guarantee that none of them will get injured? In my opinion, I don’t think it’ll be smooth-sailing for them all the way.”

Princess Jiujiu was a little cold as she said, “What about us?

Do you think we can make it out of the quarterﬁnals?”

The young man’s expression turned rigid. “Your Highness, forgive me for being direct. Our opponents in this tournament are very strong. If we can make it out of the round-robin stage, it’s because our group is easy.”

Princess Jiujiu glared at him. He remained very calm, and wasn’t suppressed by her aura.

At this point, someone knocked on the door.

“Come in.” Xu Jiujiu shifted her attention. The door opened, and a fearless-looking middle-aged man walked quickly to Xu Jiujiu. He whispered something in her ear.

“What? Do they really dare to...” Xu Jiujiu’s eyes were ﬁlled with astonishment. “Continue to investigate. I want accurate information!”

------

The weather in Radiant City had turned chilly over the past few days. After sunset, the temperature would drop signiﬁcantly. Due to a few ore mines being active around Radiant City, the air quality here was worse than other places on the continent. The air would only clear up after strong winds blew.

Wang Dong’er looked to her sides as she strolled along the streets. “I still prefer the simplicity of Shrek City. The metallic feel here is too strong.”

Huo Yuhao chortled as he sat in his wheelchair and said, “Me too! However, I’ve got to admit that the Sun Moon Empire’s technological improvements are way beyond everyone else’s. Otherwise, the three empires in the Douluo Continent wouldn’t be so afraid of them.”

Wang Dong’er nodded and said, “Yuhao, how inferior do you think they are in comparison to the Sun Moon Empire in terms of technology?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “It’s hard to tell. After all, I’ve no access to the top secrets of the three empires. Judging from the architectural styles and soul tool developments of the various empires, I believe the three empires are a hundred years behind the Sun Moon Empire. This is even including the fact that the three empires have been catching up over the past three years. There’s actually something that the Sun Moon Empire didn’t do so well in.”

“What thing?” He Caitou was curious. Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “They can’t keep their secrets well! Even the Sun Moon Empire might not have noticed it, but their technologies have been leaked quite frequently. The three empires in the three continents only needed a few decades before they managed to steal the technologies of the Sun Moon Empire, empowering their own technological development. Even though they are still inferior,

which makes things a little less obvious, they might creep even closer to the Sun Moon Empire if given a few more years.”

He Caitou appeared thoughtful as he nodded agreement and said, “You’re right. At least some of the soul tools produced by the Sun Moon Empire have appeared in auctions in other parts of the continent. They are stricter in their control of rare metals, though.”

Huo Yuhao twisted his lips and said, “They are neglecting the fundamentals and concentrating on the details. While rare metals are rare, what if someone ﬁnds substitutes for them? Furthermore, physical force can be used to obtain rare metals. True soul tool technology is very difﬁcult to create. If not for the fact that the Sun Moon Empire’s restrictions on Class 7 and above soul tools were slightly stricter, I’m sure their gap with the other empires might be even closer.” He Caitou furrowed his brow and said, “Aren’t we doing the same thing too? You are the most invested in it!”

Huo Yuhao twisted his head to look at He Caitou and asked, “Second senior, I’ve always wanted to ask you a question. Do you still regard yourself as part of the Sun Moon Empire?”

He Caitou was stunned, and turned to look at Huo Yuhao. As their gazes met, Huo Yuhao saw the emotions lurking deep in He Caitou’s eyes.

After remaining silent for a moment, He Caitou said, “Little junior, I don’t want to lie to you. That’s why I’m not going to answer your question. You just need to remember that I’ll always be a part of the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy. That should be enough.”

“Okay.” Huo Yuhao stopped probing and nodded acceptance.

Wang Dong’er was stunned by their conversation. She had always believed that He Caitou was a simple, honest, and even slightly awkward person. All these were especially obvious when he was with Xiao Xiao. He was always so embarrassed, which gave off a very loveable feeling. However, she could tell from this conversation that he wasn’t that simple of a person! Huo Yuhao also seemed to know something that she did not...

She squeezed Huo Yuhao’s shoulder gently. She had already thought about it. She was going to ask Huo Yuhao what was going on when they returned from the underground tournament.

Huo Yuhao looked ahead, his gaze peaceful. He enjoyed the refreshing air. Even though it was slightly polluted, his mind was clearer in this air.

The Tang Sect’s abilities were slowly being revealed as they proceeded further and further along in the tournament. They were bound to have attracted attention from different parties. They were also being treated more nicely. However, this also meant that their opponents were monitoring them more closely, and were doing their research on them.

Huo Yuhao wasn’t very concerned about the Tang Sect’s matches in the tournament. They had drawn an unfavorable lot initially, and met two strong opponents in their ﬁrst two matches. If they had lost even one person, they would ﬁnd it very difﬁcult in the successive matches. However, they had achieved victory in their starting two matches. Huo Yuhao was even a bit stunned by how well they had done. He could even clearly sense that his comrade’s abilities hadn’t been completely demonstrated yet, and everyone was still holding back a little. Under such circumstances, it wasn’t going to be a problem even if they met the Holy Ghost Sect. Would the Holy Ghost Sect even be able to threaten them?

Huo Yuhao was only hoping that Bei Bei would get better. Honestly speaking, he was more willing to be the main control soul master of the team, and not the team leader. He was only ranked sixth among Shrek’s Seven Monsters in terms of seniority. He had ﬁve seniors who were older than him. To some extent, they were more suited to command the team than him.

Huo Yuhao was most worried about Shrek’s team right now. The Tang Sect had battered the Clearjade Sect, so they would cease to be a threat. However, the Sun Moon team was still as strong as ever. In order to advance through the round-robin stage, Shrek would have to beat them!

The Sun Moon team and Shrek’s team were arch-enemies! It was a ﬁght where both parties had to give it their all. No one knew what the result was going to be. While Wang Qiu’er was indeed very strong, she was alone. Could she really lead Shrek to victory against the Sun Moon Soul Engineering Academy and enter the quarterﬁnals with the Tang Sect?

Even though Huo Yuhao’s conscience was clear, and the Tang Sect had done everything they could to help Shrek advance, he was still very worried. He also knew that he wasn’t the only one worried. All his teammates were also worried. In their hearts, Shrek’s glory was as important as the Tang Sect’s glory!

---

They ﬁnally reached the Green Hotel. Huo Yuhao was in a bit of a daze, but he soon regained his focus. A proud look appeared in his eyes again, and he lifted his head slightly as he leaned back against his wheelchair’s backrest.

Chen An was there to receive them at the entrance of the hotel. When he saw the four of them, he quickly rushed up to welcome them.

“You’re here!” Chen An said respectfully.

“Yes,” Huo Yuhao snorted. “What’s the situation today?”

Chen An replied, “There are three powerful soul engineers with us here today. Two of them are Class 6 soul engineers, and the other one is a Class 7 soul engineer. They are part of the refereeing team.”

“What about you?” Huo Yuhao looked at him.

Chen An laughed bitterly. “I’m playing second ﬁddle to them. I only managed to come out because I mentioned that I was receiving important guests.”

“Oh, you’re good.” Huo Yuhao nodded at him, and his expression became slightly gentler.

“Sir, it’s like this: I didn’t know what today’s tournament would be like beforehand. The rules were only announced after the betting ﬂoor was opened. The forty-eight competitors in the previous round will be divided into twenty-four groups of two, and one out of the two in each group will be eliminated. They won’t have any restrictions on the soul tools they can create. We’ll provide all types of rare metals and normal metals for the soul engineers to use. However, they have a time limit this time of four hours. After four hours, they must test their soul tools live in front of everyone. A soul engineer can observe his opponent’s soul tool without touching it. If he discovers that his soul tool is too inferior to his opponent’s soul tool, he can choose to concede defeat. If neither parties concedes defeat, they will challenge each other. They will ﬁght with the soul tools that they created, and they won’t be allowed to use any other soul tools or soul skills. The winner will advance.”

As he ﬁnished speaking, Chen An paused, then added, “They can kill each other.”

Huo Yuhao twisted his lips. “They can actually kill each other. So today’s betting plate is on the winner?”

Chen An nodded and said, “There are still many other events. For example, you can bet on how many ﬁghts there will be and how many people will die. Of course, the main one is on the winner. We’ll be providing the odds based on the results of the previous round. These odds will change based on the wagers until the ﬁghts begin.” Huo Yuhao nodded. He lifted his hand and called Na Na. In front of Chen An, he said, “One minute before the tournament begins, bet one million gold soul coins that I’ll win.”

Chen An was stunned after hearing his words. It was a gamble! Huo Yuhao didn’t even know who his opponent was going to be, but he bet such a large amount of himself. In addition, he would plunge the odds on him to win if he made such a bet just before today’s round began. Not only was he conﬁdent, but he was also very clever.

Huo Yuhao laughed and said, “I lost the other time, so I need to get some of my money back. Let’s go in.”

Huo Yuhao’s number was sixty-six. Chen An told him his opponent was number forty-eight. From what he had judged in the earlier round, his opponent was an outstanding Class 4 soul engineer. He might even be close to a Class 5 soul engineer.

He Caitou’s number was 88, and his opponent was number 21. He was another Class 4 soul engineer, and was slightly weaker than Huo Yuhao’s opponent. When they entered the VIP lounge, Huo Yuhao saw the number 96 and 98 competitors from earlier seated in the lounge. They were a little earlier today, and they didn’t bring their subordinates with them. They were talking to each other.

Number 96 smiled and nodded at the four of them when they entered. Huo Yuhao returned the greeting, but the arrogant look on his face didn’t disappear.

Number 98 was a little colder. He was even scornful as he looked at Huo Yuhao.

Chen An sent the four of them into the lounge before he left.

After all, there was still other stuff that he had to deal with.

Wang Dong’er served Huo Yuhao a glass of fruit juice, but he only took one sip. On the other side, number 96 stood up and walked over.

“How are you, my friend? Can we chat?” He bowed slightly and was very formal as he greeted Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “Please, take a seat.”

Number 96 sat beside him on the sofa, and asked very naturally, “May I know your name?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “My number is 66. I know your number is 96.”

Chapter 301: A Confrontation Of Soul Tools

96’s eyes ﬂashed. This was Huo Yuhao’s blatant way of telling him that he wasn’t going to reveal his name. He didn’t probe further, but only smiled. “Number 66, what’s your take on today’s ﬁght?”

Huo Yuhao seemed to be excited. “Interesting. Who says soul engineers can’t ﬁght? I think it’s a good idea to ﬁght using your own soul tool.”

Number 96 chortled and said, “I think it’s a good idea too.”

“It seems like we have the same thinking. I’ve seen the groups earlier. We won’t meet in this round.”

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll win.” Huo Yuhao’s gaze turned sharp.

“Is that so? We’ll see.” 96 smiled and stood up before walking back to his original seat. There was a scornful look on his face. He believed that he had gotten whatever information he needed from this arrogant young man in a wheelchair.

Huo Yuhao twisted his lips and didn’t even look at the two of them.

Testing me? You can slowly test all you want.

“To all distinguished guests, the tournament is about to begin.” A staff member came in to inform them.

Both the number 96 and 98 stood up at the same time. They didn’t give way to each other, but walked briskly out of the lounge together.

Huo Yuhao snorted, revealing how displeased he was.

A vicious gaze ﬂashed across number 98’s eyes. He was about to act up, but he was stopped by 96, who dragged him out towards the hall.

--- The hall was still as crowded as ever. Today, the central, circular stage was able to hold all the competitors. Forty-eight carving tables were on the stage, forming multiple arcs.

Huo Yuhao squinted and scanned the entire place with his Spiritual Detection. He immediately sensed that the VIP area was full, while the common area in the hall was also packed.

There were a few changes made to the hall. There had added another platform. The platform was rectangular in shape, and around ﬁve meters above the ﬂoor. It was ﬁfty meters in length, and almost extended from one side of the hall to the other. However, it was only ﬁve meters wide. The entire platform seemed to have been made from metal, and hung in the air using cables.

Were the soul engineers going to ﬁght on this platform? By restricting the shape of the platform to a rectangle, it was evident that it was there to prevent the competitors from dodging. Furthermore, those who were wise enough would bear the platform in mind when they made their soul tools.

Very soon, Huo Yuhao and He Caitou were brought onto the stage by the staff. Wang Dong’er and Na Na remained in one corner.

This time, Huo Yuhao and He Caitou weren’t arranged side- by-side. There were two rows of carving tables facing one another. Every soul engineer would sit opposite their direct competitor. However, the Duskwater Alliance didn’t explain how they had drawn the lots for this round. This was an underground tournament, and thus there wasn’t any need for explanations.

Huo Yuhao’s opponent was a young man who looked about twenty-six or twenty-seven years old. He was extremely ugly, with a broken nose and small eyes. His hair was messy, and slightly yellow. There was even a bald patch in the center of his head. It was very difﬁcult to compliment his looks. However, there was an unyielding strength in his eyes. He didn’t look at Huo Yuhao, but instead, his eyes were ﬁxed on the rare metals displayed on the stage.

There was an additional storage shelf with three different compartments on every carving table. Each compartment was ﬁlled with all types of metals. The ﬁrst compartment contained the ordinary metals, while the other two compartments were ﬁlled with rare metals. There were more than thirty types of rare metals!

With such a wide array of metals available, it was even possible to create a Class 7 soul tool. To test the abilities of the soul engineers, the Duskwater Alliance was very generous. The soul tools created by the soul engineers would eventually belong to them. The forty-eight soul tools that were going to be created were bound to be quite valuable.

------

Three small circular platforms rose up in front of the stage.

There was an elder on each platform.

The platforms stopped rising after only about one meter. The elder in the center said, “Greetings to all soul engineers and guests. I’m the chief judge of today’s tournament. The tournament is about to start. The countdown will start after I announce the commencement of today’s round. The time restriction will be four hours. Within four hours, every soul engineer must try his best to create his own soul tool. There’s only one goal: defeat the person sitting opposite you. The winners will advance to the next round.” After he ﬁnished speaking, all the competing soul engineers nodded their heads in unison and looked at their opponents.

From this round onward, the rewards of winning became very ample. Huo Yuhao learned about it from Chen An. The prize for winning this round was two kilograms each of thirty- two types of rare metals. It was equivalent to the amount of rare metals they had onstage.

For a soul engineer, a wide variety of rare metals was more attractive than gold soul coins. It was rumored that the winners of the next round could take home ﬁve kilograms of each rare metal. The variety of rare metals would even be increased to forty! Most of these rare metals were banned from being exported from of the Sun Moon Empire. They were bound to be extremely valuable!

The soul engineer opposite Huo Yuhao lifted his head and grinned, revealing his yellow crooked teeth. “Brother, how are you? My name is Gao Dalou. Come on, let’s have a good competition.”

Huo Yuhao held his laughter as he looked at Gao Dalou. He was indeed very special! However, Huo Yuhao admired his unyielding gaze. He wasn’t one to judge others based on their appearances, especially in a competition. He knew that it wasn’t going to be easy to win against his opponent today.

“Competitors, please get ready!” the chief judge shouted.

Gao Dalou immediately lowered his head, his gaze sharpening. He stared at a piece of rare metal that he had already polished.

Huo Yuhao appeared more leisurely. It was as if he wasn’t anxious at all.

“The match begins. Raise the soundprooﬁng barrier!” the chief judge shouted. Twelve eye-catching hourglasses were ﬂipped over. When the sand in these hourglasses stopped ﬂowing, the countdown would be over. All the soul engineers today were on the same stage, and thus the soundprooﬁng barrier could ﬁnally be set up, so the spectators could make noise. It was also the reason why so many people were here today.

All the soul engineers started to get busy immediately.

Gao Dalou’s right hand quickly reached out, and a pitch-black rare metal that ﬂashed with spots of silver landed in his palm. He revealed an intoxicated look in his eyes. He was gently rubbing the metal, as if he were caressing the skin of a beautiful lady.

Huo Yuhao was very interested in him. He reached out for a rare metal at one side of the table, and a piece of dark-red rare metal which weighed about one kilo ﬂew towards him.

There was a scorching aura about this rare metal as it ﬂew over.

It was Flaming Sun Iron, a metal that was only produced deep within volcanoes. It was extremely rare. It ranked as one of the top ﬁve rarest metals among the available thirty-two types of rare metals here.

The Duskwater Alliance had provided so many rare metals today, and Chen An was no longer part of the refereeing team. Huo Yuhao naturally couldn’t keep all of the rare metals to himself. Naturally, he was going to choose some of the rarer metals to create his soul tool!

His opponent did the same thing. He was holding Silverstar Steel in his hand, which was the most valuable of the thirty- two rare metals present. Its density was quite high, and it had a great afﬁnity for soul power. Any soul power that was poured into it would be doubled. It was the best material used to create

an energy-gathering formation array. One kilo of that metal was worth at least a hundred thousand gold soul coins!

The Duskwater Alliance must have had spent a lot on this tournament. Of course, it was nothing compared to the amount of wagers they collected from the countless people who were betting on this tournament.

As Huo Yuhao looked at Gao Dalou’s intoxicated look, he thought to himself. Has this guy never seen Silverstar Steel before? It’s my ﬁrst time seeing someone so intoxicated.

Gao Dalou didn’t rub it for too long. After about a minute, his expression turned cautious. He carefully held the steel on the carving table in front of him. After that, he retrieved a carving knife from behind his waist with his right hand. Huo Yuhao didn’t rush to create his soul tool. He had great spiritual power, and could create his soul tools faster than the other soul engineers. He didn’t want to reveal his complete abilities, however, and thus he wouldn’t create the strongest soul tool. However, he couldn’t lose, either. So, he observed his

opponent. He was waiting to see what his opponent was creating before he thought of a strategy to counter it.

Gao Dalou didn’t seem to be bothered by Huo Yuhao watching him. After he grabbed his carving knife, he started to work on his soul tool.

It was easy to tell if one was skilled. Huo Yuhao was stunned when Gao Dalou started to carve.

Gao Dalou’s carving knife didn’t look eye-catching, but he didn’t seem to use any effort as he cut into the tough Silverstar Steel. After three cuts, he managed to carve out three proportionate areas on the steel.

There was a name for this carving technique: One Blade, Three Tremors. Such a skill couldn’t be underestimated. It was only achievable after years of training. Not only must one be accurate and ﬂawless, but the amount of strength he used must also be balanced. Most ordinary people wouldn’t choose to employ such a technique on Silverstar Steel. If the carving went wrong, the piece of steel would become useless. At least, it couldn’t be used to create the formation array that he had in mind.

Gao Dalou didn’t stop at all. When he started carving, his carving knife seemed to have a life of its own. He wasn’t very quick, but every movement of his knife was very steady. His small eyes were ﬁxed on the Silverstar Steel, and he didn’t make a single mistake.

He wasn’t just appreciating it, but also studying the structure of this Silverstar Steel. Otherwise, he couldn’t have been so quick.

Huo Yuhao continued to remain calm. He sat on the chair in front of the carving table and placed the Flaming Sun Iron down. He was very serious as he looked at Gao Dalou opposite him.

Gao Dalou’s rhythm and steadiness gave him some inspiration. Only a few words could be used to describe Gao Dalou’s way of creating his soul tool: simple and quaint.

He made the entire process seem very simple. Every cut was very precise, and no mistakes were made. He didn’t need to carve out a rough shape like most soul engineers before ﬁne- tuning the details. He completed everything in one shot.

He only used ﬁfteen minutes to ﬁnish carving. The steel ended up in a rectangular shape with many ﬁne patterns.

The Silverstar Steel’s spots of silver light accentuated his work, and it was quite captivating, even dazzling!

Gao Dalou seemed to be intoxicated as he looked at the steel. It was like he had seen his lover, and he couldn’t help but caress it a few times.

Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but laugh slightly when he saw this weird expression.

Gao Dalou was jolted awake. He lifted his head to look at Huo Yuhao. He saw the piece of complete Flaming Sun Iron still in front of him. “Hey, brother. Aren’t you going to start? Take a look. My ﬁrst formation array is already completed. We are competitors!”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “No rush. Your method is indeed impressive. It’s really out of the ordinary! Which soul engineering academy did you graduate from?”

Gao Dalou wore a bitter look on his face, “Which soul engineering academy would want me? I can’t even afford the fees. I learned everything on my own at home. I also trained myself in this aspect by using ordinary iron scraps. I’m not afraid of being mocked by you, but I have to admit that it’s my ﬁrst time seeing so many rare metals. Especially this Silverstar Steel. It’s too... too beautiful! Its afﬁnity with soul power is too magical! If someone could let me use such rare metals forever, I’m willing to sell my life to him! I hope to win some good stuff back from this tournament.”

Huo Yuhao was moved, and he said, “Brother Gao, I’m impressed by your abilities. Let’s continue. There’s a time limit.”

“Oh, oh, yes. Let’s continue then. Continue to work hard.” As he spoke, he immediately got busy again.

Gao Dalou wasn’t bothered that others thought he was a country bumpkin who had never seen the world before. He chose the best materials…

Chapter 302:The Lofty Blood-Coagulating Carving Knife

Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but nod in his heart when he saw Gao Dalou using the best materials to create his soul tool. The method he used was very different from most conventional soul engineers, especially in terms of some details in his technique. It was evident that he had his own style. If he were able to study soul tools to such a standard just by his own perceptions, he was undoubtedly a talent!

After ﬁnishing a piece of the outer shell, Gao Dalou suddenly raised his head. He looked at Huo Yuhao, who appeared to be deep in thought, and asked, “Brother, stop looking at me. You can’t tell what I’m making. For a country bumpkin like me, even my formation arrays are created in a slightly different manner than most ordinary soul engineers.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned, and quickly reacted. His continuous observation made Gao Dalou think that he was monitoring him before creating a soul tool that was targeted at his.

He smiled, and didn’t explain anything. He stopped monitoring Gao Dalou, and ﬁnally started creating his own soul tool.

Huo Yuhao continued to use the standard carving knife on the carving table. He vised the Flaming Sun Iron on the carving table and started his carving.

Compared to Gao Dalou, Huo Yuhao was quick and exact. The carving knife seemed to be alive in his hand, and moved continuously between his ﬁngers. Each and every one of his movements was very accurate. If any teachers from soul engineering academies would have seen him, they would reckon that his work was worthy of a textbook example. Iron chippings ﬂew in the air, and a complex formation array slowly took form.

Huo Yuhao carved bit by bit, unlike Gao Dalou’s ‘One Blade, Three Tremors’. However, he was much quicker. In the blink of an eye, he had already made a few cuts. Furthermore, the link between each cut was so precise that it seemed like he had carved everything in one shot.

In terms of technique, Gao Dalou’s ‘One Blade, Three Tremors’ was much more difﬁcult than Huo Yuhao’s method. However, Huo Yuhao’s method was stable and accurate. It was simpler for him to avoid any mistakes. Furthermore, it was very difﬁcult to ensure the sharpness of his carving knife, since he was using an ordinary one. It was also difﬁcult for him to make sure that it left carving marks on the Flaming Sun Iron, which was very tough. It might be inferior to a temporary but forceful form of carving, but with the help of his Spiritual Detection, Huo Yuhao managed to match up to Gao Dalou’s technique, and he was even faster.

Gao Dalou ﬁnally ﬁnished creating his outer shell. When he looked up at Huo Yuhao again, he was dazed. What did he see? He saw streaks of shadows left behind by Huo Yuhao’s ﬁngertips as they danced. He couldn’t see what Yuhao was doing. He only saw ﬁne iron shavings ﬂying out and spreading proportionally to the sides.

He… he managed to create his formation array so quickly! Isn’t he scared of making mistakes? This was the ﬁrst thought that appeared in Gao Dalou’s mind.

He subconsciously looked at Huo Yuhao’s eyes. As he was born outside the cities, he was more sensitive towards soul tools than most soul engineers in orthodox academies. To a soul engineer, the look in one’s eyes was very important. It was possible to tell many things from someone else’s eyes.

The look in Huo Yuhao’s eyes was something else! It was clear, but there was a strange obscurity amid the deep focus. When Gao Dalou focused his attention on Huo Yuhao’s eyes, he felt that he had entered a trance. It was as if his entire soul was about to be drawn away by the depth in Huo Yuhao’s eyes. He was so shocked that he had to lower his head before he could regain his composure.

When he recovered from the shock, his face was ﬁlled with bitterness. He had only gone a few rounds, but he had now met an extremely strong opponent. It wasn’t going to be easy for him to win!...

Even with the soundprooﬁng barriers, the spectators who were here to watch the tournament still maintained their silence. They turned their attention to the competitors that they had wagered on.

Gambling was also a form of knowledge on its own. It was important to do pre-tournament analysis. They were well aware of the special characteristics, as well as the class, of every soul engineer. For a wheelchair-bound soul engineer like Huo Yuhao, it was impossible for him not to garner any attention. There were some who monitored him, and there were also some who tried to bet on him. However, Gao Dalou was more eye-catching than Huo Yuhao. This wasn’t because he was strong, but

because of the carving knife that he had.

Gao Dalou’s carving knife was a family heirloom, evident by the name on the knife. It was a top-notch knife!

Even though his family had fallen apart, Gao Dalou was secretly protected by some advanced-level soul engineers related to his family. This helped to ensure the secrecy of his carving knife. However, those who secretly helped him didn’t want him to become a strong soul engineer, so they only helped him in that aspect.

Due to the presence of his knife, Gao Dalou’s odds were 10:23, while Huo Yuhao’s odds were 5:6. From the odds, it was possible to tell how the gamblers rated the differences in their abilities.

Of course, there were people who bet heavily on Huo Yuhao before the tournament started, which had some inﬂuence on the odds. Otherwise, Huo Yuhao’s odds would be even lower. It was just that no one knew that the so-called ‘people’ were actually Huo Yuhao himself.

A dim light ﬂashed, and a look of concentration came over Huo Yuhao’s face. He ﬁnally stopped, and a ball-shaped formation array slowly took form in front of him.

This formation array was hollow, and looked like an exquisite art piece. The dark-red Flaming Sun Iron seemed to have been given life, and now shone with a dim red light. A dangerous aura was continuously being released from it, and Huo Yuhao hadn’t even put his soul power into it yet.

He didn’t have three formation arrays like Gao Dalou; he only made one. Following this ﬁrst step, he started on the other accessories. He was extremely quick. Gao Dalou was also very busy as he completed his ﬁnal assembly and double- checked everything. In fact, he couldn’t see Huo Yuhao’s work clearly even if he wanted to. While Huo Yuhao had wasted a lot of time at the start, he was very quick now. He was so quick that it was impossible to fully follow his movements. One’s vision would blur just watching him. Time passed second by second. The ﬁrst to complete his soul tool was Number 96, who took two hours. After glancing at the rest of the soul engineers, he handed his ﬁnal product over.

The second competitor to ﬁnish was his opponent. When 96 claimed that he had ﬁnished his soul tool, his opponent looked at his ﬁnished product and conceded defeat. The gap was too obvious, and there was no need to compete any further. 96 had created a Class 5 soul tool in only two hours!

Most of the soul engineers ﬁnished their soul tools after about two and a half hours. This was a tournament, and the competitors didn’t have to create the best soul tools. Since there was a time limit, the best method was to create the strongest soul tool one could complete within the time limit.

Gao Dalou ﬁnished ﬁfteen minutes before Huo Yuhao, but he didn’t rush to hand up his work. He stood on his side of the tables and watched Huo Yuhao.

He became more terriﬁed the more he watched. Although he couldn’t tell how Huo Yuhao worked on his soul tool, he still noticed some details. Although Gao Dalou’s method was different from most conventional soul engineers, the difference mainly lay in his technique. However, he had never even heard of Huo Yuhao’s soul tool before. What’s the purpose of the rings and metal strings? What’s the use of those restraints? Why does the metal

ball have three holes that are proportionately separated? What’s he doing? That isn’t a formation array!

Gao Dalou was perplexed. The more he thought about it, the more confused he became. To him, Huo Yuhao was a mystery. He was even a little curious now... what was Huo Yuhao’s soul tool used for?

Huo Yuhao took three and a half hours to complete his soul tool. After he ﬁnished assembling everything, he ended up with a soul cannon around forty-two centimeters in length in front of him. The diameter of the barrel was around ten centimeters.

There seemed to be nothing special about the soul cannon. Furthermore, the most valuable material used to construct this soul tool was only the Flaming Sun Iron, even though the quality of this soul cannon was pretty good. The rest of the materials were mostly high-density metals. He had actually used very few rare metals!

“Are you done?” Gao Dalou asked.

“Yes! Brother Gao, you must’ve ﬁnished some time ago.” Huo Yuhao smiled and nodded at Gao Dalou.

“Okay, let’s hand up our work then,” Gao Dalou was curious as he walked up to Huo Yuhao, taking the initiative to push Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair. Huo Yuhao didn’t stop him, and let him do so, placing his soul tool on his thighs.

The completed soul tools had to be handed to the three judges so that they could make their decision.

Gao Dalou had also created a soul cannon. After all, they had to challenge each other in today’s tournament. An offensive- type soul tool was going to be very useful. Using defensive-type soul tools would most certainly be a pit of soul power.

“Class 4 shock cannon that can explode. It’s a pretty good soul tool.” The three judges gave their appraisal after seeing Gao Dalou’s soul cannon. After that, they examined the soul tool that Huo Yuhao handed over.

Five minutes later...

One of the examiners coughed in embarrassment. “Little friend, what’s the use of this soul cannon? The structure is a little special!”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “It’s also a Class 4 soul tool. It’s considered a high-powered soul cannon. I used a special technique to create it.”

After whispering to one another, the chief judge looked at the other two and said, “Both of you created Class 4 offensive- type soul cannons. It’s very difﬁcult to determine which is better. I suggest that the two of you challenge each other to determine the winner. After all, it’s important that a engineer be able to use a soul tool to ﬁght!”

“Alright!” Gao Dalou agreed readily. While rare metals were very attractive to him, a soul engineer like Huo Yuhao was also very tempting! Under such a circumstance, he was very willing to test out the strength of Huo Yuhao’s soul cannon.

The chief judge said, “Let me tell you the rules. When the two of you ﬁght each other, you can only use the soul tool that you’ve just created. You can also use your own soul power, but you can’t use any soul skills or any other soul tools. Once you use any other soul tool to defend yourself, it will mean that you’ve lost. Of course, you only have one life. While victory is important, protecting your own life is also very important.”

“I understand.”

The chief referee looked at Huo Yuhao and seemed to be suggesting something with his eyes.

Huo Yuhao also looked at him calmly and said, “I understand, too.”

“Alright. Send them to the Dueling Region.” Immediately, a staff member walked over and led the two of them towards the sides of the Duel Region. ---

“Brother Chen, the young man sitting in the wheelchair used an extraordinary method to create his soul tool! Did you see it?” the judge on the left asked softly.

The chief judge replied, “It was indeed quite extraordinary. If I’m not wrong, he must have infused some elements of machinery production into it to complement his formation arrays. His formation array was created using Flaming Sun Iron. That is indeed the method you would use to create the formation array of a high-powered cannon. However, it was also a little different. There isn’t any catapult formation or energy-gathering formation. Otherwise, his soul tool might even reach the level of a Class 5 soul tool.”

The judge on the right said, “Let’s see the duel ﬁrst! Gao Dalou isn’t simple either. His carving knife is top-notch. It’s very difﬁcult to tell who’ll win or lose.”

The chief judge smiled and said, “It seems like there are no lack of talents on our side.” “Hmm, we should ask the top brass whether we can pull some people over after the tournament ends. These two we’ve just seen are pretty good. Investigate their backgrounds.”

---

After Huo Yuhao and Gao Dalou entered the long and narrow Duel Region, the spectators outside started to become very excited.

While many soul engineers had handed in their work, the judges had also decided all of the results. Huo Yuhao’s duel against Gao Dalou would be the ﬁrst of the day!

While watching the soul engineers create soul tools was a feast for these gamblers’ eyes, it couldn’t compare to a duel! It was the same reason why the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was so popular.

One was sitting in a wheelchair, while the other had a top- notch carving knife. It was going to be an exciting duel! Suddenly, the silent hall started to become very rowdy. Some of the VIP guests that had wagered on Gao Dalou and Huo Yuhao started to call out curses and encouragement.

Huo Yuhao smiled at Gao Dalou and said, “Brother Gao, I’m called Tang Wu. No matter the result, I’m glad to have met you.” It was the fake name that he had used to enter the tournament.

Gao Dalou was excited as he said, “Tang Wu? Brother, I’m very curious about your soul tool. When this ends, let me treat you to a drink and talk about it. What do you think?”

“Great!” Huo Yuhao grinned.

The chief judge was also in the Duel Region by now, diagonally above it on a separate platform.

This was an underground tournament, so as was common there were very few rules. There weren’t any restrictions on hurting your opponent. The judges were only here to determine the victor. They wouldn’t bother with casualties. “Are both of you ready?” the chief judge asked.

“Yes!” Gao Dalou replied loudly. Huo Yuhao nodded.

“The duel begins! The winner will advance!”

As the judge shouted, Gao Dalou and Huo Yuhao raised their hands at the same time.

Gao Dalou’s soul cannon was dim silvery-white, constructed using Silverstar Steel. A gentle glow surfaced on it.

What was the best way to tell if a soul master was using a soul skill? it was to see if they unleashed their martial soul! Their soul power wasn’t restricted by their martial soul, it could be used without unleashing their martial soul. Naturally, Gao Dalou didn’t even unleash his martial soul.

Huo Yuhao’s soul cannon also glowed with a dim red light, mixed with a scorching aura. The rowdy noises in the hall started to die down, and the hall went quiet. Everyone was watching them. In such a duel, it was likely that victory would be decided in one or two strikes.

Gao Dalou’s soul cannon only took a short while to charge. A ball of bright white light carrying a slight silvery glow was ﬁred towards Huo Yuhao.

It was a shock cannon that could explode. The judges had mentioned it earlier.

The charge was around thirty centimeters in diameter, and was ﬁred straight at Huo Yuhao.

In everyone’s opinion, Huo Yuhao should unleash the attack of his own soul tool and allow both cannon charges to collide with each other in the middle before they went all-out against one another.

Huo Yuhao indeed ﬁred his soul cannon. However, what he did was beyond everyone’s expectations. When the ball of dark- red light ball was ﬁred, it stuck close to the ground as it shot forward. It brushed past Gao Dalou’s charge and ﬂew straight towards him.

Fierce!

Both parties were going to be hurt. It was a battle between their ﬁghting strategies!

Gao Dalou had acted ﬁrst, and thus his cannon shell would reach Huo Yuhao ﬁrst. Was Huo Yuhao going to directly resist it?

Everyone was shocked in the next instant.

Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair seemed to come alive, and moved rapidly. It managed to dodge the incoming charge even within the narrow space.

The shock cannon had locked onto his position, thus the charge naturally followed him as he moved. Those who were sharp-eyed could tell that Huo Yuhao was using his right hand. His right hand seemed to contain magical powers. He kept on pushing or pulling the protective barriers to either side of him, which allowed his wheelchair to move and accurately dodge the charge!

There was a limit to how far the charge could travel. While it could lock onto Huo Yuhao’s position, its propulsion would die down after some time. When that happened, it could only blow apart uselessly.

Just before it blew apart, Huo Yuhao mimicked a grabbing action. After that, he ﬂung his right hand out, and his wheelchair also moved back, allowing him to avoid the cannon shell. He only heard a loud boom as the cannon shell blew apart three meters away from him. The immense shockwave pushed him towards Gao Dalou.

Huo Yuhao had avoided the explosion completely, the shockwave only affected him slightly. He had also managed to accurately dodge the entire attack. Who would have thought that a cripple could use such a method to avoid being struck by a ﬁred charge? Even a normal person might not even be capable of doing that! Gao Dalou didn’t even see Huo Yuhao’s situation. The high- powered shot was approaching him, but he wasn’t as capable of dodging as Huo Yuhao was. He ﬁred his cannon again, and this second charge collided with the high-powered burst more than ten meters away from him.

Boom!

A scorching ﬂow of wind spread out, engulﬁng more than twenty meters of the narrow passageway in front of it. Gao Dalou quickly retreated, terriﬁed. He also quickly increased his soul power to resist the powerful shockwave. Even so, he was still ﬂung back, and hit the protective barrier not far away from him.

Was that really a Class 4 soul tool? It was important to know that the shock cannon charge had some defensive uses, as its intense shockwave could neutralize various types of attacks. To some extent, it was both offensively and defensively inclined, which was was why Gao Dalou had decided to create a shock cannon. However, the high-powered shot from Huo Yuhao was too strong. It must be as strong as a Class 5 high-powered cannon shot! On the other side, Huo Yuhao was also shocked.

Gao Dalou’s shock cannon shell blew apart behind him. To him, the shockwave was nothing. It only propelled his body forward. With the protection of his soul power, he wasn’t affected.

However, he felt something wrong when the shockwave struck him, a strange feeling spread across his entire body. He felt his heart stopping at that instant. Everything around him seemed to slow down, and his breathing also went still. The uncomfortable feeling made him feel like a corpse!

Fortunately, it only lasted for a second before he regained normal movement. Even so, he was interrupted as he tried to charge his high-powered cannon, and had to re-adjust his soul power again.

How is this possible? How is it possible for a shock cannon to have such an effect! Something must be wrong... With a thought, his opponent’s black carving knife that had seemed very simple and ordinary surfaced in his thoughts.

Since Huo Yuhao was affected by this strange power, he lost the opportunity to bring down Gao Dalou instantly. The impact of the high-powered cannon charge on Gao Dalou had also ended. While Gao Dalou looked a little dirty, he wasn’t hurt. Both of them were astonished when they looked at one another.

“Is, is that a Class 5 soul tool?” Gao Dalou asked with a shocked expression. It seemed like he had forgotten that the two of them were still in a tournament.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “Class 4. A Class 5 offensive-type soul tool can’t be supported with just one formation array. Weren’t you watching me just now?”

“But…”

Huo Yuhao said, “Let’s have a private conversation when the tournament ends.” “Alright!” Gao Dalou agreed to his request immediately. As his hands moved, the shock cannon was ﬁred once again. Even though he was astonished, it didn’t mean that he was conceding defeat. There were a lot of rare metals at stake!

Huo Yuhao smiled and lifted his right hand, also ﬁring his soul cannon. However, the cannon chargel didn’t brush past the shock cannon shell this time. With his immense spiritual power, it was easy for him to lock onto his opponent’s discharge. It was literally impossible for him to fail to hit it.

Both cannon shells left the barrel at the same time. They also met at around the center point between the two of them, and blew apart. Suddenly, an intense spark of energy blurred their vision. A terrifying shock and energy undulation spread out and struck the both of them.

At this point, Gao Dalou felt that he was in a trance, and everything in front of him had turned blurry. For some reason, he felt that he had deviated from his original position. As he subconsciously turned around, he adjusted his position. When he raised his hand, he ﬁred his cannon again. With his current cultivation, he didn’t need long to charge his cannon even though he couldn’t ﬁre it continuously. After that… there wasn’t anything after that.

Boom!

Amidst a reverberating boom, Gao Dalou’s body was engulfed by electricity. He felt his entire body turning numb, and a terrifying explosion caused him to become very distressed. He was stuck on one side of the barrier, and his blood seemed to stop ﬂowing. He felt extremely uncomfortable, and wanted to spit out blood. However, he couldn’t do so.

What was going on?

The same thought appeared in everyone’s mind. In their eyes, Gao Dalou made a half turn and ﬂew towards the protective barrier to one side after his cannon charge collided with Huo Yuhao’s cannon charge. As he was only one meter away, he was caught in the explosion of his own Class 4 shock cannon shell. The shock ﬂung him away. Blood still ﬂowed out of his nose and mouth even when he increased his soul power to protect himself. He looked pathetic. Fortunately, it was only a Class 4 soul tool. If it was a Class 5, he would have been killed if he didn’t unleash his soul skills and other soul tools to defend himself.

Huo Yuhao wore a smile on his face. As he saw Gao Dalou sliding to the ﬂoor, he turned to the judge and said, “I guess it’s time to deem me the winner. If I ﬁre one more time, he’ll be dead.”

“Yes, you win,” the judge nodded. Although the situation was very weird, the strength of Huo Yuhao’s soul tool was indeed greater than Gao Dalou’s shock cannon. However, Gao Dalou decided to incapacitate himself so that he would lose for some unknown reason. Did he really think he had no chance at all?

Huo Yuhao turned the wheels of his wheelchair and rolled over in front of Gao Dalou. He smiled and asked, “Brother Gao, are you okay?”

As he was affected by the shock cannon shell, Gao Dalou’s entire body was still shaking. He struggled to prop himself up. “What happened? Why was I struck by my own shock cannon? What’s going on?” Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “You’ve lost. Let’s go.”

Gao Dalou still felt very dizzy even as he exited the Duel Region. He felt as if he was walking through a world of cotton.

After Huo Yuhao went to claim his reward, he asked, “Brother Gao, shall we ﬁnd a place to sit?”

Gao Dalou laughed bitterly and replied, “Alright, but you’ll have to treat me. I have no money.”

“Alright,” Huo Yuhao smiled as he answered.

Wang Dong’er was already there by this point. Huo Yuhao instructed Na Na to wait for He Caitou, since he hadn’t ﬁnished yet. Wang Dong’er pushed his wheelchair, and they left with Gao Dalou.

He wasn’t worried about his bet. Chen An was around, and thus nothing would go wrong. Gold soul coins were just numbers to him. Rare metals were more important. However, now was not the time.

Wang Dong’er didn’t know about the interaction between Huo Yuhao and Gao Dalou. She was a little curious as he brought his opponent along with him. However, her current appearance was only as Huo Yuhao’s maid, and thus she couldn’t say anything. After the three of them left the hotel, they started walking away from the direction that led to the Ming Yue Hotel.

------

Back in the Golden Hall,

“Chen An, what’s the background of competitor 66? His soul tool is extraordinary!” the chief judge asked Chen An. Initially, he had wanted to offer Huo Yuhao money for his soul cannon. It was obviously a Class 4 soul tool, but it had unleashed the strength of a Class 5! Whether it was in terms of the materials used or the time taken for Huo Yuhao to create his soul tool, they were both very impressive. With such a technique, he might even be able to completely alter the method of how soul tools were created. Chen An softly said, “Judge Chen, it’s not that I want to remain mum. It’s just that we can’t triﬂe with him. He…” As he spoke to this point, he made a gesture.

The chief judge was shocked. “Are you sure?”

Chen An leaned up to his ears and whispered a few words.

“Alright. You can go. Don’t tell anyone what I asked you about.” A look of fear ﬂashed across the judge’s eyes before he regained his normal appearance.

“Yes!” Chen An sniggered to himself. How can I let you get close to Sir Tang Wu? I still need him to help me get rich!

------

Huo Yuhao brought Gao Dalou and Wang Dong’er to ﬁnd a bar that wasn’t too big. While the bar wasn’t huge, there was a hubbub of laughter and shouting. The moment they walked in the door, they were greeted by pandemonium. Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow at this.

“Little Dong, go and ﬁnd the manager,” Huo Yuhao instructed.

Wang Dong’er pinched his back with some force. After that, she furrowed her brow and walked in. Very soon, a waiter walked out.

“Is there a private room?” Huo Yuhao asked.

“No, it’s full,” the waiter said without any hesitation as he looked at him in his wheelchair before glancing at the slipshod Gao Dalou. He even wore a slightly disdainful expression and spoke sarcastically. “You shouldn’t be coming to a bar in this state. No lady will like a cripple.”

Huo Yuhao smiled. “That’s not true. Cripples have their rights too, especially rich ones.” As he gestured, Wang Dong’er retrieved a bag of gold soul coins.

Huo Yuhao opened the bag and swayed it slightly. Clinking sounds could be heard coming from the bag.

The waiter’s expression changed, and he laughed. “I’m sorry, distinguished guest. I apologize for looking down on you. Although there aren’t any rooms left, there are still two seats available.”

Huo Yuhao took out a gold soul coin and said, “Give me the quietest spot. We’ve got business to discuss.”

“No problem.” The waiter’s expression changed after he received the gold soul coin.

This wasn’t a dubious setting like the Golden Hall, it was just a bar. Huo Yuhao wouldn’t hold it against a mere waiter. Sometimes, using money was more effective than violence.

Very soon, the three of them were brought to a booth at a corner of the bar. The booth consisted of seats that were separated by a few wooden benches. There were two long sofas in this booth, and a tea-table. Although this booth looked very ordinary, it was still very quiet.

“Bring your most expensive liquor.” Huo Yuhao instructed the waiter.

The waiter’s eyes ﬂashed, and he replied, “Alright! Please wait a minute. It’ll be here soon!”

Gao Dalou looked after the waiter, who had quickly scurried off, and couldn’t help but say, “Brother Tang, you’ll be blacklisted by them like that.”

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “Blacklisted? They can do it if they want to. Have you forgotten my identity?”

Gao Dalou replied, “Alright. Let’s not talk about that now. What was going on just now? Why was I struck by my own shock cannon?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “I used a small trick to daze you temporarily. After that, you were confused, and turned in the wrong direction. In such a narrow space, any slight deviation in your sense of direction was sufﬁcient to cause a huge difference in where your attack hit. Your cannon was ﬁred towards the protective barrier next to you, thus you absorbed the entire impact of the explosion. I’m also very curious about something. Why does your shock cannon contain a force even scarier than numbness? Not only can it interrupt a soul skill, but it even caused my blood to stop ﬂowing. Although it only lasted for a second, its impact was quite great. Otherwise, I would’ve taken you down in my ﬁrst attack.”

After hearing Huo Yuhao’s question, Gao Dalou hesitated. He lowered his head and didn’t mutter a word.

Huo Yuhao didn’t probe either. This was undoubtedly his secret.

“It’s ﬁne if you’re unwilling to tell me. Let’s talk about something else. You mentioned that you’ve never studied at an academy before. Since this is the case, it’s quite a miracle that you were able to reach the standard of a Class 5 soul engineer!”

A Class 5 soul engineer was like a ﬁve-ringed Soul King. For him to reach such a level through self-learning before he was even thirty, it showed how much talent and hardwork he had put in!

Chapter 303: Liquor, Medium, Icebreaker

Gao Dalou sighed, “Yes, count me unlucky. When I was young, my father was the one who taught me soul engineering skills. In my entire lineage, there has always only been one son in every generation. We are like a sect, but we don’t have the depth of a sect. My father always believed that he could teach me with everything that he had, thus he didn’t send me to a basic soul engineering academy. However, he passed away for some unknown reason when I was fourteen, and I had just become a Class 3 soul engineer. When we found him, even his internal organs had disappeared. He had died tragically. My father was also very protective of his wealth. He was very worried no matter where he kept his valuables, and usually kept them with him in his storage-type soul tool. Once he died, my family went bankrupt. My mother passed away early. We originally had a few servants, but they left since I couldn’t pay them. Very soon, I became an orphan that lived by myself.”

Gao Dalou sounded very calm. However, the expression on his face revealed that his heart was already dead.

“After that, I had to give up on my cultivation in order to make a living for myself. I found some chores in the city. Originally, I was a soul engineer, and ﬁnding a job wasn’t very difﬁcult. However, I would be cursed every time I suggested that my employer offer me some rare metals for my cultivation. As I was helpless, I could only do some chores that were beyond what I could handle. I earned some money to sustain myself. At the same time, I cultivated using my father’s manual. After more than a decade, I managed to reach the level of a Class 5 soul engineer. However, I’m broke now. At my level, I can’t experiment without sufﬁcient rare metals, and I can’t produce better soul tools either. Ah…”

Huo Yuhao was confused after he heard Gao Dalou’s recounting of events. It was his ﬁrst time hearing a Class 5 soul engineer being restricted by poverty. Even though he had other ideas in mind, he couldn’t help but ask, “Brother Gao, didn’t your soul tools become ﬁnished products? With your abilities, you should be able to sell your ﬁnished soul tools for decent prices even if the materials are slightly inferior. They should then be enough to fund your cultivation. Since when did soul engineers lack money?”

Gao Dalou looked a little embarrassed, “This… honestly speaking, I’m not afraid that you’ll mock me. My entire family has a bad habit. We are stingy. I inherited my father’s stinginess. I can’t bear to sell the soul tools that I’ve created! They are the products of my hard work.” He coughed twice as he ﬁnished.

Huo Yuhao’s lips moved a little. He was a little empathetic after hearing Gao Dalou’s tragic life story. However, he realized that there wasn’t any tragic story that had no reason in this world after hearing about Gao Dalou’s stinginess! Gao Dalou’s poverty was caused by himself! What a stingy soul engineer!

After pausing for a moment, Huo Yuhao asked, “What do you plan to do from now on?”

Gao Dalou sighed and said, “What else do you want me to do? I’m a Class 5 soul engineer now. I’m different from before. Maybe I’ll ﬁnd a sect and see if I can get some rare metals to practice with. Brother, I believe you’re at least a Class 5 soul engineer judging from your abilities to create soul tools. Your technique is also quite conventional and orthodox. You should be from a sect. Why not introduce me to your sect? I’ve no other requests; I just need sufﬁcient materials. If I get to keep all my soul tools, I’m willing to even sell my life to the sect.”

Huo Yuhao looked at him deeply and said to Wang Dong’er, “Xiao Dong, tell the waiter that we don’t need the liquor anymore. Let’s go.” “Yes.” Wang Dong’er acknowledged his words and tried to hold in her laughter as she walked away. She knew that Huo Yuhao was about to con someone again. However, Gao Dalou didn’t look very pitiful. He was actually very scheming!

“No, no! Don’t go! Brother, we haven’t had a drink yet. Even if they might blacklist you, they won’t serve you bad liquor, considering your wealth!” Gao Dalou hurriedly said.

At this point, the waiter had entered and there was a bottle of pink liquor on a tray in his hand. There were also three liquor glasses and a bucket of ice.

“Sir, your liquor is here. Do you want me to open it for you?” the waiter asked Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao turned to look at Gao Dalou. Gao Dalou said, “Open, open, of course you should open it! Hurry up!” As he spoke, he was already swallowing visibly.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “Brother Gao, liquor will make our hands numb. Overdrinking might even cause them to tremble and affect our state. You must watch out!”

Gao Dalou was completely unbothered, “No worries. No worries. We can do it occasionally.”

The waiter opened the bottle without any hesitation. He added three ice cubes to each glass before pouring the liquor into each glass. After that, he respectfully left.

Gao Dalou lifted the glass in front of him and took a sip. His face became rapturously intoxicated.

“Good liquor, this is good liquor! I’ve not had such great rose liquor in some time! It’s delicious. Brother, quickly take a sip.” As he spoke, he quickly ﬁlled his glass again.

Huo Yuhao lifted his glass and gently took a sip. The liquor was indeed quite good. A light rose scent entered his throat along with the liquor itself. The scent seemed to evaporate naturally. Very quickly, it diffused through his body. A warm aura also slowly spread out and made him feel extremely comfortable. What left Huo Yuhao stunned was that the chill in his body from the origin energy of Ultimate Ice also dropped after he took a sip of the drink.

Was the alcohol able to help him absorb the origin energy of his Ultimate Ice? With this thought, he completely downed the glass of liquor.

Huo Yuhao was completely stunned at the result.

The warmth from the alcohol suddenly increased greatly. He felt the ﬂow of his blood getting stronger and stronger. The warmth followed his passageways and rushed towards his left arm and lower limbs. Although it was still inferior compared to the origin energy of Ultimate Ice, this gush of warmth still neutralized some of the origin energy. It also fused with his blood and soul power.

This works? Huo Yuhao didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at this moment.

Gao Dalou was watching Huo Yuhao as he sipped on his liquor. When he realized Huo Yuhao’s expression was changing very weirdly, he was shocked. Although this rose liquor wasn’t cheap, he didn’t have to feel so much pain buying it...

“Brother Tang, are you okay?” Gao Dalou asked carefully.

Huo Yuhao shook his head. He had originally wanted to draw Gao Dalou into the Tang Sect, but he realized that Gao Dalou was actually very cunning, even though he seemed very honest. In addition, he was now much less interested in him as he faced this unexpected surprise.

“Dong’er, call the waiter over.” As he was agitated, Huo Yuhao even forgot that he wasn’t supposed to refer to her her that way.

Although Wang Dong’er didn’t know why he was suddenly so excited, she still quickly called the waiter over.

“Sir, what instructions do you have?” the waiter asked respectfully. Huo Yuhao said, “Go get me every type of liquor you have here.”

“What? Every type? Sir, we have more than hundred types of liquor, even though our establishment isn’t that large! We already have forty different types of wine, and…”

“Okay, go quickly then.” As he spoke, Huo Yuhao threw his entire bag of money over.

The waiter was shocked, but a ﬂash of greed crossed his face as he received the bag of cash. He followed with, “Yes, yes, I’ll go now! Please wait for me!”

More than a hundred types of liquor! How much would that cost?

Not only was Gao Dalou astonished, even Wang Dong’er didn’t understand what Huo Yuhao was doing. Huo Yuhao poured himself another glass of the rose liquor. “Indeed so, indeed so!” Huo Yuhao was evidently extremely excited. After that, he twisted his head to look at Gao Dalou, “Brother Gao, you can leave ﬁrst if you have nothing going on. I suddenly remembered I have something important to deal with.”

“Your important thing is drinking, am I right? Brother, how can you be without a buddy when you are drinking. I can’t do anything else, but I can be a top-notch drinking buddy!” Gao Dalou couldn’t give up this opportunity to taste so many delicious liquors. He quickly presented himself to Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao shook his head and replied, “Did you not hear that I only requested a glass of every type of liquor for myself? I didn’t get any for you.”

Gao Dalou turned pale. There were more than hundred types of liquor. How would it feel to drink and compare them? He had never tried it before! It should feel very magical. However, he was being chased away. This…

Gao Dalou only had two hobbies. One was to become a strong soul engineer. The other was to drink. “Brother, I take back what I said earlier. Let’s see if this works: I can join your sect. As long as you provide me with materials, the soul tools that I create will belong to the sect. However, please give me at least some money to buy wine. It’s best if I can even ﬁnd a wife. I’ll follow you if you agree to this.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned. He hadn’t expected Gao Dalou to misunderstand his actions. He had actually lowered his own asking price of his own accord. What was going on?

He hadn’t expected Gao Dalou to treat him as a conﬁdant. It was easy to ﬁnd friends, but not drinking buddies! Gao Dalou was completely convinced after seeing Huo Yuhao ask for more than a hundred types of liquor in one shot. He was imagining the amount of liquor he could drink every day if he followed Huo Yuhao! Why would he need soul tools then?

“Alright, that’s great. I’ll give you a ﬁfty percent cut for every soul tool you create. We’ll come up with the materials. You just need to create the soul tools. In addition, I think you’ve also witnessed my special method of creating soul tools. You’ll be able to learn such a method once you join our sect.”

Gao Dalou’s eyes brightened, and he replied, “Of course, of course. Brother Tang, the liquor…”

Huo Yuhao waved his hand generously and said, “Little Dong, get the waiter to add one more complete set.”

Gao Dalou licked his chapped lips and gave him a thumbs-up. “Awesome!”

Very soon, the table was ﬁlled with rows of liquor glasses.

“Brother Tang, let’s drink.” “Cheers!”

“Dalou, let’s toast once more! Oh, this liquor isn’t bad. It’s strong enough!”

“Great!”

“Fantastic! It’s absolutely fantastic! I’ve never enjoyed liquor like this! Brother Tang, did you notice that the liquors made from wheat are quite light, while those made from grapes contain the lightness of grapes even though they are hard liquors? I feel very pleasant drinking them!”

“Oh, this liquor has the taste of plums. It even tastes a little smoked! It’s quite special...”

“Cheers!”

“Let’s go…”

“Shit…”

Wang Dong’er was stunned as she watched from the side. These two drunkards didn’t stop at all. They kept on downing glass after glass of liquor. It was her ﬁrst time seeing Huo Yuhao drinking like this, so she was shocked.

At the start, Wang Dong’er thought Huo Yuhao was doing this to tempt Gao Dalou. Gao Dalou was basically bought over by the liquor. However, Wang Dong’er noticed something was wrong. Gao Dalou had already been swindled. Why did Yuhao have to continue drinking with him? In a short span of time, both of them had already drank more than thirty glasses of liquor!

There was another person who was even more shocked than Wang Dong’er – the waiter who had deliver the liquor!

There were more than a hundred types of liquor. Since Huo Yuhao had ordered two complete sets of liquor, there were more than two hundred glasses of liquor. The table couldn’t ﬁt all the glasses. Once the glasses were empty, they were immediately replaced by more glasses of different liquors. At the start, the waiter thought Huo Yuhao was trying to put on airs, and he would at most taste a few types of liquor.

However, he saw the two of them downing more than thirty glasses on their own as time passed! More than half of them were hard liquors! If they were ordinary people, they would have been completely drunk by now. However, the two of them seemed like nothing had happened.

Even though every glass of liquor had been diluted by ice cubes, they must have consumed more than a liter of hard liquor each after thirty glasses!

“Yu… Master, stop drinking.” Wang Dong’er almost addressed him incorrectly in her anxiety. She lifted her hand to grab the liquor glass from Huo Yuhao’s hand.

Huo Yuhao deftly dodged and avoided her hand. He shot a look at her. As he thought of something, he used his Spiritual Detection to tell her what he was thinking.

Wang Dong’er’s body stiffened up. After that, her eyes revealed an indescribable look of ecstasy.

Huo Yuhao gently nodded.

“That’s great. Continue. You’re in a wheelchair anyway. I can push you back anytime.”

Why was Huo Yuhao drinking so much? He wanted to test whether each type of liquor had an effect on fusing his origin energy of Ultimate Ice, or if it was only just the rose liquor. If every type of liquor could do the same thing, it must mean that liquor was very effective for him.

His conclusion was that liquor was very effective. However, the effect didn’t depend on the value of the liquor, but its strength! The stronger the liquor, the better it was! Every glass of hard liquor was like a catalyst. The origin energy in his body was increasingly being digested by Huo Yuhao’s soul power. For someone who had three immovable limbs, this was like a delicacy!

Furthermore, Huo Yuhao remained clear-headed, as all the alcohol was being used to fuse with his origin energy. He was also getting more and more excited. He could easily last for three hundred glasses without getting drunk!

Huo Yuhao was amused that Gao Dalou’s tolerance level was actually very impressive. He didn’t feel any soul power undulations from his body, Gao Dalou was just drinking normally. His eyes brightened the more he drank, just like Huo Yuhao. He was getting more and more clear-headed as he drank.

“Great liquor, this is really great liquor! I haven’t felt so happy in a long time. No, I’ve never felt so happy before! Today, I ﬁnally understand what it means when people say ‘A thousand glasses of liquor is too little when drinking with a conﬁdant.’ Brother Tang, I’m very grateful to have met you.”

After drinking his ﬁftieth glass, Gao Dalou was ﬁnally getting a little dizzy. However, the excitement in his eyes only grew.

“Brother Tang, I’ll follow you in the future. I can get liquor when I’m with you! I don’t even want the percentage cut. I’m ﬁne with just liquor. What do you think?”

Huo Yuhao chortled and replied, “This isn’t much for me. In fact, I even know a sommelier. He’s a true fanatic for delicious liquor! If you meet him, you’ll really know what it is to have a drinking buddy.”

Gao Dalou was stunned, “Is that so? Is there actually someone who can drink better than you?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “I don’t know how much he can drink, but I’ve never seen him without his liquor ever since I met him. You can ﬁnd him whenever you want to try, I’m sure he’ll be happy. Don’t worry, this liquor god lives very close to my sect.”

“Alright, alright. Drink, come on! Brother Tang, let’s drink! I’ll follow you and the liquor god in the future…” Gao Dalou was ﬁnally getting drunk. Such a drunkard would never be willing to activate his soul power to neutralize the alcohol in his body. He couldn’t bear to! It was important to bear in mind that Gao Dalou was a very stingy person...

“Brother Tang, didn’t you want to know the special characteristic of my soul tool? Since we are going to be in the same sect, I think it’s ﬁne to tell you. The soul tool that I carry around me has a special characteristic called Blood Coagulating. It’s an added component to my Blood Coagulating Carving Knife… It’s impressive, isn’t it…?”

“It’s ﬁne even if I tell you. That’s because only a descendant of my blood lineage can use this carving knife. I need to use my fresh blood to use this knife every time. Otherwise, it would have been stolen by many people already…”

“Fortunately the carving knife can only be used by a descendant of my family. Although its ranking is a little low because of my weak cultivation, it’s the only valuable that my father left me. If anyone else could use it, my Haemagglutination Carving Knife might even make it to the top thirty carving knives.”

Huo Yuhao was silently shocked after hearing Gao Dalou’s words. It was a carving knife equal to one of the top thirty top- notch carving knives! No wonder it was so strong. Even the shockwaves generated by the shock cannon were so strong because of the meticulous carvings made by this knife!

After three more glasses, Gao Dalou couldn’t take it anymore, and collapsed onto the table. Huo Yuhao drank two more glasses on his own before smiling slightly. He turned to Wang Dong’er and said, “My dear, I need to pee.”

Wang Dong’er was speechless. “Can’t you use it for your cultivation?”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly. “I used alcohol, not water. You are in a guy’s attire anyway. What are you scared of? Send me to the toilet. Otherwise, I’m going to pee my pants.”

Wang Dong’er’s face turned red. Although she had seen Huo Yuhao’s body before, she had never done anything like this before! She started stammering, “Why don’t we go home, and you can…”

Huo Yuhao replied, “I can’t hold it in anymore.”

“Aren’t, aren’t you afraid that I’ll look at someone else? My eyes will be dirtied.” Wang Dong’er ﬁnally found an excuse. “That’s true! You can send me to the door. I can go in and settle everything myself.” Huo Yuhao changed his words after teasing her. Over these past few days, he had felt tortured as Wang Dong’er regained her sense of self! A lot of his extra welfare had ceased to exist. Since he could only move his right hand, he was helpless against her.

After returning from the washroom, Huo Yuhao continued to drink. The waiter thought that they were going to stop, seeing that Gao Dalou had already passed out. However, Huo Yuhao was still drinking. He stopped drinking the cheap liquors and started to drink the high-end liquors. He only called the waiter in after he had ﬁnished all the hard liquor.

“Sir, what instructions do you have?” The waiter looked in Huo Yuhao’s eyes and felt like he had seen a ten-thousand year soul beast. This young man was unbelievable!

Huo Yuhao leisurely said, “You’ve seen my tolerance level. All these liquors can’t satisfy me. Is there anything even stronger?”

“This…” The waiter suddenly thought of something, and his eyes brightened. He said, “We still have some distillate here. Do you want some?”

“Distillate? What’s that?” Huo Yuhao was completely clueless about liquors.

The waiter replied softly, “Hard liquors are distilled beverages. Apart from some special cases, most hard liquors are puriﬁed distillates that have been blended and mixed with different ﬂavors. After that, they are sold to the general public. This is a secret. I’m only telling you because you have a lot of gold soul coins.”

Huo Yuhao wasn’t moved as he asked, “How strong is the distillate?”

The waiter chuckled and replied, “It’s twice as strong as the strongest liquor that you’ve drank so far.”

Huo Yuhao’s heart twitched a little, and thought to himself, Aren’t you telling me that the liquors here have been diluted with water and other stuff? “Give me some to try ﬁrst.”

“Alright, wait a minute. However, the price of the distillate…”

Huo Yuhao revealed a slightly furious expression, “Since when is money a problem? Tell your boss, as long as the stuff is good, I want it long-term. As long as you have it, I’ll take everything. In my manor, I have an underground wine cellar that’s ten thousand square meters!”

“What?” A ten thousand square-meter wine cellar? It’s unheard of! How rich must he be? This is the break boss needs to get rich!

When the waiter returned, he brought along a shrewd- looking elder who seemed around sixty years old.

Distillate was almost pure alcohol. It could easily be used to light a ﬁre. However, it was extremely good for Huo Yuhao, since it contained no impurities. He immediately made a high bid for all the distillate in the bar, and even pre-ordered another batch.

They left Gao Dalou in the bar. Huo Yuhao left him a note to set their next meeting. The bar would naturally take good care of him, since he was a friend of their newfound rich client.

Huo Yuhao had already controlled himself… he didn’t steal Gao Dalou’s carving knife. Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er returned to the Ming Yue Hotel with more than a hundred kilos of distillate, but he didn’t drink it right away. After he returned, he immediately entered a cultivation state as he laid down ﬂat. He activated all his soul power and cultivated the impurities and remaining alcohol within the liquor.

------

The Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament had reached the round-robin stage, and the Tang Sect ﬁnally caught a breather after facing two consecutive tough opponents. They defeated the next four opponents they faced easily. With their immense abilities, they managed to make their way to the top of their group after winning six out of six matches. They had one foot in the quarterﬁnal.

Besides the Tang Sect, there was another team in their group that won all their matches... Shrek’s team! In the ﬁrst ﬁve matches of this round-robin stage, they had snatched easy victories. Under Wang Qiu’er’s leadership, and with their extraordinary abilities, they managed to overcome the Clearjade Sect, too. It was also on that same day that the team and vice-team leaders, Cain and Xue Bing, were unfrozen. However, the Tang Sect didn’t know that Cain disappeared after the Clearjade Sect was eliminated from the tournament…

------

The Tang Sect didn’t depart the venue after they easily won their sixth match. They sat in the VIP resting area, all of them with serious expressions on their faces.

The next match was the clash of the day. The most established two teams in the history of the tournament were about to ﬁght against one another!

On one side was the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, who had won four out of their ﬁrst ﬁve matches under Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen’s leadership. On the other side was Shrek, led by Wang Qiu’er!

For both parties, this ﬁght wasn’t just about the qualiﬁcations for the next round. It was a life and death battle, a battle of glory! The enmity between both academies was simply too deep. In this round-robin stage, the Sun Moon team had already lost to the Tang Sect. If they lost again, Shrek would advance with the Tang Sect into the quarterﬁnals. If they won, the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy would face off in the next match. The

Tang Sect and the Sun Moon team would advance if the Tang Sect won. If the Tang Sect lost, all three teams would be tied on the number of wins, and points would be used to calculate which two teams would advance. While the Tang Sect had maintained a hundred percent record so far, their points

weren’t very high because they kept on preparing themselves for the team ﬁghts. The point difference between Shrek’s team and the Sun Moon team was almost negligible, and the gap might be widened in this match.

The Sun Moon team had no other way out, they had to win this match. If they won, they could ensure their spot in the quarterﬁnals as long as they achieved a huge victory in the last match. The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy wanted the Tang Sect and Shrek’s team to ﬁght one another for the other spot!

It was the same situation for Shrek Academy. As long as they defeated the Sun Moon team, they would deﬁnitely qualify with six victories in the bag. Whether they were going to be the winner or runners-up of their group would depend on their last match with the Tang Sect.

---

Wang Qiu’er slowly stood up. She didn’t walk towards the waiting area. Instead, she turned around and looked at her teammates.

“Do all of you remember what I mentioned yesterday?” she asked.

“Yes!” All of Shrek’s team members acknowledged her words. They sounded very excited, and the rest of the teams in the waiting area were drawn to them.

Not only were the spectators monitoring this match, even the rest of the teams were watching this match very closely! Shrek’s reputation was too well-established. The reputations of both academies meant that this faceoff between both teams was bound to be an extremely intense one! Dai Huabin was closest to Wang Qiu’er. Right now, his eyes were burning as he looked at her. It was as if she were his idol, his enthusiasm was bordering on fanaticism!

It wasn’t just him. Everyone from Shrek recalled what Wang Qiu’er had said yesterday.

……

“Tomorrow, we are going to face the Sun Moon team. Do all of you know why the Tang Sect gave up against them in the earlier round, but fought them in the ﬁrst match of the round- robin stage? Let me tell you! It’s because the Tang Sect was afraid that we would lose. They did their best to weaken the Sun Moon team and give us a greater chance.

“Tell me, do we need them to create this ﬁghting chance for us?

“We came here for Shrek’s glory! If not for the fact that Shrek’s Seven Monsters are representing the Tang Sect, we would only be substitutes! During the last tournament, I wasn’t even at Shrek Academy yet! But I heard of their performance. They were only substitutes then! What happened? They brought back the title. Let me ask all of you... do all of you have the heart of a champion?

“We are members of Shrek, the glory of Shrek, and the radiance of Shrek. Our advancement will not arise because of anyone’s help, but our own abilities. Tomorrow, I’ll tear the skin off whoever dares to look down on us! Do all of you understand? We are not only going to show the Sun Moon team why we are strong; we are also going to show the Tang Sect that they can’t underestimate us! Let’s show them that we are champion material! We’ll win tomorrow’s ﬁght! Shrek...will...win!”

……

Wang Qiu’er’s wild words were still ringing in the ears of every member of Shrek’s team. Her voice, which inspired their passion and excitement, raised their ﬁghting spirits to unprecedented levels. So what if it was the Sun Moon Soul Engineering Academy? So what if it was the Tang Sect? They were representing Shrek Academy – a team that had never lost this tournament before! They were ﬁghting for Shrek’s glory! Right now, they could ﬁnally chant this slogan in front of everyone!

Every time they thought of this, their auras would turn ferocious, and their ﬁghting spirits were ﬁred to the limit!

Wang Qiu’er saw the ﬁre in everyone’s eyes and nodded. She said evenly, “Follow me.” After she ﬁnished speaking, she turned around and faced the stage. As she turned, her gaze met Huo Yuhao’s. As their gazes met, Huo Yuhao saw the look of perseverance in her eyes as she led Shrek’s team towards the stage.

What left everyone from the Tang Sect shocked was that Shrek’s team didn’t send out their standard seven members to compete. They switched their personnel in such a crucial match.

Wang Qiu’er was in front, while Dai Huabin, Zhu Lu, Ning Tian, and Cao Jinxuan followed behind. The last two weren’t Xie Huanyue and Wu Feng. They were Lan Susu and Lan Luoluo!

In terms of individual abilities, Lan Susu and Lan Luoluo were only some of the best in the outer courtyard of the academy! They only had four rings, and were only Soul Ancestors, they hadn’t made it into the inner courtyard yet. But Wang Qiu’er had chosen the two of them to compete in such an important match, and left out Wu Feng and Xie Huanyue, who were both in the inner courtyard.

Huo Yuhao was more shocked that Wu Feng didn’t pose any objections, even though she was such a proud character. He couldn’t see any dissatisfaction from her.

Impressive, Wang Qiu’er!, Huo Yuhao complimented her in his heart. He had to admit that Wang Qiu’er’s leadership skills were very strong, she was able to easily handle her bunch of tough and arrogant characters. He couldn’t claim that he was at her level.

On the other side, everyone from the Sun Moon team also entered the waiting area. Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen looked very serious. To the two of them, this was also a life and death battle. Their clash against the Tang Sect had left them depleted, and they now had no choice but to use their substitutes. Even though Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were very strong, the overall ability of the Sun Moon team had dropped. Very soon, both parties entered their respective waiting areas. The entire place also went silent. Xu Tianran had already arrived on the main stage. He was very excited for today’s ﬁght, too. Yesterday, he had personally gone to visit the Sun Moon team, and promised them heavy rewards if they

won this match. If they could win this match, Xu Tianran promised them the title. In the quarterﬁnals, they wouldn’t have to face the Tang Sect. That was because the Tang Sect could only face them in the ﬁnal, and the Tang Sect’s next opponents included the Holy Ghost Sect!

Chapter 304: Wang Qiu'er Makes A Powerful Entrance

Xu Tianran was indeed the one who had planned the Holy Ghost Sect’s participation in this tournament. However, the Holy Ghost Sect was a sect of evil soul masters, formed by disciples of the Holy Ghost Church. It wouldn’t be a good thing if they were allowed to win the tournament, the people would be extremely unhappy. The reason why the Holy Ghost Sect was competing in this tournament was because they were here to deal with the Tang Sect, Shrek Academy, and even the Body Sect, who had yet to reveal themselves.

Their main mission was to remove all obstacles for the Sun Moon team. Xu Tianran had personally explained this plan to Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen. If they met the Holy Ghost Sect in the ﬁnals, they would be the champions.

Since his words were so obvious, it was very easy to tell what he was suggesting to the both of them.

Both Hongchen siblings knew what Xu Tianran expected. Today’s match was more important to them than the last tournament. After all, last time, they weren’t the core of the Sun Moon team then, even though they had lost to Shrek's team in the ﬁnals. They weren’t commanding their team, either! However, it was different this time. They were representing the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, the Illustrious Virtue Hall, their grandfather and the

entire empire. They couldn’t afford to lose today’s match!

Xiao Hongchen sat down in the waiting area. Even though he knew that the current Shrek's team didn’t consist of the best talents from Shrek Academy, he was still very nervous. Their performances had been only so-so, and they didn’t really impress anyone that much. The only person worth taking notice of was their team leader. However, there weren’t any Soul Emperors apart from her. Compared to the Tang Sect, their abilities weren’t that impressive.

However, Xiao Hongchen’s heart felt very heavy today for some reason. It was like how he felt when they faced the Tang Sect. Don’t tell me this team is able to threaten us? If we can’t even beat a second-rate team, then…

As he thought until here, Xiao Hongchen couldn’t help but clench his ﬁst. His ﬁghting spirit soared. “Elder brother, calm down,” Meng Hongchen said to him.

“Okay.” Xiao Hongchen took a look at his younger sister. This time, Wang Dong wasn’t their competitor anymore. Meng Hongchen was indeed very normal.

“Younger sister, let’s do our best today. We must win today.”

Meng Hongchen smiled. She was much more conﬁdent than Xiao Hongchen, “Elder brother, this is only Shrek's second- string team. Don’t worry, we’ll win for sure!”

------

The resting area...

Ever since Wang Qiu’er had left, Huo Yuhao had started to ponder a lot. He suddenly raised his head and said, “I understand now.” Wang Dong’er was puzzled as she looked at him and asked, “What do you understand?”

Huo Yuhao said, “I know why Qiu’er came up with this lineup. Brilliant! The Sun Moon team is deﬁnitely in trouble today.”

Wang Dong’er gently strangled him and said, “Can you not be so mysterious?”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and replied, “If you let me kiss you, I’ll reveal everything.”

Wang Dong’er rolled her eyes. “It’s ﬁne if you don’t want to tell me, but be careful tonight…”

Huo Yuhao snapped, “What are you going to do tonight? You are not even accompanying me to sleep now. Don’t tell me you are going to chase a cripple off the bed? Hmph!”

Wang Dong’er came up with a scheme, and revealed a captivating smile on her face. “If you can guess what I’m going to do, I’ll sleep with you tonight.”

“Really?” Huo Yuhao was delighted.

“Of course not. Even if you don’t tell me, I can watch and ﬁnd out.” Wang Dong’er’s attitude suddenly changed completely, and Huo Yuhao didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. She was becoming more and more like a little witch. I regret this! Why did I let her regain her conscience? However, I kind of enjoy this feeling…

“Let’s see. Wang Qiu’er will be the ﬁrst in the individual elimination round,” Huo Yuhao said so softly that only Wang Dong’er and the rest of the people from the Tang Sect could hear him.

Wang Qiu’er will be the ﬁrst to ﬁght? Everyone was confused. It didn’t make sense! With Wang Qiu’er’s status as the team leader, she should be the one holding the fort.

Just as they were full of doubts, Wang Qiu’er had already leapt up onto the stage and walked towards the center. On the other side, a tall and large youth from the Sun Moon team also jumped up onto the stage. He hadn’t appeared when they had fought Tang Sect. Evidently, he was one of the substitutes.

“It’s indeed Wang Qiu’er. Yuhao, you are brilliant!” Xiao Xiao couldn’t help but exclaim.

Xu Tianran had an epiphany, “I understand too. In fact, Qiu’er should be the ﬁrst to ﬁght.”

It wasn’t just him who had realized what was going on. He Caitou’s eyes also had a look of revelation as he smiled. It was just that he didn’t utter a sound at all.

He Caitou and Huo Yuhao were already among the top six in the underground tournament. In the next round, the top three would be decided. It was tonight. If they made the top three, they could represent the Duskwater Alliance in the ﬁnals of the tournament between the three different organizations.

They had earned quite a lot of money in the ﬁrst few rounds of the tournament. It was a pity, however, that they had only obtained some rare metals. While they had several million gold soul coins, they were useless if they couldn’t be used to purchase rare metals.

Number 96 and 98 were also in the top six. Huo Yuhao or He Caitou would face at least one of them. Huo Yuhao had met Gao Dalou again, but he hadn’t revealed his true identity. He was making Gao Dalou wait patiently. Huo Yuhao would only bring him back after the tournament ended. He wouldn’t be afraid to reveal his true identity then.

“Shrek's team versus the Sun Moon team. First ﬁght of the individual elimination round. Both parties, please report your names.” The referee for today was still the Unbreakable Douluo. As he was very fair and left many competing teams satisﬁed, this Titled Douluo and Class 9 soul engineer personally refereed some of the more important ﬁghts.

Undoubtedly, there was no ﬁght as important as the one between Shrek's team and the Sun Moon team!

Zheng Zhan was also troubled as he looked at the members from both sides. He knew about the enmity between Shrek's team and the Sun Moon team. This was a life and death battle! Neither party could afford to lose this match.

“Shrek, Wang Qiu’er.” Wang Qiu’er was still wearing a veil. Her powdery-blue hair ﬂowed behind her back. Although her appearance couldn’t be seen, her large, beautiful eyes, as well as her captivating ﬁgure, still left a deep impression in everyone’s minds.

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Ye Canshang.” While he was very tall and large, he didn’t have much ﬂesh on him. He gave everyone the impression that he was a bag of bones. There was even a weird sense of eeriness about him.

“Both parties, please step back and prepare for the match.” Zheng Zhan instructed. He even skipped the part where he was supposed to ask both parties not to hurt the other party. He knew it was futile.

Wang Qiu’er turned around and walked to her position, and Ye Canshang did the same. Wang Qiu’er stood at her position and watched her opponent. She squinted, and revealed a dim, mysterious light in her eyes.

Ye Canshang was also staring at her. However, he was smirking. His mouth suddenly enlarged, and he grinned so widely that his lips almost reached his ears. He revealed white teeth and blood-red gums. It was an awful scene.

If it was any ordinary lady, she would have screamed in fear.

However, Wang Qiu’er looked very calm.

Zheng Zhan lifted his right hand up high and looked at both parties before shouting, “Match, start!”

Wang Qiu’er immediately moved when Zheng Zhan announced the start of the ﬁght. Everyone heard a mufﬂed sound coming from the stage.

The soundprooﬁng barriers around the stage were unidirectional. The noises from outside couldn’t be heard inside, but the noises from the inside could be heard on the outside. Wang Qiu’er burst forward like a golden cannon shell as the mufﬂed sound reverberated out.

Wang Qiu’er was very ferocious in the earlier rounds, but she hadn’t gone too overboard. However, she revealed a different aura today.

Ye Canshang didn’t delay either. Two yellow and three purple soul rings rose from his feet. Following this, a black light ﬂashed on his body. A black ﬁgure separated from his body and appeared in front of him. However, his soul rings were still on his body.

It was a black skeleton with an eerie aura. It had the same ﬁgure as Ye Canshang.

As Ye Canshang’s ﬁrst soul ring shone, the skeleton doubled in size. Its bones also became thicker.

This was Ye Canshang’s martial soul, Skeleton. It was a skeleton that used his body as a blueprint. It was a very special existence. As a soul engineer, he didn’t need to lift any heavy weapons, he could just rely on his Skeleton! That was why he could handle a much heavier weight in a ﬁght, at least a few times greater than a normal soul engineer. This wasn’t considered very useful for a soul master, but it was very practical for a soul engineer.

However, his opponent today was Wang Qiu’er!

After Ye Canshang unleashed his ﬁrst soul skill, Skeleton Expansion, Wang Qiu’er had already arrived in front of him.

With the terrifying strength that Wang Qiu’er possessed, she could easily slide one hundred meters through the air.

A huge golden ﬁst hurtled toward Ye Canshang’s head.

A dangerous gust of wind swept towards his face!

Ye Canshang only felt an uncomfortable feeling in his chest before golden lights shone brightly in front of him. What’s this rhythm? It’s too quick. Isn’t she supposed to be an assault-type soul master? Why is she faster than an agility- type soul master?

Ye Canshang subconsciously ordered his Skeleton to block his body.

A pair of thick skeletal palms clawed towards Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁst.

Dodge? Was that even Wang Qiu’er’s style? Dream on!

Boom! Her ﬁst crashed against the skeletal claws. The Skeleton wanted to shut its claws, but it couldn’t do so. Cracks started to appear on its hands, and extended from the ﬁnger joints down towards the wrist.

Wang Qiu’er made a half turn in the air, and her right leg chopped down like a whip.

“She can’t be so quick!” Ye Canshang almost spat out blood. His Skeleton wasn’t something that he summoned, but his martial soul! Since his martial soul was injured, he also suffered from the backlash.

He didn’t even manage to retrieve a soul cannon before Wang Qiu’er’s leg came crashing down.

This time, Ye Canshang learned from his earlier mistake, and quickly retracted his martial soul. The broken right hand of his Skeleton disappeared.

Wang Qiu’er’s leg struck nothing, but it generated a gust of wind. This gust of wind seemed like a raging tornado in a mountain valley on a chilly winter night.

Ye Canshang’s shirt was drenched with cold sweat in just a short span of time.

Even as her leg struck nothing, Wang Qiu’er didn’t retract her power. She directly struck the ground, and used the momentum to bounce back up. She aimed her left knee toward Ye Canshang’s chest. Ye Canshang was so depressed right now that he wanted to die. He was a soul engineer. It was a bad thing to be so close to a soul master! Moreover, his opponent was Wang Qiu’er! He wanted to scream and beg her to give him a chance!

Would she do so?

Yes... but in his next life.

A layer of golden light rose from his body as he used his Invincible Barrier to protect himself.

Bang! The golden light from the Invincible Barrier undulated slightly, and Ye Canshang was scared pale. Was she really going to destroy his Invincible Barrier, too?

Beneath the stage, Xiao Hongchen was already so furious that he had stood up. He could tell that Ye Canshang had been completely suppressed, including his ﬁghting spirit. He no longer had any chance of victory. Ye Canshang was still struggling to stay in the ﬁght, however. He quickly unleashed his Skeleton again. Although it was without one hand, it was still equipped with its soul tools.

As he released his martial soul, and it prepared its soul tools in turn, Wang Qiu’er was attacking the Invincible Barrier like she was pounding a sandbag.

The Invincible Barrier wasn’t completely invincible, as it depleted his soul power. It was very useful if he wanted to save his own life, but it wasn’t as good as a protective barrier for defensive purposes. It deﬁnitely wasn’t the best choice for him to use it immediately the moment he fought Wang Qiu’er.

He unleashed his ﬁrst soul cannon. Ye Canshang chose the most explosive, high-powered cannon shell. He only had one goal, to force Wang Qiu’er away so that he could have some space to demonstrate his abilities! He was on the brink of tears as he felt his soul power depleting. However, what could he do? He could only try his best to deplete her soul power as well.

Boom! A ball of intense golden light was emitted from Wang Qiu’er’s body. After that, the high-powered cannon shell blew apart.

She blew apart the cannon shell with her ﬁst.

It exploded very close to her, and she was indeed forced back. However, the explosive force also affected the Invincible Barrier!

Ye Canshang felt his soul power dropping again. After that, he saw Wang Qiu’er returning. Furthermore, the effect of his Invincible Barrier was about to end.

This time, he saw another streak of golden light in Wang Qiu’er’s hand. Following this, the streak of golden light pierced through the Invincible Barrier.

The golden light caused the barrier to be destroyed, and Ye Canshang felt his soul power expended completely.

Zheng Zhan was monitoring their ﬁght. Just as the Invincible Barrier was destroyed, he was already in front of the two of them.

From the bottom of his heart, he greatly admired Wang Qiu’er’s violent ﬁghting style. Brilliant! She completely disoriented her opponent the moment she struck. It was a pity that her opponent represented the Sun Moon Empire.

There was likely to be a team ﬁght after this. As the referee, he had to do his best to prevent any bloodshed.

He struck his palm against the golden light, but he didn’t use too much force. After all, he was a Titled Douluo, and couldn’t overly affect the proceedings. If he depleted Wang Qiu’er’s abilities too much, it would be very unfair to Shrek's team.

However, he quickly retracted his hand when his palm contacted the Golden Dragon Spear. He was horriﬁed!

He felt the ﬂesh on his palm dissolving when he touched the spear. Although he used his soul power to stop this feeling, he was still stunned. His palm was still effective. After all, the spear was struck by the palm of a Titled Douluo. However, it still managed to pierce through Ye Canshang’s shoulder.

When Ye Canshang saw Zheng Zhan, he felt very relieved.

Referee, you came at the right time!

However, his entire body stiffened when the spear stabbed through his shoulder. His soul power was completely depleted after he had suffered Wang Qiu’er’s series of attacks. He didn’t have any excess soul power to resist the power of the Golden Dragon Spear.

By the time Zheng Zhan reacted and pulled Ye Canshang away, his entire chest cavity had already caved in. There wasn’t a drop of blood on the spear, but golden lights kept on surging towards Wang Qiu’er.

Devouring! The Life Devouring of the Golden Dragon Spear.

The life power that she drained replenished her body. Although it didn’t really help to restore her soul power, it was very effective at restoring her energy. Throughout the entire ﬁght, Wang Qiu’er had relied on her Ultimate Strength!

“You…” Zheng Zhan glared furiously at Wang Qiu’er. However, Wang Qiu’er didn’t even look at him. She turned around and walked towards the center of the stage.

Everyone from the Sun Moon team stood up.

Someone had just died again. Ye Canshang’s abilities weren’t ordinary! However, he was only able to release a single high- power cannon shell.

Meng Hongchen jumped onto the stage. They couldn’t be depleted any further. Otherwise, they were going to be like the Tang Sect, with insufﬁcient members to compete. If that happened, how were they going to ﬁght in the team round?

Meng Hongchen was about to become the second competing member of the Sun Moon team. The Hongchen Siblings had already planned it out. Ye Canshang would be the ﬁrst to compete, and he would test their opponent’s abilities. If the opponent was too strong, Meng Hongchen would be the next to ﬁght. They couldn’t allow their opponents to deplete them any further.

Meng Hongchen turned tense as she looked at Wang Qiu’er. It was evident that she had also been holding back in the earlier rounds. Otherwise, she couldn’t possibly defeat an elite Class 5 soul engineer of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy in such a short span of time, even if she was a six- ringed Soul Emperor.

Wang Qiu’er’s gaze was still as sharp as ever. It wasn’t any different from before. Her face wasn’t red, and she wasn’t panting. It looked like she hadn’t fought at all. She grabbed the center of her Golden Dragon Spear, the tip of it pointed diagonally towards the ground. She was so icy calm that she seemed like a statue.

This was the Golden Dragon Lady in her peak state! Her terrifying explosiveness had once defeated Ji Juechen in one strike. How strong was she? Without having any understanding of her, it wasn’t possible for Ye Canshang to resist her attacks. Even as Zheng Zhan intervened, he still died under the hands of the Golden Dragon Spear.

Huo Yuhao revealed an icy, divine light in his eyes. He folded his hands in front of his chest as he watched the ﬁght. He knew that his guess was right.

The individual elimination round was a great opportunity for every member of the team to demonstrate his or her abilities. However, the individual elimination round couldn’t decide the ﬁnal outcome unless one team could defeat all seven members of the other team with at most two members. More often than not, the individual elimination round was used to deplete the opponents’ abilities so as to gain an advantage in the team round.

When Huo Yuhao saw Wang Qiu’er picking Lan Susu and Lan Luoluo to enter the waiting area, he knew that Wang Qiu’er was completely aware that she couldn’t defeat the entire Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy on her own. Their only chance was in the team round.

Huo Yuhao’s guess was veriﬁed. Why did Wang Qiu’er go ﬁrst? If she managed to beat three consecutive opponents, she had the right to ask for the team round to start and give up on the rest of the individual ﬁghts. With her dominant abilities, she could deplete her opponents’ abilities yet conserve her own ﬁghting strength. In this way, Shrek's team would have a greater chance of winning, since they had Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu, as well as the Lan sisters, who all possessed martial soul fusion skills.

This was undoubtedly the best strategy. Huo Yuhao couldn’t think of a better strategy for Shrek's team. However, Wang Qiu’er had to take on a lot of pressure if they used such a strategy. Not only did she have to ﬁght three people in one shot, but she still had to lead the entire team in the team round. From the start until the end, she would be under a lot of pressure. Could she handle it?

The Sun Moon team didn’t repeat their mistakes against the Tang Sect. They sent Meng Hongchen in the second individual elimination round. This individual round might have a great impact on the entire tournament. Everyone from the Tang Sect sat up straight and silently waited for this ﬁght to begin.

Not only did Wang Qiu’er have to defeat Meng Hongchen, but she had to defeat her completely. It wouldn’t be easy. “Match, start!”

Zheng Zhan’s expression was dismal as he announced the start of the second individual round. Even though he was a Titled Douluo, he couldn’t stop a Soul Emperor from killing someone. This was a humiliation to him!

Meng Hongchen immediately moved after Zheng Zhan shouted. Learning from her previous lesson, she didn’t immediately unleash her close-combat soul tool. Instead, she unleashed her martial soul.

A layer of peculiar-looking icy blue engulfed her entire body. Her two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings suddenly lit up, revealing her cultivation as a Soul Emperor.

All the spectators cheered when they saw her six soul rings. Previously, Wang Qiu’er had shown how dominant she was. Her aura was so suppressive that the spectators couldn’t catch their breath. Right now, Meng Hongchen showed that she wasn’t inferior to Wang Qiu’er, and managed to release everyone from Wang Qiu’er’s domination. Meng Hongchen’s ﬁrst and second soul rings shone concurrently, and an icy blue ring suddenly spread from Meng Hongchen’s feet. She had already made her mind up. Isn’t your attack very strong? Alright, I shall use my defense to slowly wear you down. No matter what, you’ll enter the domain of my Icevenom Ring. No matter how strong you are, you’ll still be poisoned if you don’t have the Ultimate Ice like Huo Yuhao. Even if I can’t beat you in this round, you’ll be unable to ﬁght in the team round once my Vermillion Clear Icetoad’s poison

acts up in your body. When that happens, the Sun Moon team will win!

Meng Hongchen was very clear-headed. Against someone like Wang Qiu’er, who was very adept at close-combat, she was the best weapon against her.

However, Meng Hongchen and even Zheng Zhan were stunned when Wang Qiu’er didn’t initiate an attack. As a close- combat soul master, she didn’t intend to advance. She took a step with her left foot, and her upper body made a a half turn. She lifted her Golden Dragon Spear to her shoulder with her right hand and stretched it out.

Meng Hongchen suddenly felt an indescribable and terrifying aura around her body. When she looked at Wang Qiu’er again, she saw Wang Qiu’er’s eyes glowing strangely, and her entire person seemed to turn blurry. The two tips of her spear were emitting blinding golden lights. The golden lights even condensed to form sparks that appeared extremely threatening. Wang Qiu’er’s entire body started to emit blinding golden lights.

A layer of golden scales spread from her spear and extended throughout her entire body. Very soon, the scales engulfed every part of her body except her face. Of her six soul rings, the ﬁrst two were shining brightly.

Among all the spectators, only Huo Yuhao knew what they were. They were Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁrst soul skill, Golden Dragon Body, and her second soul skill, Dragon’s Strength.

Not only this, but Huo Yuhao also knew that Wang Qiu’er had activated an innate ability of her Golden Dragon, the Golden Dragon’s Pride. She had raised the terrifying strength of her Golden Dragon to its limit, and even activated her Golden Dragon’s Perception. Huo Yuhao used his great spiritual power to sense everything that was going on, and discovered that there was a line connecting Wang Qiu’er and Meng Hongchen at this point. Wang Qiu’er was like a volcano that was about to erupt right now. Her entire body was covered in intense, golden sparks. As the sparks grew more and more intense, her body was slowly being concealed by them. The golden sparks slowly consolidated to form the appearance of a huge golden dragon

head. This golden dragon head let out terrifying roars.

This…

Even though the entire Sun Moon team knew that Shrek's team leader was extremely strong, they hadn’t expected her to be THIS strong. Wang Qiu’er’s abilities were beyond what Meng Hongchen had imagined. She only felt that she had trouble breathing now, as if her entire body was being restrained by a tough yet invisible string. The terrifying feeling made her extremely breathless. It was like Wang Qiu’er’s spear was going to penetrate through her body in the next moment.

She didn’t hesitate any further. She quickly ended her ﬁrst two soul skills, and an icy-blue suit of armor quickly covered her body. Her entire body was under the protection of this armor. This time, it wasn’t a weapon that appeared in her hands, it was an icy-blue shield. It was at least a Class 6 or greater soul tool. Meng Hongchen felt slightly better for a moment, but she was horriﬁed to discover that the golden dragon head formed by the sparks on Wang Qiu’er’s body was about to change into a true Golden Dragon.

She had been given too much time to accumulate her power.

Meng Hongchen made the wrong call because of what had happened in the last round. She knew why she had made a mistake. This Wang Qiu’er was simply too cunning. She isn’t just strong; she even knew what I was thinking.

Meng Hongchen clenched her teeth, as she knew that Wang Qiu’er had almost ﬁnished accumulating her power. Once she erupted, it was bound to be a lethal attack.

Even Zheng Zhan was starting to get nervous. He wondered what effect Wang Qiu’er’s attack would bring about. The strength unleashed by the Golden Dragon Spear frightened him. Was it the kind of power that a Soul Emperor could unleash? Her spear wasn’t any form of soul tool, but its strength wasn’t lower than a Class 8 soul tool. No wonder Shrek Academy was the top academy in the world!

“Hoo...!” A low-pitched dragon roar sounded out, and the huge dragon head ﬁnally rose. The dazzling golden light formed its body, and its terrifying aura made everyone shudder.

Meng Hongchen took in a deep breath, and layer upon layer of icy-blue light started to rise from her body. However, they looked very insigniﬁcant compared to the glorious and terrifying gold from Wang Qiu’er.

---

This was Wang Qiu’er’s true ability! Wang Dong’er twisted her head to look at Huo Yuhao. She discovered that Huo Yuhao was watching very intently, but he wasn’t worried at all. He was only relieved.

“Hmph! Are you happy to see Qiu’er so strong?” Wang Dong’er asked softly.

“Yes!” Huo Yuhao subconsciously answered. However, he soon realized something wasn’t right, and quickly added, “I’m happy for Shrek that Qiu’er is so strong. It seems like they really have a chance today. I only hope that the referee will let them clash this one time. Qiu’er’s accumulation is simply too scary.”

---

A streak of golden light shot out just when the dragon roar was at its most resounding state. The huge Golden Dragon that had already risen into the air chased after the streak of golden light, and a terrifying golden glow instantly illuminated the entire stage. There was only one target.

“I concede defeat!” An unexpected scene occurred. Meng Hongchen grabbed her head with both her hands and quickly squatted down. At the same time, she activated her Invincible Barrier. As she screamed at the top of her voice, it was loud enough that she could break all the windows of a house if she were close enough.

Zheng Zhan was extremely tense. After hearing her scream, he acted immediately. A white barrier rose up and tried to stop the Golden Dragon Spear. However, the streak of golden light was too strong, and instantly pierced through the barrier. Its speed didn’t decrease, and it continued to shoot forward.

The Golden Dragon that followed behind even tore the barrier to pieces.

However, Zheng Zhan stood in front of Meng Hongchen as it did. He formed a ring with both his hands in front of his chest, and a white shield appeared in the space before him.

When the streak of golden light was less than three feet from this shield, a hissing sound suddenly echoed through the air. Huge patches of distorted light started to spread with the shield as the center.

When the Golden Dragon sensed this, a terrifying roar sounded again. The entire stage became a frightening world where white and gold intersected.

--- Jing Hongchen couldn’t remain seated anymore. He stood up suddenly and watched the ﬁght anxiously. His expression changed.

How’s this possible? How can Shrek Academy have such a strong competing member? He didn’t know how strong Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon Spear was. However, he was very familiar with Zheng Zhan! The ﬁrst barrier that Zheng Zhan enacted was a Class 7 defensive-type soul tool. It was strong and extremely resilient. It was a type of barrier that only Zheng Zhan possessed, that could resist any weapons that were ﬂung at it.

However, that Class 7 soul tool could only brieﬂy stop Wang Qiu’er’s attack before it was crushed. Right now, Zheng Zhan was using an extremely strong soul tool that he had relied on to become famous, the Divine Unbreakable Shield. It was a Class 9 soul tool! But from the looks of it, it didn’t seem like the shield had gained the upper hand. In terms of quality, it didn’t seem to be better than Wang Qiu’er’s streak of golden light, and the Golden Dragon that accompanied it.

--- Meng Hongchen’s face was very pale right now. She knew that if she hadn’t chosen to concede defeat, she would have faced this horrifying strike! Not only would she have been killed, she would have been obliterated!

The clash between gold and white lasted for a few moments before things died down. The streak of golden light also slowly revealed its original form… Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon Spear!

Wang Qiu’er was still standing where she was, and as the light faded her ﬁgure was slowly revealed. As she moved her right hand, the spear turned into a streak of ﬂowing light and returned to her palm. Her golden scales also faded away.

Zheng Zhan heaved a sigh of relief and lowered his head to look at the Divine Unbreakable Shield. He was horriﬁed to ﬁnd a slight indentation in the center of the shield!

Chapter 305: Intimidating One's Enemies, Entering the Team Fight

He knew that he had resisted this attack not because of the defensive strength of his Unbreakable Shield, but because of the gap in their cultivations. It also meant the spear was even superior to his shield! It was a weapon that was even stronger than a Class 9 soul tool?!

“Shrek wins the second individual elimination round!” Zheng Zhan announced the result without any hesitation.

In the waiting area, the other six from Shrek Academy were all standing up. They were extremely excited. Wang Qiu’er had crushed her opponents in two consecutive ﬁghts. In the second ﬁght, Meng Hongchen didn’t even manage to attack before she conceded defeat. It was a great morale booster for all of them!

However, Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow and gently shook his head.

“What’s wrong?” Wang Dong’er asked. Huo Yuhao said, “How depleted do you think Wang Qiu’er is?”

Wang Dong’er was intelligent, and immediately guessed what he was thinking. “She shouldn’t have used too much in the ﬁrst ﬁght. Her ﬁrst opponent was far weaker than her. However, it’s different for Meng Hongchen. Her Vermilion Clear Icetoad was very difﬁcult to deal with. Qiu’er was obviously targeting her strategy. She only had one goal, to kill her even if the depletion of her soul power was great. However, Meng Hongchen was too cunning, and backed out at the last minute.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “She’s indeed cunning. She only conceded defeat after Qiu’er attacked. She couldn’t stop after she unleashed her attack, and it was more like a duel between her and the Titled Douluo referee. While Meng Hongchen lost this ﬁght, she wasn’t depleted or hurt at all. This isn’t a good thing for Shrek later. I just wonder how depleted Qiu’er is. From the strike just now, I believe at least forty percent of her soul power has been depleted.”

The accurate number was actually ﬁfty percent. Wang Qiu’er stood quietly on the stage, a look of regret in her eyes. She had been conﬁdent in her attack, but she was duped by her opponent. Although she won, she knew that she had lost to her opponent in terms of tactics. Along with the earlier ﬁght, around sixty percent of her energy had been expended. Even though soul power wasn’t everything for her, who had the Ultimate Strength, the team round would still be affected if she over-exerted herself.

The Golden Dragon Spear was stabbed into the ground in front of her. Two Milk Bottles appeared in her hands. Rings and rings of soul power were undulating around her hands.

Using two Milk Bottles to restore her soul power?

Those who noticed this scene were astonished by her. No one dared to use two Milk Bottles of the same class at once.

She needed to guide the soul power in the Milk Bottles into her body continuously before it could fuse with her soul power. If she sucked in soul power from two sides at the same time, how should she guide it? Even a Titled Douluo wouldn’t do something as crazy as that! However, Wang Qiu’er did. She was able to do so because of her extremely strong body.

On the Sun Moon team’s side, Meng Hongchen left the stage and instructed the next competing member with a few words. After that, she discussed things with Xiao Hongchen and the other members, and gave something to this member before he got on stage.

“Both parties, please step forward and report your names.” Zheng Zhan was already in the center of the stage. The heartbroken look on his face hadn’t faded away yet. The cost of purchasing rare metals to repair the Unbreakable Shield would be an astronomical ﬁgure! How could he not be depressed? It was the main Class 9 soul tool that he used!

“Shrek, Wang Qiu’er!” These three words were destined to be greatly imprinted in everyone’s mind today.

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Ding Xiaobu.” This young man from the Sun Moon team was quite short. He was a head shorter than Wang Qiu’er, and was extremely skinny. He was like a skinny monkey. “Both parties, please step back and get ready to start.”

Wang Qiu’er was squeezing the two Milk Bottles with both her hands. She wasn’t walking very quickly, but slowly taking her time. Her soul power was slowly being restored through the Milk Bottles.

Zheng Zhan’s lips twisted a little. She was stalling for time! However, he didn’t rush her. He had personally blocked her strike earlier on, which was in fact unfair to her. Meng Hongchen had made a tactical surrender. Under normal circumstances, she should have at least used her Invincible Barrier to protect herself, which would deplete some of her soul power too. However, this was the Sun Moon Empire!

Zheng Zhan had earned his reputation based on his fairness, so now he felt a little guilty. That was why he didn’t hurry Wang Qiu’er.

Ding Xiaobu wasn’t rushed at all. As he slowly walked back, he seemed to be arranging things on his body. As long as he didn’t retrieve any soul tools, no one could stop him from meddling with his own clothing. Wang Qiu’er took almost a minute to get to her position. She stood straight, turned around and put her Milk Bottles away. Her gaze also started to become more focused. At least on the surface, no one could tell that she was depleted earlier.

“Begin!”

Ding Xiaobu moved. After Zheng Zhan announced the start of the ﬁght, he quickly leapt to one side. He was very deft. Behind him, at least ﬁfteen streaks of lights ﬂashed. All of them were soul thrusters that had been meticulously placed on his body.

An agility-type, close-combat soul engineer?

Wang Qiu’er also moved. This time, she didn’t unleash all her strength. She pulled the Golden Dragon Spear out of the ground and chased after Ding Xiaobu. She was very quick.

Ding Xiaobu wasn’t willing to clash with her, however, and started to run in circles. He used the soul thrusters behind him to adjust his speed – sometimes he was quick, sometimes he was slow. He was very agile throughout, and started to play a catching game with Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er’s gaze turned sharper and sharper. She knew that this was a strategy speciﬁcally being employed against her. It was obvious that her opponent had seen through her intentions. In addition, she was the strongest member of Shrek’s team. Her opponent was trying his best to deplete her soul power. It was likely that Xiao Hongchen would be the next from the Sun Moon team to compete.

Trying to exhaust me? Wang Qiu’er snorted, and suddenly burst forward as she tipped her toes on the ground. She leapt up instantly, and used her Golden Dragon’s Perception to predict Ding Xiaobu’s movements. She also quickly got into position, and her spear turned into a dazzling golden light that stabbed straight towards Ding Xiaobu’s chest. That instant interception, quickness, accuracy and burst of strength was extremely stiﬂing.

Even though Ding Xiaobu was prepared, his expression changed as he saw the spear heading straight towards his chest. One layer, two layers. Two layers of golden light were released from Ding Xiaobu’s body at the same time.

The spear stabbed him. However, it only raked across his Invincible Barriers. Ding Xiaobu’s Invincible Barriers retracted, and the spear wasn’t able to penetrate through two closely-linked Invincible Barriers immediately. Ding Xiaobu exploited the momentum of the spear to jump back. He made a half turn in the air, and his soul thruster propelled him away from Wang Qiu’er again.

Idiot! Wang Qiu’er realized what the Sun Moon team had given Ding Xiaobu. They had given him their Invincible Barriers!

However, was it possible to use two at the same time? This was evidently a special method invented by the Illustrious Virtue Hall.

Everyone knew how expensive Invincible Barriers were. They gave those who had them a second life! However, even the best Invincible Barriers could only last slightly above ten seconds before they broke down. Ding Xiaobu used two at the same time, which was equivalent to spending a large sum of gold soul coins! The Sun Moon team was using money to crush Wang Qiu’er and deplete her abilities.

Wang Qiu’er stopped chasing after him. She knew that she couldn’t overcome his defenses before his Invincible Barriers lost their effect unless she used the Throw of Heaven and Earth like she did earlier.

She didn’t chase him, but Ding Xiaobu came in to provoke her. He lifted a black cannon to his shoulder before ﬁring a black shell at Wang Qiu’er. The shell blew apart in the air and turned into a huge black web that seemed to be covered in grease.

Speed, harassment, and Invincible Barriers! These were the three things the Sun Moon team thought of to deal with Wang Qiu’er. What they wanted to do in this ﬁght was to deplete her as much as possible.

Wang Qiu’er could concede defeat. She had already won two ﬁghts. It would be ﬁne for her to concede defeat to conserve her abilities. However, she needed to beat one more person before she could request to end the individual elimination round and start the team round.

If Wang Qiu’er conceded defeat, Ding Xiaobu would continue to remain onstage. Whatever happened next was likely to disrupt her plan.

More importantly, what kind of person was Wang Qiu’er? For a character as proud as her, how could she allow herself to be led around by the nose by her opponent? The sharp gaze in her eyes ﬂashed repeatedly before she raised her spear.

A red glow shone from her eyes. Following this, the soul power that she unleashed was covered by an additional layer of red light.

Ding Xiaobu only felt that his opponent had turned into a prehistoric, ferocious beast. He became slightly tense. As he looked at Wang Qiu’er again, he saw that her eyes had turned completely blood-red.

Her original powdery-blue eyes now spread fear. Wang Qiu’er swung the spear in her hands, and two streaks of golden-red light ﬂashed out. The black web coming towards her was destroyed.

In the next instant, Ding Xiaobu activated two more Invincible Barriers. However, he felt like he was ﬂying within the barriers.

His Invincible Barriers could only keep him from harm, but they couldn’t stabilize him. Under the repeated attacks of the Golden Dragon Spear, he started ﬂying around within his Invincible Barriers.

“I want to see how many Invincible Barriers you’ve got,” Wang Qiu’er said coldly. As her sixth soul ring lit up, her eyes turned bloodthirsty and ﬂashed with red light.

Ding Xiaobu started to scream. “I, I concede defeat!”

The red lights retracted, and Wang Qiu’er stood up straight as she held her spear. There was a mighty aura around her, and she appeared extremely valiant and heroic! Ding Xiaobu crashed onto the ground and started to pant heavily. As he glanced at Wang Qiu’er again, his face was ﬁlled with fear.

He was really scared. Wang Qiu’er had only used her ﬁrst and second soul skills earlier to defeat Ye Canshang. She had also forced Meng Hongchen to concede defeat without even using a single soul skill. However, she had used her sixth soul skill on him!

At that moment, he felt that he was going to sustain the entire impact of Wang Qiu’er relentless attacks even though he was protected by the Invincible Barriers. As for the referee, Ye Canshang’s death had left him without any conﬁdence.

Everyone only had one chance to live. No one was completely unafraid of death, and so Ding Xiaobu had surrendered. Even though he still had ﬁve Invincible Barriers he could use, and he had more than eighty percent of his soul power remaining, he was eager to concede defeat.

Wang Qiu’er looked at him coldly and said, “I hope you’ll be so lucky in the team round later.” As she spoke, her Golden Dragon Spear had already turned into a streak of golden light and disappeared. She took out two Milk Bottles again before she turned around and walked back towards Zheng Zhan.

“Referee, we are going to give up on the next few individual elimination rounds. Let’s go straight to the team round.” After she ﬁnished informing him, she walked straight down from the stage.

One against three! Meng Hongchen was even among those three! From the looks of it, Wang Qiu’er was invincible. In the eyes of the spectators, Wang Qiu’er didn’t meet any resistance at all, and beat Ye Canshang, Meng Hongchen and Ding Xiaobu. Among the three, one died, and the other two conceded defeat.

When Wang Qiu’er stepped down from the stage, all the spectators were boiling. However, they weren’t cursing Shrek, but blaming the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

They had lost too badly. ---

When Ding Xiaobu walked down from the stage, he was given a tight slap.

Xiao Hongchen knocked him to the ground. The look in his eyes made him seem like he wanted to kill someone. “Idiot! What were you doing? You had so many Invincible Barriers! Why did you concede defeat?”

Ding Xiaobu also acknowledged his cowardice and mumbled, “But, but she used her sixth soul skill. I was scared…”

Meng Hongchen said, “What are you scared of? So what if it’s her sixth soul skill? She’s only a Soul Emperor. Do you think that she can destroy two Invincible Barriers in one shot? Even an eight-ringed soul master can’t do it in ﬁfteen seconds. Don’t you know that?”

After being slapped by Xiao Hongchen, Ding Xiaobu tolerated the pain and humiliation. However, he reacted when he saw how furious Meng Hongchen was. He glared at her and said, “What about you? Why didn’t you try to resist Wang Qiu’er’s attack when you faced her? Why did you choose to concede defeat?”

“Me? Was I in the same situation as you? Do you know how much soul power she unleashed?” Meng Hongchen got even angrier seeing that he was trying to include her in this.

Ding Xiaobu snorted. “Yes, her abilities will get even stronger if she manages to accumulate her power. However, who gave her the time to accumulate her power?” He wasn’t feeling subservient, especially after his humiliating defeat.

A handsome-looking and reﬁned young man separated Xiao Hongchen and Ding Xiaobu. “Alright, alright! We’re all on the same team. The ﬁghts are over. We have to recover in the team round. Do you think we can win by quarreling? What we need now is to work together. We can’t lose the team round.” His gaze met Xiao Hongchen’s before he nodded.

This young man was in the starting seven against the Tang Sect, but he hadn’t managed to ﬁght that day. Once he appeared, Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen’s fury calmed down.

Xiao Hongchen patted Ding Xiaobu’s shoulder and said, “I was reckless. Let bygones be bygones. However, Xiaobu, you should know what the result will be if we lose the next round. All of you should remember what the Prince Regent mentioned yesterday. There are still six of us left. We can die, but we can’t lose this round.”

“Yes.” Ding Xiaobu wasn’t very conﬁdent. When he saw Xiao Hongchen softening his stance, he immediately nodded like a donkey and stood to one side.

Xiao Hongchen turned to the young man and said, “It seems like we’ll have to change our strategy for the team round. Lan Xiu, what’s your suggestion?”

Lan Xiu gestured, and all six of them gathered together to discuss their strategy.

--- On the other side, Shrek had a few minutes to adjust their tactics before the team round started.

“Team leader, how are you?” Dai Huabin asked in concern.

“I’m ﬁne. Let’s follow the plan.” Wang Qiu’er said.

Zhu Lu, who was standing behind Dai Huabin, revealed a strange look in her eyes and lowered her head slightly. Her hands were tangled up in front of her body.

Huo Yuhao was monitoring them throughout. With his spiritual power, it was easy for him to hear what they were discussing. Dai Huabin still knows how to show concern even though he’s such an arrogant character? Qiu’er’s control over them is pretty strong. Or…

A strange thought appeared in Huo Yuhao’s head.

After Wang Qiu’er ﬁnished speaking, she immediately sat down in the waiting area and shut her eyes. She tried her best to suck in the soul power in the Milk Bottles to restore her soul power. Only she knew that she hadn’t won the last three ﬁghts easily, even though they had appeared to be a breeze for her. The depletion of her soul power in the ﬁght against Meng Hongchen was especially great.

However, she had had no choice. She had had to use the quickest method to defeat her opponents and reduce their numbers to increase their own morale. Although she had exerted herself quite heavily, she had managed to fulﬁll her plan.

She had used up more than sixty percent of her soul power earlier. If not for the fact that Ding Xiaobu was frightened, it might have been an even greater number.

She needed time to restore her soul power through the Milk Bottles. Although her speed of restoration greatly increased as she used two Milk Bottles at the same time, the burden on her also greatly increased. When Zheng Zhan’s voice resonated from the stage, she had recovered only half of what she had expended.

She stood up again and opened her eyes. Her dominant aura surged out. At this instant, the aura that she revealed was even more dominant than before. It was so domineering that it almost tore the huge stage apart.

“Let’s go,” she said softly. Her toes pointed toward the ground, and she changed into a streak of golden light as she ascended to the stage. Behind her, the rest of the team followed her up to the stage.

---

On the other side, the six members from the Sun Moon team also went up on stage. Both parties faced each other as they proceeded towards the center of the stage.

Zheng Zhan was impressed as he looked at both parties. The youths today are indeed very strong!

“Both parties, please report your names.”

“Shrek, Wang Qiu’er.” “Shrek, Dai Huabin.”

“Shrek, Zhu Lu.”

“Shrek, Ning Tian.”

“Shrek, Cao Jinxuan.”

“Shrek, Lan Susu.”

“Shrek, Lan Luoluo.”

Everyone from Shrek sounded very serious.

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Xiao Hongchen.”

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Meng Hongchen.” “Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Lan Xiu.”

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Qiu Yi.”

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Ye Nongfeng.”

“Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Ding Xiaobu.”

After hearing them report their names, Wang Qiu’er’s gaze turned towards Ding Xiaobu. She looked at him coldly. Ding Xiaobu shuddered a little as she watched him. Had Wang Qiu’er’s pupils turned vertical?

Just as they were reporting their names, no one noticed that Huo Yuhao’s body was already shaking slightly. Following this, a gust of clear wind blew past him. The light around him distorted slightly.

Even the rest of the members from the Tang Sect didn’t sense anything.

“Both parties, retreat and prepare for the start of the ﬁght.” Zheng Zhan didn’t even instruct them before the ﬁght began. Was there any point? They were arch-enemies, and were unlikely to heed his advice.

As both parties retreated, they were already ﬁghting through their gazes. When their gazes met, it seemed as if there were countless projections of knives grating against one another, creating sparks.

Wang Qiu’er suddenly felt something. When she turned around to look at the Tang Sect in the waiting area, she saw Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao was looking at her without any expression. There weren’t any emotions on his face.

Wang Qiu’er was a little stunned. She squinted, then quickly recovered. She led her team members to their side of the stage.

As they turned around, Shrek’s team went into their formation. Wang Qiu’er was standing in front of everyone, the core of the entire team. To her left was Dai Huabin, to her right was Lan Susu. Zhu Lu was behind Dai Huabin, while Lan Luoluo was behind Lan Susu. Directly behind Wang Qiu’er was Cao Jinxuan, followed by Ning Xuan. It was the same triangular formation, only with a change in personnel.

Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen weren’t the two frontmost members of the Sun Moon team. Instead, up front was the tall and burly man called Qiu Yi. His complexion was very tan, and he was more than two meters tall. From the looks of it, he weighed at least a hundred and ﬁfty kilos. His muscular arms were even thicker than Wang Qiu’er’s waist. As he stood there, he looked like a human bear.

The Hongchen siblings were standing behind Qiu Yi. Behind the two of them were Lan Xiu and Ye Nongfeng. Ding Xiaobu was the furthest back. The Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy formed a very weird rhombus-shaped formation.

A triangular formation versus a rhombus formation. The auras of both teams were already in a state of mutual hostility even before they started ﬁghting.

“Both parties, please get ready.” For some reason, Zheng Zhan started to feel very nervous. However, he was also very excited too. This ﬁght had to be the pinnacle of clashes in the younger generation. As the referee, he was also eager to see who would win.

“Begin!”

As Zheng Zhan shouted, this battle of glory and qualiﬁcation between the top soul master academy and soul engineering academy on the continent started!

Wang Qiu’er lifted her right hand and the Golden Dragon Spear appeared in her palm. After that, she leapt forward and pulled her right hand back. She seemed like she was going to ﬂing her spear.

On the other side, Qiu Yi felt his goosebumps rising when Wang Qiu’er did this. He roared as he thought about how Wang Qiu’er was going to tear him apart. His hands clasped in front of him, and a huge circular shield appeared in his palm.

This circular shield was silvery-white. It had a protruding circle in the middle, and there were ﬂowery patterns all over it. These patterns released gentle soul power undulations. In the center of the shield was a silvery-white gem as large as two ﬁsts clasped together.

As he unleashed this shield, a wave of silver light shone from the gem as Qiu Yi poured his soul power into it. This silver light engulfed the entire shield, and even all his teammates behind him.

After that, an icy-blue halo could be seen extending from Qiu Yi’s feet. This halo started to spread until it covered the entire stage.

Wang Qiu’er wasn’t just striking a pose. However, she didn’t accumulate her power this time. In the next instant, her spear turned into a streak of golden light that shot straight towards Qiu Yi. A piercing sound reverberated throughout the entire stage.

She unleashed her weapon the moment the ﬁght started.

What strategy was that?

She followed her spear. Wang Qiu’er touched her toes to the ground and burst forward like a bolt of lightning. Intense golden soul power was released from her body. Her ﬁrst and second soul rings lit up, and dragon scales covered her body.

Her teammates weren’t slow, either. First, four streaks of lights landed on Wang Qiu’er’s body simultaneously, which caused her to shine even brighter. Shrek’s team had Ning Tian, who possessed the Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda,the best auxiliary-type martial soul in the world!

She was controlling four enhancements at the same time, it was her limit. With her support, Wang Qiu’er’s aura surged.

Dai Huabin, Zhu Lu, Lan Susu, and Lan Luoluo also burst forward at the same time. They divided themselves into two groups and lined up behind Wang Qiu’er. Ning Tian’s right palm was extended to one side of her body. Her Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda started to shine, and streaks of ﬂowing light shot out of her hands. A bright silver shuttle around two meters long appeared in front of her. As she stepped onto it, she drifted up a few feet and followed the others.

Cao Jinxuan also unleashed his martial soul. The magical Time-Elapsing Clock shone brightly behind him. However, he didn’t use any soul skills at this point. His gaze was focused on the entire stage.

As the golden light shot forward, Qiu Yi shouted and used his shield to block.

Dang!...

The golden light was deﬂected with a loud ringing sound, and returned instantly to Wang Qiu’er’s hand. Qiu Yi took two steps back as the shield in his hand was struck by the spear, rippling with intense undulations of silver light.

While Qiu Yi was only a ﬁve-ringed Soul King and Class 5 soul engineer, and his shield was a Class 6 soul tool. Among Class 6 defensive-type soul tools, it was one of the best, and qutie rare. It was a foot thick, and weighed more than ﬁve hundred kilos. Even so, it suffered under Wang Qiu’er’s spear, showing how strong Wang Qiu’er was. It was very difﬁcult to imagine that she possessed such great strength.

However, the Sun Moon team started to retaliate at this point.

The icy-blue halo spread further and further. It was the lethal poison of the Vermilion Clear Icetoad! Once this lethal poison spread, Shrek’s ﬁghting abilities were bound to be greatly depleted even if the ﬁght couldn’t be immediately ended. It was one of the most lethal weapons that the Sun Moon team could use.

Icetoad Venom and Ice Venom Ring. The two teams had already covered more than half the distance between them as Meng Hongchen deployed her soul skills to their fullest. Wang Qiu’er was the ﬁrst to charge into the world of poison.

Not only that, but nine balls of silver light also rose behind Qiu Yi’s back. These nine balls of light drifted up into the air and formed an arc. Following this, nine streaks of silver light shot out at the same time. They wove a web of light in the air, blocking Wang Qiu’er’s path.

The Golden Dragon Spear swept out and clashed against the silver web. However, something strange occurred. Wang Qiu’er’s strength lost its effect for the ﬁrst time. She was struck back by a strong rebound force. Behind the Hongchen siblings, Lan Xiu’s eyes shone with silver light, and her hands were moving rhythmically. The nine balls of silver light revealed they were nine silvery metal balls, each of them as large as a human’s head.

Lan Xiu was the Sun Moon team’s main control-type soul master. This was also why Xiao Hongchen was very respectful towards him. A control-type soul engineer was very rare among soul engineers, but Lan Xiu chose this weird cultivation method for himself.

These nine balls of silver light were called the Nine Glories. Before he started learning soul tools, he was already using the Nine Glories. Initially, they were created for him by his father. However, they were only a set of Class 2 soul tools back then. Lan Xiu had continuously perfected them using his talents and practiced his control of them. It must be said that he could only create such soul tools even though he was a soul engineer.

The Nine Glories were actually nine separate soul tools. They belonged to a category of soul tools called deﬂective rays. These rays were special special light waves. They could deﬂect any type of attack. At the same time, controlling nine soul tools at the same time wasn’t an easy feat. In addition, they had to be coordinated with one another.

Lan Xiu was a rare spiritual-type soul master. However, his spiritual power was very pure, and couldn’t be unleashed through an intermediary like Huo Yuhao’s Spirit Eyes. Without his soul engineering profession, he might even be unable to ﬁght anyone. No one would have bothered to nurture him, either.

However, things were different now. Based on his extraordinary spiritual power, he had displayed an extraordinary talent in using and controlling soul tools since he was young.

The nine streaks of silver light intersected in the air and seemed to form a barrier that resisted Shrek's ﬁrst wave of attacks.

“I’ll hold Wang Qiu’er. Go and settle the rest!” Lan Xiu shouted.

As Wang Qiu’er was struck back, she lifted her head to look at the nine balls of silver light. She raised her Golden Dragon Spear once again. This time, she aimed at the sky. The Nine Glories were also experiencing rapid changes in the air. The nine metal balls gathered together, and nine streaks of silver light shot out, forming a clump of silver light that came crashing down towards Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er ﬂung her Golden Dragon Spear out, but it was deﬂected back by the clump of silver light. Following this, Wang Qiu’er punched out with all her strength and struck the clump of silver light. It was destroyed, but she was also forced back more than ten meters. Her distance to the Sun Moon team increased.

Beneath the stage, the expressions of everyone from the Tang Sect changed when they saw this scene. They are targeting Wang Qiu’er too much. The deﬂective rays were a huge obstacle to Wang Qiu’er and prevented her from using her strength. This greatly restricted Shrek's abilities!

Just as Wang Qiu’er was forced back, another person appeared beside Qiu’er. Rings of light shone from his body and rose. Barrel after barrel quickly took form as these rings of lights fused. This person was Xiao Hongchen! Two yellow, two purple and three black soul rings rose from his feet. Seven soul rings. He had seven soul rings! He was a Soul Sage!

This was the ﬁrst time in the history of the tournament that a Soul Sage had appeared. Even in the history of Shrek Academy, there had never been a twenty-year-old Soul Sage before. However, Xiao Hongchen had achieved this feat.

Countless rounds of artillery ﬁre were unleashed. Dai Huabin, Zhu Lu, and the Lan sisters were all engulfed, unable to advance.

Ding Xiaobu had already disappeared behind the group and initiated an attack against Shrek's team. Shrek's team was completely suppressed now.

No one had expected such a situation. The Sun Moon team had been concealing their abilities until now. Xiao Hongchen hadn’t fought at all before, and only revealed his extraordinary gifts at this point!

Chapter 306: An Armor Made of Beautiful Ice Crystals

It was an honor to become a Soul Sage before the age of twenty! In fact, only Xiao Hongchen knew the price he had paid for this. In the next ﬁve years, his cultivation wouldn’t see any further improvements. He made this sacriﬁce so that he could become a Soul Sage before the tournament! It was very difﬁcult to tell how he might improve in ﬁve years’ time. However, he didn’t have any regrets. He wanted to beat all his opponents and reach the highest peak of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament!

Countless cannon barrels ﬁred off. Meng Hongchen also appeared behind him. She was wearing an icy-blue suit of armor and holding a long blue sword in each of her hands. With the fastest speed she could muster, she burst towards Wang Qiu’er.

Her earlier surrender was tactical. She was going to defeat Wang Qiu’er this time to save her reputation!

There was another person behind Xiao Hongchen, Ye Nongfeng. At this point, Ye Nongfeng lifted a special soul tool to his shoulder. The back of the soul tool was cylindrical, while the front of it was full of coils. Rings of glaring light were undulating without any rhythm on these coils and gathering towards the triangular tip of the soul tool.

Ye Nongfeng’s nickname was the Destroyer. His abilities weren’t that great, and his one-to-one combat abilities were extremely weak. However, he specialized in creating and using all types of unidirectional offensive soul tools. He was willing to sacriﬁce everything to pursue this extremity. Such a person possessed great strength when used in a team ﬁght, just like the Tang Sect’s Eye of Fear. He also possessed the ability to turn the tables in a ﬁght. He and Qiu Yi were a combination: he was in charge of attacking, while Qiu Yi was in charge of defense. They were initially secret weapons that were brought in as substitutes. However, a few of the Sun Moon team’s main team members had been killed by the Tang Sect, so they now had no choice but to ﬁght. They were now revealing their true abilities for the ﬁrst time!

---

Up on the main stage, the pale-looking Xu Tianran ﬁnally smiled. He looked at Jing Hongchen and heaved a sigh of relief. He said, “Hallmaster Hongchen, you are really good at hiding things! These young people are the future pillars and talents of the empire.”

Jing Hongchen sighed and replied, “My grandson was very stubborn when it came to this tournament. To be honest, he consumed some special medicine to enable himself to cross the Rank 70 barrier and become an advanced-level soul engineer. However, he’ll be affected by that medicine for the next few years. Before he’s twenty-ﬁve, I’m afraid he’ll be unable to make any further improvements.”

Xu Tianran said seriously, “His spirit is commendable. He’s willing to sacriﬁce for the glory of the country. No matter what happens to the Sun Moon team in the end, he’ll be a pillar of our empire in the future.”

Jing Hongchen was relieved after hearing Xu Tianran’s words. He was also very excited right now. As long as his grandson and granddaughter could defeat Shrek's team in this ﬁght, they would make history for the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

--- The four who burst forward with Wang Qiu’er didn’t panic because their opponents demonstrated great strength. The four of them gathered together, and layers of light started to spread rapidly, forming a huge protective net that covered all four of them. This was the Lan sisters’ soul skill, the Hairnet!

The four of them maintained their formation and quickly moved towards Wang Qiu’er. With Ning Tian’s enhancement, the Lan sisters’ Hairnet became very resilient even though they only had four rings. The Hairnet managed to block all the streaks of lights that were ﬁred towards them. However, it was very difﬁcult for them to advance.

Xiao Hongchen didn’t panic at all. Lan Xiu and Meng Hongchen were enough to restrain Wang Qiu’er. Not to mention that Wang Qiu’er was depleted from the earlier ﬁghts, could she resist the suppression of two Class 6 soul engineers even if she was in her peak state? Lan Xiu was also a Class 6 soul engineer! Otherwise, how could he possibly control the Nine Glories, which were Class 6 soul tools?

After Wang Qiu’er was forced back, she didn’t continue to ﬁght her way out anymore. She started to shift positions quickly, and avoided the pursuit of the silver lights in the air. However, the Nine Glories seemed to be alive under Lan Xiu’s control. The nine streaks of silver light intersected in the air. At times, they formed a cage. At other times, they formed a net. Wang Qiu’er was greatly restrained, and couldn’t get close to the Sun Moon team.

Wang Qiu’er still remained very persistent even though she was greatly suppressed. Her gaze was as cold as ever. Her spear kept on ﬂashing, and she occasionally lifted her head to observe the Nine Glories.

She seemed to be waiting for something.

At this point, Meng Hongchen arrived. Her pair of swords carried streaks of sword light that were unleashed towards Wang Qiu’er. In the air, the nine streaks of silver light descended at the same time. Three streaks were aimed towards her right arm, while the other six wove a cage that moved towards her body. They seemed to be trying to pin her to the ground.

As Meng Hongchen arrived, the Vermilion Clear Icetoad’s poison also started to engulf the entire Shrek team. However, a layer of blurry, golden light started to shine from everyone from Shrek's team. The golden glow didn’t appear to offer any form of defense, but it managed to block out the poison.

Shrek's team was prepared, knowing that Meng Hongchen could poison them. Shrek Academy had its own Soul Tool Department too!

Every member of Shrek's team was wearing a type of accessory known as a isolation-type soul tool. It could isolate all types of aura from one’s body. Such soul tools were very effective against lethal poisons and polluted gases. They were specially used to resist the abilities of certain special martial souls.

They could even isolate some special elements. Simply put, it could greatly isolate the ﬁre elements of an opponent’s attack even though the impact of the attack couldn’t be avoided.

Of course, there was a price to pay for using such a soul tool. The depletion from using such a soul tool was equivalent to a Class 5 protective soul barrier. Even if one wasn’t attacked, the depletion would still persist. However, the effect was very useful for Shrek's team right now. They were isolating the poison from the Vermilion Clear Icetoad!

Wang Qiu’er stood straight, without moving, as she faced a crisis. Against Meng Hongchen’s sword lights, there was only a cold look in her eyes.

You are still so arrogant at this point? Meng Hongchen was furious now. Although she had conceded defeat earlier for tactical reasons, she wasn’t convinced by Wang Qiu’er at all. They were both Soul Emperors, and she even possessed the abilities of a Class 6 soul engineer. She didn’t think she was inferior to Wang Qiu’er at all!

At this point, the nine streaks of silver light that were crashing down towards Wang Qiu’er stopped in the air.

Yes, they stopped. Following this, a weird streak of light appeared above Lan Xiu’s head. It was only large as a palm as it drifted above Lan Xiu, but Lan Xiu seemed very lost, and the Nine Glories that he controlled started to dim. They weren’t the only ones with a control-type soul master! Cao Jinxuan’s ﬁrst and fourth soul rings lit up at the same time.

Just as the silver lights stalled in the air, Wang Qiu’er exploited the ﬂaws that had been exposed. She ducked out of the encirclement of the silver lights. Following that, she stabbed her spear ferociously towards her opponent’s chest.

Meng Hongchen’s Class 6 ice swords couldn’t compare to the Golden Dragon Spear in terms of length! Her sword lights had been unleashed towards Wang Qiu’er’s vital areas under the assumption that she wouldn’t be attacked by the Golden Dragon Spear.

Shit, their control-type soul master is up!

Meng Hongchen didn’t dare to delay any further. The chest portion of her armor cracked open, and a barrel the size of a human head popped out. A beam of intense light shot out towards Wang Qiu’er. This was an extremely powerful Class 6 energy-gathering soul cannon.

What about Wang Qiu’er? She didn’t even have any intention to dodge, and followed her spear. She was one with her spear. A sonorous dragon roar reverberated across the entire venue as her third soul ring lit up.

A golden dragon head burst forward from her right hand. It seemed like it wanted to swallow the Golden Dragon Spear.

Boom!

The energy-gathering soul cannon charge was instantly destroyed as it was struck by the spear. The indestructible spear continued to shoot forward, its tip was about to reach the cannon’s mouth.

Meng Hongchen was horriﬁed, and an icy domain shone beneath her feet. This was her third soul skill, Ice Reﬂection. Within the domain of the Ice Reﬂection, she could shift her body as if she were using Instant Teleportation. Her ﬁrst thought right now was to avoid the spear!

As a light ﬂashed, Meng Hongchen shifted three feet to the side. The spear struck nothing, but Wang Qiu’er landed following this. She forcefully stomped her right leg on the ground.

Boom!

When her right foot hit the ground, it felt as if a mature elephant had landed after jumping off a building. Immense soundwaves and quakes affected the clashes in the other areas.

The ground cracked open, and the domain formed by the Ice Reﬂection was immediately crushed. The spear generated a gust of wind as it swept across. It seemed to form a golden wheel as it shot forward.

This was Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁghting style, extremely strong and forceful!

“Meng, come back!” Xiao Hongchen shouted. He had originally thought that Lan Xiu and Meng Hongchen would be sufﬁcient to deal with Wang Qiu’er. At least, he believed they could suppress her, and after he dealt with the rest of them, this team round would more or less be decided.

Xiao Hongchen hadn’t expected Shrek’s control-type soul master to break Lan Xiu’s control instantly, severing his connection with his Nine Glories. This changed the entire situation!

Meng Hongchen also wanted to return, but she had to handle Wang Qiu’er ﬁrst! Since she couldn’t dodge, she could only sweep her swords and activate the abilities of these two Class 6 soul tools.

An intense chill spread out from both swords. Two streaks of icy-blue light intersected as they shot towards Wang Qiu’er. While my swords aren’t as long as your spear, my sword lights are faster than you!

However, Meng Hongchen didn’t understand Wang Qiu’er’s character. How could she let Meng Hongchen escape with such a good opportunity presented to her? The red lights used to deal with Ding Xiaobu earlier appeared again. Wang Qiu’er’s eyes turned blood-red. The golden scales on her body opened up, and her aura changed. The spear continued on its trajectory and seemed to completely ignore the two blades.

You underestimate me too much! Meng Hongchen was furious. She couldn’t dodge at this point. She quickly summoned her soul power. She thought to herself, I’d like to see who’s going to be hurt more!

Pfft pfft..

Bang!

The two light blades landed on Wang Qiu’er’s body ﬁrst. However, Wang Qiu’er didn’t even move. The blades ﬂashed once before dimming after they struck her. Her scales started to tremble violently, and her clothes were also torn in two areas.

After that, Meng Hongchen ﬂew back. A crisp, snapping sound rang out, and her Class 6 swords were broken into four pieces by Wang Qiu’er’s spear. After that, the spear struck Meng Hongchen in the chest.

That banging sound was generated from the spear. Wang Qiu’er’s fourth soul ring also shone at this point.

Fourth soul skill – Golden Dragon Explosion! Sixth soul skill

– Golden Dragon’s Bloodlust!

With the help of these two soul skills, Wang Qiu’er was in her peak condition right now. Why did she choose her Golden Dragon’s Bloodlust? It was a decent soul skill for an ordinary soul master, but it was very average for a true, elite soul master. After all, this soul skill could only be used on one person. To most soul masters, using such a soul skill only increased their physical strength by thirty percent. The effect on their soul power wasn’t too pronounced.

However, it was different for Wang Qiu’er! She possessed Ultimate Strength! How strong would she be if her physical strength increased by another thirty percent? Moreover, she would be in the Bloodlust state of a Golden Dragon. The increase wouldn’t just be thirty percent! In addition, she still had Ning Tian’s Seven Treasures Glazed Pagoda strengthening her. Her strength had reached a frightening level!

None of the Sun Moon team understood Wang Qiu’er, which left Meng Hongchen at a huge disadvantage.

Meng Hongchen spat blood as she ﬂew through the air. She collided with the barrier on the other side of the arena before falling to the ground. Not only were her swords broken, but the protective armor in front of her chest had also cracked. Her arms were hurt, and she was bleeding profusely.

This attack hurt her internal organs. Meng Hongchen was critically injured!

“Younger sister!” Xiao Hongchen shouted. His eyes turned red, and he burst out. All his barrels combined to form a huge cannon that was more than half a meter in diameter before it ﬁred towards the Lan sisters’ Hairnet. At the same time, he rushed towards Meng Hongchen.

At this point, a strange bolt of white lightning appeared silently in front of Xiao Hongchen. The bolt of lightning targeted Wang Qiu’er, who was still in her original position after she took down Meng Hongchen.

This bolt of lightning was too sudden. An intense glow quickly engulfed Wang Qiu’er. It was so quick that she didn’t have time to dodge.

Wang Qiu’er’s body started to shake tremendously, and an astonishing scene appeared. Her powdery-blue hair started to turn pale-white. It lost its glow, and she fell to her knees. She was aging at an alarming speed.

This was…

Apart from Huo Yuhao, the rest of the Tang Sect’s members stood up. He Caitou was the most shocked. This was a soul tool that he and Huo Yuhao had never seen before.

These were aging rays. It was a new soul tool that the Illustrious Virtue Hall had invented. Once one was struck by these aging rays, their life power would quickly be depleted and they would quickly turn old and frail. In a worst case scenario, they might even die. If their life power wasn’t replenished in time, or wasn’t strong enough, they would die from old age.

It was a powerful Class 7 soul tool! It was still in the experimental stage, and could only be used on one subject. The person who researched this soul tool was none other than the one using it right now, Ye Nongfeng. He was known as the Destroyer, one of the most extreme talents among the younger generation of Illustrious Virtue Hall’s disciples. He was only interested in soul tools that could cause annihilation!

Wang Qiu’er’s forehead and right arm started to show wrinkles.

After unleashing this attack, Ye Nongfeng also started to look very pale. He was only a Class 5 soul engineer. He had needed to use a Milk Bottle to activate this soul tool. More than eighty percent of his soul power had already been depleted, but his eyes were ﬁlled with a look of maniacal excitement. Wang Qiu’er was the ﬁrst human subject he had used this soul tool on, and its effects were very obvious. This aging ray was invented and designed by him, and some other strong individuals in the Illustrious Virtue Hall then helped him to complete it. Jing Hongchen had deliberately modiﬁed this soul tool for him to use as a reward for his pioneering spirit.

Indeed, it performed a miracle right now.

“Team leader!” the rest of Shrek’s team exclaimed at this moment. To them, Wang Qiu’er wasn’t just their team leader, she was their spiritual leader. If Wang Qiu’er collapsed, their morale and ﬁghting spirit would be gone.

“Bastard!” The Hairnet was destroyed. Dai Huabin activated his White Tiger’s Devilgod Transformation to resist Xiao Hongchen’s attack. Seeing that Wang Qiu’er had descended to such a state, his eyes turned red. He peered into the sky and roared furiously. He used his right hand to pull Zhu Lu into his embrace.

Instantly, a beam of strong white light shot into the sky. The entire stage turned into a world of black and white. A huge white tiger appeared from the sky, and seemed to traverse through space, instantly arriving in front of Ye Nongfeng, clawing at him!

At this point, Lan Xiu also recovered from Cao Jinxuan’s Time Lock, and quickly activated his Nine Glories. He was about to stop the attack of the Netherworld White Tiger.

However, the Netherworld White Tiger was a martial soul fusion skill. It was a skill that two noble families of the Star Luo Empire had combined to unleash for thousands of years. Their ancestors had even followed the ﬁrst-generation Sea God, Tang San, into the Divine Realm.

The Netherworld White Tiger resisted the nine deﬂection rays. After that, the tiger swept Qiu Yi to one side with its claws. Following that, it shut its claws and furiously attacked Ye Nongfeng until he was completely crushed. It was only when the Nine Glories struck again that the tiger was forced back. Qiu Yi quickly returned in front of Lan Xiu, and his shield shone with silver light, boosting his defense to its maximum level. The attack of the Netherworld White Tiger had been too sudden, and it came when they were at an advantage. Ye Nongfeng’s death was due to his carelessness!

On Shrek’s side, Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu weren’t the only ones who acted. The Lan sisters also demonstrated their full abilities at this point. They held each other’s hands and burst into the sky. In the blink of an eye, they ﬁlled the sky above the stage before descending. They were going straight for Xiao Hongchen, Meng Hongchen, and the Nine Glories. This was their fusion skill, Empyreal Net.

This was the true ability of Shrek’s team. Two martial soul fusion skills were used at the same time, increasing their ﬁghting strength signiﬁcantly. Of course, the price to pay for using these two fusion skills was also very big. After using them, their soul power would drop signiﬁcantly. If not for the fact that Wang Qiu’er was struck by the aging ray, they wouldn’t have used their fusion skills.

At this point, a ﬁgure silently crept up behind Wang Qiu’er and stabbed a transparent Draconic Dagger towards the back of her neck.

Ding Xiaobu, who had disappeared earlier, ﬁnally appeared.

He had used some method to conceal himself temporarily.

“Team leader!” Cao Jinxuan and Ning Tian shouted at the same time. However, they had discovered it too late. At this point, the dagger was already stabbing towards Wang Qiu’er’s neck. As he looked at the pale, long hair in front of him, Ding Xiaobu’s eyes were ﬁlled with excitement. If he could kill Wang Qiu’er, there would be a great reward for him!

Where was Zheng Zhan? When the Netherworld White Tiger appeared, he was already lagging. The situation was too complex. Wang Qiu’er and the Hongchen siblings had taken most of his attention.

He hadn’t expected a martial soul fusion skill to appear in front of Ye Nongfeng, who had lost most of his ﬁghting strength. When he rushed over, it was already too late. Ding Xiaobu was also exploiting this distraction and attempting to kill Wang Qiu’er!

Wang Qiu’er was on the verge of death. However, something strange happened. A white, icy ﬂower started to bloom behind the back of her neck.

As a ding sounded, Ding Xiaobu’s blade was deﬂected away by the ﬂower.

Following this, a miraculous scene occurred. That icy ﬂower rippled with rings of golden light. A weird light distorted the air. The entire stage was dyed golden, with Wang Qiu’er’s body the center of it. After this, a huge, golden vertical eye drifted up in mid-air, and gusts of air dragged Wang Qiu’er’s body upward.

Every gust of air left a dazzling radiance around Wang Qiu’er. Wherever they passed, pieces of armor would appear on her body.

First, her chest was covered with armor. On this section of the armor, there were bright, ﬂowery patterns. The icy ﬂower kept on extending around her. What was weirder was that a vertical eye also appeared on Wang Qiu’er’s forehead. The eye was shining with golden light. On closer inspection, the light from the eye seemed to actually belong to…

The golden armor quickly engulfed Wang Qiu’er’s entire body, her aura soaring. Sonorous dragon roars were ringing out continuously. Her pale-white hair started to regain its glow and powdery-blue color from the roots. An illusory, golden dragon-shaped projection started to revolve around her body. The armor behind her back was carved with the image of the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion. However, her long hair covered half the image. Despite this, the scorpion tail that extended all the way to her hip region could be seen clearly.

Wang Qiu’er slowly stood up straight, like a newly born war goddess. She pointed her spear forward, and the golden vertical eye in the air suddenly turned into a streak of golden light before it descended. Under the illumination of the golden light, Wang Qiu’er’s entire body became thirty percent larger, and the golden dragon that surrounded her also seemed to turn real.

What was going on? After he witnessed the changes to Wang Qiu’er’s body, Xiao Hongchen revealed a grim look in his eyes.

Did she mutate? Is she from the Body Sect, and this is the second awakening of her Body Soul? How is this possible? Her martial soul is already so strong. If this is its second Awakening, it completely violates the laws of nature!

“Ding Xiaobu, out.” Just as Xiao Hongchen was in a daze, Zheng Zhan had already used his Divine Unbreakable Shield to block the golden light that had almost pierced Ding Xiaobu’s chest. This time, he was forced several meters back due to the impact, and knocked into Ding Xiaobu.

Wang Qiu’er, who was completely covered in armor, revealed a strange look in her eyes. She had mushroomed in size. She was like a valkyrie that had descended upon the battleﬁeld.

Just one gaze caused Zheng Zhan to shudder. This aura…

Nine streaks of silver light descended from the sky. The Netherworld White Tiger was deﬂected away again. It was a fusion skill that could be used continuously in a ﬁght, which was very rare. However, its ﬁghting strength would weaken as time passed if the users’ cultivations weren’t strong enough. After its initial outburst, the Netherworld White Tiger was restrained by Qiu Yi’s Class 7 shield and Lan Xiu’s Nine Glories.

On the other side, the Hongchen siblings, who were trapped in the Empyreal Net, also demonstrated their strongest abilities.

“Gua!...” Meng Hongchen let out a weird sound. Following this, she grew a size larger. She seemed to be lifting the sky with her hands before her sixth soul ring lit up. She was going to use her sixth soul skill, which she had never used before.

She sucked in her gut and grit her teeth. She appeared ferocious now, even though she was bleeding profusely from her nose and mouth.

Her back arched, and a bulge quickly rose. Layer upon layer of icy-blue light started to rise continuously form her, and a terrifying aura was soaring. Xiao Hongchen was much stronger than his sister. A streak of dark-gold light shone from his body. He fell forward and also let out the same sound as his sister before turning into a Three- Legged Golden Toad.

However, he only maintained the Three-Legged Golden Toad form for a moment before another transformation occurred. He changed into a golden powder that quickly disintegrated before gathering together again. In the blink of an eye, he had turned into a huge soul fort with countless barrels. Countless streaks of light shot out and resisted the Empyreal Net. There were even a huge number of soul rays that were aimed towards Wang Qiu’er and the rest of Shrek’s team. Ning Tian and Cao Jinxuan were the focus of the greatest ﬁrepower. This showed that Xiao Hongchen could tell that the two of them were very important in enhancing Wang Qiu’er’s strength.

Cao Jinxuan and Ning Tian didn’t panic at all. Ning Tian stepped onto her shuttle before landing in front of Cao Jinxuan. Although her shuttle couldn’t ﬂy very high and could only remain three meters above the ground at most, it was still very quick. Following this, a layer of golden light lit up on her body. Invincible Barrier! Xiao Hongchen was a seven-ringed Soul Sage and a Class 7 soul engineer. The strength of the soul tools that he unleashed was extremely high. However, he couldn’t overcome an Invincible Barrier used by a ﬁve-ringed Soul King! The appearance of soul tools gave many auxiliary-type soul engineers the ability to defend themselves on a battleﬁeld, it wasn’t something only realized in the Sun Moon Empire!

The Seven Treasures Glazed Sect had been very invested in soul tools over the past few years. Their aim was to mitigate the defensive weaknesses of their direct disciples.

With the defense of the Invincible Barrier, Xiao Hongchen couldn’t kill Ning Tian and Cao Jinxuan without using his full strength.

Compared to the two of them, the Lan sisters weren’t doing too well. The two of them had used quite a lot of strength to unleash the Empyreal Net. However, there was a limit to how much their strength would increase even if they were using a fusion skill. Their control of the Empyreal Net could match up to a Soul Emperor, but they were facing a Soul Sage! Their Empyreal Net was quickly dispelled by the soul rays. The Lan sisters looked very pale. In such an intense ﬁght, their inferior cultivations were still limiting factors. No matter what, there was still a gap between the overall abilities of Shrek’s team and the Sun Moon team.

A similar situation occurred for the Netherworld White Tiger. The illusory light from the tiger’s body started to dim. Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu’s fusion skill couldn’t last any longer.

While it seemed like Shrek had gained an advantage earlier, this advantage was now slowly being eroded by the Sun Moon team.

Wang Qiu’er moved at this point. She lunged forward with her left leg and her spear in front of Xiao Hongchen. She was very quick. It was very different from earlier when she had used her strength to enhance her abilities.

Her spear thrust out, and the soul rays that were targeted towards her were destroyed. Her target was the Steel Fortress that Xiao Hongchen had formed! At this point, Meng Hongchen erupted after she completed her preparations. She bent forward and grabbed hold of her ankles. The bulge on her back burst open, and streaks of white, ﬂuid light shot out towards Wang Qiu’er.

Even though there were only slightly more than ten streaks of these lights, an indescribable, nausea-inducing feeling surfaced when they appeared behind her. Even Xiao Hongchen quickly backed off and increased his distance from his sister.

This was the Vermilion Clear Icetoad’s sixth soul skill, Corrosive Ice. She condensed her poison into a ﬂuid before combining it with her soul power. Not only was its impact force great, the intensity of the poison was also extreme. This was Meng Hongchen’s most lethal soul skill. She had tested it once before; one drop of her Corrosive Ice was sufﬁcient to kill a Diamond Mammoth, an extremely large soul beast.

As for humans, even a Soul Douluo wouldn’t be able to handle the poison. Five and six-ringed soul masters’ Invincible Barriers would also be completely corroded upon contact with her poison. More frighteningly, her Corrosive Ice could lock onto its target, and would pursue it. There was no way to avoid it, and it could pursue its target for up to a minute. The streaks of ﬂuid that contained massive amounts of poison were targeted towards Wang Qiu’er. Meng Hongchen was critically hurt by her earlier, and hated her immensely. She had used all her strength in this attack. Right now, her face was also very pale. The strength of her Corrosive Ice meant that she had used up almost all of her soul power. Its strength was equivalent to three six-ringed soul skills used by an ordinary soul master!

Wang Qiu’er seemed to sense something, and stopped. When the poisonous ﬂuid was about to touch her, it suddenly stopped in mid-air, as if it had been frozen. It was converted into ice crystals, and the stench of the poison also disappeared.

Meng Hongchen’s life power seemed to have been sucked dry. Her entire face turned pale-white, and she took two steps back. She lost control of her voice as she said, “Impossible, impossible! How can my Corrosive Ice be frozen?!”

She wasn’t the only one who was surprised. Xiao Hongchen, who was clearly aware of his sister’s abilities, was also astonished. He was in his Martial Soul True Body right now. When he realized things were amiss, he changed form once again. The greatest strength of his Golden Toad True Body was that it could quickly turn into a soul tool of any form. It was different from using soul skills. When he entered such a state, the soul tools that he agglomerated were no longer restricted by size, only by his own cultivation. It also meant that any soul tool that he formed now was at least Class 7!

Chapter 307: The Last Clash

As a dark-golden light ﬂashed, Xiao Hongchen changed into a single heavy cannon. The body of the cannon was extremely thick, and the barrel was more than a meter in diameter. Intense golden light shot out towards Wang Qiu’er, who wasn’t very far away.

The poisonous crystals were crushed and scattered in the air, but the golden light was about to reach her.

Wang Qiu’er didn’t dodge. Patches of ice ﬂowers condensed in front of her body, which quickly formed a layer of diamond ice crystals. Golden sparks quickly rose from her body. Roaring mightily, the golden dragon around her body instantly grew in size and blocked Xiao Hongchen’s attack.

As she focused her gaze on him, Wang Qiu’er thrust her spear out again. Golden light ﬂashed, and the cannon was crushed. However, the golden light was like a ﬂuid, ﬂowing away to regroup and form another heavy cannon. That cannon was ﬁred at Wang Qiu’er once again. At this point, nine streaks of silver light descended and engulfed Wang Qiu’er at the same time. The Nine Glories had unleashed their strength once again.

The Netherworld White Tiger had already ended. Both Dai Huabin and Zhu Lu were attacking frantically as they panted in exhaustion. However, their attacks were resisted by Qiu Yi’s shield. Lan Xiu had exploited this opportunity to help Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen.

Nine streaks of silver light crashed down. Wang Qiu’er lifted her head to look at the sky. It was only at this point that the look in her eyes became clear again.

A sonorous dragon roar sounded. She trembled, and a frightening force was released from her body. The dragon surrounding her quickly expanded and destroyed the rays that were targeting her. After that, she bent her upper body back and unleashed her spear, hurling it upwards before she straightened her waist and charged towards Xiao Hongchen.

Her Golden Dragon Spear ﬂew out ﬁve meters and changed into nine streaks of golden light. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!

Nine booms sounded at the same time. The Nine Glories instantly turned into broken scrap. Their rays weren’t able to stop the attack from the Golden Dragon Spear!

Lan Xiu collapsed to the ground after his soul tools were destroyed. He had used all his spiritual power on these nine soul tools, so his spiritual power was critically damaged at this point.

Xiao Hongchen’s cannon paused for a moment as Cao Jinxuan started to bleed from his eyes and nose. His Time- Elapsing Clock had made an opening for Wang Qiu’er again!

Boom!

Wang Qiu’er collided hard with the huge cannon. Xiao Hongchen wasn’t ﬂung back from this collision. When the dark-golden lights dissolved, he was in his normal form and ﬂipped upwards. It seemed like he was trying to trap Wang Qiu’er.

Not far away, the pale Meng Hongchen leapt towards him.

She was a streak of white light that collided with her brother.

It was their martial soul fusion skill, Hongchen’s Yearning!

Wang Qiu’er was restrained by the golden lights that had risen again. However, she released a chill from her body and prevented the golden lights from taking proper form again.

When Meng Hongchen arrived, both siblings let out an intense golden glow. Their terrifying auras changed into a colorful rising whirlpool. The Hongchen siblings and Wang Qui’er were all in the center of the whirlpool!

Everyone was stunned by this scene. This was a life-and- death battle! There was no other way of resolving this ﬁght!

If Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were able to defeat Wang Qiu’er, they wouldn’t have a problem defeating the rest of Shrek’s team. If the opposite happened, the Sun Moon team wouldn’t be able to resist Shrek’s team any further, either. Everyone subconsciously stopped. All of their gazes were ﬁxed on the whirlpool, which was a mix of gold, red, blue, white, and many other colors. Within the terrifying whirlpool, there was a violent undulation of soul power. Even Zheng Zhan felt a little afraid as he looked at the whirlpool.

“Why did you help me?” Stuck in the whirlpool, Wang Qiu’er’s called out in her mind.

A gentle voice replied, “I wasn’t just helping you; I was helping Shrek, too. Shrek’s glory doesn’t just belong to all of you.”

“Yuhao!”

“What?”

“Nothing…”

The whirlpool continued to grow in size. From an initial diameter of three meters, it quickly expanded to ten meters, and was even expanding at an increasing rate. When it reached close to thirty meters in diameter, everyone had to retreat frantically so that they wouldn’t be affected by it.

What was going on? Who were the victors and losers? Even though many people reckoned that the Hongchen Siblings wouldn’t lose given their combined seven-ringed and six- ringed abilities, Wang Qiu’er still showed how dominant she was! However, no one knew that Wang Qiu’er was using her martial soul fusion skill right now. It was a fusion skill between her and a certain someone.

It was the Dragon Roar of Destiny!

In the center of the whirlpool, a golden vertical eye slowly appeared. It was ﬁlled with depth and majesty, and could even see past the mysteries of destiny.

Countless streaks of golden light were released from that golden vertical eye. The entire whirlpool stopped, and then started to decrease in size at an alarming rate.

In mid-air, a slender ﬁgure formed from the golden vertical eye. The golden lights returned to Wang Qiu’er’s hand as her spear. Right now, her veil was already crushed. Her ravishing looks were visible in front of everyone at this moment.

“This is…”

It was such a familiar appearence! Commotion immediately ensued. Why? Why is she onstage? Isn’t she the lady formed from Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’s martial soul fusion skill?

Her ravishing looks were too memorable. Right now, everyone was shocked.

On the main stage, Jing Hongchen had already lost his cool, and shouted, “Stop the ﬁght!” However, it was a pity that his voice couldn’t pass through the barriers.

Wang Qiu’er changed into a streak of golden-white ﬂowing light before she dashed down. She turned into a huge golden dragon covered in icy armor as she moved.

This was Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁfth soul skill in her Dragon Roar of Destiny state, Golden Dragon’s Roar!

Bang!

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!...

The entire stage was boiling as if it had been struck by a Class 9 stationary soul cannon shell. A frightening explosive force was being unleashed, with the whirlpool at the center of the explosion.

The rest of the members from both teams were instantly ﬂung into the air by the horrifying impact of the explosion, smashing into the barriers at the sides. The center of the stage even caved in a few meters.

Zheng Zhan protected his body using his Divine Unbreakable Shield. He stared at the the core of the explosion. Even he couldn’t intervene in such a confrontation. Any movement of his could potentially affect the result of the ﬁght!

Young people nowadays are too strong! The explosion that had just occurred was probably at a Soul Douluo’s level of power. However, they were only two Soul Emperors and a Soul Sage!

Debris fell from the sky. The shockwaves from the explosion lasted for more than ten seconds before they faded away.

The soul engineers who maintained the defensive formation around the stage experienced more than a one-third dip in their combined soul power, but they managed to keep the barriers from being damaged. After all, the explosion was proportionally distributed around the entire stage. If the explosion had been targeted at one point, these barriers might not have been able to resist it.

The entire stage seemed to have been hammered by a titan. There was a huge depression forty meters in diameter and ﬁve meters in depth at the center of the stage now!

Everyone’s attention was ﬁrst captured by a golden ﬁgure. Wang Qiu’er was standing proudly at the center of the stage in the depression. Right now, her armor had already disappeared, and she had returned to her original size. However, she still looked as beautiful as the Goddess of Light! A stream of blood ﬂowed down the edge of her lips. However, this didn’t affect how ravishing she appeared. Right now, she had left a deep and memorable impression in many people’s minds as she stood there like a valkyrie.

Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were separated to either side of her. Meng Hongchen was down on one knee, and spitting out blood. She seemed completely out of energy now.

Xiao Hongchen’s condition was even worse than hers. He was back in human form. He looked as if he had been knocked down, as there were many wounds on his body, and his limbs were twisted around. It was difﬁcult to tell if he was alive or dead.

Wang Qiu’er slowly turned around and looked at Lan Xiu and Qiu Yi before coldly asking, “Are we still going to continue this team round?”

Zheng Zhan had no choice but to intervene. He could tell that the Hongchen siblings weren’t in good shape. If he didn’t announce the end of the ﬁght, their lives might be in danger. “The team round goes to Shrek…”

“Wait a minute!” A furious voice sounded. The barriers around the stage were removed, and Jing Hongchen burst onto the stage. He arrived beside Xiao Hongchen in the blink of an eye and quickly gave him a pill. After that, he stood up and shouted, “There’s something wrong with this ﬁght! We need to investigate thoroughly. Do not announce the outcome yet!”

After he ﬁnished speaking, a commotion ensued. While they had lost the team round, everyone had to admit that it was an exciting ﬁght, and extremely intense. But Jing Hongchen’s sudden appearance stalled the announcement of the result of this ﬁght, and left everyone with an ominous feeling.

“Is the Sun Moon Empire trying to be a sore loser?” a cold voice sounded. Following this, a streak of light descended from the sky and landed beside Wang Qiu’er.

It wasn’t an outsider; it was the eldest senior sister of Shrek Academy’s inner courtyard, Zhang Lexuan.

Jing Hongchen looked at the tragic state his grandson was in, and was completely heartbroken! It took only a simple inspection to ascertain that Xiao Hongchen’s internal organs were critically hurt, and his limbs were completely fractured. It was unknown whether he could even survive, much less recover!

“I said there’s something wrong with this ﬁght. We need an investigation!” Jing Hongchen bellowed, his eyes completely red.

Zhang Lexuan replied coldly, “Alright, point out the problem if you think there is one. Even though this is the Sun Moon Empire and we’re from Shrek, I believe the Sun Moon Empire’s citizens can see for themselves. What right do you have to doubt our students? Tell me. If you can point out any evidence to prove that we used unfair methods, we’ll concede defeat.”

---

Just as they were bickering on the stage, Huo Yuhao’s body shuddered slightly. However, he soon regained normalcy. It was just that his expression was a little pale. He coughed gently and used his hand to cover his mouth. He rubbed away a tinge of blood at the edge of his lips.

“You’re back?” Wang Dong’er whispered into his ear.

Huo Yuhao looked over at her and smiled. “I knew I wouldn’t be able to hide it from you.”

“You must tell me what happened when we return. What was with Qiu’er’s armor?” Wang Dong’er asked softly.

“This… I still have a tournament tonight,” Huo Yuhao reminded her.

Wang Dong’er snorted and didn’t continue speaking. However, she grabbed his right hand and transferred some of her soul power to him.

---

Zhang Lexuan wasn’t going to give in. Jing Hongchen wanted to end the ﬁght and treat his grandson’s injuries, but that had to wait now.

“Alright. Let’s clear things up. Wang Qiu’er, tell me, what’s your background? Why do you look so much like the martial soul fusion skill exhibited by Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong? We need an explanation.”

Wang Qiu’er laughed scornfully. “Is there a problem just because I look like her?”

Jing Hongchen coldly replied, “You look identical to a martial soul fusion skill!” Another voice sounded at this point. “Hallmaster Hongchen, you don’t have to ﬁnd a reason. Qiu’er is only identical to me because we are sisters.”

As this voice sounded, a ﬁgure jumped onto the stage and came up beside Wang Qiu’er.

Jing Hongchen was in a daze. He realized at this point that Wang Dong and Wang Qiu’er looked very similar.

“Sisters?” Jing Hongchen muttered. Following this, he was shocked when Wang Dong’er removed the hairband that held her hair together. Her powdery-blue hair ﬂowed down, and she gently rubbed off the camouﬂage on her face and neck, revealing her true appearance.

Suddenly, an identical pair of faces appeared in front of everyone’s eyes.

Such a ravishing look actually belonged to two people. Wang Dong and Wang Qiu’er. They… Meng Hongchen shivered when she saw this. She wanted to say something, but she couldn’t. Her eyes rolled upwards before she collapsed to the ground.

Wang Dong’er said loudly, “My name is Wang Dong’er, and this is my elder sister, Wang Qiu’er. The Raiment of Light that Yuhao and I exhibit is mainly controlled by me. Is there a problem because it looks like me? Are our identical looks a reason to decide the outcome of the ﬁght? Hallmaster Hongchen, your grandson and granddaughter lost the ﬁght. You are representing the Sun Moon Empire if you are trying to be a sore loser.”

“The, the two of you…” Jing Hongchen hadn’t expected such a situation. Wang Dong was actually a woman. He still recalled that his own granddaughter seemed to…

“Hallmaster, quickly treat your grandson. He’s critically injured.” Zheng Zhan was already beside Jing Hongchen at this point, and whispered in his ear. At this point, Zheng Zhan also seemed very grim. As the referee, he had been humiliated because Jing Hongchen stopped him from announcing the result of the ﬁght! However, Jing Hongchen’s grandchildren were already in such a state. This ﬁght was very important to the Illustrious Virtue Hall, and he understood this clearly!

Jing Hongchen shot a vicious glare at Wang Dong’er and Wang Qiu’er before he snorted in anger. He raised his hand and wielded a beam of red light, dragging his grandchildren’s bodies to him before ﬂying off.

Zhang Lexuan immediately turned his attention to Zheng Zhan and said, “Referee, I think it’s time to announce the result.”

Zheng Zhan nodded. After taking a deep look at them, he announced, “The round is over! Shrek Academy wins the team round!”

“We’ve, we’ve won…” Ning Tian muttered to herself.

Dai Huabin hugged Zhu Lu and was ﬁlled with excitement and wild joy. The Lan sisters hugged each other and started weeping.

Cao Jinxuan looked around him and realized there was no one to celebrate with. At this point, Zhou Sichen rushed up to the stage and picked him up.

“We’ve won! We’ve defeated Sun Moon! We’ve defended Shrek’s glory!”

---

In the resting area, everyone from the Tang Sect apart from Huo Yuhao stood up, clenching their ﬁsts tightly. At this point, they felt as if they had returned to ﬁve years ago when they defeated the Sun Moon team in the last tournament. Yes, Shrek had won! Shrek’s glory had been defended once again!

It is indeed unfair. Huo Yuhao thought to himself as he sat in his wheelchair. So what? So what if it’s unfair, if I’m doing this for Shrek’s glory? Is it fair that the Sun Moon team is using soul tools specially created for them by the Illustrious Virtue Hall? In this world, there’s no absolute fairness.

“Cough cough!” Huo Yuhao covered his mouth with his hand and wiped away another patch of blood. He was even more hurt than Wang Qiu’er during the ﬁnal clash. After all, he had helped her block many attacks. Rather than saying Shrek had won, it was more accurate to say that both parties had suffered greatly. If not for the fact that Meng Hongchen’s soul power had been depleted earlier, and she was also injured, the last confrontation between both parties might have even been even worse.

Huo Yuhao had changed into a suit of armor and relied on Wang Qiu’er to control their fusion skill. Furthermore, he had used his Imitation so there was no way anyone could ﬁnd out.

---

On the stage, Wang Qiu’er gently collapsed onto Zhang Lexuan. However, she revealed a rare smile on her face. She turned her gaze to Huo Yuhao. She didn’t say anything, but she revealed the slightest tinge of gentleness in her weakened state.

Zhang Lexuan smiled at Wang Dong’er, saying, “Dong’er, thanks.”

Wang Dong’er shook her head and replied, “We are all from Shrek Academy. Eldest senior sister, you don’t have to stand on ceremony! Furthermore, I think everyone will believe me if I claim to be Qiu’er’s sister. Qiu’er, are you willing to be my elder sister?”

Wang Qiu’er was stunned for a moment. A weird look ﬂashed across her eyes. “Elder sister?”

Wang Dong’er realized that she had misunderstood her, and rushed to correct her words. “It’s ﬁne in that way, but not ﬁne in that other way.”

Wang Qiu’er was in a momentary daze, and she revealed a bitter look on her face. “I know. I’d like to rest for a while. Eldest senior sister, let’s return.”

“Okay.” Zhang Lexuan sent Wang Dong’er a deep gaze before helping Wang Qiu’er off the stage.

---

This exciting ﬁght was ﬁnally over. Shrek had defeated the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. At this point, they had won six matches along with the Tang Sect. They were going to qualify! Their last match with the Tang Sect was going to determine their placing in the group. Wang Qiu’er was spent today. Although it wasn’t obvious, it was clearly evident that she was gravely hurt from how weak she was. Fortunately, Shrek didn’t lose any members. What kind of sparks would be created in their clash with the Tang Sect?

After the Sun Moon team’s loss, the spectators were feeling down. However, they were most embarrassed by Jing Hongchen’s intervention. Their hatred for Shrek had diminished a little. Of course, it also had to do with Wang Qiu’er and Wang Dong’er. They were both too beautiful! If they were from the Sun Moon Empire, they would have been goddesses in everyone’s eyes.

---

Up on the main stage, Prince Regent Xu Tianran’s expression was changing unpredictably. However, this didn’t continue for too long. After a while, he put a smile on his face and said, “Tell the imperial physician to make a trip to the Illustrious Virtue Hall to treat the Hongchen siblings. He must heal them at all costs.” “Your Highness, you are very generous,” Ju Zi complimented him.

Xu Tianran smiled at her and said, “Let’s go, let’s return. Imperial Tutor, I’ll need to rely on you for the remaining rounds of the tournament.”

“Okay.” The Imperial Tutor grunted, but Xu Tianran didn’t seem to be bothered. Ju Zi stood up and pushed his wheelchair as he left.

“Your Highness, do we need to pacify the citizens? I’m afraid today’s defeat…” Ju Zi said softly as she pushed him along.

Xu Tianran replied, “What’s there to pacify, since their skills aren’t up to par? Let it die down. The tournament hasn’t ended yet, so I don’t think their attention will dwell too much on this matter. Send someone to investigate Wang Qiu’er’s background. I still think there’s something wrong. She seems a little too strong. Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen’s martial soul fusion skill can even trouble an eight-ringed Soul Douluo, but Wang Qiu’er is only a six-ringed Soul Emperor. How was she able to win so easily? She was even depleted in the earlier ﬁghts. Something must be wrong. Humiliation! It’s a humiliation! If not for the fact that Jing Hongchen is still useful… hmph!”

A cold light ﬂashed across Xu Tianran’s eyes. He shut his eyes and didn’t speak further. Ju Zi felt a chill run down her spine. He wasn’t being generous! It was only because Jing Hongchen and his Illustrious Virtue Hall were still useful, and thus Xu Tianran wasn’t willing to offend him, so he tolerated the defeat. Xu Tianran was too scary…

------

The Ming Yue Hotel...

Wang Dong’er retracted her left hand and asked curiously, “Tell me, what happened?”

Huo Yuhao knew that he couldn’t hide things any further, and revealed how he was able to form a martial soul fusion skill with Wang Qiu’er. He also recounted how he was able to unleash the Dragon Roar of Destiny. After hearing his recounting of events, Wang Dong’er was in a daze. It was too much of a coincidence. Not only did Wang Qiu’er look identical to her, but she could also form a fusion skill with Huo Yuhao.

“Hmph!” Wang Dong’er snorted furiously and jumped off from the bed.

“Dong’er, I was in the wrong,” Huo Yuhao said submissively.

An amused look ﬂashed across Wang Dong’er’s eyes, but she placed her hands on her hips before furiously saying, “Do you know why you were in the wrong?”

Huo Yuhao was clever. “I know. I shouldn’t have kept the truth from you. I was only afraid that you’d misunderstand, that’s why I didn’t tell you anything. However, my Dong’er is such a magnanimous person. Why would she be bothered about something as trivial as this? I’m the coward who made you angry. I’m in the wrong. I understand my mistake now. Dong’er, forgive me. Don’t worry, my heart is only for you. Honestly speaking, I also felt very weird when I found out I could form a martial soul fusion skill with her. I was even more curious about her background. However, I’m still unable to see anything. I can only feel that she doesn’t have any ill intentions.”

Wang Dong’er laughed coldly. “Of course she doesn’t have any ill intentions. She only has love for you.”

He promptly broke out coughing at her words.

Wang Dong’er thought for a moment before saying, “To prevent you from ‘committing an offense’, I’ll forbid you from interacting with Wang Qiu’er alone. If there’s anything you want to talk to her about, I must be by your side. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” Huo Yuhao quickly agreed with a sincere look on his face.

Wang Dong’er returned to the bed and sat beside him. “Yuhao, you must know that I’m not jealous. It’s just that your body isn’t in good shape, but you are still working so hard. It’s better to be involved in fewer matters. Am I right?” “Yes, you’re right. You’re right.” He could only agree with her now.

Wang Dong’er sighed and said, “Seeing that you’ve been performing well recently, I wanted to accompany you to sleep tonight. However, I’m hurt because you’ve been lying to me for so long. Your punishment will be that you’ll continue to sleep alone on the bed. I’ll sleep on the sofa.”

“……”

“Alright, go and cultivate. You still need to compete in the round of six in the soul engineering tournament tonight. I’m afraid your opponent will be difﬁcult to deal with. How’s your injury?” Wang Dong’er stopped joking and asked worriedly.

Huo Yuhao replied, “Don’t worry, my body is different from a normal person’s. With the immense life power of the Life Gold, this injury is nothing. I’ll be able to recover by tonight. Protect me. I’ll start cultivating now.”

Although Shrek Academy had won the match today, Huo Yuhao seemed to feel more inhibited. He felt that the tournament was getting more and more complex. However, there weren’t any clues on the surface.

The Starlight Sapphire ring on his right hand shone, and a porcelain jug appeared in his hand. It contained the distillate that he had bought from the bar the other day.

Wang Dong’er retreated to a sofa at the side, watching him.

After he opened the jug, a strong alcoholic smell drifted out. The distillate was very strong, and had not been blended yet. An ordinary person would be drunk after two sips of it.

A dim icy fog spread out from Huo Yuhao’s body. He placed the jug to one side and quickly stripped, revealing his muscles. The surface of his skin was already covered with icy fog. The image of the Ice Jade Empress Scorpion surfaced behind his back. It was a sign that he had unleashed his second martial soul.

He grabbed the jug again and quickly swallowed the distillate as if he were a whale. Every time he stopped to breathe, his skin would shine with a dim red glow. It was a stark contrast to the icy fog around him.

He quickly circulated his soul power, and a dim golden glow appeared. His immense spiritual power enabled him to accurately circulate his soul power, and under that precise control, his soul power started to initiate the catalytic effects of the distillate. He circulated his soul power according to the method of the Mysterious Heaven Technique.

A streak of azure light ﬂashed past his brow. A small yet shiny and transparent azure-green carving blade ﬂew out. It surrounded Huo Yuhao’s body and drifted above his head after making a circuit around him. A green aura descended and fused with Huo Yuhao’s body. It was the Life Guardian’s Blade!

With the strong life power of the blade and the catalytic effects of the distillate, Huo Yuhao started to fuse with the origin energy of Ultimate Ice at a much faster rate. Although he wasn’t able to move, his soul power was increasing at a faster rate than before. In addition, the speed at which he absorbed the origin energy increased as his soul power grew. His conﬁdence in his cultivation also grew as a result. Wang Dong’er seemed to be immersed in her thoughts as she looked at Huo Yuhao. She revealed a slight smile on her face. He’s really getting stronger and stronger. Ah, Wang Qiu’er, you are really a huge headache! She’s also so nice to him. I must watch this fool properly…

------

Night fell, and four ﬁgures appeared in a dark corner as usual.

He Caitou lowered his voice and asked, “Yuhao, our opponents tonight won’t be easy to deal with. Must we win or…?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “Second senior, you are Tang Si and I’m Tang Wu now. You should call me second brother. We can’t make any mistakes now. We must win tonight! Use some of your true abilities. The rare metals that we can potentially win tonight can’t be bought with money, and the Tang Sect needs them. After we reach the round of three, we can compete against the other two underground organizations. It’s a pity that we can’t bet with rare metals or it would be even better. Let’s make a huge wager tonight, and win more money ﬁrst.”

Huo Yuhao had already amassed more than twenty million gold soul coins after winning his previous rounds. The amount of money he had was enough to equip an army of ten thousand soldiers. However, twenty million gold soul coins was nothing in the world of soul engineers. Soul engineering was a profession that burned a lot of money. Creating a successful soul tool was very lucrative, but how many soul engineers had a close to hundred percent success rate like Huo Yuhao? That was why some strong soul engineers often created soul tools of lower classes to exchange for money to sustain their daily expenses. It was also why soul engineering sects were very cautious when they accepted disciples, and why the Illustrious Virtue Hall was so respected. Without the support of an empire, there wasn’t any way soul engineers who engaged in

elite and advanced research could survive!

---

At the familiar Green Hotel, Chen An was waiting at the entrance since he was no longer a judge. As Huo Yuhao and He Caitou advanced further and further in the tournament, his attitude was becoming ever more respectful. “Young Tang masters, quick. Let’s enter.” Chen An immediately went up to receive Huo Yuhao as soon as he saw him, a fawning look on his face.

Huo Yuhao passed all his gold soul coins to him and said, “Divide it into two and stake each half on my brother and me.”

“Second master, we’ve not started the lot drawing. You…” Chen An roughly knew how many gold soul coins Huo Yuhao had. He was a little hesitant, as it would be quite a huge bet. Even the most distinguished guests in the Golden Hall didn’t bet so much. Furthermore, he didn’t even know his opponent yet, and the last six competitors left were all very strong.

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “No worries. If I didn’t even have this little conﬁdence, I wouldn’t be here at all. You can use it to bet. I’m conﬁdent.”

“Yes!” Chen An acknowledged his words respectfully.

“We don’t have to rush to enter. How’s the matter I asked you to settle?” Huo Yuhao asked. Chen An appeared to be in a spot and said, “It’s indeed a little difﬁcult to buy rare metals now. Although we have some channels to purchase rare metals, you must know that the three underground organizations are organizing their own tournament. Rare metals are being used in great amounts in these tournaments, and a huge batch of them is being used as rewards for the participating soul engineers. The control on rare metals has become very strict, so…”

Huo Yuhao snorted coldly. “That’s is your problem. Don’t bother explaining it to me. I only want to see the results. If you do this well, I’ll promote you from Class 5 to Class 6, and from ﬁve rings to six rings.”

“What?” Chen An was stunned after hearing his words. He seemed a little doubtful.

“Why? Don’t you believe me?” Huo Yuhao glanced at him coldly.

“I believe, I believe!” Chen An hurriedly nodded. Huo Yuhao said, “Although I’m a domineering person, I’m never stingy towards those who help me. Give me your hand. I’ll let you feel it for a while.”

Chen An was dazed for a moment, and extended his right hand.

Huo Yuhao used three ﬁngers to feel his pulse. Suddenly, Chen An felt a wave of pure soul power transferring into his body from Huo Yuhao’s ﬁngertip. This wave of soul power wasn’t very strong, but it was extremely pure. There didn’t even seem to be any elements present, but it contained vibrant life power.

Suddenly, Chen An felt the pores on his body opening up. His blood was surging, and he instantly felt much younger. He was even more astonished to realize that his soul power was undulating rapidly after the pure soul power entered his body. He could feel his own soul power being enhanced, it was too obvious. In addition, he didn’t sense any evil aura from it!

Chapter 308: The Soul Engineering Tournament's Round-Of-Six

However, this wonderful feeling only lasted for three seconds before it disappeared after Huo Yuhao released his hand.

“This, this… Master Tang, how is it possible?” Chen An felt as if everything he had known was a lie. He hadn’t expected that a soul master could help increase the cultivation of a soul engineer. He quickly inspected his body and sensed the changes in his soul power. As he did, he discovered that the enhancement was real. His soul power didn’t stop increasing even after Huo Yuhao’s ﬁnger stopped contacting his hand. It was real!

Chen An was only a soul engineer, and his martial soul wasn’t very outstanding. His cultivation was able to reach Class 5 because he had consumed all sorts of medicine and used soul tools to forcefully stimulate his progress. He had thought that he would remain in this class for the rest of his life. His cultivation hadn’t increased in the last seven years!

But right now, his soul power had ﬁnally experienced an increase after years of dormancy. Furthermore, he was also felt that the impurities in his soul power were being cleansed by the introduction of Huo Yuhao’s soul power. Although the immense life power only surged in his body for a moment before disappearing, it still generated a lot of beneﬁts for him. The feeling of being ﬁlled with energy, rushing blood, and youth was too wonderful. At this point, Chen An was looking at Huo Yuhao with a burning passion in his eyes.

Huo Yuhao calmly said, “In this world, no one can understand everything. There are many things that exist even if you don’t think they do. Do you understand?”

“Yes! Yes, I understand!” Chen An hurriedly nodded. Wang Dong’er and Na Na furrowed their brow when they saw how submissive he had become. They didn’t know what Huo Yuhao had done to him that caused his attitude to change greatly.

Huo Yuhao said, “Alright, bring us in. Please carry out my orders as soon as possible. When this tournament ends, I’ll be going into retreat to study soul tools. It’ll be difﬁcult to tell if we’ll ever meet again. Don’t worry about the money. If you can bring the goods, I’ll have the money for you. Of course, you must keep this conﬁdential. Otherwise, don’t expect to obtain any beneﬁts from me.” “Yes, I’ll certainly keep it conﬁdential.” Chen An was in an unsteady state right now. To a soul engineer, there was nothing more astonishing and surprising than an increase in his cultivation. This was especially so when the enhancement was extremely pure. Chen An didn’t sense any side effects at all! If he could really become a Soul Emperor, he might be able to become a Class 6 soul engineer. While Class 5 and Class 6 were only one class apart, the treatment of soul engineers from these two classes varied immensely! How could a Soul King

and Soul Emperor be treated the same way? There was also a huge increase in one’s abilities when one advanced from a Soul King to a Soul Emperor. Furthermore, Chen An also recalled that Huo Yuhao had once mentioned that he might consider letting him become an evil soul master if he performed his

tasks well. If that was the case, it wasn’t a foregone conclusion for him to become a Soul Sage! To Chen An, this was a great motivation!

He was determined to take the risk and complete the task Huo Yuhao had asked of him. In this world, there were only eternal beneﬁts. The beneﬁts that Huo Yuhao could bring to him made him extremely determined to take that risk. After being in the Duskwater Alliance for so long, he had many contacts he could use... Chen An was very excited as he led Huo Yuhao and the other three into the Golden Hall before he left. Numbers 96 and 98 had not arrived at the resting area yet...

Huo Yuhao didn’t speak much as he arrived. This was the Duskwater Alliance’s territory, so there was a possibility of being monitored. It was best to remain silent.

Chen An returned after a while. He bent his waist and whispered something into Huo Yuhao’s ears, “Every soul engineer will be given ten hours to create a soul tool today. There aren’t any restrictions on the number of soul tools that can be created. The ﬁghts will only commence early tomorrow morning. There are fewer restrictions now. Apart from the restriction of using any other soul tools, there aren’t any other restrictions.”

Huo Yuhao thought of something and asked, “This means that I can use soul skills?”

Chen An nodded and replied, “Yes. Apart from testing one’s soul tools, this is also a test of one’s overall abilities. I heard that the grand ﬁnal between the three organizations will be held in a similar style. Everyone is going to compete on a bloody stage. Only one will emerge as the champion out of the nine competitors in the grand ﬁnal. Only the ﬁrst three will be rewarded. I heard that the winner will take home a Class 9 soul tool.”

After hearing the words ‘Class 9 soul tool’, Huo Yuhao was also shocked. It was too great of a reward. What were Class 9 soul tools? Strategic weapons! In the Sun Moon Empire, how many Class 9 soul tools were sealed inside the military vault? Even Class 9 soul engineers were restricted by the materials they possessed and the difﬁculty of creating Class 9 soul tools. Generally speaking, there were very few people who had more than three Class 9 soul tools. Of course, Jing Hongchen was an exception, since he was backed by the empire.

The destructive power of a Class 9 soul tool was even more devastating than a Titled Douluo in terms of a single attack. With a Class 9 soul tool as a reward, the soul engineers who competed weren’t afraid to risk their lives!

“You’re good.” Huo Yuhao acknowledged. “Go and get busy. I know what to do. Remember to help me place the bets.” Seeing how conﬁdent Huo Yuhao was, along with the miraculous scene he experienced earlier, Chen An had already made up his mind. He was going to place some of his own money on Huo Yuhao. No one would mind more money!

As Chen An left, Huo Yuhao revealed a slight grin on his face. The task he had set for Chen An wasn’t very difﬁcult. Everything Chen An felt was real. The immense life power came from the Life Guardian Blade. As for the pure soul power, Huo Yuhao had retrieved it from the origin energy of Ultimate Ice when he cultivated in the morning. He left a shred of it to strengthen Chen An’s conviction. It was quite precious! It was also very helpful to Huo Yuhao’s own enhancement of his soul power.

After this period of cultivation, Huo Yuhao’s soul power would increase by leaps and bounds. He was more and more conﬁdent that he would be able to walk again soon.

The door opened. Number 96 and 98 walked in, still decked out in black. When he saw Huo Yuhao, 98 twisted his mouth and said, “I didn’t expect this! You actually managed to reach this stage. You’d better pray that you don’t meet either of us!” Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “It’s difﬁcult to tell who will win or lose. I bet ten million gold soul coins on myself. I wonder if you dare to do that?”

Number 98’s expression changed, “Ten million? I didn’t know you were such a wastrel. You’d better pray that you don’t draw me as your competitor.”

Number 96 dragged him away, simply nodding at Huo Yuhao.

The two of them walked to one side and sat down.

Huo Yuhao squinted, thinking of the carving blades that the two of them had used, and revealed a smile on his face.

Wang Dong’er thought to herself after seeing his smile, What’s he up to again? He must be trying to dupe these two fellows.

96 and 98 came a little late. They only sat down for a short time before some staff members came to inform them that the tournament was about to begin. ------

They entered the Golden Hall again. 96 and 98 were in the spotlight, while Huo Yuhao naturally caught some attention too, since he was in a wheelchair.

He had caused some trouble on his ﬁrst day of the tournament, but his performance had been average in the succeeding rounds. There wasn’t anything very special about him. He wasn’t like 96 and 98, who had blazed their way into this round. However, Huo Yuhao was able to edge out his opponents every time, and ﬁnally reached the round of six. If he won this round, he would be qualiﬁed to represent the Duskwater Alliance.

As there were only six people left, the stage in the hall was also much more spacious. There were three distinct regions, and the carving table in each region had been enlarged. At the center of the stage were three circular tables. Every table was stacked with rare metals. They were the rewards for the victors today.

The startling thing was that the Duel Region behind it had been dismantled. There was only the circular stage in the center.

Huo Yuhao and the rest were brought to a tunnel behind the stage. They didn’t enter through the main door of the hall like before. In addition to the four of them, there were two other young men around twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old waiting there, who appeared quite excited. They were also competitors in the round of six. According to the information Chen An had given Huo Yuhao, they were both Class 5 soul engineers. They were the weakest two of the six remaining competitors.

On the stage, a handsome young man wearing a dazzling golden shirt walked up to the stage.

“Greetings to all distinguished guests. I’m the emcee for today’s tournament. You can call me Ajin. I’ll help everyone interpret today’s ﬁghts.”

All the spectators got excited when they heard that the match was about to begin. They started to cheer, and whistling could be heard from time to time. They had placed heavy bets on today’s ﬁghts, since they could now bet on speciﬁc individuals. As for how the six of them would be paired up, it was going to be decided using lot. This lot-drawing would be very important.

“First, let me introduce all of you to our top six soul engineers. I must reiterate that the information that we released regarding the six of them before the start of the match and the analysis that I’m going to give you now are all based on their performances in the previous rounds. We’ve never asked them what their class or abilities are. That’s because it’s taboo to talk about such things.”

Ajin’s voice suddenly sounded very high-pitched. “Let’s welcome our ﬁrst competitor, whose number is 37, onto the stage.”

A young man slightly to the front in the tunnel behind quickly ascended the stage. He took two to three steps and walked over in front of Ajin, placing both his hands behind his back.

“He has defeated many strong opponents en route to the last six. He even created a strong yet rare Class 5 soul tool in the previous round. We estimate that he’s a Class 5 soul engineer, and specializes in creating dexterous, offensive-type soul tools.”

“Next, let’s welcome our number 85 competitor up onto the stage.”

The other young man also quickly went up to the stage. He stood beside 37. His introduction was similar to 37, it wasn’t very special. Those who were sharp could tell that they were the weakest two. They were also given higher odds to win.

“Third, let’s welcome our number 66 soul engineer up on the stage. I’ll need some of my staff members to give him a hand.”

Huo Yuhao was pushed onto the stage by two staff members.

The emcee came to his side and smiled at him before saying, “Although it’s a little inconvenient for him to move, he managed to triumph in every round of this tournament. We don’t know what his limit is, but we estimate him to be a Class 5 soul engineer. From his calm and composed performances, we can roughly tell that he has a strong, yet mysterious amount of potential.

“Our fourth competitor today is our number 88 soul engineer. He has been wearing a mask all this while, and has a huge and burly ﬁgure.”

He Caitou walked up to the stage and quickly made his way over beside Huo Yuhao.

“He once demonstrated his strength. We estimate him to be between a Class 5 and Class 6 soul engineer. In fact, I’d like to know why he’s always wearing a mask. Perhaps he’s a familiar, reputable soul engineer in our empire! I rate him highly.”

He Caitou listened to Huo Yuhao’s instructions and didn’t mutter a word. After all, he was wearing a mask. His appearance seemed very cold.

“Our ﬁfth competitor is our number 98 soul engineer.

“He is very strong, and even possesses an extremely special, sharp carving blade. We believe it to be a top-ranked carving blade, and estimate him to be a Class 6 soul engineer. We can conﬁrm that his abilities are Class 6 and above. I don’t think any of the ﬁrst four competitors would like to draw him in this round.

“Our last competitor is our number 96 soul engineer. Just like our number 98 competitor, we believe him to be a Class 6 soul engineer. He also possesses a sharp carving blade that we believe to be a top-notch carving blade. We’ve announced earlier that he and our number 96 soul engineer won’t meet each other in this round since they are the strongest. This is to ensure that we can send our best lineup to the grand ﬁnal. Let the lot-drawing begin!”

Chapter 309: Betting Against the Darkness Green Dragon

“Let’s draw the lots!.”

When the emcee uttered these four words, 98 deliberately glanced at Huo Yuhao in his wheelchair, who was a head shorter than everyone else. His lips moved, and he seemed to be mouthing, “Pray!”

Huo Yuhao smiled a strange smile. Yes! Pray, but it’s you who has to pray that you won’t be matched with me...

The lot-drawing process was simple. There was a large crystal ball, and six tiny balls inside with magnets on them. There were two magnets in each of three different areas inside the crystal ball, and the tiny balls that were drawn to the magnets in these respective areas when the crystal ball began to rotate would face each other today.

The balls with 96 and 98 were already attached to two different regions, which meant the two wouldn’t meet each other in this round. The four other balls were still at the bottom.

“Alright, I will commence today’s crystal lottery. Spin!” The emcee pressed a button beneath the crystal, and the crystal ball gradually started to rotate.

The four balls at the bottom were gradually tossed into the air as the crystal began to spin faster and faster. The three grooved areas with magnets attached to them didn’t move.

The ﬁrst ball was quickly sucked away to one of the remaining empty regions.

“Alright, number 88 into the third region. I have to say that you’re quite fortunate, mysterious soul engineer 88. You’re lucky that you’re not up against the two of them, who we have estimated as powerful Class 6 soul engineers.”

He Caitou’s number was the ﬁrst to be drawn. 98 glanced at Huo Yuhao once more, as if he was saying, Your chances of meeting us are a lot higher now. Another tiny ball was sucked into one of the regions with a whistle right at this moment. This time, this ball was sucked into the region with 96 inside.

“37 versus 96, inside the ﬁrst region.”

37 was instantly overcome with despair. He knew that he had a chance against He Caitou, but he had no chance against 96.

96 was conﬁrmed to be a Class 6 soul engineer, and he possessed a ranked carving knife as well!

“Alright, the ﬁfth one has been retrieved. 66 versus 98, in the second region.”

Both 98 and Huo Yuhao’s eyes immediately became a little peculiar. Their gazes met, and Huo Yuhao saw a sardonic smile, while 98 saw a look of exasperation and helplessness.

There was no suspense with the last draw. 85 versus 88, in the third region. He Caitou was practically given a walkover. “Alright, the lottery has been completed. Everyone will be given ﬁfteen minutes to place their bets. Only you who are here will be able to take advantage of this treatment. The opportunity will never return if you let it slip... the ﬁfteen minutes begins now! May I invite the three contesting pairs to move to your respective seats? The next ten hours will be tiring and exhausting, but the ultimate winner can take the rare metals that have been prepared for you at the center of the competition stage. It’s very difﬁcult to evaluate these metals, because they can’t be purchased on the market. Every winner will win ﬁfty-four different kinds of rare metals, ﬁve kilos of each!”

The lottery had been completed, and the entire Golden Hall began to hustle and bustle. Everybody had their own guesses and estimations from the lottery, and everyone would undoubtedly have the most conﬁdence making their bets at a time like this. Of course, placing their bets within the allotted ﬁfteen minutes also meant that their odds were a lot lower than before. Even so, the entire place still descended into chaos, and all thirty-six betting booths were packed with people.

He Caitou came over to Huo Yuhao and pushed his wheelchair into the second region, while 98 tagged along. “You’re ﬁnished, little fellow. Your only chance to live is if you admit defeat right now,” he continued proudly, “This is what it means to say ‘God knows what you did’. You’re too arrogant, so you ended up having to face me! Hahahaha!”

Huo Yuhao turned around and looked at He Caitou. He frowned and said, “Am I that arrogant? 98, are you that conﬁdent of gobbling me up?”

98 grunted coldly and replied, “If I can’t beat someone like you, hmph!”

Huo Yuhao laughed. “Why don’t we place a bet? This tournament exists for wagering anyway!”

A suspicious look ﬂashed across the other soul engineer’s face. “You still dare to wager with me, young man? What are the stakes?”

Huo Yuhao said, “I’ll take your carving knife. If you lose, then that carving knife will belong to me, and I won’t take your life. See, I’m such a conversationalist, and I’m so amiable and generous.”

“You want my carving knife?” 98 wasn’t a fool. He could tell from Huo Yuhao’s smiling face that he wasn’t anxious or worried at all, and he felt alarm bells go off in his head. Has he been hiding his abilities this entire time?

“What about you? Unless you have your own ranked carving knife, you’re not worthy of making this bet with me.”

Huo Yuhao answered, “I don’t have a ranked carving knife, but I have a soul tool. What do you think?” He reached inside his pocket and took out a soul tool that resembled a chest plate. It was the Hongchen’s Blessing that Jing Hongchen had given him.

“Take it and let him feel it, brother.” Huo Yuhao passed his Hongchen’s Blessing to He Caitou beside him.

He Caitou’s took Huo Yuhao’s Hongchen’s Blessing and stepped over to 98. They were all soul engineers, so everyone was relatively discerning about soul tools. He Caitou revealed the Hongchen’s Blessing’s formation arrays to 98 for a single look before he infused his soul power into it and released a thread of the soul tool’s aura. He then passed it back to Huo Yuhao.

98’s eyes grew slack. That was… a miniature formation array?

Soul tools weren’t necessarily more powerful as they got bigger, and this was especially true with regards to their formation arrays. Smaller soul tools were easier to carry, too. For instance, Hongchen’s Blessing was only several centimeters thick. How could Huo Yuhao carry it with him everywhere he went if the formation arrays inside were too big?

Creating miniature formation arrays was ten times harder than the same normal-sized formation arrays. Typically, only soul engineers above Class 7 would attempt something like this. 98 had only been given one look at it, but he realized that the soul tool that he had just seen possessed at least ﬁve miniature formation arrays, and every single one seemed exceedingly complex. This soul tool was deﬁnitely not a prototype, and was undoubtedly Class 8, at the very least! It also possessed a dense and intense aura. The miniature formation arrays inside were already incredibly valuable by themselves, because every high-level soul engineer crafted formation arrays with their own unique methods. Learning something about these unique methods was priceless to mid- level soul engineers!

98 hadn’t expected Huo Yuhao to wager something as precious as this against him. Of course, he was conﬁdent that his ranked carving knife’s value wasn’t inferior to this soul tool.

Greed began to stir in his heart. His eyes closed into slits as he stared at Huo Yuhao, and Huo Yuhao stared back at him. Huo Yuhao’s eyes were calm, and there even a tinge of condescension in them.

Is this a trick? Has he been hiding his abilities this whole time? He wants to bait me and win my ranked carving knife!

98 was a little arrogant, but he wasn’t an idiot. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have become the soul engineer that he was today before the age of thirty! He pondered long and hard, and decided that he would reject this wager. Even though his aura would be beaten back because of this, it was better than actually losing his ranked carving knife that was too precious to him. However, he noticed a ﬁne detail right at this moment. Huo Yuhao was using his right hand to grip the wheelchair’s armrest, and it seemed a little strong. Even his ﬁnger’s joints were a little greenish-white.

Soul engineers all had good eyes. Otherwise, how could they craft intricate and delicate soul tools? A thought ﬂashed through his mind as he stared at Huo Yuhao’s right hand, which was still gripping the wheelchair’s armrest tightly. Maybe he doesn’t have the conﬁdence to defeat me at all, and he simply wants to use this wager to beat back my grandeur?

98 began to scrutinize Huo Yuhao closely when he thought about that possibility. He quickly found another ﬁne detail; Huo Yuhao’s other arm seemed to be quivering, the arm that he had never used before. Huo Yuhao’s calm eyes were ﬂickering with something, and those eyes seemed to betray a little anxiety and discordance. These details weren’t obvious, but 98 managed to pick up on these clues as he observed Yuhao closely.

“Okay, I’ll take the bet.” A conﬁdent smile surfaced on his face. Huo Yuhao was momentarily stunned. “You’re really betting with me? I’m lacking a ranked carving knife anyway. Many thanks to you, then!”

98 stared back mischievously and said, “Do you really have the conﬁdence to defeat me? I don’t think so. Since you want to die, little fellow, I will fulﬁll your wishes today.”

Huo Yuhao answered coldly, “We’ll have that bet, then. If you’re not afraid, we can make this bet public, and the Duskwater Alliance can be our witness. Otherwise, what if you lose and you deny that this bet exists?”

98 was full of avarice, and his mind was already made up. No matter how he looked at Huo Yuhao, he felt as if he was trying to put up a strong front. A cold smile appeared on his face as he said, “Alright, the Duskwater Alliance will witness our wager. They will see how you lose that soul tool to me. You, come here.” He reached out and hollered at the emcee on stage not far from where they were.

Akin walked over hurriedly. He was just an emcee, and he didn’t dare to offend the Sun Moon Empire’s soul engineers. Soul engineers were the most highly regarded profession in the country!

“What do you need, sir?” Akin sounded a little fawning.

98 grunted coldly and said, “I want to wager with my opponent, and we are betting on who will be the eventual winner. I want the Duskwater Alliance to lay witness to this wager.”

“Ah? Okay!” Akin’s eyes sparkled. He was the Golden Hall’s top-rated emcee, and he knew all too well what the audience loved to watch. Exciting things were a lot better for the gambling atmosphere, and this was especially true when everyone was still placing their bets!

Ajin hurriedly made sure he knew everything there was to know about the situation. He immediately picked up his speaker-type soul tool and announced on stage, “Everyone placing your bets, please wait a moment. There’s a minor interlude that I have to tell everyone about so that everyone can make better judgments. Just a few moments ago, 98 and 66, who are both mighty soul engineers, have announced their own wager! 98 will use his own carving knife as the stake, and

66 will use a powerful soul tool as his! We will invite the tournament’s chief judge to assess these two items so that we can conﬁrm their value. Of course, the wager has been announced and completed, and both parties cannot take anything back anymore.”

98 grabbed the speaker-type soul tool from his hands and said loudly, “My stake is a carving knife. It’s the same one that will be used later on in the competition.”

He stuffed the speaker-type soul tool back into Ajin’s hands after this sentence. When he turned around at Huo Yuhao, he could see that Huo Yuhao’s head was lowered, and there seemed to be sweat dripping down from his temples.

“Why don’t we let it go, brother?” He Caitou whispered into Huo Yuhao’s ear.

“Let it go? No, it’s too late. The announcement has already been made.” His ears were pretty good, and 98 could clearly tell what they were going on about.

At this moment, the three judges that the Duskwater Alliance had sent forth stepped onto the competition stage. The judges had changed once more because this was the round of six, so the judges that came forward today were all Class 7 soul engineers. These three mighty Class 7 soul engineers had veils draped over their faces, as it was clear that they had some reputation in the outside world, so they were afraid that people familiar with them would recognize them.

The three judges stepped onto the competition stage and quickly arrived before them.

98 directly retrieved his carving knife and handed it over. He wasn’t afraid of people pining after his carving knife, as the world seemed to look on. Furthermore, he had quite a background to back himself up.

His dark green carving knife was a tad bigger than most carving knives. The blade seemed to have rust marks, but they didn’t seem like actual rust. It seemed ancient and unornamented, and there were two dragon-shaped engravings on both sides of the blade. It emanated chilly sensations, and

even the naked eye could tell that this carving knife was extraordinary.

The middle judge among the three took the carving knife carefully. He was immediately overcome with a look of astonishment. “This… Darkness Green Dragon?”

98 answered proudly, “Yes, it’s my Darkness Green Dragon.”

The judge turned around and took Ajin’s speaker-type soul tool. He deepened his voice and said, “98 has chosen his Darkness Green Dragon as his stake. This is a ranked carving knife, the Darkness Green Dragon is ranked 59th on the Carving Knife Leaderboard. It carries darkness and wind elements, and any soul tool that it creates will carry these two elements. It’s three times heavier than typical carving knives, and is well-known for its stability. Using this carving knife with suitable soul tools will create formidable effects, and it will have a ten percent increase in success rate when forging soul tools above Class 7.”

Yes, this was a formidable ranked carving knife. Ranked carving knives were almost priceless to soul engineers.

The three judges turned towards Huo Yuhao when they ﬁnished introducing 98’s carving knife. Huo Yuhao was grasping his Hongchen’s Blessing as tightly as he could with his right hand, and his eyebrows were tightly knit together, but he didn’t make a sound at all.

96 came over beside 98 and asked him a few questions inquisitively while he glanced at Huo Yuhao from time to time.

98 whispered some explanations to him with a smile on his face. 96 frowned slightly, and he responded as if he were chiding his friend.

“What are you betting with?” The judge stepped up to Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao hesitated for a moment before he over his Hongchen’s Blessing.

“My teacher gave this to me. Don’t spoil it.” The look of reluctance on his face was undeniable as he spoke.

The leading judge examined the soul tool’s formation arrays as he took Huo Yuhao’s Hongchen’s Blessing. His body trembled as he blurted out, “This is the Illustrious Virtue Hall’s…”

“Shut up!” Huo Yuhao interrupted him with an angry shout.

The judge seemed to realize something, and he hurriedly closed his mouth as he continued to inspect the soul tool. The other two judges came over, and all three of them inspected it for a long time as their eyes ﬂowed with astonishment and shock.

This was a soul tool that Jing Hongchen, the Illustrious Virtue Hall’s Hallmaster, had created himself. Even though they weren’t sure if this was a Class 9 soul tool, they could tell that this was an incredible soul tool from how complex it was and from the materials that were used to craft it.

The three judges exchanged looks, but 98 was a little impatient. He walked over and said, “Can you make the announcement? You guys can’t be biased. Otherwise, hmph!”

The chief judge nodded. He picked up the speaker-type soul tool and said, “66 has chosen a high-level soul tool as his stake. For some special reasons, we cannot describe this item, but we can attest that its value is comparable to the Darkness Green Dragon. Alright, we have ﬁnished assessing their stakes, and the Darkness Green Dragon will temporarily be given back to 98 for use in the tournament. This soul tool will be kept with us, and it will be given to the victor after this round. The wager has been established, and the Duskwater Alliance will treat either party that goes back on his word at enemies. We will do our best to make sure that this wager goes through.”

The three judges kept the Hongchen’s Blessing after the announcement and returned to their seats. The judges were sitting on three elevated chairs three meters above the ground, so they could watch everything that was going on with the contestants from their vantage point. Ajin took the speaker-type soul tool back and said loudly, “Alright, the interlude is over. I trust that the wager between these two soul engineers has inﬂuenced your bets in some way, my dear guests. You have ten minutes left, hurry up and make your bets! The booths will close once time is up.”

The gamblers were indeed a lot livelier after this interlude’s excitement and stimulation.

Huo Yuhao’s face seemed to glow with ice-cold light as he hit himself softly on the left shoulder. An amused smile broke out across his face.

He’s taken the bait in the end!

He Caitou escorted Huo Yuhao to the second region’s crafting desk before he patted him on the shoulder and returned to his own side.

98 walked over to his own crafting desk opposite Huo Yuhao. There was a bright smile on his face as he said, “So, this soul tool is from the Illustrious Virtue Hall. It’s quite impressive… looks like you’re committed quite a bit to this gamble.”

Huo Yuhao answered coldly, “You still have a chance to regret your words. Otherwise, won’t you be devastated if you lose your ranked carving knife to me?”

98 laughed out loud. “I wouldn’t be so sure that I’ll be the one that will be devastated after this round. You’re daydreaming if you want me to retract my wager. Weren’t you so arrogant and outrageous before this? Why are you cowering now? Enough bullshit, we’ll see who wins this wager with our abilities. Don’t worry, even though I have absolute conﬁdence that I will win, I will not underestimate you. I will use the soul tools that I’m most adept and familiar with against you today, and I won’t give you a single thread of a chance at all.”

Huo Yuhao’s face changed slightly, but he said nothing more. He closed his eyes and began to conserve his energy and mentally prepare himself.

---

The rare metals and the myriad of reﬁned metals that were to be used in this round were sent up. This round was ten hours long, so a lot more metals had been prepared for today. Some were placed on the crafting desks, while a rack specially given to each contestant was placed next to each of them for their own convenience.

The ﬁfteen minutes allotted for betting quickly passed, and the gamblers returned to their seats one after another. After the lots had been drawn, the audience knew that the most attractive and interesting faceoff would be between the two soul engineers who had made their own individual bet. The other two were conspicuously unbalanced, and the odds were pathetically low. The odds for the match between Huo Yuhao and 98 were relatively higher, while Huo Yuhao’s odds were the highest. This was because he was against 98, and nobody could see how he had any advantage at all. Without talking about anything else, the judges estimated him as a Class 5 soul engineer, while 98 was a Class 6 soul engineer. 98 also possessed a ranked carving knife, the Darkness Green Dragon!

Huo Yuhao’s odds were at 1:3, while his opponent’s odds were at 5:4. The other two matchups were more evenly split.

“Begin!” The soundproof barriers rose right after the chief judge’s announcement. The emcee was already outside the competition stage, and was responsible for narrating today’s competition. He quickly got onto a tall structure outside the competition stage, and took a seat ﬁve meters above the stage. His seat was equipped with a speaker-type soul tool and a telescopic soul tool. The emcee could clearly see what the six soul engineers were doing on stage.

All six soul engineers began to move once the announcement was made. This round had no limit as to the number of soul tools that each contestant could create. That also meant that every contestant was allowed to create as many as they wanted within the stipulated time. The choice that each contestant had to make with regards to the volume and power would be up to them.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes were especially focused and serious today. He had the same faith that he would deﬁnitely be victorious, but he also understood that 98 wasn’t easy to deal with. The man had a ranked carving knife, and he was also a Class 6 soul engineer, so his standards were comparable to Huo Yuhao’s own abilities. The only thing that guy didn’t have was Huo Yuhao’s Spirit Eyes, which gave him an advantage.

A dash of golden light glowed beneath Huo Yuhao’s eyes. He waved his right hand over his forehead, and a green blade charged with life energy appeared in his hands: his Life Guardian Blade! His opponent had a ranked carving knife, so how could Huo Yuhao match up to his opponent if he didn’t use his own?

Outside the competition stage, Ajin exclaimed at almost the same time as Huo Yuhao retrieved his own ranked carving knife. “Wow, wow! Look at that, my dear guests.what has our 66 taken out? It’s a carving knife that’s entirely green in color, and from my perspective, that carving knife looks like it’s been sculpted from a jewel. It’s very eye-catching, and it’s a green color ﬁlled with life energy! It’s so beautiful! 66 does have some substance to back him up. It’s no wonder he dares to wager against 98!”

The people that had bet on 98 became a little gloomy once they heard this.

98 couldn’t hear what was going on outside, but he seemed to feel something when Huo Yuhao took out his Life Guardian Blade. He looked up, and was momentarily stunned, and his eyes coincidentally met Huo Yuhao’s stare. Their gazes met, and he was met with Huo Yuhao’s calm and composed smile.

He grunted coldly and muttered, “So that’s the thing you’ve been hiding? Let’s not talk about the fact that your carving knife is not even ranked, and even if it is ranked, it’s more important to see who the user is.”

Huo Yuhao didn’t respond at all. He picked up a piece of rare metal known as Multiridged Devilgold and began his own construction.

This metal had a unique characteristic. This metal always seemed like it had uncountable ridges even when it was ﬁrst mined, but everything else was as smooth like a mirror. This was how the name Multiridged Devilgold came about.

Multiridged Devilgold was different from other metals because it was inherently resistant to soul power. Any soul power that was infused into it would be rejected, and it could even produce a reactionary force several times the power of the soul power infused inside. If the soul power infused inside exceeded the range that the Multiridged Devilgold could take, the metal would explode.

Multiridged Devilgold wasn’t considered very rare because it was still produced in relatively large amounts. It was typically the best choice for crafting defensive soul tools. This was especially true when soul engineers wanted to craft formation arrays for a protective soul barrier. The product would possess the Multiridged Devilgold’s natural resistance to energy and soul power once completed, an excellent effect.

The only problem was that Multiridged Devilgod was extremely tough, and at the same time naturally resistant to soul power. This meant it was a lot more difﬁcult to create formation arrays from this metal.

However, this was no problem at all before Huo Yuhao’s Life Guardian Blade. The sharp bluish-green blade cut nimbly into the Multiridged Devilgold, and the Life Guardian Blade absorbed every single ounce of life energy from the metal with every stroke and every part it touched. With Huo Yuhao’s precise control, life energy was only sucked away from the places that the blade actually cut into, and those parts naturally became extremely weak without any life energy at all. Huo Yuhao was engraving and cutting into the Multiridged Devilgold as if he were slicing tofu, and the metal was quickly forged and engraved into a disc-like shape about the size of his palm.

Ajin knew quite a bit about crafting soul tools, so he could commentate properly. His jaw hung open as he looked on from his high seat.

“Oh my heavens! That’s just incredible! Multiridged Devilgold is extremely resistant to soul power, but it’s become as weak as tofu beneath 66’s mystical carving knife.”

98 was also carving and sculpting a rare metal. He was focused on creating his own soul tool, so he no longer looked at Huo Yuhao; all his energy and attention was focused on the soul tool in front of him. His Darkness Green Dragon ﬂickered with faint green light with every stroke, and caused the metal to ripple at the same time.

---

The Golden Hall outside was in an uproar compared to the competition stage’s silence. Everybody was discussing things vigorously with their companions and the people they were familiar with.

Ten hours was a really long time, and many people started to leave after watching the show for more than two hours. However, they were just getting something to eat, and weren’t actually leaving.

The Duskwater Alliance’s service was exceedingly good. Food and refreshments were provided outside the Golden Hall, everything free of charge.

The audience could also redeem blankets free-of-charge, and the sofas that they were given to sit on were spacious and very comfortable for lying down. Even though these sofas couldn’t compare to actual beds, it was much better than sitting up for the next couple of hours.

The Golden Hall’s lighting became progressively dimmer over time, so the competition stage’s lighting stayed the strongest.

Some ofﬁcials got onto the stage discreetly and delivered some food and drinks to the competing soul engineers before they slunk away. They even had thick cotton layers beneath their shoes so that they could avoid making too much sound, and could avoid affecting the competitors. ---

Time continued to pass, and soul tools were completed one after another. Ajin stepped off his high seat after another period of commentating to rest as well. It was getting late, and the gamblers had to rest. They couldn’t absorb any more commentating anyway.

The six people on stage were very focused, and they didn’t want to waste even a single second of time.

The contestants would signal to the judges after each soul tool was completed, so that the judges could assess them and conﬁrm that they had been completed. These soul engineers could keep their soul tools only after the judges had given their approval, and these soul tools would be used in the face-off afterwards.

After three hours, 98 had already ﬁnished two soul tools, while Huo Yuhao had yet to ﬁnish a single one; he was the only person among the six contestants who hadn’t raised his hand yet. Some of the gamblers who weren’t resting and were still very excited, and those who had placed their bets on him, were getting worried. Of course, this was a minority, as only those who could take a high risk would choose to bet on the underdog.

98 completed four soul tools in six hours. This was an astonishing speed, as all four soul tools were Class 5 soul tools.

Class 6 soul engineers didn’t have to craft Class 6 soul tools if they were limited by time. Soul engineers would have to consider defending themselves ﬁrst before anything else in a contest between soul engineers, rather than attacking their adversary. Therefore, one soul tool was clearly not enough for combat, and having a balanced and suitable combination of soul tools was the best choice.

Six hours went by, but Huo Yuhao still hadn’t raised his hand a single time. There were many seemingly sophisticated components on his crafting desk. Some were formation arrays, while others were parts and accessories that the judges couldn’t fathom. Nobody knew what exactly he was doing, and they were perplexed that he still hadn’t ﬁnished a single soul tool.

98 would look up at Huo Yuhao from time to time. His eyes seemed a little doubtful as well. What’s this fellow trying to do? Why doesn’t he have a single completed soul tool yet? He must have some ability to boast of if he dares to use that thing as his stake. Is he panicking? No, he must be using some special method or technique. His eyes are very focused, and it doesn’t look like he’s giving up.

98 naturally paid more attention to Huo Yuhao as these thoughts ran through his head. His eyes darted to the crafting desk opposite him intermittently, and his hand movements were naturally a little slower than before.

He quickly discovered that Huo Yuhao was actually crafting one single soul tool. Those parts and accessories were laid around the table to form a vague shape. He’s only crafting one soul tool? Is he trying to gamble everything he has on some excessively powerful attack?

His eyes closed into slits, and he pondered for a moment longer before he began to craft another soul tool. His movements were conspicuously faster than before as metal dust and fragments drifted all over the place. His eyes ﬂickered with dark and cold light as he thought to himself, You want to ambush me with an extremely powerful soul tool, huh? Then I will foil your plans before you can even execute them properly. All six contestants continued crafting their soul tools nervously and hurriedly. They raised their hands again and again, and the gamblers who were resting before began to wake up. The ten hours were almost up, and Huo Yuhao was the only odd one out among the six contestants who hadn’t

created a single ﬁnished product.

Eight hours went by. Huo Yuhao had been working anxiously this entire time, but he ﬁnally looked up from his work. There was a clear look of fatigue on his face. He had formidable spiritual power, but he had been tensed up and nervous for many hours. He was truly feeling a little exhausted from crafting this soul tool before him.

There were almost a hundred accessories and components laid out on the crafting desk before him.

Huo Yuhao had designed this soul tool with the Life Guardian Blade as its core ever since he remembered that he had the carving knife. This was also the ﬁrst time that he had attempted to make it, and it was because of this fact that he had to be very careful and meticulous throughout the entire process. Of course, his meticulousness was also highly related to the soul tool’s inherent complexity. Huo Yuhao glanced at the hourglass next to him. I have one hour left. I guess I have enough time to ﬁnish it.

Huo Yuhao wasn’t in a hurry. He sat there with his eyes closed so that he could focus his attention, and he channeled soul power across his body to adjust his body’s state and his state of mind.

His soul power couldn’t complete its circulation because his left arm and his legs were frozen. Therefore, he found it a lot more difﬁcult to adjust his condition and his body’s state. This was also a substantial reason why he felt so exhausted after just ten hours. If he had done this before he was injured, he could continue for two days and two nights without a problem.

I have to accelerate my absorption of the Ultimate Ice origin energy of heaven and earth. Fortunately, I’ve found some methods recently…

Fifteen minutes went by, but Huo Yuhao was still sitting there motionless, and the round was inching towards its end. There were very few people who had placed their bets on him, but these few people were still exceedingly displeased as they watched him, and many of them even started to curse and shout.

There would be a corresponding doll on the soul engineers’ respective desks for each soul tool that they completed. At this point, the soul engineer with the most soul tools had six ﬁnished products, but Huo Yuhao hadn’t even completed one. He wouldn’t even be allowed to enter the faceoff after this if he didn’t have a single completed soul tool.

Everybody looked on as the ten hours slowly ticked down to ﬁfteen minutes...

Chapter 310: The Adjudication Shield

There were only ﬁfteen minutes remaining in the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament’s round of six.

Huo Yuhao had just been sitting there with his eyes closed for almost an hour, resting up. He ﬁnally opened his eyes, and his eyes sparkled before he got down to work once again.

A formless layer of Spiritual Detection blanketed his crafting desk, and every single sophisticated component seemed like it was numbered. He raised his right hand to draw a component from the desk’s other end toward him using Controlling Crane Capturing Dragon and pressed it down on another part to lock it in before placing them ﬂat on the crafting desk. His right hand began to move like a butterﬂy meandering through ﬂowers, and he was so fast that he left afterimages on his crafting desk.

The multiple soul tool components of different shapes and sizes that were made from all sorts of rare metals were being continuously assembled by his right hand. A soul tool gradually took form on his crafting desk. ---

Time continued ticking down. The other ﬁve contestants had already ﬁnished their work; nobody would dare to risk the ﬁnal minutes to complete their soul tools. They gave themselves enough of a buffer and reserve time during their crafting process, so all their eyes drifted over to Huo Yuhao at the same time.

They could see that Huo Yuhao didn’t have a single doll on his crafting desk at all, meaning he had no ﬁnished product. The other ﬁve contestants had different expressions on their faces, and even He Caitou’s eyes ﬂickered with a hint of worry. Hongchen’s Blessing is a Class 9 soul tool! What’s he doing? With his Spiritual Detection to guide him, how can he not create a single soul tool after ten hours?

The hourglass had dwindled down to its ﬁnal minutes, and the ﬁne grains of sand were gradually ﬂowing away. 98 smiled condescendingly; he was entirely conﬁdent of winning even if Huo Yuhao could ﬁnish crafting the soul tool he was working on. It was easy to make mistakes when working under such tense conditions. Besides, could this soul tool be operational and effective? In other words, could he really succeed in completing it?

Even if he does succeed, I already have a plan to counter that.

What can he do with just one soul tool?

Yes, his stake was quite impressive. It looked like a defensive soul tool that’s at least Class 8! Very suitable for me!

“It’s done.” Huo Yuhao raised his right hand vigorously, and his soul tool dropped down onto his crafting desk with a clang. His hourglass still had a teeny bit of sand.

The gamblers who placed their bets on him fell back into their respective seats, as if their souls had departed their bodies. Huo Yuhao had ﬁnally completed one soul tool, which meant that there was still a thread of hope. A single thread was better than nothing at all.

98 frowned from where he sat opposite Huo Yuhao. He could see that Yuhao had forged a very strange-looking soul tool that it was shaped like a shield. The shield’s physical appearance was split into three different parts. There was a protruding center shaped like a sphere and as large as a human head, whose silver-white metal surface shone with gentle bluish- green light.

The shield’s outer surface was mostly grey metal, with this protruding hemisphere at its center, and otherwise very unassuming. Its outermost circumference was a pale blue metal, and a lot thinner compared to its other parts. One would realize upon closer inspection that this shield was crafted by assembling many different components together. There were multiple rare metals contained inside, and even an

established soul engineer like 98 couldn’t identify them all with one look.

“Time’s up, contestants. Please stop everything you’re doing. Judges, please step forward to assess their soul tools.” Ajin was back on the stage. The soundprooﬁng barrier dropped, and clamorous noises immediately ﬂooded the competition stage.

The three judges were already on stage, and the ﬁrst person they approached was Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao hadn’t produced a single soul tool throughout the entire round up until the last moment, and they wanted to make sure whether he was qualiﬁed to continue in this round.

--- A few people were sitting inside a guest lounge at the center of a structure hovering in the air above the Golden Hall. There was a lady dressed in a long black robe seated in the middle of everyone, her baggy and oversized robe covering her entire body. One could only tell her gender from the faint lines of her physical frame.

She was wearing a conical bamboo hat, and a black veil covered her face. Only her two peculiar bluish-grey eyes were revealed, and they were silently watching everything that was happening outside.

The guest lounge was very quiet at this moment; everybody was just watching without making a sound.

“What do you think about 66, Old Three?” the lady sitting in the middle asked plainly.

The person she was talking to was an elderly man who looked about sixty years old. His silver-white hair dangled behind his head, and he had a very tough and muscular physique. He wasn’t that young anymore, but his eyes were still exceedingly sharp and pithy. “That youth is very sophisticated, vice sect leader. I noticed that he was crafting an extremely complicated composite soul tool from the very beginning, but it’s the ﬁrst time that I’ve seen this production method. There are seventeen formation arrays contained inside. The largest one is an energy-gathering formation array, and it’s also the one that’s located at the shield’s center. He was the slowest when he was creating that formation array, but I couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary about it. The other sixteen formation arrays should be deﬂective rays and something of the like. Some are a little different from the rest, and the six formation arrays on the outermost circumference should be deﬂective rays with reversal capabilities, if my eyes didn’t fail me. That also means that this shield should have absorbing capabilities.”

“Deﬂection and absorption at the same time? What’s he trying to achieve?” The vice-sect leader’s silver-white eyes showed a little doubt and suspicion.

The elderly man shook his head and said, “I won’t be able to guess that, either. Even though he’s not considered a very high- level soul engineer, every soul engineer has his or her own innovations and creativity. This soul tool’s complexity can be compared to a Class 7 soul tool, and I can tell from the ﬁnal assembly phase that there are many gears and other structures that I cannot understand. Most of them should be his own inventions. I have to say that this youth is a genius. I wish to take him in under our wing if it’s possible.”

Another elderly man sitting on the vice-sect leader’s other side smiled and remarked, “Even you hold this fellow in high regard? Since that’s the case, I’ll ﬁnd someone to talk to him after the contest and ask him about his thoughts. Some of my people told me before this that they’ve closely inspected the soul tool that he’s using for their individual wager, and that soul tool is from the Illustrious Virtue Hall. Furthermore, it’s likely that the Hallmaster of the Virtue Hall, Jing Hongchen himself, was the one who created it. It’s a Class 8 soul tool at the very least, but it’s actual strength can only be conﬁrmed after proper assessment.”

The vice-sect leader sounded a little surprised. “Can he be Jing Hongchen’s disciple? But I’ve never heard of Jing Hongchen having a crippled disciple. Do you think this fellow can defeat your precious disciple?”

The ﬁrst elderly man shook his head and said, “It’s hard to say. Between my two disciples, Huang Zheng is relatively levelheaded and steady, and he does things more stably. He’s the senior brother, and lives up to his status. However, Mo Ke is more talented. But his greatest weakness is that he is easily arrogant and condescending. He’s a little better in front of me, but he’s always arrogant and condescending towards outsiders. I’ve reminded him countless times, but he’s never kicked the habit. I do wish to see him lose to 66 today, and that’s not a bad thing for his future growth and development.”

The vice-sect leader said, “We shall wait and see, then. Second Elder, how are the Duskwater Alliance’s proﬁts looking from this tournament?”

The other elderly man that spoke to the ﬁrst one replied, “We have gained almost thirty-three percent more than our original projections.”

The vice-sect leader nodded her head and said, “Very well. After this, we will increase our control over the government’s rare metals. You have to send some people when the time comes, as these are our sect’s core resources.”

“Yes,” the Second Elder acknowledged respectfully.

--- The three judges swiftly made their assessments on the competition stage, and they afﬁrmed that Huo Yuhao had successfully created a soul tool. However, the judges shared the third elder and the vice-sect leader’s confusion, and they didn’t understand why Huo Yuhao would craft a soul tool like that. This was a defensive soul tool in a ﬁght, which meant that Huo Yuhao would be the passive one taking hits. Did he want to defeat his component by grinding down his soul power?

98 didn’t look so good when he saw that Huo Yuhao’s soul tool was a shield. Initially, he had believed that Huo Yuhao was creating an offensive soul tool with incredible attacking strength. But it seemed like his judgment was wrong, and that meant some of his plans to counter Huo Yuhao were wasted. He had spent four hours creating an Invincible Barrier against Huo Yuhao speciﬁcally because of his erroneous judgment.

All six soul engineers were quickly validated. 98 had six completed soul tools, Huo Yuhao had only one, and 96 also had six. He Caitou had ﬁve, and the remaining two had four each.

96 and 98 had a great advantage over the others in terms of the number of soul tools they had created. The chief judge took the speaker-type soul tool from Ajin. He announced the number of soul tools that each contestant had ﬁnished before he lowered his voice and said, “I’ll pose my routine questions now. The crafting phase is over, and because this is the round of six, every soul tool will have to be ﬁeld- tested, no matter how each one has turned out. Your soul tools have to be proven in battle to show their strengths and their worth. Let me ask you now – does anyone feel that your soul tools are not enough to ﬁght against your opponent? You have the option to back out now. Otherwise, you are responsible for your own injuries, and even your death once we enter the combat phase.”

There was a lot more tension on the competition stage once this was said, and the atmosphere felt a lot more antagonistic. Many ofﬁcials were already on stage to remove the six crafting desks, and they also temporarily removed the rare metals that were intended as prizes. It was clear that this circular competition stage was where the six soul engineers would ﬁght it out!

Nobody backed out. The prizes were so rich and generous, who didn’t want to give it a shot? Even if someone ended up on the losing end, they could still admit defeat. It was very unlikely for someone to die in a tournament that was focused on comparing soul tools.

“Very well. Since nobody has decided to back out, we shall commence the combat phase. May I invite 96 and 37 to start the ﬁrst match?”

Huo Yuhao’s individual bet with 98, along with the incredible value of their stakes, meant that they would probably be the last to ﬁght. The ﬁrst match would deﬁnitely be between the more unbalanced pairs.

37 fought against 96, and was already at a complete disadvantage in his aura and disposition. There was no suspense at all, and 96 took just ﬁve minutes to achieve an overwhelming victory. Then it was He Caitou’s turn against 85. He Caitou gradually stepped towards the competition stage with a large cannon on his shoulders. He had crafted ﬁve soul tools – the black heavy cannon on his shoulder, a round breastplate, a shield, a waistplate, and a helmet.

Those were his ﬁve different soul tools, and he was well- equipped in terms of both attack and defense. Almost every single contestant chose this direction.

He Caitou’s opponent was a little simpler in comparison. His opponent had a breastplate, and one relatively smaller soul cannon on each of his shoulders. He also had a belt-like soul tool around his waist.

They were inside the Golden Hall’s competition stage after all, and it was a lot smaller than the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament’s competition stage. Neither party had much space to move around, and any long-range attacks could reach the other side in no time.

The three judges returned to their positions, and the chief judge exclaimed, “Begin!” Both He Caitou and 85 unleashed their martial souls at almost the same time. He Caitou was very quick, and six soul rings rose up from his feet. On seeing this, the audience erupted into shouts and exclamations! He Caitou was a six- ringed Soul Emperor, and this meant that this tall and broad- shouldered man in a mask was likely to be a Class 6 soul engineer as well! The people who had placed their bets on He Caitou began to gasp and exclaim in joy and delight.

85 paled in comparison. He had two yellow and three purple soul rings; only ﬁve soul rings, and he didn’t have the most optimal soul ring combination.

Both parties chose to unleash the same soul tool initially, a protective soul barrier. A layer of white light rose up and enveloped their bodies inside. Both soul barriers were Class 5, as they had only had ten hours to craft their soul tools.

The belt-like soul tool that 85 had around his waist burst with colorful light, and circle after circle of intense light rippled out from it. His soul power undulations began to ﬂourish with lightning speed. “Wow! Look, everyone! The soul tool around 85’s waist is an extremely rare energy-gathering soul tool. It can focus and condense the user’s soul power over a short period of time. It’s very difﬁcult to create a soul tool like that, and one has to be very precise in the crafting process! Otherwise, one mistake will cause injuries to the user. I can imagine right now that 85’s subsequent attack will as vigorous and violent as a thunderstorm! With his energy-gathering soul tool’s ampliﬁcation, his attacks can rival that of a Class 6 soul engineer for a short period of time.”

He Caitou didn’t respond as he watched his opponent’s energy-gathering soul tool. He calmly raised his left arm and blocked his chest, the footlong shield on his left arm beginning to chime faintly and radiate a layer of orangish-yellow light.

“Eh, look! What a great counter! The shield that 88 has chosen to use should be a soul reﬂecting shield! This shield is highly resistant and effective against all soul power attacks, or more accurately, all kinds of soul rays. The only problem is that I can’t tell what this soul reﬂecting shield’s Class is...”

The ﬁght begun, and Ajin’s saliva was spewing all over the place as he commentated excitedly on the battle. An energy-gathering soul tool could temporarily increase a soul engineer’s offensive ability, but it also consumed a lot more soul power. The user would have to achieve victory as quickly as possible.

85 felt his heart sink when he saw He Caitou’s six soul rings.

He knew that he only had one chance to win.

Because of this, he didn’t wait for He Caitou to do anything else, and ﬁred off the twin soul cannons on his shoulders. Two different lights blasted toward He Caitou.

The soul cannon on his left shoulder was a brilliant white soul ray. The air around it felt a little strange as this ray surged out, and everyone seemed to see cracks and tears in the air wherever this soul ray passed. The air seemed to become glassy and shatter in its wake.

The other soul cannon ﬁred a pink sphere of light. This sphere was as big as a ﬁst, but it grew increasingly larger as it ﬂew through the air. Every single contestant who could make it into the round of six had their own unique strengths, and 85 wasn’t an exception!

Even Huo Yuhao was a little astonished as he watched those soul cannons. Both of them were Class 5 soul tools that were rarely seen.

The soul ray that cracked open the air as it ﬂew was called a splitting shockwave. Even though it was similar to a shock bomb, there was a world of difference between them.

Shock bombs relied on intense and forceful shockwaves and undulations, but the splitting shockwave resembled uncountable knives and blades. Powerful cutting effects would be dished out to the target, and it would cut in very irregular patterns. The splitting shockwave was highly destructive, ﬁerce, and brutal. However, it was very difﬁcult to craft one of these, and it was quite challenging to control it as well. Splitting shockwaves were inherently unstable, and could easily injure their user. Therefore, soul engineers typically didn’t opt for such a soul tool. However, 85 seemed very conﬁdent, and it was clear that he was very familiar with using similar soul tools.

The pink sphere on the other side wasn’t much worse, and it was known as an enfeebling cannon. This cannon could be considered a more primitive version of the aging ray which had been used on Wang Qiu’er.

It was difﬁcult for any energy-based defenses to dispel a enfeebling cannon’s effects, and anybody struck by it would immediately enter a weakened state. This weakened state was a prolonged and continuous one, and the victim would have to rest for a very long time to recover.

Both soul tools were considered incredibly difﬁcult to craft among Class 5 soul tools. Furthermore, a lot of soul power had to be consumed when using them.

It was clear that 85 was prepared with his equipment. He had a Class 5 protective soul barrier to defend himself, and his energy-gathering belt boosted his soul power, while his two formidable soul cannons would take care of his opponent. His setup was quite impressive. The splitting shockwave was the ﬁrst to reach He Caitou. It clashed with He Caitou’s soul barrier, shrill and ear-piercing sounds ringing out. The audience could see cuts and scars swiftly webbing out across He Caitou’s soul barrier.

The splitting shockwave’s most frightening characteristic was that it could be ﬁred continuously. As long as the user had enough soul power to sustain his or her attack, this attack could be used continuously and without pause. Of course, this attacking style increased the chances of the soul tool itself breaking apart.

The enfeebling cannon shell followed immediately afterwards. It was not hard to imagine that He Caitou’s soul barrier would deﬁnitely not be able to withstand the splitting shockwaves if he entered a weakened state, and it was likely that that would be instantly sliced and diced into pieces. 85 immediately took the upper hand as he made his ﬁrst attack.

But He Caitou wasn’t worried or panicky from beginning to end. He pressed his shield and its orange light, and the orange radiance seemed to materialize as it wrapped around his protective soul barrier and barricaded the splitting shockwave without. The cracks and scars immediately vanished. He Caitou’s feet moved as the enfeebling cannon shell came shortly after. He took a step to the left, evading the attack with incredible speed. The fact that his large and bulky body could make such agile and nimble dodging movements was astonishing.

The enfeebling cannon charge was locked onto him, however, and began to follow him as he waltzed around.

The helmet on He Caitou’s head lit up, a bright silver beam erupting out of it and circling once around his body. The enfeebling cannon charge was pursuing closely behind him, so it was naturally encompassed within this beam’s radius, and was instantly scooped up by the silver light.

“This… is this what’s known as a Class 5 capturing hand? It can capture any powerful energy-based existence, and is primarily used to counter stationary soul cannons. It’s quite a surprise that 88 has created a soul tool like that. It’s a very clever creation.”

He Caitou’s capturing hand wrapped around the enfeebling charge, and its lock-on effects were immediately dispelled. He Caitou hurled the cannon charge back out towards 85, wanting to give his opponent a taste of his own medicine. The pink light sphere hurtled straight towards 85 at a speed faster then it had originally been launched at!

85 was overcome with shock, but his response was still appropriate. He Caitou’s capturing hand could capture any energy-based entity at a certain speed, but it couldn’t keep any lock-on capabilities. 85 dodged to one side and avoided this cannon shell, but his splitting shockwave paused for a moment because of his movements.

Right at that moment, a brilliant blue pillar of light surged across the competition stage. This blue pillar boomed like a thunderbolt, and the entire Golden Hall seemed to tremble and shiver along with it. There was only a protective dome around the competition stage; there wasn’t a sound-prooﬁng barrier. Therefore, everybody in the audience could hear the crisp and deafening boom.

The heavy cannon on He Caitou’s shoulder was ﬁnally unleashed, a Lightning Cannon! This was one of He Caitou’s favorite soul tools!

Frightening lightning tore the air open as it thundered towards He Caitou’s opponent. The bluish-purple lighting caused the air to twist and contort, and 85 had just evaded his own enfeebling cannon charge when his face changed.

Class 6! That’s a Class 6 lightning cannon! My protective soul barrier can’t handle that!

He hesitated for a single moment before he shouted, “I admit defeat!” He did have an option against this attack. He could use his Invincible Barrier to defend himself, but doing so was no different from admitting defeat. Almost every soul engineer above Class 5 was equipped with an Invincible Barrier, but this item was so outrageously expensive that nobody would ever use it unless the circumstance was a matter of life and death. This was especially so when the tournament prohibited using soul tools that were not crafted during the tournament, and this meant using an Invincible Barrier was equivalent to admitting defeat.

Boom! The Lightning Cannon was withdrawn after just one shot. But even so, 85 was immediately thrown backwards from the impact, and his Class 5 protective soul barrier instantly shattered. His soul power was almost entirely smashed away by the impact, and his entire body was burned black. He puked out a mouthful of blood when he dropped back to the ground.

Ajin couldn’t help but exclaim, “85 loves wealth more than he loves his life! I believe he has an Invincible Barrier with him, but he couldn’t bear to use it. I would have done the same thing if I had been in his shoes. It’s a pity I’m not a soul engineer...”

The battle was over, and victory had been determined. He Caitou was actually quite merciful and generous. Otherwise, if he had unleashed his Lightning Cannon’s strength to its fullest extent, 85 would have been heavily injured, or instantly killed!

“Thank you for showing me mercy.” 85 climbed to his feet and immediately bowed respectfully to He Caitou. Even though he had lost this round, his opponent had instantly stopped attacking after he admitted defeat. He was full of goodwill towards his opponent. He Caitou remembered everything that Huo Yuhao had told him. He didn’t make a sound, but nodded in his opponent’s direction before he departed the competition stage to claim his prize.

---

Two matches out of three were over. 96 was very powerful and dominant, and He Caitou’s last Class 6 soul tool was equally strong and impressive. Both of them gave the audience a deep and lasting impression.

Soul engineers typically resolved their combats very quickly, and rifts in strength and standards were quickly presented in a ﬁght. The highlight of the show was about to begin, and the contestants that had bet against one another were about to ﬁght!

Everyone in the audience began to take shorter and quicker breaths. Some were pleased and others upset about the result of the previous two matches, but the third and ﬁnal match had the best odds. This was especially true for those who had placed their bets on Huo Yuhao; every single one of them could feel butterﬂies in their stomach. Even though they knew their chances of winning their bets were slim, they still had to hold on to that thread of hope until the very end. The odds were one to three… these was considered very good odds, and they would make windfall proﬁts if they won this bet!

Those who had placed their bets on 98 weren’t worried at all. Six soul tools versus one... unless his opponent had a trump card that ensured his victory, 98’s advantage was just too evident. There was nothing they had to be worried about at all.

Huo Yuhao smiled,but his smile felt a little chilly. Ofﬁcials pushed his wheelchair onto the competition stage, and 98 stepped onto the stage on the other side, fully equipped with his six soul tools.

Their gazes met, and the corner of 98’s mouth curled into a smile. “Do you feel the pressure now, little fellow? Give it up. I won’t kill you, considering you’ve given me such a nice present. I’ll let you keep your life because of that.”

Huo Yuhao’s face was black. “We haven’t even fought yet. How are you so sure that you’ll win? Let me tell you, I have a lot of soul power. Hmph!” 98 laughed heartily and said, “That means you want to use that shield of yours to grind me down until I have no soul power left? Do you think that’s realistic? I have at least a hundred ways of breaking through your defenses. You’re so outrageous and arrogant even though you’re sitting on that

wheelchair. Now I understand why you are crippled.”

Huo Yuhao felt a knot form in his heart. Even though he was intentionally showing weakness to his opponent, he still didn’t feel very happy when his opponent labelled him as an outrageous and arrogant cripple.

“We’ll see during the match. I hope you won’t cry after losing the battle. The Darkness Green Dragon, huh? It’s already mine,” Huo Yuhao grunted coldly, but he didn’t seem like he had any substance to back up his words.

“My Darkness Green Dragon is right here. I’m afraid you can only look at it. Hahaha!” 98 waved his right hand, and a dark green light waltzed around his ﬁngertips like a spiritual serpent that had come alive. Huo Yuhao had to admit that 98 was quite accomplished with soul tools, and he had his own attainments. “Judge!” Huo Yuhao suddenly shouted.

All three judges turned towards him confusedly.

Huo Yuhao said, “I’ve already given my stake to you before this. The crafting phase is over, so shouldn’t 98 give his stake to you just like I have? That’s only fair!”

98 felt his face freeze for a moment, but he quickly returned to normal. He generously revealed the Darkness Green Dragon in his hands and said, “Take it away, then. It will come back to me in a moment’s time, anyway.”

Huo Yuhao could clearly tell that 98 couldn’t bear to part with his carving knife when the judges took it away.

All soul engineers at every class were as intimate with the carving knife they always used as if it were their own child. It was natural that any soul engineer would feel a little out of place without their favorite carving knife in their possession.

---

They entered the competition stage and took their sides.

They had the soul tools that they had crafted earlier on them.

Huo Yuhao placed his shield ﬂat down on his legs and gently caressed its surface. The unsettled expression on his face gradually disappeared, and he ﬁnally displayed a self-conﬁdent smile.

He was absolutely certain that this shield was one of the most successful soul tools that he had crafted over his entire life, and had named it the Adjudication Shield.

“Are you guys ready?” the judges inquired from their elevated seats.

“I’m ready!” Both Huo Yuhao and 98 responded at the same time.

“Alright. Bring up the protective barriers!” The pale yellow protective barriers rose up and formed a hemisphere that encompassed the entire competition stage. The barriers were there to prevent the soul tools unleashed from damaging the Golden Hall.

Huo Yuhao raised the shield in his hands. 98 seemed as casual as ever on the other side, and he raised a strange- looking soul cannon with his right hand.

“Begin!”

The round of six’s ﬁnal match began with the judge’s announcement.

Huo Yuhao raised his shield in front of him. However, not a single soul ring could be seen on his body.

On the other side, whistling sounds could be heard beneath 98’s feet as two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings rose up, one after another. Dense soul power undulations immediately rippled from his body. He wasn’t at all hasty to attack. Instead, he took a few steps forward as he placed his soul cannon on his shoulder.

Of the other six soul tools that he had created, other than his Invincible Barrier, he took the longest to craft this one.

This soul cannon looked like it was embedded into his shoulder, and it gave the audience the feeling that it was part of his body. This was a quality that an outstanding soul engineer had to possess, and every soul tool he created had to have chemistry with the soul engineer’s body.

This soul cannon was silver-white in color, and faintly radiated green light. The cannon’s mouth was ﬂat and rectangular, and the entire cannon seemed a little peculiar. The black, ﬂat opening began to ﬂicker with light.

98 channeled his soul power, and a soul tool on his waist behind his back erupted with light. He also had an energy- gathering soul tool, but his energy-gathering soul tool was a little gentler than the one that belonged to 85. At least, the soul power undulations didn’t seem as strong. However, once this soul tool was activated, the soul cannon on his shoulder erupted with green light. There appeared to be black streaks of air circulating around the cannon’s mouth.

Huo Yuhao hid his body completely behind his shield. Blue light sparkled on his shield, and a faint wheel of light could be seen that increased the shield’s defensive area of effect. The hemispherical protrusion in the shield’s center didn’t change much, while the silver-white regions at the shield’s center and on its edges shone with relatively more intense white light. The shield had quite an impressive outward appearance to the naked eye.

However, the gamblers who had placed their bets on Huo Yuhao felt their hopes dwindling to nothing. Could he really grind down his opponent’s soul power with this shield?

They witnessed Huo Yuhao’s soul rings at this moment. He had two yellow, two purple, and one black soul ring. This was the optimal soul ring combination, but he only had ﬁve. He was a Soul King, so how he could win a war of attrition against a Soul Emperor? A Soul Emperor’s soul power was at least two or three times more plentiful than a Soul King’s. Huo Yuhao rarely revealed his soul rings’ true colors to outsiders so that he could hide his identity. He was using Imitation to mask their actual colors!

98’s soul cannon ﬁred, and a dark red beam stretched through the air, sweeping towards Huo Yuhao.

---

Inside the central guest lounge, the third elder muttered under his breath, “I want to see how this fellow is going to defend himself against Mo Ke’s corrosive decomposition cannon. With the Darkness Green Dragon’s ampliﬁcations, this corrosive decomposition cannon would be considered very powerful even among Class 6 soul tools. It’s very explosive, but its continuous destructiveness is its strongest attribute. No matter what deﬂective and absorptive effects that shield possesses, it can only take effect on material entities. How is he going to defend himself?”

Huo Yuhao proved how he could defend himself on the competition stage. He placed his shield in front of him, and began to chant something under his breath. The shield blocked everyone’s vision, and his eyes suddenly turned grey.

The audience watched as the corrosive decomposition beam was about to reach his shield. A grey streak suddenly burst from Huo Yuhao’s body and condensed into a sphere of smoky fog that blocked the beam’s forward movement, just like that.

A series of crackling sounds could be heard as steam rose up from the competition stage. Huo Yuhao didn’t move at all, but a black skeleton suddenly appeared before him. This skeleton seemed to have been called from nowhere, and the gray fog blocked the light beam for one moment before this black skeleton forcefully intervened.

Chapter 311: Huo Yuhao's Third Martial Soul

The skeleton quickly turned dark-green. Right after that, it emitted an aching, clattering sound that made it seem as if it could collapse at any time.

As Huo Yuhao continued chanting, streams of grey air continued to surge from his body, ﬂowing into the black skeleton in front of him. Upon absorbing these streams of air, the skeleton began to totter about. However, it only continued to totter, and not collapse.

Everyone couldn’t help but feel astonished upon witnessing this scene.

Was 66 not planning on using his soul tool to take 98’s attack? Wasn’t he clearly using the power of his martial soul? Was his martial soul a Skeleton? Furthermore, was he summoning a skeleton outside his body? However, why did none of his soul rings light up upon strengthening that skeleton’s defenses? While everyone else was dumbstruck, Huo Yuhao himself was somewhat astonished. As he used the necromantic arts his teacher had imparted to him, he felt that it was somewhat incompatible with his Spirit Eyes.

His spiritual power was relatively strong right now. The moment he felt something was off, he immediately withdrew his Spirit Eyes along with its soul rings. Moreover, he suddenly felt as if something in his mind had shattered. Right after that, he felt a trace of enlightenment, along with a large amount of information that ﬁlled his spiritual sea.

The sudden appearance of so many astonishing things in one’s mind would deﬁnitely have struck any other person dumb. However, Huo Yuhao was a person who had cultivated his spiritual power to the concrete-immaterial realm. After a brief moment of astonishment, he immediately used his spiritual power to temporarily seal these pieces of memory-like information in his spiritual sea. At the same time, he continued chanting his spell.

A strange scene stunned the entire audience. Under the eyes of everyone present, a grey soul ring quietly rose from Huo Yuhao’s feet. Right, a grey soul ring that was ﬁlled with a deathly stillness. The instant it appeared, it seemed as if all of the light within the Golden Hall had vanished.

A tall, faint ﬁgure appeared behind Huo Yuhao’s back. Although it was only a silhouette, and its facial features couldn’t be clearly seen, the boundless aura coming from it stunned the entire ﬁeld.

Practically everyone seated in the centre of the VIP lounge got to their feet at the same time, their expressions that of bewilderment. Even the female vice-founder wasn’t an exception to this. All of them quickly moved to the window, staring at Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao felt his senses immediately change the instant the grey soul ring appeared. The various spells of the Divine Law of Necromancy that Calamity Necromancer Electrolux had imparted to him in the past began to appear clearly in his mind. Every single spell appeared like a construct or model, and the originally superﬂuous spells seemed to shorten. Now, he would be able to cast any of his spells as long as he followed the models within his mind. Huo Yuhao raised the shield with his right hand. Due to the brief pause he had, the black skeleton in front of him had already exploded with a bang and turned into small fragments because of the corrosive decomposition cannon. The cannon charge then landed on his Adjudication Shield at practically the same instant.

Unexpectedly, Huo Yuhao put his shield away and placed it on his legs. At this moment, 98 ﬁnally saw the deathly grey in his eyes.

As the person who was on the stage, 98 was the person who could sense the change in Huo Yuhao’s aura the most clearly. This was a choking feeling that made it seem as though his throat was being crushed, and the enormous pressure and deathly stillness made him suffocate somewhat. He could only increase the amount of soul power in his corrosive decomposition cannon and hope that it could take Huo Yuhao out.

After putting his shield down, Huo Yuhao raised his right hand. Gently tapping the air, he began to chant once again. He felt the soul power in his body roil about quickly, and the spiritual power in his mind surged forth in torrents. It felt as though something was simultaneously drawing out the spiritual and soul power in his body.

A large, pitch-black door appeared in front of Huo Yuhao without any prior warning, and the discharge of the corrosive decomposition cannon inches away from him fell right into that door.

That large door seemed as thin as a feather, but the corrosive decomposition stopped moving after falling into it, as though it had fallen in quicksand.

Right after that, a mournful howl rang out from that door. With a wave of his hand, the door that had already fallen to the ground several meters away from him instantly stood upright. A grey ﬁgure pounced out from the door, charging straight towards 98!

This was a metallic-green humanoid with a pair of wings on its back. However, it didn’t have a head.

This sudden change of events left 98 greatly astonished, yet somewhat frenetic. He paused the ﬁring of his corrosive decomposition cannon for a brief moment, then aimed it at that zombie.

“Chichi!” An ear-piercing shriek mixed with the poison mist caused by the corrosion in the air rang out. However, the headless zombie only paused for a brief moment when facing 98’s attack. Right after that, it charged forward, ignoring the destructive might of the corrosive decomposition cannon. His body was tougher than cast iron! This necromantic spell was called the Spectral Gate, and its activation would create a door linked to the netherworld, summoning a specter that could aid one in combat.

According to the memories that Electrolux had left him, the Spectral Gate could summon a spectre whose strength could range from a three-ringed to a six-ringed orthodox soul master from the Douluo Continent. The speciﬁc specter that would be summoned, on the other hand, would be dependent on one’s luck.

The fact that the headless iron zombie was able to directly take on a corrosive decomposition cannon truly astonished Huo Yuhao. However, he didn’t dare to dally around; he quickly released another necromantic spell. A transparent grey whip appeared before Huo Yuhao. With a wave, it struck the headless iron zombie.

Immediately, the headless zombie let out a mournful shriek. A ray of light that was identical to it in texture was drawn out from its body, before merging back into it.

This was the Death Whip, a weapon which could directly attack an opponent’s soul. If it was used on one’s own summoned spectres, it would raise its combat strength for a brief period of time.

After being struck by the Death Whip, a bronze tint appeared on the headless zombie’s skin. It forcefully took another cannon shot, getting within ﬁve meters of 98.

Currently, 98 was truly feeling somewhat panicked. Smacking his chest with his right hand, he instantly released a white soul ring that tossed the rushing headless zombie away.

Nobody would’ve thought that the Elite Soul Engineering Tournament would end up like this, but nobody could say that Huo Yuhao was breaking the rules, either. After all, the round- of-six permitted the use of soul master abilities! Only, Huo Yuhao’s abilities were overly strange. These were clearly the skills of an evil soul master! If this wasn’t an underground tournament, some of the orthodox soul engineers there would’ve called him into question.

However, this was the Duskwater Alliance, and nothing could stop the betting from continuing.

Huo Yuhao seldom used necromantic magic, but it helped conceal his identity within the Golden Hall. At this moment, the skill with which he used these magics began to improve.

The headless zombie immediately charged forward again after being pushed back. While it took care of 98, Huo Yuhao began to chant another spell.

A red ring of light quietly appeared beneath 98, rising into the air. Right after that, a dark-red skull appeared above him, and his movements seemed to slow somewhat.

This was the Curse of Blood, a necromantic spell that could slow a person down. This spell had another terrifying bit to it; once its target was attacked, the effect of the curse would ﬂare up, injuring him even more.

After casting this spell, Huo Yuhao’s chanting became even more resounding. As his strange chants continued to ring out, the illusory ﬁgure of light behind him became even clearer. One could faintly see that this ﬁgure was precisely the Divine Law of Necromancy, Calamity Necromancer Electrolux! Naturally, only Huo Yuhao was able to identify him. Everyone else could only see the blurry image of an old man.

The strength of a necromantic spell was normally proportional to the length of its chant. The longer the chant, the stronger the spell would be.

An intense sense of crisis enveloped 98. However, he currently had no way of taking Huo Yuhao out. That headless zombie was simply too quick, and not only did it not fear death, it was even as tough as steel. The most he could do with the soul tools he’d crafted during this tournament was push it back, or even injure it somewhat. However, he wouldn’t be able to take it out. 98 also understood that he needed to use a few abilities which were speciﬁcally strong against the zombie to take it out. However, how was he to ﬁnd a soul tool that was speciﬁcally strong against it right now?

Huo Yuhao’s strange chanting was like a voodoo curse to him. As his expression kept changing, 98 suddenly rolled on the ground, dodging the headless zombie’s charge. Right after that, a ray of light erupted behind his back. The powerful momentum created by the soul thrusters on his back sent him ﬂying straight towards Huo Yuhao.

At the same time, he activated a golden Invincible Barrier, and a pitch-black dagger appeared in his hand.

This dagger was a corrosive decomposition dagger, a close- combat Class 4 soul tool. Upon striking one’s target, this dagger would quickly corrode and decompose an opponent’s body and outer defenses, all the way until it pierced its target.

98 wasn’t just a soul engineer who specialised in long-range attacks; he was somewhat capable in the ﬁeld of close-combat as well!

Faced with the headless zombie’s incessant interruptions, he realised that if this continued, he’d be ﬁnished if Huo Yuhao used even a single soul skill. As such, he was forced to take a risk out of desperation. Glancing at Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair- bound self, he knew that as long as he could get close to the latter and interrupt his mysterious chanting, he’d be able to end the ﬁght. As long his Invincible Barrier was around, the headless zombie wouldn’t be able to injure him either.

The headless zombie was exceptionally strong and tough, but it didn’t have any abilities beyond these two physical traits. Even though it was chasing ninety-eight from behind with all its might, it wasn’t capable of stopping someone who was travelling at full speed using soul thrusters.

How large could the tournament stage be? Almost immediately after using his soul thruster, ninety-eight reached Huo Yuhao. He swung his sword qi-ﬁlled blade downwards, straight at Huo Yuhao’s head. When he did so, he saw a trace of regret ﬂit through Huo Yuhao’s eyes, before an enormous shield suddenly appeared and blocked his entire line of sight.

“Chi—” A dark green layer of light instantly rose from the shield’s surface. Ninety-eight gazed at it expectantly, ready for his corrosive decomposing dagger to pierce straight through the shield. To his astonishment however, his dagger was the one that seemed to corrode when it came in contact with the shield; it was as if the tip of his knife had been dulled.

Immediately afterwards, a ring of light lit up on the shield’s surface and sent ninety-eight’s body ﬂying like a cannon shell.

This was a Class 7 soul tool known as the Adjudication Shield. Huo Yuhao had ﬁnally ﬁnished it after ten hours of hard work and the use of his Life Guardian Blade.

Of the three abilities it had, two—reﬂection and absorption— could only be used on material objects; they were useless against anything energy based. Its last ability, on the other hand, was called ‘Adjudication.’ Just like its other two abilities, it could only be used on objects.

However, Adjudication was an ability that had been passed on by the Life Guardian Blade. If used, it would instantly absorb the life force of any substance it was currently in contact with and destroy it. This ability was capable of affecting any and all soul tools Class 7 and below, and was still somewhat useful against soul tools above Class 7, albeit with reduced effectiveness. This could be considered a godlike ability for soul engineers who specialised in close-combat. With this shield in hand, why would Huo Yuhao be afraid of any opponents getting close to him?

He hadn’t stopped chanting since the start of the battle. Following this brief interlude, Huo Yuhao’s chanting had already lasted for over ten seconds.

Finally, his chanting came to an end. When he did, his eyes had been tinted dark purple, and the enormous ﬁgure behind him froze momentarily. Immediately afterwards, Huo Yuhao raised his right hand and pointed at ninety-eight. The moment he did so, a dark purple light covered ninety- eight’s skin. Surprisingly, even his Invincible Barrier hadn’t been able to block Huo Yuhao’s necromantic magic. As soon as the dark purple light covered his body, Ninety-eight let out a miserable howl despite being inside of his golden Invincible Barrier; he felt as if every inch of his body was melting.

By channelling all of the soul power in his body, he found that the most he could do was slow the melting.

Once he’d ﬁnished casting this spell, Huo Yuhao’s face turned somewhat pale. With the experience he’d gained from casting a few spells, he’d discovered that necromantic spells mainly relied on his spiritual power; they didn’t drain much of his soul power.

However, his specialty was precisely his spiritual power! His current spiritual power was comparable in prowess to that of a Soul Douluo. And yet, even with this level of spiritual power, casting that necromantic spell had instantly cost him nearly a third of his total spiritual power. The strength of his necromantic magic could be seen from this. This was Withering, an extremely powerful single-target magic. It directly struck the target’s spiritual plane, in turn igniting the target’s life force. This would create a mysterious elemental transformation that lead to the target melting from within.

Regardless of how much strength one possessed, one could only use the energy within their body to resist Huo Yuhao’s Withering. If they were incapable of doing so, they’d wither away and die. Moreover, Withering lasted for a full minute!

Seeing that the situation wasn’t going too well, the Third Elder, who was seated in the middle of the VIP lounge, couldn’t wait any longer. He stood up and shouted, “Ninety-eight admits defeat. Quickly end your skill.”

With a ﬂash of light, the Third Elder then appeared above the stage and ﬂoated there.

Huo Yuhao shivered inwardly; he truly had gone somewhat overboard with his performance today. Fortunately, he’d only used his necromantic abilities. “Who are you? What gives you the right to make a decision for him?” Huo Yuhao asked indifferently.

If the Third Elder didn’t care about the Duskwater Alliance’s reputation, he would’ve charged straight towards the soul barrier. Instead, he shouted, “I’m his teacher. I mean what I say! You’d better end your attack right now!”

“Sure.” Huo Yuhao didn’t insist on continuing. The elder standing in midair had to be at least a Soul Douluo; he was an existence that he couldn’t handle yet.

He pointed his ﬁnger at ninety-eight and ended his Withering. Feeling as if his skin had suddenly turned to mud, the latter immediately crumpled. The omnipresent feeling that his skin was melting had ﬁlled ninety-eight's heart with fear.

In reality, the pain he’d felt had just been a false sensation. So long as his soul power didn’t run out, Withering wouldn’t turn him into a withered corpse. That terrifying feeling he’d had was simply one of Withering’s effects. After all, it was mainly an attack directed at his soul. Following the death of Electrolux, Huo Yuhao was the only person in the world capable of using necromantic spells. Who in the world could have experience against these sorts of attacks?

Huo Yuhao looked towards the three stunned referees and proudly stated, “I’ve won. Bring my rewards to me.”

As soon as the the defensive barrier had been lowered, the Third Elder quickly walked over to ninety-eight and helped him up. After checking his body over and ensuring that he was unharmed, he let out a sigh of relief. When he turned back to Huo Yuhao, his gaze was somewhat astonished.

The three referees had already stepped onto the stage. However, they didn’t walk towards Huo Yuhao. Instead, they hesitantly looked towards the Third Elder.

At that moment, another elder stepped onto the stage. This was the person who’d previously been called ‘Second Elder’ in the VIP lounge. “Your subordinates greet the alliance master.” The referees all simultaneously bowed towards the Second Elder.

“Get up. Why haven’t you given our little friend his rewards? Our Duskwater Alliance has always prided itself on its honesty, and would never go back on its word.” The Second Elder, who was also the Duskwater Alliance Master, had a stately appearance. After combing his white hair behind his head, he put an amiable smile on his face. This, combined with his ﬂuttering white beard, made it so that he gave off a good impression to anyone meeting him for the ﬁrst time.

The moment he spoke, the three referees didn’t dare to dally any longer. They quickly walked over to Huo Yuhao and handed over both the Hongchen’s Blessing and the Darkness Green Dragon.

“No, you can’t give it to him! That’s my Darkness Green Dragon!” Ninety-eight had ﬁnally woken up at this point. When he saw what was happening, he immediately got to his feet and charged over.

Huo Yuhao raised his right hand and pointed it at ninety- eight. The latter’s face immediately became pale, and he ducked to the side.

Huo Yuhao smirked. “Not anymore. If you’re willing to bet, you also have to be willing to admit defeat. Are you trying to renege on your bet in front of so many people?”

The Third Elder’s face immediately turned somewhat ugly. He grabbed Ninety-eight, who was still trying to charge over, and slapped him. “Was losing face in front of everyone here not enough? Follow me back.”

With that, he dragged ninety-eight off-stage and vanished without a trace.

The master of the Duskwater Alliance smiled as he stood on the stage. “Hello, young friend. I’m the owner of the Duskwater Alliance. You can call me Nangong Wan.”

Nangong Wan? Huo Yuhao was somewhat astonished when he heard his name; he’d thought that Nangong Wan was a girl’s name. “Greetings, alliance master Nangong. I’m delighted to meet you.” He’d ﬁnally attracted the upper echelon of the Duskwater Alliance’s attention. Although he couldn’t see anything from the surface, the fact that he was speaking so amiably to him after seeing his necromantic magic said a lot about him.

Nangong Wan didn’t say much more. He turned towards the three referees, “Alright, go ahead and announce the end of the tournament.”

“Yes.” The referee loudly announced, “After a heated contest, the Duskwater Alliance’s top three in this year’s Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament have been decided. These three are sixty-six, eighty-eight, and ninety-six. Besides the prizes they’ll be receiving today, they’ll also receive the opportunity to represent our Duskwater Alliance in the ﬁnal tournament against the other two alliances.”

With this, the tournament had ﬁnally ended. There were both happy and disappointed people. Some of the gamblers who’d been daring enough to place bets on Huo Yuhao began to cheer loudly; others, who’d bet on the wrong person, could only hang their heads dejectedly. Nangong Wan walked over to Huo Yuhao and smiled. “Young friend, could we have a little chat?”

Huo Yuhao expression became vigilant and he said, “There’s nothing we have to discuss. I’ve only come here to win the prize. If you want to have a chat with me, come and so when I’m the overall champion. Now then, according to the rules of the tournament, I’ll be taking away this shield I’ve made.” Even as he spoke, he was already looking towards the prize below the stage with a greedy glint in his eyes.

Nangong Wan smiled slightly. “Naturally that’s ﬁne. Since younger brother isn’t willing to talk right now, we’ll have a nice chat after you win the overall tournament representing our Duskwater Alliance. There’s something that I’d like to tell you in advance, though. If you win this honor for our Duskwater Alliance, we’ll give you an additional reward on top of the reward from the overall tournament.”

“That’s better.” Huo Yuhao answered. At this point, He Caitou had already stepped onto the stage and started pushing his wheelchair forwards so that he could claim his prize. Nangong Wan squinted as he looked at Huo Yuhao, revealing a somewhat thoughtful expression.

All of the doors in the Golden Hall were now wide open, allowing the various gamblers to walk out. After watching the tournament for an entire night, everybody felt lethargic.

Once they’d retrieved their prizes, Huo Yuhao, He Caitou, Wang Dong’er, and Na Na all walked back to the Qing Se Hotel.

Huo Yuhao suddenly squinted and said, “Little Dong, take me back towards that pub we went to last time. After taking two hundred and ﬁfty six steps, take a left into the alleyway. Quick.”

Wang Dong’er didn’t utter a word. She naturally understood why Huo Yuhao was so nervous, thus she chose not to inquire about the abilities he’d used earlier. She continued forward as per his instructions.

Huo Yuhao closed his eyes and didn’t say a word.

After exactly two hundred and ﬁfty six steps, Wang Dong’er took a sudden left, and was closely followed by He Caitou and Na Na.

This was a pitch-black alleyway with no street lamps present. The moment that the four of them were enveloped in the darkness, all traces of them vanished.

------

Qing Se Hotel, Underground, VIP Lounge... “Teacher, I was wrong.” Ninety-eight kneeled in front of the Third Elder with an ashamed look on his face. His expression was ﬁlled with regret and pain. Now that he'd lost his ranked carving knife, his soul engineer abilities had decreased by at least twenty percent. The Darkness Green Dragon had been a priceless treasure!

The Third Elder looked at him calmly and silently. Ninety-six was also quietly kneeling next to him with his head lowered.

Besides the three of them, the Duskwater Alliance Master Nangong Wan, the mysterious vice-founder, and a few other middle-aged men were also present in the VIP lounge.

“Vice-founder, what did you think of that youth?” Nangong Wang asked in a low voice.

A mysterious glint appeared in the vice-founder’s greyish- blue eyes. “He’s very intriguing. He feels just like what we’ve been looking for.”

Nangong Wan was astonished. “Are you saying that he could be…?”

The vice-founder nodded his head slightly. “Yes, it’s that sort of mysterious feeling. You didn’t notice it, but earlier, his soul rings suddenly changed. He originally had ﬁve of them, but they suddenly changed into a single one—a never-before-seen grey soul ring. You have to realize that not even the founder

and I can violate the rules of the Douluo Continent. We still have to have the same soul rings as other soul masters. And yet, he’s let us see something that blatantly goes against these rules: A gray soul ring, and one that’s very unique at that. This grey soul ring of his let him use at least three different abilities in a row. If every single one of those abilities were soul skills, that grey soul ring is incredibly special. Meaningful... this youth is very meaningful.”

Nangong Wan said, “I’ve sent people to shadow him. Let’s just see where he’s heading for now, and who he’s related to. Since he’s dared to use these abilities in front of us without any misgivings, he deﬁnitely has some kind of power backing him. He deﬁnitely has another identity; he’s just using the more ordinary martial soul of his twin martial souls to hide his evil one. Only, we don’t know what his evil martial soul is.”

The vice-founder said, “You did very well today by not inadvertently alerting him. I’ll immediately report this to the founder and see what his decision is.”

“Yes.”

The moment he said this, a black-clothed man quickly entered the room and whispered a few words to Nangong Wan.

“Trash!” Nangong Wan said coldly.

The vice-founder’s eyes twitched.

Nangong Wang said, somewhat embarrassedly, “My men lost all traces of him after they took a turn into a rather dim alleyway. Go call Chen An over.”

“Yes.” The black-clothed man withdrew, trembling as he did so. After a few moments, Chen An quickly entered into the room and kneeled. “I pay my respects to the alliance master.”

The fact that Chen An had been able to become the manager of the Golden Hall naturally meant that Nangong Wan trusted him deeply. The latter furrowed his brows. “Tell me everything that you know about sixty-six.”

Chen An’s trust for Huo Yuhao had grown even more after seeing his terrifying power in the tournament earlier. He also knew that the alliance master would have a few inquiries after witnessing the earlier scene, thus he’d prepared a few things to say. He hurriedly replied, “This sixty-six and his brother eighty-eight piqued my interest the moment they walked in…”

He then began to describe to Nangong Wan how Huo Yuhao had killed a person in the Golden Hall, and how he’d been betting alongside his participation in the competition. By telling ninety-percent of the full story and throwing in a few ﬁbs, he was able to deftly hide the deeper relationship between him and Huo Yuhao. Naturally, he wouldn’t mention the fact that Huo Yuhao had asked him to help buy a few rare metals.

After listening to his explanation, Nangong Wan turned towards the vice-founder with a much better expression on his face. “Based on what I’ve seen, this Tang Wu’s main objectives are to make some money and obtain some rare metals. It’ll be easier for us to talk to him if we have something that he wants from us. He’ll deﬁnitely come again for the ﬁnal competition. At that time, why don’t I have a chat with him and bring him in?” The vice-founder nodded. “I’ll observe him in passing on that day. Once I get back, I’ll see what the founder thinks of him. Maybe the founder will even come to take a look at him in person. I hope that he’s the person we’ve been looking for all this time.”

------

Brilliant Delight Hotel...

The door opened noiselessly, and a formless ﬁgure quickly entered before quietly shutting the door.

Only after the day had closed did four ﬁgures emerge from within the void. The light surrounding them distorted slightly, after which everything returned to normal.

He Caitou, Na Na, and Wang Dong’er turned towards Huo Yuhao.

Naturally, Huo Yuhao knew that the three of them were ﬁlled with questions. After pondering for a moment, he said, “Do the three of you trust me? If you do, don’t ask. If I wanted to lie to you, I could’ve just told you that I used Imitation to do that, but I didn’t. What I can tell you, however, is that I’m not an evil soul master.”

He Caitou patted Huo Yuhao on the shoulder and took off his mask, disguise, and coat. “I’m tired. I’m going to rest. Junior brother, you should rest too.” He used his actions to show his trust in Huo Yuhao.

“Second brother, this is for you.” Huo Yuhao tossed a dark- green bundle towards him.

He Caitou’s eyes lit up. He didn’t decline and grabbed the Darkness Green Dragon. “Thanks, junior brother.” With that, he left the room with a smile on his face.

Na Na nodded, “Yeah, the sun’s gonna rise soon. I’m tired too. Master, you should get a good rest. Then, I’ll be going.” In reality, Na Na knew a few things about Huo Yuhao’s earlier actions because he’d previously helped cleanse her father and mother’s souls. As such, she knew that he was somewhat capable in the ﬁeld of souls. “They’ve left. Close the door.”

Wang Dong’er helped Huo Yuhao take off his disguise. “Yuhao, I don’t agree.”

“Hmm?” Her confusing sentence left Huo Yuhao stunned. “What don’t you agree to?”

Wang Dong’er looked deeply into his eyes, and a rare unyielding look appeared in her beautiful eyes.

“I don’t agree to you trying to enter the inner ring of the Holy Ghost Church. I can ignore the origins of that power of yours, but you’d better be clear that I will absolutely not agree to you entering the inner ring of the Holy Ghost Church.”

Huo Yuhao’s entire body shook, and he looked towards Wang Dong’er with a stunned expression. “You, how did you know?”

Wang Dong’er pushed his wheelchair over to his bed, then helped him take off his clothes. After that, she helped him onto the bed and laid him down. Afterwards, she took off her coat, buried herself in his blanket, and hugged Huo Yuhao tightly.

“I didn’t realize what you were trying to do at ﬁrst, but I ﬁnally understood after seeing that special ability you used earlier. You weren’t just trying to obtain rare metals by participating in this underground tournament; that’s just one of your objectives. Your true objective is to utilize the relationship between the Duskwater Alliance and the Holy Ghost Church to sneak in. Am I right? It’s because of that ability of yours that’s similar to that of an evil soul master that you feel so conﬁdent. You knew from early on that the people from the Holy Ghost Church wouldn’t do anything to you after they saw your abilities.”

Huo Yuhao sighed lightly. “You’re too smart, Dong’er.”

Wang Dong’er hugged him tightly and said in an abnormally stern voice, “Therefore, I don’t agree. Even though you have your Imitation, and even though I can help you disguise yourself, don’t you know that there are too many people in the Holy Ghost Church who’re familiar with you? There’s no need to mention anyone else—even Teacher Xiao Ya can easily recognize you. Do you really think that you can escape from such a powerful organization once your cover’s blown?”

Huo Yuhao became silent for a moment. “Someone has to do it. The most terrifying thing about the Holy Ghost Church isn’t their strength, but the secrets they hold. We don’t know how the Holy Ghost Church is structured, nor how strong they really are. In a situation like this, we’re taking them on blind.

The day that the Holy Ghost Church decides to make their appearance, we’ll be faced with the threat of destruction. I can practically guarantee you that they only have two targets—the Body Sect, and Shrek Academy!

“The academy has given us so much, thus I want to do something for the academy. Don’t worry. Once I’ve obtained a basic understanding of their inner workings, I’ll get out. You of all people should know that I do things properly.”

Huo Yuhao was still trying to console Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er ﬁercely got up and pressed down on Huo Yuhao’s body, leaving mere inches between her and him as she stared him in the eye. She emphasised each word clearly as she said, “Since I’ve said that you can’t do it, you can’t do it. Your life is mine; it belongs to me, Wang Dong’er. You can go if you want, but only over my dead body!” As Huo Yuhao gazed into the stubborn and unyielding look in her eyes, he felt her warm body press against his. Wang Dong’er’s body was very soft, and it seemed as though the two of them had fused together as she lay on top of him.

Huo Yuhao raised his right hand and wrapped it around Wang Dong’er’s slender waist, sighing gently. “Dong’er, huu…”

Without giving him the chance to utter a word, Wang Dong’er domineeringly kissed his lips, locking the words he wanted to say away.

Huo Yuhao eyes’ widened after feeling Wang Dong’er’s slightly awkward kiss, but his lips softly melted into hers immediately afterwards.

Huo Yuhao shut his eyes and simply held onto her waist. At this moment, the only thing he wanted to do was enjoy her tenderness.

Just like this, the two of them continued to tightly hug each other. Their kiss lasted for a long, long time... “Promise me, okay?” Wang Dong’er lightly panted as she lay on his chest. Her voice had become soft, but now made him want to act tenderly towards her.

“Okay, I promise.” Huo Yuhao sighed lightly. In the end, he’d conceded to her again.

Wang Dong’er immediately raised her head excitedly. “Really? You’re not allowed to go back on your word.”

“Yup.” Huo Yuhao smiled at her.

Wang Dong’er excitedly moved upwards and tightly hugged his neck with a happy expression.

Chapter 312: The World of Specters

After a moment, Huo Yuhao said, “Help me up, Dong’er. I want to cultivate for a while.”

Wang Dong’er was momentarily stunned. This was the ﬁrst time that Huo Yuhao had wanted to cultivate in the midst of them having an intimate moment.

“You’ve tired yourself enough for today. You gave Shrek Academy a hand after our own match, and you participated in another soul tool contest afterwards. You should take a break.”

Huo Yuhao replied, “The abilities that I just used were left to me by my teacher. I suddenly feel that another seal has been released in my spiritual sea, and I think that my teacher has left something for me. Otherwise, there was no way I could’ve defeated a Class 6 soul engineer so easily. I need to see what my teacher’s left for me.”

“Oh. Then, don’t work yourself too hard.” Wang Dong’er sat up and then helped Huo Yuhao sit up. “You aren’t angry, are you?” Wang Dong’er blinked owlishly at him. Her long eyelashes were so close to his face that they were subtly brushing it.

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “Kiss me and I won’t be.”

Wang Dong’er immediately kissed him on the cheek without hesitation. Her face turned a little red and she said, “Will that do? I know that my decision will ruin your plans, but you have to understand that I will follow you if something happens to you. I know that you’d risk your own life for me as well.”

Huo Yuhao patted her head lovingly, as if he were indulging a child. “I know that.”

Wang Dong’er shifted his numb legs and helped him sit up with his legs crossed. Huo Yuhao closed his eyes and gradually entered meditation.

He was quite exhausted, but it was actually easier for him to focus his attention because he was. As such, he quickly entered his meditative state. As Huo Yuhao’s consciousness submerged into his spiritual sea, he directly opened the partial memories that had been unsealed.

Memories instantly ﬂooded forth, and slowly merged together with his own. A projection appeared in his spiritual sea at the same time.

“Teacher!” Huo Yuhao became excited when he saw the projection. Wasn’t this a projection of the Calamity Necromancer Electrolux?

Electrolux’s white clothes ﬂuttered atop his translucent body, but he wore a faint smile on his face as he looked at Huo Yuhao. He calmly said, “I’m very happy that you’re able to see this, Yuhao. The fact that you can means that your spiritual power has become strong enough for you to absorb what I have to teach you.”

Huo Yuhao’s excited emotions instantly settled down as if he’d been splashed with cold water. He had no doubt that this was something his teacher had left behind before he’d passed away, and that this was just a projection based on his spiritual imprint, not Electrolux himself.

Huo Yuhao forced himself to focus, and listened intently to Electrolux’s words.

“Yuhao, I’ve hesitated for a long time, and have debated on whether or not I should pass my necromancy to you. After all, necromancy is considered evil to many people due to its relation with death, corpses, and spirits. Many humans will naturally develop a sense of fear towards necromancy. I’ve thought long and hard about it, and about you as well. In the end, I’ve decided to teach them to you anyway.

“Necromancy is only one branch of the magic contained within my world, and it’s not a frightening thing at all. Furthermore, it’s the type of sorcery that’s closest to a human’s origin and essence. Everything about necromancy stems from life. In fact, the ﬁrst breakthroughs in necromancy were made so that humans could prolong their own life—so that they could ﬁght against the laws of nature. However, when humans dove deeper into necromancy, some necromancers went down a different path, choosing to slowly deviate from the original path. They relied on necromancy to strengthen themselves, and proceeded to kill other living beings in order to steal their life energy in order to do so. “I was once a mighty necromancer. In the beginning, I possessed the element of light, and was adept with all sorts of light-type magic spells. However, I became ﬁlled with vengeance and hatred after certain things happened to me, thus I delved into necromancy by relying on my talents and opened up a whole new path for myself—light-based necromancy. I won’t tell you the unfortunate events that I’ve had to go through, but before you can completely receive my teachings on necromancy, you must remember that necromancy is dangerous because of its strength, and because of its forbidden realms. If you descend into the darkness within necromancy, you will be destroyed by it. You can practice necromancy, but your heart must still be shrouded in light. These are the words that I shall imprint into the deepest regions of your soul so that you won’t be blinded by revenge nor hatred no matter where you are. I don’t hope for necromancy to be spread or gloriﬁed by your hands; my only wish is that my lineage will continue.

“I’ve studied and perceived your world closely, and realized that your world is different from my own: In my world, the existence of gods is equivalent to your spirit reaching such an extremely high level that it evolves. When that happens, you will drift illusorily through space, as if your body has been transformed into countless elements, and you won’t be able to control anything about yourself anymore. However, in your world, there seems to be a special energy that takes you to another realm once you reach that level. This is actually becoming a god, but it’s a pity that I won’t live to see you reach that level. If that day does occur, please keep my necromancy as part of your abilities. That is my greatest wish.

“My most profound and sophisticated spells have been integrated into your memory. You’ll be able to use them as long as you continue increasing your spiritual power. At ﬁrst glance, light and necromancy may seem to be at odds with each other, but in truth, all things can be connected together so long as you ﬁnd something that they have in common—somewhere where both things intersect. And that concept is life for light and necromancy.

“Only when light shines on the world do we have life. Sunlight and water have been the most important things for life and survival since the oldest days of humanity. On the other hand, necromancy studies the power of death. One is about life, while the other is about death. But the truth is, they’re just focused on opposite ends of life. Life and death aren’t mutually exclusive, and under certain circumstances, they’ll even be attracted to each other, and can be alternated between one another.”

“...”

Huo Yuhao listened quietly to Electrolux’s teachings, and slowly perceived all of the complex and sophisticated necromancies kept within his memories. He felt as if he’d entered another world.

He’d always wanted to learn more about necromancy from Electrolux. However, Electrolux had only taught him some foundational things before, and even then had barely scratched the surface. It was only at this moment, when the lineage and teachings that Electrolux had left for him were ofﬁcially unsealed, that he truly understood how unfathomable and mystical necromancy was.

Furthermore, Huo Yuhao gradually came to understand what his grey soul ring represented.

What Electrolux had left for him wasn’t as simple as information and lessons—it also included a necromantic framework that Electrolux had personally created. Huo Yuhao had to use the energy within his own body as the foundation when he used necromancy, followed by his spiritual power to perceive the element of light between heaven and earth. He had to do everything in tandem and in resonance with his life origin to do anything at all.

Huo Yuhao could no longer use his other martial souls when using necromancy. His grey soul ring represented the necromancy framework that Electrolux had left behind for him, though it wasn’t actually a soul ring.

However, from a pragmatic perspective, possessing Electrolux’s necromancy teachings was equivalent to having a third martial soul. And yet, it wasn’t a martial soul—it was superior to one. This “martial soul” couldn’t be boosted with soul rings, but it would become stronger alongside Huo Yuhao’s soul power and spiritual power.

According to Electrolux’s explanation, a necromancer’s life energy and life force were exceptionally important. Life force was presented as soul power in this world.

This was because necromancy would cause a negative backlash tp the necromancer’s own body when practiced. Furthermore, necromancy spells that relied on the power of light required continuous resonance through life. Huo Yuhao possessed Life Gold, so he didn’t lack life energy, which in turn was one of the most important reasons why Electrolux had been willing to pass his necromancy on to him. Electrolux had previously told Huo Yuhao that the reason necromancers were considered evil was mostly because necromancers didn’t have enough life energy to continuously practice necromancy, which was why they had to extract life energy from other living beings. This process was cruel and full of bloodshed, thus it was natural that other people would misunderstand.

------

It was midday the following day when Huo Yuhao awoke up from his meditation. He was still a little fatigued despite just waking up. Fortunately, they’d already competed yesterday, so he had an entire day to rest up. Tomorrow was the ﬁnal round of the round robin section, and the Tang Sect was up against Shrek Academy.

“Are you alright, Yuhao?” Wang Dong’er asked concernedly. She’d just walked out of the bathroom and seen that Huo Yuhao’s face was a little pale.

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “I’m alright, I’m just mentally exhausted. I’ve gained so much. Do you remember when I told you that I had a teacher from another world? The truth is that what you guys saw yesterday and the abilities that I used weren’t those of an evil soul master. They came from this teacher of mine, and he calls it necromancy.”

“Necromancy?” Wang Dong’er stared at Huo Yuhao in surprise.

Huo Yuhao nodded and replied, “Yes, it’s called necromancy. Initially, I thought necromancy was no different from an evil soul master’s abilities. To be honest, I’ve always been quite against necromancy, which is why I don’t typically use it. However, I understood a lot more now that I’ve absorbed the memories that my teacher left behind for me. I’ve understood that necromancy, an evil soul master’s abilities, and any force in the world aren’t inherently wrong per se. The only difference lies in whether the use is suitable, and is dependent on the user’s personality and state of mind. These two things form the crux of the issue.”

Wang Dong’er nodded and said, “As long as you remember who you are.”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and replied, “You’re everything that I am. I’m hungry, dear.”

“Let’s go grab a bite to eat.”

Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao into the canteen. When they entered the canteen, Huo Yuhao was pleasantly surprised to see a familiar ﬁgure.

Bei Bei’s face was still a little pale, but he was nonetheless sitting alongside everyone else. Huo Yuhao immediately exclaimed excitedly when he saw him, “Eldest senior brother!”

Bei Bei smiled and said, “How are you feeling? You must be quite exhausted from yesterday. From what I hear, you haven’t even had breakfast yet.” Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao next to Bei Bei and then sat down next to him.

Huo Yuhao asked, “How are your wounds, eldest senior brother?”

Bei Bei answered, “Both the aura and darkness energy have ﬁnally been completely expelled. I should be alright once I recover some of my vitality.”

“That’s fantastic!” Huo Yuhao said animatedly, “I can ﬁnally heave a sigh of relief. I’ll be a lot more relaxed with you around to lead our company of eight.”

Bei Bei smiled faintly and said, “I’m afraid that it’ll be quite difﬁcult for you to relax. We’ll be facing off against Shrek Academy’s team tomorrow. What do you have in mind?”

Huo Yuhao pondered momentarily, before saying, “I was just about to discuss this with everyone. We’re stronger than they are when it comes to overall ﬁghting strength, but I want to let them come out on top as we enter the next round just in case. If we do that, their opponents in the quarterﬁnals will be relatively weaker.”

There would be four different matches in the quarter-ﬁnals. Even though the matchups in the quarter-ﬁnals had yet to be determined. However, all it took to decide them was a simple lottery, and all four quarter-ﬁnal matches would consist of the number-one of one group against the number-two of the second group. This also meant that, if the Tang Sect progressed as the second-place team in their group, they’d be matched against a team that had topped the table in their group. Following this reasoning, there was a one-in-three chance that the Tang Sect would come up against the Holy Ghost Sect in the quarter-ﬁnals.

However, if Shrek Academy topped the table and entered the quarterﬁnals, they’d be up against a second-placed team from another group, which would greatly reduce their burden.

Bei Bei turned to his companions and said, “Tell me what you guys think.”

Jiang Nannan was the ﬁrst to speak. “I stand by my words. We belong to Shrek, thus we’re all part of their team. No matter how far we go this time, we’ve already gained the glory and honor that we deserve. However, Shrek Academy’s team has to reach the ﬁnals to keep their glory and honor. I agree with Huo Yuhao’s suggestion.”

She turned around to face Xu Sanshi after her comment.

Xu Sanshi felt a little helpless. “Why’re you looking at me?

Am I not from Shrek Academy as well? I agree with you.”

“Agreed.” He Caitou’s answer was a lot simpler.

“I agree.” Xiao Xiao was a little louder than usual, but she fully displayed her determination.

Wang Dong’er nodded and chimed in, “I agree.”

Bei Bei smiled and said, “Alright, it’s settled then. We shall take these few days to adjust our conditions, especially you, Yuhao. Even if I take part in the battle, you’re still the core of the team, as well as Shrek’s Seven Monsters’ mastermind.” “Alright.” Huo Yuhao nodded.

“Let’s dig in.” Bei Bei continued with a smile on his face, as their sumptuous meals were already laid out on the dining table.

------

With Bei Bei ﬁnally feeling better, everybody was in a good mood today. This meal was especially enjoyable for everyone.

Bei Bei called Huo Yuhao into his room after the meal.

“How’s it going with the soul engineer’s tournament, Yuhao?” Bei Bei inquired.

Huo Yuhao glanced at Wang Dong’er beside him before brieﬂy recounting their participation in the soul engineer’s tournament. Bei Bei listened quietly to his description; he didn’t even interrupt when Huo Yuhao mentioned necromancy. “You want to go undercover?” Bei Bei asked doubtfully.

Huo Yuhao nodded and answered, “I do. But Dong’er thinks that that will be too dangerous, thus she stopped me.”

Bei Bei said, “That’s for the best, because it is too dangerous. I know that you want to ﬁnd out and investigate what’s going on in their inner circle, but the Holy Ghost Church has already displayed strength beyond what we can deal with. They’re simply too powerful; we don’t stand a chance. Furthermore, mobility is a problem for you, and your wheelchair is too conspicuous. Even if you can put on makeup and change your appearance, it won’t be hard for them to connect the dots if you appear too many times. This is especially true now that we’re likely to ﬁght the Holy Ghost Sect’s team after this. You shouldn’t attend the grand ﬁnals. Rather, since you’ve already raised their suspicions, you should just disappear for now.”

Huo Yuhao frowned slightly and said, “I don’t think that’s necessary, eldest senior brother. The Duskwater Alliance still needs me to ﬁght for them in the soul engineer tournament. Furthermore, they want to rope me into their organization as well, so they won’t use force against me unless it’s as a last resort. I shouldn’t have any problems ﬁnishing the last round of the tournament if I respond correctly and adapt to the circumstances. The ﬁnal prize is a Class 9 soul tool! That’s not something that can be measured with money.”

Bei Bei replied solemnly, “You can’t place your life on the line for money.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and shook his head. “I have conﬁdence, eldest senior brother. Second senior brother and Dong’er will come with me when the time comes. Even if I don’t consider my life, I still have to take their lives into account, right?”

Bei Bei stared at Huo Yuhao with a surprised expression. “Where is this conﬁdence of yours coming from, little junior brother?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “Eldest senior brother, I mentioned the things that I did when I was recounting yesterday’s events to you because I don’t wish to hide this from you... I obtained a very unique ability through a miraculous encounter. It can be counted as my third martial soul in a sense, and it has bestowed certain special abilities upon me. This special ability doesn’t belong to our world, which is why I have the conﬁdence to escape with my life whenever I’m in danger. I did intend to take a risk when I went undercover before yesterday, but after consolidating these unique abilities last night, I don’t think that I’m taking a risk anymore. Dong’er, I said the same thing to you. If you’re too concerned about me, I can simply take you along with me when I go undercover.”

Wang Dong’er felt a little curious when she heard his words. She knew very well that Huo Yuhao would never mess around whenever her life was concerned, which meant that he must be extremely conﬁdent if he could make such an endeavor sound so riskless.

“You promised me last night!” Wang Dong’er’s pretty eyebrows knitted up as she stared at Huo Yuhao with indignant eyes.

Huo Yuhao grasped her hand and said, “Listen to me, Dong’er. I wish to go undercover not just to investigate the Holy Ghost Church, but also to ﬁnd a way to save teacher Xiao Ya. Nobody but me is more suitable for this job amongst the few of us, and that’s because I’m the only one that has the ability to go undercover in the Holy Ghost Church. Only I have absolute conﬁdence in convincing them that I’m an evil soul master. As for safety, how about this—I’d like you guys to see something.” A gloomy and cold aura suddenly erupted from Huo Yuhao’s body, followed by a peculiar grey soul ring rising from his feet in the next moment.

This was the ﬁrst time that Bei Bei had seen Huo Yuhao use necromancy, thus he watched closely with widened eyes as he perceived Huo Yuhao’s soul power undulations.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes became a faint grey color, and he pointed his right index ﬁnger outwards as he drew something in the air. A strange grey hexagram appeared and sparkled as it drifted to the ground. Gray light glowed from it the moment after it touched the ground, after which it consumed Huo Yuhao’s entire body and he vanished into thin air. Even his wheelchair was gone.

Wang Dong’er was as close as she could be to Huo Yuhao, and she was also incredibly familiar with his abilities. She could immediately tell that Huo Yuhao wasn’t using his Imitation or anything else to turn invisible—he’d actually disappeared for real!

A dense aura of light rose from Wang Dong’er’s body as her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings extended from her back. She ﬂapped her wings gently, and light-type soul power immediately permeated every corner of the room.

She didn’t feel anything at all; Huo Yuhao was truly no longer present inside of the room!

How is this possible? Instant Teleportation? Huo Yuhao does have that ability, but that’s one of his soul bone’s abilities. He mentioned before that he can’t use his other soul skills or soul bones when he’s practicing necromancy. How has he done this? He’s disappeared completely! It’s been more than ten seconds, and he doesn’t look like he’s going to appear yet either.

Just when Bei Bei and Wang Dong’er were beginning to feel more and more dumbfounded, the grey hexagram reappeared on the ground in the same spot. Grey light surged into the air in the next moment, and Huo Yuhao reappeared before the two of them amidst the grey light with a swoosh.

Bei Bei and Wang Dong’er exchanged a look, both of their gazes full of awe and astonishment. Bei Bei was the ﬁrst to blurt out, “What kind of ability was that?”

Huo Yuhao smiled and replied, “This ability is a little mystical, but you can consider it something that my otherworldly teacher left behind for me. Eldest senior brother, do you remember the ﬁrst time I met you and teacher Xiao Ya? I had ventured into the Great Star Dou Forest by myself back then, and when you guys found me, I was unconscious near the roadside. I’m not sure if you remember, but dark clouds hung over the Great Star Dou Forest during that time, and an intense spiritual presence ﬂashed through the forest.”

Huo Yuhao could tell from Bei Bei’s eyes that he was thinking hard. Bei Bei nodded after a moment and said, “I do remember something like that happening. We immediately followed you when we realized that you were heading towards the Great Star Dou Forest, but you were already unconscious when we found you.”

Huo Yuhao nodded. “Yes! I’d already fainted by then. But before I fainted, someone entered my mind. That person is the teacher that I’m talking about—the one from another world.”

“I’m still unsure even now where my teacher is from, and all I know is that he’s very powerful. He told me that his powers were almost godlike, but his spirit was shattered for some reason, and only a thread of his divine sense arrived on our world. It was coincidental that he entered my mind, and he would awaken from time to time inside my spiritual sea afterwards. Most of the time, he was in deep slumber. He began to impart an ability called necromancy to me.

“At Dong’er’s home some time afterwards, an energy inside my body was suddenly triggered. My teacher incinerated the last remnants of his divine sense to save me, and he’s now gone forever. However, he was the one that created the Spirit that you guys have seen, and he was the one that showed me how to sign that pact with my Spirit. Otherwise, how could I have innovated and invented this all by myself?”

Bei Bei had a look of revelation on his face. “So that’s the mystical story behind everything. No wonder I’ve always felt as if you had some deep and dark secret... so that’s what happened. What did you mean when you said this was something that your teacher left behind for you?” Huo Yuhao answered, “He said that there are actually many planes in this world. Every plane is a world on its own, and some share the same spacetime with us, while others don’t. Teacher used his own powerful abilities to create a relatively smaller world, which he called a demiplane. Before this, I used a spatial key that he had left behind to enter the demiplane that he had opened up. That wasn’t Instant Shift, as I did leave this world entirely. This also means that I can hide inside his demiplane whenever I’m in danger, and I may even be able to bring some people inside. That world is a very narrow and simple world, but it’s very safe.”

This was the ﬁrst time that Wang Dong’er or Bei Bei had heard of something like this, and they were astonished beyond measure. They almost found it impossible to accept that there was something so mystical and fantastical in this world, that other planes actually existed, and people could enter those planes by using certain methods.

Wang Dong’er asked curiously, “Yuhao, does that mean that both eldest senior brother and I can enter that demiplane you speak of?”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “But you guys have to be mentally prepared. The demiplane that my teacher created has its own rules, and he claimed it to be one of the most complete demiplanes. All that’s inside are my teacher’s specters, and they’ve been nourished inside for thousands of years. Not even he knew how powerful they’d become, and how many there are. The world is very dark and eerie, and it can’t be considered

absolutely safe.”

“That’s alright. Take me inside to have a look!” Wang Dong’er was eager to give it a try.

Huo Yuhao knew that he would have to prove to them that he had the ability to protect himself if he wanted to convince them to give him permission. He nodded and said, “Stand next to me. Let me try.”

Wang Dong’er and Bei Bei came up beside his wheelchair.

Huo Yuhao raised his hand and began drawing that gray hexagram once more.

Once they were close enough to him, both Bei Bei and Wang Dong’er could feel a chilly and sinister aura that made their hair stand on end when Huo Yuhao unleashed his third martial soul. It was an aura ﬁlled with deathly silence. Bei Bei’s sensations were the deepest, as he had been interacting intimately with an aura of death and darkness in recent days. He thought to himself, Little junior brother’s abilities are actually very similar to that of an evil soul master...

The hexagram that Huo Yuhao drew this time was a lot bigger than the previous one.

Gray light burst out as the enormous hexagram gradually descended to the ground. All three of them were completely enveloped when the intense gray light rose up once more.

The grey light ﬂickered, and they vanished into thin air.

---

Wang Dong’er and Bei Bei felt waves of intense dizziness, and everything around them seemed to twist and contort, as if it were about to be torn apart. Right at this moment, an icy-cold streak of air ﬂowed from Huo Yuhao and protected them, separating them from this agonizing sensation.

This process didn’t take long. They suddenly felt their bodies relax as they arrived inside another world.

Wang Dong’er and Bei Bei regained their senses, and saw that they were being protected by the grey streaks coming from Huo Yuhao’s body.

Huo Yuhao dispelled the grey air, and a cold wind gusted towards them. Wang Dong’er shivered from the cold, and only then did she look around at the world around her.

This was only Huo Yuhao’s second time inside this demiplane, and he was as curious as Wang Dong’er and Bei Bei were.

The lighting was dim in this world. There was a strange- looking sun hovering in the skies above. It was black all over, and shone with insidious purple light. Yes, the light was purple. This purple light wasn’t very strong, and was the reason why it was so dark and dim inside this demiplane.

The landscape was uneven, and not a single plant could be seen even if they gazed into the distance. The ground was black, and appeared as if it had been painted over with black ink, while cold and chilly auras surged from all directions.

There were some hills in front of them, and nothing else could be seen beyond that.

There was a large door behind them. They seemed to have entered through this door.

“This… is this really another world?” Wang Dong’er asked, astounded.

Huo Yuhao answered, “According to my teacher, this isn’t considered a world. The reason is because this place only has some ground, but it doesn’t have a sky. Our world is a planet, and it possesses complete biological chains. We will enter a boundless world as long as we progress into the sky, but this demiplane is a far cry from our world. There are only undead creatures in this place. Furthermore, this world has its boundaries, and its boundaries are designated by darkness and nothingness. Any creature in this world will be consumed by that darkness and nothingness if they step into it. I’ve

managed to bring us here with the spatial key that my teacher

left behind for me, and that refers to this large door behind us. We can only return to our own world through this door.”

Bei Bei asked, “What if the undead creatures in this world use this spatial key?”

Huo Yuhao answered without hesitation, “They will enter our world. This undead demiplane that my teacher created was built to make it convenient for him to summon undead creatures. I will use another method to explain, and then you guys will know how powerful my teacher was when he was still alive.”

“My teacher’s full name was ‘The Divine Law of Necromancy, the Calamity Necromancer Electrolux.’ His rationale for creating this undead demiplane was to investigate a certain branch of necromancy. According to the language that we speak on the Douluo Continent, he wanted to research a soul skill. He created this place so that he could perfect his necromancy. After thousands of years of nourishment, there are uncountable powerful undead creatures in this world.”

Bei Bei and Wang Dong’er didn’t really understand when Huo Yuhao droned on about magic and sorcery, but it was easier to understand when Huo Yuhao talked about soul skills.

One single person could create an entire world. Even though it was an incomplete demiplane, this feat was frightening enough. How horrifyingly powerful were his magics and sorceries?

Huo Yuhao stared at the fearful looks on their faces, and his eyes ﬂowed with a contemplating look. “You guys don’t have to be afraid, Dong’er, eldest senior brother. Necromancy is powerful, and especially so when it’s practiced at the level that my teacher was at. He was a Demigod, and necromancy at that level becomes so powerful that it’s almost impossible to believe. However, my teacher mentioned that no matter how powerful necromancers are, they have to use their own life energy to practice necromancy. My teacher used some special magic rituals to turn himself into a half-human and half- undead lich back then, but his body gradually declined and withered after using some exceptionally powerful spells. He told me that the abilities he imparted to me were only part of his own abilities. Despite that, these abilities are enough to be useful for an entire lifetime.”

Wang Dong’er said, “Can we walk a little further to look around, Yuhao?”

“Of course we can, but we have to be careful. We can encounter undead creatures at any time in this place.” He pushed his own wheelchair as he spoke. He faced the large door behind him, and chanted something under his breath before the large door transformed into a grey streak and entered his palm.

“Never move more than twenty steps away from me, as I can take care of you guys within this range. This is especially so for Dong’er, because your light-type abilities will be greatly weakened in this place, because the element of light doesn’t exist in this demiplane.”

Wang Dong’er was momentarily stunned, and hurriedly released her martial soul. Indeed, when her soul rings rose one after another from her feet, her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ wings that extended from her back turned entirely blue in color. Furthermore, they were dim and lightless, and the golden spots that were supposed to be on their surface became pale yellow patterns.

Wang Dong’er could clearly feel that her soul power was being consumed at an exponentially greater rate after she released her martial soul. Under such circumstances, she could only rely on her own soul power to use her soul skills, and she couldn’t draw upon any strength from the element of light in the air. Without the element of light, there was no way she could regenerate what she expended.

“That’s just incredible. It’s true!”

Bei Bei released his martial soul as well, but his situation was a lot better than Wang Dong’er’s situation. Six soul rings rose from the ground as lightning circulated around his body. Fine, compact scales covered his right arm and began to spread all over his body.

Bei Bei said, “I don’t feel any different in this place compared to our own world. The only difference is that the air seems to tremble and quiver, as if it’s been stimulated by my lightning.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and replied, “That’s very normal. From an elemental perspective, light and lightning are generally good counters against undead creatures. This place doesn’t have any light elements, so these undead creatures will become unnaturally powerful. However, there aren’t any restrictions on lighting-type abilities. Therefore, you will fare well against the undead creatures in this place, eldest senior brother.”

Huo Yuhao signaled for Wang Dong’er to continue pushing his wheelchair as he spoke.

They quickly headed up a nearby hill...

Chapter 313: Qiu'er and Dong'er's Duel

The ground was very ﬂat and smooth in this world. More accurately put, this place didn’t seem like an actual world at all, as there were no plants at all!

They immediately saw something that made their skins crawl when they reached the top of the hill.

Once over this hill, tremendous masses of white skeletons turned their heads at almost the exact same moment. Their eyes ﬂickered with bright red spiritual ﬁre, and there were at least several hundred of them!

The skeletal heads snapped around in unison, and spiritual ﬁres danced about in their empty sockets. The ﬂames glowed faintly in the air – what an absolutely astounding sight!

Wang Dong’er subconsciously gasped in shock. The throngs of skeletons paused for just one moment before they began charging towards the three of them. Huo Yuhao said, “Anything living and breathing is very alluring to undead creatures. They will be able to evolve by an incredible amount if they can consume our ﬂesh and blood. Any undead creature can reach the top of their food chain by evolving continuously. The memories that my teacher left behind for me informed me that there are thirteen different types of undead creatures in this place. These normal skeletons are the weakest ones.”

“Let me test their strength.” Bei Bei took a step forward, and shielded Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er behind him.

Bei Bei had been nursing his wounds in bed for such a long time, and he was already feeling the itch for action. He hadn’t completely recovered yet, but he had regained seventy to eighty percent of his strength back. He felt very belligerent as he faced off against these skeletons.

Seven or eight skeletons quickly arrived before them. Their bodies were their weapons, and one of the skeletons that came forward reached out with its skeletal claws, lashing out at Bei Bei’s chest. The skeletons’ joints cracked and clattered as they charged forward.

Wang Dong’er wasn’t that much weaker than Bei Bei, but her face was ghastly pale as she looked on. What girl wasn’t afraid of skeletons? This was especially so because they were inside such a dark and gloomy place, and her own strength was restrained and weakened.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “It’s alright, don’t worry. Don’t forget, my teacher left this place for me. I am this world’s dictator.”

Crack! Bei Bei swung his right arm and smashed the skeleton’s arms in front of him into pieces. He sidestepped and grabbed this skeleton’s ribcage, swung his right hand forcefully, and hurled this skeleton against two other incoming ones. Bei Bei’s ﬁrst soul ring lit up in the next moment, and his Thunderous Dragon Claw lashed out and demolished two other skeletons.

When these skeletons were blown into smithereens, the spiritual ﬁre that was dancing around in their heads didn’t go out. Instead, they ﬂew into the air and into the distance.

However, there were some exceptions. The two skeletons that were destroyed by Bei Bei’s Thunderous Dragon Claw had their spiritual ﬁres extinguished once they rose into the air.

“Lightning is formed by the positive energy between heaven and earth, and lightning is extremely destructive against the spirit. These skeletons’ spiritual ﬁres aren’t that strong.”

Huo Yuhao pointed his right hand towards the ground as he spoke. The skeletons that Bei Bei had just smashed into pieces began to reassemble at an alarming speed. The ﬂickering ﬂames in their eyes gradually became grey in color.

They didn’t attack Bei Bei anymore. Instead, they turned around and charged towards their own companions.

Huo Yuhao muttered some incantations under his breath in the next moment, and he waved his right arm as a gray streak surged across the sky and whipped against the ﬁrst dozen skeletons leading the charge. These skeletons quivered vigorously before the spiritual ﬁres in their eyes jumped out and into the sky. Their spiritual ﬁres returned to their sockets in the next moment, and these skeletons turned around and lunged towards their companions.

“You can control them, little junior brother?” Bei Bei asked, astonished.

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “These skeletons’ ﬁghting strengths are comparable to that of normal humans, and I can control them without even using any incantations. If I can reach the pinnacle of the necromancy that my teacher left behind for me, then I will truly become this world’s dictator. Even now, these undead creatures can’t hurt me because of the divine sense imprint that my teacher has given me. Do you guys understand now why I’ll be absolutely safe even if I go undercover deep into the Holy Ghost Church? If I run into danger, I can hide in this place. No matter how powerful those people from the Holy Ghost Church are, they can’t enter the demiplane that my teacher created to catch me. Even the Ultimate Douluo, the Darkness Holy Dragon, Long Xiaoyao, can’t do so.” Bei Bei lowered his head subtly and said, “You’ve convinced me, little junior brother. Even though I still don’t wish for you to take this risk, your necromancy is truly mystical and powerful. But you have to remember, evil soul masters have the poorest of reputations in our world, and especially in the Douluo Continent’s three native empires. The truth is that your necromancy isn’t presented as that much different from the evil soul masters in our world. We don’t think you’re an evil soul master, but that doesn’t mean other people won’t. This probably includes the academy, as well.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “I know what you mean, eldest senior brother. Don’t worry, unless I’m in a situation that concerns my life and death, Huo Yuhao will only have twin martial souls. Tang Wu is the necromancer, and not me.”

Bei Bei laughed and said, “You’re very intelligent. That’s good, as long as you understand.”

Huo Yuhao heaved a faint sigh and said, “Neither the Tang Sect nor the Shrek Academy can accept evil soul masters.”

Wang Dong’er didn’t make a sound beside them. Huo Yuhao turned towards her and said, “Dong’er…”

Wang Dong’er interrupted him. “You don’t have to say any more, I understand what you mean. I only have one request. If you wish to place yourself in danger, then you must bring me along with you. I can become anything you want me to. I will be wherever you are.”

“Okay.” Huo Yuhao answered joyfully. He knew that this was the most that Wang Dong’er was willing to give, and there was no way he could stop her from following him. Wang Dong’er herself was a mighty Soul Emperor, and with his necromancy, it wasn’t likely that they would run into trouble.

“Let’s go back.” The skeletons that Huo Yuhao were controlling couldn’t hold their companions back anymore. Huo Yuhao reopened the large portal, and Bei Bei and Wang Dong’er stuck close to him as they stepped back inside together.

Grey light ﬂashed, and the skeletons that Huo Yuhao was controlling grew slack and stopped moving entirely. The entire undead world grew quiet once more.

---

Light ﬂickered, and Huo Yuhao and company materialized within Bei Bei’s room.

Both Bei Bei and Wang Dong’er heaved a sigh of relief.

Bei Bei forced a laugh and said, “Feels good to be back.

Truthfully, I don’t really like that cold and gloomy place.”

Wang Dong’er immediately chimed in. “I dislike that place even more. The Douluo Continent is so much better because there’s light.”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “Who wants to be in that place unless there’s no other choice? Alright, you should rest up, eldest senior brother. We should go back and continue cultivating. I’ve recently discovered some methods to accelerate the absorption of the Ultimate Ice origin energy of heaven and earth inside my body. I will aim to recover as quickly as possible, and I will be a lot more conﬁdent to go undercover when I’m fully recovered.”

------

The Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament had entered the round robins’ ﬁnal round, and the atmosphere was a lot tenser than during the elimination rounds before this.

The round robins’ ﬁnal round would determine the eight teams which would progress into the quarterﬁnals.

This was the ﬁrst tournament that accepted participation from sects, so there was a lot more honor and glory involved compared to past tournaments. The teams that could make it into the quarterﬁnals from a roster of over one hundred participating teams would have deﬁnitely proven how strong they were.

Nobody would pay attention to the process; everybody was only concerned with the results.

These next two days would complete the round robins’ ﬁnal matches. There were bound to be many unexpected circumstances in this ﬁnal showdown. However, not every match in this ﬁnal round would be intense. Some teams that didn’t have a chance of progressing anymore didn’t ﬁght with everything they had, since all they had to do was get their ﬁnal matches over with. There were some teams that required a victory in the ﬁnal round to progress into the quarterﬁnals, however, and their matches were especially intense. This was standard.

Of course, there were teams in yet another situation . They could already progress no matter what their ﬁnal result was. How would they perform in their ﬁnal match?

The ﬁrst battle of group one, Shrek Academy’s team versus the Tang Sect. This was one such situation.

Both teams had won all six of their previous matches. No matter how this ﬁnal match turned out, they were both going into the quarterﬁnals. How would their match turn out to be under such circumstances?

Both teams were going into the quarterﬁnals, but it was very different to be the ﬁrst-placed team or the second-placed team in the group stages. Everybody in the audience paid attention to this matchup.

The entire arena was quiet at this moment. Everyone felt a little dry in their throats and mouths as they stared at what was happening on the competition stage. This was especially true for the men.

There were two incredibly beautiful girls facing each other on the stage, and they looked nearly identical.

Pinkish-blue hair hung behind their backs. One of them had wave-like hair, while the other had smooth and straight hair.

One was clad in the Shrek Academy’s traditional dark green uniform, while the other was in a blue set of robes.

They were both so breathtakingly stunning, and they appeared at the same time on the competition stage. They had just admitted that they were sisters in the previous round!

Huo Yuhao’s face was as dark as it could be inside the waiting area. He regretted everything. When he was about to personally go onto the competition stage to announce that the Tang Sect was giving up this match, Wang Dong’er told him otherwise. She was already dressed like a girl, and she said, “You’re not very mobile. We’re just going to admit defeat, so let me do it for you.”

Wang Dong’er stepped onto the competition stage. However, when the Unbreakable Douluo told the two girls to return to their positions, Wang Dong’er said nothing at all, and stepped back toward her own corner!

She hasn’t admitted defeat? She actually didn’t admit defeat!

What is she trying to do?

Wang Qiu’er retreated emotionlessly on the other side. It was clear that these two girls were trying to vie for glory and recognition.

Everybody from the Tang Sect looked at Huo Yuhao. They couldn’t stop this match from going down even if they wanted to, as there was a soundprooﬁng barrier around the competition stage. Furthermore, the only person who could represent their teams would be the contestant on stage once the match had begun. Nobody could stop this match if Wang Dong’er didn’t say anything.

“This girl!” Huo Yuhao was exasperated and nervous. How could he not be anxious? The woman he loved was on one side, while the woman that he was hopelessly muddled with was on the other. The truth was that Huo Yuhao had always felt a little guilty towards Wang Qiu’er, and he didn’t wish to see either girl get hurt. He really wanted to pluck Wang Dong’er off the competition stage, lay her over his legs, and spank her perky buttocks.

Wang Dong’er stared at Wang Qiu’er on the other side of the stage, and gradually raised her right hand from her side. Wang Qiu’er’s eyes closed into slits, and they didn’t say a word to one another, while their colliding eyes became as sharp as ever.

The audience didn’t like either team in this matchup, so they didn’t really care who emerged victorious in the end. It didn’t matter to the audience who won and who lost, so this was just a delightful show to them, and this matchup was more about appreciation than anything else.

---

The Sun Moon Empire’s Prince Regent, Xu Tianran, was sitting on the rostrum in silence with a casual look on his face. There was a tinge of surprise in his expression, but there was a deep-seated hatred and vengeance lying in the bottom of his eyes. These two beautiful ladies actually don’t belong to me.

What’s worse is that there’s nothing I can do about it…

Xu Tianran’s heart ached as if a venomous scorpion were stinging him with its tail.

---

“Begin!” Zheng Zhan bellowed, and both Wang Dong’er and Wang Qiu’er made their moves.

Wang Dong’er raised her right hand from her side, and a dash of black light sparkled along with a black soul ring. This was her second martial soul, the Clear Sky Hammer!

Wang Qiu’er raised her hand at the same time on the other side. Golden light ﬂickered, and six soul rings rose swiftly from beneath her feet as she gripped her Golden Dragon Spear in both hands.

They began to make a move against each other in the next moment.

They didn’t channel their highest possible speed. Both of them made short and brisk steps towards each other, and pinkish-blue hair swayed in the wind as they closed the distance between one another.

“Watch out.” Wang Dong’er exclaimed softly as her black ten- thousand year soul ring glowed brilliantly. Her Clear Sky Hammer, which wasn’t that big initially, began to swell, and the hammer’s head became a lot bigger, while its handle became longer. Her Clear Sky Hammer actually transformed into a long-handled battle hammer in an instant.

The hammer’s head was conical, and almost two feet long. There were ancient patterns on the black hammerhead, but the thick and concentrated aura it contained was even more frightening.

Wang Dong’er spun in a semicircle as she raced across the competition stage and swung her Clear Sky Hammer with both hands from behind her back. Her elegant frame turned back around, and her Clear Sky Hammer made one full rotation in the air. Her Clear Sky Hammer carried a horrifying gust of wind as she slammed it down towards Wang Qiu’er. Are they really sisters? Almost everyone in the audience had this same thought as they watched Wang Dong’er’s fearsome hammer strike.

It was clear that Wang Qiu’er hadn’t expected Wang Dong’er to ﬁght her like this. She was never one to show weakness, however, and she raised her Golden Dragon Spear with both hands to block Wang Dong’er’s hammer.

Clang!

The sound that erupted made the entire competition stage tremble. This was a pure and forceful collision of strength!

Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon Spear was a lot thinner than Wang Dong’er’s Clear Sky Hammer, but her Ultimate Strength’s advantage was immediately placed on full display as the Clear Sky Hammer bounced back.

Right when Wang Qiu’er moved to pursue her opponent, Wang Dong’er’s elegant frame began to waltz like a pretty butterﬂy. She tapped on the ground with the tip of her left foot, raised her right foot and stepped on her left calf as she spun rapidly in midair. Her Clear Sky Hammer that was thrown backwards carried an aura more intense and ferocious than before as it came back down once more.

Clang!

Another loud boom rang out. It was clear that Wang Qiu’er had applied more strength this time, to the point where Wang Dong’er was sent stumbling backwards. However, she made another turn as she was propelled backwards, and her hands seemed like they were glued to her Clear Sky Hammer as she used this force to rotate yet again.

After Wang Qiu’er repelled Wang Dong’er’s second hammer for the second time, she pushed with her left hand and swung her right hand forward. Her Golden Dragon Spear’s tip stabbed with lightning speed at Wang Dong’er’s chest.

Wang Dong’er’s third hammer strike came down at the same time. She found the most opportune moment as her thick and heavy hammer’s head crashed against the Golden Dragon Spear’s tip. This time, Wang Dong’er had the upper hand. No matter how strong Wang Qiu’er was, she couldn’t defy the laws of nature. She was holding her spear with one hand, and the tip of her spear was extended far in front of her. It wasn’t easy for her to apply strength at all, while Wang Dong’er was hurling her hammer with every ounce of strength she had. The Clear Sky Hammer was known as the strongest tool soul. Wang Dong’er was far inferior to Wang Qiu’er in terms of pure strength, but she managed to unleash her full potential with her Clear Sky Hammer, and by relying on this forceful ﬁghting style.

Wang Qiu’er withdrew her spear and pressed down with her right hand. She used the impact that her Golden Dragon Spear exerted against the ground and swung her right leg nimbly towards Wang Dong’er’s neck.

Wang Dong’er seemed to have entered a very strange and mystical state. Her legs rotated once more, and her Clear Sky Hammer rained down for the fourth time as she retreated agilely.

Everybody could tell at this point that Wang Dong’er was executing a special ﬁghting technique, and it wasn’t a soul skill. It was a ﬁghting style created according to her martial soul’s unique characteristics. Combining these unique ﬁghting styles with martial souls would unleash the martial soul’s full potential!

Bei Bei was sitting right next to Huo Yuhao. There was only astonishment in his eyes at this time. “This… is this the Clear Sky Sect’s Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique? I didn’t know she had this trick up her sleeve. Such incredible strength!”

Wang Dong’er could hold her own against Wang Qiu’er, when Wang Qiu’er possessed Ultimate Strength! It was evident how powerful the Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique was!

Wang Qiu’er squatted down. If she had been facing someone else, she would probably have chosen to dodge this attack, and she would have a better chance that way. However, how could she show any weakness by dodging away when she was facing Wang Dong’er?

Wang Qiu’er swung her Golden Dragon Spear forward, and pressed the spear against her back while bending down. She blocked this attack with her spear behind her back. Clang!

Wang Qiu’er’s body was pushed down from the impact, and Wang Dong’er spun around once more from the rebound.

Wang Qiu’er stabbed out with her spear right at this moment, and captured the loopholes in Wang Dong’er’s movement as she rotated in the air. It was very difﬁcult for Wang Dong’er to dodge this attack because they were very close together.

Wang Dong’er’s footwork suddenly changed in the face of such a disadvantageous situation. She didn’t just spin around anymore, but her elegant frame sidestepped to evade Wang Qiu’er’s attack, leaving two afterimages behind her from her movement. This was the Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track of the Tang Sect’s Secret Techniques!

Her ﬁfth hammer strike whistled through the air.

Clang, clang, clang, clang… The Clear Sky Hammer clashed continuously against the Golden Dragon Spear. Every collision caused a bright and crisp clanging sound, while every clang was sharper and brighter than the previous one. Neither girl used their soul skills; they were just ﬁghting each other with pure strength and ﬁghting

techniques.

The audience was dumbfounded as they looked on.

These two girls were ﬁghting with such masculine and straightforward styles and techniques. How could they not be shaken?

Wang Dong’er was clearly at a disadvantage in terms of strength. Every impact with Wang Qiu’er pushed her back a few steps, but her Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique was still as steady as ever. Wang Dong’er also used her Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track, and didn’t give Wang Qiu’er any chances to counterattack.

The collisions continued. On the twentieth clash, Wang Dong’er was forced to the edge of the competition stage. She was probably going to crumble if this was allowed to continue. Wang Qiu’er stopped trying to ﬁnd Wang Dong’er’s weaknesses and loopholes, and just raised her Golden Dragon Spear to block the Clear Sky Hammer again and again. Wang Qiu’er met force with force, and just blocked each and every one of Wang Dong’er’s hammer strikes.

Two incredibly beautiful girls who looked identical to each other had burning belligerence in their eyes. Neither one of them was willing to give any quarter at all!

Clang, clang, clang!

Wang Dong’er’s Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique was becoming faster and faster. Three more forceful collisions occurred when she was several meters from the edge of the competition stage.

The edge was right behind her as she continued moving backwards. She would crash against the protective dome if she continued retreating, and that would undoubtedly affect her Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique. Everyone sweated for Wang Dong’er. Only Wang Qiu’er didn’t share this sentiment. The reason was because Wang Qiu’er could tell that Wang Dong’er’s eyes were ﬁlled with ﬁghting spirit, and her aura didn’t diminish at all from her continuous retreat.

Wang Dong’er couldn’t retreat anymore after the Golden Dragon Spear clashed against her Clear Sky Hammer for the twenty-fourth time. Her eyes sparkled right at this moment, and intense golden light erupted from her body as she swung her hammer for the twenty-ﬁfth time.

If this hammer bounced up like it always had before this, it was bound to slam against the protective barrier behind her. However, Wang Dong’er’s entire body seemed to become golden as she swung her hammer out this time. This was the mark of her raising her soul power to the highest possible level.

Clang!

Wang Dong’er’s Clear Sky Hammer was forced up from the impact once more amidst the bright clash, but it was different this time. She didn’t move back anymore, and even though her Clear Sky Hammer was pushed back into the air, she didn’t have to swing it behind her back anymore. Instead, it was Wang Qiu’er who quivered faintly, and it was her who took a half-step backwards.

Wang Dong’er took a step forward. She spun around in a semicircle in midair and swung her hammer for the twenty- sixth time. Her Clear Sky Hammer clashed with the Golden Dragon Spear once more, but it was Wang Qiu’er who took yet another step back this time.

“What’s happening?” Huo Yuhao was astounded as he watched from beneath the stage. His eyes ﬂowed with incredulity and disbelief.

Bei Bei clapped his hands all of a sudden and said, “What a technique! It seems like Dong’er has mastered her Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique. This technique’s most salient characteristic is its ability to make use of reactionary force. Her attacks seem to be very precarious, but she hasn’t paused for a single moment, because she’s been drawing upon her opponent’s strength to make every strike stronger than the last. When she reached her twenty-ﬁfth strike and couldn’t back away anymore, she channeled all her soul power into one tremendous blow to turn the tables. This ﬁght will depend on how long she can keep her Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique going! The ﬁrst person who cannot take the collisions anymore will lose this ﬁght!”

Huo Yuhao didn’t seem excited at all. He didn’t want to see either Wang Dong’er or Wang Qiu’er hurt, and the contest of pure strength they were engaged in was the most precarious kind. One misstep, one accident, would lead to severe injuries.

Clang, clang, clang, clang, clang… Hammer and spear continued to clash. There were no other tricks or artiﬁce. There was just pure force against pure force. It was Wang Qiu’er’s turn to retreat now, her eyes showing the same astonished look. She knew that Wang Dong’er was strong, but she had always believed that there was still quite a gap between them. But Wang Dong’er chose to meet force with force when strength was Wang Qiu’er’s forte. This took her by surprise, but what made her more astonished was that Wang Dong’er’s hammer was getting stronger and stronger.

There were still things that Wang Qiu’er could do to break force with force, but she wasn’t inclined to do so anymore. She could see the stubbornness in Wang Dong’er’s eyes, and she wanted to see how far Wang Dong’er could go.

Wang Qiu’er continued retreating, and by the time Wang Dong’er threw out her forty-eighth strike, Wang Qiu’er had already retreated to the center of the competition stage.

Boom!

The sounds before this had been bright and crisp, but this collision released a deep and loud boom! Wang Qiu’er’s legs sank half a foot into the ground from the hammer. Besides that, with her body as the epicenter, large web-like cracks began to appear on the metal stage. What astonished everyone even more was that dust began to appear around the stage, which was about a hundred meters in

diameter. It meant that the entire stage had sunk into the ground beneath it from this blow!

This!…

The forty-ninth hammer!

Boom!

Smoke and dust surged into the sky, and everyone in the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy’s respective waiting areas stood up at the same time. Everyone’s eyes were ﬁlled with fear. The person that took the brunt of that heavy hammer, Wang Qiu’er, left a deep footprint on the competition stage’s surface!

Wang Dong’er swung her Clear Sky Hammer for the ﬁftieth time at this moment. The golden light from her body had become blindingly brilliant, while her hammer’s black colors were like dark clouds looming over the arena.

A bright dragon roar rang out from Wang Qiu’er’s mouth at this moment. She couldn’t really withstand Wang Dong’er’s Chaotic Splitting Wind Hammer Technique anymore.

Golden scales covered her entire body, and Wang Qiu’er stabbed her Golden Dragon Spear into the sky and clashed once more with the Clear Sky Hammer.

Boom!

After another deafening boom, Wang Qiu’er’s feet left two deep grooves on the ground as she stumbled backwards. Wang Dong’er stumbled backwards in similar fashion, and every step she took left deep footprints on the competition stage. However, she was still rotating with each step, along with her Clear Sky Hammer.

There was some distance between them now, and Wang Dong’er’s ﬁfty-ﬁrst hammer couldn’t reach Wang Qiu’er anymore.

Wang Dong’er swung her enormous hammer downwards, and it carried a fearsome shadow with it as it smashed directly against the ﬂoor in front of her.

Boom, boom, boom!

A frightening scene appeared before everyone’s eyes.

The competition stage collapsed inwards with Wang Dong’er at the epicenter, and a deep crater twenty meters in diameter and more than ﬁve meters deep was created in a ﬂurry of stone and gravel. Wang Dong’er drew upon this frightening impact and soared more than ten meters into the sky.

This strike sent out shockwaves so powerful that Wang Qiu’er was forced a few steps back. What the audience saw was the stage collapsing inwards, and this single hammer strike seemed to force the entire stage to sink down by a meter or so. Such terrifying strength!

The ﬁfty-second hammer! Wang Dong’er was in the sky as she heaved her hammer with both hands. She plummeted from the sky and went straight for Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er’s eyes erupted with brilliant light as she gripped her Golden Dragon Spear with both hands.

Boom!

The entire world seemed to change in that moment. All the dust on the competition stage’s surface billowed outward, and a central vacuum zone was revealed.

Wang Dong’er’s graceful body was bounced high into the sky, while Wang Qiu’er was blasted against the ground like a cannon shell. One in the sky, and one on the ground.

Wang Qiu’er seemed a little exhausted and black-faced, but her eyes were still as bright as ever. Wang Dong’er was thrown up through the air, and a single thread of blood trailed from the corner of her mouth. Huo Yuhao was equally black-faced inside his waiting area. His right hand pressed down hard against his Golden Tree wheelchair, and his body seemed to arch upwards subtly as divine light sparkled in his eyes.

Huo Yuhao’s mouth moved, and a ripple appeared on the protective dome around the competition stage. A strange scene occurred: a golden ray drilled through the protective barrier into the competition stage, and it shot up towards Wang Dong’er like a shooting star.

Wang Dong’er’s ﬁfty-third hammer was still charging up when the golden projection wrapped itself around her.

The golden projection seemed identical to Wang Dong’er’s appearance. This wrapping action immediately interrupted her rhythm; her Clear Sky Hammer embodied too much strength at this point, and her hammer ﬂew from her hands toward the ground.

BOOM! Half of the competition stage collapsed just like that. Wang Dong’er made a few quick spins in midair and vomited a small pool of blood. She switched her martial souls as her bluish- golden wings extended out from her back, and only then could she stabilize herself in the sky.

Wang Dong’er glanced unhappily towards her waiting area, but she was met with Huo Yuhao’s serious and solemn eyes.

Wang Dong’er felt her heart quiver. She knew that Huo Yuhao was truly angry this time.

Wang Qiu’er frowned deeply as she looked on from the ground, and she also looked towards Huo Yuhao inside his waiting area. She was equally surprised by the ability he was using. Furthermore, what did he want to do by interfering like that?

“I admit defeat.” Wang Dong’er’s reluctant voice rang out through the air. She extended her wings and gradually descended back down onto the shattered and damaged competition stage. The Unbreakable Douluo wasn’t happy at all. Wang Dong’er’s last strike, the one that she couldn’t control, had almost landed on him. Her hammer had been charged more than ﬁfty times, and that last strike had contained enough strength that even an eight-ringed Soul Douluo wouldn’t dare to meet force with

force. He was a nine-ringed Titled Douluo, but he probably wouldn’t have had it easy if he had to defend himself forcefully against such a sudden attack. Fortunately, Wang Dong’er hadn’t locked onto him, and her strike didn’t hit him in the end. Even so, Zheng Zhan’s face was as grey as could be.

Wang Dong’er stared at Wang Qiu’er, and Wang Qiu’er stared back at her.

Their gazes clashed, but Wang Dong’er didn’t say another word as she turned to step off the competition stage. Wang Qiu’er grasped her Golden Dragon Spear and her eyes closed into slits. She didn’t have it easy winning this round at all. Furthermore, her victory came when Huo Yuhao interfered with the battle.

Wang Qiu’er had the advantage no matter what the situation if they were having a contest of strength, and it was clear that Wang Dong’er’s body was almost at its limit. However, Wang Qiu’er knew that she would have been injured if Wang Dong’er had thrown a few more strikes at her.

Such formidable explosive strength! I didn’t know she had this up her sleeve...

The audience began to clap, a sound that echoed like rain as it grew louder and louder. What a spectacular contest! There were no tricks, no drama, nothing strange or sinister. Everything in this ﬁght was pure strength against strength.

This battle dazzled and mesmerized everybody in the audience. Even though both parties were opponents to the Sun Moon Empire and eventually defeated their home team, the audience couldn’t help but erupt in applause at this moment. This ﬁght was simply too spectacular and magniﬁcent, as it was one without deceit or artiﬁce. It was a showdown between sisters, and this ﬁght left a deep and lasting impression in everyone’s minds.

Wang Dong’er stepped off the competition stage and returned to Huo Yuhao’s side. She was still grumbling under her breath, “I haven’t lost.” Huo Yuhao didn’t look at her at all, and instead turned towards Bei Bei.

Bei Bei stood up and said to the Unbreakable Douluo on stage, “The Tang Sect admits defeat for every match in today’s round.”

The entire arena was taken aback once they heard his words. The thunderous applause quieted down in an instant, and there was no atmosphere whatsoever left in the arena.

Zhang Zhan was also momentarily stunned. He could tell that Huo Yuhao had interfered to stop the ﬁght, but didn’t know how he had managed that. The protective barrier was so powerful, so how did he use an ability to stop Wang Dong’er from continuing with the ﬁght? This matter had to be pursued…

However, the Tang Sect had admitted defeat for the rest of their matches in this round, so there was no point in getting to the bottom of it right now. Bei Bei gave his habitual and classic scholarly smile. “The Tang Sect doesn’t have any reserve team members, and everybody needs to rest. We don’t need to have this showdown with the Shrek Academy anymore since we’ve already qualiﬁed for the next round. We admit defeat.”

Zheng Zhan was stunned for a little while once more before he quickly recovered and nodded. “The Tang Sect admits defeat. Shrek Academy is victorious in this round.”

Group one’s ﬁnal and most important clash was over, just like that.

The Shrek Academy team had won all seven matches, and they progressed into the quarterﬁnals at ﬁrst place in their group. The Tang Sect won six matches and lost one to follow behind them at second place. Both teams had ofﬁcially qualiﬁed for the quarterﬁnals, and whatever matches were left in their group didn’t mean anything anymore.

Wang Qiu’er didn’t feel excited at all because her opponent had admitted defeat. She strode towards the Tang Sect’s waiting area from the competition stage. She took big steps all the way in front of Huo Yuhao before she stopped.

She lowered her voice and asked him, “Why?”

Chapter 314: Lot Drawing for The Round of Eight

Huo Yuhao stared at her calmly and replied, “Why, what?”

Wang Qiu’er continued, “Why won’t you ﬁght me? Are you not as brave as Dong’er is? What about your Ultimate Ice? What about your formidable spiritual power? Why won’t you dare to come on stage to see who’s the stronger one?”

Huo Yuhao gave her a deep stare, and he could see the moisture swirling around at the bottoms of her eyes. He heaved a faint sigh and said, “Is it that amusing for you to bully a cripple? Do you think I can defeat you in my current state?”

Wang Qiu’er’s aura froze and her ferocity was beaten back. She stared at Huo Yuhao in his wheelchair, and her condescending words didn’t come out of her mouth in the end.

She turned towards Wang Dong’er and said, “Nobody has won this ﬁght. If we meet again in the ﬁnals, you and I will ﬁnish what we started if he can’t ﬁght.” “It’s a deal.” Wang Dong’er didn’t show any weakness at all in her reply.

Wang Qiu’er departed with large strides, bearing her Golden Dragon Spear. The Shrek Academy team was walking towards her, and she led them away from the competition arena.

Huo Yuhao watched her ﬁgure disappear from view before he exhaled deeply and said, “Brother Ji, bring me back to the hotel.”

Ji Juechen was slightly taken aback, and glanced subconsciously at Wang Dong’er. Wang Dong’er had always been the one responsible for pushing his wheelchair.

The toughness that Wang Dong’er showed against Wang Qiu’er immediately vanished into thin air. She lowered her voice and whispered, “I know I was wrong, Yuhao. Can you not be angry with me?”

Huo Yuhao snapped around and glanced at her as he forced down the boiling rage in his heart. He lowered his voice and said, “We’ll talk about this when we get back.”

Huo Yuhao had to give her face when they were outside, no matter what. He closed his eyes after his reply.

Wang Dong’er stuck out her tongue and gestured at Ji Juechen, who hurriedly pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair back towards their hotel.

The others wore strange expressions on their faces. Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao gave Wang Dong’er a thumbs-up, and seemed a little amused.

Wang Dong’er blushed and pouted towards them. She gestured in Huo Yuhao’s direction with her lips and gave them a pleading look.

Jiang Nannan covered her mouth and giggled, but then turned away. It didn’t seem like she wanted to help at all.

------ Everyone received news that new rooms had been arranged for them once they returned to the Brilliant Delight Hotel. The teams that had progressed into the quarterﬁnals were assigned better rooms. The ﬁrst-place teams of each group stayed in the top level, while the second-place teams stayed on the second level.

Huo Yuhao directly rejected the offer to switch rooms, and he told the ofﬁcials that he didn’t want any more inconveniences.

Wang Dong’er pushed his wheelchair obediently back inside their room.

Wang Dong’er pushed his wheelchair all the way inside and bolted the door. She stood beside Huo Yuhao and lowered her head, as if she were a little child who had done something wrong. She placed her tender and smooth hands in front of her and ﬁddled with her ﬁngers.

“Let me help you on bed to rest, is that okay?” Wang Dong’er whispered. “Do you have any strength left in your hands?” Huo Yuhao answered coldly, and his eyes landed on Wang Dong’er’s quivering arms.

There wasn’t a single ounce of strength left in Wang Dong’er’s hands after those intense clashes from before.

“I know I messed up, Yuhao. The truth is, I just wanted to prove that she’s not stronger than me. I didn’t have any other intention. We were just ﬁghting normally, and we wouldn’t have placed our lives on the line.”

Wang Dong’er’s explanation made Huo Yuhao even more furious, and the rage that he had been holding back immediately erupted.

“Wang Dong’er! Listen to me! We are the Tang Sect, and you are part of the Tang Sect’s team! You didn’t listen to instructions and made decisions on your own! How am I to command and instruct the others from now on? Have you thought about that? Also, I don’t care at all whether you’re stronger than Wang Qiu’er or she’s stronger than you! I’m just concerned about your safety! Do you not know how powerful her Golden Dragon Spear is? You would have been irrevocably injured if you had been struck by her spear! What am I to do if something happens to you? Why do you have to make me worry and make me anxious like that? If you regaining your personality means you’ll be so rebellious, I would rather have that gentle and soft you! At least you won’t make me worry that way!”

“Do you not know that I feel ten times more pain if you were hurt than if it had been my own injuries? You had an exciting time with Wang Qiu’er on stage, huh, but did you know what I was feeling beneath the stage?”

Wang Dong’er stuck out her tongue. She didn’t attempt to dispute him, and she lowered her head and put on a pitiful look as she listened to his chiding.

There was no question that this was the best solution to deal with Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao raised his voice angrily against her, but the fury in his heart gradually dissipated as he watched her cute and obedient behavior.

Huo Yuhao snapped, “Give me your hands.” Wang Dong’er hurriedly gave him both of her hands.

Huo Yuhao grabbed her right forearm as he looked at her trembling arms, and he channeled his gentle Mysterious Heaven Technique’s soul power and helped her slowly smooth out and adjust her passageways and nerves.

Wang Dong’er stared at the serious look on his face and felt the warmth and comfort from his large hand against her arm. Waves of warm sentiment swelled in her heart as she inched forward and sat down on his lap before leaning into his chest.

Wang Dong’er’s warmth and tenderness melted the last strands of anger in Huo Yuhao’s heart. How could he scold her anymore when she was so soft in his embrace?

Huo Yuhao continued helping her smooth the passageways in her arms. He suddenly looked up and shouted in the direction of their room door, “Senior brothers and senior sisters, stop listening. Go back, wash up, and get some rest.”

“Ahem…” Dry coughs could be heard from outside their door, and everything quickly quieted down.

Wang Dong’er blushed and whispered, “Those nasty fellows.”

Huo Yuhao put down her arms for a moment and stroked her cheek so that she was staring into his eyes.

“Dong’er.”

“Yes.”

“This is the ﬁrst and the last time. I don’t want to see something like this happen again.”

“Okay.”

“I want to punish you.”

“How are you going to punish me?”

“I’m going to spank you!”

“You’re so nasty…”

------

The round robins’ ﬁnal matches were over. Eight teams progressed into the quarterﬁnals, and this also meant that the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was entering its ﬁnal phase.

The ﬁrst-place teams out of the teams that qualiﬁed were: Shrek Academy, the Snowdemon Sect, the Holy Ghost Sect, and the Proudsword Sect.

The Heavenly Soul Empire’s princess, Wei Na, and Mu Xue were part of the Snowdemon Sect, and they were considered acquaintances. There was nothing to be said about the Holy Ghost Sect. Their mighty evil soul masters never gave their opponents any chance at all, and they hadn’t encountered any particularly strong opponents throughout the entire tournament thus far. Most of their rounds were resolved in the single elimination matches. The Proudsword Sect was a relatively reclusive sect, and their performances were extremely low-proﬁle. It felt as if they won every round by a hair’s breadth. They advanced gradually but steadily, and they eventually came out from the round robins with a full score.

The other quarterﬁnalists, which consisted of the second- place teams in the round robins, included the Tang Sect, the Star Luo National Academy, the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy, and the Heavenly Dragon Sect.

The Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy was another reputable soul engineering academy based in the Radiant City. They were second only to the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy in reputation, but they had always been held back by the Sun Moon Academy in past seasons. There were rumors going around that the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy had an unprecedented and irreplaceable team of prodigy students this season, and it was this team that had brought them into the quarterﬁnals. They were considered a formidable dark horse.

Huo Yuhao was connected in some way to the Heavenly Dragon Sect. The Heavenly Dragon Sect and the Earthdragon Sect were a pair of relatively withdrawn sects that were both quite reputable amongst the other sects. The Heavenly Dragon Sect was comparatively stronger than the Earthdragon Sect, and their martial souls were all true dragons. This was the reason why the Earthdragon Sect was considered a subsidiary sect of the Heavenly Dragon Sect.

Naturally, the Earthdragon Sect would never admit that. Even though they had a friendly relationship with the Heavenly Dragon Sect, they had never been willing to concede the Heavenly Dragon Sect’s superiority. The Heavenly Dragon Sect’s impressive ﬁghting strength couldn’t be denied, however. They came out with six victories in the round robins, and the only match they lost was against the Snowdemon Sect, and the reason they came out second in their group. For some reason, they were clearly fooling around during their battle against the Snowdemon Sect, and they didn’t give everything they had.

The quarterﬁnalists were ﬁnalized. The teams would take two days off, and then the quarterﬁnals would ofﬁcially begin. One day was enough to conclude the quarterﬁnals, and the winning teams would be given another two days to rest before they would enter the semiﬁnals. Two more days would be allocated before the grand ﬁnals, and the tournament would then be over. Today was the ﬁrst day of rest before the quarterﬁnals. All eight teams were up early in the morning to draw lots before the quarterﬁnals began. This was exceedingly important for every team.

It didn’t mean that the teams who qualiﬁed in second place weren’t strong at all. For instance, the Tang Sect gave everything away to Shrek Academy, but those with a discerning eye could tell that the Tang Sect was actually stronger than Shrek Academy. In actual fact, the Tang Sect had helped Shrek Academy cripple some of their opponents so that they could qualify successfully.

Similarly, the Heavenly Dragon Sect had also qualiﬁed as the runners-up in their group. Their true strength had always been a mystery, but there was no doubt that they had incredible prowess. Some of their contestants, who were clearly their main team members, hadn’t even taken part in the tournament yet.

Whichever team ended up against them wouldn’t have an easy time. As for the remaining two second-place teams, the Star Luo Empire’s representative team and the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy’s team, how could they be weak if they made it into the quarterﬁnals?

The lottery was to be carried out at the Brilliant Delight Hotel. The contestants had to admit that the organizing committee’s decision to do this was laudable. It was very humane, and allowed the contesting teams more time to rest.

------

All eight quarterﬁnalist teams were already inside the Brilliant Delight Hotel’s grand banquet hall.

The eight teams were standing in eight rows. Huo Yuhao was standing in front of the Tang Sect’s team. This spot had originally belonged to Bei Bei, but Huo Yuhao was sitting in his wheelchair, so he wouldn’t be able to see what was going on in front if he was seated to the back.

Zheng Zhan, who had been the referee for the Tang Sect on many different occasions, was sitting on the rostrum. There were several other ofﬁcials present that the Sun Moon Empire had sent forth especially to organize this tournament.

One of the ofﬁcials stood up and gathered everyone’s attention. He smiled brightly and said, “First, I would like to congratulate every team that’s managed to qualify for the quarterﬁnals. As you all know, this is the ﬁrst tournament that sects have been allowed to participate in, and it’s been a lot more competitive than previous seasons…”

This ofﬁcial went on with his formalities for ﬁfteen minutes before ﬁnally touching on the topic that everyone was waiting for.

“Now, we will draw the lots for the quarterﬁnal matchups. This lottery will not only determine who you will face in the next round, it will also determine the teams that you might face in the subsequent rounds. I trust that the outcome of this lottery will be beneﬁcial for your preparations. The rules are as follows...

“We will invite the four ﬁrst-place teams onto the stage, and they will take their turns drawing lots to decide which teams will be in the ﬁrst group and which teams will be in the second group. Every ﬁrst-place team will draw lots against a second- place team, and the only rule is that the ﬁrst-place team cannot be matched against the second-place team in their same group during the round robins. Who you draw shall be your opponent in the quarterﬁnals! After the pairings have been settled, the winners from the ﬁrst and the second group will enter the semiﬁnals.

“The winners of the semiﬁnals will proceed into the grand ﬁnals!

Huo Yuhao frowned faintly as he listened to the ofﬁcial’s announcement. According to their lottery rules, it was still possible for the Tang Sect to meet Shrek Academy’s team in the semiﬁnals. This wasn’t something they wanted to happen.

The four ﬁrst-place teams quickly sent their representatives up on stage.

Wang Qiu’er was undoubtedly the representative for Shrek Academy’s team, Tang Ya represented the Holy Ghost Church, and Mu Xue represented the Snowdemon Sect. Huo Yuhao was familiar with all of them. The Proudsword Sect sent up one of their youths.

The teams couldn’t help but feel a little nervous, as they were about to choose their opponent in the quarterﬁnals. There was no doubt that the Snowdemon Sect and the Proudsword Sect were the weaker teams amongst the ﬁrst-place ﬁnishers, and the Holy Ghost Sect was assuredly the strongest team. Shrek Academy had Wang Qiu’er to anchor things down, so they were still considered quite powerful.

Not a single second-place team wanted to be matched up against the Holy Ghost Sect.

The groupings were drawn ﬁrst.

Shrek Academy was the ﬁrst to draw their grouping. They were the champions from the previous season after all, and considered a legendary team. The Sun Moon Empire had to give the Shrek Academy respect at a time like this, no matter how much they didn’t like them.

Wang Qiu’er looked very calm and composed. She would give everything she had against whichever team she would eventually draw, and there was no such thing as anxiety or fear in her heart.

“Shrek Academy, ﬁrst group.”

Wang Qiu’er drew into the ﬁrst group.

The Holy Ghost Sect was the second team to draw lots.

Tang Ya was dressed in a long black robe as she had always been. Her exquisite features were hidden beneath a veil, but how could her frame and her eyes fool the Tang Sect’s team, who were all so familiar with her?

Bei Bei was standing right behind Huo Yuhao, and Huo Yuhao almost instantly felt Bei Bei’s hands tighten around his wheelchair’s handles. It wasn’t hard to guess what he was feeling inside.

Tang Ya didn’t hesitate at all, and drew her lot.

“The Holy Ghost Church, second group.” Everyone could feel that Shrek Academy’s team was relieved when they heard “second group”. The Holy Ghost Sect in the second group meant that Shrek Academy’s team would only meet them in the grand ﬁnals.

The Snowdemon Sect, represented by Wei Na and Mu Xue, were next.

Mu Xue was the one responsible for drawing lots. She hesitated for a moment before she stuck her hand inside the lottery box. Her expression became gloomy when she drew her card.

“The Snowdemon Sect, second group.”

It was no wonder Mu Xue seemed despondent and agonized. The Snowdemon Sect was in the same group as the Holy Ghost Sect!

The youth representing the Proudsword Sect smiled. “I don’t need to draw anymore, right?” “The Proudsword Sect, ﬁrst group.”

The four ﬁrst-place teams ﬁnished drawing their groups. Shrek Academy and the Proudsword Sect were in the ﬁrst group.

The Holy Ghost Sect and the Snowdemon Sect were in the second group.

This was a good draw for the two teams in the ﬁrst group.

“Next, we will draw lots for the quarterﬁnal matchups. Shrek Academy will draw ﬁrst.”

Wang Qiu’er raised her hand and drew her card. However, she was dazed for a moment when she withdrew her card.

“Shrek Academy has drawn… the Tang Sect.”

Everybody’s expressions froze in the Tang Sect’s team. Huo Yuhao smiled bitterly at Wang Qiu’er on stage, and his lips moved and trembled, but no sound came out.

Wang Qiu’er subconsciously glanced in the Tang Sect’s direction after drawing them, and coincidentally saw the words that Huo Yuhao was mouthing. She could tell that he was saying, “Do you hate us that much?”

Wang Qiu’er mouth twitched as she placed the card back inside the lottery box.

The ofﬁcial responsible for the lottery announced, “Shrek Academy’s team and the Tang Sect belonged in the same group before this, so this lot is nulliﬁed. The Shrek Academy will draw one more time.”

Yes, because of the round robins, Shrek Academy’s team would not go up against the Tang Sect in the quarterﬁnals.

Wang Qiu’er drew another card.

“Shrek Academy’s new opponent is…” The ofﬁcial paused for a moment to build up the suspense.

The Tang Sect had no response at all, but the other second- place teams focused on his words.

“…the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy!”

“Heh…” Somebody from the Tang Sect laughed out loud. It was Xiao Xiao. The Sun Moon Empire really had some hate going on with Shrek Academy. The lottery was so coincidental. Shrek Academy had just taken care of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, and now the Shrek team had to face off against the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy. This conﬂict and vengeance was really swelling.

The lottery ofﬁcial looked helpless and exasperated as well. The students from the Radiant Academy didn’t seem so surprised, but instead, every single one of them appeared as deﬁant as could be. There was no question that the only thought in their minds was, What if we defeat Shrek Academy and regain our nation’s glory? Our honor and glory will overshadow the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy!

The Proudsword Sect was second in line to draw.

Huo Yuhao became truly nervous at this point. The scenario that he absolutely did not want to see was the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy being allocated into the same group, because that meant they would have to ﬁght each other before the grand ﬁnals. Therefore, the Proudsword Sect’s draw was very important to Huo Yuhao and his team. Even though the Proudsword Sect seemed a little weaker than the others, the Tang Sect would rather face off against a stronger team.

“The Proudsword Sect’s opponent in the quarterﬁnals is… the Heavenly Dragon Sect.”

Once this was announced, everybody in the Tang Sect was overcome with delight, and they all heaved sighs of relief.

Over on Shrek Academy’s side, Dai Huabin, Wu Feng and the others also heaved sighs of relief. They didn’t want to ﬁght the Tang Sect either, and no matter what personal vengeances they had with Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er, and the others, these were but internal matters. Furthermore, it was because of this very fact that they knew how formidable Shrek’s Seven Monsters were. Even if Shrek Academy’s team had Wang Qiu’er, their team strength was still a far cry from the Tang Sect’s overall strength.

The ﬁrst group’s lots had been completely drawn. The two remaining teams that hadn’t been allocated yet were the Tang Sect and the Star Luo National Academy.

Princess Jiujiu of the Star Luo National Academy didn’t look so good. The Holy Ghost Sect was in the second group, and even if the Star Luo National Academy was to ﬁght against the Snowdemon Sect in the quarterﬁnals, and even if they could beat them, they would have to go up against the Holy Ghost Sect or the Tang Sect in the semiﬁnals. Both teams were far too strong for the Star Luo National Academy to ﬁght against.

“The Holy Ghost Sect will draw next.”

“The Holy Ghost Sect is against the… Star Luo National Academy.”

Xu Jiujiu’s expression turned grey when she heard that. She had a tough and unrelenting personality, but she was still overcome with shock. She understood that they had no chance at all against the Holy Ghost Sect, because the Holy Ghost Sect was possibly stronger than even the Tang Sect.

There was no need to draw the last lot. The Tang Sect would be up against Mu Xue and Wei Na’s Snowdemon Sect in the quarterﬁnals.

This was a fantastic draw for the Tang Sect, as the Snowdemon was evidently weaker than the Holy Ghost Sect. It didn’t seem like it would be very difﬁcult for the Tang Sect to defeat their designated opponent, while they would have a showdown against the Holy Ghost Sect in the semiﬁnals. The Holy Ghost Sect would be greatly weakened no matter what the result was. Of course, it was better if the Tang Sect could win this battle, but even if the Tang Sect lost, they would have smoothed the path ahead for Shrek Academy.

One precondition was that Shrek Academy had to get through their own group. Their opponents were not weak, and it was still uncertain whether they could ﬁght their way into the grand ﬁnals.

Huo Yuhao exhaled deeply and turned around to look at Bei Bei. “This should be the best outcome.”

Bei Bei’s eyes had been ﬁxed on Tang Ya from beginning to end. He nodded and said, “Yes! If we can defeat the Snowdemon Sect, you will be in charge when we face the Holy Ghost Sect.”

“Alright.” Huo Yuhao knew what he was trying to say. His eldest senior bother was afraid that he would lose himself if they went up against Tang Ya.

“Alright, the lottery is over. The quarterﬁnals will commence the day after tomorrow! The ﬁrst group will ﬁght it out in the morning, and the second group will battle in the afternoon. Make your preparations, everyone, as the tournament has reached its ﬁnal phase. Every round will be exceptionally important to every team here today, I hope everyone can achieve the best results!”

The lottery was over, and the ofﬁcials retreated one after another. The eight quarterﬁnalists also took turns exiting the grand banquet hall.

“Huo Yuhao!” a charming voice rang out.

Huo Yuhao turned around and saw Mu Xue and Wei Na walking over together. Wei Na’s face was full of regret as she said, “I didn’t expect us to meet you guys in the quarterﬁnals. This is a terrible draw for us.”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “How can that be? You guys came in ﬁrst in the group stages, but we were second in ours.”

Mu Xue grunted coldly and said, “Stop pretending! Everyone knows what you guys were doing against Shrek Academy. Don’t think that you will deﬁnitely defeat us! We will meet again in the arena when the time comes!”

Huo Yuhao smiled slightly and just nodded. “Everyone has a chance. We will all ﬁght with everything we have. I just hope that this tournament will not affect our friendship. In the end, we’re still business partners, are we not?”

Wei Na’s eyes lit up as she said, “That’s what I wanted to say, as well! No matter how this tournament turns out, we will still be business partners. I’m looking forward to more cooperation with the Tang Sect in the future!”

“Deﬁnitely!”

Both parties kept walking out as they talked. Once they left the main door, Mu Xue, Wei Na, and the rest of the Snowdemon Sect bid their farewells to the Tang Sect before they took their leave.

The other teams left as well. Bei Bei said, “Let’s head back as well. Let’s have a meeting in my room.”

------

The Tang Sect’s members gathered in Bei Bei’s room. They hadn’t moved to the second level, but the Tang Sect’s new room was a lot better than their old and decrepit one from before.

Xu Sanshi stretched out lazily on the sofa and said, “Why are we having a meeting, Bei Bei? Today’s lottery turned out pretty well. We should have a good rest and destroy the Holy Ghost Sect when the time comes. We have to knock some sense into Xiao Ya, no matter what.”

Bei Bei frowned and said, “Don’t think it’s all ﬁne and dandy. We have to defeat the Snowdemon Sect before we can ﬁght the Holy Ghost Sect.”

Xu Sanshi was a little surprised. “Are you kidding me, Bei Bei? Do we really have to open a meeting for our battle against the Heavenly Soul Empire’s Snowdemon Sect? I think they were lucky to be top in their group. On the other hand, I think the Heavenly Dragon Sect is stronger than they are, and they will be the ones standing in the way of Shrek Academy’s in their group.”

Bei Bei grunted coldly and said, “It’s not as easy as you think. Tell him, little junior brother. What problems are we going to face?”

Huo Yuhao understood that his eldest senior brother wanted to test him. “We can’t overlook one sect.”

Xu Sanshi was momentarily stunned. “What sect?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “The Body Sect!”

“The Body Sect? Haven’t they been keeping their heads down this entire time?”

Huo Yuhao said, “That’s the point. They haven’t revealed themselves yet, so we have to pay extra attention to them. According to reliable sources, the Body Sect is deﬁnitely participating in this tournament. However, they haven’t shown any tracks yet. What does this mean? This means that the Body Sect is hidden within another team, and they haven’t shown their true colors yet. This team is quite strong, and what I can tell from the current situation, the Body Sect is likely to be embedded among one of quarterﬁnalists.”

“Of the eight quarterﬁnalists, the Shrek Academy, us, and the Holy Ghost Sect can be excluded. These three teams simply cannot have any people from the Body Sect embedded inside them. Of the ﬁve remaining teams, the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy is also unlikely. After all, the Body Sect once ambushed the Illustrious Virtue Hall, and they are on bad terms with the Sun Moon Empire. The Proudsword Sect, the Heavenly Dragon Sect, the Snowdemon Sect, and the Star Luo National Academy are suspects. If I’m not wrong, the Body Sect’s people are deﬁnitely hidden within one of their reserve lineups.”

Bei Bei nodded, satisﬁed at Yuhao’s words. “He’s right. Therefore, don’t think that we are lucky for drawing the Snowdemon Sect! There’s a twenty-ﬁve percent chance that the Snowdemon Sect has people from the Body Sect hidden inside their team. If they want to defeat us, then the Body Sect will deﬁnitely have to ﬁght. Therefore, it’s very probable that we will be up against a very formidable opponent in our next match.”

The corner of Xu Sanshi’s mouth twitched. “We can’t be that unlucky, can we? One in four? Will we actually meet them? However, it seems like the Shrek Academy’s lot is pretty good. They’re up against the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy! That means they don’t even have a one-in-four chance of going up against the Body Sect!”

Bei Bei continued, “No matter which team the Body Sect is hidden in, every single team in the quarterﬁnals is quite strong. It’s likely that the Body Sect will show themselves in the quarterﬁnals. We cannot rest our hopes on luck, and that means we have to be careful with what we decide to do.”

Xiao Xiao heaved a faint sigh and said, “It would be fantastic if the Body Sect is hidden inside the Star Luo National Academy.”

A smile appeared on everyone’s faces when she said this. Wasn’t that right? The Star Luo National Academy was going up against the Holy Ghost Church. The Body Sect against the Holy Ghost Sect would be a spectacular battle! If they ended up dealing heavy losses to each other, that would be a perfect outcome for the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy.

Huo Yuhao sighed faintly and said, “Even though I wish that were true, I have to say that it’s very unlikely.”

“Why?” Xiao Xiao asked curiously.

Huo Yuhao answered, “It’s very simple. Have you guys not realized that the Star Luo Empire has been trying to reach out to Shrek Academy? They have always been trying to form an alliance or some kind of camaraderie with us, and they’ve always been trying to get the academy’s help. Princess Jiujiu’s urgency and her eagerness wasn’t fake when she was purchasing the Zhuge Divine Crossbows! She requested a Titled Douluo test the Zhuge Divine Crossbow as soon as possible! If we think from their perspective, if the Star Luo National Academy had a partner as formidable as the Body Sect, in addition to the fact that the Body Sect isn’t on good terms with Shrek Academy, why would they be so eager to lean towards us?” Everyone’s heads bobbed up and down as they listened to his analysis.

Bei Bei said, “Little junior brother makes a lot of sense. Therefore, our chances of meeting them have become one in three. Alright, let’s not talk about this anymore. Let’s discuss our battle strategies and tactics for the next round.”

There were fewer and fewer teams staying in the Brilliant Delight Hotel as the tournament progressed over time. Most of the teams who had been eliminated from the tournament had chosen to leave, as this place was considered a sad place for them now. Of course, some teams had wanted to stay so that they could continue watching the tournament. This was a great opportunity that they didn’t want to miss. But the teams that had been eliminated were forced to move out of the Brilliant Delight Hotel.

Therefore, the spacious and tremendous Brilliant Delight Hotel was only housing eight teams at the moment. The entire hotel seemed empty and uninhabited.

But this emptiness was ﬁlled with a stiﬂed atmosphere. The next three rounds represented glory, wealth, and reputation, all at once, for every quarterﬁnalist!

Shrek Academy undoubtedly felt the most pressure, because they were the previous season’s champions, and much of their glory and reputation was at stake. Their opponents in the subsequent rounds were simply too powerful, but their draw was considered fortunate. At the very least, they were up against one of the weaker teams in the quarterﬁnals. But what about afterwards? Everything that was to come was hard to predict!

The Holy Ghost Sect was the most mysterious team. Their team members rarely showed themselves in public other than in the arena during the tournament.

The Tang Sect was no longer considered a dark horse. Their team members’ identities had been investigated and publicized after their impressive showing. When everyone discovered that they were the Shrek Academy team that had clinched the championship last season, their label as a dark horse vanished into thin air.

It was even more taxing for Huo Yuhao, because he had to prepare for the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Competition’s grand ﬁnals on top of his ofﬁcial tournament.

This tournament’s timing was alternated from the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. Therefore, the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament’s grand ﬁnals was ﬁxed on the second day after the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament’s semiﬁnals. This also meant that the underground tournament’s grand ﬁnals was one day away from the other one. It was the best way to attract more people to bet and wager!

Nine people were participating in the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament. Huo Yuhao had used his necromancy to defeat his opponent in the previous round, but he had no idea what the ﬁnal round’s rules were going to be. This was a soul engineer tournament, after all, and it was natural that the rules of the grand ﬁnals would be adjusted after he had set a precedent by using his martial soul to defeat his opponent. The other two underground organizations would also be very careful about such a thing.

Therefore, Huo Yuhao had to design some of his own authentic soul tools, besides preparing for their quarterﬁnals, so that he could win something in the underground tournament. He had to claim this championship for the Tang Sect’s development, and also because he wanted to go undercover in his enemy’s camp.

Two days were given for the quarterﬁnalists to take a breather, and every team took this chance to rest up.

------

The quarterﬁnals were ﬁnally here. Radiant City was bustling early in the morning, and dawn had yet to break when citizens thronged out of the city to claim a good spot to watch the tournament from.

The quarterﬁnals would conclude today. There were four matches to be fought, and every match was one strong team against another. Nobody wanted to miss a single match for anything in the world.

Every single citizen who was hurrying out of the city along the roads and streets was carrying dry rations and water. They were prepared to spend an entire day in and around the spectator’s grandstands, and they were going together in groups. What was the beneﬁt of going together with friends? The greatest one was that their seats wouldn’t be taken by others if they wanted to head to the bathroom when the time came!

The masses of toilets that had been set up outside the city speciﬁcally for the tournament since its beginning had actually amassed quite some fertilizer for the farms around the Radiant City, though the farmers had to be the only ones who were excited about that.

According to the tournament’s rules, the ﬁrst group would ﬁght it out in the morning, while the second group would have their chance in the afternoon.

------

When the sun peeked out from the horizon, the teams that represented the strongest youths in the world walked out of the city as platoons of soldiers formed human walls to escort them.

Not only were the ﬁrst four teams that were ﬁghting in the morning going to the arena, but the second group – the Holy Ghost Sect, the Tang Sect, the Snowdemon Sect, and the Star Luo National Academy – had all gotten up early in the morning, as well.

There was no need to watch the other rounds during the round robins, and each team could just mind their own business. However, it was imperative for every team to understand their adversaries during the quarterﬁnals. At the same time, it was also better to head down to the arena so that they could get used to its atmosphere as early as possible.

The quarterﬁnals would be the true showdown between powerhouses. After today, the quarterﬁnals would narrow down into the semiﬁnals, and the four eliminated teams would be heading home.

Huo Yuhao was still sitting silently in his wheelchair. The quarterﬁnalists didn’t leave the Brilliant Delight Hotel at the same time, which was why they were the only team on the street at the moment.

Chapter 315: The Round of Eight Starts!

After careful analysis, it appeared that the most likely place the powerful members of the Body Sect were hidden in was either the Heavenly Dragon Sect, the Proudsword Sect, or the Snowdemon Sect. Frankly speaking, no matter where the Body Sect was hidden, they would pose a huge threat to the Tang Sect and Shrek Academy.

After they entered the top eight, they would surely face many challenges!

When everyone from the Tang Sect arrived at the arena, the team from Shrek Academy was already doing their warm-ups with their opponents from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy.

As they were in the ﬁrst half, Shrek Academy would deﬁnitely go ﬁrst.

The four rounds today were all major. The sun was already in the sky, and the weather was decent. As bright sunlight illuminated the earth, everyone felt a sense of warmth. Radiant City had experienced cold temperatures in the past few days, so the sunlight today lifted everyone’s spirits.

Wang Qiu’er stood quietly outside of the VIP resting zone as she looked down at the arena, which had already been ﬁxed from the damage she had helped cause it yesterday. No one knew what she was thinking. Her powdery-blue, wavy hair was bathed in sunlight, making it appear golden.

At the same time, she was like a solitary plum tree in winter. She stood there in solitude, appearing out of place, and yet, she was the center of it all.

When everyone entered the resting zone, Wang Dong’er, who was standing next to Huo Yuhao, walked over to Wang Qiu’er.

Huo Yuhao was stunned, but didn’t stop her. He trusted her. While Dong’er had every intention of competing against Qiu’er, she would not behave rashly, particularly after what had happened the last time.

Wang Dong’er walked up next to Wang Qiu’er. Likewise, sunlight poured onto her silky-smooth hair. The reﬂected sunlight was even more intense, but at least it was not blurry like the light Wang Qiu’er’s hair reﬂected.

Their faces looked exactly the same, even though there was a small age discrepancy. When the two girls stood there, they looked as if they were from a painting.

Wang Qiu’er sensed that Wang Dong’er coming up next to her, and turned to look at her.

“Why are you here?” Wang Qiu’er asked.

Wang Dong’er smiled slightly and said, “Did I not say it that day? You are my sister! The competition’s about to start, so I’m here to check on you.”

Wang Qiu’er said coldly, “If you’re here to show off, you can leave. You’ve won.”

Wang Dong’er was stunned, but soon understood what Wang Qiu’er meant. She sighed and said, “Do you know, after the ﬁght that day, he scolded me. It was the ﬁrst time he lost his temper at me.”

Wang Qiu’er frowned and said, “So why are you telling me this? He was deﬁnitely afraid that you would be hurt by me.”

Wang Dong’er shook her head slightly and said, “It’s not only that. I can also feel that he admires you greatly. Furthermore, you’ve saved him so many times. Regardless of whether it’s him or me, we’re both grateful to you. If not for that fact that I can’t compromise our feelings for him, I would very much like to be your sister. I respect you greatly.”

“You can leave,” Wang Qiu’er said, as the expression on her face turned even colder.

Wang Dong’er bowed her head and said, “I know that, regardless of what I say, you’ll treat it as if I’m mocking you. However, all I can tell you is that I don’t despise you. In fact, I kind of like your tenacity.”

With that, she ﬁnally turned toward where the other members of the Tang Sect were resting. She took two steps out, stopped, then turned her head to look at Wang Qiu’er and said, “Sis, you must win.”

When she heard the word ‘sis’, Wang Qiu’er’s heart, for some reason, trembled. Her toned, strong arms clenched tightly into ﬁsts as she nodded in one vigorous motion.

Wang Dong’er’s red lips trembled as she returned to Huo Yuhao’s side.

“What did you tell her?” Huo Yuhao asked her curiously.

Wang Dong’er said slightly coyly, “This is a matter between us women, so why are you asking?”

“Eh…” Huo Yuhao looked helpless.

Xu Sanshi, who was sitting next to him, chuckled, “Yuhao, you resemble me more and more. How does it feel to have such a strict wife?” Huo Yuhao glared at him and said, “Third brother, at least I have a wife to take care of me, is Sister Nannan really your ‘wife’?”

Xu Sanshi turned his head to look at Jiang Nannan as he made kissing motions at her. Jiang Nannan pretended to not have seen it, but instead was trying to get the organizer of the tournament to prepare beverages for them, willingly oblivious to him.

Xu Sanshi turned his head back and glared back at Huo Yuhao and said, “Yuhao, you’re learning all the wrong things. Now you know how to hit where it hurts. Hmph!”

Huo Yuhao chuckled bitterly. “You started it, alright?”

------

The members of every team were all present, including those from the Holy Ghost Sect. They were still as mysterious as ever, cloaked entirely in black robes. Tang Ya sat at the front, reﬂecting her important position in the sect. At the back of the team stood the woman whom Huo Yuhao thought was familiar. She appeared to be the teacher in charge. However, the Scorpion Tiger Douluo Zhang Peng was nowhere to be found. He was not with the Holy Ghost Sect’s team.

The Snowdemon Sect had arrived much earlier. Wei Na and Mu Xue sat at the front of the team, conversing in low tones, while the others were silent behind them. They all appeared extremely alert, and would occasionally glance in the direction of the Tang Sect.

There were far fewer participants in the waiting area than before. However, the atmosphere was still extremely tense, especially since every team would have to compete today. It felt like the very air could ignite at any moment.

------

Up on the main podium, the Prince Regent Xu Tianran had arrived a long time ago. Ju Zi sat next to him as she passed him a cup of fragrant tea. Xu Tianran drank from the cup, looked at the Hallmaster of the Illustrious Virtue Hall and asked, “Hallmaster Hongchen, how are your grandson and granddaughter doing?”

Jing Hongchen replied quietly, “Thank you for your concern, Your Highness. Thanks to the imperial physicians you sent, their conditions have stabilized. However, as their injuries are not light, they will need at least a year to make a full recovery.”

Xu Tianran sighed softly and said, “As long as there are no after-effects, it’s ﬁne. They’re both pillars of the empire. Help me tell Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen that this defeat does not mean anything. After all, defeat is the mother of success. As they now have the painful experience of a defeat, this will help them walk on more proper paths in the future. Tell them it’s from me personally. I believe that one day they’ll be able to beat the group from Shrek Academy!”

“Thank you, Your Highness.” Jing Hongchen appeared drained after these two days. The defeat of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy team had placed a great deal of pressure on him. Many other ofﬁcials had raised complaints against him. It was a major humiliation to the empire for them to be unable to even make it past the qualiﬁers. Furthermore, both Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen were severely injured. If not for the fact that Xu Tianran had sent the only healing-type Titled Douluo of the Sun Moon Empire to attend to them, Xiao Hongchen’s wounds might have been fatal, and Meng Hongchen could have been permanently crippled.

Only with Xu Tianran’s strong support was Jing Hongchen able to preserve his position. However, he understood that there was no free lunch in this world. After this incident, he was ﬁrmly in the orbit of the Crown Prince. He now had no choice but to serve him loyally in the future. He understood how powerful Xu Tianran was, and was clear on the Crown Prince’s ambition. While he still had doubts in his heart, he now had no choice but to believe ﬁrmly in him.

“Hallmaster Hongchen, do you think the Radiant Academy can beat Shrek?” The ﬁrst competition was about to start, and Xu Tianran was naturally in high spirits. He was particularly enthused by the prospects of witnessing such intense ﬁghts!

Jing Hongchen said, “While I don’t think we should over- emphasize our enemy’s power, and undermine ourselves, I have to say that Radiant Academy is not as good as the Imperial Academy. While the team from Shrek isn’t particularly powerful, Wang Qiu’er is too difﬁcult to defeat. We all saw what happened that day. Wang Qiu’er used all her might at the very end, which was close to the power of an eight-ringed Soul Douluo. If not, there was no way she could have defeated my grandson and granddaughter. With such a captain, the team from Shrek Academy has a very good chance.”

Xu Tianran nodded, sighed, and acknowledged, “We really can’t underestimate the ten thousand year foundations of Shrek Academy.”

The mysterious Imperial Tutor who sat next to him suddenly said, “No matter how long they’ve been established, they also need talents. I think that the teams from Shrek Academy and the Tang Sect contain all their talents for this generation.”

Xu Tianran’s eyes ﬂashed as he smiled and said, “Imperial Tutor is right.”

Ju Zi, who sat next to Xu Tianran, said nothing. The trace of a smile could be seen on her face. She looked down at the arena, and in the depths of her eyes, one could see a hint of worry.

------

Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, was the referee. Ever since he had joined the competition, injury rates had plummeted. He refereed all the important rounds, such as today.

“The ﬁrst round for the top eight, Shrek Academy versus the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy. May the teammates from both teams enter the waiting zone. The ﬁrst competitor for the individual elimination round from both teams, please come into the arena.”

On Shrek’s side were seven people. Their combination was exactly the same as the one they had used to face off against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. They were Wang Qiu’er, Dai Huabing, Zhu Lu, Ning Tian, Cao Jinxuan, and the Lan sisters. This was their standard team. In the previous round against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, they had not worked together ﬂawlessly. This was because after Wang Qiu’er was struck by the aging ray, Dai Huabing and Zhu Lu unleashed their power too early, causing them to almost lose control of the

competition. For this, Wang Qiu’er scolded them harshly when they returned.

However, Wang Qiu’er understood clearly that if not for Huo Yuhao’s fusion, while the Aging Ray might not actually make her age, there was no way she could have beaten Meng Hongchen and Xiao Hongchen due to the massive depletion of her soul power at that time.

However, this made her even more unhappy. She did not want to show weakness in front of Huo Yuhao!

When she entered the waiting zone, Wang Qiu’er jumped onto the arena without even sitting down. The team from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy had unpleasant looks on their faces.

No one wanted to ﬁght this immensely powerful Golden Dragon Girl! Her Golden Dragon Spear could attack both near and far, and was almost impossible to resist. Many people believed that she was the most powerful competitor in the entire tournament, particularly after she defeated the Hongchen siblings!

Who would dare to ﬁght her? However, this was the individual elimination round, and they had to send someone to face her, since she had already stepped up.

A youth leapt out from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy team’s side and landed in the arena.

The youth was handsome, and his body well-deﬁned. He looked like a piece of jade, and his eyes brimmed with conﬁdence. He strode conﬁdently to the center of the arena, where Wang Qiu’er was waiting.

“State your names.”

“Shrek, Wang Qiu’er,” she said in her characteristically straightforward manner. “Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy, Lu Jun. Hello, Golden Dragon Girl, it’s a pleasure to go up against you. Please show mercy…”

Lu Jun spoke to Wang Qiu’er in a gentlemanly manner, but she did not wait for him to ﬁnish before she turned her back to walk to the periphery of the arena, completely ignoring this handsome young man.

Lu Jun’s mouth twitched. She doesn’t give me face at all.

What a personality. I like it!

Wang Qiu’er’s strong showing, coupled with her beautiful face, attracted many people. All those who thought they had a chance, be it soul masters or soul engineers, tried to ask her out, including Lu Jun.

Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, looked at him coldly and said, “Young man, don’t expect her to show you mercy just because you’re handsome. She has a ﬁery temper, and all she cares about is winning. Be careful.” Lu Jun nodded his head and said humbly, “Thank you for your advice, senior. I’ll be careful.”

His careful attitude left a good impression on the Unbreakable Douluo. He had heard that there were some exceptional participants from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy. Lu Jun should be one of them!

Today, he would be able to assess the young man’s performance throughout this competition. If possible, he would not mind taking in a disciple...

Lu Jun reached the edge of the arena after Wang Qiu’er. They looked across at one another. At this moment, Lu Jun was no longer smiling, and a severe expression settled on his face as he looked at Wang Qiu’er.

Who dared to be careless in front of the Golden Dragon Girl!? Flirting was ﬂirting. His team was already in the top eight, and Lu Jun was undoubtedly a core member of his team. He dared not be careless! “Prepare yourselves!” said the Unbreakable Douluo as he looked at both sides.

“Begin!”

Wang Qiu’er sprang into action. Her left foot stomped down on the ground, and her body ﬂew toward Lu Jun, who was more than a hundred meters away, like an arrow.

Everyone had witnessed how explosive she could be. In the blink of an eye, she covered the entire distance!

When Lu Jun heard Zheng Zhan say to prepare, he had already squatted down. When the referee announced the start of the round, he leapt into the air like a bolt of lightning. Behind him, a pair of wings from a ﬂying-type soul tool expanded instantly, and four rays of light shot out, propelling him into the sky.

Chapter 316: One-man Team

The Unbreakable Douluo’s eyes lit up. This young man is smart indeed. As a soul engineer, the most important thing was to use his own advantages to attack his opponent’s weaknesses. The rules of the tournament set by the Sun Moon Empire were already in favor of soul engineers. Taking advantage of them wisely was crucial.

Lu Jun had evidently planned this out beforehand. After he jumped up, he used all his strength. In the process, the ﬂying- type soul tool was already ready. When he jumped up, there was a single moment’s pause.

Wang Qiu’er was fast, no doubt. However, no matter how fast she was, she had to cross a distance of 100 meters. When she reached him, Lu Jun was already 20 meters above the ground.

This was already beyond Wang Qiu’er’s close combat radius. However, Wang Qiu’er was no pushover, and she did not lack battle experience. She rushed forward, touched the ground, bent her knees, and in the next instant, everyone heard a ‘boom’ from the ground. A hole about two meters wide appeared, and her body was like a golden cannon shell as it shot into the air after Lu Jun.

She gripped her Golden Dragon Spear. With her speed, it would not be difﬁcult for her to catch up to him.

At this moment, one could clearly see the counter-strategy the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy had prepared for Wang Qiu’er.

As he noticed that Wang Qiu’er was about to catch up, Lu Jun, who was in mid-air, activated his Invincible Barrier.

When Wang Qiu’er went up against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, she was able to score victory after victory. However, in her ﬁght against Ding Xiaobu, she was bogged down. This served as an inspiration for the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy. If not for Ding Xiaobu’s cowardice, he would deﬁnitely have been able to wear Wang Qiu’er down!

Wang Qiu’er’s face was cold, and she caught up to Lu Jun in mid-air quickly. In terms of explosive speed, even a ﬂying-type soul tool could not compare with her!

Even a high-class ﬂying-type soul tool needed time to charge up and release its power. However, Wang Qiu’er’s body had no such needs.

Lu Jun was very calm. He even smiled at Wang Qiu’er who was approaching him, behaving as gentlemanly as he could.

Wang Qiu’er’s face was emotionless. In the next instant, she reached Lu Jun’s altitude. While he looked on in shock, she did not attack his Invincible Barrier. After she passed him, she instead landed on Lu Jun’s Invincible Barrier with one foot, directly on his head…

Who knew that Wang Qiu’er would use this method to counter Lu Jun’s counter-strategy? The round right now looked extremely weird to everyone. Lu Jun was using his ﬂying-type soul tool and carrying Wang Qiu’er higher into the sky!

After a moment of shock, Lu Jun started to react. He tried to shake his body as he sought to throw Wang Qiu’er off as fast as he could.

However, just as he was about to use his strength, a powerful energy came from the top of his head. The ﬂying-type soul tool behind his back started to whine louder and louder, and he found that could no longer ascend any higher into the sky.

The Invincible Barrier was not all-purpose. It could prevent its user from being struck, but it could not let him do whatever he wanted.

At this moment, Wang Qiu’er was like a proud, golden statue as she stood on top of the Invincible Barrier. She suddenly exerted a powerful pressure that Lu Jun’s Class 6 ﬂying-type soul tool could no longer take. His body stopped its upward ﬂight… and then, it started to drop down.

Lu Jun tried to change his direction of ﬂight. However, he was helpless in face of the immense pressure from above. If he tried to continue upward, he would be forced back to the ground by Wang Qiu’er. Flying horizontally was out of the question too. His well-designed plan had been ruined by his opponent. Lu Jun, who had been brimming with conﬁdence a moment ago, started to sweat.

The Invincible Barrier had a time limit. Furthermore, he had used a rather ordinary Invincible Barrier, which could only last for around seven seconds. From his perspective, he had seven seconds of buffer time, which was enough for him to escape her pursuit. Then, he could exert pressure on Wang Qiu’er until he beat her. Who knew that Wang Qiu’er would start off using this method to ﬁght him?

Lu Jun was an elite from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy. He ﬂipped his hands, and two soul cannons appeared on his shoulders. This time, he had no choice but to go on the offensive. The two rapid-ﬁre soul cannons on his hand started to pound Wang Qiu’er.

Golden scales instantly covered her entire body, and a golden dragon started to swirl around Wang Qiu’er. She released her Golden Dragon Body.

The rapid-ﬁre soul cannon’s main strength lay in how fast it could shoot. It was able to cover a wide area, or lay down suppressive ﬁre on a particular foe. Each of its shots was about the size of an egg. However, when they landed on Wang Qiu’er’s body, it was like they had hit a steel wall. There was no way they were hurting her at all.

In the absence of soul tools, Wang Qiu’er’s defenses were no weaker than a defensive-type soul master! Many people had forgotten about this, including Huo Yuhao. This was because her offensive powers were too strong and too eye-catching!

Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon Spear shone with layers of golden light as it blocked many of the shots that were ﬁred at her. The remaining ones that hit her were unable to hurt her.

At the same time, Wang Qiu’er applied force to her legs as she exerted even more pressure downward. Lu Jun wanted to use his ﬂying-type soul tool to control his descent, and hence, he had to expend soul power. While he was naturally gifted and able to make Class 6 soul tools, he was still just a ﬁve-ringed Soul King. He could not use his Class 6 soul tools while experiencing such a depletion in his soul power.

A thought ﬂashed past Lu Jun’s mind, and he immediately stopped ﬁring. He retrieved an odd-looking soul tool from his storage-type soul tool.

This appeared to be a soul tool that resembled a basin, and the bottom of this basin-like soul tool was rather thick. The sides of the basin arched up and curved outward. Lu Jun tore his shirt open to reveal a tight-ﬁtting singlet underneath. His singlet was ﬁlled with different types of metal. No one knew how he did it, but the black ‘basin’ suddenly attached itself to his chest.

With that, a ray of white lightning shot out from his chest. It teleported him at the speed of lightning through the air.

This explosive power was strong indeed! When it was released, a layer of armor covered Lu Jun’s body. Furthermore, he still had his Invincible Barrier, which buffered him against the shockwave in mid-air.

While Wang Qiu’er was able to stand in a stable fashion before, she was sent ﬂying at this moment. Lu Jun’s speed was too fast, and he smashed forcefully against the protective barrier around the arena. However, if not for this shocking energy, there was no way he could have escaped Wang Qiu’er just now!

There was a loud bang as Wang Qiu’er landed on the ground. With the energy she had just released, she caused dust and dirt to ﬂy about the moment she hit the ground.

The hearts of the ofﬁcials organizing the competition skipped a beat. Why is it that whenever this girl appears, the arena is quickly damaged? We need to reinforce it, again!?

Lu Jun was sent into a daze too. However, as his body bounced back, he had already removed his Invincible Barrier. While he still had about a second of it left, he did not want to waste any more soul power on it.

At this moment, his shirt was already drenched in cold sweat. When he was spectating, he had thought that everyone who Wang Qiu’er defeated simply did not do enough. However, now that he was the one facing the top female competitor in the tournament, he understood the immense pressure they were under. He ﬁnally understood why Ding Xiaobu admitted defeat just as Wang Qiu’er was about to use her sixth soul skill. What immense pressure he must have faced! While he was rattled, he did not dare to slow down. As his ﬂying-type soul tool was protected by the Invincible Barrier, it was not destroyed. At this moment, he hurriedly used it to gain altitude again. The only thing he should be doing was creating distance!

However, at this moment, Lu Jun suddenly felt his body turn cold. This was because he saw that Wang Qiu’er, who was stuck in the ground thanks to the force of her impact, was staring at him coldly. Her hand made a throwing motion. The long and sharp Golden Dragon Spear was sent ﬂying straight for him.

Lu Jun inhaled to calm himself before he acted. On his back and chest, a ray of light started to shine instantly. The light behind his back pushed him forward, and then he adjusted the wings of his ﬂying-type soul tool. This caused him to ﬂy diagonally upward, as if he were a plane taking off.

The light in front of his chest started to shine even brighter. It came from the basin-like soul tool which he had previously used to escape Wang Qiu’er’s control.

The ray of light went straight for her . This time, everyone could clearly see that it was a ray of white electric light about as thick as a pail. It was charged with electricity and extremely fast. However, it was constrained by distance, and could only reach a target ten meters ahead of him.

Lu Jun’s mastery of distance was perfect. He only unleashed this light when he was in front of Wang Qiu’er.

Boom!

The ground shook. This was because the ground of the arena was covered with huge metal plates. When the thick electric light hit it, snake-like jolts of electricity spread everywhere, even out to the edge of the arena.

Lu Jun also used this powerful energy to bounce back into the sky!

This blow was both offensive and defensive. Lu Jun’s specialty was that he ﬁrmly believed in one ideal, and that was that if he wanted to defeat Wang Qiu’er or drain her as much as he could, he had to create as much distance from her as possible.

He had made the soul tool on his chest. It was called the Lightning Cannon. While it was classiﬁed as a Class 6 soul tool, its power within ten meters was equivalent to that of a Class 7 soul tool. However, this kind of soul tool had its own glaring weaknesses. It had a strong recoil, and this recoil could not be compensated normally, or the power of the cannon would drop greatly.

After many painful experiences, Lu Jun was able to craft it into its current shape. While he was able to retain its power in this form, he would have to bear with the enormous recoil.

In other words, while his opponent might not be sent ﬂying by his attack, he deﬁnitely would ‘ﬂy’ because of it! However, Lu Jun had developed a whole series of soul tools to complement this unique trait of his Lightning Cannon. He tried to maximize its potential while reducing the probability of it injuring him.

This was the case at the moment. Why did he ﬁre it down from the sky? He wanted to tap into the recoil of the Lightning Cannon to let him bounce back to a higher altitude. As long as he could widen the distance between Wang Qiu’er and himself, he believed he would succeed. Furthermore, the Lightning Cannon would severely injure Wang Qiu’er too. As long as he completed his objective, he believed that he had a chance of success.

The moment he unleashed the cannon, everything before him turned white. When he saw the huge amount of electricity devouring Wang Qiu’er, Lu Jun did not delight in it. Instead, he became panicky. Is this too much? He knew the power of the Lightning Cannon. At this moment, he was slightly worried for Wang Qiu’er, who he had a crush on.

Quickly, he froze. While his body was in an upward trajectory, the electricity underneath him had dissipated. He did not see any trace of Wang Qiu’er. “The competition has ended. Please show mercy.” The Unbreakable Douluo’s voice resounded throughout the arena. He was already in mid-air as he stared at Lu Jun’s back.

That was right, Wang Qiu’er stood there with her feet on Lu Jun’s ﬂying-type soul tool, which was on his back. Her Golden Dragon Spear was pointed straight at the back of his head.

The reason she did not stab down was not because she showed mercy. Instead, because of the explosive force in that short frame of time, she ﬁrst had to maintain her balance.

Everything happened too fast. From Lu Jun’s ﬂight and attack, to the end of the competition, it took only a few breaths.

Everyone saw that Wang Qiu’er did only one thing. Instant Teleportation.

She can teleport? In the waiting zone, the team from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy looked at each other. They all wore ugly expressions on their faces.

Only when Lu Jun sensed the back of his head turning cold did he understand what had happened. Under the protection of the Unbreakable Douluo, he descended to the arena.

He saw a look of regret in Wang Qiu’er’s eyes.

Does she regret defeating me? Does she pity me? At this moment, Lu Jun did not feel depressed because of his defeat, but instead, was secretly delighted. When he saw that Wang Qiu’er was not in his electric light, he actually felt relieved. At least he had not used some extraordinary cruel method to defeat her.

Then, he heard Wang Qiu’er mumble to herself.

“Had I known I couldn’t have stabilized my body, I would’ve stabbed.” “Ms. Wang, are we enemies?” Lu Jun asked in sorrow and anger.

Wang Qiu’er shot him a cold look and said in an icy, regal tone, “When I drew the lot and saw your name, we became enemies.”

Lu Jun walked off the arena, depressed. However, he could not help but look at Wang Qiu’er. He realized that he could not hate her. Why am I such a dumb idiot!? He slapped himself, and then closed his eyes, vowing not to look at her.

His friends thought that this was an act of self-rebuke. They all went up to console him. After all, it was not humiliating to lose to Wang Qiu’er.

The next two competitors from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy were both mid-level Class 5 soul engineers. In the face of Wang Qiu’er’s tempest-like attacks, they were both quickly defeated.

No one knew whether it was because there was no enmity between the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy and Shrek Academy, or because of Zheng Zhan’s rapid reactions, but the team members from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy were able to escape without serious injuries.

Three victories in a row in the individual elimination round.

Three points.

The team members of the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy began to stand up. They did not plan to achieve victory in the individual elimination round. Once they reached the top eight, victory should be decided in the group round! According to the original battling style of Shrek Academy against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, after Wang Qiu’er won all three rounds, it was time for the group round. The six members of Shrek Academy, all of whom were at full strength, went up to support Wang Qiu’er.

Evidently, this tempo was decent indeed.

The Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy had prepared for the group round too. This was their specialty, as well! They had trained together for many years, and had good ties with each other. They were as close as siblings. In terms of coordination and camaraderie, they surpassed the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. Furthermore, they also had a killer move they could only use during the group round. Coupled with the fact that the ﬁrst three of them were not injured too seriously, they walked up to the arena with conﬁdence.

However, they forgot something…

They were not the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy!

“Next!” the Unbreakable Douluo Zheng Zhan hollered at them.

What next? The group of them, who were ready to ﬁght, looked confused.

Zheng Zhan was confused too. He strode over to them and said, “What are you doing? Send the next one up!”

The captain of the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy was a young man who was not very tall. He had a clear demeanor, and his skin was as smooth as that of a girl. He looked at Zheng Zhan in confusion and asked, “Referee, isn’t it time for the group round? Why have you not announced it?”

Zheng Zhan’s mouth twitched, and three black lines drooped from his forehead. “What nonsense. Do you think that it’s time for the group round? Since the initial elimination round, to the round-robin round, and now to the top eight, how can you not know the rules of the tournament? We’ve only had three individual elimination rounds. What group round is there to speak of?”

The captain of the Radiant Academy said, “However, after three individual elimination rounds, we have the right to ask for the group round!”

Zheng Zhan was so infuriated that he turned icy-cold as he stared at them harshly and said, “Did you win? Did you win? Shrek did not ask for the group round. What’s wrong with your brains?”

“This…” Everyone from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy suddenly discovered the core of this problem. Was this not so? Wang Qiu’er did not ask for the group round!

The captain of the Radiant Academy looked at Wang Qiu’er, who was using two milk bottles to replenish her strength, and shouted in a rather loud voice, “Are you playing us?”

Of course, he did not know that among the six of his teammates who heard his words, the ﬁrst thought that entered their minds was “Play with me, play with me…”

Wang Qiu’er was stunned too. She was confused as well. The team from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy did not incite hate in her, and hence, she was much less ferocious towards them. Furthermore, the Unbreakable Douluo had been watching her closely, so she did not have the chance to use any devastating methods to decrease their overall will to battle.

While she did not achieve her objective, she did not experience too much depletion in her own strength, either. Who knew that her opponent would say something like this? A cruel look appeared in Wang Qiu’er’s eyes. She narrowed her eyes, and an icy-cold aura locked itself squarely on the captain.

The captain felt his body go cold. He cried out an absurd statement, “Don’t be rash!” As he said that, he tried to hide behind the Unbreakable Douluo.

“This guy…”

There was amplifying equipment near the main podium, and thus everyone could hear what was said on stage. When he heard the captain’s words, Prince Regent Xu Tianran’s facial muscles twitched at an astounding speed.

This was too humiliating...

The Hallmaster of the Illustrious Virtue Hall had a solemn expression on his face. However, there was a hint of schadenfreude in his eyes. “Captain, stop talking…” Lu Jun, who was next to the captain, touched him.

“Why are you touching me? Are you trying to take advantage of me?” The captain slapped him.

“Big Sister, I’d never dare to do such a thing!” Lu Jun almost cried. The other team members quickly walked off.

A girl? Wang Qiu’er was stunned too. The captain from the Radiant Academy was just like Wang Dong’er, a girl in guy’s clothing!

“I’ll go. Prepare yourselves. When I win, we’ll take care of them together.” Lu Jun did not manage to hold her back as his captain walked onto the arena.

On the arena, the captain of the Radiant Academy walked toward Wang Qiu’er with big steps. As she walked, she appeared to be building up her aura. Quickly, she arrived before Wang Qiu’er. She puffed out her chest, and then took a few steps back. Then, she said something that made Wang Qiu’er’s killing intent break almost instantly.

“Why are yours so big?” The captain of the Radiant Academy had an angry look on her face. She was staring right at Wang Qiu’er’s chest!

The captain was almost a whole head shorter than Wang Qiu’er. Wang Qiu’er’s chest was at the level of her eyes.

This was the ﬁrst time Wang Qiu’er’s expression had changed since the start of the competition. As her opponent’s question was too sudden and random, she blushed instantly.

Both she and Wang Dong’er had the same, divinely beautiful face. Now that her face turned red, she looked as gorgeous as a peony.

“Do you want to die?” Wang Qiu’er swung her Golden Dragon Spear out instantly. While the captain of the Radiant City Academy might be a girl, she behaved like a hooligan!

However, while this captain might seem overboard, her reaction was not slow. She leapt back and dodged her spear. She did not retaliate, but instead turned to the Unbreakable Douluo and said, “Referee, she attacked me before the competition started.”

Who dares to say she’s dumb? At this crucial moment, she was smarter than anyone else. Zheng Zhan instantly appeared between the two of them. He looked at Wang Qiu’er and said seriously, “I’ll warn you once. If you break the rules again, I’ll disqualify you.”

The captain of the Radiant Academy team smiled gleefully. However, Zheng Zhan quickly turned to her and said seriously, “Watch your words. You’re representing Radiant City. If you offend your opponent with your words once more, I’ll disqualify you too.”

The captain of the Radiant Academy team’s mouth twitched as she said, “I’m only stating a fact. Let’s start, let’s start. Just let me beat her.”

“Report your names,” said Zheng Zhan with an ugly expression.

“Shrek, Wang Qiu’er.”

“Radiant Academy, Xu Tianzhen.”

When she heard this name, Wang Qiu’er could not help but stiﬂe a smile. She almost laughed. This person is really as her name goes. She’s so dumb and ‘tianzhen’ (naïve).

“Both sides, step back,” Zheng Zhan shouted out.

“I’m awesome, you’re ﬁnished.” Xu Tianzhen waved her not- so-big ﬁst at Wang Qiu’er. Only then did she turn to walk to the edge of the arena.

Wang Qiu’er completely ignored Xu Tianzhen. She gripped her Golden Dragon Spear and walked to her own side. That short intermission had helped her regain much of her soul power.

Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁghting style was unlike that of most soul masters. She battled with her as the center of it all. To be precise, she fought with an unprecedented will and an indomitable spirit. She used her innate potential. The stronger her opponent, the more she could tap into her potential, and the stronger she would become. This was why she was terrifying.

She always looked down on her opponent. This was her plan.

Her arrogance came from her bones.

“Begin!”

“Swoosh!” An ear-splitting sound, as if space itself was being split apart, could be heard. The Golden Dragon Spear zoomed toward Xu Tianzhen, who was about 100 meters away, like a bolt of electricity. This was her most powerful response to what Xu Tianzhen had said.

However, Xu Tianzhen, who was in combat mode, changed too.

She placed her hands together in front of her face, raised her arms, and while interlocking her ﬁngers, made a motion as if she were lifting the very sky. Her not-very-big chest appeared bigger because of his motion too.

A piercing ray of red light shot out from her body. In the center of her skyward palms, a reddish-orange ball of light appeared.

Two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings, the perfect combination, rose from underneath her feet. Her third soul ring instantly started to shine. A ray of reddish-orange light shot out and struck the lightning-like Golden Dragon Spear.

Boom!

A huge explosion went off. Struck by the reddish-orange light, the gold light around the Golden Dragon Spear started to fade, and its speed slowed signiﬁcantly. However, it continued on its way toward its target.

The ﬁrst soul ring around Xu Tianzhen started to shine too. A reddish-orange halo appeared underneath her feet, and the ray of reddish-orange light above her head started to sink down into the ground. Then, her body suddenly disappeared. When she re-appeared, she was standing where the earlier ray of light had shone. Like this, she was able to dodge the Golden Dragon Spear, appearing behind it!

Wang Qiu’er took a step forward as she stomped on the ground. Her entire body rose up into the air as she charged toward Xu Tianzhen. After she dodged the Golden Dragon Spear, the light in Xu Tianzhen’s eyes became extremely clear. From her palms, ten thousand rays of light shot into the reddish-orange ball of light in the air, turning the entire arena into a bright, golden-red world.

Wang Qiu’er suddenly felt disoriented. Under the powerful light, she lost her target.

---

Below the arena, He Caitou suddenly opened his mouth and said, “This is a descendant of the Sunmoon, the possessor of the Sun. The captain of the Radiant Academy is from the main branch of the Sun Moon Empire’s imperial family.”

“Eh?” The stage was covered in golden-red light. One could barely see clearly. Everyone from the Tang Sect looked at him simultaneously in shock.

He Caitou felt out of place. He turned to see if anyone else was looking at him before saying in a low voice, “Members of the imperial family of the Sun Moon Empire have a powerful type of martial soul. This was one of the reasons why they could ascend the throne. The Sun martial soul is possessed only by the direct descendants of this bloodline. The power of the sun is extremely strong and intense. It is the top ﬁre-type martial soul. While it isn’t an Ultimate Strength Martial Soul, it’s not too far off. Furthermore, it can tap into the power of the sun to strengthen the owner. Compared to elder sister’s Moon, it is superior.”

Evidently, just as He Caitou was doing his analysis, everyone else noticed that as the reddish-gold light on the arena grew stronger, the light from the sun around became weaker. Only the light that shone down on the arena seemed stronger. This created an odd spectacle. It was as if a light pillar about a hundred meters wide had descended from the sky and landed on the arena.

“She used her third soul skill ﬁrst, Divine Sunlight. Then, she used her ﬁrst soul skill, Inverse Sun. At the same time, she should have used her ﬁfth soul skill, Lofty Lightrays. Wang Qiu’er is up against a strong foe.”

--- Up on the arena, Wang Qiu’er, who was in the middle of it all, could feel it best. As the entire arena was basked in the powerful reddish-gold light, she knew her vision was affected. All she could see before her was a patch of gold. She couldn’t even sense Xu Tianzhen’s location.

Furthermore, the temperature of the arena rose continually because of this golden-red light. It was like lava from the early days of the Earth. The heat was roasting her body.

At this moment, what shocked Wang Qiu’er was the fact that she was not thinking about how she should subdue her enemy. Instead, she wished she had Huo Yuhao’s Ultimate Ice armor on her. With that, she would not need to fear the heat of the sun.

Wang Qiu’er waved her right hand and instantly retrieved her Golden Dragon Spear. She stood in her original position and closed her eyes.

Golden scales soon enveloped her entire body. A golden dragon swirled around her protectively, and a layer of golden fog soon rose from her body. Like a statue, she stood in the center of the arena without moving.

When he saw the vast amount of gold and red, Huo Yuhao could not help but frown. At this time, he couldn’t help Wang Qiu’er anymore. Unlike last time, he hadn’t hidden himself in advance. Furthermore, he did not think that Wang Qiu’er would admit defeat. Most importantly, he had a match in the afternoon too; if he overexerted himself, what could he do for the Tang Sect later?

While he could forcibly use Spiritual Detection to penetrate the protective barrier and help Wang Qiu’er, he did not know how draining it would be. Hence, he hesitated.

Faced with Wang Qiu’er’s inaction, Xu Tianzhen was perplexed. Of course, she could sense Wang Qiu’er’s location, but she did not dare to act without caution. Wang Qiu’er stood there like a statue, but she was also like a volcano that could blow up at any moment. Once she did, she would strike with devastating force.

Frankly speaking, Xu Tianzhen was an anomaly in Radiant City. Her unique aspect lay in the fact that she was actually a soul master, not a soul engineer. After all, how could someone like her, who possessed the powerful Sun martial soul, not cultivate? With this option available, no one would willingly be a soul engineer.

Xu Tianzhen had entered the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy as a special exception. While she knew how to use soul tools, she preferred to use her martial soul.

Xu Tianzhen did not move easily. On the arena, everything seemed to have been silenced by the reddish-gold light.

Why was Xu Tianzhen not in a rush? Her Lofty Lightrays was a powerful domain-type attack. This attack not only burned its target by increasing the temperature, but it actually also harnessed the power of the sun in the sky. As time passed, it would absorb even more power from the sun. Not only could it raise the temperature in her domain, but she could also accumulate enough of it to attack explosively. The power from it would be devastating. Hence, she was likewise in no rush.

The person who was truly caught in a rut was the referee, the Unbreakable Douluo Zheng Zhan. As the referee, he had to observe the two sides as they fought in the arena. At the right moment, he had to declare the competition to be over, and announce a winner. Normally, he would not be struck by any attacks himself. However, faced with this domain-type soul skill, there was nowhere he could run! While the Lofty Lightrays were not actually ‘lofty’, they were still relatively tall. At that height, how could he judge what was going on down there? Furthermore, he couldn’t forcibly resist the suppression from the domain-type soul skill. If not, Xu Tianzhen would be affected. Helpless, this powerful Class 9 soul engineer could only bear the effects of the domain- type attack. With his astounding cultivation, he would not be injured, but it was not a good feeling to be roasted alive, either!

Everyone, both on the arena and off it, was tense. The team from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy stood up to watch the round. They knew that if Xu Tianzhen lost, they would truly be ﬁnished.

Chapter 317: Baptism of the Sun, the Golden Dragon Lady

Reddish-yellow light shone on the arena of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. It had been there for more than a minute now.

No one could tell what was going on in the arena because of the light, but dark-red molten metal ﬂowed down the inside of the protective barrier, and the intense heat caused many waves to form on it.

If even the metal was melting, one could tell how terrifying the temperature in the arena was.

Huo Yuhao did not help Wang Qiu’er in the end. He believed in her abilities. At the same time, he did so for the Tang Sect. He was a member of the Tang Sect, and while the glory of Shrek was important, he was the main control-type soul master of the Tang Sect as well. If he could not take part in the top eight ﬁght at full strength, what if his teammates became injured? After entering the top eight, any mistake might cost them the entire competition. Even if Wang Qiu’er lost, she still had other teammates.

All the best, Qiu’er. Huo Yuhao clenched his right ﬁst unconsciously.

Suddenly, at this moment, the scene in the arena started to change. The intense reddish-gold light began to contract at an astounding pace.

Everyone could now see that the ground of the arena was heated completely red. The light, that was slowly receding to a single spot, became more and more mysterious. It started to twist and turn intensely, forming shapes like water ripples.

This is…

Xu Tianzhen’s form could be seen. Both her palms reached out into the sky, and she held a small sun. However, the sun had turned dark red.

On her body, the light from her sixth soul ring shone radiantly. The jet-black soul ring appeared to have dyed the sun, even turning it darker.

“This is Sun’s Gaze. Her sixth soul skill is actually Sun’s Gaze.

Wang Qiu’er is in danger,” He Caitou blurted out.

Without needing his explanation, Huo Yuhao could clearly see the purpose of Sun’s Gaze. It gathered the energy of the sun, compressed it, and concentrated it. The reddish-gold light was concentrated onto one point as if it were ﬂowing through a funnel. Without a doubt, that was where Wang Qiu’er was standing.

Indeed, this was a classic case whereby the spectators would have a better understanding of what was going on compared to the person who was directly involved. Wang Qiu’er could not see what was going on. All she could feel was the temperature around her rising steadily. When all the light had been concentrated at that point, Xu Tianzhen would be able to unleash a devastating attack.

Sun’s Gaze was an extremely powerful attack. However, The conditions for gaining it were extremely difﬁcult. One had to locate a soul beast called the Sun Bug and ﬁnd the king of a colony of Sun Bugs. Only then could one obtain this soul skill. The place where the Sun Bugs could be found was as dangerous as the Core Regions of the Great Star Dou Forest.

Finding the king of the Sun Bugs wasn’t something that could be done within a few hours. One could only imagine the difﬁculty Xu Tianzhen had to go through to obtain this soul skill. However, Sun’s Gaze was also an attack with many abilities.

It could be combined with the many other soul skills of her Sun martial soul, such as Lofty Lightrays and Divine Sunlight. Furthermore, its offensive power was incredible. For someone who possessed a martial soul like hers, it was a godly move.

Tapping into the Sun’s Gaze ability to be combined with other attacks, Xu Tianzhen had been preparing this attack for a very long time. When she ﬁnally unleashed it, it would be as strong as a full-strength attack from a seven-ringed Soul Sage. It was capable of melting metal, and was almost as hot as Ultimate Fire.

No, I must tell Qiu’er. The gaze in Huo Yuhao’s eyes concentrated, and a golden light shone from his pupils.

Just when he was about to intervene and inform Wang Qiu’er through Spiritual Detection, an odd scene appeared.

The rapidly shrinking sunlight suddenly stopped. Then, the clear roar of a dragon could be heard.

A cold smile formed around the corners of Xu Tianzhen’s mouth. It’s too late now. My Lofty Lightrays and Sun’s Gaze have locked onto you. Right now, after the size of the domain has been reduced, you will be burned by ﬁre from the sun. Even a Soul Sage cannot escape. Aren’t you waiting for your chance? Now, let’s see what tricks you have. Even with your Instant Teleportation, can you really escape the ﬁre of the sun?

A cold look ﬂashed across Xu Tianzhen’s eyes. Was she really as naïve and dumb as she looked? Only she knew the answer to that question.

Indeed, the increasingly mysterious light paused for a short while. Then, it started to retract inward and soon, it was about to concentrate on a single point.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes were closed, and his shapeless spiritual power penetrated the protective barrier. His spiritual power was being depleted at an astounding rate. However, the moment his spiritual power entered the arena, he immediately opened his eyes. The golden light in his eyes faded, and a look of shock crossed his face.

The light was ﬁnally concentrated onto a single point. Wang Qiu’er’s slender frame could be seen.

“I told you, go and die!” Xu Tianzhen shouted intensely. It was as if she had already seen Wang Qiu’er’s body melting and exploding under Sun’s Gaze.

After they lost Wang Qiu’er, she did not believe that the team from Shrek could threaten her anymore.

“There’s no need to hide, I won’t kill you.”

From Xu Tianzhen’s perspective, Wang Qiu’er, who should have no way of resisting, lifted her right hand. Her long Golden Dragon Spear pointed straight into the sky. All of the concentrated sunlight was congregated around her body.

Explode? No. Not a single sound could be heard.

Then, an unbelievably bright light started to shine.

It was not as eye-piercing as before. Instead, it was dazzling and radiant. Wang Qiu’er’s clothes were gone. However, she currently had another layer of golden marble on her that was extremely eye-catching. A terrifying aura could be felt from her body, and her powdery-blue hair ﬂew behind her.

She was naturally beautiful, but at this moment, clad in the golden marble armor, she looked even more regal and mysterious. The terrifying aura made even Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, inhale.

Xu Tianzhen looked at the scene before her in shock. She could not believe what she was seeing. She had deliberately planned to trap her opponent, and then unleash her most powerful soul skill. However, in the end, the power of her attack was gone. On the other hand, her opponent shone so brightly, like a reborn phoenix.

What was going on? “I know,” said Huo Yuhao.

Just now, when his spiritual power penetrated the protective barrier, he could immediately sense Wang Qiu’er’s aura increasing rapidly. Hence, he did not decide to continue assisting her with Spiritual Detection.

Now, as he looked at Wang Qiu’er, he understood what was going on.

“Teacher previously mentioned that the Dragon God bathed in Sunmoon Essence, which then created the Golden Dragon and the Silver Dragon. The Golden Dragon inherited the Brilliance of the Sun, which eventually became an ultimate power. The Silver Dragon absorbed the Brilliance of the Moon, which eventually became multi-elemental. The Golden Dragon’s power came from the Brilliance of the Sun, which was also the source of the sun’s power. Hence, how could she be scared of ﬁre from the sun? Xu Tianzhen’s martial soul is the Sun, which is the best complement for her. This has allowed her own power to increase. In my opinion, not only has Qiu’er regained all her strength, but her power is now also at an unprecedented peak. Her overall soul power may even have increased.” The teacher Huo Yuhao had mentioned naturally referred to Elder Mu. Only Elder Mu had such a wide range of knowledge. No one knew if the Dragon God existed. However, the history of the continent had many records of the Golden Dragon and Silver Dragon.

Trying to defeat the Golden Dragon with the power of the sun was like pouring oil on ﬁre.

Bei Bei smiled and said, “Knowledge is power!”

Wang Qiu’er gripped her Golden Dragon Spear and walked toward Xu Tianzhen. Her feet, covered with golden marble, strode quickly over the surface of the ground, which had been almost completely melted into a metallic puddle. Yet, she showed no sign of discomfort.

When Xu Tianzhen ﬁnally reacted, the small sun in her palm shone with light. Another Divine Sunlight landed on Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er had no intention of dodging. The reddish-gold light spread all over her golden armor. All it did was make it even glossier. How could it hurt her?

“You, you, you…”

Wang Qiu’er said plainly, “I won’t kill you, and I must thank you for further reﬁning the power in my blood. My martial soul is the Golden Dragon, and it has only been puriﬁed at this point. My soul power increased by a level too. If you want to continue increasing my soul power, you can continue attacking me. Thanks.”

Xu Tianzhen’s face changed. At that moment, she realized the curious predicament she was in. Her own martial soul would further strengthen her opponent’s martial soul. Furthermore, it was a one-way street. When her attack landed on her opponent, it was like feeding her a tonic!

Oh shit!

The light from the sun went out. Xu Tianzhen looked seriously at Wang Qiu’er. Many different expressions ﬂuttered across her face. At this moment, neither side was attacking. The Unbreakable Douluo could not declare that the round had ended. However, everyone could tell that this peculiar round had indeed ended.

“Ahh… I yield,” Xu Tianzhen said with her head bowed.

Wang Qiu’er said plainly, “You should have realized that none of you have any chance anymore. For the individual elimination round, in my current condition, I can even defeat a Soul Sage.”

“Yes.” Xu Tianzhen suddenly lifted her head. Her eyes brimmed with regret. “Wang Qiu’er.”

“Yes?” As her cultivation and blood had both been reﬁned and strengthened, Wang Qiu’er was in an extremely good mood. She had also become more patient.

“If only you were a guy! I’d do everything I could to chase after you and become your girl,” Xu Tianzhen cried out as she clenched her ﬁsts.

The look of excitement on Wang Qiu’er’s face froze. The Unbreakable Douluo, who was about to announce the result of the competition, stumbled and almost fell into the liquid-hot metallic puddle that was the current arena ﬂoor. The students from the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy all covered their faces. Lu Jun bent over. He did not dare to look at his weird captain.

Xu Tianzhen quickly stood upright and looked at Zheng Zhan, who looked back at her as if she were an alien, and said, “I concede defeat. Our team concedes defeat. We won’t ﬁght anymore.” With that, she turned and walked off the arena.

Just when everyone breathed out in relief, Xu Tianzhen suddenly stopped, turned back to look at Wang Qiu’er, and said, “Wang Qiu’er, are you sure you aren’t a guy in disguise?”

Wang Qiu’er gripped her Golden Dragon Spear tightly and said darkly, “I realize my decision to not kill you was a mistake!” “Bye!” Xu Tianzhen said as she dashed off without hesitation. She ran, leapt, somersaulted in mid-air, and very quickly got off the arena stage.

---

The ﬁrst round of the top eight round ended in such a comical fashion. After Wang Qiu’er left the arena, she waved at her teammates, and then disappeared instantly. After all, the armor formed from the ﬁre of the sun could not last for long. She had nothing on underneath the armor. Furthermore, she wished to absorb everything she had gained today to preserve the increase in her own power.

Shrek Academy became the ﬁrst team to enter the top four.

The next round in the ﬁrst half was between the Proudsword Sect and the Heavenly Dragon Sect. They stood up and walked to the waiting zone while looking at each other. The enmity between the two teams did not appear to be very strong. Instead, they both shared similar sentiments in their minds.

Wang Qiu’er is too powerful.

At ﬁrst, as the average strength of Shrek Academy was not that strong, the few powerful sects did not pay much attention to them, until they witnessed their match against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. The performance of Shrek Academy was glorious beyond words. Even though

the team from Shrek was a ‘one-woman team’, that one woman in their team was too strong!

As they watched Wang Qiu’er leave, even the powerful evil soul masters from the Holy Ghost Sect looked wary.

Just now, an attack that was more powerful than a Soul Sage could muster served only to beautify her outﬁt. Wang Qiu’er, who was already the most powerful soul master in this tournament, had become even stronger. Anyone from the other six teams might meet her! How could they not worry?

Among the six teams, only the Tang Sect appeared to be at ease.

As the ﬁrst round for the morning ended with the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy admitting defeat, the tournament was able to move on pretty quickly.

The Proudsword Sect and the Heavenly Dragon Sect entered the waiting zone. They were told that they had a while to prepare. The arena had to be cleared and maintained.

Time was needed for the melted stage top to cool down. Furthermore, the dripping metal had affected the protective barrier, which also needed to be ﬁne-tuned..

------

On the main podium...

Ju Zi whispered softly in Xu Tianran’s ears. “Your Highness, Xu Tianzhen and you are-?”

She had seen Xu Tianran use his powers before. Hence, she knew about the hereditary martial soul of the Sun Moon Empire’s imperial family.

Xu Tianran’s face had a weird look as he said, “That was my rebellious sister. That girl doesn’t listen to anyone. Father treated her too kindly...”

Ju Zi opened her eyes in shock and said, “She’s a princess?

This…”

Xu Tianran naturally understood what she meant as he smiled bitterly and said, “That’s right, she’s my brutish, rebellious, and carefree younger sister. She’s also the only princess in the main branch of the imperial family. When she was born, she was extremely playful and cute. Hence, father named her Tianzhen, and she is known as Princess Tianzhen. However, who would have expected then that this girl could create so much trouble for the entire imperial family? She stole makeup from the concubines, demolished father’s rest palace, and even burned the main pavilion down. When she ﬁnally grew up, father wanted to send her to study at the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, but she did not want to go. Instead, she wanted to study at Shrek Academy. You should know that our relationship with Shrek Academy has never been good. While she’s naughty, she’s also father’s favorite, and my brothers and I all like her. Naturally, we wouldn’t let her take such a risk. For this, father blew up at her for the ﬁrst time, and grounded her for a while. After her grounding, she still chose not to go to the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, as she was still rebellious. Instead, she decided to go to the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy. Speaking of it, in terms of cultivation, Princess Tianzhen is the best of all my siblings. It was quite a feat for her to enter the top eight. However, she’s too embarrassing. Luckily for me, she did not mention that she was a princess. If not, I would really be humiliated...”

Ju Zi smiled and said, “Princess Tianzhen is so adorable. This isn’t a bad thing! I like her direct and carefree personality. She doesn’t seem as tired as you, Your Highness.”

Xu Tianran laughed bitterly and said, “Exactly. While my brothers and I ﬁght among ourselves, we all like her very much. The more we spoil her, the more unrestrained her behavior becomes. There’s no way around it. She has to return to the palace after she graduates. As her sister-in-law, please guide her well. If she can be just half as smart and obedient as you, I wouldn’t have to worry so much. I don’t know what trouble she’ll cause next. Also, if you can, help me scout for exceptional talents from the younger generation in Radiant City. Help me ﬁnd a good husband for her, and I’ll be more at ease.”

Ju Zi smiled and nodded in agreement. She could tell that while Xu Tianran tried to make his situation sound helpless, he cared a great deal for Princess Tianzhen…

------

In the resting area...

Bei Bei said to Huo Yuhao in a low voice, “Yuhao, after being in this competition, I realize your suggestion for the academy was right.”

Huo Yuhao was stunned, but quickly understood what he meant. “Elder brother, do you mean the combination of soul tools and soul masters?”

Bei Bei nodded.

“Over the past few years, as the Sun Moon Empire is developing their soul tools rapidly, Shrek has been in an increasingly disadvantageous position. However, ever since ancestor decided to develop soul tools, I realize that we are ﬁnally on the right path. No wonder the Sun Moon Empire devotes so much energy to soul tools. Soul engineers can actually be so strong. However, they don’t have enough talented people to become soul masters! On the other hand, our academy does. In this aspect, the original three countries of the Douluo Continent are much stronger than the Sun Moon Empire.

“Every soul master and martial soul has its unique advantages. At the same time, they have their own weaknesses too. With the presence of soul tools, they’ll be able to rectify these weaknesses. Furthermore, when soul masters and soul tools work closely together, they’ll be able to increase their overall ﬁghting strength.

“Your Ultimate Soldier Plan has succeeded. I feel that after you recover, you’ll undergo a transformation. Look, other than the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy, which has been eliminated, the other teams that entered the top eight were all soul master sects. Also, many of them know how to wield soul tools. Everyone can see this trend!”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “Elder brother, the Tang Sect isn’t weak in terms of our soul tools, either. When we get back, we should get Elder Xuan to make an appropriate soul tool for each of us. In fact, the main reason why the Sun Moon Empire can beat the original three countries on the Douluo Continent with soul tools is because of the disparity in strength at a high level.

“In terms of individual battling strength, a Class 9 soul engineer cannot match up against a nine-ringed Titled Douluo. However, on the battleﬁeld, the situation is different. The destructive power a Class 9 soul engineer can bring to the battleﬁeld far exceeds that of a nine-ringed Titled Douluo. Furthermore, there are many possibilities for soul tools. Hence, the Titled Douluo does not have the overall advantage over a Class 9 soul engineer. Shrek Academy, and the former three countries, may be developing soul tools, but we started off late and in terms of high-end soul tools, the Sun Moon Empire is far ahead of us. If we want to catch up, we will need time!

“It’s not hard for each country to realize the potent combination of soul masters and soul tools. Like Shrek, if that’s our only objective, there’s no way we can beat a Class 9 soul engineer. The same applies to the Tang Sect! No one knows how many Class 9 soul tools the Sun Moon Empire has accumulated over all these years. While we can’t ascertain their number, it’s certain that the strength of just one can eliminate an entire army. That is extremely scary!

“Hence, if we want to resist the Sun Moon Empire, we will have to delay them as much as possible for our own research and development to catch up. After all, in terms of Titled Douluo, the original three countries of the continent will always have an advantage, even if the Sun Moon Empire has the Holy Ghost Church.”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “You’re right. However, the Sun Moon Empire is on the verge of striking. I feel that once the Crown Prince ascends the throne, he’ll start a full-scale war. Time waits for no man!”

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “That isn’t something we can decide. The strength of an individual is too small.”

Bei Bei said, “If war really does happen, what will you do?”

Huo Yuhao said without hesitation, “I’ll enlist in the Star Luo Empire’s army.”

“Oh?” Bei Bei could see that Huo Yuhao had evidently planned for this. On his other side, Wang Dong’er looked at Huo Yuhao in surprise. She had never heard him mention this before. Huo Yuhao said, “After my body recovers, and I achieve some academic success, I have to take care of things at home.”

Wang Dong’er spoke up suddenly, “You’re going to seek revenge?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and said, “I will have my revenge, but not now. As someone from the Star Luo Empire, no matter how much I hate the family, I have to serve my country. I’ll use my power to help my country resists its foreign foes. At the same time, I have to slowly progress to his position, and maybe even surpass it. Only like this can I force him to repent before my mother’s grave.”

Wang Dong’er sighed visibly and said, “Yuhao, you really have changed.”

Huo Yuhao chuckled and said, “I don’t hate the world as much I used to when I was young, right?”

Wang Dong’er nodded.

Huo Yuhao said, “Teacher once asked me, what’s the goal of life? At that time, I replied ‘revenge’ without any hesitation. That was my desire. In other words, my hard work was primarily driven by a strong desire for revenge. However, teacher then asked me, ‘What comes after revenge?’ I couldn’t answer him. At that time, I didn’t know what I’d do after I got my revenge.

“Teacher then said, ‘I don’t expect you to go and save humanity, but I hope that you can be a good person. Since you have no goal for your future, let me give you this goal.’

“Then, confused, I asked teacher, ‘What’s the deﬁnition of a good person?’

“Teacher smiled, and told me, ‘To make more people smile.’”

At this point, Huo Yuhao suddenly paused and frowned for a moment, before continuing. “If there’s war, no one knows how many people will perish. No one knows how many people will become refugees. Hence, I hope that by taking part in the war, I’ll be able to shorten it. Once the war ends, many people will smile happily. Of course, if possible, I hope that there will be no war to begin with. However, what I can do is still too limited.” Bei Bei was shocked by what Huo Yuhao had said. He had never expected his little brother to say such things.

Wang Dong’er was shocked too. She gripped Huo Yuhao’s hand and said softly, “I want to be a good person, too. When you do all this, I’ll always be by your side.”

Bei Bei suddenly smiled. He placed his hand on Huo Yuhao’s shoulder and said, “Earlier, I felt that the Tang Sect lacked an ideal or goal. However, I believe I have found it now. Thank you, Yuhao.”

The two of them looked at each other and smiled. Nothing needed to be said. At this moment, the arena had been cleaned up, and the second round of the ﬁght for the top eight was about to start.

---

First half, second round, Proudsword Sect versus Heavenly Dragon Sect! The Tang Sect was not very familiar with these two sects. At this stage, if anyone wanted to win, they had to use all their strength. Hence, this was the best time to observe their opponents, which is why they had arrived early. While Wang Qiu’er had left, along with the other female teammates, the

rest of the team from Shrek Academy, such as Dai Huabing, Xie

Xuanyue, Zhou Sichen, Cao Jinxuan, and a few others, stayed behind to watch and make preparations. The winner of this ﬁght, be it the Proudsword Sect or the Heavenly Dragon Sect, would be their opponent!

The competition was still being refereed by the Unbreakable Douluo and Class 9 soul engineer, Zheng Zhan.

The ﬁrst people both sides sent out were both big, tall youths.

The competitor from the Proudsword Sect wore tight-ﬁtting green clothes. He was at least 1.8 meters tall, and while he had to be under twenty years old, he looked very mature. His shoulders were broad, and his arms exceptionally long. In particular, his hands were large, and his ﬁngers were long and thick. When they saw this person walking up on stage, Ji Juechen had the biggest reaction among everyone from the Tang Sect. A razor-sharp sword qi started rising from him. While it was momentary, it caught the attention of everyone from the Tang Sect.

Ji Juechen narrowed his eyes. There was a fanatical look in his eyes at this moment. He tapped lightly on the armrest of his seat.

Huo Yuhao and Jing Ziyan had seen this reaction from him often. It meant that his desire to ﬁght was at its maximum, and he was itching to act. Evidently, the youth from the Proudsword Sect had aroused this sentiment in him.

On the other side, a youth in tight-ﬁtting red clothes appeared. He was also tall and strongly built, but he was slightly shorter than the youth from the Proudsword Sect, yet appeared much ﬁrmer and broader. His hair, which looked as hard as metal, was orange-red and short.

Both of them were extremely powerful. Thanks to Wang Qiu’er’s stunning performance in the individual round, every team now sent their most powerful teammate out in the ﬁrst round. If not, they would suffer like the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy and the Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy, and be at a disadvantage and lose their momentum. That was not a good thing.

Hence, even if the two of them were not the most powerful members of the Proudsword Sect and the Heavenly Dragon Sect, they were not that far off.

“State your names.”

“Proudsword Sect, Wu Yifan.”

“Heavenly Dragon Sect, Xing Yan.”

The two youths stated their names, but they ﬁxed their gazes ﬁrmly on one another. A powerful intent to ﬁght could clearly be felt by both of them. “Please retreat and prepare for the competition.” While Zheng Zhan felt stiﬂed in the previous round, it had ended, and he was now ﬁnally able to relax. At this moment, as he refereed a match between two comparatively normal sects, he appeared to be in a much better mood.

The two competitors retreated to their respective ends of the arena. As they turned to face each other, their eyes started to shine. A powerful and unbridled ﬁghting intent was rising up!

“Begin!”

Right after Zheng Zhan said that, Xing Yan from the Heavenly Dragon Sect struck ﬁrst. He took one step out and with a bang, his entire body shot forward like a cannon shell. In mid-air, two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings appeared. He was an elite! Not only was he a six-ringed Soul Emperor, but he also had the ideal soul ring combination!

However, why did his ﬁghting style look so familiar…

Everyone in the audience had the same thought in their mind… his ﬁghting style seemed to resemble Wang Qiu’er’s. However, his explosive violent strength was slightly weaker than hers, not quite as terrifying and unstoppable. Even so, his overall style resembled hers quite closely. In mid-air, his ﬁrst soul ring started to shine. A layer of thick, Scarlet Dragon scales enveloped his entire body instantly.

This was his martial soul, the Scarlet Dragon!

A deafening dragon roar rang from his mouth. Xing Yan’s body doubled in size. His thick body was covered with dragon scales, including even his face. Evidently, he was not too far from becoming a seven-ringed Soul Sage, who could reveal his Martial Soul True Body!

On the other side, Wu Yifan was no ordinary person either. Faced with his charging opponent, he stepped out and positioned his index and middle ﬁngers together. Then, he pointed forward with both ﬁngers.

Instantly, a roar could be heard. A wide green sword appeared in mid-air. Likewise, two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings appeared. However, they did not appear on Wu Yifan’s body, but instead, on his sword.

His ﬁrst soul ring started to shine. The soul rings of normal soul masters would shine brightly when they unleashed their soul skills, the halo expanding outward or increasing in size. However, Wu Yifan’s soul ring was different. The ﬁrst soul ring shone on his green sword and started to contract, and was completely absorbed into his sword.

The green light on the sword ﬂashed, and a ray of sword light shot out with an ear-splitting shriek as it pierced toward Xing Yan of the Heavenly Dragon Sect.

No wonder he was from the Proudsword Sect! His martial soul was this sword!

Faced with this sudden sword qi, Xing Yan’s face changed. In terms of explosive strength, he was not as powerful as Wang Qiu’er, the gold dragon girl, and so naturally was much slower. If Wang Qiu’er were the attacker, Wu Yifan could still use his sword qi, but by the time it reached her, Wang Qiu’er might already be in front of him. Right now, Xing Yan was still twenty meters away!

Faced with the incoming sword qi, Xing Yan’s third soul ring started to shine. He made a circle with his hands, and an intense, dark-red light appeared on his dragon claws. It went straight for the sword qi.

Not only did he want to learn her battling style, but he also wanted to learn her indomitable force!

In the past few days, the Heavenly Dragon Sect had studied Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁghting style the most avidly. The reason was simple. The martial souls of all the disciples of the Heavenly Dragon Sect were dragons! Some dragon martial souls were weak, while others were strong. However, they had all inherited the haughty elegance of dragons!

When Wang Qiu’er fought, she demonstrated a haughty and elegant style which had captivated everyone from the Heavenly Dragon Sect. Hence, the students and teachers of the sect researched Wang Qiu’ér’s ﬁghting style and studied its essence. Then, they taught it to their disciples! Faced with an opponent attacking head-on, they would not dodge their opponent’s attack. The beneﬁt of this was not only in appearing powerful. Through the Heavenly Dragon Sect’s careful analysis, this was the best way for the two sides to come into contact in the shortest possible time. At the same time, they could also suppress their opponents in terms of aura. This was an excellent way to ﬁght if you were a more powerful soul master!

Shhh! An ear-piercing sound could be heard. The green sword qi was shattered by Xing Yan’s punch. However, he felt a pain shoot through his ﬁst, and wounds could be seen on his scales.

It was not easy to resist! Not everyone could do this so simply...

Wu Yifan stepped forward after he released his sword qi. His strong right hand gripped the handle of the sword. The tips of his toes touched the ﬂoor, and then he leapt into the air. He now wielded his sword with both hands as he charged toward Xing Yan. When he entered this sword-body fusion state, Wu Yifan’s entire body appeared to be ﬁlled with an indescribable sharpness. A powerful aura expanded from him, the sword qi within it evident. A sword light three inches thick could be seen on his sword. The air in front of him was shattering, and at the tip of the sword, a black void appeared!

How powerful!

@Chapter 318: The Pure Bloodline of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon

Even though they did not clash, Xing Yan could clearly feel how sharp his opponent’s blade was. His scales started to tremble slightly. An attack of that level should never be met head-on!

He lifted his body with great effort and his second soul ring started to shine. A pair of dragon wings expanded behind his back. They beat once and took him soaring into the air. At the same time, his fourth soul ring started to shine. The scales on his body immediately started to release a light that burned as hot as ﬁre.

Xing Yan used his body in this attack, his Draconic Meteor, an extremely powerful attack and control-type soul skill. Draconic Meteor’s offensive strength was extremely strong. When he activated it, it also tripled his defenses. The moment the attack hit the ground, it would cause a series of powerful chain explosions. With his current cultivation, the attack had a range of thirty meters! As his dragon wings beat, the Scarlet Dragon unleashed Draconic Meteor once again. This was his signature move!

Coldly, Wu Yifan did not stop as he continued to drive his sword through the air. His feet touched the ground, and a pair of metallic wings opened behind his back. Light shone in all directions, and he left the ground. As he rose, he made a ninety-degree turn. A green light shone on his green sword, and his ﬁfth soul ring started to ﬂash.

A small but audible buzzing arose. The size of the huge green sword doubled, now about four meters long, as an eye-dazzling sword radiance shone forth.

Wu Yifan’s martial soul was the Greensteel Sword. He was a Rank 63 assault-type Soul Emperor. This was his ﬁfth soul skill, Divine Greensteel Sword. It was a rare tool martial soul soul skill that increased the power of the martial soul itself, like soul skills from beast martial souls.

The expanded Greensteel Sword doubled Wu Yifan’s ﬁghting abilities! Xing Yan, who was using Draconic Meteor, instantly felt that something was amiss. He did not dare to crash down on the divine Divine Greensteel Sword! However, he had already unleashed his soul skill. It was too late to change direction. In terms of martial soul control, not everyone could compare with the freaks from Shrek Academy.

However, Xing Yan had his own plans. He continued to use Draconic Meteor, but he did not attack his opponent directly with it. Instead, he unleashed it downward, using the explosive speed of Draconic Meteor and his own incredible defenses as he tried to avoid being locked onto by the Divine Greensteel Sword.

In mid-air, Xing Yan stopped using Draconic Meteor. The red light faded, and he descended to the ground. The Divine Greensteel Sword, which was already in mid-air, did not give up so easily. It turned around and continued to pursue Xing Yan.

Do you think I’m scared of you? After this series of tactical humiliations, Xing Yan felt ashamed and perplexed. He turned around and roared magniﬁcently. The scales on his body all stood erect, making him look like a huge porcupine. The light around the sixth soul ring on his body started to shine even brighter.

Just when everyone thought that he would use his most powerful soul skill to ﬁght his opponent’s Divine Greensteel Sword, cunning ﬂashed across Xing Yan’s eyes. He touched his back with his right hand, and suddenly, a soul cannon two meters long and thirty centimeters wide appeared. The mouth of the cannon faced the Divine Greensteel Sword, and balls of terrifying red light came exploding out of it!

With each explosion, the sixth soul ring on Xing Yan’s body dimmed. This was how intensely his soul power was being depleted.

There was no way to change the Divine Greensteel Sword at this moment. It dove down at him at full strength, still shining with a blinding green light. In the blink of an eye, it crashed into the balls of red light.

Just like Bei Bei had said, only when a soul master used a soul tool could he maximize the strength of the soul tool. Boom!

In mid-air, a deafening explosion rang out. The two types of light, green and red, combined in mid-air to form a huge dual- colored ball of light. Countless rays of light started to ﬂy in all directions, and the protective barrier all around the stage glowed intensely.

A look of triumph crept across Xing Yan’s mouth. No one knew the strength of this cannon better than he. This was the heaviest and most-draining Class 6 soul cannon. Each of its attacks was immensely powerful. Its name was the Gigant Bursting Cannon, and it rivaled the Gigant Lightning Cannon. In terms of control, the Gigant Bursting Cannon was not as powerful as the Gigant Lightning Cannon, but in terms of pure, explosive strength, it was superior!

Xing Yan’s biggest weakness was close-combat. However, it was hard for him to attack his opponents from afar, too. The Gigant Bursting Cannon was made just for him!

Xing Yan believed that once the cannon hit its target, even if Wu Yifan remained undefeated, he would still be severely injured. At that moment, he prepared to unleash his full strength.

---

Underneath the arena, Ji Juechen, the sword fanatic, said suddenly, “The Heavenly Dragon Sect has lost.” He did not control the sound of his voice. The many replacements for the Heavenly Dragon Sect who were in the resting zone shot langry looks at the Tang Sect.

However, at this moment, the situation in the arena changed.

---

An unassuming green ray of light descended from the heavens. It was emerald-green, clear, and sparkling vigorously. It dropped down as gently as a feather.

In the next moment, the dragon scales on Xing Yan’s body turned green. Just when he wanted to unleash his martial soul, the soul rings around his body split open, as if they had been cloven by a sword, and his scales ﬂew everywhere. Xing Yan was sent ﬂying away by the terrible slash. A humongous wound stretched from his forehead all the way to his abdomen.

Had the referee, the Unbreakable Douluo, not intervened, Xing Yan would have been disemboweled.

Was he weak? Of course not. However, he was careless. With the cannon in hand, he made the mistake of underestimating his opponent. The smudge of green light was too insigniﬁcant. It was like residue from their clash. When he ﬁnally reacted, it was too late to block it.

The green light landed on the ground, and Wu Yifan emerged from it. His face was pale, and the sword in his hand had been reduced to only a meter in length. Green light rippled on it like waves on water.

This was the sixth soul skill of the Greensteel Sword, Shedding!

Wu Yifan’s most powerful killing move was to use his sixth soul skill right when he was using his ﬁfth soul skill, Divine Greensteel Sword. From the Divine Greensteel Sword, he could extract the true form of the sword and unleash its devastating power.

Even if Xing Yan were careful, there was no way he could have blocked that move during their clash. The only way he could have obtained victory was to ﬂy away as far as he could after bombarding Wu Yifan.

Xing Yan’s estimate was not wrong. When his cannon hit the Divine Greensteel Sword, Wu Yifen was able to escape with Shedding. However, he could not avoid getting hurt. If he had not had enough time to attack afterward, he would have used up even more soul power. If he had used both powerful skills and still not won, he might have lost the match.

Xing Yan lost this round not because of tactics, but because of his mindset. In fact, since the start of the tournament, they had underestimated the Proudsword Sect. While they might be the second team from the small group round, they were extremely conﬁdent in their own abilities. In their eyes, their only opponent in this tournament was the Holy Ghost Church, the other sects were nothing to them. Xing Yan lost because of his mentality. Xing Yan collapsed onto the arena. While the Unbreakable Douluo had blocked much of the sword qi, some of it still entered his body, and he was badly injured. Blood ﬂowed from his wounds, and a green light ﬂashed.

“The Proudsword Sect wins.”

The moment the protective barrier opened, a tall ﬁgure jumped onto the arena at the speed of lightning. Quickly, he arrived next to Xing Yan and lifted him up. He quickly sealed his meridians, and then injected blue soul power into his body to help resist the powerful, intrusive sword qi.

Wu Yifan, whose face was pale, did not dare to waste any more time. He quickly took out a milk bottle to replenish his soul power. This had not been an easy victory, and he had used all his strength. He had not expected the soul cannon!

After a short time, the new youth from the Heavenly Dragon Sect carried Xing Yan off the arena, before returning to the stage. This time, Wu Yifan could clearly see that this youth was a good two meters tall. He could almost ﬁt inside his opponent’s mountain-like body. The young man’s hair was short and needle-like as well, but deep blue in hue. His shirt had no sleeves, and his muscular arms looked like they had been sculpted from stone. His entire body emitted a terrifying aura.

“Are you the captain of the Proudsword Sect?” the tall youth asked as he walked up to the center of the arena. His expression was cold and emotionless.

“Yes,” replied Wu Yifan.

While he had won the ﬁrst round, Wu Yifan was not happy. He was the most powerful member of the Proudsword Sect. While his sect was not ordinary, his guys fellow team members were all ranked between Ranks 55 and 59. He was the only Soul Emperor. They had been observing the Heavenly Dragon Sect. In the past, Xing Yan had occupied a dominant position on that team, and the young man before him had not appeared. However, Wu Yifan could clearly sense right now that this young man was stronger than Xing Yan! Even though Xing Yan had been injured, and he might not be able to ﬁght in the subsequent rounds, how much power was the Heavenly Dragon Sect hiding?

“Very good.” The young man from the Heavenly Dragon Sect did not say anything else. He walked to the center of the arena and indicated to the judge that he would be the second competitor from the Heavenly Dragon Sect!

---

In the resting zone...

“Elder brother, why do I feel an aura similar to yours from the Heavenly Dragon Sect competitor?” Huo Yuhao asked Bei Bei in a low voice.

Bei Bei nodded slightly and said, “I can feel it too. I fear that his martial soul is similar to mine.”

“Heavenly Dragon Sect, Yu Tianlong.”

“Proudsword Sect, Wu Yifan.”

“Begin!”

With that one command by the Unbreakable Douluo, the second elimination round between the Proudsword Sect and the Heavenly Dragon Sect began.

Yu Tianlong did not ﬁght like Wang Qiu’er, as Xing Yan had. Instead, he took big steps as he walked toward his opponent. He did not move quickly; his pace was only slightly faster than that of an ordinary person. However, Wu Yifan, who was facing him, felt as if he were staring at a mountain, which was getting bigger with each step. It was a suffocating sensation.

In the previous battle, almost half of his soul power had been depleted. The attack from the soul cannon in particular had left him feeling slightly shell-shocked. Faced with this pressure, Wu Yifan did not rush to attack. His vast ﬁghting experience helped to calm the terror in his heart. He got a grip and activated his soul power. Since his opponent was in no rush, he did not plan on rushing either. His martial soul, the Greensteel Sword, manifested in front of him. It quickly regained its initial form.

The distance between the two sides quickly shrank. Yu Tianlong lifted his right hand, and arcs of blue electricity started to spread across his body. Bluish-purple scales appeared, and his body grew as he advanced. With each step, his body would expand. When he reached the center of the arena, he was already two and a half meters tall, and his shoulders a meter and a half across. The terrifying but majestic scales on his arms were extremely thick, and arcs of bluish- purple electricity crackled around him. He like a human- shaped monster now, and even his eyes had turned bluish- purple. ---

“Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon?” Huo Yuhao asked as he turned to look at Bei Bei.

Bei Bei was closely watching Yu Tianlong up on the arena stage, and replied, “That’s right, this is the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon. Furthermore, this is a pure-blooded Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon.”

“Eh? Is it different from yours, elder brother?”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “While mine is also descended from the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon, it has undergone mutations. Those that are descended from ancestor Yu Xiaogang have already evolved into the Golden Holy Dragon. Much of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon blood is lost. Hence, we don’t have the true Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul. Those with the pure Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon blood should be like him, extremely explosive and destructive.” “How does it compare to the Golden Holy Dragon?” Huo Yuhao asked.

“We’ll only know after we ﬁght,” Bei Bei replied with a smile.

When he heard this, Huo Yuhao came to his own conclusions. If Bei Bei’s assessment was as such, it only meant one thing... Yu Tianlong was almost as powerful as his elder brother! The Heavenly Dragon Sect was powerful, indeed!

---

As Yu Tianlong stopped his advance, beads of sweat started to form on Wu Yifan’s forehead. He was not a sword fanatic like Ji Juechen. In his heart, he had normal human emotions, too. If it were Ji Juechen, even if his opponent was as powerful as a Titled Douluo, he would still move forward to attack.

This was not because of a disparity in power, but of will. This was also why Ji Juechen could ﬁnd enlightenment of his own sword intent and domain at merely twentyish years of age! At this moment, Ji Juechen, who had been watching Wu Yifan excitedly, closed his eyes. This was because he was too into swords, and hence his understanding of swords surpassed that of normal people. From the sword intent Wu Yifan was unleashing, Juechen could tell that Yifan’s will to battle could not compare to before. This swordsman no longer piqued his interest.

Faced with his opponent’s mountain-like body, the psychological pressure Wu Yifan could take reached its limit. He roared and leapt off the ground. Fusing his sword and body into one, he charged toward Yu Tianlong. A powerful sword intent could be sensed once more, but it was still weaker than before. He was being suppressed by his opponent’s aura!

Yu Tianlong did not approach. Instead, he stopped, and contracted the muscles on his arm. His blue dragon claws clenched, and the electricity around his body started to retract.

A powerful sword light shot out from the green sword and appeared before Yu Tianlong.

The electricity, which was gone only a moment ago, now started to surge out from every part of Yu Tianlong’s body. Instantly, it formed a ball of lightning as it blew the sword intent apart.

While Wu Yifan was suppressed, he was still the captain of the Proudsword Sect. He did not lack ﬁghting experience. He clearly understood that his chances of victory against this person were not high. The only chance he had was to use his explosive strength.

Hence, he had no intention of conserving energy as he deployed his powerful attacks almost immediately.

Green light started to expand, and his ﬁfth soul ring started to shine. This was the powerful Divine Greensteel Sword again. The huge, green sword brimmed with a severe sword intent as he thrust it toward Yu Tianlong’s chest. The huge sword, which seemed capable of cleaving the sky and earth open, helped Wu Yifan regain a bit of an advantage.

Yu Tianlong stood there, unmoving. In his eyes, there was a show of mirth. He raised a pair of dragon claws and made a hugging motion before him. Instantly, a huge amount of electricity surged forth. Between his two arms, a huge ball of lightning was formed.

At this point, Huo Yuhao could not help but nod his head. In terms of control over thunder, Yu Tianlong surpassed even his elder brother. He indeed possessed a pure-blooded Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon!

When he realized that his opponent was not dodging, Wu Yifan’s heart soared with delight. He chuckled coldly to himself as he thought, While the Proudsword Sect is not good in many other aspects, we do specialize in piercing and overcoming thick armor. In a face-to-face attack, even if you can defeat me, you will pay a heavy price!

The green light instantly pierced the ball of lightning. At that moment, the light in the arena dimmed. Yu Tianlong still did not move. However, the tip of the green sword had penetrated his lightning sphere.

What a terrifying ﬁghting style! If it could not be blocked, his body might be sliced in half by the Divine Greensteel Sword! At this distance, even the referee could not save him.

However, just as the tip of the Divine Greensteel Sword pierced through it, the Sword was unable to progress any further. Green light and lightning shone non-stop.

Wu Yifan, who was behind the Divine Greensteel Sword, revealed an expression of shock. He could clearly sense that what was coming at him from the tip of his sword was not a terrifying electric power, but instead waves of attacks. The electric energy actually felt like layers of silk eating away at his Divine Greensteel Sword. The sharp tip of the sword was like soft leather in the face of this tough defense.

Let’s do it!

Wu Yifan did not have much time to think. His soul power was being drained rapidly as he used this high-level soul skil, and there was no way he could sustain it for long. His sixth soul ring started to shine, and his body suddenly ﬂashed. He grabbed onto the green light and once again moved to escape. Wu Yifan’s body was bathed in light. At the same time, countless blueish-purple tendrils of electricity started to appear on the Divine Greensteel Sword. An explosion sounded in mid-air, and the sword qi scattered in all directions.

In just that one moment, Wu Yifan was a ray of green light, just like in the previous round. He ﬂoated toward his opponent’s back. There was only this one chance for him...

Yu Tianlong appeared to not have discovered him. He continued to stand there without moving. Each of his dragon claws became charged with electricity as he slashed them through the air. Other than a string of electricity surrounding him, he appeared defenseless.

A chance!

Wu Yifan did not stop at all. He moved with his sword, and he had already retracted all of his energy. His last bit of soul power was concentrated on the tip of this sword as he pointed it straight at his opponent’s back. The emerald-green sword tip was instantly at Yu Tianlong’s back. The Unbreakable Douluo was hesitant. He could tell that Yu Tianlong was stronger. In this situation, should he intervene? If he intervened, Yu Tianlong would be deemed to have lost.

Just as he was deliberating this, he saw a cruel look in Yu Tianlong’s eyes.

Oh shit. The Unbreakable Douluo’s heart missed a beat as he charged toward the both of them.

Just as he was about to use Shedding and break away from the main body of his Divine Greensteel Sword, Wu Yifan felt his body move an inch.

It’s a hit! Wu Yifan’s heart leapt with joy. Soon, however, he discovered that something was amiss. His sword had pierced underneath Yu Tianlong’s armpit. It did not actually hit him!

Yu Tianlong suddenly clamped his left arm tightly to his body, securing the blade of the sword between his arm and his body. Then, with a low draconic roar, a whip-like object that looked like a dragon tail appeared from his right leg. Lightning ﬂashed at this moment and crept, via the Divine Greensteel Sword, into Wu Yifan’s body.

Wu Yifan suddenly felt his body going numb. The terrifying lightning had already swallowed him whole. Under these circumstances, where could he hide?

Just as the leg was about to hit Wu Yifan, the Unbreakable Douluo appeared. He tapped Yu Tianlong’s leg lightly with his right hand, before it made contact with Wu Yifan.

With a crunching impact, Wu Yifan ﬂew into the distance. Blood spurted out from his body in mid-air as he ﬂew backward and landed hard.

Yu Tianlong retracted his leg. He turned and gave Zheng Zhan a deadly stare. If not for Zheng Zhan’s swat, he was conﬁdent of shattering Wu Yifan’s internal organs!

Zheng Zhan glared back. “Boy, what’s your problem? I can’t alter the ﬂow of the competition, but I can’t let you kill, either!”

Without a doubt, Wu Yifan would have died had he actually been hit by Yu Tianlong. Hence, Zheng Zhan did not completely take away Yu Tialong’s power. The power of the kick was just enough to severely injure Wu Yifan to the point where he could no longer take part anymore, but it would not be fatal.

It was not easy for the Unbreakable Douluo to make this decision.

The anger in Yu Tianlong’s eyes receded a bit. He nodded at the Unbreakable Douluo and said, “I’ve won.”

“For the individual elimination round, second round, the Heavenly Dragon Sect wins.”

After the end of this duel, the overall results were more or less ﬁxed. In terms of overall strength, there was a big disparity between the Proudsword Sect and the Heavenly Dragon Sect.

In the next few rounds, Yu Tianlong was able to use his immense power to defeat more three challengers consecutively. The opposing team completely lost their will to ﬁght.

In the battle for the top eight, the Unbreakable Douluo did not interfere as much. Even if the other party might lose their ﬁghting ability, he would not intervene. The only reason he intervened was to prevent death.

At this moment, there was no hope left for the Proudsword Sect. Even though they were unwilling, they still conceded defeat. The Heavenly Dragon Sect was thus able to progress to the next round and become the second team to enter the top eight. In the semi-ﬁnals, it was likely that they would challenge the team from Shrek Academy, led by Wang Qiu’er.

At this point, the matches for the morning had ended. The subsequent two rounds for the top eight teams would be held in the afternoon.

----

Over in Shrek Academy’s area, Dai Huabing, Cao Jinxuan, and the rest had ugly expressions on their faces as they left. The strength of their opponents was beyond their expectations, particularly Yu Tianlong. The strength he had displayed was comparable to Wang Qiu’er. Coupled with Xing Yan, who was also a six-ringed Soul Emperor, they were facing an uphill battle in the semi-ﬁnals!.

The Tang Sect also returned to the hotel. There was still some time until the afternoon rounds. It was extremely important for them to get some rest and strategize.

---

They decided to have an early lunch. Bei Bei gathered his teammates.

“Everyone saw the rounds in the morning. What do you think?” Bei Bei asked as he sat at the head of their table.

Xu Sanshi replied quickly, “The Heavenly Dragon Sect is no pushover! I think Yu Tianlong’s Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul is more powerful than yours. Even if we went against them one-on-one, it would not be easy to win!”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “Yu Tianlong has inherited the pure-blooded Blue Lightning Thunder Dragon bloodline. There was no deviation or evolution, it was deﬁnitely pure. Ten thousand years ago, the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon was one of top six martial souls on the continent. This is not an easy opponent. Furthermore, the Heavenly Dragon Sect also has other powerful contenders. Their martial souls are all draconic, and hence, they will not be weak. It’ll be a difﬁcult ﬁght for Shrek in the next round. They may not be able to defeat them with just the power of Wang Qiu’er. Anyone else? What other thoughts do you have on your minds?”

Surprisingly, Nan Qiuqiu, who had just joined the Tang Sect and appeared very demure, opened her mouth to speak.

“I think one’s mindset in this competition is important, too. When Wu Yifan faced Yu Tianlong, he was not weak. However, he was under immense psychological pressure from his opponent. This shows that he had a very weak mentality. He should at least have been able to give Yu Tianlong some trouble, instead of losing so badly in the end.” Bei Bei smiled and nodded. He said, “Qiuqiu is right. One’s mentality is important too. On this point, we have to admit that Wang Qiu’er does this better than any of us here. Honestly speaking, I’ve been waiting for the day when Wang Qiu’er would go up against someone like Yu Tianlong. I wonder what kind of match that’ll be. Do you know, Yuhao?”

Huo Yuhao sighed and said, “Elder brother, brothers, and sisters, while I don’t want to undermine everyone’s conﬁdence, there’s something I feel that I must say. We are in trouble.”

When everyone heard that, they were all shocked, including Bei Bei. They had no idea what Huo Yuhao was talking about.

Bei Bei nodded and said, “Tell us, no matter what the problem is, we have to face it together. You requested this meeting. It’s not too late to come up with a counter-strategy.”

Huo Yuhao said, “After the morning rounds, there are two judgments we can make. The Radiant City Soul Engineering Academy and the Proudsword Sect do not contain hidden Body Sect members.” When they heard this analysis, they instantly understood what he meant. Instantly, their faces changed.

Huo Yuhao continued, “I carefully observed the Heavenly Dragon Sect. When Yu Tianlong went to ﬁght, everyone on their team, regardless of whether they were on the main team or the reserves, all looked at him in admiration. This cannot be faked. Hence, we know the importance of Yu Tianlong to the Heavenly Dragon Sect. Furthermore, Yu Tianlong’s Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul is not a body soul. This means that the most powerful contender from the Heavenly Dragon Sect has no link to the Body Sect. Hence, we can deduce that the Body Sect is not likely to be hidden there.

“Earlier, we analyzed the few teams that the Body Sect may have been hidden in. Now, we can deduce that the only possibilities are the Star Luo National Academy and the Snowdemon Sect. For the Star Luo National Academy, I’ve deduced that the possibility of them collaborating with the Body Sect is almost negligible. On the other hand, the Snowdemon Sect, which comes from the Heavenly Soul Empire, is much more likely to be in cahoots with the Body Sect. Today, I also noticed that at least six of their reserve members did not show much of a reaction when Yu Tianlong came up. In other words, they were not surprised at his strength. What does this mean? I’m afraid that we’ve gotten the short end of the stick this time.”

At this point, everyone knew what he meant. The room turned silent instantly.

To describe their situation as ‘the short end of the stick’ was an understatement. What did it mean to meet the Body Sect? They were powerful enough to resist Shrek Academy. They also dared to attack the Illustrious Virtue Hall, and inﬂicted severe damage on them!

No one doubted the advantage of the Body Sect in terms of their martial souls. By coming to the Sun Moon Empire to compete, they demonstrated how conﬁdent they were.

Shrek’s Seven Monsters had long suspected that the Holy Ghost Sect would appear in this competition. This was the plan the Sun Moon Empire had devised to take care of the Body Sect. Right now, they were about to get caught in it all.

Even if they were able to defeat the Body Sect, there was another more mysterious evil soul master group behind the Body Sect, the Holy Ghost Sect! So far, deaths had followed them wherever they went.

If they wanted to break out from this trap, it would be immensely difﬁcult for the Tang Sect.

Huo Yuhao said in a low voice, “Don’t be too demoralized, guys! While our opponents are strong, we aren’t weak either! Elder brother can ﬁght once again, and our Tang Sect has three six-ringed Soul Emperors. Three of us have twin martial souls. In this aspect, the Body Sect can’t beat us. The Academy can match the Body Sect, and we now have the title of ‘Shrek’s Seven Monsters’. Are we supposed to fear them?”

Xu Sanshi nodded, and a strong will to ﬁght appeared in his eyes. “That’s right, Yuhao is right! Fuck the Body Sect! I’ll fuck them all! I’ll go ﬁrst for the individual elimination round!”

Bei Bei gestured at him to tell him to calm down. “Be quiet. We can ﬁnd out who the more powerful members of the Body Sect are beforehand, and prepare against them. Yuhao, tell us what you think, and the strategy you have in mind.” Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “The Body Sect is undoubtedly powerful. It is impossible to beat them one-on-one. Even so, I feel that we should adopt Shrek’s strategy. As long as one of us can win three individual elimination rounds, we can force them into the group round.”

The biggest advantage the Tang Sect had was from Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection. With it, while the Tang Sect did not ﬁght very often in the group round, they had yet to face any true opponents thus far. Furthermore, as Shrek’s Seven Monsters had known each other for so many years, they all worked well together.

Bei Bei said, “Then, who do you think we should send ﬁrst in the individual elimination round? We’re facing the Body Sect, it’s not likely we’ll score three victories like Wang Qiu’er.”

Huo Yuhao spoke up without hesitation, “I’ll go ﬁrst.”

“You?” Bei Bei was shocked. Wang Dong’er, who was sitting next to him, glanced at him sharply. Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “There are some advantages to me going ﬁrst. First, the opponent will not expect me to ﬁght ﬁrst. Second, I have a body soul too. In comparison, I understand them better than everyone else here. Third, while I’m immobile, I have many tricks up my sleeves. I’m conﬁdent

of at least one victory. Recently, my spiritual power has improved as well.

“Most importantly, it won’t affect everyone if I become a bit more drained during the individual elimination round. I direct the group round, and don’t ﬁght directly in it. In my current state, I can’t ﬁght at the front like everyone else. Spiritual Detection will only drain a bit of my spiritual power. I can assist everyone else, provide control and render assistance from behind. The group round won’t be as taxing for me. Furthermore, I have…”

He softly said a few words, which made everyone smile.

He Caitou blinked, and a sly smile crept across his face. He nudged Huo Yuhao and chuckled, “Little brother, aren’t you afraid of the Illustrious Virtue Hall coming after you?”

Chapter 319: Tang Sect vs Body Sect!

Huo Yuhao laughed and said, “Do you think they’ll let us off even if we don’t use it? The Sun Moon Empire must have some scheme in this tournament. There’s one thing I’m certain of… they won’t expose their scheme before the tournament ends. They’ll watch their behavior up until that point.”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “Alright, this will be the competing order in the individual elimination round. Yuhao is ﬁrst, I’m second, Dong’er’s third. If we ﬁght until the fourth person, Sanshi will compete.”

Xu Sanshi appeared very depressed as he said, “Why am I near the back?”

Bei Bei said, “You don’t specialize in attacking. Furthermore, you are the core of our strategy in the team round. When that time comes, you’ll be the one in charge of many strategies. How can we operate if you don’t conserve your ﬁghting strength? What you are going to do will be very dangerous.”

Xu Sanshi nodded. “That’s true. I’m always so important!”

Everyone turned away and acted like they didn’t know him.

---

After this, they discussed some details of the tournament. An hour before the start of the tournament, they dispersed to their rooms to rest for a couple of hours.

The reason was simple: the ﬁrst match of the afternoon was between the Star Luo National Academy and the Holy Ghost Sect. There was no need to watch this match, since the gap between both parties’ abilities was too wide. The Star Luo National Academy didn’t even stand a ﬁghting chance. The second match of the afternoon was scheduled to start two hours after the ﬁrst match. Even if the ﬁrst match ended early, some buffer time was still needed.

It was actually very important to watch the Holy Ghost Church compete. However, it was more crucial for the Tang Sect to win this round. If they couldn’t beat the Snowdemon Sect, they didn’t need to bother with the rest of the tournament anymore. They had to keep themselves in their best states.

Na Na, Nan Qiuiqiu, Jing Ziyan, and Ji Juechen all proceeded to the tournament venue ﬁrst. Very soon, Na Na returned with news that the Star Luo National Academy had only put up slight resistance for show before they announced their forfeiture. The gap in their abilities was too huge. Princess

Jiujiu didn’t want the outstanding young talents of the Star Luo Empire to perish in this tournament. As there was no way they could win, it was better to lose without suffering any casualties.

---

The Tang Sect only arrived ten minutes before their match. Everyone found this very strange. Aren’t they concerned at all? This shouldn’t happen!

After Huo Yuhao entered the resting area, Princess Jiujiu took the initiative to welcome him.

“We’ve lost. Let’s see how you’ll fare.” Princess Jiujiu smiled at Huo Yuhao and Bei Bei as she greeted them. Huo Yuhao asked, “Your Highness, you seem to be in good spirits.”

Princess Jiujiu snorted and replied, “So what if I’m in good spirits? Can it decide the outcome of the tournament? It’s better if the tournament ends earlier for us. We are going to return tomorrow morning. Don’t forget our agreement.”

She sounded a little ﬂirtatious here. Wang Dong’er couldn’t help but raise her brows when she saw this.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “I won’t forget that. It is my honor to serve Your Highness.”

Princess Jiujiu bent her waist and her lips reached Huo Yuhao’s ears before whispering something. After that, she straightened up and said, “Alright, I wish you success in the tournament. We’ll watch this match before leaving.”

Huo Yuhao didn’t make a sound. However, he appeared very surprised. Princess Jiujiu’s voice was very soft. Only he knew what she said. Wang Dong’er couldn’t help but pinch Huo Yuhao as they were in the resting area, “Confess! I didn’t know you are actually so popular with the ladies. Even the princess is interested in you!”

Huo Yuhao looked at her grinning face and knew that she didn’t believe Princess Jiujiu had anything to do with him. He couldn’t help but laugh. “Yes! To be fancied by Her Highness, it shows how handsome and suave your husband is!”

“Such thick skin!” Wang Dong’er made a clown face at him. “What did she say to you? So mysterious!”

Huo Yuhao softly said something. Everyone from the Tang Sect became very stunned after this.

Wang Dong’er even said, “How did it turn out this way? We are really…”

“Let’s take this one step at a time. We should prepare to enter the waiting area.” Huo Yuhao appeared very calm right now. Bei Bei patted his shoulder and said, “Little junior, you must remember not to force anything.”

“I will remember. Don’t worry, eldest senior.” Huo Yuhao nodded.

---

At this stage of the tournament, there wasn’t any need for anyone to hide their abilities anymore. Shrek’s Seven Monsters ﬁnally revealed their strengths.

On the other side, everyone from the Snowdemon Sect had already made their way to the waiting area.

Just like Huo Yuhao had expected, most of the main team members from the Snowdemon Sect in the previous few rounds, including Mu Xue, didn’t move at all. Most of the people who stood up were substitutes who had never competed before. The only familiar face to Huo Yuhao was the person at the back of the Snowdemon Sect’s team. Her hair was tied in a braid, and she appeared very amicable and gentle. She was Princess Wei Na.

Yes, Mu Xue wasn’t going to compete, but Wei Na was going to. This signiﬁed many things. Before this, Princess Jiujiu had whispered this to Huo Yuhao – Be careful of Wei Na. She’s not simple.

Even though they were just eight simple words, Wei Na’s appearance seemed to support Princess Jiujiu’s words. Huo Yuhao became more cautious.

Three out of the four semiﬁnalists had been decided. Team Shrek, Team Heavenly Dragon, and Team Holy Ghost were the three current semiﬁnalists. The last semiﬁnalist would be decided after this match. As the previous three quarterﬁnal matches seemed to be very one-sided, the excitement died down, and the spectators had a lot of hope for the last quarterﬁnal match.

Wei Na seemed to feel Huo Yuhao watching her as both parties entered the waiting area. She turned to take a look at him and smiled at him sweetly.

Huo Yuhao nodded at her. It was a form of greeting. No matter the result, or whether the Snowdemon Sect was a front for the Body Sect, he knew that they weren’t enemies. If the Body Sect snuck into the Heavenly Soul Empire, it was beneﬁcial for them in their resistance against the Sun Moon Empire. The enemy of one’s enemy was one’s friend. Moreover, the Heavenly Soul Empire was the Tang Sect’s biggest client.

Zheng Zhan furrowed his brow when he saw the Tang Sect. Apart from Wang Qiu’er, the Tang Sect had given him the greatest headaches in all the rounds that he refereed. The Tang Sect’s members didn’t follow the rules, and were very difﬁcult to deal with. His attention was ﬁrst caught by Wang Dong’er, and he immediately became more focused.

“Quarterﬁnal to the semiﬁnal. This is the last quarterﬁnal match. Snowdemon Sect versus the Tang Sect! Both parties, please send your ﬁrst members up for the individual elimination round!” the Unbreakable Douluo shouted.

A tall young man stood up on the Snowdemon Sect’s side. He took a step forward and ascended the stage. At the same time, he looked over at the Tang Sect.

After that, he saw Wang Dong’er standing up.

Others might underestimate the Tang Sect, but the Snowdemon Sect wouldn’t. That was because the Snowdemon Sect had Mu Xue and Wei Na, who were both quite familiar with Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er. They had already treated the Tang Sect as their opponent, and thus they had been monitoring the Tang Sect’s ﬁghts.

In this tournament, there weren’t many people who had cultivations that were six or more rings. Among them, Wang Dong’er was one of the most outstanding ones. It wasn’t just because she looked like Wang Qiu’er’s sister, but more importantly, it was because of her great abilities. Against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, Wang Dong’er had fully demonstrated her abilities and cultivation. She had left a deep impression in many people’s minds. Furthermore, it wasn’t a secret anymore that Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao had twin martial souls. After all, they had accomplished great things in the previous tournament! As a result, the young man from the Snowdemon Sect turned serious when he saw her standing up. The two most monitored members of the Tang Sect were Wang Dong’er and Xu Sanshi. He Caitou came in third. He Caitou was a Class 6 soul engineer and six-ringed Soul Emperor. He had left a deep impression in

everyone’s minds during the team round against the Clearjade Sect. His Eye of Fear was the nightmare of his opponents. Huo Yuhao was the fourth most monitored in the Tang Sect. After all, he was stuck as a Soul King. In everyone’s eyes, a Soul King and Soul Emperor were very vastly different.

Just as the young man was shuddering in his heart, he was suddenly stunned. That was because Wang Dong’er didn’t ascend the stage directly. She walked behind Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair and pushed his wheelchair towards the stage.

Wasn’t Wang Dong’er going to compete ﬁrst? Wasn’t she going to imitate her elder sister’s ﬁghting style?

Everyone was bafﬂed. After that, they saw Wang Dong’er pushing Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair before she brought him up on the stage. She only brought him up to the edge of the stage before jumping off and returning to the waiting area. Huo Yuhao used his right hand to push the wheels of his own wheelchair forward. He slowly proceeded towards the center of the stage.

The ﬁrst person isn’t Wang Dong’er, but Huo Yuhao?

Although Huo Yuhao had performed well in the earlier rounds of the tournament, and even defeated seven people in one shot, he only rarely appeared as the tournament progressed. His performances weren’t too exciting. Most of the time, it was his teammates that performed well!

It’s only him! The young man from the Snowdemon Sect looked relieved. After all, Huo Yuhao was only a Soul King. In terms of individual abilities, Huo Yuhao was at most the fourth strongest in the Tang Sect. In addition, Huo Yuhao was a control-type soul master, and he was even crippled. He wasn’t much of a threat.

Wei Na also furrowed her brow in the waiting area. She didn’t understand why the Tang Sect would send Huo Yuhao up ﬁrst. From their looks earlier, they must have had guessed something. Wasn’t a control-type soul master like Huo Yuhao supposed to be reserved for the team round?

She also revealed a pensive look as she thought about that. As she recalled how sly Huo Yuhao was during their negotiation earlier, Wei Na couldn’t help but develop an ominous feeling…

---

On the stage, both parties quickly reached the center. They waited on opposing sides of Zheng Zhan.

“Both parties, please report your names,” Zheng Zhan said formally.

“Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Wang Yanfeng.”

Wang Yanfeng was more than one hundred and ninety centimeters tall. His body was big and burly. The white attire that he wore was very tight. He had short hair, and his eyes were ﬁlled with energy. Although he wasn’t very handsome, he gave off a very mature feeling. His sharp eyes seemed able to penetrate a person’s heart. Although they hadn’t started competing yet, Huo Yuhao could sense a dominant aura from his body.

Zheng Zhan looked at both parties and said, “Step back and prepare for the start of the ﬁght. Let me reiterate, try not to go too hard on your opponent. When I judge that either of you can’t handle it anymore, I will end this ﬁght.” Although only Huo Yuhao’s right arm could move, he was very deft as he controlled his wheelchair. He rolled his wheelchair back to his side of the stage.

Wang Yanfeng didn’t say anything either. He only nodded at Huo Yuhao before turning to the other side of the stage.

Very soon, both parties got into their respective positions.

They turned around and faced each other.

Zheng Zhan raised his hand up high and shouted, “Begin!”

Wang Yanfeng immediately moved. His toes pushed off as he burst towards Huo Yuhao. He was very quick, but wasn’t as violent as Wang Qiu’er. However, he seemed illusory throughout the entire process. It seemed as if he was bursting forward, but Huo Yuhao couldn’t lock onto him, even with his Spiritual Detection!

Wang Yanfeng was moving from side to side at an extremely high speed. Huo Yuhao immediately made his judgment. Both parties unleashed their martial souls at almost the same time. Huo Yuhao had two yellow, two purple, and one black soul ring. Everyone from the Tang Sect knew he was using his Imitation now. Apart from Wang Dong’er, no one really knew the colors of Huo Yuhao’s soul rings.

Six soul rings rose from Wang Yanfeng’s feet. There were two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings. His aura also grew stronger and stronger.

Huo Yuhao didn’t move a single centimeter, remaining in his position. His right hand pointed forward, and a petite ﬁgure shot out from his brow. She grew in size as she moved, and turned into the appearance of a little girl, drifting two meters in front of Huo Yuhao.

It was the Snow Lady.

Once the little Snow Lady appeared, the temperature around Huo Yuhao quickly fell.

Wang Yanfeng seemed to slow down as he burst forward. He had evidently unleashed his martial soul, but nothing could be seen.

What was his martial soul?

If not for the fact that Huo Yuhao had formulated his guess before the ﬁght even started, he would have been in a spot right now.

Wang Yanfeng was less than thirty meters from the Snow Lady right now. At this point, he suddenly shouted and jumped forward. His legs landed steadily on the ground, and he clenched his ﬁsts while raising his hands up. After that, he hammered his ﬁsts down.

He was still thirty meters from Huo Yuhao and the Snow Lady right now, so it wasn’t possible for his ﬁsts to strike them. He was hammering the ground!

A bronze-green glow spread from his ﬁsts. As his ﬁsts pounded the ground, there wasn’t any sound at all. However, a wave of green gas swept towards Huo Yuhao and the Snow Lady. It was a very strong shockwave!

Huo Yuhao was in awe. His opponent’s attack wasn’t unleashed using pure strength and soul power. It involved some level of technique and strength control. It was a combination of strength and technique. He was indeed a talent from the Body Sect! Were his ﬁsts his martial soul? In the younger generation of the Body Sect, Wang Yanfeng should be one of the best...

Huo Yuhao squinted as he faced the green gust of gas. The Snow Lady didn’t resist it directly. On the contrary, her petite ﬁgure drifted back and landed on Huo Yuhao’s shoulder.

Huo Yuhao raised his only moveable hand. A strong golden glow lit up on his palm.

Following this, a golden ﬁgure appeared from his body. It wasn’t quick, but it appeared just before the green gust of gas reached him.

Chi... The wave of gas struck the ﬁgure. The ﬁgure seemed to chop it down the middle, and the two halves struck the protective barriers around the stage. A huge glow was instantly created.

Neither parties used any soul skills in their ﬁrst confrontation. The rest of their team members in the waiting area were in awe, especially the Snowdemon Sect. Their team members were stunned.

Huo Yuhao didn’t use his ability to summon things, but used his own soul power to tackle Wang Yanfeng. In addition, he didn’t seem to have expended much energy as he overcame Wang Yanfeng’s attack. They were all shocked by this level of skill.

Huo Yuhao didn’t retract his palm. He clenched it into a ﬁst and pushed it forward. Suddenly, a golden force was unleashed from his ﬁst towards Wang Yanfeng.

It was a pure battle of soul power! There weren’t any soul skills involved! “He’s actually able to combine his spiritual and soul power! Whose ﬁghting skill did he inherit?” Wei Na muttered to herself.

Wang Yanfeng was equally stunned. When they had researched Huo Yuhao’s abilities earlier, they were completely different! Was this even possible for a control-type soul master? Isn’t this a ﬁghting method of our Body Sect?

One of the most important principles that the Body Sect had was that its disciples should never use their soul skills lightly, because their opponents would become familiar with one’s soul skills after each use. They should only be used at the most critical moments in order to achieve a decisive effect.

Because of this, the Body Sect was considered one of the best in terms of their research into ﬁghting techniques. In this aspect, even Shrek Academy couldn’t compare to them. It was also one of the reasons why the Body Sect was so strong.

However, Huo Yuhao was using a ﬁghting technique now. From how he resisted Wang Yanfeng’s attack earlier, it showed that he wasn’t ordinary either! His ability to counterattack in such a short period of time showed that he was indeed very strong.

While Wang Yanfeng was awed, he didn’t slow down. He took a step forward with his right foot and allowed his aura to rise. At the same time, he pounded his ﬁsts down again, and a blinding bronze-green glow was unleashed towards the force that Huo Yuhao had shot at him.

Bang!...

An explosive ring reverberated out. The golden and green glows dispersed. Huo Yuhao didn’t move from where he was sitting in his wheelchair. Wang Yanfeng looked backward and retreated one step.

At this point, the expressions of everyone from the Snowdemon Sect, or rather the Body Sect, couldn’t help but change.

Two ﬁsts against a single ﬁst. Huo Yuhao exerted a force from a mid-range distance, while Wang Yanfeng used his body to defend against it, but Wang Yanfeng was the one who suffered. This signiﬁed that Wang Yanfeng was inferior to Huo Yuhao in terms of his cultivation. How was this possible? He was one of the strongest from the Body Sect, and was even a Soul Emperor! On the other hand, Huo Yuhao was only a Soul King!

Such a result left those with some insider information feeling incredulous.

Wang Yanfeng’s senses were very acute. When he steadied himself, he burst towards Huo Yuhao without any hesitation. He opened his arms, and his ﬁrst soul ring ﬁnally lit up. His arms grew to three times their original size. He attacked Huo Yuhao’s head as he began to glow with an intense bronze-green light.

The Body Sect was very skillful at ﬁghting techniques because of their martial souls. As their bodies were part of their martial souls, their soul skills usually enhanced a certain part of their body. Without outstanding ﬁghting techniques, it was impossible for them to tap into their advantage to the fullest. Huo Yuhao’s expression didn’t change, but his eyes turned completely golden. With his Spiritual Detection, he could clearly sense the circulation and undulations of his opponent’s soul power, as well as his strengths and weaknesses.

In Wang Yanfeng’s eyes, the young man in the wheelchair suddenly shot out a strong glow from his eyes before taking in a deep breath.

Wang Yanfeng felt as if that simple inhalation had sucked away all the air around him. Not only did this not stop his advance, but the vacuum even drew him ahead faster and faster!

This change might be slight, but the change in tempo left Wang Yanfeng in a tight spot. His aura dropped signiﬁcantly.

Huo Yuhao raised his right hand at the same time as he inhaled. He faced his palm towards himself before ﬂipping it upward. His hand let out an intense golden light.

As Yuhao ﬂipped his palm over, Wang Yanfeng felt a huge storm coming. When Huo Yuhao unleashed his palm, it felt as if the weather had changed, and a sovereign was descending!

Wang Yanfeng’s hands were enhanced by his soul rings. In everyone’s opinion, he should have struck Huo Yuhao ﬁrst. However, Wang Yanfeng’s body stopped in the air when Huo Yuhao unleashed his palm. He snapped his double palms back before striking out against Huo Yuhao’s palm.

Boom!...

Three palms intersected, and a huge ﬂash of light went off, followed by the crash of the impact. The protective barriers around the stage started to ripple.

Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair slid backward, and he knocked into the protective barrier behind him before he stopped. But Wang Yanfeng had already been struck backward.

He took three steps back before he managed to steady himself, each step slamming loudly onto the metal plates of the arena stage. His upper body trembled slightly, and his face started to ﬂush. Everyone could tell that Huo Yuhao had gained the upper hand in this clash. If not for the fact that he couldn’t move his legs, his advantage might have been even greater.

It was a pure clash of soul power. There weren’t any ﬂowery tricks. It was a battle of their abilities.

Those who had once lost to Huo Yuhao and were unconvinced would immediately understand that they deserved to lose if they saw this clash between Huo Yuhao and Wang Yanfeng.

Both parties were forced back. However, this was only the curtain raiser.

When Huo Yuhao clashed with Wang Yanfeng, the Snow Lady was already sitting on his shoulder. Right now, she burst out like a bolt of lightning. She ﬂashed out, and appeared above Wang Yanfeng’s head. She ﬂipped around in the air and struck her palm toward his forehead.

At the same time, Huo Yuhao’s golden eyes suddenly turned purplish-gold. Two streaks of purplish-gold light shot out.

Wang Yanfeng only saw a patch of purplish-gold light in front of him. Following this, his very soul seemed to have been struck, and everything turned white.

However, his cultivation was still very strong. He had earned his Soul Emperor cultivation through his own efforts. Furthermore, his spiritual power was greater than most ordinary soul masters, since the Body Sect was very skilled in the research of ﬁghting techniques.

While Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Shock left him in great pain, he reacted instinctively when he realized something was wrong.

He raised his right arm and thrust his left arm forward, causing an intense golden light to surge from his body.

It was actually an Invincible Barrier!

The Snow Lady’s palm smacked the Invincible Barrier, and was deﬂected away. However, the barrier turned icy-blue instantly, and the temperature around it also fell signiﬁcantly. While the Snow Lady’s palm seemed very soft and gentle, it was actually even stronger than Huo Yuhao’s palm strike earlier.

Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow. The Body Sect uses soul tools too? Didn’t teacher mention that they were very rigid in this aspect? It seems like they are also keeping up!

Without the Invincible Barrier, his Spiritual Shock and the Snow Lady’s Snowless Glacier would have given him the absolute advantage even if Wang Yanfeng wasn’t immediately defeated. However, the barrier helped Wang Yanfeng avert this crisis.

Although Huo Yuhao was startled by his opponent’s Invincible Barrier, he didn’t stop his attack. Even with the Invincible Barrier, Wang Yanfeng was still in a trance after being hit by the Spiritual Shock. He was like a practice target as he stood in place.

The barrier could protect him from absolute harm. However, his soul power would be greatly depleted if the Invincible Barrier were struck repeatedly. Huo Yuhao raised his right hand, and a dark-golden projection slashed down like a huge heavenly ax. When the ﬁve streaks of light appeared, all the spectators felt a chill down their spines.

Boom!...

The icy-blue layer cracked and disappeared. Huo Yuhao’s claws pushed Wang Yanfeng’s barrier three feet into the ground. It was his Darkgolden Terrorclaw!

The Snow Lady wasn’t idle either. A deep blue light ﬂashed, and coordinated with Huo Yuhao’s attack perfectly. When the dark-golden blades disappeared, an icy-blue light blade of light struck the barrier ferociously.

Clang!...

A clear and crisp sound of metal striking metal resonated out loudly. The Snowdemon Sect was horriﬁed to discover that there was an obvious crack on an Invincible Barrier activated by a six-ringed Soul Emperor.

What did this mean? It meant that the defense of the barrier was about to be overcome! This also meant that Huo Yuhao and the Snow Lady’s repeated attacks bore an offensive power that had reached a terrifying level!

The Snow Lady’s attacks were all Ultimate Ice and Snow. Along with the Darkgolden Terrorclaw’s destructiveness and Wang Yanfeng’s inability to directly control his barrier due to his shock, such a situation had occurred.

However, Wang Yanfeng also recovered from the shock to his soul after this attack.

He immediately discovered the crack in his barrier. Horriﬁed, he quickly retreated. At the same time, his third soul ring lit up. His hands formed ﬁsts in front of him, and he punched out towards Huo Yuhao. This was Wang Yanfeng’s body soul’s third soul skill, Mountainquake Strike!

Huo Yuhao didn’t choose to clash directly against the ﬁst this time. He struck his palm towards the ground and leaned back. A row of jets appeared on his shoulders. When his wheelchair was propelled into the air by the rebound from his palm strike, the jets were also ﬁred. Instantly, he shot several dozen meters into the sky.

Wang Yanfeng’s attack was a measure to stop Huo Yuhao from attacking him anymore. With his current state, he wasn’t able to lock onto his opponent, so Huo Yuhao managed to easily dodge his Mountainquake Strike.

However, Huo Yuhao was still given a scare by the strength of the Mountainquake Strike!

It unleashed a ball of green light, roughly the size of a human head. It stopped for a moment in the air before blowing apart, converting into a greenish-black sphere more than ﬁve meters in diameter. The force of its explosion was immense. He must have completed the Second Awakening of his martial soul! While Huo Yuhao was in awe, his body had already started to descend.

Right now, the Snowdemon Sect’s team members in the waiting area were all in shock. Who would have expected Huo Yuhao to ﬂy so high up in the air even though he was in a wheelchair? Furthermore, he appeared very agile. His right hand was so powerful. How strong would he be if his whole body could move?!

The Snow Lady had already returned behind Huo Yuhao’s back. She pushed his wheelchair through the air, and a deep blue light shot forward. In this manner, she managed to slide his wheelchair down through the air, landing on the other side of the stage.

Wang Yanfeng also took this chance to catch his breath. When he saw Huo Yuhao on the other side of the stage, he felt helpless, and almost spat out blood in frustration.

Although the main effect of Spiritual Shock had already disappeared, he still had a splitting headache right now. As he looked at Huo Yuhao, he felt fear rising inside. He hadn’t expected this opponent would be so difﬁcult to deal with...

When he sensed his own condition, he was on the verge of tears. His soul power had dropped by forty percent after he was hit by Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Shock and the subsequent attacks. He only had sixty percent of his soul power left! His soul power was very dense, considering that he was from the Body Sect. Ordinary soul masters couldn’t compare to him at all!

When the Invincible Barrier had ﬁrst appeared, it had indeed caused a lot of problems for soul masters. Soul engineers who were ﬁnancially sound loved to use their Invincible Barrier to protect themselves when they fought, just before using their strongest soul tool against their soul master opponent. It was a move that left many soul masters feeling helpless and depressed.

However, soul masters slowly found a way to deal with this as time passed, even though they couldn’t catch up to soul engineers in terms of technology. For example, they could launch an assault against the Invincible Barrier!

While the assault couldn’t harm their opponent, their soul power would fall signiﬁcantly as the barrier came under attack. The stronger the assault, the greater the depletion. Of course, this was under the condition that the soul master wasn’t forced back by his opponent!

Huo Yuhao used this fact to launch a few attacks, causing Wang Yanfeng’s soul power to fall by almost half. This would undoubtedly be very useful for the rest of the ﬁght.

However, Wang Yanfeng wasn’t a simple character either. He turned around to face Huo Yuhao, but didn’t chase after him. He remained where he was and took a deep breath, initiating the circulation of his soul power. As he recovered from his headache, he tried to adjust his condition.

The elites of top-ranked sects weren’t easy to deal with. Even under unfavorable circumstances, Wang Yanfeng didn’t panic at all. Rather, he analyzed the situation. Huo Yuhao’s ﬂaw was too obvious. He needed his wheelchair to move. This meant that he couldn’t ﬁght like Wang Qiu’er, using a high speed and tempo to overwhelm his opponent.

Wang Yanfeng was exploiting this opportunity to catch his breath. However, he turned grim following this. That was because he saw Huo Yuhao brandishing a Milk Bottle, replenishing his own soul power.

Wang Yanfeng had his own Milk Bottle, but there was one thing that Huo Yuhao had judged accurately. The Body Sect had a very strong distaste for soul tools. While it had become less acute in recent years, they only used soul tools that had practical uses to them. For example, Milk Bottles, ﬂying-type soul tools, and protective-type soul tools, such as the Invincible Barrier.

However, Wang Yanfeng wouldn’t use his Milk Bottle in a ﬁght! That would be giving his opponent the best chance to attack him! Doing so would mean there was a period of time when he would be interrupted. That period of interruption could be fatal against a strong opponent!

Wang Yanfeng couldn’t take it anymore. He was infuriated by how Huo Yuhao seemed so contemptuous of him!

Chapter 320: The Ever-Transforming Huo Yuhao!

He crouched and leapt skywards. At the same time, he extended his hands to his sides and something weird occurred. Wang Yanfeng’s body continued to rise, and didn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon. His six soul rings lit up at the same time.

Not only this, but a greenish-bronze glow also lit up behind Wang Yanfeng’s back in the form of two huge palms. The greenish-bronze hands carried a very thick aura that suppressed the entire stage.

---

Xu Tianran squinted on the main stage and laughed coldly. “I thought they’d continue to conceal their abilities. They’ve ﬁnally appeared. The Body Sect is indeed in the Heavenly Soul Empire! Hmph!”

Jing Hongchen also clenched his ﬁst, and there was a look of bitter resentment in his eyes. When the Body Sect attacked the Illustrious Virtue Hall, it was the biggest humiliation of his life. How could he not feel hatred when he saw them now?

---

Huo Yuhao found it difﬁcult to breathe onstage. The appearance of the greenish-bronze palms behind his opponent’s back made him feel as if he were being suppressed by a mountain. The ground started creaking too. It was like the stage couldn’t handle this pressure, and was about to collapse.

Only the Snow Lady was still sitting on his shoulders and behaving as if nothing had happened.

Was this the Second Awakening of a body soul? Huo Yuhao was very calm right now. He knew that his opponent was from the Body Sect, and thus he had expected the ﬁght to become intense.

This was a Bronze-level body soul.

He recalled what Elder Mu had told him about body souls.

---

“Yuhao, I’ll tell you what a body soul is today, and why they are so strong.

“Body souls are very special existences among martial souls. Generally speaking, our martial souls can be anything, but they are rarely a part of our body. We are incomplete if a part of our body is our martial soul.

“The earliest soul masters with body souls were believed to be mutants. Furthermore, the advantages of body souls weren’t known yet. That’s why they were looked down on.

“But a genius with a body soul appeared and managed to unlock the secret of making a body soul strong. This person was the ﬁrst sect leader of the Body Sect!

“He went through a period of tireless cultivation, and discovered that having one’s own body as a martial soul was more reliable than any other type of martial soul. More importantly, a body soul possesses characteristics that other martial souls don’t have.

“For example, it’s easier to control a body soul, compared to a regular martial soul. This is derived from the fact that humans have great control over their own limbs. In addition, the limit of a body soul is also much higher than most martial souls!

“Simply put, you can only control the size of your martial soul if it’s a sword. You can pour your soul power into it, and use your soul rings and skills to enhance its strength. If your martial soul is your arm, it isn’t just about size anymore. First, every ﬁnger can change signiﬁcantly. Even your veins and arteries, bones, and pulse can be controlled. A soul skill can exhibit different kinds of possibilities in the hands of a strong soul master with a body soul.

“The most frightening part of a body soul is in its Second Awakening.”

“Our martial souls Awaken when we are six years old. There are martial soul imprints on our body from that age onwards. We can start cultivating if we have soul power. “The Second Awakening is something unique to a body soul.

“What’s a Second Awakening? It refers to an evolution in your martial soul. It also means that a body soul can evolve one level higher than others. Let me give you an example: If a body soul is as strong as an Earthdragon after its ﬁrst Awakening, it might become as strong as a true dragon after its Second Awakening. There’s a huge change in quality!

“Right now, only body soul Soul Masters are able to experience this Second Awakening, and this is why the Body Sect continues to prosper. Someone who possesses a body soul and is able to become a soul master will want to join the Body Sect and make themself stronger. The Body Sect is also very protective and caring towards their disciples.

“It is possible to tell if a body soul is undergoing its Second Awakening. If you meet such a soul master in the future, you must be very careful! Their body can become a terrifying weapon!

“There are even different levels of this Second Awakening. The Body Sect categorizes them into four levels. After the Second Awakening is completed, light projections formed from the individual’s martial soul will appear behind him as he unleashes his evolved abilities. The color of this projection is very key to understanding the level of his Second Awakening.

“A black projection carrying a metal glow appears during an Iron-ranked Second Awakening. After this Awakening, the ﬁghting strength of the individual’s martial soul will increase by thirty percent or more.

“A bronze glow represents a Bronze-ranked Second Awakening. After this Awakening, the ﬁghting strength of the individual’s martial soul will increase by sixty percent.

“One level higher is Silver. Such an Awakening will only appear in more important body parts, such as the skeleton or head. Once the Awakening is completed, one’s ﬁghting strength can double. Some can even increase their ﬁghting strength by a level. A Soul King can temporarily possess the offensive abilities of a Soul Emperor.

“The rarest and scariest rank is a Gold-ranked Second Awakening. The light projection created will be golden. If you meet such a soul master, you should not ﬁght him unless your soul power is more than a level higher than his. Such a soul master possesses great explosive power, but this will vary between different soul masters depending on the strength of their martial soul. When they undergo their Second Awakening, their offensive strength might even increase up to three times their normal standard.

“Your eyes are also a body soul. Considering how important one’s eyes are, I think its Second Awakening will be at least a Bronze-ranked one. Since your abilities are spiritual, I think it’ll be a Silver-ranked one. If that happens, your abilities will greatly increase.

“It’s precisely because the Body Sect’s disciples can undergo this Second Awakening of their body souls that the Body Sect looks down on soul tools. If you meet them in the future, you must be very cautious.”

---

While Elder Mu wasn’t around anymore, his words were still deeply entrenched in Yuhao’s memories. When Huo Yuhao saw those bronze palms, he knew that Wang Yangfeng’s Second Awakening was at least a Bronze-ranked one! Elder Mu also told him that most of the disciples in the Body Sect would only experience an Iron-ranked Second Awakening. It was rare to see a Bronze-ranked Second Awakening. As for a Silver-ranked ones, there weren’t more than ten people in the Body Sect who reached that level during their Second Awakening. As for the Gold-ranked Second Awakening, only their ﬁrst sect leader had reached that level.

However, the sect’s members didn’t crave Gold-ranked abilities. The stronger one’s Second Awakening was, the greater one would be drained. At the Gold-ranked level, one’s life power might be completely drained!

The bronze palms shone brightly behind Wang Yanfeng’s back up there in midair. Wang Yanfeng wasn’t hiding his identity anymore. He mimed a pressing action as he aimed his palms towards Huo Yuhao.

Suddenly, the two bronze palms expanded rapidly, actually reaching a length of more than ten meters and a width of more than ﬁve meters. Both palms struck down, crashing down towards Huo Yuhao’s head! Before the palms reached him, the ground around Huo Yuhao had already caved in in the shape of a palm!

While Wang Yanfeng was furious because of how Huo Yuhao was so contemptuous of him, he wasn’t careless at all. After they exchanged blows earlier, he knew Huo Yuhao wasn’t an easy opponent to deal with. Without his Second Awakening, there wasn’t any way he could defeat Huo Yuhao.

Even though this blow depleted him greatly, he also had conﬁdence that he could use it to win. With his cultivation as a Soul Emperor, the strength of his body soul, and the increase in ﬁghting strength from his Second Awakening, he believed that his opponent couldn’t possibly defeat him!

After all, Huo Yuhao was only a Soul King! There was still a big gap between them!

However, Huo Yuhao was smiling at this point. It looked like Huo Yuhao had met an old friend, his smile was casual and familiar. Wang Yanfeng abruptly felt as though the sky was turning around. Everything around him seemed to have suddenly changed. He was horriﬁed to discover that Huo Yuhao was now ﬂoating in mid-air in his wheelchair.

A frightening pressure started to bear down on him.

No one had expected such a change. However, Huo Yuhao seemed to have done it very simply.

He had released a pitch-black glow from his body. A projection of a turtle-like shield that seemed to have a snake- shaped carving shone along with his ﬁfth soul ring, and appeared silently in front of him. Following this, a light ﬂashed, and he changed positions with Wang Yanfeng.

Wang Yanfeng was the one who was about to suffer from his own attack!

Everyone felt that it was unreal, too astonishing! Even his fellow Tang Sect members, except for Xu Sanshi, were shocked. They couldn’t believe what had just happened!

Wang Yanfeng realized what was going on at the critical moment and shouted without any hesitation, “I concede defeat!”

A streak of dazzling silver light fell from the sky and engulfed his body.

More than a quarter of his side of the stage was turned to dust and collapsed completely. The protective barriers on this side of the stage surged with blinding light. The more than twenty soul engineers who were maintaining the protective barrier all spat blood at the same time.

A pair of bronze palm prints were still present on the ground that had caved in. The area that was struck was completely smooth and appeared worked by someone with splendid carving skills.

Only two spots within this area hadn’t caved in. Wang Yanfeng was in one of the spots, while Zheng Zhan, who had used his silver-colored protective barrier to protect Wang Yanfeng, was in the other spot.

Zheng Zhan’s arms were still shaking gently. He was horriﬁed, but it wasn’t obvious.

As a Titled Douluo, he should have been able to easily restrain a Soul Emperor. However, those palms made him ﬁnally understand why the Body Sect was so strong. Zheng Zhan knew that it would be impossible for him to unleash such a strong palm strike without any soul tools even if he had eight rings. Even soul masters who specialized in cultivating martial souls might not be so terrifying when they unleashed their Martial Soul True Body with seven rings.

This was the strength of a body soul!

However, Wang Yanfeng had still lost.

Huo Yuhao was seated in his wheelchair in the air. He slowly landed with the Snow Lady’s help. He seemed very relaxed, and didn’t even pull out his Milk Bottle. Wang Yanfeng hadn’t seen what had happened, but Zheng Zhan had witnessed everything clearly. Huo Yuhao had only taken his Milk Bottle out earlier. He didn’t suck any soul power from the bottle. He had not been far from Huo Yuhao earlier, as he had been preparing to save the crippled young man.

Huo Yuhao’s Milk Bottle had unleashed a light that made it look like soul power was being absorbed from it. However, there weren’t any soul power undulations from that light. Was it a smokescreen or illusion?

At this point, Wang Yanfeng still couldn’t believe that he had lost. However, he knew that he couldn’t have blocked his own attack. He would have been critically injured even if he didn’t die. There wasn’t any way he could compete in the team round after this.

As an elite from the younger generation of Body Sect disciples, he had actually lost to a Soul King! It was even a Soul King who was crippled! He was even more embarrassed that his opponent was from Shrek Academy. It was important to know that the Body Sect and Shrek Academy had many disputes with one another! Embarrassing. It was too embarrassing...

Wang Yanfeng lowered his head in shame. He quickly rushed off the stage, and didn’t even say anything.

Huo Yuhao wore a smile as he sat back in his wheelchair. The light from his Milk Bottle appeared once again. This time, he was really sucking the soul power from the Milk Bottle to restore his own soul power.

He didn’t just win this physical ﬁght. More importantly, he achieved a psychological and tactical victory.

He had wanted to give his opponents the impression that he was willing to ﬁght until the end against them. Both parties had clashed a few times with one another, and Wang Yanfeng couldn’t help but feel that Huo Yuhao was really strong. The rest of the changes were all within Huo Yuhao’s calculations.

He used his Imitation to tempt his opponent into unleashing an all-out attack. It was also his ﬁrst time using the ﬁfth soul skill of his Spirit Eyes, Spiritual Duplication. It was the strong soul skill that he obtained when he was in the Great Star Dou Forest with Wang Qiu’er.

It was obvious what soul skill he had duplicated from the effects of it. It was Xu Sanshi’s Mysterious Underworld Displacement!

This divine skill from a defense-type soul master achieved the same divine effects even when he used it. No matter how well the Snowdemon Sect knew him, they couldn’t have guessed he had such a skill.

Wang Yanfeng was the one who bore the consequences of his own attack. In fact, Wang Yanfeng had a wealth of live experience. It was a pity that he wasn’t cunning enough to best Huo Yuhao. Bound to his wheelchair, Huo Yuhao was too deceptive. His greatest advantage wasn’t any overwhelming ability, but the complexity of the types of abilities he possessed. He could use a myriad of ﬁghting strategies against his opponents!

Only Wang Dong’er truly understood everything when she ﬁnished watching this ﬁght. Only she understood that the core of Huo Yuhao’s abilities came from his Spirit Eyes, even though he had used so many soul skills! All his planning had revolved around his Spirit Eyes.

“Tang Sect versus the Snowdemon Sect. The Tang Sect wins the ﬁrst individual elimination round,” Zheng Zhan announced the result, watching Huo Yuhao carefully. Huo Yuhao gave him a very weird feeling…

Down in the waiting area, Wei Na’s astonishment slowly faded away. She nodded slightly, and her eyes ﬂashed. She whispered a few words to her teammates before another young man jumped onto the stage. He quickly walked out to the center.

As this was an individual elimination round, the stage couldn’t be repaired, as that would give the victorious soul master the time needed to restore his soul power and energy. The tournament could only continue. At most, some simple repairs could be made before the team round.

“Both parties, please report your names.”

“Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Chen Lu.”

The members of the Snowdemon Sect were all glaring at Huo Yuhao, as if they were trying to ﬁgure out something about him. Huo Yuhao appeared as leisurely as ever, as if nothing had happened at all. His aura also hadn’t changed because of the previous ﬁght.

Both parties quickly retreated to their respective sides of the stage. Huo Yuhao was still holding his Milk Bottle in his hand, and seemed to have no intention of putting it away. However, he didn’t delay the ﬁght either. He pressed three of the ﬁngers of his right hand against his Milk Bottle before turning his wheelchair around. It was a pretty sad sight. The spectators weren’t too hostile either, since the Sun Moon team had already been eliminated. They pitied him a little as they saw him in this state.

Huo Yuhao turned around as he reached his side of the stage. Only he knew that the previous victory hadn’t come easily. Wang Yanfeng was indeed very strong. The Soul Emperors of the Body Sect weren’t inferior to Soul Emperors like Ma Xiaotao from Shrek. Even when Huo Yuhao was in his normal condition, he still had to give his all in order to beat such an opponent with his cultivation as a Soul King. Moreover, he was in a very deprived state right now. His greatest advantage was that his opponents didn’t know him well. They also didn’t know about the

enhancement to his spiritual power that he had received after

he went to the Iceﬁre Yin Yang Well and ended up in his current disabled state. Indeed, his Spirit Eyes were the core of all his ﬁghting strategies!

“Begin!” the Unbreakable Douluo shouted, announcing the start of the second individual elimination round.

Chen Lu crouched down before jumping forward. He was very quick, like an arrow loosed from a bow. He stuck close to the ground as he raced towards Huo Yuhao. Everyone was impressed by his speed.

His speed was different from Wang Qiu’er’s speed, which was generated from her explosive power. His speed came from his extremely great leaping abilities. When he came up onto the stage, Huo Yuhao had immediately realized his legs were different from those of normal people, they were more muscular and developed. His calves were so thick that they were almost the size of a regular person’s thighs!

As he leapt forward, he immediately demonstrated his shocking springing ability. He was in front of Huo Yuhao almost instantly.

Sliding tackle! Against the immobile Huo Yuhao, Chen Lu chose an offensive method that was difﬁcult to anticipate. Just as he was about to reach Huo Yuhao, he leaned back and kicked forward with his legs, one high and one low as he slid in. He wasn’t targeting Huo Yuhao, but his wheelchair!

It was a brilliant tactic. Zheng Zhan’s eyes brightened. Even though Chen Lu’s attack was a little despicable, Zheng Zhan had to admit that it was effective.

If Huo Yuhao were without his wheelchair, it would be equivalent to him losing his legs. He already found it very difﬁcult to move. Without his wheelchair, his ﬁghting strength would fall considerably. Even though Chen Lu had ﬁve soul rings just like Huo Yuhao, he seemed to have found the key to victory the moment he entered the fray.

Everyone believed that Huo Yuhao had to stop his opponent’s sliding tackle right now. Otherwise, he would lose his only form of mobility if his wheelchair was damaged. There wasn’t going to be any way for him to face his opponent then.

Even those from the Tang Sect couldn’t help but become anxious when they saw this. What method was Huo Yuhao going to use to deal with his opponent?

Huo Yuhao didn’t move. It seemed like he had no intention of stopping his opponent. Chen Lu was very quick, and was about to strike the wheelchair...

Even Chen Lu was surprised when Huo Yuhao didn’t bother to stop him. He was already prepared: if Huo Yuhao tried to stop him, he would unleash all his strength and destroy the wheelchair no matter the price. Once he did that, victory was almost certain!

Just as Chen Lu was slightly uncertain, Huo Yuhao ﬁnally acted. He slapped the side of his chair using his right hand, and his wheelchair ﬂew into the air. At the same time, his wheelchair slid diagonally to one side.

Dodge!

If he was just purely dodging Chen Lu’s attack, Chen Lu was already prepared to deal with it. However, Huo Yuhao and his wheelchair seemed to fuse with the air as they dodged. They disappeared without a sound…

Concealment? Chen Lu was shocked. He even forgot to retract his power, and only reacted after sliding more than ten meters. He pointed his toes to the ground before leaping up again. However, he couldn’t trace Huo Yuhao after he turned around.

All the spectators were stunned when they saw this. Huo Yuhao is even able to conceal himself?

In the Snowdemon Sect’s waiting area, Wei Na focused even more intently on the ﬁght going on. She realized that Huo Yuhao wasn’t just a difﬁcult character to deal with in terms of business negotiations. Even with only his right hand, he was still very strong!

Huo Yuhao was naturally using his evolved million year soul skill, Imitation!

In fact, he had no choice. Once his opponent moved, he could tell that Chen Lu’s main strength was his speed. At the same time, his own greatest ﬂaw was his current lack of agility.

Huo Yuhao had used his Spiritual Shock earlier, and knew his opponent would exercise caution against it. Moreover, he didn’t want to overuse his Spiritual Shock, which was his strongest killer move. The more he used an ability, the easier it was for his opponent to ﬁnd ﬂaws in it. That was why he used his Imitation to conceal his ﬁgure and disappear in the air. As long as he didn’t shift too much, it would be very difﬁcult for his opponent to determine his position from the ripples in the air.

Through his Spiritual Detection, Huo Yuhao also discovered that Chen Lu’s martial soul was his calves.

One’s calves were points of exertion for one’s strength. From this, he could tell that Chen Lu was very strong in terms of speed and explosive power.

After pausing for a moment to assess the situation, Chen Lu immediately reacted. He quickly turned around. His third soul ring shone brightly, and he immediately sprang into the air. His legs intersected in the air as he kicked out. Instantly, he created several illusory projections of his legs in the air.

Every projection carried a streak of dark-green light, and a piercing sound reverberated in the air. In a ﬂash, countless projections appeared in the air and ﬁlled the stage! Without a doubt, Chen Lu was using a high-frequency area attack to determine Huo Yuhao’s position!

His spiritual power wasn’t weak, since he hailed from the Body Sect. As he focused to sense Huo Yuhao’s position, he would immediately capture Huo Yuhao’s position once there were any strong soul power undulations.

Indeed, a streak of dark-golden green light caused a ring to ripple before Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair appeared once again. He had used his right hand to block the kick-blade, but seemed a little pathetic as he did so.

Chen Lu snorted and quickly jumped up again. His third soul ring was still shining, and his legs intersected as they kicked out at the same time as he charged towards Huo Yuhao. Streaks and streaks of dark-green projections engulfed him. Amid the piercing whistles, the light blades were all aimed towards Huo Yuhao!

However, it was at this moment that something weird appeared. Huo Yuhao suddenly rose several meters into the air and avoided the blades with an unbelievably deft movement. At the same time, he made a turn in the air which seemed to completely violate the laws of physics. He charged towards Chen Lu!

Chen Lu was stunned at this moment. Even a soul master with wings couldn’t have made such a dodging action in the air; it involved countless swaying movements mid-air! Is his disability fake? Otherwise, how did he manage to dodge everything so quickly in midair?

Chen Lu couldn’t be bothered by anything else, too horriﬁed by this action. He quickly shut his legs, and a beam of intense bronze light shone behind his back. Just like Huo Yuhao had predicted, his body soul was his calves. In addition, his Second Awakening was a Bronze-ranked one!

Instantly, Chen Lu’s whole body grew by more than a meter. His calves also became extremely thick, tearing his pants open. His legs intersected as he kicked out. Amid the terrifying bronze light, his calves were like two huge awls unleashed against Huo Yuhao. As his calves swept through the air, it felt as if the air had been torn apart. Huo Yuhao’s speed fell drastically.

Chen Lu was still living in the shadow of Wang Yanfeng’s defeat. Right now, Huo Yuhao was demonstrating some very weird abilities. He had to give his all at this point!

The Second Awakening of his body soul was indeed frightening. His body soul became very strong, and covered a domain that no ordinary soul masters could compare to. Even a Soul Emperor couldn’t achieve a ﬁghting strength like him!

Something that left Chen Lu shocked happened again. In his opinion, the only way Huo Yuhao could avoid his attack was by resisting it directly. It was impossible to dodge. After learning from Wang Yanfeng’s mistakes, he didn’t force his soul power out of his body. He gathered the strength of the Second Awakening in his calves. In this way, he wouldn’t be affected even if Huo Yuhao switched places with him!

However, something weirder than what had happened to Wang Yanfeng occurred. Huo Yuhao and his wheelchair broke just as Chen Lu’s calves struck him. Yes, they broke. Countless streaks of bloody light burst out, and the broken wheelchair scattered in all directions. Everyone exclaimed and jumped up in shock at this scene.

Chen Lu was in a daze. However, he also discovered that something was wrong at the same time. That was because he didn’t feel as if he had contacted anything when he struck Huo Yuhao!

A deep blue sword light that seemed as if it wanted to tear the nine heavens apart silently appeared not far away behind Chen Lu.

That deep blue sword light was shiny and transparent. It was so clear that it seemed like it was formed with a water crystal. Wherever it passed, it formed a deep blue light screen. It appeared just at the moment when Chen Lu ﬁnished his previous attack and had yet to unleash his next attack. The timing was perfect.

Unparalleled Chill, Empress’ Sword. This time, Huo Yuhao was the one holding the Empress’ Sword. The Snow Lady had disappeared. Chen Lu’s eyes shone with light. In the face of such a crisis, he didn’t panic at all. Among the younger generation disciples of the Body Sect, he was one of the best. Even though his cultivation was inferior to Wang Yanfeng’s, he was only still eighteen years old. In terms of talent, he might even be better than Wang Yanfeng. Wang Yanfeng lost at the, ah, hands of his own attack, but Chen Lu was even more cautious after the loss.

After realizing something was amiss, he didn’t even turn around to look. He immediately activated his ﬁfth soul ring.

A pitch-black soul ring shone brightly, and Chen Lu did a half-crouch. Behind him, a third leg silently extended out. This leg was also covered in a greenish-bronze glow, and looked identical to his own legs.

The three legs bent at the same. As a low-pitched roar sounded, Chen Lu seemed to have over-compressed the air beneath him, causing an explosion to spread out. He released a projection from his body after this.

The bronze light engulfed his entire body. The weird thing was that the bronze projection revealed the form of a mutant with a dragon’s head and a frog’s body.

Just as he completed this, the Unparalleled Chill ferociously slashed his body.

Dang!...

It sounded like an awl had struck a huge bell. There was a tremendous echo across the entire arena. It even shook the stage slightly.

Chen Lu was smashed down to the ground by the sword, and his body sank a foot into the ﬂoor. The mutated projection that was supposed to protect him was also covered with a deep blue layer of light. It froze instantly.

The spectators were bamboozled by this series of changes. There were very few who could tell what was actually happening.

Undoubtedly, Chen Lu was suffering. However, why was he at a disadvantage? What did Huo Yuhao do to him? Very few people understood the sequence of events. Only those who were very keen could guess that Huo Yuhao was using an illusion.

---

In the Snowdemon Sect’s waiting area, all their team members looked very serious now. Right now, they had just realized that Huo Yuhao was able to pose a huge threat to them. His abilities seemed to be endless. He used the Ultimate Ice, illusions, summoning, and even soul tools. How was a soul master able to possess all these skills?

Even though Wei Na and Mu Xue knew Huo Yuhao, they didn’t know much about him. Even after investigating his background, they only knew that he had twin martial souls; one spiritual-type and the other Ultimate Ice-type. In addition, he had turned the tables in the previous tournament.

However, all this had been accomplished when his body was in its normal condition. Right now, only his right hand could move. Even though he had twin martial souls, how many of his abilities could he unleash? They were bound to be greatly weakened! However, they understood some things after watching the ﬁrst two ﬁghts. Even when Huo Yuhao had problems moving, his ﬁghting strength couldn’t be underestimated. He was not inferior to a Soul Emperor even when handicapped. The most frightening thing was how mysterious his ﬁghting strategies were. Wang Yanfeng lost so ridiculously, and Chen Lu was also losing right now!

---

After the ﬂying-type soul tools on his shoulders raised Huo Yuhao into the air, they shot out light that propelled his wheelchair towards Chen Lu. Huo Yuhao raised his right hand, and his Darkgolden Terrorclaws appeared.

As someone who possessed the Ultimate Ice, he was well- aware that his opponent’s power depletion from that attack wasn’t very great even though he had used all his strength. Chen Lu used his ﬁfth soul skill at the critical moment, which greatly resisted his attack. It was Chen Lu’s mutant projection that was frozen, and not Chen Lu himself. He was only delayed right now because he was still affected by the chill brought about by the Ultimate Ice. Huo Yuhao thought privately that if he were in his peak state, he would be able to completely suppress his ﬁve-ringed opponent, even if his opponent was from the Body Sect. He might even be able to crush him. Facing what he was now, he could completely rely on his Ice Explosion to continue harming his opponent. At the same time, his speed wouldn’t be so slow, were it not for his body condition...

Chapter 321: The Strongest Member of The Body Sect

There was a loud crunch, and a huge crack appeared in the ice. It looked like Chen Lu was about to break out from the ice...

Huo Yuhao’s expression turned serious, and he swiped his right hand. The complete version of the Darkgolden Terrorclaws was unleashed.

No one could compare to him in terms of capturing the perfect timing. Just as the dark golden lights from his terrorclaws arrived, the ice broke apart, and Chen Lu escaped. Chen Lu was instantly greeted with the extremely sharp blades.

Chen Lu had no other choice; his ﬁfth soul ring lit up. He used his ﬁfth soul skill once again, the Three-Legged Dragontoad.

He had obtained this soul skill after hunting and killing a ten-thousand year Three-Legged Dragontoad. When he used this soul skill, he could create another leg for his body soul. As he released a light barrier from his Three-Legged Dragontoad, he could protect himself and greatly increase his ﬁghting strength. Among the same-generation disciples of the Body Sect, his ﬁfth soul ring was the best among all the soul rings at the same level. He was recognized to have the strongest ﬁfth soul ring in the entire Body Sect.

Gaining ﬁve rings and attaining this ability before he was eighteen years old was why he could represent the Body Sect in this tournament. At the same time, he was being nurtured as one of the future elites of the sect.

Chen Lu, who wanted to get up, and slammed was smacked back to the ground. Although his Three-Legged Dragontoad blocked the attack of the Darkgolden Terrorclaws, the terrorclaws were still the Darkgolden Terrorclaw Bear’s greatest ability. It was extremely destructive, and wasn’t inferior to Huo Yuhao’s strongest version of the Unparalleled Chill.

Five enormous cracks appeared on the barrier, and the effect of the ten-thousand year soul skill was instantly destroyed. Chen Lu was so devastated that he almost spat blood. Huo Yuhao had no intention of letting him off. He retracted his Terrorclaws and clenched his ﬁst. A bright-golden light extended from his body. Following this, he punched out at Chen Lu.

Sovereign’s Descent! This was the Sovereign’s Descent formed after Huo Yuhao fused his spiritual power and various abilities together. He had already evolved the Dragon God Douluo’s skill into his own version.

Chen Lu cursed in his heart, and a layer of golden light was released from his body. He had already used his Three-Legged Dragontoad twice, and it wasn’t feasible for him to use it a third time. As his soul power rapidly dipped, he had no choice but to activate his own Invincible Barrier.

Ripples formed on the barrier as the blow slammed against it, but it gave Chen Lu an opportunity to catch his breath. He quickly channeled power into his legs and sprang up from the depression he was in. With how strong his legs were, he immediately ﬂew high into the sky.

Chen Lu was clearly aware of his greatest strength, which was his speed. However, he had been completely suppressed by Huo Yuhao during their confrontations. His speed advantage couldn’t be realized.

After using his ﬁfth soul skill twice and initiating the Second Awakening of his body soul, he had already used up more power than Wang Yanfeng had earlier!

Time wasn’t on his side!

Chen Lu hated Huo Yuhao a lot right now. It was his ﬁrst ﬁght in the entire tournament! His teammates and Princess Wei Na were watching him! How could he lose to a cripple?

He ﬂipped around in the air, and his energy ﬂow smoothed out. Although he was affected by the chill from the Ultimate Ice, he managed to repress this chill using his cultivation.

He took a deep breath, and seemed to grow larger. His legs expanded, and the greenish-bronze projection ﬂashed behind his back again. This time, Chen Lu had completely locked onto Huo Yuhao. Having jumped high into the air, he came swiftly crashing back down! He couldn’t differentiate between Huo Yuhao’s illusions, so he wanted to use his speed so that Huo Yuhao didn’t have any opportunity to use his illusory tricks.

This time, Huo Yuhao couldn’t dodge the incessant attacks anymore. He looked up at his opponent in the sky and raised his right arm to block his body.

A ring of distorted ripples was released from an ordinary- looking ring on one of his right-hand ﬁngers. This ring of ripples changed into a gentle, milky-white shield that protected him. Subtle golden patterns appeared on the shield.

In order to prevent himself from being displaced, Chen Lu came down with only his physical body. His legs, which were now more than two meters long, appeared deformed. It was as if two bronze pillars were descending from the sky and crashing down.

When the two bronze pillars struck Huo Yuhao’s shield, there was a massive boom as a ball of greenish-bronze light surged and blew apart, with Huo Yuhao at the center of the explosion. It felt as if a huge hammer had fallen from the sky and pounded the stage. The surrounding ﬂoor collapsed, and a terrifying destructive force caused countless ﬁssures to extend across the stage ﬂoor.

A ﬁgure shot back into the sky, and a bronze light started to undulate tremendously. As his screams echoed out, the ﬁgure that shot into the sky spat out fresh blood. As the bronze light dispersed, it became clear that the ﬁgure belonged to Chen Lu.

The tremendous explosion caused debris to ﬂy everywhere. As Chen Lu was driven back, Huo Yuhao’s ﬁgure also became clear amid the debris. Rings of white surrounded his body and made it seem as if he were in a fairy tale. Layers and layers of glowing light undulated around his shield, as if they were shaking. Beneath him, there was an area one and a half meters in diameter that hadn’t collapsed at all.

He managed to block Chen Lu’s all-out attack?

Chen Lu crashed down. When he landed on the ground, his calves had already returned to normal. However, he fell on his butt and grabbed his legs with both his hands while screaming in pain. Right now, it was very clear that his calves were in very unnatural shapes. Evidently, he was gravely injured.

Huo Yuhao shut his eyes and sensed the surging life aura in his body. Through his spiritual force, he asked in some concern, “Brother Skydream, how are you?”

He had used the Life Reﬂecting Shield to resist Chen Lu’s attack. It was the strength the Skydream Iceworm had conferred onto Huo Yuhao after he turned into a spirit.

Even though the Skydream Iceworm didn’t have four orange- gold soul rings like the Snow Empress, he was still a million- year soul beast! Although his blood couldn’t compare to the Snow Empress, he was still the only soul beast in the continent to reach a million-year cultivation!

The greatest strength of the Life Reﬂecting Shield was that it could reﬂect an attack after absorbing the impact of an attack. Once the attack was reﬂected onto the opponent, the harm that was inﬂicted on the opponent would be equivalent to the strength fed to Skydream Iceworm’s body to restore the defensive strength of the shield. In the close-combat that had just occurred, Chen Lu’s all-out attack on the Life Reﬂecting Shield was fed back into his calves. How could he not be seriously injured?

However, the Skydream Iceworm didn’t have it easy against this attack either. He had indeed absorbed a huge amount of life power to replenish his own body, but he had also absorbed the entire impact of the attack, as he didn’t have Huo Yuhao’s soul power to support him. As a result, he bore the entire attack, which was stronger than an attack from a seven-ringed Soul Sage using his Martial Soul True Body, all on his own.

“I’m ﬁne. The life power is very concentrated. However, I’ll need some time to absorb it. At least, within ﬁfteen minutes, I’m unable to help you resist an attack of such a level again. Deal with it yourself.”

After hearing the Skydream Iceworm’s words, Huo Yuhao heaved a sigh of relief. He couldn’t use his own soul power to increase the defensive strength of the Life Reﬂecting Shield. However, he had to conserve his energy in the individual elimination round! He could only exploit the Skydream Iceworm’s strength. With Chen Lu’s cultivation, it was impossible for him to truly damage the Life Reﬂecting Shield. The Skydream Iceworm only needing ﬁfteen minutes to recover was already beyond Huo Yuhao’s expectations.

As lights shot out above his shoulders, Huo Yuhao was propelled over the depression. The Unbreakable Douluo was already in front of Chen Lu. After checking out his condition, he immediately gestured to signal the end of the ﬁght.

“Second individual elimination round. Huo Yuhao from the Tang Sect wins.”

Everyone from the Snowdemon Sect went silent in the waiting area. Wang Yanfeng jumped onto the stage and carried the critically injured Chen Lu down. After a brief inspection, he discovered that Chen Lu’s calves had broken into three parts. It wasn’t just an injury to his physical body; it was also an injury to his martial soul! He was highly unlikely to be able to compete in the team round.

Fortunately, Chen Lu wasn’t weak, and his calves were quite strong. Although they were fractured, his passageways weren’t seriously hurt. After his teammates helped set his broken bones, he was in much less pain.

Wei Na personally used her Snow Lotus to help him recover. Even if he couldn’t compete today, he could still recover within a week under her treatment, based on his control of his martial soul.

Chen Lu’s injury wasn’t a big deal. However, what were they going to do in the following ﬁghts? Huo Yuhao had already won two ﬁghts. The Soul Emperors from the Tang Sect had yet to compete. If this continued, the Snowdemon Sect was going to be in an extremely disadvantageous situation.

Wei Na furrowed her brow. At this point, a cold-looking young man stood from the Snowdemon Sect stood up and said, “Let me go.”

Wei Na was stunned. As her gaze met his, the young man nodded at her. His body ﬂashed, and he was already up on the stage. When Zheng Zhan announced Huo Yuhao’s victory, Huo Yuhao was already making use of the time to restore his soul power. However, he felt his hair rising when this young man from the Snowdemon Sect appeared on the stage. It gave him the same feeling as the time when the Skydream Iceworm met the Ice Empress in the Extreme North!

A soul master who was at most twenty years old actually gave him this sense of oppression, as if he were being watched by a savage beast. Evidently this young man’s cultivation was quite high!

Huo Yuhao focused his gaze and circulated his spiritual power to dispel that sense of oppression as he stared back at his opponent.

This young man from the Snowdemon Sect was tall and burly; all of his muscles were well-deﬁned and toned. He stood almost two meters tall, and his shoulders were quite broad. His hair was split between half brown and half red, both sides of which appeared very soft. His eyes were narrow and long, and contained a cold, indifferent look. His nose was straight. Although he wasn’t especially attractive, he was still slightly charming. Oddly, his skin was white, smooth, and glowed. When he raised his hands, his skin appeared very delicate.

A strong opponent! Huo Yuhao immediately had this thought. He had the feeling that this guy was probably the strongest opponent he’d faced in the tournament thus far. He might not even be able to beat him if he was in peak condition! Had the Body Sect ﬁnally sent their team leader up after losing two consecutive ﬁghts?

The young man didn’t rush to the center of the stage like the others had to reduce the time Huo Yuhao had to restore his soul power. Instead, he slowly approached Huo Yuhao. However, every step that he took increased the sense of oppression that he gave off. His aura also gradually started to grow.

Huo Yuhao’s expression changed slightly. With his acute senses, he was able to immediately sense how frightening his opponent was. His opponent’s soul and spiritual power had reached a natural and seamless stage of fusion that was superior to even his own.

Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power was still greater than this young man’s, but his soul power was weaker. When he fused them together, there were naturally some inequalities. Contrary to this, the feeling that his opponent gave him was one where his soul power and spiritual power couldn’t be differentiated anymore—they seemed to be a single entity. Huo Yuhao had only experienced something like this from Elder Mu.

Elder Mu had once told him that anyone who managed to do something like this had the potential to become a Transcendent Douluo. If not, one’s limit would be becoming a Titled Douluo, no matter how great his talent and martial soul were. Taking a deep breath, Huo Yuhao calmed himself down. He looked at his opponent with a burning gaze and revealed a dim layer of golden light in his eyes. Soon afterwards, this layer of light quickly covered his entire body. A pure undulation comprised of his spiritual power surged towards his opponent. I might be inferior to you in terms of my fusion of soul and spiritual power, therefore I’ll use my superior spiritual power

to clash against you. He couldn’t lose to his opponent in terms

of his aura.

The tall and burly young man revealed a shocked expression. He stopped in his tracks momentarily, before continuing to walk towards Huo Yuhao.

Zheng Zhan didn’t stop them from staring at each other.

Rather, he was astonished.

He could clearly tell that these two young men in front of him had surpassed him in certain realms, despite their inferior cultivations. Was this the standard that most outstanding soul masters of the younger generation could achieve? Zheng Zhan was certain that they’d surpass him in the future so long as they were given sufﬁcient time to mature and improve further. When the burly young man reached Huo Yuhao, their clashing auras peaked. Even Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair revealed a dim golden glow.

Huo Yuhao seemed a little pale. His eyes had turned almost pure gold at this point, and even his hair had been dyed golden. However, his opponent still seemed as calm as ever.

Back in the waiting area, everyone from the Tang Sect was shocked. They all knew Huo Yuhao very well. Based on the situation on-stage, it seemed like Huo Yuhao was at a disadvantage despite not being suppressed by his opponent’s aura. This burly young man must be quite strong.

“Both parties, please give your names.” Zheng Zhan said.

“Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao.” They were only a simple few words, but Huo Yuhao struggled to simply mutter them. The pressure bearing down on him was simply too great.

“Snowdemon Sect, Long Aotian.” The young man said. “Both parties, please step back and prepare for the start of the ﬁght.”

Long Aotian nodded at Huo Yuhao, not attempting to hide the admiration in his eyes in the slightest. He then turned around and walked to his spot. Even though the stage had been heavily damaged, he didn’t seem to care or notice. As he crossed the ﬁssures that littered the ground, there seemed to be an aura around him that carried his body over them—he crossed them like they weren’t even there.

When he turned around again, the aura and sense of oppression that he’d been directing towards Huo Yuhao disappeared. Huo Yuhao’s spiritual power surged forward, but seemed to ﬁnd nothing. His opponent was obviously right in front of him, yet his spiritual power had completely lost its target. Huo Yuhao groaned, and a hint of red surfaced on his face. However, he stopped himself from spitting out the fresh blood that had ﬁlled his throat.

Strong!

Huo Yuhao was sure that he’d met the greatest opponent in his life thus far; the Body Sect deserved to be known as the most mysterious and powerful sect in the continent! Long Aotian’s cultivation was on another level compared to his own. He had to be the team leader of the Body Sect.

Huo Yuhao took a deep breath to calm the surging blood and energy in his body. After a moment, he slowly pushed his wheelchair towards his own spot.

Back in the waiting area, Wang Dong’er looked at Bei Bei anxiously.

Bei Bei shook his head at her and said, “Don’t worry, he knows his limits. We have to trust him.

“This Long Aotian is going to be a tough nut to crack. Sanshi, you should start preparing.”

“Yes.” Xu Sanshi looked at him. After years of brotherhood, he immediately understood what Bei Bei meant by the look in his eyes. Huo Yuhao retreated to his side of the stage and turned his wheelchair around. He grabbed the handle with his right hand and pulled himself up even straighter.

Long Aotian was facing him again, but the aura from his body wasn’t nearly as strong as before. Despite this, he seemed to have fused with the stage where he stood.

Unity of Heaven and Man. Had his cultivation reached such a level?

Huo Yuhao’s eyes lit up. This was the level that he was pursuing! It wasn’t just him. In the resting area, Ji Juechen’s eyes also brightened. Both he and Huo Yuhao had very high goals when it came to their ﬁghting techniques. No one else could compare to them in this aspect. It was also because of this that they were more intrigued when they saw Long Aotian’s current condition.

Zheng Zhan gestured as he shouted, “Begin!”

Huo Yuhao quickly lifted his head. Instantly, his eyes brightened and ﬁve soul rings surged upwards from his body. Following this, two streaks of purplish-gold light shot out of his eyes towards his opponent.

He wasn’t going to hold back anymore. After winning two consecutive ﬁghts, his soul and spiritual power had been greatly depleted. This third round would be a huge test for him.

Huo Yuhao’s ﬁrst soul ring shone brightly, a hint of white hidden amidst the glow. Now that he’d increased his spiritual power to its limit, his Imitation wasn’t able to conceal the true color of his soul rings anymore.

Two streaks of purplish-gold light swept through the air and instantly reached Long Aotian.

Long Aotian didn’t move from his position and made a weird gesture in front of his chest. He raised his right palm towards the left and curled his ﬁngers. He then raised his left palm towards the front with his ﬁngers straightened.

As he did this, he released a shiny glow from his body. Surrounded by the glow, he seemed to have become a jade sculpture.

When Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Shock arrived, Long Aotian’s sculpted body lit up with a blinding purplish-gold light. Following this, it disappeared. His body swayed a little, followed by the shiny glow on his body dispersing.

On the other side, Huo Yuhao let out a mufﬂed groan, and he seemed very grim.

He hadn’t gained any advantage from this attack. However, he was slightly excited by how Long Aotian had resisted his attack. He could sense that Long Aotian had fused his spiritual and soul power with his entire body and then fused it with the heaven and earth to resist his attack.

Such an experience and sensation were very enlightening to Huo Yuhao. This was the realm that he’d been searching for! This was the direction that he’d been working towards after he entered the concrete-immaterial realm.

If he could achieve a breakthrough and enable his spiritual and soul power to fuse with his body, his cultivation, physical strength, and control could rise to yet another level.

Such a live experience was incredibly valuable for him. At the same time, his opponent’s strength was also stimulating Huo Yuhao’s own potential.

Long Aotian was stunned after resisting this attack. He gently pressed his feet against the ground, and seemed to slide across the ground towards Huo Yuhao.

Soul rings started to rise from beneath his feet. Yellow, purple, purple, black, black, black, black. Seven soul rings of the best combination, out of which, four were ten thousand year soul rings. This number had only been achieved by Wang Dong’er in the Tang Sect—apart from Huo Yuhao—who was special. However, Wang Dong’er was still one level lower than Long Aotian in terms of cultivation.

Huo Yuhao ﬁnally understood why the sense of oppression from his opponent had been so strong: Long Aotian’s abilities had reached an unprecedented level.

Seven rings! He was a Soul Sage.

Long Aotian wasn’t the only Soul Sage in this tournament; there had also been the Three-Legged Golden Toad, Xiao Hongchen.

However, everyone from the Tang Sect could tell that Xiao Hongchen had gained his seven-ringed cultivation through both medicine and some other special methods. He might even have sacriﬁced his future improvements as well as overstimulated his current potential in order to have become a Soul Sage in time for the tournament.

Was Long Aotian the same? Deﬁnitely not. As a disciple of the Body Sect, how could he possibly reach such the Unity of Heaven and Man realm through medicine? His cultivation was achieved through his own hard work and effort. Such a Soul Sage, a Soul Sage from the Body Sect, was very scary! His four ten thousand year soul rings were even superior to the Unbreakable Douluo beside him.

Zheng Zhan only had four ten thousand year soul rings.

The Body Sect actually had such a strong individual among their ranks. The expression of everyone from Tang Sect changed. Even Xu Tianran, Jing Hongchen and the mysterious Imperial Tutor were all affected when they saw Long Aotian’s seven soul rings. Their auras started to undulate.

Before Long Aotian had surfaced, Wang Qiu’er was recognized as the strongest in this tournament. Her ﬁghting strength was the best. However, those who were sharp could tell that Long Aotian was superior to Wang Qiu’er even before he made a move. They just didn’t know what his martial soul was.

A hundred meters was nothing to Long Aotian. He took only a second to move this distance.

He didn’t perform any superﬂuous actions or unleash any of his soul skills. He raised his right hand and mimicked a pressing action towards Huo Yuhao.

Suddenly, the entire stage started to gently shake. Huo Yuhao sensed that his opponent wasn’t just Long Aotian, but the air within the protective barriers around the stage. Even the sunlight became a part of his opponent’s attack.

Even though nothing weird had happened yet, Huo Yuhao felt a huge change occurring.

Was this a ﬁghting technique in the realm of Unity of Heaven and Man? Huo Yuhao’s eyes brightened. Even Long Aotian was a little stunned. He wondered why Huo Yuhao wasn’t fearful or panicky, but excited.

Huo Yuhao raised his right hand and formed a ﬁst, then shuddered slightly. Following this, a golden projection separated from his body. He also turned golden, just like a golden sculpture.

This golden projection was slender. Although it was illusory, her appearance made Long Aotian feel that the pressure he was putting on Huo Yuhao was being borne by this projection.

She looked a little familiar. Three pairs of wings opened behind her, and her long hair ﬂowed. She punched with her right hand and blocked Long Aotian’s palm.

“Plop——”

There was no tremendous collision. When both parties contacted each other, Long Aotian’s attack seemed to have been retracted. The ﬁst of the golden projection also developed an indescribable, whirlpool-like glow that seemed able to engulf everything.

Two beams of light, golden and white-jade, blew apart after a momentary silence. They changed into two light barriers that stuck close to each other as they rippled.

Huo Yuhao seemed to really become a statue as he sat in his wheelchair. There wasn’t a single change in him. The golden projection in front of him was also crushed as the beams of light blew apart.

Long Aotian didn’t move a single inch. However, there was a look of shock in his eyes.

It was deﬁnitely not a soul skill. It was a ﬁghting technique. What ﬁghting technique was it? It wasn’t the Sovereign’s Descent that Huo Yuhao had inherited from the Dragon God Douluo!

Even with Long Aotian’s cultivation, he couldn’t continue to advance as they clashed. In the next instant, the golden projection re-formed. She retracted her left hand and extended her right hand. As she tugged and pulled, a pure golden whirlpool with a diameter of around one foot ﬂew out from the hands of the golden projection, barreling towards Long Aotian.

Long Aotian took a step back and raised his right arm. His palm straightened like a blade. Suddenly, his entire arm and body turned a jade color. Behind him, a twisted blade formed by compressed air lit up and slashed.

“Chi ⼀⼀” There was a deafening screech in the air. The golden whirlpool was destroyed, but the jade blade light was also crushed.

This time, Long Aotian retreated half a step again, whereas Huo Yuhao was bleeding from his nose and mouth.

While it seemed like a simple collision, it was actually more dangerous and scary than using soul skills.

After the golden projection was crushed again, Huo Yuhao’s face was already completely pale. He retracted his right arm to his chest before pushing it out again. The golden projection took form again. This time, the projection clasped her palms before her chest. An austere aura was released.

Long Aotian’s expression turned serious. After entering the realm of Unity of Heaven and Man, his senses were probably superior to Huo Yuhao’s even if his spiritual power wasn’t comparable. His sense of crisis was especially acute.

When that golden projection took form in front of Huo Yuhao again, Long Aotian only felt his heart shrinking. After that, his heart beat extremely quickly, and he started perspiring profusely. Even with his cultivation, he still broke out in a cold sweat. It was as if he were being targeted by a venomous snake that could kill him with one bite.

How’s it possible? His cultivation is deﬁnitely below mine. He has also been greatly exhausted. Why is he giving me such a feeling?

Although Long Aotian was shocked, he didn’t slow down. He pointed his toes to the ground and he ﬂipped backward. At the same time, his arms drew a huge circle in front of his body. His entire body turned jade-white, and his complexion glowed. Behind him, a silver-white human ﬁgure quickly took form. It was the second awakening of his body soul. It was a Silver-ranked awakening.

In fact, Elder Mu wasn’t even sure whether the second awakening of body souls in the Body Sect could evolve. The highest level of second awakening right now was the Whitesilver level. Only a person with his second awakening in the Whitesilver level could transcend the level of a Titled Douluo and evolve to the Gold level.

Huo Yuhao’s judgment was very accurate. Long Aotian was the strongest among the younger generation in the Body Sect. He was likely to inherit the position of the leader of the Body Sect in the future. His status in the Body Sect was very high; it was even superior to many elders.

After seeing Long Aotian’s second awakening of his Body Soul, everyone from the Snowdemon Sect in the waiting area couldn’t help but stand up. They didn’t understand why he would do this even though he was at an advantage. At this point, the projection in front of Huo Yuhao’s body moved. She swept her clasped palms forward, and a thin, golden light shot out. Wherever the light passed, no ripples were created. Not even a sound could be heard. Without looking carefully, it was almost impossible to detect it. At least

no spectator was able to see this golden light. It even seemed to absorb the light that it refracted.

Long Aotian had a grave look on his face. When the golden light ﬂashed, even his soul felt a piercing pain. This was an attack that he couldn’t possibly dodge. He refused to use an Invincible Barrier to protect himself. As the strongest individual in the younger generation of the Body Sect, he was a ﬁrm believer that martial souls were still stronger than soul tools.

“Chi——”

The protective white light around Long Aotian’s body was like a rubber ball that had been pricked. It instantly blew apart and turn into a white glow that quickly dispersed. He groaned and shuddered. The white lights around his body started to surge. Huo Yuhao wasn’t in the best condition on the other side either. After unleashing this attack, the projection in front of him instantly dimmed and disappeared. He was very pale, and was relying on his wheelchair to keep himself from collapsing. He was panting, and the light in his Spirit Eyes had also

dimmed slightly.

However, he was still staring at his opponent. He sighed in his heart. It was his ﬁrst time using this ultimate technique.

However, the result…

“Plop⼀⼀” Long Aotian’s body started to jerk tremendously, and he spat out blood. The blood that he spat out was a little weird. After spitting it out, it immediately changed into countless blood arrows that scattered and let out a series of sizzles. As it landed on the ground, it formed small holes, but the depth of these holes couldn’t be determined.

His body jerked slightly, and he also looked slightly pale. When he looked at Huo Yuhao again, his expression was very serious. He lifted his right hand, and a milky-white glow appeared. Brother Long is hurt? Everyone from the Snowdemon Sect was astonished. It seemed like he was in rather bad shape. They also didn’t expect Huo Yuhao to weaken Long Aotian at the last moment.

“I concede defeat.” Huo Yuhao’s weak voice sounded. He signaled towards Zheng Zhan.

After winning two consecutive ﬁghts, Huo Yuhao ﬁnally lost to the most outstanding youth from the Body Sect. Although Long Aotian didn’t use his full abilities in this ﬁght, he was still hurt by Huo Yuhao’s last attack.

Wang Dong’er rushed up the stage immediately. She came to Huo Yuhao’s side, and he smiled at her to show that he was ﬁne. When Wang Dong’er was about to push him off the stage, Long Aotian suddenly said, “Wait a minute.”

Huo Yuhao twisted his head to look at him. Wang Dong’er’s eyes were ﬁlled with caution and hostility. Long Aotian’s abilities were beyond what they had expected. Long Aotian looked at Huo Yuhao with a deep gaze. “Can I ask if the golden projection was a ﬁghting technique that you invented?”

Huo Yuhao slowly nodded.

Long Aotian said, “You are strong. Among those of the same generation, you are the most creative opponent I’ve met. It’s a pity that your body is restricting your abilities. Otherwise, you’d probably be the strongest opponent I’ve ever met. If there’s a day you can stand up, I hope to ﬁght you in your best state.”

Huo Yuhao smiled, “You’ll have that opportunity.” When he said that, his eyes seemed to be dazzling. He had given his all in this ﬁght and curbed his opponent several times. However, he still fell short in the end. But there was still the team round. More importantly, he hadn’t revealed all his trump cards. Otherwise, what were they going to do against the Holy Ghost Sect?

Chapter 322: Yama's Invitation

Huo Yuhao knew that Long Aotian was much stronger than him, but that he still had a ﬁghting chance. After ﬁghting Long Aotian, he had gained a deeper understanding of his abilities. If he could regain his mobility and absorb all the origin energy of Ultimate Ice in his body, his cultivation would reach the level of a Soul Emperor. When that happened, he was conﬁdent of challenging Long Aotian through his various ﬁghting methods.

Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao off the stage and immediately stood behind him to massage his shoulders. Huo Yuhao also had a Milk Bottle in his hand, and started to recover his soul power.

Even though he had lost this ﬁght, the Tang Sect still held the advantage. Among the three who had competed from the Snowdemon Sect, Chen Lu was deﬁnitely unable to compete in the team round. This meant that they were already a man down for the team round.

Xu Sanshi stood up. It was the ﬁrst time he was so serious in this tournament. The strength of his opponent also motivated his own ﬁghting will.

“Second competing member from the Tang Sect, please come up to the stage.” Zheng Zhan seemed to be a little lost after witnessing such an exciting ﬁght. However, he still continued to manage the proceedings of this individual elimination round.

Xu Sanshi was about to walk up to the stage, but he heard a voice calling, “Wait a minute.”

He was a little puzzled as he stopped. He turned to Jiang Nannan beside him.

Jiang Nannan stood up and looked at him with a passionate gaze. She said softly, “Return safely.” As she spoke, she hugged Xu Sanshi’s neck in front of everyone before pecking him on the cheek.

Xu Sanshi was stunned. Xiao Xiao was the shyest among the three ladies of the Shrek’s Seven Monsters. However, Jiang Nannan was the most conservative. He was lucky when she was willing to hold his hand. Even if he pestered her for a month, he might not even be able to kiss her.

However, Jiang Nannan now took the initiative to kiss him in front of everyone. Furthermore, she wasn’t encouraging him to win.

She had asked him to return safely. It was just a simple few words! However, Xu Sanshi’s blood surged.

He hugged Jiang Nannan tightly and let out a loud whistle. He stomped his right foot on the ground and jumped up onto the stage

He was too excited. He was even blushing slightly. His entire aura also seemed a little unstable. However, this instability made him seem like a volcano that was about to erupt. He was under great pressure.

He took big steps forward and came to the center of the stage. He nodded at the referee. In the Tang Sect’s waiting area, Bei Bei gave Jiang Nannan a thumbs-up. Everyone from the Tang Sect knew that Jiang Nannan was the greatest motivation for Xu Sanshi. Jiang Nannan was his greatest weakness, but she was also a catalyst to him.

Xiao Xiao laughed. She copied Jiang Nannan’s gentle voice and said, “Return safely.”

Jiang Nannan blushed. “I hope that everyone can return safely.”

Bei Bei teased, “Then you should give me a kiss when I compete later and tell me to return safely. Alright?”

Jiang Nannan snapped, “Bei Bei, keep dreaming. Xiao Ya is watching.”

Bei Bei’s expression turned stiff. He laughed bitterly and shook his head. Jiang Nannan appeared very apologetic after she said that, and hurriedly said, “Sorry, I…”

Bei Bei smiled and said, “No worries, I’ll make sure Xiao Ya returns safely as well.” As he said this, there was a strong sense of belief that came from him. However, everyone could feel how desperate he was.

Bei Bei turned to Huo Yuhao and softly asked, “Yuhao, what is his martial soul?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “His martial soul should be his skin. It’s very rare among body souls. I communicated this to second senior earlier.”

Bei Bei furrowed his brow. “Does that mean that he has no ﬂaws?”

Huo Yuhao answered, “He is really strong. He must have invented his own ﬁghting skill, and even has a very deep comprehension of it. His cultivation has even reached the realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man. To him, soul skills won’t make a big difference. His body is his strongest soul skill. He’s very scary.”

After he ﬁnished saying this, he shut his eyes and continued to replenish his soul power. In his mind, scenes of his ﬁght with Long Aotian also replayed continuously, especially the last clash between them.

Ancestor Tang San, I’m sorry. I wasn’t able to carry on the Tang Sect’s reputation of having the best, top-ranked hidden weapons on the continent. However, I only used half of the power of that ultimate technique. He would have died if it were paired with lethal poison.

If Yama tells someone to die, no one will dare to delay. This ultimate technique was ranked third among the Three Great Hidden Weapon Techniques of the Tang Sect that Tang San left in the Poison Scripture, Yama’s Invitation!

Yama’s Invitation, a hidden weapon that could chase one’s soul and seize it forcibly! Huo Yuhao had used his self-invented Goddess of Light’s ﬁghting technique to imitate Yama’s Invitation. This had depleted all his remaining soul power. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have conceded defeat.

Long Aotian was too strong. There was no way he could have weakened him without using such a method. Long Aotian was a seven-ringed Soul Sage who could exhibit a Martial Soul True Body. If everyone from the Tang Sect only competed based on their order, they might have to pay a huge price even if they could defeat him. If that happened, what would they do in the team round later on?

This was why Huo Yuhao had sacriﬁced all his soul power to use the Yama’s Invitation.

Although Long Aotian managed to resist his attack, he was still eventually hurt. Furthermore, Huo Yuhao could also conﬁrm that he was hurt quite badly.

Yama’s Invitation had two deadly ways to kill its target. The ﬁrst was lethal poison. Huo Yuhao hadn’t had time to research the poison chapter that Tang San left behind in depth. As a result, he couldn’t re-create the true Yama’s Invitation. That was why he couldn’t truly utilise this deadly technique. This was why he said he’d only exhibited a part of Yama’s

Invitation.

The second one was the actual Yama’s Invitation. There was a special technique to unleash it. It fused the Controlling Crane, Capturing Dragon, Purple Demon Eyes, Mysterious Heaven Technique, Mysterious Jade Hands and many other abilities. It also greatly depleted one’s soul power. Furthermore, it didn’t matter what rank a soul master was in – the depletion would be equally great. It was just that the strength of Yama’s Invitation would increase depending on one’s cultivation.

The actual Yama’s Invitation couldn’t be avoided. Once it entered the opponent’s body, it would immediately be crushed before it coursed through it at a frightening speed. Even without any lethal poison, it was still very terrifying. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be among the Tang Sect’s Hidden Weapon Hundred Separation, and even be the third-ranked throwing-type hidden weapon. Huo Yuhao had unleashed the second effect of Yama’s Invitation earlier. Long Aotian had used the strength of his body soul, which had undergone its second awakening, to reduce the majority of the impact force from Huo Yuhao’s partial Yama’s Invitation. He had also dispelled the part of Yama’s Invitation that was formed using Huo Yuhao’s spiritual and soul power. However, the crushed Yama’s Invitation still gave him great trouble after it entered his body.

When he spat out that mouthful of blood, he had used his soul power and control over his body to force the Yama’s Invitation out of his body.

However, Yama’s Invitation was very strong. Even though he had forced it out of his body, his passageways were still bound to be hurt. They weren’t lightly hurt either.

Right now, the next ﬁght on the stage had already begun.

As the referee signaled the start of the ﬁght, Xu Sanshi immediately unleashed his Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle and charged towards his opponent. Right now, he was very energetic, and his aura was pressing. His eyes appeared very sharp. There was only one thought in his mind. If I perform well, will Nannan give me further rewards?

In the waiting area, Jiang Nannan was a little worried as she saw Xu Sanshi charging towards his opponent. She asked, “Bei Bei, will he be ﬁne?”

Bei Bei smiled and answered her, “Why? Don’t you trust his abilities? While his opponent is strong, he is adept at defending. This is the best kind of ﬁght for him. If it were me, I wouldn’t do any better than him. Especially after your encouragement earlier, I believe he’ll be able to unleash his full abilities. Don’t worry. When this guy is serious, he can be better than anyone.”

“Okay.” Jiang Nannan nodded gently. She focused on the two on the stage, who were getting closer and closer to each other.

Long Aotian acted as if nothing had happened in his previous ﬁght against Huo Yuhao. He continued to slide forward as usual. The feeling of the Unity of Heaven and Man appeared once again.

Xu Sanshi felt the pressure that Huo Yuhao had felt earlier. His opponent’s omnipresent and integrative aura was very uncomfortable.

However, Xu Sanshi wouldn’t ﬁght his opponent using ﬁghting techniques. They weren’t what he was good at. He placed his shield in front of him to protect himself. They were about to clash.

Long Aotian wasn’t the one who made the ﬁrst move. Instead, it was Xu Sanshi. When Long Aotian was ten meters away from him, he stomped on the ground with his right leg and stopped himself in his tracks. His third soul ring shone, and his shield surged with black light. His aura instantly became very cold and eerie.

As he pushed his shield forward, his ﬁrst soul ring shone slightly after his third soul ring. Layers of black light started to surge outward. These lights were like bubbles that rushed towards Long Aotian like overlapping waves.

Xu Sanshi’s third soul skill, Mysterious Underworld Force, and his ﬁrst soul skill, Mysterious Underworld Quake.

When he used the Mysterious Underworld Quake this time, it didn’t provide him all-around control and defense. Instead, it was focused in one direction. As he unleashed it with all his strength, the layers of black light resisted the pressure that Long Aotian brought to him.

This was Xu Sanshi’s true ability. He was one of the Gemini from Shrek Academy in the past. Even Shrek’s Seven Monsters had never seen him go all-out before.

Long Aotian snorted and swept his right hand upward. A white blade formed out of thin air. Suddenly, the black bubbles were crushed as they encountered the blade. Xu Sanshi’s quaking force was unable to reach Long Aotian. However, Long Aotian was stalled as he was attacked.

After the white blade of air got close to Xu Sanshi’s shield, it was eventually dissipated by the Mysterious Underworld Quake. Long Aotian lifted his right arm and mimicked a pressing action towards Xu Sanshi with his palm. Suddenly, a white, palm-shaped glow spread. This palm-shaped glow completely stopped the Mysterious Underworld Quake that had re-formed after it was destroyed. In addition, it also forced its way closer to Xu Sanshi.

Black and white were clearly separated. Long Aotian’s attack seemed unstoppable, and quickly arrived in front of the Xu Sanshi’s shield.

“Boom——”

The white palm-shaped glow scattered. Amidst the tremendous boom, Xu Sanshi retreated. He staggered backward, and his footsteps seemed a little messy.

Long Aotian was unforgiving. He stepped forward with his left leg and formed a ﬁst before striking again. This time, it was a ﬁst-shaped glow which seemed even stronger. The glow, which was more than a meter in diameter, quickly reached the staggering Xu Sanshi.

Xu Sanshi’s shield tilted slightly to one side. Under the effect of the Mysterious Underworld Force, the surface of the shield shone with layers of pitch-black light.

“Boom——” Another loud boom sounded. Xu Sanshi retreated seven to eight steps this time. He even lifted his shield as it was jerked to one side.

Long Aotian attacked with his right ﬁst.

Xu Sanshi did something unexpected this time. He squatted down and tilted his shield upward.

“Bang.” When the ﬁst-shaped glow scattered, a huge patch of white light could be seen above Xu Sanshi. However, he rolled over from this ﬁst.

His shield seemed to grow on his body. Even when he rolled, the shield still protected him. He rolled for several dozen meters before he managed to get up, and when he stood up, he still retreated a few steps.

After three consecutive strikes, Xu Sanshi appeared very disheveled. However, Long Aotian squinted his eyes and smiled. He said, “Good.”

Xu Sanshi’s held his shield in front of him and groaned, “I don’t need you to tell me that I’m good. Come on!” As he said, he hooked his left hand to bait Long Aotian to attack him.

Long Aotian didn’t make a sound. He pointed his left foot toward the ground. This time, he reached maximum speed. His body ﬂashed before he was immediately in front of Xu Sanshi. As he unleashed his palms, intense white light seemed to turn his entire body into a burning white color.

“Boom——” The Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle was crushed.

Xu Sansh groaned as he was pushed back.

However, it was only the ﬁrst layer of the shield that was crushed. After the ﬁrst layer was crushed, Long Aotian’s strength destroyed the second layer, followed by the third layer…

In front of Xu Sanshi, his shield seemed to turn into countless layers. Furthermore, he was also retreating continuously.

Chapter 323: Xuanwu's Domain

Right now, those who were sharp could tell some clues. While Xu Sanshi was retreating, he wasn’t completely at a disadvantage. Every step that he took was timed at the perfect instant when the impact force from his opponent was the strongest. His defensive control against an opponent’s attack had reached a ﬂawless level. When he retreated, his shield also changed continuously. Every layer that was crushed weakened the attack of his opponent.

Long Aotian knew it best. Even with his control, he couldn’t stop Xu Sanshi from weakening his attack. It seemed like his opponent was an old turtle who would never perish even in the face of the most brutal thunderstorms. He would only hide within his own shell.

“Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom…”

Xu Sanshi kept on retreating. Long Aotian’s attack was unceasing, while he was struggling to stay alive. His second and third soul rings shone at the same time. He used the Mysterious Underworld Shield as a series of defensive layers. It worked very similarly to the Mysterious Underworld Quake, especially because he had to control every layer properly to resist Long Aotian’s attack.

The Eternal Defense, Xu Sanshi. He was living up to his name now.

“Boom——” A loud explosion resonated, and Xu Sanshi was ﬂung back along with his shield. He retreated more than twenty meters this time before he crashed to the ground. He staggered a few steps again before he neutralized the impact force that had struck him.

On the other side, Long Aotian also stopped, and the look in his eyes became sharper.

What a troublesome fellow to deal with. Long Aotian cursed in his heart. Huo Yuhao’s judgment was right. The strength of Yama’s Invitation was beyond what Long Aotian had expected. Although he had forced the Yama’s Invitation out from his body, his passageways were still damaged. He was also greatly depleted because he had gathered too much of his soul power earlier.

While the realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man was very strong, its depletion of Long Aotian’s soul power was also very great. After the series of attacks, his passageways were hurting. To prevent his injury from worsening, he took it down a notch. Xu Sanshi seems to have been ﬂung away, but Long Aotian knew that he was exploiting the momentum of his attack to spring back. However, Long Aotian didn’t stop him either. He also needed this time to catch his breath.

Is everyone from the Tang Sect so difﬁcult to deal with? Long Aotian breathed in deeply and tried to repress his internal pain. He retracted the burning white glow around his body. Finally, one of his seven soul rings lit up.

He’s not using his abilities in the realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man anymore? Beneath the stage, Huo Yuhao brightened as he monitored the ﬁght.

Long Aotian’s transformations veriﬁed his guesses. Even though Long Aotian wasn’t any weaker as he unleashed his soul skills, his injuries should be quite bad, since he was no longer in the realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man. He was tapping into his soul skills to increase his ﬁghting strength.

Of course, Huo Yuhao also knew that Long Aotian was scariest when he fused his realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man and his soul skills with the second awakening of his body soul.

Second senior, hang in there!

His ﬁrst soul ring shone, and Long Aotian’s body made some weird changes. He started to bulge, and was now much bigger than before.

Following this, his third soul ring also shone. There was now another layer of dark-golden glow on his skin.

Unleashing these two soul skills caused his aura to become stronger and stronger.

Everyone could tell that his ﬁrst soul skill was used to enhance his strength, speed and other traits. His third soul skill was used to increase his body’s tenacity, as if he were making his body metallic. Of course, it was more advanced than that.

Right now, Long Aotian seemed as if he had an extra layer of dark-golden armor on his body. As he unleashed these two soul skills at the same time, he was already charging towards Xu Sanshi.

Xu Sanshi didn’t retreat this time. His ﬁfth soul ring lit up. Suddenly, a pair of crimson-red eyes opened on his shield. Turtle God’s Strike.

“Boom——” Two ﬁgures clashed in the air. Xu Sanshi seemed to have become stronger. As they clashed, his entire body was dyed completely black.

However, Xu Sanshi couldn’t compare to Long Aotian in terms of absolute cultivation. He was still the one who was sent ﬂying back.

“Enjoyable!” Xu Sanshi shouted, though there was already a streak of blood on the side of his lips. However, the look in his eyes became even more incisive.

Long Aotian, who was slightly delayed by the collision, charged forward again. He came in front of Xu Sanshi and smashed his left ﬁst down. At the same time, he raised his right hand up high.

A weird scene occurred. As his second soul ring shone, his right arm was distorted and turned into a long, golden blade.

As his left ﬁst collided with the Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle, Xu Sanshi immediately staggered back. However, the shield was still protecting his body. However, the dark-golden blade slashed like a bolt of lightning at the next moment.

Long Aotian’s actions were extremely swift. He didn’t give Xu Sanshi a chance to avoid him.

As Xu Sanshi tilted his shield, he tried his best to block the direct attack of the dark-golden blade. However, the blade was too sharp. With a clang, the blade stabbed straight into Xu Sanshi’s shield. Xu Sanshi groaned. When a martial soul was hurt, it was no different from hurting the soul master. At times, the soul master might even be more critically injured.

After the dark-golden blade stabbed into the shield, it expanded in size and seemed to completely mount itself to the shield. Long Aotian pulled the shield, attempting to drag Xu Sanshi towards him. At this point, his left arm had already changed its form. It turned into a dark-golden hammer, and smacked down ferociously.

Xu Sanshi had no other choice now. He squatted down and used his shield to protect his body.

“Boom——”

These two consecutive blows were too strong. As the hammer pounded the shield, Long Aotian’s blade and the shield ﬁnally separated. There were many marks on the shield now, and it seemed on the verge of being torn apart. Xu Sanshi also spat out blood as he retreated. Long Aotian stretched his arms to his sides, and his fourth soul ring lit up. Once he started his all-out attack, he wasn’t going to give Xu Sanshi a chance anymore.

He only decided to use such a ferocious method to defeat Xu Sanshi because he was very difﬁcult to deal with. Not only would this save time, but it would also helped to conserve his soul power.

Something weird happened. Long Aotian grew in size again. But this time, it seemed as if he were noodle that was being stretched out. He reached more than four meters in height. As he extended his arms upward, he was like a piece of dark- golden metal that had been stretched after it melted.

Long Aotian continued to grow, and was soon more than ﬁve meters tall. Both his arms then clasped together, and changed into a huge ax.

It was actually possible to use a body soul in this manner?

Changing one’s body into different forms? Long Aotian’s ﬁghting style was very special. At least, no one was like him in this tournament.

Long Aotian pulled his ax back and burst towards Xu Sanshi. This strike was bound to be astonishing. The burning white that had covered his body earlier surfaced once again. This was his fourth soul skill in the realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man, the Berserk Godslash.

Long Aotian wanted to use this strike to end Xu Sanshi and this ﬁght.

Xu Sanshi was stunned. He didn’t even try to dodge. He only stood there, rooted in place.

The ax was about to chop down. Suddenly, Xu Sanshi smiled.

A very arrogant and conﬁdent smile.

“Chi!”

As the ax slashed down, Xu Sanshi and his shield were split in two. However, they then turned into a patch of black ﬂuid.

When the ﬂuid spread, the stage suddenly darkened, and the ground turned completely black. A huge amount of black water surged, and waves were formed almost instantly. The entire stage had suddenly turned into a black ocean.

Long Aotian had exploited his momentum in the air to unleash his attack. Moreover, he was a seven-ringed Soul Sage, and could ﬂy using his soul power. But no matter how strong an ax was, how useful was it in water?

An astonished look appeared on Long Aotian’s face again. He had been locked onto Xu Sanshi a second ago. However, everything seemed to change when he struck his opponent.

Is this… is this a domain-type soul skill?

Long Aotian took in a deep breath. Just like how the Tang Sect hadn’t expected the Body Sect to have someone as strong as him, he hadn’t expected to meet someone from the Tang Sect who was so difﬁcult to deal with. As the black waves surged, a ﬁgure formed from the black water, rising amidst the waves.

Xu Sanshi’s voice sounded from all directions. “While your attack is strong, you can’t overcome water. Water is the strongest defense. If you want to overcome my defense, show me what you’ve got.”

A huge shield appeared in the sky. The body of the shield was pitch-black, but it exuded an eerie, black wave of gas above it as well. This shield was more than three meters in diameter, and the shell and horn of the turtle on this shield were very obvious. At the centermost area of the shield, there was a black snake on top of the turtle. If not for its ruby-red eyes, its ﬁgure would have been concealed by the blackness of the shield.

At this moment, the Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle no longer existed. There was only the Xuanwu Shield!

The black water was Xu Sanshi’s domain. It was also his sixth soul skill, Xuanwu’s Domain.

Even among Shrek’s Seven Monsters, Bei Bei was the only one who knew about his sixth soul skill. After years of tireless cultivation, he also understood that Xu Sanshi hadn’t waited for his seventh soul skill, but completed his control of the Xuanwu through his sixth soul skill. It was his greatest trump card!

In Xuanwu’s Domain, he was able to fully use his Xuanwu Shield. At the same time, the strength of the Xuanwu Shield would be greatly increased in Xuanwu’s Domain. In this domain, all of Xu Sanshi’s abilities would increase by a hundred percent! Of course, Xuanwu’s Domain required a lot of soul power to maintain...

As it enhanced him, the domain would also suppress the opponent. This suppression was on two levels, both spiritual and physical.

The Xuanwu was a divine aquatic beast. As a result, an enemy would face the suppression of water in Xuanwu’s Domain. Long Aotian could already feel it. The air disappeared, and everything around him turned very thick. He couldn’t breathe, and the water pressure was rising.

With Xu Sanshi’s current cultivation, his enemies would have to handle water pressure and resistance equivalent to a depth of twenty meters.

This was the home ground of the Eternal Defense, Xu Sanshi!

Long Aotian nodded gently as he looked at Xu Sanshi, and even gave him a thumbs-up.

Those who were strong often developed admiration for one another. However, Long Aotian’s eyes shone very brightly at this moment.

A silver projection rose behind his back. The last time it had appeared, it had done so to resist Yama’s Invitation!

Long Aotian’s body jerked, and he forced the water pressure around him away. His ﬁfth black soul ring shone at this point. His body lit up in a burning white ﬂame, like he had set himself on ﬁre.

His fourth soul skill was the Berserk Godslash. His ﬁfth soul skill was named the Transformation of Heaven and Earth!

Long Aotian began to spin in place like a drill, his body completely contorted. As he spiraled rapidly, he started to rise. The water pressure of Xuanwu’s Domain was forced away by his spiraling motion. Even though Xu Sanshi used all his strength to suppress his opponent, he could only watch as Long Aotian gained altitude.

Right now, Long Aotian’s aura was very dangerous.

Huo Yuhao could tell that Long Aotian was ﬁnally at his strongest state.

Second Awakening of his body soul, Unity of Heaven and Man, and soul skills. All three had come together. Xu Sanshi was only a Soul Emperor. His Xuanwu’s Domain wasn’t strong enough to completely trap this opponent!

Long Aotian used his domineering abilities to drive himself out of Xuanwu domain. He escaped the domain, and instantly shot into the sky.

Of course, this was also because there weren’t any restrictions on the height of the venue. If they had followed the rules of the last tournament, it wouldn’t have been possible for him to launch himself into the sky.

Long Aotian was like a huge ball of incandescent light as he rose into the sky. After he rocketed more than a hundred meters up, he suddenly stopped. The ball of burning light turned, and then plummeted down with an unstoppable and ferocious momentum.

Unity of Heaven and Man, Transformation of Heaven and Earth! This was the true meaning behind this strike!

As he saw this, Huo Yuhao ﬁnally gained an understanding of Long Aotian’s abilities. When Long Aotian chose to use his soul skills, his impressive ﬁghting techniques gave his attacks incredible explosive power. Long Aotian’s ﬁrst and third soul skills were used to strengthen himself. The purpose of the rest was to increase his destructive power to the limit. The strength of his current attack was already comparable to the attack of an eight-ringed Soul Douluo!

Every time a soul master advanced to the next level, the difference from his previous level was substantial. The higher one advanced, the more obvious the difference would be. Although Long Aotian was extremely gifted, he must have had sacriﬁced a lot in order to become a Soul Sage. He had also suffered a lot, and he was the only one who knew just how much. He hadn’t had a childhood, but instead sacriﬁced everything for his cultivation to achieve what he was today. Even so, he had only just become a Soul Sage. Although he had only just become a Soul Sage, he had managed to increase his destructive power to the level of a Soul Douluo without using his Martial Soul True Body. His abilities were truly extraordinary!

Many soul masters’ soul skills were named after meteors. However, Long Aotian’s current attack was more like a real meteor! Xu Sanshi drifted in his own domain and had a stern look on his face. He lifted his Xuanwu’s Shield up high, and black light surged out. The entire domain started to revolve rapidly. It was like a black whirlpool was being generated.

The Transformation of Heaven and Earth came crashing down. When it charged into the domain, it even caused white smoke to surface. The domain seemed react to this attack like a living being. It quickly rose, revolved, attenuated, and diverted Long Aotian’s attack. It was attempting to suppress the violent assault!

At this instant, Xu Sanshi did something no one expected.

Black light ﬂashed, and someone else switched places with him. There was no way he could lock onto Long Aotian in that state, and thus he was naturally not the one being switched over. There was only one other person apart from Xu Sanshi and Long Aotian on the stage...

“I concede defeat! Referee, please protect me!” Xu Sanshi appeared on one side of the stage. He was even shouting shamelessly. Xuanwu’s Domain quickly subsided. The Transformation of Heaven and Earth that was being suppressed also blew apart.

BOOM!

It was an unprecedented explosion, a mushroom cloud even formed. Heaven and earth were transformed. The protective barriers around the stage shone extremely brightly, forced into their strongest defensive mode.

A white barrier opened up, and the white light that struck the barrier was dispelled by the intense undulations generated by the barrier. The impact in this direction was also the smallest.

As he resisted Long Aotian’s attack, Zheng Zhan’s jaw was clenched so hard he almost broke his teeth! That bastard! How dare he use me? However, he had no other choice now. Xu Sanshi was most cunning in the way he had conceded defeat at the same time he switched places with Zheng Zhan. There wasn’t anything wrong in being protected by the referee after conceding defeat. The Transformation of Heaven and Earth’s suppression of his domain wasn’t enough to let Long Aotian lock onto him, and so gave him an opportunity to use the Mysterious Underworld Displacement.

Xu Sanshi and Bei Bei had already planned it out earlier. They could rely on Huo Yuhao’s two victories in the individual elimination round. With those two victories, the Tang Sect could request that they enter the team round as long as they won one more individual elimination round. This also meant that they only needed to defeat Long Aotian!

However, they didn’t have to be impatient about it. Even if they didn’t win this round, they still had ﬁve more opportunities. Bei Bei, Wang Dong’er, and He Caitou had yet to compete.

That was why Xu Sanshi’s aim was very simple; probe the abilities of his opponent and deplete him at the same time. He just needed to conserve his own strength for the team round.

Xuanwu’s Domain had been unleashed, and the Xuanwu Shield had evolved and mutated. Xu Sanshi had been extremely high-spirited. Almost everyone thought that he was going to ﬁght all out with Long Aotian. Long Aotian had also believed that, and used his strongest strike. Who knew that Xu Sanshi would be so shameless, and switch with the referee before conceding defeat?

Even though Huo Yuhao had countless ﬁghting strategies, he couldn’t use shameless tactics like Xu Sanshi!

The explosion lasted for seven to eight seconds before it ended. The spectators were horriﬁed to see a huge depression in the center of the stage that spanned more than ﬁfty meters in diameter. Only the area that the Unbreakable Douluo had protected was in better shape. The depth of the depression couldn’t be seen from beneath the stage. However, those on the main stage could tell that it was ﬁve meters deep! The stage was actually made of high-quality granite reinforced with steel plates. How strong did the impact have to be in order to form this huge depression?!

The watching Jing Hongchen’s expression also changed greatly at this point. Even though Xiao Hongchen and Long Aotian both had seven rings, he knew that Long Aotian was deﬁnitely superior to Xiao Hongchen. This also meant that the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy would have also faced trouble if they had advanced and met the Snowdemon Sect.

Long Aotian appeared at the core of the explosion. He was half-kneeling on the ground, his hair ﬂowing on both sides of his head. Right now, he resembled a God of War.

Long Aotian’s expression was very dismal as he slowly got up. His face was pale as he looked at Xu Sanshi, who was looking over curiously. He furiously shouted, “Why didn’t you dare to ﬁght me?”

Xu Sanshi leisurely said, “It’s not that I don’t dare to, it’s that I don’t want to. Why must I ﬁght all out with you?”

“Coward!” Long Aotian said coldly. “You’re not ﬁt to be my opponent!”

Xu Sanshi laughed. “That’s funny! You’ve fried your brain from cultivating too much. For such a fellow like you without any strategy, I don’t think you’ll become anything successful in the future! A real strong individual must be ﬁne up here.” He tapped his own head meaningfully.

Long Aotian’s aura was a little unbalanced. His monstrous attack had depleted a lot of his energy, and even caused his previous injury to relapse. There was a prickling pain between his chest and belly.

“The Snowdemon Sect wins.” The Unbreakable Douluo glared at Xu Sanshi. Before he could say more, Xu Sanshi had already jumped off from the stage. He didn’t want to be cursed at!

Long Aotian leapt out of the depression. He looked coldly towards the Tang Sect in their waiting area and said, “Next!”

He’s indeed very strong! Bei Bei was very impressed. Long Aotian had defeated both Huo Yuhao and Xu Sanshi consecutively, and acted as if nothing had happened. He even asked for the next competitor to take the stage. His abilities were indeed extraordinary.

In the Snowdemon Sect’s waiting area, Princess Wei Na suddenly stood up and said to the Unbreakable Douluo, “Referee, can we request that the stage be repaired, now that it’s in such bad shape. Otherwise, the spectators won’t be able to watch the upcoming ﬁghts.”

Indeed, most of the stage had been destroyed. The center of the stage had turned into a huge hole and looked extremely battered. There was no way to ﬁght on such a stage.

However, time was needed to repair the stage. This would undoubtedly be very beneﬁcial for the Snowdemon Sect. Long Aotian had been greatly depleted. He could use that time to recover slightly, and continue the individual elimination rounds. He might be able to defeat the whole of the Tang Sect on his own!

Princess Wei Na was very clever. Bei Bei also stood up and said to the referee, “The stage is indeed badly damaged. However, there shouldn’t be any rest time in the individual elimination rounds, according to the rules.

“The Snowdemon Sect just won the previous ﬁght. If repairs are carried out now, it’ll be very unfair to us. Please deal with this issue fairly.”

Xu Sanshi’s previous antics left Zheng Zhan extremely unimpressed with the Tang Sect. However, Xu Tianran had personally paid him a visit before this semiﬁnal round. Although the Tang Sect knew many things, the Sun Moon Empire was also aware of these things, since they were the one who had organized this tournament. Many things also became more and more obvious as the tournament reached the quarterﬁnals.

To the Sun Moon Empire, the rise of the Tang Sect was indeed a threat. However, the Tang Sect’s threat to them had to be calculated alongside that of Shrek Academy. However, the Body Sect was an even greater threat, considering how they had attacked the Illustrious Virtue Hall before. There was deep hatred towards the Body Sect in the Sun Moon Empire. Given a choice, the empire would be more inclined towards the Tang Sect, though it would be best if both teams suffered greatly to pave the way for the Holy Ghost Sect. He would rather let the Holy Ghost Sect win and invite condemnation than to let Shrek or the Body Sect become the champions of this tournament.

Xu Tianran had the intention of starting a war after this tournament was over. He wasn’t afraid of criticism from the three empires of the continent!

As a result, Zheng Zhan wouldn’t stand on the Snowdemon Sect’s side, even though he was irked by Xu Sanshi.

“The stage is indeed greatly damaged. To continue the tournament and to ensure fairness, I’ll personally ensure that the stage is level. The tournament shall continue. Tang Sect, please send up your third competing member.”

As he spoke, Zheng Zhan swiped his right hand, and a ball of white light as large as a human head ﬂew out. Under his control, this ball of light let out a white glow. It spread out over the stage, quickly engulﬁng the entire surface.

As the white light glowed, the damaged stage seemed to be covered by an extra layer of light. The toughness and durability of this layer were shocking. Long Aotian’s expression also changed, as he couldn’t recognize what class of soul tool Zheng Zhan was using.

Crown Prince Xu Tianran nodded slightly and revealed a smile on his face. The Unbreakable Douluo is indeed very adaptable. Yes, I want them to continue ﬁghting!

Princess Wei Na furrowed her brow. She turned to the Tang Sect and said, “My friends, can we negotiate a little?”

Bei Bei stood up and smiled at Princess Wei Na. He said, “Your Highness, please tell us what you want.”

Wei Na smiled and said, “Although it’s regrettable that we’re ﬁghting each other in this tournament, I’d like to say that our sect respects the Tang Sect very much. Both our sects have obtained two victories as of now. No matter who wins today, the winner still has to continue to compete against the enemy in the ﬁnal. My suggestion is... let’s enter the team round right now. What do you think?”

When she referred to the ﬁnal, she speciﬁcally used the word ‘enemy’. Although she wasn’t loud, the Holy Ghost Sect in the resting area could deﬁnitely hear her. Immediately, a few men in black stood up. However, their leader, the mysterious lady in black, gestured to them, and they sat back down.

Bei Bei pondered for a moment before saying, “Alright, we are willing to go with your idea. Let’s enter the team round then, to decide the victor.”

Bei Bei had thought about it for a moment, and realized that the Snowdemon Sect wouldn’t gain any advantage over them even if they entered the team round right now. While Long Aotian was strong, he was also greatly depleted after ﬁghting two consecutive times. In addition, Chen Lu couldn’t ﬁght right now. This meant that the Snowdemon Sect was ﬁghting them with only six people. On the Tang Sect’s side, Huo Yuhao had quickly restored his soul power. The time he was afforded when Xu Sanshi fought Long Aotian had enabled him to mostly recover.

After both parties ﬁnished their negotiation, they quickly proposed their idea to the Unbreakable Douluo. Wei Na also jumped up on the stage immediately and came up beside Long Aotian. A snow lotus in full bloom appeared in front of her chest. A gentle glow shone down on Long Aotian as she helped restore him.

While Long Aotian was the strongest in the Snowdemon Sect, Wei Na was the real brains behind the entire team. She could judge things for herself. Long Aotian was depleted after ﬁghting two consecutive times. However, she knew him well enough to know that he wasn’t in bad shape. This senior of hers was a fanatic. At this point, his ﬁghting will had increased to its peak. The only thing troubling him was his earlier injuries. At this point, treating his injuries would greatly help restore his ﬁghting strength. Even though his soul power had been depleted, his opponents were also depleted, just like him.

The members of both teams ascended to the stage. Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao, while Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi walked shoulder-to-shoulder in front of the entire team.

Long Aotian’s gaze turned sharp again as he saw Xu Sanshi ascending the stage. He snorted furiously. He had nothing but contempt for Xu Sanshi now. Xu Sanshi wasn’t bothered. He placed one hand on Bei Bei’s shoulder, and even seemed a little delighted. “See? This is how impressive a defense-type soul master is. We are naturally talented in developing hatred!”

Bei Bei smiled and replied, “You are right! You are very right.

You have a mocking face.”

Xu Sanshi was infuriated. “Bei Bei, how dare you say that I deserve to be beaten up?”

Bei Bei acted innocent. “I didn’t say that. You said it yourself!”

As they squabbled like this, the tense atmosphere around Shrek’s Seven Monsters suddenly relaxed. Bei Bei gestured towards Huo Yuhao as he placed his right hand behind his back.

Huo Yuhao knew what was going on.

---

Both teams formed a row in the center of the stage.

Indeed, Chen Lu wasn’t competing. The Snowdemon Sect, or rather the Body Sect, only had six members, led by Long Aotian.

Long Aotian was in front of everyone else. Princess Wei Na was behind him, followed by Wang Yanfeng and the rest of the team.

The spectators had beheld a great show watching the ﬁrst few individual elimination rounds, especially when they witnessed Long Aotian’s unrivaled abilities and Xu Sanshi’s domain. Both were unprecedented so far in the tournament. Right now, the most intense team round was about to start. The spectators were cheering excitedly, and their fervor was rising.

“Competing members from both parties, please report your names.”

“Tang Sect, Bei Bei.”

“Tang Sect, He Caitou.”

“Tang Sect, Xu Sanshi.”

“Tang Sect, Jiang Nannan.”

“Tang Sect, Xiao Xiao.”

“Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao.”

“Tang Sect, Wang Dong’er.”

After Bei Bei returned as the team leader, Shrek’s Seven Monsters naturally reported their names according to their seniority.

On the other side,

“Snowdemon Sect, Long Aotian.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Wei Na.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Wang Yanfeng.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Gu Tong.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Jiang Yixi.”

“Snowdemon Sect, Chen Yu.”

Apart from the ﬁrst three familiar faces, there were three other members from the Snowdemon Sect. Gu Tong was a slender young man with a very delicate appearance. He even seemed a little shy. However, his eyes were especially bright.

Jiang Yixi was a woman. Her appearance was more ordinary, but her ﬁgure was very good. Huo Yuhao ﬁrst noticed her hands when he observed her. They were bound to capture attention. Her hands were smooth and long, even longer than most men taller than her. Her palms were white and smooth, while her skin was radiating a golden glow. It was obvious that her martial soul was her hands.

The young man named Chen Yu had a well-developed ﬁgure. However, he was strangely hunchbacked. His body curled up slightly, but the look in his eyes was very sharp.

Both teams lined up in two rows as they observed each other.

Zheng Zhan said, “From the individual elimination round to the team round, all of you would normally have had some rest. However, this rest time will be voided since the individual elimination rounds weren’t fully completed and no team attained three victories. The team round is about to start. Both teams, please take up your positions and prepare to ﬁght.”

The members of both teams quickly retreated. They were all very experienced, and had fought alongside their teammates countless times. They didn’t need to arrange any additional ﬁghting strategies,and neatly retreated to their own positions.

It was a little weird, as they were standing on the layer of light the Unbreakable Douluo had created. It didn’t feel very tough below them, but it wasn’t soft, either. There was only a springy sensation.

As he retreated, Xu Sanshi said, “Leave Long Aotian to me. Doesn’t he want to ﬁght all-out against me? I’ll do exactly that against him.”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “End it quickly. Yuhao, command us.”

“Alright.” Huo Yuhao didn’t stand on ceremony either. As a control-type soul master with Spiritual Detection, no one was more suitable than him to control the entire situation.

Very soon, both teams were lined up at their respective sides of the stage.

Zheng Zhan took a deep breath, a slightly complex look on his face. These kids were able to make it so intense in the individual elimination rounds. I wonder what it’ll be like in this team round. Anyway, His Highness also told me to let them suffer as much as possible. I shall be less strict in this team round, and let them ﬁght more freely!

On the other side, Wei Na also instructed her teammates with a few words. After hearing her words, even Long Aotian seemed to calm down.

“Both parties, please be prepared! Team round: begin!”

Chapter 324: The Team Fight--The Tang Sect VS The Snowdemon Sect

Zheng Zhan swung his right arm down to announce that the match had ofﬁcially begun!

Both teams’ formations immediately changed.

Long Aotian stood at the Snowdemon Sect’s vanguard, while Wang Yanfeng and Gu Tong stood to either side of him. Jiang Yixi and Chen Yu stood behind them at their sides, the ﬁve of them forming a sharp triangle formation. This was an offensive formation, and since Princess Wei Na was their auxiliary-type soul master, so she was positioned behind this triangle. Long Aotian was in front of her, and this meant her defense was practically impregnable.

The Tang Sect’s formation immediately transformed as well. Xu Sanshi and Bei Bei charged forward side by side, and Jiang Nannan disappeared behind Xu Sanshi in a ﬂash. At least, her opponents couldn’t see her from the front. Xiao Xiao and He Caitou followed behind Xu Sanshi and Bei Bei. Wang Dong’er extended her wings. She actually left Huo Yuhao behind as she soared into the air, and ﬂew forward about two meters above everyone else, maintaining reach with both the sky and the ground.

Huo Yuhao was the one who surprised their adversaries the most.

Huo Yuhao didn’t make a move immediately. Instead, he raised his right hand in the air, and the large Starlight Sapphire ring on his ﬁnger sparkled as an enormous metal sphere appeared in front of him.

The metal sphere looked like a giant porcupine. There were a large number of cannon barrels on its surface, and it had eight thick metal legs. These metal legs were arranged around the metal sphere and stuck close to it as they moved stably along the ground.

Huo Yuhao tapped lightly on its surface with his right hand, and a bright light ray ﬂew out from his forehead as he seized the opportunity to rise into the air. The little Snow Lady ﬂew out behind him and pushed him along. They entered the enormous metal sphere.

---

Several people’s expressions changed on the rostrum. The ones with the blackest faces were Xu Tianran and the Hallmaster of the Illustrious Virtue Hall, Jing Hongchen.

“What’s this about, Hallmaster Hongchen?” Xu Tianran uttered these words through the gaps between his gritted teeth.

The All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress wasn’t one of the Illustrious Virtue Hall’s top-secret technologies, but ever since the Illustrious Virtue Hall came up with the design, both the design and the Hall had been personally approved by Xu Tianran as part of the Sun Moon Empire’s future main military forces. They had already begun producing the Fortresses in bulk!

But at this moment, this military equipment that was still being treated as a secret had appeared in the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament. How could Xu Tianran not be upset?

Jing Hongchen was also dumbfounded. “That… that’s not possible! Huo Yuhao was on exchange at our academy for a while, but I was always guarded against him. It’s impossible for him to have obtained our core technologies and knowledge. Calm down, Your Highness. We will investigate this matter after this. It is likely to have something to do with Xuan Ziwen, our chief researcher who has deserted us. Only he could possibly have known all the data regarding the All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress.”

“Hmph!” Xu Tianran grunted angrily and shot a dark, cold glare at Jing Hongchen. If not for the fact that the Illustrious Virtue Hall’s Hallmaster was highly reputable, and he still had uses for him, Xu Tianran would have ended his life right away with his temper.

---

The Snowdemon Sect’s team members were also greatly astonished as they watched Huo Yuhao enter his All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress.

Everyone was ﬁlled with awe and astonishment, but Princess Wei Na’s eyes sparkled.

What was this toy about? It was so large and massive, and it looked like every single cannon barrel could ﬁre something different. It wasn’t hard to imagine how powerful and domineering something like this would be on the battleﬁeld. The Heavenly Soul Empire was already one of the Tang Sect’s biggest customers...

Huo Yuhao was a beat slower than his companions. Once he entered his fortress, the enormous sphere that was over three meters in diameter began to move.

Eight lengthy metal legs stretched out at the same time and raised the self-driving fortress from the ground. The metal clanging sounds were clean and crisp, and not a single grinding or rubbing sound could be heard.

Huo Yuhao had personally reﬁned his All-Terrain Self- Driving Fortress with Xuan Ziwen, and it was a lot more powerful than the ones that the Sun Moon Empire were mass producing.

This was also the main reason why Huo Yuhao had dared to expend his soul power before this, and the main reason why he still had the conﬁdence to continue in the group battle. There were six sealed Milk Bottles that Xuan Ziwen had personally crafted inside this fortress, all of them Class 7. Every single one

contained ample soul power, and together, they had enough soul power that Huo Yuhao could take part in a small battle without expending any of his own soul power!

Xuan Ziwen was the one who had come up with sealed Milk Bottles. Class 7 sealed Milk Bottles were at the highest possible class with his current research progress. Even the Illustrious Virtue Hall only had data and materials for crafting Class 6 sealed Milk Bottles!

Even though Huo Yuhao couldn’t raise his fortress’ offensive abilities to that of a Class 7 soul engineer with his six Class 7 sealed Milk Bottles, he had no problem unleashing and maintaining a Class 6 soul engineer’s offensive prowess for a prolonged period of time. Right now, his role in his team was no longer as simple as just a control-type soul master. He was now part of his team’s offensive front! Thirty-two cannon barrels of different shapes and sizes at the top of his fortress were the ﬁrst to ﬁre. Whistling sounds could be heard as thirty-two orange-red spheres soared into the sky and rained down on his enemies in the distance.

The fortress’ eight metal legs began to rotate rhythmically in the next moment, and it ran forward in pursuit of his teammates!

Both forces were about to collide in the center as Huo Yuhao’s thirty-two orange-red cannon shells rained down on his opponents.

The Tang Sect wasn’t absolutely stronger than their adversaries in terms of personal ﬁghting strength, but the Body Sect would face a great task if they wanted to ﬁnd someone that understood the usage of soul tools better than Huo Yuhao and He Caitou!

All six of the Tang Sect’s team who were charging forward halted at the same time. With Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection shared amongst everyone, they would never misjudge anything at all. Long Aotian was still in front of his entire team, and he formed a circle with his hands as an incandescent wave rippled out and swept towards the orange-red shells hammering down on them. He wanted to open a path for his team with his formidable strength.

However, a peculiar scene occurred. The cannon shells paused in midair, and patches of blinding light erupted the moment the white air wave slammed into them.

Who would have thought that Huo Yuhao’s thirty-two cannon shells weren’t an attack, but instead were ﬂashbangs? It wasn’t in line with how soul engineers typically fought. But it was this very fact, that it wasn’t in line with how soul engineers typically fought, that made it easier for the results to show!

The Tang Sect’s entire team immediately turned around and defended themselves against the ﬂashbangs. Their opponents were caught off guard, and their entire ﬁeld of view went white.

This was an explosion caused by thirty-two ﬂashbangs going off at the same time. There were no dead angles from the front, and three of the people from the Body Sect who were struck by this blinding white light exclaimed at the same time.

The ﬂashbangs didn’t last for very long. The Tang Sect’s entire team turned around with their eyes closed in the next moment, and launched an assault on their opponents as soon as possible... with their eyes still closed!

Did they even need to use their eyes? With Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, they would never pick or recognize the wrong people even if their eyes were shut!

The eight metal legs on Huo Yuhao’s fortress suddenly straightened and pushed the entire fortress up three meters above the ground. Every single cannon barrel was trained on his opponents, and hundreds of different soul rays and cannons poured out and cascaded against them.

Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi pounced forward at the same time, going straight for Long Aotian. Jiang Nannan was still hidden behind Xu Sanshi. Huo Yuhao’s plan was for the three of them to combine their efforts to take down Long Aotian as quickly as possible! Long Aotian was too powerful, and it would be quite a challenge for the Tang Sect to win this group battle if they didn’t deal with their greatest threat ﬁrst. Huo Yuhao would team up with He Caitou to suppress the rest of the Snowdemon Sect’s team so that their companions would have that chance.

Xiao Xiao followed closely behind Xu Sanshi and Bei Bei. Her tremendous Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron appeared out of nowhere and split into three, the three different cauldrons appearing behind Long Aotian. This was equivalent to isolating him, while all three cauldrons exploded with a deafening tone at the same time. Cauldron Quake!

Wang Dong’er soared high into the sky. With Huo Yuhao’s forceful suppressing ﬁre as cover, she ﬂew soundlessly and discreetly towards the backs of her opponents. Her target was Wei Na.

The Tang Sect’s explosive movement came without warning, but everybody fell into their roles and positions as quickly as was humanly possible. They made use of Huo Yuhao’s formidable ﬂashbangs and immediately gained the upper hand. Huo Yuhao’s All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress’ offensive capabilities were comparable to that of a Soul Emperor operating a soul tool fort. Furthermore, he could maintain his fortress for an even longer time. Hundreds of soul rays pressed down like a waterfall, and even the Body Sect’s most powerful individuals had to react with everything they had.

Wang Yanfeng was following closely behind Long Aotian. His arms instantly swelled up at this moment, resembling two enormous shields as they blocked the soul rays coming straight for them.

He maintained this stance for three seconds, and greenish- bronze light ﬂickered from behind his back. He was forced to unleash his body soul’s Second Awakening!

He Caitou also released more than ten different soul tools at the same time, and worked together with Huo Yuhao to suppress their opponents. In addition to Xiao Xiao’s isolating efforts, there was no question that Long Aotian had been separated from his teammates.

The audience beneath the competition stage were also temporarily blinded by the powerful ﬂashbangs, and their vision was only gradually coming back to them. Meanwhile, a series of collisions could be heard from the competition stage.

Boom, boom, boom!

Something that absolutely astounded the Tang Sect’s entire team occurred with three intense impacts. Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, and Jiang Nannan ﬂew backwards one after another, while Long Aotian, who they were besieging at the same time, stood in the same spot. He turned around and swung his incandescent arms toward Xiao Xiao.

How was that possible?

The same thought occurred to everyone. Long Aotian’s eyes were still closed, and it was evident that he had been affected by the ﬂashbangs before. However, he suddenly erupted as Bei Bei and the two others surrounded him, and his position switched three times in a row before he forced them back with forceful retaliations. Every position he chose was exceptionally precise, and his eruption was so quick that Bei Bei and the others were still a step behind even with Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection.

Could it be that his Unity of Heaven and Man wasn’t affected by how chaotic the battleﬁeld was? That wasn’t possible!

Xiao Xiao didn’t retreat as Long Aotian suddenly charged towards her, because she was clear that the Body Sect’s other team members were behind her. Huo Yuhao and He Caitou were currently holding them back, and she would block their ﬁrepower if she moved back. She would also ﬁnd herself in a more perilous situation. The three Threelives Soulcrush Cauldrons collapsed together, and an indescribable majesty was released. Three cauldrons merged into one, and the enormous cauldron boomed deafeningly as it crashed onto the ground.

This humongous cauldron blocked Long Aotian’s attack. The large cauldron buzzed and trembled, but a black light shot into the sky, and lights ﬂickered as Xiao Xiao disappeared inside. Long Aotian could only see her fourth soul ring sparkling.

National Treasure, Cauldron’s Sovereign!

This attack didn’t just draw upon the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron’s strength, it also borrowed upon the national fate that existed discreetly in the air. This aura was so powerful that even somebody like Long Aotian was suppressed in an instant. His Unity of Heaven and Man was extremely reliant on aura, and his soul power had been weakened after repelling three people in a row. Xiao Xiao actually defended herself against his attack!

Xiao Xiao’s aura soared as she disappeared into her Cauldron’s Sovereign, and a black whirlpool gradually appeared over the enormous cauldron.

Three intense explosions detonated with loud booms, her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron the epicenter, and three black halos rippled outward.

The other team members from the Body Sect who had fended off Huo Yuhao and He Caitou’s combined efforts rushed forward, and were pouncing forward when an indescribable and formidable impact force smacked them in the face. Every single one of them was thrown into the air when they tried to block this sudden force.

National Treasure, Cauldron Supremacy, and Cauldron’s Quaking Tremble!

Three skills fused into one!

Both Xiao Xiao and Huo Yuhao were Elder Xuan’s students, and even though they weren’t Soul Emperors yet, how could they lose to others in terms of ﬁghting strength and control over their martial souls? Even Long Aotian was sent stumbling backwards from this sudden eruption. All three circles were equally powerful. If somebody weaker had to absorb these shockwaves, that person would have been sent ﬂying through the air, or been locked in place.

Xiao Xiao relied on her sudden eruption to buy enough time for her companions.

Wang Dong’er was in position. She plummeted from the sky, and her wings were tinged with sharp bluish-golden hues as she slashed at Princess Wei Na.

Wei Na seemed like she had already seen Wang Dong’er coming, and her feet tapped the ground lightly as she drifted forward. She turned back and glanced at Wang Dong’er at the same time.

Wang Dong’er saw a pair of brilliant silver eyes, and a silver wheel rose up from behind Wei Na’s head.

Everything around Wang Dong’er seemed to twist and become surreal, and an intense dizziness shot into her brain.

This is...

But in the next moment, a piercing, needle-like pain shook Wang Dong’er back to her senses, Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Interference was there to help her. However, Princes Wei Na borrowed this tiny pause to dash into her companions’ protection.

Everything happened very quickly, and Huo Yuhao could see through many things as the main control-type soul master.

How could Long Aotian suddenly erupt and repel Xu Sanshi, Bei Bei, and Jiang Nannan as if he could see into the future? The reason was simple: Princess Wei Na wasn’t just a healing- type soul master for the Snowdemon Sect’s team, she was also a control-type soul master! Her abilities were spiritual, though her other martial soul wasn’t her eyes. It should be her brain!

There was no question that the brain was one of the most important components of a human body. A human’s spiritual sea and a human’s spirit were contained inside the brain. There was no question that the brain’s abilities were spiritual- type. Princess Wei Na actually had twin martial souls, and her second martial soul was a powerful body soul, her Brain!

She had used her mighty spiritual power to aid Long Aotian before this. However, from what the Tang Sect could observe from the Body Sect’s other team members, Princess Wei Na couldn’t help several people at once like Huo Yuhao could, but only one person at a time.

Huo Yuhao made all these judgments in an instant. It seemed as if the Tang Sect was in a disadvantageous position, and the reason was simple – their formation!

Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, and Jiang Nannan were charging forward once more. Xiao Xiao was deep inside enemy lines, and even though she had erupted forcefully to repel her opponents, she was still surrounded. Wang Dong’er was behind their opponents’ entire team, and this meant both girls were separated from their companions. This situation gave their adversaries an opportunity to break them down one by one.

The battleﬁeld began to change once more. Dense black light poured out, and Xu Sanshi’s sixth soul ring sparkled. It didn’t take long for his Xuanwu Domain to appear once more in the arena.

Thick black light seemed to eclipse the sun as it blanketed the entire stage. All six of the Body Sect’s team members immediately found themselves in a suffocating and stiﬂing state.

When Xu Sanshi unleashed his Xuanwu’s Domain, a ghastly pale light burst out from Huo Yuhao’s fortress. Mass Enfeeblement!

Domains were undoubtedly used for crowd control, and the Body Sect’s entire team was now slowed down with the help of Huo Yuhao’s Mass Enfeeblement and Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu Domain.

Light burst out from behind Wang Dong’er, and her ﬂying- type soul tool spurted continuously as it propelled her into the sky. Wang Dong’er unleashed three Hexagram Arrays behind her, and her Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess rained down on her opponents. In terms of position and cultivation, ganging up on Xiao Xiao was the best decision the Body Sect could make, and that was what they did. However, the three Hexagram Arrays that Wang Dong’er unleashed were positioned around Xiao Xiao with her in the middle, and three circles formed an arc with her in the middle.

The youth called Gu Tong from the Body Sect suddenly turned around and looked up at Wang Dong’er. Two brilliant white beams blasted from his eyes as his ﬁrst, second, third, and fourth soul rings all lit up at the same time.

The white beams immediately switched colors in order from red to orange, yellow, green, blue, and then to purple after they left his eyes. Two silver-white eyes appeared behind his back.

This was yet another individual with a body soul that had gone through a Second Awakening at the Whitesilver level.

At this moment, there were two people from the Body Sect’s seven team members who had displayed Whitesilver second awakenings: Long Aotian and Gu Tong. Wei Na’s body soul was her brain, and there was no question that her Second Awakening was also at the Whitesilver level. Three Whitesilver Second Awakenings! The elites of the Body Sect’s younger generation were all gathered in this place!

Wang Dong’er’s expression changed a little as the two formidable beams came straight for her. Even though her opponent only had ﬁve soul rings, this attack wasn’t easy to deal with.

Wang Dong’er’s ﬁfth soul ring sparkled, and her frame became completely transparent; the Goddess of Light’s Possession!

Radiant and dazzling golden ﬂames glowed on her both hands as she pushed out.

Boom!

Light rippled in all directions as Wang Dong’er was instantly thrown back horizontally even though she was ﬂying upwards. Her entire body was covered with a seven-colored layer of light, and her ﬂying-type soul tool was extinguished at the same time. It looked like her soul power had been completely arrested.

Fortunately, the Xuanwu Domain had been completed. Black light surged as Wang Dong’er’s body disappeared among the black waves. This was a domain’s strength, and the person who unleashed this domain was the dictator of all things within it. Many different stronger abilities had to be used to break apart a domain.

The battle on the other side had also reached its climax. Long Aotian was once more forcing his way out of the Xuanwu Domain, and wanted to use his Transformation of Heaven and Earth once again. However, Xu Sanshi appeared in the sky and forcefully blocked his attack with his Xuanwu Shield, holding him back to the point where Long Aotian couldn’t break through at all.

Bei Bei rushed to Xiao Xiao’s side, and with the help of Wang Dong’er’s Hexagram Array, blocked their opponent’s assault.

The Eye of Terror that He Caitou had been setting up in the sky was also complete at this point. He switched to his Gigant Lightning Cannon, and ﬁred one shot behind Xiao Xiao to buy Bei Bei some time.

Over on the Body Sect’s side, two enormous wings extended from Chen Yu’s back. His martial soul was actually Wings! It was something that shouldn’t be seen on a human body...

Chen Yu’s wings ﬂapped as he soared into the sky, forcefully repelling the Xuanwu Domain’s black waves as he lunged to one side. He then slashed out with his wings, as if they were two giant axes.

Wang Dong’er reappeared inside the Xuanwu Domain, lashing out with her wings at the same time and colliding with Chen Yu. Chen Yu was also a Soul Emperor, and their wings clashed again and again. It was clear that Chen Yu had located Wang Dong’er’s position with Wei Na’s help.

The Body Sect had one fewer person, but only Long Aotian and Wang Yanfeng had expended soul power among their six remaining team members. Long Aotian was incredibly powerful, so whatever he expended didn’t affect him much. Over on the Tang Sect’s team, Huo Yuhao seemed to have consumed a little too much. His All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress was ﬁring hysterically, but he had stopped using his own abilities.

Wang Dong’er retreated as she fought, and inched closer to Huo Yuhao.

Jiang Yixi and Jiang Nannan were ﬁghting it out apart from the main battleﬁeld. Jiang Nannan’s body was soft and ﬂexible, and she was adept at close combat. Jiang Yixi’s martial soul was her hands, and her hands transformed into claws that possessed formidable destructive power. Both of them were Soul Kings, and it was hard for either side to gain the upper hand.

The battle had progressed to this point, and it seemed as if both teams were no longer cooperating with one another. This was because their individual abilities were simply too strong, and they couldn’t completely cooperate with each other more often than not. This also happened because both teams were trying to sever each other’s teamwork and cooperation.

Bei Bei and Xiao Xiao charged forward at the same time and went up against Gu Tong and Wang Yanfeng. Two versus two, and neither party had the upper hand.

Wang Yanfeng was a little drained from his battle with Huo Yuhao, and it was clear that he hadn’t completely recovered, while Gu Tong’s long-range attacks were exceptionally powerful. Gu Tong’s martial soul was his eyes, but the path that he had decided to take was drastically different from Huo Yuhao’s. His eyes were his strongest weapons, and every single beam that was ﬁred from his eyes was accompanied by alternately sparkling soul rings. Wang Dong’er retreated as she continued ﬁghting, her movements were a little lackadaisical and slow because she was still affected by Gu Tong’s previous attack. Otherwise, how could she be forced back again and again by Chen Yu?

The Eye of Terror was ﬁnally in place in the sky, and intense light began to condense towards it. The Body Sect’s entire team instantly felt the immense pressure coming from above them. However, the Tang Sect seemed to have been suppressed in every individual or group combat that was taking place in several different places at once. They seemed like they were in a dire situation, and even Zheng Zhan was unsure which side had the upper hand at this moment.

There was a boom of impact, and a fountain of blood spurted from Xu Sanshi’s mouth as he was sent hurtling through the air. There was still quite a gap between him and Long Aotian’s strength, and he also had to maintain his Xuanwu Domain to control their opponents. Even though Sanshi had Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection to warn him, Long Aotian ﬁnally found and wounded him with pure brute force.

Long Aotian wasn’t in good shape, either. His face looked a little pale, and his breathing was conspicuously heavier and thicker than before. The injury that he had sustained from the Yama’s Invitation was continuously affecting him, while his soul power was being consumed continuously. His current strength was far from his peak condition.

Long Aotian spun around once he knocked Xu Sanshi away. Hurting Xu Sanshi like that was enough for him, and Long Aotian didn’t have to pursue his opponent and break him down completely. Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu Shield had brought a lot of trouble, and if he really wanted to defeat Xu Sanshi for good inside his Xuanwu Domain, he would have to commit some time and energy even if he were in his peak condition. Long Aotian knew that he would have to pick apart the Tang Sect’s team members one by one if the Snowdemon Sect was to win

this match.

Long Aotian chose He Caitou as his target, because he was the only pure soul engineer in this ﬁght, and also because Long Aotian wasn’t far from his position. He pounced towards He Caitou in a ﬂash.

He Caitou grinned as he watched Long Aotian dash towards him.

He Caitou was the most unassuming one amongst the Shrek’s Seven Monsters. He hadn’t fought much in the tournament’s previous rounds, and the only thing he had done that caught the audience’s attention was his Eye of Terror. Otherwise, he wasn’t much to them, and not many people had noticed that he actually had six soul rings!

Long Aotain chose him as his best chance at breaking through the Tang Sect because he ﬁgured He Caitou was probably the easiest to knock out, and also because his Eye of Terror in the sky was about to erupt. Wei Na signaled that to Long Aotian, and Long Aotian didn’t want to give him that opportunity.

Long Aotian’s entire body sparkled with bright light as he raised his enormous dark golden axes high into the sky as he charged forward, unleashing his Berserk Godslash!

Long Aotian didn’t use his other soul skills to boost his strength, conserving energy, but he entered his Unity of Heaven and Man realm once more.

Long Aotian had always looked down on soul engineers. From his perspective, soul engineers relied on many different tricks and shortcuts to raise their cultivation, so how could they compare to his soul power that he had obtained from pure hard work?

He Caitou actually laughed as he watched Long Aotian pounce towards him. He raised his hand, and a pale golden cigar appeared in his mouth as his ﬁfth soul ring lit up. He Caitou casually looked down and lit his cigar with a soul ray that was ﬁred from his shoulder and took a deep puff.

Long Aotian’s ferocious Berserk Godslash arrived.

A white light layer glowed on He Caitou’s body – it was his Class 6 protective soul barrier, and intense red light lit up on his chest at the same time. A cannon barrel with a mouth half a foot in diameter opened up on the armor at this chest area.

Boom!

Long Aotian’s strike was fearsome and powerful, and He Caitou’s Class 6 protective soul barrier was blown to smithereens. He Caitou only managed to slow Long Aotian’s large axes for a single beat.

He Caitou sucked on his pale golden cigar ferociously in the next moment. A golden barrier bloomed from his body and forcefully repelled Long Aotian’s Berserk Godslash. Everyone could see the golden cigar in his mouth burn rapidly away as his golden light barrier was struck, half of it was gone after he took the Berserk Godslash.

This… was that a soul skill?

Yes, that was He Caitou’s ﬁfth soul skill, Invincible Barrier Golden Cigar. His cigar was his auxiliary martial soul, and even his companions weren’t that willing to use it. But everything changed when his ﬁfth soul skill appeared.

This Invincible Barrier Golden Cigar’s existence was far too invaluable for a food-type soul master. The Tang Sect had kept this a secret in the tournament, all the way until now.

With this soul skill around, the Tang Sect didn’t have to create any more Invincible Barriers. He Caitou’s current cultivation meant he could maintain his Invincible Barrier for seven seconds when he was using his ﬁfth soul skill to defend himself. Furthermore, the soul power that was consumed during these seven seconds was from the soul skill, and he didn’t have to expend any more of his own soul power to maintain it. This effect was a lot better than the Invincible Barriers created by soul tools, but the regrettable thing was that this Invincible Barrier Golden Cigar would only exist for two hours after it was crafted. A lot of soul power was required to craft one, and this was the reason why He Caitou was the only one who would use it in combat, even at a time like this.

But it was enough!

Long Aotian’s expression froze when his axes bounced back, and he saw an insidious ball of red light erupt in front of him in the next moment.

This red light swallowed up his entire body in an instant. Long Aotian had just unleashed a powerful soul skill, and he couldn’t struggle out of it as his entire frame was swallowed inside a sphere of red light.

Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, who was also a Class 9 soul engineer, blurted out, “A Class 7 Light of Binding!”

Zheng Zhan felt an unprecedented astonishment after seeing this red sphere. He was awed by both teams before this, but his awe had stemmed from how powerful their martial souls were. The Binding Light that beamed out from He Caitou’s chest at this moment shook him to the core. Other than the fact that this Binding Light was a Class 7 soul tool, it was something that only the Sun Moon Empire possessed. It was very complicated to craft even one of these, and this soul tool had extremely high criteria for crafting materials and resources. He Caitou could use his Light of Binding, and this meant that the Tang Sect had mastered this technique and this technology. This astounded the Unbreakable Douluo even more than their formidable might and strength.

The Binding Light would ﬁre a single beam, and the target would be arrested and immobilized once struck. The target would be suppressed and held back by immense soul power, so Binding Lights could only be Class 7, at the very least. Class 7 Binding Lights had enough power to temporarily lock down an eight-ringed Soul Douluo’s abilities. The Binding Light’s effects would also be removed if the target was attacked after he or she had been manacled, but the target would have to take the complete brunt of the attack as long as the target hadn’t struggled out of the bind before it struck. Binding Lights could be considered a favourite among the control-type soul tools that high-level soul masters used.

One small change could affect the entire situation. The whole battleﬁeld immediately transformed once He Caitou unleashed his Binding Light. Nobody attacked Long Aotian at all, not even He Caitou… but Shrek’s Seven Monsters suddenly ﬂared up as a team. Huo Yuhao hadn’t been doing much this entire time, but now he suddenly darted out from his All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress.

Xu Sanshi had vomited blood from Long Aotian’s attack before this, and jumped high into the air. Now, Huo Yuhao appeared and caught him before he channeled his Mysterious Underworld Displacement. Black light surged as Xu Sanshi and Wang Dong’er suddenly swapped places, and Wang Dong’er was now in front of Huo Yuhao.

Wang Dong’er was already prepared, and she extended her arms and brought Huo Yuhao into her embrace.

Huo Yuhao was on one side as his eyes twinkled with pale golden light.

Wang Dong’er was on the other side, and her radiant wings stretched out behind her back as she unleashed her martial soul, the Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess.

The area around them glowed as they both released their martial souls at the same time, and a unique radiance shimmered from their bodies.

This light was very strange and unique, its color alternating between blue, purple, and gold. Dense light energy formed its core, and many strange soul power undulations were mixed up within it.

A colossal projection appeared behind Wang Dong’er’s back; a complete and magniﬁcent Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess!

An enormous virtual vertical eye appeared behind Huo Yuhao. This vertical eye was dazzling gold in color, and its pupil shone with faint purple hues.

Blinding blue, purple, and gold lights intertwined together to form a gigantic sphere of light that blasted down from the sky towards the ground in front of Long Aotian.

“Save Aotian!” Princess Wei Na shouted at the top of her lungs. She didn’t know what Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er were trying to do, but Huo Yuhao had ﬁnally exploded after holding back for such a long time. It was evident that their combined attack wouldn’t be weak at all.

However, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er weren’t the only two of Shrek’s Seven Monsters who burst into action.

Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu Shield ﬂared with black light after switching positions with Wang Dong’er, and multiple shields that glimmered with black light surrounded the winged Chen Yu and locked him in. Xu Sanshi withdrew his Xuanwu Domain as he unleashed his Xuanwu Shield Formation, as his domain consumed too much soul power. Xu Sanshi had been wounded during his attempts to block off Long Aotian before this, but it was still quite impossible for Chen Yu to overcome XU Sanshi’s cultivation and break free of the barricade to help Long Aotian.

Bei Bei exploded at the same time. A long and drawn-out dragon roar echoed across the arena as Bei Bei’s entire body seemed to stretch out. His bluish-purple lightning immediately began to sublimate as dazzling golden light radiated from him, and golden dragon scales covered his entire body. Bei Bei’s body quivered violently as a vigorous and ﬁrm golden lightning streak blasted free from his body and transformed into a colossal lightning net. Bei Bei used this lightning net to stop Wang Yanfeng, who was on his way to lend Long Aotian a hand, right in his tracks. Bei Bei also unleashed his Golden Dragon Head from one ﬁst at the same time, and crushed the incoming beams from Gu Tong’s eyes.

Xiao Xiao’s Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron split into three once more and dropped to the ground: Cauldron Quake! She teamed up with Bei Bei and locked two more of the Body Sect’s team members in place. Bei Bei’s intense and biting lighting suppressed them so much that they couldn’t unleash their body souls’ Second Awakening, which was their strongest technique.

Jiang Nannan ﬂared up at the same time. She unleashed her third soul skill, Instant Shift, and her fourth soul skill, Invincible Golden Body, at the same time, which allowed her to appear behind Jiang Yixi in an instant. Jiang Nannan took a direct hit from her opponent as she wrapped her legs around Jiang Yixi’s waist, and her ﬁfth soul ring glowed: Soft Bone Lock!

Three soul skills were discharged one after another, and Jiang Nannan immobilized Jiang Yixi in the blink of an eye!

@Chapter 325: An Instantaneous Eruption of Strength Leading to Victory

He Caitou’s soul tools rained ﬁre down on Wei Na like a meteor shower, forcing her to use her Invincible Barrier because her companions weren’t around to defend her.

Only several seconds were required for the entire situation to change. They were just at an impasse of sorts, but every single member from the Body Sect was suppressed and stiﬂed in this instant.

How is this possible? Emotions and disbelief rose up in Wei Na’s heart. There was no way she could believe or accept that Shrek’s Seven Monsters could achieve such tacit understanding and chemistry all of a sudden from how chaotic things were before this. They hadn’t communicated with one another at all before everything happened, so how could they all ﬂare up at the same time, and how could they all choose different targets? Furthermore, their movements connected with one another so seamlessly that there were almost no loopholes or weaknesses at all. What was Shrek’s Seven Monsters’ greatest strength in group battles? Rather, what was their core ﬁghting strength? Why did they choose to go into the group round even though they knew that every single member of the Body Sect was incredibly powerful?

Shrek’s Seven Monsters’ core ﬁghting strength wasn’t Bei Bei’s Golden Holy Dragon, or Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu Domain. Similarly, it wasn’t Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s martial soul fusion skill. It was the invisible and intangible Spiritual Detection that was shared amongst everyone during their group battles, and it was with this Spiritual Detection that everyone could achieve frightening chemistry and mutual understanding. This was their mightiest force, and it gave them the courage to challenge stronger opponents in a group battle.

The Tang Sect’s team had been probing their opponents from the very beginning, and they deliberately relaxed and separated themselves afterwards. Huo Yuhao had planned and created every single tactic and movement, from when they seemed like they lacked teamwork and were at a disadvantage, right up until this moment, when they all ﬂared up at the same time. He only had one true goal: he wanted to take down the Body Sect’s strongest member, Long Aotian! No matter how many hidden abilities Princess Wei Na possessed, and whether or not she was her team’s core, her overall prowess was still a far cry from Long Aotian’s. The most important result that Huo Yuhao wanted to achieve by taking down Long Aotian wasn’t just to weaken the Body Sect’s overall strength, he also wanted to attack their conﬁdence!

All the calm and composure from before was so that they could charge up for this moment’s eruption!

The blue, purple, and gold light sphere that Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er had fused into transformed into an enormous vertical eye in the same moment that it returned to the ground. This was Huo Yuhao’s Spirit Eyes, and Wang Dong’er was supporting him.

The enormous eye seemed deep and profound, and a boundless world seemed to appear if one gazed closely into it. In the next moment, a frightening mixture of blue, purple, and gold light shot out!

This beam of light resembled a symphony of lights as it ﬁred straight out, and everywhere it passed by was tainted with a peculiar golden color. This included the separating layer that the Unbreakable Douluo had laid out across the ground.

Long Aotian was still struggling as hard as he could inside the red Binding Light that was keeping him down. He could feel that something was wrong, and he unleashed his strongest technique, his Martial Soul True Body, in an attempt to break free from the Binding Light’s manacles.

But this Class 7 Binding Light was simply too powerful. The claim that it could temporarily restrict a Soul Douluo’s abilities wasn’t just a myth, and even though Long Aotian had unleashed his Martial Soul True Body and his entire body had gone incandescent, he could only watch as the bindings around him slowly broke down. However, the multi-colored beam had already arrived in front of him.

This beam passed through him in the blink of an eye. Just when everyone from the Body Sect believed that this attack was focused on Long Aotian, the enormous, three meter-wide tricolored light beam instantly elongated, and almost split the competition stage in two. Jiang Nannan still had Jiang Yixi immobilized with her Soft Bone Lock, and disappeared in a ﬂash through Instant Shift. Jiang Yixi couldn’t even react as she was swallowed by the tricolored light beam.

The Golden Road Amidst Withering Resplendence, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s ﬁrst martial soul fusion skill.

The Binding Light holding Long Aotian ﬁnally broke apart, but he had been transformed into a golden statue. He wasn’t the only one; Jiang Yixi had also become a golden statue after she was struck by the Golden Road.

Long Aotian was exceptionally powerful, but Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er both had twin martial souls, one was a Soul Emperor and the other a Soul King. How could their combined efforts, their martial soul fusion skill, not be powerful? They had teamed up to defeat and best mighty Soul Sages before!

The best way to ﬁght against the Golden Road was to avoid being struck by it. In the end, the Golden Road couldn’t lock onto a target. But once struck… Martial Soul True Body, dispelled; martial soul, dispelled. Intense light and spiritual energies gravely corroded their bodies, which were frozen in place.

The gigantic tricolored vertical eye reverted into a tricolored sphere, and the temperature in the air plummeted in the next moment. The tricolored sphere transformed once more, and black and white lights intertwined as a terrifying pressure was unleashed.

Ice-cold frost and snow swept up as a black hammer appeared with transparent Ultimate Ice condensed on its surface. A huge blizzard immediately billowed around Long Aotian with his body in the middle, and the freezing low temperature created another transparent layer of frost and ice on his body, which had already become a golden statue.

A giant formed from frost and snow grasped an enormous, fearsome hammer, and it seemed like it was going to tear the world to pieces as it plunged down from the sky.

This… this was the fusion between the Ice Jade Empress’ Scorpion and the Clear Sky Hammer. This was one of Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s other martial soul fusion skills!

Blaze Amidst the Frost, the Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer!

The Binding Light, the Golden Road, and the Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer. These three supreme abilities were what Huo Yuhao had prepared to end Long Aotian.

Huo Yuhao might not have been able to defeat Long Aotian even if his body was fully recovered one-on-one. However, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er against Long Aotian in a one-versus- two situation meant that Long Aotian didn’t stand a chance at all. Huo Yuhao’s soul power was being consumed at an alarming rate, but Wang Dong’er was the main director now, and it wasn’t very problematic for them to unleash two martial soul fusion skills at the same time.

“Long Aotian has been eliminated!” Wei Na screamed at the top of her lungs, and her voice sounded piercing and shrill.

Her exclamation was directed at the Unbreakable Douluo, Zheng Zhan. How could she not tell that Long Aotian, who martial soul was being stripped from his body, was absolutely unable to resist this attack? But Zheng Zhan seemed to be half a beat slower, and he was one step too slow to save Long Aotian.

A sharp scream rang out from Wei Na’s mouth, and the ﬁve soul rings on her body suddenly transformed at this moment. Her two yellow, two purple, and one black soul rings suddenly became six identical black soul rings as the fourth of her new soul rings sparkled with black light.

Everyone could see twisting and contorting waves ripple from her body amid her ear-piercing scream. A silver-white light sphere ﬂickered behind her back, which seemed to be composed of countless rolls and folds. It was the shape of a brain!

This was her fourth soul skill, Wail of the Banshee. It was a formidable soul skill that layered spiritual and sonic energies together, and it was a ten-thousand year soul skill.

Wei Na couldn’t be bothered with anything else when she could tell that Zheng Zhan would be a little too late. She immediately unleashed a powerful ability that was the most likely to save Long Aotian, and couldn’t be bothered with hiding her second martial soul’s soul rings anymore.

Everyone could tell from her second martial soul that she had only begun to attach soul rings to her spiritual-type martial soul after she became a Soul King or a Soul Emperor. Every single ring was a ten-thousand year soul ring!

Even though she could have done it better, this was enough. It was hard for soul masters with spiritual-type martial souls to obtain suitable soul rings in the ﬁrst place, Huo Yuhao being an obvious example. It was even harder to ﬁnd hundred-thousand year soul rings; hundred-thousand year spiritual-type soul beasts did exist, but every single one was exceptionally powerful, and that meant hunting and killing one was very challenging. It wasn’t that easy for the Body Sect to ﬁnd and kill soul beasts like that even with their host of powerful individuals, let alone ﬁnding and killing as many as nine for Wei Na. The Body Sect was a sect, it didn’t exist just for Wei Na herself, and even if they had the ability to help her accomplish all that, the sect’s other members would call this unreasonable resource allocation into question.

Therefore, Wei Na chose to attach soul rings to her second martial soul after she became a Soul Emperor so that she could attain honor and glory for the Heavenly Soul Empire in this season’s tournament. She was the Snowdemon Sect’s second strongest team member after Long Aotian!

Could her Wail of the Banshee stop Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer?

Every single person who was currently locked in battle was affected by the twisting waves when they rippled outward. Wei Na couldn’t be bothered with friendly ﬁre because Long Aotian was in a perilous situation of life or death, and even her teammates were subject to this mass control-type soul skill.

Every single person subconsciously covered their ears as their minds temporarily blanked out, accompanied by a momentary weakness in their bodies.

Xiao Xiao only had ﬁve soul rings, and she began to bleed from her nose. Jiang Nannan was about to attack Jiang Yixi after the latter was struck by the Golden Road when she groaned, and her nose began to bleed as well.

The Body Sect’s team members had it a little better. They understood Wei Na well enough, and everyone made the necessary preparations. But even so, every single ability they were unleashing or channeling was interrupted. It was a pity that this mighty skill that had miraculous effects on everyone did nothing when it went up against the Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer. It couldn’t shake the hammer at all.

Huo Yuhao was also a spiritual-type and control-type soul master. His Spirit Eyes only had ﬁve soul rings, but what kind of soul rings were they? Without talking about his other soul rings, his ﬁrst soul ring was a million-year soul ring, while his spiritual power had undergone multiple evolutions and was in the concrete-immaterial realm. Furthermore, he was teaming up with Wang Dong’er in this attack. How could he be so easily shaken?

Long Aotian’s consciousness was still clear, but there was only one thought in his heart: It’s over.

The Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer loomed over him. He no longer had his martial soul to protect him, and Ultimate Ice had invaded his bone marrow, while the Golden Road’s intense corrosive effects were encroaching frantically onto his wounded body. He would possibly have a chance to resist everything if he were in his peak condition, but now… He could hear Wei Na’s voice very clearly in his head. However, there was only sorrow in his heart. If somebody had told him before the tournament that he would die in combat, he would have been full of disbelief and disdain towards that comment. He had too much faith in his own strength and

abilities, but everything that was happening before his eyes had rendered his mind completely blank and empty. It’s over, everything’s over. Wei Na’s frantic attempt to save him hadn’t slowed their opponents in the least!

BOOM!

The ﬂoor quaked and trembled, as the Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer was just too destructive. The hammer’s petrifying effects instantly swallowed everything within twenty meters of it, and the entire arena became a world of ice and snow.

“No!” Wei Na gave a blood-curdling scream as tears burst from her eyes. Long Aotian wasn’t just the strongest individual among everyone in the Body Sect’s younger generation, he was also her boyfriend who she loved dearly, and her ﬁancé!

However, her tears were just trickling down when her eyes grew slack. The reason for that was because she could clearly see that the enormous hammer didn’t smash into Long Aotian’s body, and even though he was thrown into the air as the hammer slammed against the ground, the golden hues on his body were gradually receding as he hurtled through the sky. Two ﬁgures separated in midair. Huo Yuhao was tossed into the sky, and landed back inside his All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress that was still prostrate on the ground, while Wang Dong’er stretched her wings and soared away through the air. She lifted her hands at the same time, and a Hexagram Array accurately appeared beneath Jiang Yixi’s feet. Still struggling against the effects of the Golden Road, she was immediately swept into the sky. Wang Dong’er pushed her hands out immediately afterwards, and a mass of intense golden light burst towards Jiang Yixi: the Butterﬂy Goddess Slash!

He’s still alive! Long Aotian is still alive! Wei Na had forgotten that she was still participating in a tournament at this moment, and her tears paused for only a moment before they cascaded out like a waterfall once more.

Wei Na was also very powerful individually, and this was the reason she knew very well that Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er weren’t affected by her attack… they had shown mercy to Long Aotian!

Long Aotian somersaulted in midair as he dropped back on the ground. His entire body was quivering continuously – the Heavenly Emperor’s Hammer hadn’t hit him, but Huo Yuhao’s Ultimate Ice was so cold that he was still freezing all over. His face seemed exceptionally slack and lifeless, and his eyes were ﬁlled with disbelief.

How many people had died at the hands of the Tang Sect in the previous rounds? However, the Tang Sect gave him a chance today, in this match. He was still alive, still alive!

Long Aotian realized, for the very ﬁrst time, that life was wonderful. To be alive was to have hope, and he was the number-one individual among the Body Sect’s younger generation. He was also the Heavenly Soul Empire’s future emperor’s son-in-law, and he was Wei Na’s ﬁancé. I’m still alive!

In this moment, his typically tough and cold face overﬂowed with complicated emotions and expressions as he lay there dazedly, motionless.

“You’ve… been eliminated.” Zheng Zhan was a little too slow, but he stepped in front of Long Aotian now. Wei Na didn’t holler at Zheng Zhan for nothing, and even though he was deliberately one step slower, Long Aotian was deﬁnitely going to be eliminated from this match. Long Aotian was truly too frighteningly powerful in terms of individual strength. If one team had to win this round, the subsequent teams would probably rather have the Tang Sect advance.

Long Aotian’s slack eyes gradually recovered. His eyes were full of disappointment and frustration as he looked towards Huo Yuhao, who had landed back inside his All-Terrain Self- Driving Fortress. Long Aotian nodded heavily before he turned around and walked towards the edge of the competition stage. He was strong, arrogant, and proud... but he also knew about gratitude. Furthermore, he did actually lose!

Long Aotian’s defeat was just as Huo Yuhao had predicted, and the rest of the Body Sect’s team members were greatly affected. Ever single one of them was shaken to the core, and even their main control-type soul master, Wei Na, was full of rippling emotions. There was no longer any doubt as to the outcome of this battle.

It wasn’t hard to imagine how Jiang Yixi would end up as she had to face off against Wang Dong’er’s Butterﬂy Goddess Slash unprotected. Furthermore, she was still being controlled and arrested by the Golden Road and Wang Dong’er’s Hexagram Array. Wang Dong’er deliberately held back, and Jiang Yixi was eliminated shortly afterward.

It was seven versus four after that. Huo Yuhao had practically lost all his ﬁghting strength, but he still had his All- Terrain Self-Driving Fortress.

The Eye of Terror in the sky ﬁred a powerful light beam at Wei Na without hesitation.

Wei Na managed to recover and react in time, and fended off this attack. However, she sustained light injuries in the process.

Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, Xiao Xiao, Jiang Nannan, He Caitou, and Wang Dong’er unleashed their mighty abilities, and took another ﬁve minutes under Huo Yuhao’s command while he struggled to keep his Spiritual Detection going to ﬁnally suppress their opponents. It was quite a challenge, but they ﬁnally emerged victorious.

The round was over, and the Tang Sect had defeated the Snowdemon Sect, or rather the Body Sect, and proudly pushed into the semiﬁnals.

However, Shrek’s Seven Monsters weren’t in good shape. Huo Yuhao was completely spent, while Xu Sanshi, Jiang Nannan, Xiao Xiao, and Bei Bei were injured. Xu Sanshi’s wounds were relatively more serious, but the only two who emerged perfect and unscathed were Wang Dong’er and He Caitou. Even they had also expended a lot of soul power.

It could be said that it would have been an almost unassailable task for the Tang Sect to defeat an opponent as powerful as the Snowdemon Sect without Huo Yuhao’s planning. It would have very difﬁcult to determine who the winner would have been otherwise.

The Tang Sect didn’t win because they were stronger. It was far more accurate to say they won because of Huo Yuhao’s battle tactics and strategies, all the way from the single elimination matches to the group battle afterwards. Huo Yuhao had been dragging the Snowdemon Sect by the nose the whole time.

--- “We won! We won!” Shrek’s Seven Monsters exchanged looks with one another, and not a single one of them could hide the elation in their hearts, as they exclaimed excitedly again and again while embracing one another.

Of course, this didn’t include Huo Yuhao. He was far too spent, and could only move his right hand anyway. Even if he could bounce himself out from his All-Terrain Self-Driving Fortress, he would probably fall down and knock himself dizzy.

Wang Dong’er pulled him out from his Fortress gently.

---

The tournament had progressed into the semiﬁnals, and the semiﬁnalists had been determined.

They were: Shrek Academy, the Heavenly Dragon Sect, the Holy Ghost Sect, and the Tang Sect.

The two teams from Shrek Academy each took a spot in the semiﬁnals!

------

“Congratulations.” Wei Na, Long Aotian, and the rest of the Snowdemon Sect’s team members arrived before the Tang Sect.

Wei Na’s pretty face was still gleaming with tears as she grasped Long Aotian’s left hand tightly with her right hand. Her smile was very sincere, as if she hadn’t lost the match at all.

Bei Bei chuckled and said, “Beating you guys in this round was difﬁcult for us.”

Long Aotian said, “We will ﬁght again if the opportunity arises.” He turned towards Huo Yuhao as he spoke.

Huo Yuhao was weak and exhausted, but he was still hanging on as he sat there in his wheelchair. He nodded back at Long Aotian with a ghastly pale face. Wei Na said sincerely, “Thank you for showing mercy, Yuhao. I will always remember this favor. Aotian is my ﬁancé, and I wouldn’t have known what to do if something had happened to him during the tournament.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “We are not your enemies, princess. Furthermore, the Heavenly Soul Empire is one of the Tang Sect’s biggest customers. How could I afford to damage our rapport and friendly relationship? Brother Long, we will ﬁght again when I’m fully recovered. I have to admit that I can’t defeat you at the moment if we go up against one another one-on-one.”

Long Aotian replied, “No, I’m the one who has lost today. I’m the team leader, but I was too focused on individual strength, and I didn’t help Wei Na streamline the team and keep them together. We put too much faith in our individual abilities, which was the biggest reason why we lost to you in this round. Your team is a lot better than us in that respect. I’ve lost, and I’ve lost convincingly. However, my failure will only be for this day. From tomorrow onwards, I will work hard to make up for my weaknesses and what I lack.”

Huo Yuhao chortled and said, “We are not your enemies, but I’m very willing to be your rival.”

Long Aotian strode over to Huo Yuhao and reached out with his right hand.

Huo Yuhao raised his own, and they smiled while they stared into each other’s eyes. They were full of appreciation for one another, and all the grudges and ill-feelings from the battle before this vanished into thin air.

Wei Na walked over to Bei Bei and whispered some things into his ear. Bei Bei’s head tilted to one side and his eyes sparkled, and the two of them interacted with their eyes before they bid their farewells and left the competition stage.

Four teams advanced from the quarterﬁnals, and the semiﬁnals were about to begin. The quarterﬁnals’ ﬁnal match was undoubtedly the most epic and spectacular one.

The Tang Sect and the Snowdemon Sect were both met with warm applause from the audience as they stepped off the competition stage. These two teams didn’t belong to the Sun Moon Empire, but everyone knew how to respect strength and might. These two teams had obtained sincere admiration and respect from the Sun Moon Empire’s citizens.

---

On the rostrum, Xu Tianran didn’t leave right away after match like he always did. Instead, he was just sitting there with a dark and gloomy look on his face.

Fifteen minutes passed before Xu Tianran ﬁnally raised his hand to signal Ju Zi to push him off the arena. He departed with his servants and his bodyguards escorting him.

“Ju Zi, I’m full of grievances after that round,” Xu Tianran spoke and sighed at the same time.

Ju Zi said tenderly, “Don’t be displeased, Your Highness. Even though the Sun Moon Empire didn’t enter the semiﬁnals, we still have the Holy Ghost Sect.” Xu Tianran shook his head and said, “The Holy Ghost Sect’s strength doesn’t belong to us, in the end. If not for the fact that we have to deal with the Body Sect and Shrek Academy, do you think I would have been willing to work together with those evil and nasty fellows? However, we are falling behind in nurturing our younger generation. Shrek Academy and the Body Sect have lived up to their reputations as sects and entities with a long history. If not for our soul tools, the Sun

Moon Empire might not be able to dominate the entire Continent even after ten thousand years. Today’s battle has enabled me to understand many things. I have been too arrogant and proud in the past.”

Ju Zi heaved a faint sigh and said, “Your Highness, you will deﬁnitely become a brilliant emperor of the Sun Moon Empire in the future.”

Xu Tianran smiled faintly as he patted her hand. “I don’t care about being a brilliant emperor or whatever. What I care about is the process, the process of expansion and development. I care about unwavering determination in the face of challenges, the ambition and the courage to reach the top of the world. My entire life is devoted to reigning supreme over the entire Douluo Continent.” Ju Zi said resolutely, “You will deﬁnitely be successful, Your Highness. I will always be your pawn and your vanguard, and I will always be willing to ﬁght for you, no matter the occasion. I will not regret it even if I have to die in battle.”

Xu Tianran laughed and replied, “No, you are not allowed to die in battle. I am still hoping for us to share that glory and honor when it comes time. I will always need someone who knows my heart beside me, and you’re the most important one.”

Ju Zi seemed touched as she responded, “Thank you for your love and concern, Your Highness. Do you think the Holy Ghost Sect can defeat the Tang Sect, Your Highness? It seems like the Tang Sect is quite strong indeed, judging from their performance today. The Body Sect actually lost to them.”

Xu Tianran answered, “The Holy Ghost Sect may not be stronger than the Body Sect in terms of individual strength, but don’t forget where the Holy Ghost Sect comes from. Their presence is very different from the Body Sect, and the most frightening thing about evil soul masters isn’t their strength, it’s their evil. Of course, none of that is important anymore. No matter who claims the championship in the end in this tournament, these elites of the younger generation have only two choices: submit, or die!”

Ju Zi felt her heart quiver as she bit down on her lower lip.

Her beautiful eyes seemed to be pondering something…

------

The Tang Sect had returned to the hotel. They couldn’t be bothered with a postmortem this time, and everyone went back to their respective rooms to rest as soon as possible.

They had achieved their main goals in this battle. The Body Sect wasn’t their enemy, after all, and the Tang Sect had managed to win and progress into the semiﬁnals without damaging their relationship. They had completed all their main tasks in this tournament.

Huo Yuhao sat opposite Wang Dong’er as they channeled their Haodong power together. Color had returned to Huo Yuhao’s face, and he wasn’t as pale now. Today had been far too exhausting for him, and taken a toll on his physical and mental strength. Much of his soul power and spiritual power had been consumed.

Long Aotian had been right, the Body Sect’s entire team was too proud and arrogant, and they weren’t able to unleash their strongest individual abilities because of their teamwork, or rather, the lack thereof. But even so, Huo Yuhao was still overly spent as the Tang Sect’s team leader and commander.

Huo Yuhao was thinking back over the entire match as he sat on his wheelchair on the way back, and made his own evaluations about the Body Sect’s individual team members. He realized afterwards that if both teams’ battle strategies and tactics were in place and not problematic, there was only one way the Tang Sect could defeat the Body Sect: his body had to recover. It was only then that his ﬁghting strength could be unleashed to the highest possible level, and he could cooperate better with Wang Dong’er. Only then would they have a chance of defeating the Body Sect.

They rested for nearly four hours before they headed to the canteen to eat. They were met with two guests in the canteen. More accurately put, they were met with two princesses!

---

After their meal, Bei Bei, Huo Yuhao, Wei Na, and Xu Jiujiu sat together in the living room on the Brilliant Delight Hotel’s top ﬂoor that belonged to the Snowdemon Sect.

Both princesses had lost their respective ﬁghts, and while the Star Luo National Academy was defeated straightforwardly, they managed to keep themselves in one piece. Xu Jiujiu’s expression was very normal and casual, as she had already foreseen today’s outcome when they drew the Holy Ghost Sect as their quarterﬁnal opponents.

“When do you guys plan to depart?” Bei Bei took the initiative and asked with a smile on his face.

Xu Jiujiu exchanged a look with Wei Na and said, “We’re not in a hurry. I think we’ll wait for the entire tournament to end before we’ll leave. If the Brilliant Delight Hotel refuses to continue providing their services to us, we’ll ﬁnd a nearby hotel to stay in.” “Oh? You don’t seem like you’re in a hurry to return home,” Bei Bei continued, with the same smile on his face.

Xu Jiujiu glanced in his direction. She had a strong impression of the Tang Sect’s eldest senior brother. This guy was handsome, and he always wore that faint smile on his face. He seemed scholarly and refreshed, and it was easy for others to have a favorable impression of him.

However, his ﬁghting style was drastically different from how he typically carried himself when he wasn’t in combat. He was ferocious, and was as fearsome and intimidating as could be. Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi anchored the Shrek’s Seven Monsters’ vanguard!

“Yes! We’re not in a hurry. The semiﬁnals and ﬁnals will be even more spectacular. Since we’re here, we should ﬁnish watching the tournament before we go,” Xu Jiujiu responded with a bright smile on her face.

Most of the teams who had been defeated chose to leave. The tournament spanned a very long period of time, and the Brilliant Delight Hotel turned away those who had been eliminated from the tournament. Some teams couldn’t ﬁnd a place to stay in the city even if they wanted to.

Of course, some of these teams had arranged things for themselves beforehand so they could continue watching the tournament. Most of these teams were the Sun Moon Empire’s native teams, so it was relatively easier for them to stay behind. The teams that belonged to the Douluo Continent’s three native countries mostly didn’t choose to stay behind because they weren’t very friendly with the Sun Moon Empire. They didn’t want to stay for too long because they were afraid that the Sun Moon Empire would take action against them.

Xu Jiujiu turned towards Wei Na after she declared that she was staying behind. “How about the Snowdemon Sect, sister Wei Na? When are you guys leaving? Oh, that’s wrong... I should call you guys the Body Sect. I didn’t expect you to have so many secrets! You have twin martial souls, and you’re also one of the Body Set’s prodigy warriors! Whitesilver Second Awakening! Very impressive!”

Wei Na had returned to normal by now, and she still wore the same gentle and tender look as she always did. She smiled faintly, and dimples appeared on her cheeks like a fresh and pleasant lily ﬂower.

“Since you aren’t in a hurry to leave, then we are even more reluctant to go. We’ll wait for the tournament to end before we leave.”

Xu Jiujiu smiled and said, “That’s great! We can accompany each other when we leave. I guess I’ll have a companion for my journey.”

Wei Na nodded. “That’s good! Bei Bei, Yuhao, why don’t we decide on a time and place so we can leave together after the tournament? You can call the others from Shrek Academy too! The more the merrier!”

Bei Bei heaved a faint sigh and shook his head. “We are very exhausted today, my dear princesses, and it isn’t very convenient for Huo Yuhao to move around. We’ve expended too much today, so we should stop beating around the bush and get straight to the point so that we can go back to rest after our discussion. Otherwise, the two of you can ﬁnish your discussions beforehand and ﬁnd us afterwards.”

Xu Jiujiu’s expression didn’t change as she listened to Bei Bei calling her out on her tongue-in-cheek. Wei Na blushed, but she was still smiling pleasantly as she stared at Xu Jiujiu in amusement.

The two princesses looked at each other, but neither of them seemed willing to speak ﬁrst, and the room instantly descended into silence.

Bei Bei waited for a little while before he heaved a faint sigh and walked behind Huo Yuhao. He began to push Yuhao’s wheelchair, and they started to leave.

“Wait.” Xu Jiujiu couldn’t hold herself back anymore, and spoke ﬁrst. Xu Jiujiu didn’t have the same conﬁdence and strength that Wei Na did. Even though she had faith that she was better than Wei Na at managing and handling things, Wei Na had the Body Sect behind her, and there were probably many powerful individuals from the Body Sect in the area. Wei Na had reason to be conﬁdent, and she had reason to feel safe. But what about her? Would her company be able to ensure her safe passage back home?

Bei Bei pressed his hands on the Golden Tree wheelchair’s handles and turned towards Xu Jiujiu. Xu Jiujiu paused for a moment and said solemnly, “Alright, I’m not going to beat around the bush anymore. You guys have seen what the tournament is like. The Sun Moon Empire is becoming stronger and more dominant, and according to our analysis, the Sun Moon Empire has a malicious plan that they will execute after the tournament! We’re not sure what their plan is, but the Sun Moon Empire’s strength combined with the Holy Ghost Sect is a big threat to everyone! We will have a hard time defending ourselves if they make a move against us, as this is their territory, after all. Therefore, I want my people to leave together with you guys. Together we stand, and divided we fall. It’s easier for us to take care of one another when we’re together.”

Bei Bei tilted his head. Xu Jiujiu had portrayed her sincerity relatively well with her words, and this was probably what she had meant from the start. Perhaps her words weren’t complete, but they were enough to express her anxiety and worries.

Wei Na nodded and continued, “I agree with Jiujiu. Together we stand, and divided we fall. The Sun Moon Empire is too calm and quiet, to the point where I feel afraid. It would be a lot safer for everyone, and we will ﬁnd ourselves in a better situation if we all leave together after the competition. At least, they’ll have to try a lot harder if they want to deal with us.”

Bei Bei glanced at both princesses and said, “Either one of you can represent a country, but the Tang Sect is just a tiny sect. We’ll probably not participate in this.”

Both Xu Jiujiu and Wei Na were astonished by Bei Bei’s response. From their perspective, the Tang Sect had no reason to reject their proposal, but Bei Bei did so directly and straightforwardly.

Huo Yuhao said nothing at all in his chair. He was being a patient listener, Bei Bei was the Tang Sect’s eldest senior brother, and was also the Tang Sect’s real director. Huo Yuhao would always hold himself back when Bei Bei was around so that his eldest senior brother could decide everything. This wasn’t just because of his respect for Bei Bei, it was also because he had absolute faith in his senior brother!

“Alright. It’s getting late, princesses. We’ll take our leave ﬁrst. We can continue this discussion afterwards.” With that, Bei Bei pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair and left the room.

--- Xu Jiujiu and Wei Na glanced at each other, both of them temporarily rendered speechless.

Wei Na forced a laugh after a long while and said, “I thought Huo Yuhao was difﬁcult to deal with, little did I expect that the Tang Sect’s eldest senior brother was even more difﬁcult to deal with. It’s apparent that he thinks we’re not sincere enough.”

Xu Jiujiu also wore a black face as she turned towards Wei Na and said, “Wei Na, I know that you have the Body Sect behind you. But you should also understand that the Sun Moon Empire hates the Body Sect more than they do us. If they really have some evil plan to execute, the Body Sect will be their ﬁrst target, Shrek Academy will come next, and then they will target us. Let’s have a heart to heart talk... what do you think?”

Wei Na tilted her head and said, “Alright, then I won’t hide anything any more. We are not just here to participate in the tournament, we also have to execute other tasks and duties…”

--- Bei Bei pushed Huo Yuhao and walked down the hotel corridor. He shook his head in exasperation and said, “These princesses are so sly and cunning. They don’t wish to give anything, yet they want to drag us onto the war chariot. They’ve calculated this well... but what do we have? We represent the Tang Sect, not Shrek Academy. We don’t know who they have and how many people they have backing them up, and we don’t even know how Shrek Academy has arranged things. Our advantage is that our company is small, and the Sun Moon Empire can’t do anything against us if we really want to leave because we have you around. It’s better for us to avoid getting involved in this.”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly and said, “We will be much smaller targets if we lose the next round. However, if we win, the Holy Ghost Church will surely come after us whether or not the Sun Moon Empire targets us.”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “There are still many things that are blurry and unclear. The princesses are in more of a hurry than we are, while everything will be clear after the tournament’s next round. At the very least, we can be sure that the Sun Moon Empire will not make a move against us within Radiant City even if they want to...”

Chapter 326: Dark Clouds Hanging

Huo Yuhao said to Bei Bei using his Spiritual Detection, “Eldest senior, I’m going to go out later.”

Bei Bei thought of something before he extended two ﬁngers and tapped on Huo Yuhao’s shoulder.

Huo Yuhao nodded.

The two of them had great chemistry with each other. “Yuhao, be careful. Don’t push yourself too hard.”

“Don’t worry, eldest senior. I know my limits.”

Bei Bei sent Huo Yuhao back to his room before he returned to his own room to rest. After returning to their rooms, Wang Dong’er started to help Huo Yuhao put on make-up. He had an appointment today. The make-up was used to conceal his actual looks. Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao silently out of the hotel. They proceeded towards a dark and quiet corner and quickly ventured far away from the hotel.

Huo Yuhao’s ability to disguise and conceal himself was an important reason why Bei Bei was so conﬁdent earlier. If their opponent didn’t know when they left, how could he deal with them?

Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao far away, and they even went around in a circle before they proceeded towards their destination. After walking for an hour, they ﬁnally stopped at a dark and quiet corner.

Huo Yuhao was drained today. Although he had rested for some time, and his soul and spiritual power had somewhat recovered, he was still feeling weak and exhausted from the tournament. It was best to remain cautious.

Wang Dong’er squatted down beside Huo Yuhao and whispered, “He’s here. Should I guide him over?” “Yes. I just used my Spiritual Detection to check. There’s no one within a ﬁve hundred meter radius of us.” Huo Yuhao nodded his head.

Wang Dong’er only stepped out silently after this. She didn’t make a sound, and soon brought someone over from the other side of the road – Chen An.

“Sir.” Chen An rushed to greet Huo Yuhao when he saw him. After witnessing what had happened in the last round of the underground tournament, he became even more respectful towards Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao’s abilities during that round were an eye-opener for him. He had revealed the true abilities of an evil soul master! Naturally, Chen An’s efﬁciency also increased as a result.

“How’s the matter I asked you to see to?” Huo Yuhao asked.

Chen An hurriedly answered, “It’s almost done. This is the list.” As he spoke, he passed a piece of paper to Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow when he saw the list. “So little?”

Chen An laughed bitterly. “Sir, I’ve already done my best. Rare metals are in short supply now. The Duskwater Alliance has stocks, but the higher-ups treat them as treasures.”

“They claim that the value of these rare metals will soar in the future and they’re prohibiting the sale of them now. I only managed to get this much because my friend is one of the higher-ups in charge of managing the warehouse. This must not leaked. Otherwise, I’ll be dead.”

Huo Yuhao nodded and said, “Alright, let’s just get these ﬁrst. Don’t worry, I won’t let you do all this for nothing. Hold this ﬁrst.” As he spoke, he passed a card to Chen An.

“There are ﬁve hundred and ﬁfty thousand gold soul credits here. Take it as the deposit. When you return, get the goods ready. When they arrive, I’ll give you the remaining sum that I owe. When that time comes, your share will not be forgotten. I’ll fulﬁll my promise to you.”

After receiving the card, Chen An didn’t seem to be doubtful at all. Huo Yuhao’s passing of the card to Chen An represented a lot of things. “Alright, sir. I have an idea. In a few days’ time, our Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament’s grand ﬁnals will be held on the second day after the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament’s semiﬁnals are over. When the grand ﬁnal begins, you’ll naturally be competing. All the higher-ups from the three underground organizations will also be gracing the event. This will also the point where the warehouse is emptiest. Let’s meet then. I’ll get someone to deliver the goods, and you’ll send someone to verify the goods. The exchange can occur then when we are both not present. It’ll also be the safest time and place for us. What do you think?”

Huo Yuhao revealed a grin and said, “Not bad. Your idea is pretty reliable. Let’s do it this way then. Alright, you can return now. Take care. When the matter is settled, you can follow me in the future if you want to.”

“Yes, sir. Thanks for nurturing me. Let me complete this task ﬁrst before we go on to other stuff.” After greeting Huo Yuhao again, Chen An turned around and left. As he walked out of the dark corner, he glanced around him before quickly leaving.

Huo Yuhao revealed a cold smile on his face as he watched Chen An leave. This fellow’s heartbeat was getting faster and faster when he was speaking earlier. Evidently, he must be lying. I can’t tell what he’s lying about, but he’s pretty good to have obtained all these rare metals.

“Dong’er, protect me. Let me see if I can get more clues from him. If I do ﬁnd out anything, second senior and I might not even need to compete in the grand ﬁnal.”

“Right here? Won’t it be too dangerous? Can your body take it?” Wang Dong’er asked concernedly.

Huo Yuhao replied, “I’m ﬁne. There are very few people who will pass by here. I’ll continue my Imitation to conceal our ﬁgures. You just need to be more alert. I have to start; he’s getting farther away. Let’s hope he doesn’t go too far.”

As he spoke, Huo Yuhao shut his eyes. A streak of golden light shone from his forehead. As the golden light ﬂashed, it disappeared into the air. Huo Yuhao then remained motionless like a statue.

His spiritual power had entered the concrete-immaterial realm. In a ﬁght, Huo Yuhao still couldn’t fully fuse it with his soul power. However, he was much stronger at using his spiritual power now.

A golden projection formed, consolidated from his spiritual power. It even carried a streak of his spirit. Although it couldn’t do anything, it was able to cover much greater distances than his Spiritual Detection. It was also more agile.

With Huo Yuhao’s current spiritual power, he could cover up to three kilometers if he made his detection unidirectional. However, his Spiritual Avatar in the concrete-immaterial realm was able to cover ﬁve kilometers. He had never tested his limits, but his spiritual power was exhausted at a rate proportional to how far his avatar was from his body.

Chen An walked very quickly. After turning two street corners, he ﬁnally slowed down and proceeded like a normal person on the streets. At this point, he was already on the main street, which was bustling with people. The surrounding restaurants and entertainment facilities were also booming with business.

The Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament had greatly boosted the economy of Radiant City. Over the past few months, almost all the businesses had been raking in proﬁts.

Chen An heaved a sigh of relief when as he mingled with the crowds. He had always been cautious, and thus was certain that he wasn’t going to face any problems anymore.

Every man for himself! Chen An revealed a cold smile on his face. As he walked, he thought to himself. By working with that mysterious evil soul master, I’m sure I can change my destiny. Since I’m going to do it, I must gain as many beneﬁts as possible. As long as I’m stealthy, I can please both sides, and emerge as the biggest proﬁteer.

As he thought of all this, his footsteps became quicker. After passing through the main street, he turned into a narrow alley and walked quickly. However, he wasn’t aware that there was an invisible Spiritual Avatar observing all his actions less than three meters above his head.

In places where there were fewer people, Chen An walked very quickly. He continuously cut through various streets and alleys to change his position. It also seemed as if he were going in circles. After walking for about ﬁfteen minutes, he reached a huge building.

At this point, Huo Yuhao revealed a shocked look on his face. That was because this place was too familiar. It was the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy!

Chen An didn’t enter the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy. He followed a path at the side of the academy before entering an alley. This alley was behind the academy.

There was another building here, which seemed like a residential property. However, Chen An was stopped by a soldier in full battle attire the moment he walked into this alley.

Chen An retrieved a token before he was allowed to enter.

Huo Yuhao had been in the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy for two years, but he hadn’t known there was something like this behind the academy. After all, he had been more focused on soul tools then. Furthermore, the exchange students from Shrek Academy were normally watched very closely. Chen An heaved a sigh of relief as he walked into a wide courtyard. There was someone waiting for him there.

“How is it? Have you settled things over at the buyer’s side?” There was a middle-aged man waiting for Chen An. He had ordinary looks, but seemed very anxious now. It was obvious that he had been waiting for quite some time.

Chen An nodded and replied, “Don’t worry. Everything’s settled. I even brought his deposit. Brother Li, there must be nothing wrong with the goods! If we do this well, we won’t have to worry about money for the rest of our lives.”

“It’s ﬁne as long as the buyer is okay with everything. We’ve already started preparing over here. Don’t worry, I’m one of the six in charge of the warehouse. In addition, I’m the main person in charge. I’m the vice-supervisor. I’ve already started preparing since many years ago.”

“It’s very strict in the warehouse, but I have my methods. No one is better than me at creating fake rare metals. Others can’t hide them in their storage-type soul tools, but I can. Where’s the deposit? Also, please take a look at the list again. See whether it’s right.”

As he spoke, he passed a list to Chen An. Chen An took out a card and said, “There are two hundred thousand gold soul coins here. It’s the deposit. The remainder will be paid when the goods are delivered.”

He received the list and looked it over. After that, he nodded and said, “The list is right. Quickly prepare the goods. I’ll come here tomorrow night at this time to collect them. I’ll also pass you the remaining ﬁve hundred thousand gold soul coins then.”

“Alright. We’ll follow your arrangement.” The middle-aged man was excited as he put the card away. After that, he sent Chen An out of the room.

Huo Yuhao saw everything with his Spiritual Avatar, and was speechless. Chen An is too greedy. I gave him ﬁve hundred thousand gold soul coins as a deposit earlier, but he only offered two hundred thousand to the seller. Furthermore, the list that Huo Yuhao saw earlier was accurate. However, the price was only half. This meant that Chen An was going to pocket half of the one million four hundred thousand gold soul coins involved in this deal. He was swindling both parties.

However, Huo Yuhao had still managed to achieve his goal.

This was the place he was looking for. After he stopped following Chen An, Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Avatar slowly shadowed the middle-aged man and he continued to investigate…

Morning

The weather in Radiant City had ﬁnally took a turn for the better. The sun was shining brightly, and caused the city to become extremely dazzling.

After a night of rest, everyone from the Tang Sect had recovered. Only Xu Sanshi was still healing under the care of Jiang Nannan, as his injuries were slightly more serious.

In the early morning, the Tang Sect was already welcoming two guests – Xu Jiujiu and Wei Na, the two princesses.

After seeing Bei Bei, Wei Na proceeded towards Xu Sanshi’s room as Bei Bei led her. She used her Snow Lotus to treat his injury, which revealed the sincerity of the Heavenly Soul Empire. Xu Jiujiu mentioned that she wanted a private conversation with Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao smiled as he said to Xu Jiujiu, “Your Highness, eldest senior is the one who decides matters in the Tang Sect. You don’t have to talk to me privately.”

Xu Jiujiu looked at him deeply and replied, “Alright, time is tight. I’ll get straight to the point. Currently, I have three Titled Douluo and around forty detectives with me in Radiant City. Along with my troops and ﬁfteen preparatory squad members, they form the entire strength that I have in Radiant City.”

Huo Yuhao listened to her seriously, but didn’t make a sound.

Xu Jiujiu continued. “When we ﬁrst came to Radiant City, we didn’t discover much. However, we realized that something was amiss after we reached the round-robin stage. We sent three waves of detectives back to the empire to deliver news, but they all disappeared without a trace. Do you remember Grandma Yi Man? Her title is Starcloud, and she has a Rank 93 cultivation. As the three waves of detectives disappeared, she personally returned to the Star Luo Empire. However, we lost news of her as well. We were alerted because of this. After this, we tried to investigate the matter, and discovered some clues. There seems to be trap around Radiant City – it has become a situation where we can only enter, but not leave.”

After hearing her words, Huo Yuhao was also shocked. He had known that the Sun Moon Empire was going to do something, but he didn’t expect them to be so daring.

Radiant City was the largest city on the continent. It wasn’t easy to seal the entire perimeter of a city like that.

With Huo Yuhao’s intelligence, he immediately discovered a serious problem.

“Your Highness, do you mean that the Sun Moon Empire is trying to deal with all non-Sun Moon Empire teams in this tournament?” Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow when he said this. His doubts had been answered. The greatest problem for the Tang Sect now was their overall abilities and lack of manpower. They couldn’t investigate on such a large-scale like the Star Luo Empire. Huo Yuhao also believed that Xu Jiujiu wasn’t lying, and the situation was only going to become more serious.

Xu Jiujiu nodded and said, “It’s highly possible. In addition, they aren’t just targeting us. They are also trying to deal with the secret forces that have followed us on our journey here. For example, there’s the Star Luo Empire, the Body Sect and Shrek Academy. We are all the elites of the various empires. Our team members even more so. By capturing all of us, it’ll be a huge blow to the various empires. Furthermore, it also means something else if they dare to do this.”

Huo Yuhao’s eyes ﬂashed with a cold look. “They are prepared for war, aren’t they?”

Xu Jiujiu took in a deep breath. “That’s right.” She seemed to be put in a spot as she muttered those two words. What did it mean if the Sun Moon Empire was prepared for war? It meant that they were going to invade the Heavenly Soul and Star Luo Empires. It was going to be a big war! However, were the three empires of the continent prepared?

Huo Yuhao took in a deep breath. He knew that at least the Tang Sect wasn’t prepared.

“Thank you, Your Highness, for delivering such valuable news to me. What are you going to do? After yesterday’s negotiations, I believe you and Princess Wei Na have reached an agreement.” Xu Jiujiu cursed in her heart. This sly fox. I’ve already said so much, but he’s not telling me his position.

“That’s right, we’ve reached an agreement. If we want to break out, we must band together. Although there are only a few teams left, we are still considered quite familiar with one another. As long as Shrek Academy and the Tang Sect, as well as both Wei Na’s team and mine team up together, we’ll become a force to reckon with. We’ve been investigating thoroughly. Radiant City is so huge, so it’s very difﬁcult to seal it completely. We should gather our strength and escape in a particular direction.”

“However, there’s another problem regarding the war. It seems like the Sun Moon Empire is prepared, but we are not. That’s why we need to try to earn more time for ourselves. We can’t just directly leave. We need to deal a larger blow to the Sun Moon Empire before we leave, and slow them down. In this way, we’ll have more time to prepare.”

Huo Yuhao was in awe. Her Highness’s thought process is quite clear. Although she doesn’t know the arrangements of the enemy, she knows what the critical thing is – stall our enemy. “Yuhao, we’ve interacted several times, but I still am not familiar with your academy. Can you tell me what the strength of your academy is for this tournament? If your academy is willing to cooperate with us on this mission, it’ll be much better.”

Huo Yuhao shook his head. “Your Highness, we are representing the Tang Sect this time. We are really unclear on the academy’s arrangements. However, I can introduce you to our eldest senior sister in the inner courtyard of the academy. You can discuss the details with her.”

Xu Jiujiu seemed a little pensive. After a moment, she nodded and replied, “Sounds good. I’ll need to trouble you then.”

Huo Yuhao smiled and thought to himself – sounds good?

That’s your purpose, isn’t it?

After this brief conversation, both parties left pleased. Huo Yuhao had obtained valuable information, while Xu Jiujiu also achieved her goal. ---

At this point, the Tang Sect’s hall was getting more and more crowded. Wei Na had already done her best to heal Xu Sanshi, and assured him that he could ﬁght the Holy Ghost Church the next day. Zhang Lexuan also arrived with Wang Qiu’er.

Zhang Lexuan was stunned when she saw Princesses Wei Na and Jiujiu on the Tang Sect’s side. Although she wasn’t familiar with them, she had naturally been observing them. After all, they represented two different empires! And Wei Na also represented the Body Sect.

The Tang Sect’s hall was now packed.

There was Bei Bei, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er from the Tang Sect, Zhang Lexuan and Wang Qiu’er from Shrek Academy, and the two princesses. The seven of them represented four different parties.

Wei Na and Xu Jiujiu looked at each other. Xu Jiujiu nodded her head gently. Zhang Lexuan smiled and said, “It’s really crowded in here. It’s the semiﬁnals tomorrow. Bei Bei, how're your preparations?”

Bei Bei replied, “We’ve prepared everything that we need to.

Tomorrow’s ﬁght will be very important. We’ll do our best.”

Zhang Lexuan nodded slightly and pretended not to know the two princesses. She asked, “These two are?”

Bei Bei rushed to introduce them to one another. After the three of them greeted one another, Xu Jiujiu seemed to turn a little anxious. She expressed her wish to converse in private with Zhang Lexuan. This time, Princess Wei Na also wanted to join in on the conversation.

Zhang Lexuan didn’t reject her request. The three of them borrowed one of the Tang Sect’s rooms and began to discuss matters with one another.

The hall became much more quiet after they left. Only the three from the Tang Sect and Wang Qiu’er remained. Bei Bei looked at Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er before he looked at Wang Qiu’er. He couldn’t help but shake his head helplessly. He turned to Huo Yuhao and said, “Was Princess Jiujiu sincere earlier?”

Huo Yuhao nodded slightly. He recounted everything Xu Jiujiu had said to him earlier. He didn’t withhold any information because Wang Qiu’er was around. After all, this was a matter that concerned both Shrek Academy and the Tang Sect. Moreover, he already thought of her as a trustworthy friend after their many ordeals together.

After hearing Huo Yuhao’s report, Bei Bei turned serious. Wang Dong’er laughed coldly, “They are obviously trying to make use of us as messengers. Their real goal isn’t to work with us, but with the academy.”

Whatever Wang Dong’er could tell, Huo Yuhao naturally could tell too. Bei Bei laughed and said, “This is normal. They have Titled Douluo following them, but we only have the few of us. No one will bother with us if things really escalate to a conﬂict between the truly strong individuals. However, they are not wrong to treat us as a part of the academy.”

Huo Yuhao could see a slight but deﬁnite and furious intent in Bei Bei’s eyes. After knowing him for so long, Huo Yuhao was clearly aware that Bei Bei was actually a very proud person, even though he seemed to be very tough on the outside. The existence of the Tang Sect was an important link between him and Tang Ya. How could he not have any reaction when they were being looked down upon?

Huo Yuhao said, “It’s actually good that they are not concerned about us. In this way, they’ll become our cover when we do certain things.”

Bei Bei looked at him. Their gazes met, but they didn’t say anything.

Wang Qiu’er, who had remained quiet all this time, suddenly stood up and said, “Eldest senior sister and I are here this time because we want to inform all of you about what we’ve discovered. Whatever that Princess Jiujiu mentioned might not be everything that they’ve discovered. From what we know, Radiant City has indeed been sealed. “The Sun Moon Empire deployed a few legions of soul engineers to mount a defensive line, with advanced-ranked soul engineers to hold the fort. All the teams that left earlier must have been stopped by them. However, the weird thing is that they didn’t seal all of Radiant City. They only sealed three sides, and left one side empty, the west side. It is the direction that we would take if we wanted to take the longest time to return to our academy.”

The information that Wang Qiu’er provided was very important. To some extent, Shrek Academy and the Tang Sect were together. She didn’t conceal any information, and told Huo Yuhao everything.

Huo Yuhao immediately retrieved a map of Radiant City. He had bought it when they ﬁrst came to Radiant City for the exchange. He opened up the map to take a look at the surrounding geography of Radiant City.

Radiant City was located in a good position. Three of the sides that it faced were vast plains suitable for farming and training soldiers. It was only the west side that faced a mountain range, called, naturally enough, the Sun Moon Mountain Range. It wasn’t considered too expansive, but it blocked the western ﬂank of Radiant City. Although Radiant City wasn’t surrounded by city walls, it wasn’t too far-fetched to claim that it was constructed based on the mountain range. It was just that the other three sides of the city were too wide, and thus hardly anyone noticed the west side of the city when they came to Radiant City.

Huo Yuhao furrowed his brow when he saw the map. “Encircling three sides and leaving one side empty. In the art of war, this strategy is used to prevent enemies from ﬁghting too desperately by deliberately leaving an opening for them. However, the Sun Moon Empire doesn’t have to do this! Their goal should be to capture us all! Why would they leave an escape route for us? Furthermore, the geography of the mountain range is very complicated. It’s ideal for hiding. Sealing the mountains will also be much more tedious than sealing the vast plains.”

Bei Bei was also looking at the map. He said, “In addition, this mountain range is very close to Radiant City. There can’t be soul beasts residing in it. It should be an ordinary mountain range.”

The few of them started to become very doubtful.

Wang Qiu’er said, “We’ve thought of all that, too. From appearences, the most likely situation is because the Sun Moon Empire knows that the combination of our academy and the Body Sect will be too strong. That’s why they’ve left us an escape route, but we’ll have to make a detour in order to return. This will at least delay us. However, we don’t know what they are trying to delay us for. After all, there are more than ten Titled Douluos between our academy, the Body Sect, and the Star Luo Empire. If the Sun Moon Empire wants to keep us here, they’ll have to pay a huge price. It might not be something they can handle. Capturing the rest of the teams will also have dealt a huge blow to the three empires on the continent.”

Huo Yuhao suddenly shook his head and said, “No, no.” His breathing had sped up as he said, “It can’t be that simple. Think about it. Even if we have to make a detour to the west, how long will it delay us? Let’s not even talk about Titled Douluo; even for us, we can make up for the additional distance very quickly using our ﬂying-type soul tools. If the Sun Moon Empire wants to do something, they can’t possibly do so in those additional few hours. If they are successful, I don’t think people like us can affect them.” As he spoke until here, he seemed to have understood something. “If we think of it from the Sun Moon Empire’s perspective, what would we do if we wanted to deal with our competitors in this tournament? Would we only capture a few of the members from each team and release the stronger ones?”

Bei Bei shook his head and said, “I certainly wouldn’t do so. I’d rather let the weaker ones go, but I would have to capture the stronger ones from Shrek Academy and the Body Sect. After all, neither our academy nor the Body Sect can turn out in full strength. This means that our strength is already scattered. While the ﬁghting strength of ten Titled Douluo is very great, this is still the Sun Moon Empire, and they also have the help of the Holy Ghost Church! Along with their Class 9 soul engineers, they are strong enough to threaten us if they team up.”

“Yuhao is right. If they can keep us here, including the Titled Douluo, it’ll be a true, critical blow to us! If I were the one leading such an operation, I’d do my best to ensure this happens. I would also try my best to capture all the Titled Douluo.” As he ﬁnished speaking, Bei Bei stopped. His breathing had also quickened. As he looked into Huo Yuhao’s eyes, they could see one another’s fear.

Huo Yuhao pointed to the Sun Moon Mountain Range on the map and said, “Then, let’s make a bold guess. Not only is this mountain range not an escape route, but it might even be the path to death. They’ve intentionally left this path open for us, and are trying to make us think that they are leaving an escape route for us. Their aim is to draw us over. They are really scheming!”

Wang Qiu’er disagreed. “That’s only what you think. We’ve sent people to check out the mountain range. There’s nothing wrong with it. Although there are a few troops there to guard the region, they won’t pose a threat to us. The two of you might be overreacting.”

Huo Yuhao replied “Perhaps. We can’t check things out, and thus it might not be good for us to comment. However, our guess can be considered rational given the situation we are in. Qiu’er, who did the academy send here?” Wang Qiu’er replied, “There aren’t many people from the academy, but they are the stronger ones. Elder Xuan is here personally, along with another four elders from the Sea God’s Pavilion.”

“Dean Xian Lin’er’s also here. There are a total of six Titled Douluo from our academy. Including Elder Xuan, we have four Transcendent Douluo.”

After hearing her words, Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er and Bei Bei were all astonished. Although they knew that the academy would provide reinforcements, they hadn’t expected the lineup to be so strong. Even Elder Xuan was included, and there were four Transcendent Douluo among the six Titled Douluo. What did this mean? It meant that almost half the higher-ups of Shrek Academy were here! Only Dean Yan Shaozhe was left in Shrek Academy to hold the fort.

A warm feeling rose in their hearts. They were touched by the academy’s regard for their safety.

Wang Qiu’er followed by saying, “We posit that the Sun Moon Empire left us an escape route on the west side because Elder Xuan was there to personally check it. He even scanned the entire mountain range from the sky before he came to his conclusion. It’s unlikely that your guess is right.”

Bei Bei nodded and said, “Perhaps we’re worrying too much. If Elder Xuan checked it himself, there shouldn’t be any problems.”

With Elder Xuan’s abilities, how could there be something wrong if he couldn’t detect anything?

Wang Dong’er also nodded slightly, agreeing with what he said. They trusted Elder Xuan.

Only Huo Yuhao seemed to be thinking of something.

However, he didn’t say anything.

Bei Bei said, “If that’s the case, there should be more than ten Titled Douluo, given that there are three from the Star Luo Empire and at least three from the Body Sect! With such a strong lineup, I’m sure the Sun Moon Empire will be worried, since we are able to cause signiﬁcant damage. In that case, it’s possible that they left an escape route for us. Little junior, what do you think?”

Huo Yuhao replied, “Perhaps. However, I don’t know why I feel so uneasy. If there’s an escape route for us, it shouldn’t be like this. However, Elder Xuan also checked it himself. Let’s hope that everything’s ﬁne. Qiu’er, what does the academy think about sabotaging the Sun Moon Empire while we’re here?”

Wang Qiu’er shook her head. Her expression turned slightly gentler, and she said, “Elder Xuan said that it’s not important whether we sabotage Radiant City. The most important thing is for us to return. Tomorrow is the semiﬁnals, and the ﬁnal will be after that. No matter what we achieve, we must leave this city. This was what Elder Xuan told us to tell all of you.”

Huo Yuhao took in a deep breath, and his nose felt a little runny. “I don’t have a family. Ever since I joined the academy, it has become my family.”

Wang Dong’er lifted her hands to clasp his shoulders. She knew that Huo Yuhao was most emotional when it came to this. Bei Bei smiled and said, “Who says you have no family? Isn’t the Tang Sect your family? Since Elder Xuan has already made arrangements, let’s just follow it. As for sabotaging Radiant City, we don’t have to do it since he doesn’t want us to do so.”

Huo Yuhao laughed, and they looked at each other. They didn’t say a single word after this.

After a while, Zhang Lexuan left the room with the two princesses. It was obvious that their discussion wasn’t very pleasant. Xu Jiujiu wore a dismal look on her face. While Wei Na seemed very calm, the gentle look in her eyes had disappeared. After they exited the room, the two princesses immediately took their leave.

Just like Bei Bei and Huo Yuhao thought, the two of them had no intention of dealing with them over this matter after they had established contact with Shrek Academy.

Chapter 327: Semiﬁnals!

Zhang Lexuan snorted after she watched the two princesses leave. “They must be daydreaming if they are trying to tie us together. Is the Sun Moon Empire stupid? Our academy and the Tang Sect possess nearly all the outstanding disciples among the younger generation. Even if they dare to take the risk, we won’t dare to. Elder Xuan was right. It’s important for everyone to return safely.”

Shrek Academy was neither a sect nor a country. They wouldn’t let their students take risks for any reason. This was the greatest difference they had with the Star Luo Empire, Heavenly Soul Empire, and Body Sect.

Bei Bei looked at Zhang Lexuan and seemed to ask her something with his eyes.

Zhang Lexuan said, “That bunch is pretty vicious. They want to attack the Illustrious Virtue Hall and attempt to assassinate Xu Tianran. Xu Tianran has always been an aggressive person, and the Sun Moon Empire’s Emperor is going to kick the bucket soon. If Xu Tianran comes to rule the Sun Moon Empire, a war will soon break out. But if he’s dead, there will be internal strife within the Sun Moon Empire. This will delay the war for some time, and give the various empires sufﬁcient time to prepare.”

Huo Yuhao revealed an enlightened look, “I see. However, they are indulging in fantasies. Xu Tianran is now the Prince Regent. I’ve met him before. He’s a very ambitious person, and had a very eerie vibe about him. He has even pulled Jing Hongchen to his side. I believe even the Holy Ghost Church has been pulled to his side, as well. It’s going to be very difﬁcult to ambush and kill him. Furthermore, Xu Tianran lost his legs to an ambush. Don’t you think he’ll be very wary after that painful experience? I’m afraid that it would be very unlikely to be successful.”

Zhang Lexuan nodded and said, “We agree on this. If they want to cause trouble, let them do it themselves. Let’s just not participate. While it’ll be good if they succeed, we won’t be any worse off if they don’t.”

Bei Bei asked, “When are you planning to make a move?”

Zhang Lexuan said, “As I didn’t express my interest to join, they didn’t mention any detailed timing. However, I believe they might delay it until after the tournament if we do participate. After all, the tournament has not ended yet. If we don’t join now, they might act earlier. They won’t take our safety into account, either. When I mentioned that I was going to opt out, they suggested that we provide support instead. I didn’t agree to that, either. That’s why their attitude changed; they’ve started to treat us as enemies.”

Bei Bei said, “They have no choice but to do so. After all, it concerns the national security of both empires. Compared to the interests of an empire, individual lives are nothing. Why would they treat us as well as the academy? Let’s not care about them and continue with the tournament. When it ends, we’ll leave just like Elder Xuan has arranged.”

“Okay.” Zhang Lexuan nodded. Suddenly, her expression turned slightly weird and she said, “Bei Bei, are you conﬁdent tomorrow?”

Bei Bei was stunned, and slowly shook his head.

Tomorrow, they would be facing the Holy Ghost Sect. How could they be conﬁdent when Tang Ya was in the Holy Ghost Church? It was an evil soul master sect, even more mysterious than the Body Sect! In the previous rounds, only a few people from the Holy Ghost Church competed. They had used their strong evil soul master abilities to advance all the way to the semiﬁnals.

Zhang Lexuan hesitated for a while before she said, “Even though all of you are representing the Tang Sect, Elder Xuan also told us that safety is the ﬁrst priority. Nothing is more important than life. All of you are the future of the academy and the Tang Sect. Winning the tournament is no longer important under the circumstances we are in right now. You must remain alive if you want to snatch Xiao Ya back.”

Bei Bei subconsciously lowered his head as he saw the glow in Zhang Lexuan’s eyes. He gently nodded, but didn’t make a sound.

Zhang Lexuan suddenly became agitated. “You mule, go die if you want to.” After she ﬁnished speaking, she turned around and left, slamming the door behind her. She understood Bei Bei too well. From Bei Bei’s actions, she could tell that he wouldn’t heed her advice. Bei Bei expression twisted as he sighed. At times, feelings couldn’t be forced. He knew that Zhang Lexuan was acting in his best interests. However, he only had Tang Ya in mind! If someone had to be blamed, Elder Mu was the one. However, Elder Mu had already passed away. Zhang Lexuan also wanted to stay true to her promise. Bei Bei was afraid to face her.

Wang Qiu’er looked at Huo Yuhao and said, “I’ll wait for you in the ﬁnals. No matter what plans you have, I hope to have a good ﬁght with you when we meet.”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly. “Is it interesting bullying a cripple?”

Wang Qiu’er’s body jerked slightly, and her lips twisted. She didn’t say anything else, turning around and leaving.

Wang Dong’er lifted her hands and pinched his back. Huo Yuhao coughed and said to the depressed Bei Bei, “Eldest senior, let’s discuss our team. To us, the Heavenly Soul Empire and Star Luo Empire’s plan might be our best cover.” Bei Bei lifted his head, and his expression returned to normal. He nodded gently.

Huo Yuhao smiled and said, “After the semiﬁnals, the second day will be the ﬁnal of the underground tournament. The Holy Ghost Church will also be present. We should let the two princesses know about this matter. If they want to make a move, that will be the best day.”

Bei Bei laughed, “Maybe the two princesses won’t be the ones to delay the Sun Moon Empire, but us.”

------

Over these last few days, Radiant City’s atmosphere had become more and more tense. The Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was about to reach its semiﬁnal stage. At the same time, the three underground organizations were also organizing the ﬁnals of the Radiant City Elite Soul Engineering Tournament.

All the teahouses and restaurants were discussing the two tournaments. Evidently, the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was more attractive. However, everyone was also attracted to the underground tournament, as they were allowed to bet on it. Through the underground tournaments, the three underground organizations beneﬁted greatly.

The semiﬁnal lineup of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament was as follows. In the morning, the Heavenly Dragon Sect was ﬁghting Shrek Academy. In the afternoon, the Tang Sect was ﬁghting the Holy Ghost Sect.

These were two semiﬁnal rounds with many talking points. Whose dragon-type martial soul was stronger, Yu Tianlong’s Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon, or Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon? Under what circumstances would they meet in the tournament? This was the biggest talking point of the semiﬁnal round. Which dragon was stronger?

Because of Long Aotian’s impressive showing, Wang Qiu’er’s reputation dipped a little. Even though she hadn’t fought Long Aotian, many believed that she was weaker than him.

Of course, there were loyal supporters of Wang Qiu’er as well. In their eyes, the ravishing, cool, and elegant Wang Qiu’er was the best in this tournament. As long as no one defeated her in a duel, she would always be the strongest.

Many people fought as they tried to debate the question of who between Wang Qiu’er and Long Aotian was stronger.

The second semiﬁnal round was touted to be the most intense match in the entire tournament.

Those who were sharp could tell what kind of existence the Holy Ghost Church was. It was made up of evil soul masters! However, the Sun Moon Empire had been restraining all discussion of the Holy Ghost Sect. Since the Sun Moon Empire dared to let the Holy Ghost Sect compete, they had naturally made their own arrangements.

As a result, it was illegal to even discuss the Holy Ghost Church in Radiant City.

Even so, everyone still wondered how strong an evil soul master sect was. If they emerged as the eventual winners, the Sun Moon Empire would become a laughingstock. At the very least, it would be a black mark on the entire history of the tournament.

What had Xu Tianran thought? That history was written by the victors! If he could rule over the entire continent, what black mark could he not remove? This fact alone was why he dared to let the Holy Ghost Sect compete.

There were some quite intense objections even within the Sun Moon Empire. However, Xu Tianran wasn’t bothered. After he curbed some of them with violence, the Holy Ghost Sect managed to complete their registration.

Nobody liked an evil soul master sect. That was why the Tang Sect became the hot topic in this second semiﬁnal round.

The Tang Sect had defeated the Snowdemon Sect, which had possessed the seven-ringed Soul Sage Long Aotian and a few Soul Emperors. They had fully demonstrated their abilities. To many spectators, the Tang Sect was a huge treasure vault. They always delivered something new to win in each round. Could they defeat their opponents and achieve eventual victory? It was difﬁcult to tell. However, it was probably their only hope!

From their showing in the quarterﬁnals, it was evident that their abilities in the later rounds were greater than what they had shown in the earlier rounds. If the Tang Sect couldn’t stop the Holy Ghost Sect, the Holy Ghost Sect was likely to be the eventual winners.

That was why many people supported the Tang Sect secretly. They hoped the Tang Sect could defeat the evil soul master sect!

The semiﬁnals of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master started under such an atmosphere.

The weather today was a little gloomy. Clouds ﬁlled the sky, and it felt a little oppressive. It seemed like it might rain at any time.

If it were any other normal time, no one would have left their houses in such weather unless they had something important to attend to. However, it was different today.

In the early morning, Radiant City was already bustling.

There were huge crowds gathering towards the suburbs.

The Sun Moon Empire’s military, which was in charge of maintaining order, had already begun their job at the tournament venue in the wee hours of the morning, trying to prevent a stampede. Today, there would be a record-breaking crowd. There were simply too many people. It was impossible to see the end of the crowd!

When there were ten thousand people, it would seem as if the crowd was inﬁnite, but right now, there were far more than ten thousand people!

Several hundred thousand spectators were crowding around the tournament stage. Those furthest from the stage were a good two kilometers away. They had to rely on a telescope to see what was going on. Even so, everything still wasn’t clear to them.

Four teams entered the venue simultaneously. All of them had gone through several rounds to be able to be present today. It was already the highest honor to be among the semiﬁnalists. However, only one team would win!

Who would be the victor? No one was thinking about this question yet. The most important question right now was… which teams would qualify today? The Tang Sect and Shrek Academy were ﬁnally seated together. Even though Dai Huabin, Wu Feng and the others didn’t like the Tang Sect, they were even more unwilling to get close to evil soul masters or their direct opponents, the Heavenly Dragon Sect.

Shrek Academy came without their teacher. Only their eldest senior sister, Zhang Lexuan, was here with them. Everyone looked very serious. They were going to ﬁght a strong opponent today.

There were eight people on the Holy Ghost Sect’s team. From her ﬁgure, it was easy to recognize that Tang Ya was seated in the front. Behind her, every member of the Holy Ghost Church had covered themselves up with huge black cloaks. The lady furthest back gave Huo Yuhao the familiar feeling he had experienced earlier.

When the Tang Sect came to the waiting area, the members of the Holy Ghost Sect shot them cold and eerie looks.

On the Tang Sect’s side, everyone was already in their best condition apart from Xu Sanshi, who was still a little pale. They were under more pressure than Shrek Academy in today’s semiﬁnals.

Against evil soul masters, it wasn’t just about victory or failure anymore. Their lives were on the line. This was also why Zhang Lexuan had warned Bei Bei to take care of their own safety.

Before they moved off in the morning, Bei Bei had also warned his teammates. However, were they able to control themselves when they really fought? No one was sure about this. For victory and the glory of Tang Sect, Shrek’s Seven Monsters were very determined. So what if they were evil soul masters? They’d beaten evil soul masters before!

The stage had already been repaired and returned to its former appearance. To prepare for the semiﬁnals, it hadn’t just been rebuilt. It was also reinforced with steel plates! Even the protective barriers were re-arranged so that they wouldn’t be damaged like they were before.

The twenty-thousand-strong military division in charge of maintaining order today were all fully equipped with weapons and helmets.

No matter the rank of the soldiers, everyone from the military was wearing the same white armor. The only difference was in terms of patterns. Ofﬁcers of different ranks had different patterns on their armor. For the highest-ranking ofﬁcers, there was an additional feather on their helmets.

The color of the feather also varied depending on the rank of the ofﬁcer.

Order was maintained through this military presence.

Anyone who dared to defy the military was courting death!

---

On the main stage, Xu Tianran had already arrived. Many ofﬁcials were there with him. The mysterious Imperial Tutor was also here. He sat to Xu Tianran’s left, while Ju Zi sat to Xu Tianran’s right.

Xu Tianran appeared very relaxed today, wearing a smile on his face. The sun had just risen. Even though the weather wasn’t very good, that didn’t seem to affect his mood.

Xu Tianran smiled after receiving a cup of tea from Ju Zi. “Ju Zi, who do you think will win in the morning round?”

Ju Zi was startled, and slowly shook her head. She replied, “I don’t dare to make any wild guesses. However, I believe that the leaders of both teams will be crucial in determining the victor. I’ve heard that the both of them are the strongest dragon-type soul masters in this tournament. Wang Qiu’er is the backbone of Shrek’s team. If she loses, I’m afraid Shrek’s ﬁghting strength will drop greatly.”

“It’s also roughly the same for the Heavenly Dragon Sect. Yu Tianlong’s abilities seem better than the rest of his teammates. He’s also the next sect leader of the Heavenly Dragon Sect. He holds a high status in his sect.”

Xu Tianran nodded satisfactorily and said, “Then let’s guess ; will they meet in the individual elimination round?”

Ju Zi smiled and said, “I shall make a guess then.” Xu Tianran laughed and said, “Alright, you can guess ﬁrst.

However, what’s our stake going to be?”

Ju Zi shook her head and answered, “I won’t bet. I’m only making a guess to entertain Your Highness. Everything that I have belongs to you. What can I use to bet against you?”

After hearing her words, Xu Tianran was in an extremely good mood. He opened his arms to hug her waist. “You are very right. No wonder you are mine, Ju Zi. Tell me, what’s your guess?”

Ju Zi said, “I think they’ll meet in the ﬁrst individual elimination round.”

“Oh?” Xu Tianran was a little stunned as he looked at her. He asked, “Why?”

Ju Zi replied, “They are both very proud individuals. They need a fair ﬁght to prove themselves. I think this is especially true for Yu Tianlong. Wang Qiu’er’s individual reputation has been outstanding in this tournament! She’s also the ﬁrst to compete in every ﬁght. He’s a man with a dragon-type martial soul, too. There’s no way he won’t compete against her! If Wang Qiu’er doesn’t ﬁght ﬁrst, Shrek’s momentum will be very weak. She relies on momentum to ﬁght, and I’m sure she’ll want to continue that. That’s why I think they’ll meet in the ﬁrst ﬁght.”

“Great! Intelligent! It seems like I don’t have to worry about passing the military to you,” Xu Tianran nodded as he smiled.

Ju Zi was delighted. She wanted to bow, but Xu Tianran stopped her.

“Ju Zi, you must remember this. You are no longer my subordinate. You are my wife. You don’t have to bow to me. Didn’t I tell you that before? Everything that you have belongs to me. I’ve also treated you as an important part of my life. No matter what I give you, you deserve it. Moreover, I must help you fulﬁll your wish. You are still inexperienced, but it’s ﬁne for you to be a lieutenant now. Work hard. Once you gain some merit, you’ll soon control the entire military. I’ll be relieved to hand the military over to you.”

“Thank you, Your Highness.” Xu Tianran smiled and replied, “Alright. Let’s watch the ﬁght. It’s about to start.”

---

In the waiting area...

Wang Qiu’er was sitting in the main seat for Shrek’s team. Her back was very straight, and she had a digniﬁed posture. She shut her eyes and rested for a while.

At this point, Yu Tianlong stood up and walked towards her.

After seeing what he was doing, Dai Huabin suddenly stood up behind Wang Qiu’er. There was a cold look in his eyes.

“Sit down,” Wang Qiu’er instructed him.

Dai Huabin appeared quite stern, but he still obediently sat down. The Tang Sect was seated next to Shrek Academy. When they saw how Wang Qiu’er had managed to tame Dai Huabin with just her words, even Huo Yuhao was very impressed. Indeed, there was always someone more dominant! This wasn’t just based on abilities; it seemed like Dai Huabin had been truly won over by Wang Qiu’er.

Yu Tianlong stopped three meters away from Wang Qiu’er.

“Wang Qiu’er.” As he looked at her, his eyes shone. He didn’t even glance at Dai Huabin. His attention was completely captured by Wang Qiu’er.

She was too beautiful. The dark-green uniform that she wore accentuated her fair complexion. Her ﬂowing, powdery-blue hair was like a waterfall behind her back. She didn’t have any ﬂaws. Although her eyes were shut, her long eyelashes still curled upward – it was a captivating sight.

Yu Tianlong believed that he was a very composed person. However, he felt his breathing getting faster and faster as he came closer to Wang Qiu’er. “What?” Wang Qiu’er asked coldly.

Yu Tianlong asked, “Do you to dare to ﬁght with me?”

“What are we betting with?” Wang Qiu’er asked in the same frosty tone.

Yu Tianlong said, “I’ll be the ﬁrst to compete in the individual elimination round. I hope to ﬁght you. If I lose, I’ll join Shrek Academy. If you lose, you must join the Heavenly Dragon Sect. Do you dare to take this bet?”

Wang Qiu’er revealed a scornful look. “Shrek Academy doesn’t accept trash.”

“What did you say?” Everyone from the Heavenly Dragon Sect stood up. They were all infuriated.

Yu Tianlong lifted his hand and gestured towards his teammates. He suppressed some of their rage and asked, “Are you scared?” Wang Qiu’er couldn’t even bother to continue talking to him anymore. She shut her eyes, and didn’t make another sound.

Zhang Lexuan, who was standing behind Team Shrek, stood up. “Yu Tianlong, don’t try to take advantage of us like that. We are Shrek, an open-minded academy. We don’t restrict our students. The Heavenly Dragon Sect is a sect. Do you think the conditions are fair in the bet you are suggesting?”

Yu Tianlong was stunned. He wasn’t intentionally trying to take advantage of them. He was just being direct. “What do you suggest then?”

Zhang Lexuan said, “Alright, I shall make the decision for Qiu’er. If she loses, she’ll join the Heavenly Dragon Sect after she graduates. If you lose, you’ll be her servant for three years. This is only fair.”

Yu Tianlong hesitated after hearing her words. He was the future sect leader of the Heavenly Dragon Sect! It would be too much for him to take if he lost.

Wang Qiu’er also opened her eyes wide after hearing Zhang Lexuan’s words. They were ﬁlled with surprise.

Yu Tianlong was close to her. When he saw her captivating eyes, he unwittingly said, “Alright, I agree.”

Wang Qiu’er was too beautiful. She was so beautiful that he couldn’t help himself.

Wang Qiu’er stood up and turned her head to look at Zhang Lexuan, but Zhang Lexuan just nodded at her.

Wang Qiu’er was in a bit of a daze. She still clearly remembered what Zhang Lexuan had said to her before.

“Qiu’er, you should know that you can’t interfere in Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s relationship. There are good guys in this world. Why do you have to give up the entire forest for one tree? There’ll be opportunities in the future. I’ll pull some strings for you.” “Eldest senior sister, why don’t you ﬁnd a guy for yourself, then?”

“I made a vow.”

With her intelligence, she understood why Zhang Lexuan had accepted this bet on her behalf.

Yu Tianlong was tall and burly. His looks were decent too, and his abilities were strong. He didn’t seem to be inferior to Huo Yuhao at all. It was a pity that Zhang Lexuan didn’t understand. Her relationship with Huo Yuhao wasn’t so simple! There were things that couldn’t be changed.

“Even if I win, you don’t have to be my servant. Just end the match,” Wang Qiu’er said.

Yu Tianlong was stunned. As he studied Wang Qiu’er’s cold and indifferent look, there was a weird feeling in his chest. In the Heavenly Dragon Sect, he was a leading ﬁgure who was respected by all. The colder Wang Qiu’er acted towards him, the greater his desire to make her submit to him grew.

In terms of overall abilities, Yu Tianlong didn’t think his sect was inferior to Shrek. They might even be better. However, the Heavenly Dragon Sect’s problem was similar to Shrek Academy’s. As the team leader, his cultivation was far superior to those of his teammates. He was unsure of his team’s chances in the group round. Although Shrek’s individual abilities weren’t great either, they had shown two martial soul fusion skills during their last team round.

Those were martial soul fusion skills! One was a control- type, and the other was an assault-type fusion skill. Along with their weird time controller, Shrek’s team was indeed quite strong!

The Heavenly Dragon Sect wasn’t conﬁdent of winning in the team round. Since this was the case, they should be more ‘generous’. As long as they beat Wang Qiu’er in this round, she would join their sect in the future. When that happened… As he ﬁnished thinking, Yu Tianlong revealed an arrogant smile on his face. “Okay, we’ll do as you request. We’ll decide victory in this ﬁght. If you win, we’ll concede defeat. A man is always ready to give and take. So what if I become your servant? If you lose, you’ll join us! That’ll be fair.”

Yu Tianlong acted very manly. He was a straightforward person, and gave off a very mighty feeling.

Wang Qiu’er nodded at him before returning to her position and shutting her eyes.

One ﬁght to decide it all?

When everyone in the resting area heard about this, they thought that it was a very childish arrangement. Both teams had toiled to reach this stage, but they wanted to end this semiﬁnal match with just one duel? It seemed a little irrational. However, they also realized that it was a good method after thinking about it for a while. By using this method, this duel was likely to be very intense! The staff members in the resting area went to report the decision to their higher-ups. It was the ﬁrst time in the history of this tournament that such a simple but crude method would be used to settle the result in a semiﬁnal round.

If they were any other teams, such a method was unlikely to be used. The rest of the team’s members would likely reject the suggestion! However, Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong held absolute authority in their respective teams. Their teammates wouldn’t object.

One ﬁght to decide it all!

Fierce!

------

It was time for the duel. On stage, Zheng Zhan walked out towards the center of the stage. He had just received the news. I can’t believe they thought of this. It’s good though. At least I’ll be under less pressure. I can prepare more for the semiﬁnal match in the afternoon. Without a doubt, the clash between the Tang Sect and the Holy Ghost Church was the more important semiﬁnal round.

“Semiﬁnals, ﬁrst round! Shrek Academy versus the Heavenly Dragon Sect. Competing members from both parties, please enter the waiting area!” Zheng Zhan shouted, as loud as ever. His voice echoed out through the sound-amplifying soul tool.

When only one member from each team appeared, the spectators were stunned. What was going on? Weren’t there supposed to be seven members from each team?

Yu Tianlong and Wang Qiu’er didn’t even enter the waiting area. They jumped up on the stage at the same time and walked out to Zheng Zhan, demonstrating their resolve.

Although Zheng Zhan had already received the news earlier, he was still shocked.

They’re really going to do it! Young people nowadays are really able to handle pressure. I wouldn’t have dared to do this in the past. “First semiﬁnal round. Shrek Academy versus the Heavenly Dragon Sect. After discussions between both sides, they’ve decided to use a duel to determine the victor for this round! Shrek Academy and the Heavenly Dragon Sect will be sending their team leaders out to ﬁght!”

When Zheng Zhan announced this strange arrangement, there was a huge commotion among the spectators.

However, there were only a few who were disappointed.

Most people started to get very excited.

Xu Tianran and Ju Zi weren’t the only ones guessing how this semiﬁnal round between Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong was going to pan out! Almost all the spectators were making the same guesses, especially Wang Qiu’er’s supporters.

The two teams were using a duel to decide the winner. This was undoubtedly very attractive to the spectators. It was the only way Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong would be able to ﬁght one another in their best condition. The winner would earn the title of the best dragon-type soul master in this tournament! Although Bei Bei’s martial soul was also a dragon, he had rarely appeared in the previous rounds. His performances weren’t very eye-catching, either. There were very few spectators who remembered him

“Wang Qiu’er will win!”

Someone started shouting among the crowd. His voice made the spectators even more excited.

“Wang Qiu’er will win!”

“The Golden Dragon Lady will win!”

Hysterical screams soon engulfed the entire spectator stands. There were too many people who adored Wang Qiu’er. Wang Qiu’er was even given a scare by the huge soundwaves that echoed out. She hadn’t known that she commanded such a respected position in the hearts of the Sun Moon Empire’s citizens. After all, she was representing Shrek Academy! Shrek Academy was the arch-enemy of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy! It was unbelievable that she was so popular even under such a circumstance. Apart from her beauty and cold demeanor, her simple and brutally aesthetic ﬁghting style captivated everyone.

Yu Tianlong didn’t feel depressed because of all the shouting and screaming. Rather, a passionate gaze glowed in his eyes.

His thinking was evidently different from an ordinary person’s. Wang Qiu’er’s popularity only made him more even excited. He was thinking how great it would be if Wang Qiu’er could become his woman. The feeling of making everyone’s goddess his woman was…

Finishing his train of thought, Yu Tianlong revealed a smile on his face. Just as everyone was cheering on his opponent, he smiled instead. Zheng Zhan thought it was a little weird, and couldn’t help but shudder.

I really can’t understand young people these days!

--- On the main stage, Xu Tianran looked a little gloomy. He was also very strong, and ruled the entire empire. He naturally had the same thought as Yu Tianlong, and might even be more extreme than him. However, he was tormented because he couldn’t do anything even if he could make such a lady submit

to him. This torment caused him to grab hard onto his

wheelchair handle.

If he couldn’t own it, then he would rather destroy it! Xu Tianran revealed a ferocious look in his eyes right then...

---

“Both parties, please get ready.”

Since this was a duel, and both parties were already known to each other, Zheng Zhan skimmed over a lot of the administrative process. He opened his arms wide and pointed to the two sides of the stage.

Wang Qiu’er turned and walked away, her face still as cold as ever. Even though she was moved by the screams, she soon regained her composure.

While she was very cold, Yu Tianlong’s eyes were instead burning with excitement. A strong ﬁghting will rose in his heart.

Wang Qiu’er was a tough character! To win her over, defeating her was the ﬁrst step! If he couldn’t even beat her in a duel, there wasn’t any meaning to the other matters!

Chapter 328: Duel of the Two Dragons!

Yu Tianlong turned around after taking a deep look at Wang Qiu’er’s perfect ﬁgure, and walked towards his own side of the stage.

The dimly yellow transparent protective soul barriers were set up, isolating them from the outside world. The screaming spectators also gradually quieted down. Their goddess was about to compete, and they wanted to see every detail of the ﬁght carefully, so they stopped all their shouting and screaming.

Both Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong retreated to their respective sides of the stage. They stood straight and turned back around.

Wang Qiu’er’s gaze turned sharp at this instant. Before she turned around, she glanced at Huo Yuhao. Huo Yuhao seemed to sense her gaze. Even though they were isolated by some distance, he still shot her an encouraging look. Wang Qiu’er turned around and muttered softly, “I won’t owe you anything at all.”

No one heard her words. The next moment, Wang Qiu’er’s body surged with a frightening ﬁghting intent that was very suppressive.

When this sense of suppression appeared, the protective barriers around the stage all lit up slightly.

The Unbreakable Douluo was shocked, and he almost retreated without thought. There was a horriﬁed look in his eyes.

Was Wang Qiu’er actually concealing her powers in the previous rounds?

Compared to Zheng Zhan, Yu Tianlong was even more surprised, since he was the one bearing the pressure from Wang Qiu’er! In Yu Tianlong’s eyes, Wang Qiu’er seemed to have become a huge, roaring Golden Dragon! The terrifying sense of suppression caused his martial soul to shudder slightly.

The Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon was a top-ranked martial soul, one of the best among dragon-type martial souls. However, it still shuddered in the face of Wang Qiu’er’s aura. What did this signify?

One martial soul could suppress another martial soul. Simply put, those with tiger-type martial souls had an obvious advantage over those with horse-type, bull-type, and sheep- type martial souls.

Such a situation was very common in the world of soul masters. However, it rarely happened in such huge tournaments. That was because every team sent the disciples with the strongest martial souls to compete. These disciples were also their elites. If their martial souls were ordinary, they wouldn’t be here!

However, Yu Tianlong felt as if his martial soul were being suppressed now. How could he not panic? Before today, he hadn’t expected his Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon to ever be suppressed by another martial soul. Furthermore, it was even another dragon-type martial soul! His unyielding desire to win suddenly took a huge blow, and he wore a solemn expression on his face.

“Begin!” Zheng Zhan wasn’t willing to bear the huge pressure anymore. He quickly moved his arm to signal the start of this duel.

Wang Qiu’er’s head was originally down, but after she heard Zheng Zhan, she quickly raised it, and her powdery-blue hair moved on its own, ﬂowing back behind her.

Something weird occurred. From the roots, the color of her hair started to change tremendously. It was as if a golden ﬂuid were ﬂowing from the roots of her hair and spreading down to its tips.

A bright golden light was released from her body, and a golden layer of ﬁne dragon scales quickly engulfed her form. The bright golden light easily illuminated her half of the stage. Wang Qiu’er demonstrated her overwhelming strength the moment the duel started. Her supporters became even more maniacal as they screamed hysterically at the sight.

Yu Tianlong didn’t rush forward, either. He took in a deep breath, and his chest expanded. A deafening, thunderous rumbling echoed out from his body. Bluish-purple dragon scales surfaced, starting from his right arm and quickly spreading to the rest of his body. Very quickly, he grew larger. Amid a blinding bluish-purple glow, two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings rose from his feet.

Lightning surrounded him, and painted his half of the stage a glowing bluish-purple.

The gold and bluish-purple lights were extremely dazzling. Before both parties had even clashed physically, they had already raised the excitement level of the spectators.

Wang Qiu’er opened her arms wide. She lifted her head and let out a sonorous dragon roar. Her voice shook the nine heavens, and caused the surrounding protective barriers to undulate. An intense golden fog rapidly rose from her body. Her six soul rings rose with this fog.

---

Wang Dong’er whispered to Huo Yuhao, “Qiu’er seems a little different today! Her ﬁghting intent is very strong!”

Huo Yuhao nodded slightly. He could also feel that Wang Qiu’er was different right now. She seemed to be even stronger than before. It wasn’t just in terms of her soul power, it was also in terms of the fusion of her spiritual and soul power.

When Huo Yuhao had faced Long Aotian earlier, he had demonstrated the realm of the Unity of Heaven and Man. Wang Qiu’er now seemed to show something similar to that. The only difference was that Wang Qiu’er’s fusion wasn’t with Heaven, but with her own martial soul!

This also meant that her Golden Dragon seemed to have undergone something similar to the Second Awakening of a body soul.

How was a second evolution possible if it wasn’t a body soul? This was very weird. Huo Yuhao wasn’t sure why, either. However, he was certain that Wang Qiu’er was very terrifying in this state. Even if his body were ﬁne, he believed he wouldn't stand much of a chance against her right now.

---

Yu Tianlong eventually made the ﬁrst move. Wang Qiu’er’s soaring aura had suppressed him until he couldn’t move. He was also afraid the Wang Qiu’er’s attack might overwhelm him if her aura was allowed to soar any further.

He rubbed his hands in front of him, and a bluish-purple ball of lightning instantly took shape. Yu Tianlong lunged forward with his left foot and mimicked a ﬂinging motion.

He held the lightning ball in his right hand. Suddenly, his ﬁrst, second, and third soul rings shone brightly, and countless bolts of lightning were released from his body. They started to gather towards the lightning ball in his hand.

Bei Bei was shocked when he saw that. “His control of lightning is very strong. No wonder he’s so conﬁdent.” Lightning was the most ruthless and unstable element. Controlling lightning was far more difﬁcult than controlling the other elements.

As the bolts of lightning gathered, Yu Tianlong’s lightning ball turned a darker and darker blue. After a few seconds, it turned black, a black that seemed capable of engulﬁng everything. Dark purple lightning ﬂickered around the black ball.

Even with the protective barriers to isolate them, the undulations of the lightning were still very terrifying. How much energy was needed to compress lightning until it turned black?

Yu Tianlong waved his right arm ahead, and the black lightning ball instantly turned into a streak of illusory light shooting towards Wang Qiu’er!

Wang Qiu’er’s eyes had turned completely golden as her roar ended. There was even a dim glow shining around the edges of her eyes. She shot out with no intention of dodging the pitch-black ball of lightning, which continued straight towards her.

The intense golden light from her body quickly gathered in her right hand. When she lifted her palm, it was already as shiny as a golden water crystal.

Boom!

Wang Qiu’er used her ﬁst to block the ball of lightning. It was her golden ﬁst, also known as the Golden Dragon’s Fist!

A tremendous boom reverberated, and caused all the lights to dim. The ball of lightning blew apart as its size expanded a hundredfold. It changed into a huge black lightning net that engulfed Wang Qiu’er.

The pitch-black lightning wanted to tear Wang Qiu’er apart.

Terrifying, dark-purplish bolts of lightning wreathed her.

Another boom sounded as a hole was promptly blown apart in the lightning net. Wang Qiu’er shifted her feet, and the steel plate underneath her sank slightly. She ﬂew forward towards Yu Tianlong like an arrow with unstoppable momentum.

How is this possible? Yu Tianlong was astonished. He hadn’t expected his Lightning Cage to be destroyed so quickly!

He had seen quite a few of Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁghts earlier. His Lightning Cage was targeted at her style. Wang Qiu’er was overbearingly forceful. The best way to beat her was by pestering and weakening her!

However, she was too strong, even his Lightning Cage was instantly overcome. Even though there were still small streaks of lightning dancing around her as she burst out, they were unable to penetrate her dragon scales.

Yu Tianlong also moved, as he didn’t have time to think. Another deafening dragon roar sounded. His body grew in size as he reached more than two and a half meters in height. His bluish-purple scales shone with razor-sharp edges.

As he lifted his right hand, he reached out towards Wang Qiu’er with his Lightning Dragonclaw.

Wang Qiu’er also lifted her right hand. Her spear converted into a streak of golden light that appeared in her palm. She swept her spear out, and the remnants of lightning around her body were guided towards the tip of her spear, and then ﬂung to one side.

It wasn’t that the Lightning Cage was useless against her. It was just that she had burst forward without any hesitation.

By the time Yu Tianlong realized this, his Lightning Dragonclaw had already been destroyed by Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon Spear. The two of them had ﬁnally clashed directly!

Wang Qiu’er pointed her spear forward, and was about to stab Yu Tianlong in the chest.

Yu Tianlong was also very strong. Just like Wang Qiu’er, he was most adept at close-combat ﬁghting.

He reached out towards the spear. At the same time, he shrank down and dropped his shoulder before moving forward.

Wang Qiu’er would never let him grab hold of her spear. She withdrew her spear behind her back and also dropped her shoulder. Their shoulders met, and she crashed into Yu Tianlong.

After Yu Tianlong’s body ballooned in size, he was extremely large. Wang Qiu’er’s slender ﬁgure seemed tiny in front of him!

As their vastly different bodies clashed against each other, Wang Qiu’er’s fans couldn’t help but hold their breath.

Wasn’t she being a little unwise to clash with him in this manner?

However, deafening cheers erupted in the next moment.

Crash! The golden and bluish-purple dragon scales collided with each other. Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong ﬁnally made contact.

Yu Tianlong didn’t even have time to see the look in Wang Qiu’er’s eyes before he felt a terrifying force surging towards him. He had always been very proud of his strength. However, he was ﬂung helplessly backwards this time, crashing into the protective barriers behind him.

However, Wang Qiu’er didn’t gain the absolute upper hand. The lightning around Yu Tianlong was very intense. After she knocked into him, her body was encircled by bluish-purple lightning once again, and she was stalled for a moment.

She’s too strong! Yu Tianlong was horriﬁed at this moment. He ﬁnally understood why many strong opponents were defeated by Wang Qiu’er. She was indeed deserving of her reputation!

However, this didn’t mean that he lost the duel, even though his strength was inferior to hers. As he bounced back, he opened his arms wide and roared into the sky. His fourth soul ring shone. Suddenly, a huge, bluish-purple dragon head two meters in height separated from his body and charged towards Wang Qiu’er.

The dragon head covered more than ﬁve cubic meters. Amidt the bluish-purple lightning, its beard, eyes and horns appeared very real.

For him to have reached this extent meant that Yu Tianlong was not far from becoming a seven-ringed Soul Sage. As Wang Qiu’er experienced a brief moment of numbness, her ﬁrst, second, and third soul rings lit up at the same time.

First soul skill – Golden Dragon Body. Second soul skill – Dragon’s Strength. Third soul skill – Golden Dragon’s Fist!

Her petite ﬁgure became even more slender. When she was almost two meters tall, her captivating body and looks became even clearer to the spectators.

A golden dragon head also appeared above her ﬁst. Compared to Yu Tianlong’s dragon head, hers was much smaller, but much more tangible. It looked like it had really been carved out of gold.

She advanced and unleashed her ﬁst.

Wang Qiu’er’s movements were always very simple and direct.

Two sonorous dragon roars reverberated. One was loud and clear, while the other was very low-pitched. They reverberated across the stage simultaneously.

The golden and bluish-purple dragon heads clashed against each other.

Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong also stared at each other at the same time.

Yu Tianlong was shocked to realize that Wang Qiu’er’s pupils had turned into two thin lines. Vertical pupils!

The pupils of dragons were vertical. However, Yu Tianlong and Wang Qiu’er were both humans. Yu Tianlong was already very conﬁdent in his control over his martial soul. However, he wasn’t able to make his eyes identical to that of his martial soul.

The closer the changes to his martial soul, the better a soul master was able to unleash the strength of his martial soul. Right now, Wang Qiu’er’s transformation was warning Yu Tianlong that her degree of fusion with her martial soul was undoubtedly greater than his. There were two dazzling glows of different sizes. One was large, and the other was small. However, the smaller one looked much more real. Even though Yu Tianlong’s lightning dragon head seemed very dominant, Wang Qiu’er was as steady as a rock as she stood in place.

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!…

A series of booms sounded. Yu Tianlong was smashed back into the protective barriers once again, while Wang Qiu’er also retreated a few steps. At the center of their collision, an elemental windstorm formed a huge hole in the ground with a diameter of one meter and an unknown depth, showing how much strength had been accumulated in the previous clash.

While she retreated, Wang Qiu’er’s attacks didn’t stop. She extended her right hand and thrust her spear forward. Her weapon pursued Yu Tianlong, aiming to stab him. A three-foot spear light shot forward, and was on the verge of piercing into Yu Tianlong.

Yu Tianlong was horriﬁed. He believed himself to be extremely adept in terms of offense, and he loved to attack, too. However, he was weaker than Wang Qiu’er, at least in terms of aura and offensive power!

Is she really an assault-type soul master at the same level as me?

As he thought of all this, his pride was also stirred. He faced his palms outward in front of him, and a pitch-black lightning ball instantly appeared. His ﬁfth soul ring shone.

Suddenly, the lightning around Yu Tianlong’s body turned black. The Golden Dragon Spear’s light stabbed the black lightning ball before it dissipated.

Wang Qiu’er had managed to regain her balance now, and wouldn’t let go of this opportunity. She leaped forward and pointed her actual spear at Yu Tianlong.

Yu Tianlong landed on the ground steadily. His lightning ball remained the same, but he shifted forward three feet. He used the lightning ball between his palms to meet the tip of the Golden Dragon Spear. When the tip of the spear touched the lightning ball, Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong’s bodies both let out low-pitched dragon roars. Yu Tianlong’s scales even opened up to resist the Golden Dragon Spear.

Wang Qiu’er was stunned. It was the ﬁrst time she had been blocked in the entire tournament, especially when she had relied on her strength and the power of her spear. Even when she had faced Huo Yuhao, he didn’t dare to face her spear directly!

Following this, Wang Qiu’er realized something wasn’t right.

Yu Tianlong’s surroundings turned pitch-black, and his scales also turned equally black. Terrifying black lightning was instantly unleashed outward, and the lightning ball between his hands seemed to become tangible. Even as Wang Qiu’er stabbed him with all her strength, he didn’t waver at all.

Wang Qiu’er was shocked, but she didn’t know that Yu Tianlong was even more astonished. In his opinion, Wang Qiu’er’s spear should be made of metal, and all metals conducted electricity to some extent. Right now, his soul skill had increased the lightning to its extreme. The strength of his lightning was even superior to ordinary seven-ringed Soul Sages!

However, this lightning didn’t spread to Wang Qiu’er through her spear. Wang Qiu’er’s spear didn’t conduct electricity!

His body jerked, and he roared into the sky. His ﬁfth soul ring turned into a halo that expanded outward, engulﬁng Wang Qiu’er. The lightning ball blew apart, along with the black lightning that had spread around him.

Lightning Prison, the ﬁfth soul skill of Yu Tianlong’s Blue Tyrant Lightning Dragon!

The lightning ball he had used to attack Wang Qiu’er in the beginning was a simpler version of the Lightning Prison, which reduced his consumption of soul power. In terms of strength, it was far inferior to the real Lightning Prison.

Wang Qiu’er felt numbness across her entire body as the terrifying lightning spread. The frightening explosion almost turned her body into dust, and the searing pain left her in extreme discomfort.

But Wang Qiu’er was a very tough character. Even against a strong opponent, she had always proved herself to be even stronger. The greater the pressure from her opponent, the more her ﬁghting potential was realized.

Her sixth soul ring shone, and a layer of bloody light covered her golden eyes. They turned scarlet-gold at this point, and her scales also expanded. Carrying a bright and bloody glow, they expelled the invading lightning.

She retracted her spear and stabbed it into the ground. At this point, her fourth soul ring lit up. A layer of dominant golden light erupted outward, her body as the center. This eruption process continued on and on.

Boom, boom, boom…!

There were three tremendous booms. Three layers of golden light surged out. The horrifying explosive force quickly spread out and neutralized the Lightning Prison!

This was Wang Qiu’er’s fourth soul skill, Golden Dragon Explosion!

There was no retreat and no compromise. There was only manic assault. This was the true meaning behind Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁghting style.

Yu Tianlong was delighted when he saw his Lightning Prison trap his opponent. However, when it was immediately blown apart by Wang Qiu’er’s Golden Dragon Explosion, he was stunned!

Wang Qiu’er’s cultivation soared under the Golden Dragon’s Bloodlust. Her terrifying strength was unleashed along with the Golden Dragon’s strength. Once again, Yu Tianlong’s Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon was trembling!

Wang Qiu’er focused her eyes, and her ﬁsts clenched around her spear.

Something strange occurred. Her spear seemed to melt into a ﬂuid that fused with her body through her palm. Instantly, it ﬂowed over her entire body. Wang Qiu’er’s ﬁfth soul ring also lit up at this point.

An elevated dragon roar resonated, and a huge golden dragon surfaced on her body. Wang Qiu’er went up on her toes before pushing. The golden dragon encircled her, and she charged straight towards Yu Tianlong with an unstoppable momentum.

Fifth soul skill, Golden Dragon’s Roar! This was Wang Qiu’er’s strongest offensive soul skill!

Yu Tianlong revealed a horriﬁed expression, but his sixth soul ring also lit up at the same time. As he rolled his hands, his scales turned black again. He leaned forward and arched his back. Suddenly, his scales ﬂipped upward, and Yu Tianlong’s head turned into a real dragon’s head.

He opened his mouth, and a clear blue crystalline ball was released from his mouth, ﬂying towards Wang Qiu’er.

Yu Tianlong’s sixth soul skill, Blue Lightning Dragon’s Breath! BOOM!

This was a clash between the strongest and the strongest!

When they clashed with each other, the entire stage was presented with a magniﬁcent scene. At the point of collision, blue and golden light scattered. There were bolts of lightning, arc-shaped glows, and the impacts of shockwaves. All these caused the protective barriers around the stage to undulate with rings of light, and the spectators were unable to see what was happening on the stage.

Who won, who lost?!

The spectators entered a very tense state, especially Wang Qiu’er’s supporters. This duel was too important to them. If Wang Qiu’er won, it would prove that she was the strongest dragon-type soul master in this tournament!

The lights lasted for seven to eight seconds before they slowly faded away.

The ﬁgures of Wang Qiu’er and Yu Tianlong were also slowly revealed. Wang Qiu’er was panting heavily. The golden light on her body had become weaker, and there was a streak of blood at the edge of her lips.

Yu Tianlong’s condition was even worse than hers. The scales on his right shoulder and chest had rolled up, and he was bleeding profusely.

It looked like he had been bitten by the golden dragon. His face was very pale.

Without a doubt, Wang Qiu’er had gained the upper hand in the previous clash.

Both of them were still as competitive as before, however. Yu Tianlong’s eyes were ﬁlled with a crazed look, perhaps because he was agitated after being hurt. He roared out, “I haven’t lost!”

Intense bolts of lightning appeared once again. However, they were no longer black, only bluish-purple like before. He wiped his left hand on his chest and right shoulder. A patch of bluish-purple lightning ﬂashed past, and he sealed his wounds, accompanied by the smell of burning ﬂesh.

His face contorted because of the intense pain. However, he grit his teeth and bore the pain stoically. He took a step forward with his left leg and ﬂew up. He opened his arms wide, as if he wanted to hug Wang Qiu’er.

Wang Qiu’er’s expression was still very cold. Her competitive will didn’t seem to waver because her opponent had gone crazy. She also moved her left leg forward and leapt into the air, not giving in at all as she barreled towards him.

Yu Tianlong’s arms expanded, and he slashed towards the sides of Wang Qiu’er’s body with his Lightning Dragon’s Claws.

He had once tested this attack before; even a huge granite boulder was blown to ashes after he hugged it with this attack!

After being dealt a huge blow by Wang Qiu’er, he forgot all about his romantic feelings. There was only a burning competitiveness in his heart. He wanted to win! Wang Qiu’er smacked her hands to her sides and resisted his attack forcefully. She was also very adept at using her trademark attacks!

Two booms sounded at the same time. The Golden Dragon edged out the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon once again. Even though Yu Tianlong had already tried his best for this attack, he still didn’t manage to gain any headway as his claws clashed with Wang Qiu’er’s shining, golden hands.

Wang Qiu’er grabbed onto his dragon claws and pulled them backward. She seemed to be pulling Yu Tianlong into her embrace.

However, Yu Tianlong saw her lifting her right knee in front of her chest.

Subconsciously, he wanted to lift his leg to kick her. However, her arms shook at this moment, and two waves of force spread through his arms. Yu Tianlong screamed in pain, and his arms were abruptly dislocated even though he was protected by the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon! Following this, Wang Qiu’er’s golden knee touched his chest, but she pointed it down immediately.

Wang Qiu’er was merciful towards him. When her knee hit his chest, she let go of his claws. Yu Tianlong was smashed to the ground. His entire body caved into the ﬂoor.

If Wang Qiu’er hadn’t let go of his hands, his arms would have been torn off as she struck him in the chest with her knee.

Victory had been decided at this point.

Wang Qiu’er drifted back to the ground in front of Yu Tianlong.

Yu Tianlong’s mouth was bleeding profusely. As he looked at the gloomy sky above, there was an indignant look on his face. However, he had indeed lost this ﬁght. Wang Qiu’er had even let him off twice, even though she could have seriously hurt him. She hadn’t torn his arms off, and she hadn’t struck the center of his chest. Otherwise, his sternum would have been shattered.

She’s too strong. She’s really too strong! I’ve lost. I can’t beat her. While our abilities aren’t too far apart, she’s able to repress me in every aspect.

Yu Tianlong shut his eyes indignantly. Blood still ﬂowed from his nose and mouth. However, the crazed look on his face slowly disappeared.

Zheng Zhan walked forward quickly and checked Yu Tianlong’s condition. After he did so, he immediately gestured.

“Shrek Academy, Wang Qiu’er wins.”

After Zheng Zhan announced the result, cheers erupted across the entire spectating crowd. Hysterical screams could be heard, and the spectators were evidently extremely excited at this point. Their Golden Dragon Lady had won! She had defeated Yu Tianlong!

Their Golden Dragon Lady was the number one dragon-type soul master in this tournament. She led had Shrek into the ﬁnals with her abilities! Everyone believed that the glory belonged to Wang Qiu’er. Wang Qiu’er had stolen the limelight from the rest of Shrek’s members!

Right now, cheers could also be heard in the resting area. When Wang Qiu’er’s right knee struck Yu Tianlong to the ground, all the main team members and substitutes from Shrek’s team jumped up in excitement. They couldn’t be bothered even when they ﬂipped the chairs and tables and quickly rushed out of the resting area.

When the Unbreakable Douluo announced the result, they immediately rushed up to the stage and came to Wang Qiu’er’s side. They encircled her and threw her into the air.

Victory! They had attained victory! This was Shrek’s glory.

Shrek Academy had made the ﬁnals once again! From the last tournament to this tournament, Shrek’s team had experienced the two toughest tournaments in their history!

In the last tournament, Shrek’s Seven Monsters had turned the tables. In this tournament, Wang Qiu’er was the one who did so!

So what if we are a one-man team? Wang Qiu’er ﬁrst curbed her own teammates using her dominant abilities and cold demeanor!

Apart from Huo Yuhao, everyone from Tang Sect also jumped up in excitement and started clapping.

They were also delighted that Shrek Academy had won. As members of Shrek’s Seven Monsters, they also carried Shrek’s glory on their shoulders! Seeing that Shrek’s team had entered the ﬁnals once again, they couldn’t help but recall everything that had happened in the last tournament. They too had toiled to win that tournament! All of them were feeling emotional at this point. Wang Dong’er was agitated. Ever since Wang Qiu’er had saved Huo Yuhao, she had experienced great emotional changes with regards to Wang Qiu’er. She knew deeply that nothing was going on between Huo Yuhao and Wang Qiu’er. On the stage that day, she had claimed that Wang Qiu’er was her sister. After that, she experienced even greater emotional changes. As she witnessed how Wang Qiu’er defeated Yu Tianlong, she felt as if she were the one on the stage. For an instant, she even thought that she had turned into Wang Qiu’er and fought Yu Tianlong herself.

Although Huo Yuhao couldn’t stand up and couldn’t cheer for Shrek, he was very moved and excited right now.

Victory! Qiu’er has really led Shrek into the ﬁnals through her individual abilities. Qiu’er, you’ve led your teammates to this stage entirely through your own determination and abilities! I know how much you must have sacriﬁced. Your abilities have also improved. You deserve to enter the ﬁnal match!

After the cheers had died down, Qiu’er was let down by her teammates. She didn’t seem very excited. She was just as cold as ever. She quickly walked to the side of the stage and jumped off.

Yu Tianlong had already returned to his resting area with the help of his teammates. Although his injuries weren’t light, he wasn’t too gravely hurt, as Wang Qiu’er had taken mercy on him.

As he saw Wang Qiu’er returning to the resting area, Yu Tianlong called out to her, a little hoarsely.

Wang Qiu’er twisted her head to look at him, “What?”

The look in Yu Tianlong’s eyes was a little complicated. “I’ve lost. I’m lost convincingly. My abilities are indeed inferior to yours. However, this doesn’t mean I’ll always be lousier than you. I’ll exceed you one day!”

“Anytime.” Wang Qiu’er was calm. It was as if victory was very normal for her.

Seeing that she was about to leave, he hurriedly said, “I’ll fulﬁll the terms of our bet. From now on, I’ll be your servant for three years.”

Wang Qiu’er furrowed her brow. “No need. As long as the Heavenly Dragon Sect concedes defeat, you’ll have fulﬁlled the terms of our bet.”

Yu Tianlong was very stubborn, “No. Since I made a promise earlier, I won’t go back on my word. When the tournament is over, I’ll be your servant. I’ll protect you for three years.”

From the time he lost until the time he reached the resting area, Yu Tianlong had already thought of many things, even though it was only a short period of time. I’ve lost. I’ve lost to Wang Qiu’er. After his craziness disappeared, her ravishing ﬁgure became more etched in his mind. He discovered he had fallen in love with this cold-hearted, yet strong Golden Dragon Lady!

It was only at this point that he understood why the leader from Shrek Academy had proposed that bet. Dignity didn’t seem very important in the face of love! He had decided to truly follow Wang Qiu’er for the next three years. He was conﬁdent in himself. Even though he had lost today, he didn’t think his cultivation was too far behind hers. In these three years, he needed to conquer her through his own hard work! He was going to convince her to be his woman!

Chapter 329: An Earlier Final Round!

With this thought in mind, Yu Tianlong even felt that he did not hurt as much anymore. Hence, he demonstrated his willingness to keep his side of the bargain to Wang Qiu’er as quickly as he could.

“It’s up to you,” Wang Qiu’er replied casually, turning to face her companions. “Let’s go, we’ll return to our hotel. In the afternoon, we’ll watch another semi-ﬁnal match.” With this, she strode forth in the direction of the Brilliant Delight Hotel.

Yu Tianlong sighed with admiration in his heart. Neither defeat nor victory fazes her, what a heroine!

Who would have expected the morning round to end so quickly? However, the timing of each round in the competition could not change so easily.

To ensure that they would all be in a good state, the teammates of the Tang Sect and the Holy Ghost Sect both went back to their hotels to rest. After they left, the exuberant and excited crowd took almost two hours to settle down. Almost everyone there was shouting “Golden Dragon Girl!”. Wang Qiu’er’s prestige was at an unprecedented level.

However, how could they know what she was thinking? When they were back at the hotel, Wang Qiu’er did not celebrate with her teammates. Instead, she retired quickly to her room to rest.

Everyone from Shrek’s team knew that Wang Qiu’er had been injured in this tournament. They all thought that she was trying to recuperate as fast as she could. Once she regained her full strength, she would prepare for the upcoming ﬁnal.

---

The Tang Sect gathered in Bei Bei’s room.

“I’m naturally happy that Shrek won, and I believe that everyone shares my sentiment. We have to uphold the honor of Shrek. From the bottom of my heart, I thank Qiu’er for continuing our glorious streak for Shrek,” Bei Bei said sincerely.

Everyone else nodded in agreement They were just as excited as those from Shrek over the win.

Then, Bei Bei’s voice changed as he continued in a more serious tone, “However, in the next semi-ﬁnal round, we’ll be up against a tough challenge. Comrades, whether or not we can advance and meet Shrek in the ﬁnal will depend on our performance later. We’ve already planned our strategy. Is there anything else anyone would like to add?”

Everyone shook their heads.

Bei Bei’s gaze turned sharp as he said, “With the Shrek’s victory, the Tang Sect can’t show any weakness. I know, because of Tang Ya, that everyone is worried about me. I wish to thank you for your concern, but also tell you that Shrek’s victory in the semi-ﬁnals is not only their glory, but ours, too! Please don’t care about Tang Ya. I believe that if her mind was still clear, she would be happy to see us doing our best for the Tang Sect. All we have to do is treat them like our opponents. There’s no need to think about anything else.”

“Tang Sect, victory!” Bei Bei shouted suddenly. At this moment, his reﬁned demeanor was completely replaced by a strong ﬁghting will.

“Tang Sect! Victory! Victory! Victory!” Shrek’s Seven Monsters, Na Na, Ji Juechen, Jing Ziyan, and even Nan Qiuqiu, all shouted loudly.

Everyone was clear that their opponent was much more powerful than Shrek. They did not even know their enemies well. However, there was no escape from this battle. If they lost, it would be extremely difﬁcult for Shrek to defeat the Holy Ghost Sect. The only thing they could do was try their best. Only through victory did they stand a chance!

Bei Bei inhaled and said, “Good, please go back and rest up, everyone. We’ll meet after lunch. Let’s adjust our mindsets and energy, and be prepared to deal with the strongest opponent we’ll meet in this tournament!”

--- Everyone returned to their respective rooms. Bei Bei closed the door to his room and sat down in the living room lounge.

The look on his face softened, and his face turned warm. “Tang Ya…”

---

The sky outside turned darker and darker. While it was noon, the light outside made it look like evening. The thick storm clouds in the air appeared to descend a bit. The heaviness in the air made everyone uneasy.

After the intense emotional roller-coaster of the morning, even the spectators seemed drained. They had come here early for a good seat. Right after the competition began, it had ended quickly. While Wang Qiu’er was able to rile them up, the wait until the afternoon round was way too long!

Many of them now sat on the ground and ate their food. A lot of them were on the brink of falling asleep. While it was cold and cloudy, it felt better than the stiﬂing heat. Furthermore, with so many people around, it was hard to feel the chill. Winter had yet to come.

Finally, someone stepped onto the main podium. The crowd started to rouse from their slumber.

Looking at the sky, it appeared that noon was close at hand.

Over at the resting zone, the ﬁrst to arrive was the team from the Heavenly Dragon Sect. Yu Tianlong had changed his clothes. Despite his pale face, he still walked with a conﬁdent gait. One could not tell that he was injured.

The other team members of the Heavenly Dragon Sect looked depressed. After all, they were eliminated despite having entered the top four. This was no small blow to them!

The arena was restored and further reinforced by noontime. The afternoon competition would be far more intense. One could almost imagine how it would go down. Those who were more perceptive could tell that this was the ‘ﬁnal’ of the tournament! In terms of strength, the multi- talented Tang Sect and the Holy Ghost Sect, which was comprised completely of evil soul masters, were both stronger than any of either’s previous opponents!

---

The Tang Sect arrived next.

Bei Bei stood at the front. His gaze was cold, and the smile on his face had disappeared. However, he still walked with conﬁdence.

Behind Bei Bei, Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao forward. Then, it was He Caitou, Xu Sanshi, Jiang Nannan, Xiao Xiao, and ﬁnally, Nan Qiuqiu, Nan Nan, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan.

The eleven of them quickly entered the waiting zone.

The crowd, who had completely woken up, started to discuss them intensely. While their goddess was not taking part in the second semi-ﬁnal, her sister, Wang Dong’er, was competing! She was just as pretty, and she also possessed the cultivation of a Soul Emperor!

Everyone loved to watch the Tang Sect in action. The main reason was because of their ever-changing tactics. In the previous round, even when they were at a disadvantage, they were able to work together and turn the tides on their opponent, the Snowdemon Sect, and obtain victory. That planning, strategizing, and change in tactics, as well as their strange soul skills, enchanted the audience.

Today, they were about to face the powerful Holy Ghost Sect.

What kind of match-up would this be?

The crowd grew more and more excited. As their voices grew louder and louder, the atmosphere started to heat up.

The Tang Sect were all rather quiet. When they entered the resting zone, they closed their eyes to rest, ensuring that they would be in their best possible state.

Very soon, the Holy Ghost Sect appeared.

Nine people came from the Holy Ghost Sect. Leading them was the Scorpion Tiger Douluo, Zhang Peng. The appearance of this Transcendent Douluo was a testament to the importance the Holy Ghost Sect placed on this tournament.

Behind Zhang Peng was the mysterious woman who inspired both a sense of familiarity and fear in Huo Yuhao at the same time. Behind her was Tang Ya, who looked much skinnier, as well as a group of evil soul masters.

With the arrival of the Holy Ghost Sect, the atmosphere became tensed up. Everyone wondered if the Tang Sect could stop their progress. The very thought of it made the crowd even more excited.

Some die-hard fans of Wang Qiu’er believed that the best-case scenario from this competition would be mutual defeat. If this happened, Shrek Academy could achieve an easy victory in the ﬁnals and become the champion!

Of course, other fans of Wang Qiu’er who believed that she was perfect thought that regardless of who won, she should be able to defeat her opponents even if they were at their peak. This would allow them to be crowned the undisputed champions!

No matter what happened, it was impossible to affect the two teams in the resting zone. At this moment, everyone was curious as to why the team led by Wang Qiu’er had yet to arrive. At this moment, there was not much time left until the semi-ﬁnal round of the afternoon. Were they not planning to watch?

Even the Heavenly Dragon Sect, who had been eliminated, came to watch. How could Shrek not come? After all, the winner of this round would be their next opponent!

---

Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, walked onto the arena ﬂoor once more. The quick victory in the morning had been a great relief to him. At this moment, his attention was at its peak. Naturally, he knew that this competition would be the most difﬁcult one to referee since the start of the tournament. However, he had been instructed by his superiors that he should intervene as little as possible in this round. The two sides should be allowed a free hand.

With this order, Zheng Zhan felt more at ease.

---

The main podium...

The Prince Regent and Crown Prince, Xu Tianran, suddenly asked the mysterious Imperial Tutor next to him, “Imperial Tutor, what are the Holy Ghost Sect’s odds against the Tang Sect?”

The Imperial Tutor replied in a deep voice, “Eighty percent.”

Xu Tianran looked at him in surprise. He knew that the Imperial Tutor had a high opinion of themselves, but he had never expected him to say eighty percent!

“Oh? Does this mean that you believe the Tang Sect only has a twenty percent chance of victory? Where does this twenty percent come from?” The Imperial Tutor replied plainly, “The Tang Sect has many tricks up their sleeve, particularly Huo Yuhao, who’s probably the core of their team. Their cooperation and coordination in the group round is something no team can emulate. This includes the Holy Ghost Sect. This may have something to do with Huo Yuhao’s spiritual-type martial soul. Their twenty percent chance of success lies in this uncertainty. As long as the competition goes on as normal, they have no chance at all. The disparity in strength is too wide.”

Xu Tianran nodded and said, “Okay then, let’s watch the exciting show that the Holy Ghost Sect has set up for us.” Xu Tianran did not have much interest in this match. Even though the Holy Ghost Sect, and by extension the Holy Ghost Church, had intimate ties with him, he did not like this evil soul master sect. The two parties used each other to their mutual beneﬁt. If the Holy Ghost Sect lost, there would be less pressure on him. If the Holy Ghost Sect won, it was a form of vengeance. If the Holy Ghost Sect became the overall champions, he would be under even more pressure. It might even have disastrous consequences for the Continental Advanced Soul Master Academy Soul Dueling Tournament, which had a history of more than ten thousand years!

Hence, no matter whether the Holy Ghost Sect won or lost, there would be pros and cons to Xu Tianran. He liked to watch competitions which he did not personally have a stake in. This helped him better appreciate them…

---

Quickly, the competition was about to start.

On the arena, Zheng Zhan proclaimed, “Coming up next is the second semi-ﬁnal match of this tournament. The two competitors are the Holy Ghost Sect and the Tang Sect. May the two sects please enter the waiting zone.”

When they heard his voice, Shrek’s Seven Monsters, other than Huo Yuhao, all stood up. A light shone in each of their eyes. At this moment, they had returned to the moment of their ﬁnal battle against the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy in the last tournament.

That round had been truly arduous for them, but they were eventually able to emerge as champions with their determination. The competition that faced them now was just as difﬁcult as the previous one. However, it was also able to stimulate their potential and desire to ﬁght. The stronger their opponent, the stronger their will to ﬁght!

Among them, the one with the greatest change in emotion was Bei Bei, who was their captain. At this moment, all Bei Bei thought about was protecting the honor of the Tang Sect.

Only by propelling the Tang Sect to glory could he fulﬁll his promise to Tang Ya. At the same time, this was the best way for Tang Ya to regain her mind!

On the other side, the group from the Holy Ghost Sect was silent. Led by Tang Ya, seven of them stood up as they walked toward the waiting zone. A dark and mysterious aura could be felt from them, just like the weather today.

Quickly, the two sides gathered in their respective waiting areas.

Huo Yuhao turned to look at Bei Bei and nodded. Bei Bei patted his shoulder. Between the two of them, nothing needed to be said.

“Individual elimination round, may the team members from both sides approach the arena.”

A short youth from the Holy Ghost Sect quickly ran up. In the blink of an eye, he was on the arena. His movements were as gentle as a leaf.

Over on the Tang Sect’s side, Bei Bei, who sat at the front, stood up. Leaping from the balls of his feet, he quickly entered the arena.

Bei Bei’s appearance surprised the Holy Ghost Sect. While he did not ﬁght often, they were able to gather from their research that this reﬁned and handsome youth was the eldest disciple of the Tang Sect and the captain of the Tang Sect team for this tournament.

Who knew that he would be the ﬁrst to ﬁght in the individual elimination round?

Chapter 330: Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture

In everyone’s eyes, while Bei Bei might be a Soul Emperor, he did not seem to be as powerful as Wang Qiu’er. Hence, why would he suddenly use a tactic similar to Shrek’s? By sending the captain up ﬁrst, it would be a massive blow to the entire team if the captain were to lose!

However, Bei Bei had already gone up. This was a reality no one could change.

The two contenders walked simultaneously to the center of the arena and soon stood before the Unbreakable Douluo.

Zheng Zhan looked at the two of them and said in a low voice, “Please state your names.”

“Tang Sect, Bei Bei.”

“Holy Ghost Sect, Ji Li.” Ji Li? This name is auspicious indeed. Too bad he’s an evil soul master. (TL Note: ‘Ji Li’ means auspicious in Chinese.)

The protective barrier around the arena started to rise. The match was about to start!

“Both sides, to your places.”

Bei Bei looked deep into his opponent’s eyes. Ji Li, who had a short stature, had a pair of dark eyes. His pupils were a weird inky-green, and ﬂuctuated continuously. He looked like a venomous snake stalking its prey.

His opponent’s dark and menacing aura did not affect Bei Bei. At this moment, Bei Bei brimmed with a powerful aura.

The two sides turned and walked off. Bei Bei soon arrived at his end of the arena.

Ji Li reached his end of the arena at the same time. The two sides stared at each other. The Unbreakable Douluo Zheng Zhan looked at the main podium, then at the sky. Finally, he raised his right arm high into the air.

“Begin!”

With his bellow, the second semi-ﬁnal round started.

Bei Bei’s ﬁghting style was vastly different than before. With Zheng Zhan’s announcement, he roared loudly and ﬁercely, to the point where the world was drowned out. His body grew in size, and purplish-blue dragon scales soon appeared and covered his entire body.

If Bei Bei had not fought in the ﬁrst round, the crowd would not have found it so obvious. However, the morning round had already let them witness a showdown between a Golden Dragon and a Blue Lighting Tyrant Dragon!

When Bei Bei released his martial soul, the crowd instantly thought, Even this soul master from the Tang Sect has a dragon martial soul, and it resembles Yu Tianlong’s Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon almost perfectly! How could they not be surprised?

Bei Bei only fought in the group component of the quarter- ﬁnal round. His performance was average, and nowhere as exciting as Xu Sanshi’s. However, the Heavenly Dragon Sect noticed his martial soul, especially its mutation.

---

Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon? Yu Tianlong’s eyes narrowed into slits. This meant that the two of them might be related by blood. In the quarter-ﬁnal round, his scales seemed to have turned golden, but it was a different shade of gold than Wang Qiu’er. The golden light from Bei Bei’s body looked paler than Wang Qiu’er’s, but it was even more glaring. Too bad the protective soul barrier was there, which prevented him from ﬁnding out what type of martial soul Bei Bei possessed.

Due to his martial soul being the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon, Yu Tianlong was able to better understand such martial souls. He knew that among the many variants of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul, his pure one might not be the strongest. Ten thousand years ago, his ancestor Yu Xiaogang’s martial soul had already started to mutate. Its power became weaker, but when he combined forces with his allies to form the Golden Triangle, he could summon the powerful Golden Dragon.

Bei Bei’s mutant Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul was pale-gold, and he came from Shrek Academy. Does this mean he’s descended from Yu Xiaogang?

With this thought in mind, Yu Tianlong looked at Bei Bei more favorably than before. Furthermore, Bei Bei’s opponent was an evil soul master. As an orthodox soul master, he had no reason to support the evil soul master. Hence, he cheered for his close blood relative from the Tang Sect silently.

At this moment, another group of people ﬁnally entered the resting area. Yu Tianlong was stunned. Wang Qiu’er had ﬁnally come! She had brought the team from Shrek Academy, too. She appeared to be slightly ﬂustered, but fortunately, she did not miss the competition.

Wang Qiu’er sat in the front. When she noticed that the ﬁrst to go up was Bei Bei, she appeared to sigh in relief. Then, she stood up and beckoned Dai Huabin over as she whispered something to him.

A look of confusion crossed Dai Huabin’s face, but he quickly nodded and replaced her. He then took over her spot. The other members of the team from Shrek all moved one seat forward and ﬁnally, the last seat emptied out. Wang Qiu’er then sat down in the last seat. She closed her eyes and appeared to be meditating.

What is she doing? Yu Tianlong looked curiously at Wang Qiu’er. As the captain, why is she sitting all the way in the back? Could it be that the injuries I inﬂicted on her this morning are too severe, and she needs to focus on recuperating?

That’s impossible! In my state, even though my injuries were worse than hers, it didn’t stop me from watching this match. With her Golden Dragon martial soul, she should’ve recovered completely by now. What’s she doing?

He did not understand Wang Qiu’er’s actions at all. However, Yu Tianlong did not let Wang Qiu’er occupy his attention. The competition in the arena had ﬁnally started!

------

Bei Bei roared, and two yellow, two purple, and two black soul rings started to rise. The dazzling scales of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon soon covered his entire body. Even his arms looked thicker and stronger. A layer of blue light shone over his hair.

He propelled himself toward his opponent at blazing speed.

Ji Li charged forward too. His entire body appeared weightless as he ﬂoated toward the center of the arena.

Neither side was moving very quickly. At the very least, they were not as fast as Wang Qiu’er. However, in two breaths, they still reached the center of the arena.

Bei Bei lifted his hand and he slashed at his opponent with his Thunderous Dragon Claw.

The aura of his Thunderous Dragon Claw was not as eye- catching as Yu Tianlong’s. A closer look would reveal that the size of Bei Bei’s Thunderous Dragon Claw was smaller than Yu Tianlong’s. Fewer sparks of electricity circled it too.

For soul skills, size never correlated with absolute power. Most of the time, size and power exhibited an inverse relationship.

When Yu Tianlong saw this attack, a look of shock crossed his face. In terms of control over electricity, Bei Bei wasn’t any weaker than him!

Ji Li from the Holy Ghost Sect reacted in a very curious way. Faced with the powerful Thunderous Dragon Claw, his body contracted, and then an ominous, light-blue gas poured from his body. Following that, his small body started to expand. His black top soon split open, and an odd scene occurred.

After expanding, Ji Li’s ﬁrst and third soul rings started to shine with light. A layer of blue-grey scales covered his upper body, and he suddenly seemed immensely strong. His lower limbs became shorter, and muscles wrapped around his lower torso. His head became triangular in shape, and his lips protruded to reveal a mouthful of fangs.

As his head changed shape, no one could tell what his original form was. His face, now covered with scales, looked extremely evil. His eyes glowed with a terrifying light.

His arms became exceptionally thick, and by crossing them in front of him, he was able to block Bei Bei’s Thunderous Dragon Claw. Following that, his left leg stepped out, and one could see that it had grown in size, too. Likewise, it was covered with dense, grey scales. When his leg touched the ground, one could hear a loud boom, and a powerful wave of energy rushed toward Bei Bei.

This wave of energy was also greyish-blue, and it had a bloodthirsty feel to it. After it appeared, it took the shape of a huge mouth that resembled some kind of beast.

Bei Bei remained fearless. A layer of white light shone from his body to form a light barrier. “Poof!” When the energy wave hit the barrier, it dissipated quickly.

Class 6 protective soul barrier!

The Tang Sect not only had martial souls, but also soul tools!

When he saw the protective soul barrier Bei Bei suddenly unleashed, Ji Li was stunned. At this moment, Bei Bei was already in front of him. He reached out with his right arm, which instantly increased in length. The sharp claws of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon slashed down on Ji Li’s head.

At that moment, electric light pulsated, and the Thunderous Dragon Claws struck ﬁrst. Behind those claws were the Bei Bei’s actual dragon claws!

Ji Li didn’t even try to dodge. He reached out with a pair of sharp claws too. First, he shattered the Thunderous Dragon Claws, and then he reached for Bei Bei’s actual claws. Not only that, but Ji Li’s small eyes shone with an icy-cold light. His protruding lips and fangs reached forward, and a purplish-black tongue that resembled an arrow ﬂew toward the center of Bei Bei’s forehead.

Attacking with his tongue, this soul master was weird indeed. So far, in this tournament, no one had seen this before. However, one had to admit that it was too sudden.

Bei Bei subconsciously raised his left hand to block it.

His Class 6 protective soul barrier was still activated, but the purplish-black tongue pierced through it. Then, the tongue touched Bei Bei’s dragon claws.

There was an explosion, and Bei Bei stumbled backward. His right claw did not manage to make contact with his opponent.

With his tongue alone, Ji Li was able to make a Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon retreat. What kind of power was this? Furthermore, smoke started to appear from Bei Bei’s left palm.

Bei Bei reacted instantly. Lightning danced on his right hand, and he swiped at it with his sharp claws, cutting the scales in the center of his palm off immediately. Only that way could he avoid the corrosive effect of the poison there!

The hardest part about defeating evil soul masters was that no one understood them very well. Their battling methods and styles were often impossible to predict and imagine.

With that one touch, Bei Bei was at a disadvantage. Fortunately, he had the powerful defenses of his Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon. If not, he may have had to cut off his own hand!

------

In the waiting zone, Xiao Xiao suddenly exclaimed in shock, “I know! Braineater! His martial soul is a Braineater.”

Everyone looked at her. Xiao Xiao then said in a low voice, “I heard teacher talking about a terrifying soul beast that lives in the south of the continent. It’s called the Braineater. It subsists off the brain juices of all living organisms, and is extremely cruel and bloodthirsty. Once a Braineater appears, it will cause panic in the local region. With just one or two Braineaters around, an entire town will become a dead zone. Both humans and beasts will be found with a small hole in their forehead, with all their brain juices sucked cleanly out from that hole.

“Teacher said that the Braineater is an extremely horrible soul beast. Once it’s discovered, the local soul masters will do their best to hunt it down. The Star Luo Empire even has a task force dedicated to killing them. Hence, this soul beast is almost extinct. I never expected to see a human with this martial soul.”

No one had seen a Braineater before. Just like Xiao Xiao had said, it was almost extinct. No one had expected it to appear as a martial soul.

Huo Yuhao quickly asked, “What're its abilities? What are its weaknesses?”

Xiao Xiao’s teacher was Elder Xuan’s disciple. Elder Xuan had seen many things, and naturally understood the Braineater well. Xiao Xiao said, “The Braineater is very strong, particularly its straw-like tongue. When it attacks, it is extremely powerful. Normally, they use their tongue to feed on the brains of its prey. Other than strength, the Braineater moves very quickly, too. Its defenses are extraordinary, and its only weakness is that it can’t attack from range. Hence, to hunt a Braineater, one has to attack and suppress it from afar before ﬁnally killing it.”

When he heard this piece of information, Huo Yuhao nodded. A golden light shone in his eyes but they quickly returned to normal.

On the arena, Bei Bei was forced back by Ji Li’s tongue. However, Ji Li had no intention of letting him go. He stomped down on the ground and bounced up. A pair of giant claws slashed at Bei Bei’s head. At the same time, his thin, sharp, and powerful tongue shot out toward Bei Bei’s face once more.

In the face of his opponent’s strong attacks, Bei Bei remained extremely calm. The third soul ring on his body shone, and the strands of lightning around his body became denser. A powerful bluish-purple light shone brightly. As Bei Bei retreated, his body started to ﬂash in and out of sight rapidly. It was not terribly fast, but in that instant, it appeared extremely mysterious. This was a Tang Sect Secret Technique, the Ghost Shadow Perplexing Track!

Ji Li’s tongue brushed past Bei Bei’s head by inches. At that moment, Bei Bei was already next to him. A pair of dragon claws grabbed his left arm.

In terms of power, how could a Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon be weaker than a Braineater?

Ji Li was surprised by Bei Bei’s sudden evasion. He shrieked in a high-pitch voice. His body turned in mid-air, and his arms, which were like two hammers, smashed in Bei Bei’s direction.

Two deafening thuds were heard; Bei Bei retreated by three steps. However, his dragon claws had already left ten white scars on Ji Li’s right arm. He was even able to tear off some of his scales.

Furthermore, strengthened by his third soul skill, Thunderous Fury, it was impossible for Ji Li to completely block Bei Bei’s lightning. Electric light shone on his right arm, and he lost all feeling in it.

However, before Bei Bei could continue his attack, Ji Li swung his tongue around and lashed out with it once more.

The speed and strength of his tongue were too powerful. Its penetrative ability was extremely strong. Bei Bei’s arm still throbbed with pain from the contact just now.

No matter how powerful Bei Bei’s dragon scales were, he did not wish to be pierced by the tongue! Earlier, he was only able to block it with a Class 6 protective soul barrier and his arm.

It could be said that Ji Li’s tongue was his most powerful killing tool. No matter how the battle went, as long as one was pierced by his tongue, it was over, and the victim might even die.

At such a short range, the radius of Ji Li’s attack was extremely large. Even if Bei Bei wanted to dodge, it was too late.

At this moment, Bei Bei made a strange movement. Faced with the sharp tongue, he did not dodge or try to resist. Instead, he clasped his hands in front of him, as if he were praying.

In that instant, countless sparks of electricity, all densely- packed together, appeared. They resembled a tiny forest of lightning.

“Is this Vigorous Thunderbolt?” Huo Yuhao said in disbelief.

If not for the second soul ring that shone from Bei Bei’s body, he would not dare to say this.

Vigorous Thunderbolt was originally meant to be deployed around the user. It would then turn into a web of electricity that could attack its opponent like a domain-type soul skill. However, Bei Bei had reduced it to an incredibly small size between his palms. One could only imagine the amount of control required!

Ji Li’s tongue pierced through the dense forest of lightning and thunder with ease. It seemed that the sharp tongue would easily reach Bei Bei. At that moment, everyone from the Tang Sect stood up. As they knew about the terrifying nature of the Braineater, they were even more fearful.

Over on the Holy Ghost Sect’s side, Tang Ya, who sat at the front, grabbed the armrests of her seat with her hands. Immediately, the armrests were crushed into powder.

The Scorpion Tiger Douluo’s eyes narrowed, and a severe expression crossed them. However, he did nothing. His attention was centered on Ji Li.

Oddly, the person at the center of it all, Bei Bei, looked extraordinarily calm. His eyes were still as he looked at the purplish-red, triangular-shaped tongue approached him. He had no intention of dodging it.

Stop!

Ji Li’s tongue ﬁnally stopped in the end, only two inches away from Bei Bei. His dark-red tongue dripped with a clear liquid. A bloody odor permeated the surroundings. Lightning and thunder twisted and turned around his tongue, expanding in size. Ji Li wanted to pierce forward with his tongue, which was indeed moving forward slowly. However, compared to his speed before, it was way too slow. The two sides were at a stalemate.

The Tang Sect, who were all standing except for Huo Yuhao, sighed in relief.

Wang Dong’er thumped her chest and said, “Elder brother scared all of us.”

Xu Sanshi said, “He did it deliberately. With Bei Bei’s personality, he would never do something that he’s not conﬁdent of. That guy is screwed. Look at him, in terms of application and usage of soul skills, Bei Bei surpasses even me. Ah, at ﬁrst, we weren’t that far apart in terms of strength. However, ever since he obtained his ﬁfth soul skill, the difference became more and more obvious. Even after I got my Xuanwu’s Domain, all I can do is to defend myself against him. Bei Bei is devious and sly. He wouldn’t go up ﬁrst if he wasn’t conﬁdent in himself.” The one who understood Bei Bei’s ﬁghting abilities was naturally the one who had known him the longest, and the one who sparred with him the most often, Xu Sanshi.

At ﬁrst, Huo Yuhao had known his elder brother very well. However, he had left Shrek Academy for two and-a-half years. When he came back, so many things had happened that he had not had much time to truly interact with him.

When he heard Xu Sanshi’s words, Huo Yuhao was relieved. While Xu Sanshi might appear unreliable at times, at crucial moments like this, he would not comfort everyone without solid reasons.

As Shrek’s Seven Monsters talked, there were new developments surrounding the stalemate on the arena.

Two inches, one and-a-half inches, one inch.

The odorous tongue was approaching Bei Bei slowly. Everyone knew that if he were touched by that tongue, it would be a catastrophe for Bei Bei. However, in this stalemate, Bei Bei’s body started to change too. A low dragon roar sounded, which slowly became louder and louder. The blueish-purple electricity around him became brighter and brighter, and soon, it had turned golden.

The thick armor-like scales on him became transparent, and his body now seemed to be covered by a layer of golden crystals. An intense aura of light started to rise, and the dense forest of electricity in the palms of his hands gradually turned from bluish-purple to gold!

As electric light ﬂashed and electricity twisted and turned, the progress of the tongue became slower and slower. Ji Li’s thick body was exerting all its strength. He planted his legs ﬁrmly on the ground, and his ﬁrst and third soul rings began to shine brightly with light. Even his second soul ring started to shine!

His ﬁrst three soul rings increased his power. Hence, this allowed the physical attributes of his body to converge with that of a Braineater. He now possessed the strength and speed of a Braineater. In fact, he had been able to use the innate ability of a Braineater when he received his ﬁrst soul skill, allowing his head to transform into the shape of a Braineater. As for his remaining four soul skills, it was not that he did not want to use them. Instead, in this condition, he could not use them.

That was right, his tongue was his strongest offensive ability. Many times, however, his strongest ability was also his weakest.

Evil soul masters had two traits. First of all, their ﬁghting styles were not widely accepted by the general populace. Secondly, their cultivation could increase rapidly.

Ji Li, with his Braineater martial soul, was able to rapidly increase his own strength by devouring his enemies’ brains, regardless of whether they were humans or soul beasts. The stronger his victims, the faster his cultivation would increase.

When his martial soul ﬁrst awoke, even he himself did not think that he could become a soul master, as he continued to live aimlessly. When he was twelve years old, he was discovered by the Holy Ghost Church, and ﬁnally started his training. In just eight years, he was able to progress from a clueless teen with just Rank 2 soul power to a Rank 60 evil Soul Emperor. This increase would be impossible for ordinary soul masters!

Furthermore, as his cultivation increased ceaselessly with each brain he devoured, his mental state and personality started to distort as well. This was a common occurrence among most evil soul masters.

However, the reason he could devour brains was because of his tongue. His tongue, likewise, was the most important and most powerful aspect of his Braineater martial soul. Once his tongue was hurt, he would be severely weakened.

Hence, Ji Li could only withdraw his tongue to use a more powerful soul skill, or use his tongue to kill Bei Bei!

With his twisted personality, faced with a Soul Emperor and the possibility of eating his brain, how could he choose the latter? A twisted mentality was a common weakness among evil soul masters!

The golden electric light grew stronger and stronger. As he looked at the approaching tongue, a cold look crossed Bei Bei’s face.

His clasped dragon claws started to shine. A bright gold light instantly fused with the lightning between his palms, turning it into a golden electric ball of light.

With a cry of pain, Ji Li ﬁnally realized that something was amiss, and he no longer dared to pierce forward. Instead, he tried to withdraw his tongue with all his might. However, at this moment, it was way too late.

One had to admit that his tongue was strong. Even after it had been zapped by electricity, it was still not destroyed.

However, this was not Bei Bei’s attack. The real reason why he had controlled his opponent was so that he could complete his transformation from Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon to Radiant Holy Dragon.

A terrifying electric light instantly expanded. Bei Bei’s body trembled. He gripped tightly with his left dragon claw as he controlled the ball of golden light that was pulling on Ji Li’s tongue. He then raised his right hand.

Bei Bei’s ﬁfth soul ring started to shine brightly. The jet-black soul ring appeared to have turned golden. Following that, Bei Bei’s right dragon claw regained its human shape. However, it was completely covered with golden scales.

Then, the shadow of a huge Radiant Holy Dragon appeared behind him. His right hand instantly transformed into golden crystal. His scales became blurred, and a loud dragon roar started to sound from Bei Bei’s mouth. His palm came smashing down on Ji Li’s tongue.

“Crack!” A thunderous boom sounded.

Earlier, none of his attacks could injure his opponent. Now, with this palm, a weird scene appeared.

It was as if a ball of wild thunder had been unleashed from his palm. With a cry of agony, Ji Li’s tongue was covered with golden electric light.

Bei Bei pulled forcefully with his left hand, and Ji Li’s body tumbled forward uncontrollably. His eyes betrayed a look of shock, and the bluish-gray scales on his body started to crackle with golden electric light as well.

Bei Bei’s kicked forward, and in the blink of an eye, he was already in front of Ji Li. He reached out with his hands and launched three palm-strikes at Ji Li. The palm-strikes landed on his shoulders and chest.

Ji Li was dumbfounded. His tongue remained stifﬂy straight, and his entire body shivered. When Bei Bei’s fourth palm- strike hit his chest, his entire body was already covered with golden electric lightning bolts as thick as an arm. All the scales on his body opened up.

---

On the main podium, the mysterious Imperial Tutor, who sat next to the Prince Regent, Crown Prince Xu Tianran, lifted his right hand and smashed down on the armrest of his chair.

Not a single sound could be heard, but the armrest of the chair disappeared. “Dragon God Douluo Mu En’s Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture was actually passed down...”

Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture? To Xu Tianran, this was an extremely foreign name. However, it was enough to shock and infuriate the Imperial Tutor. Evidently, it was quite a powerful soul skill.

---

After four palm-strikes, Bei Bei slowly straightened. He did not continue his attack, but instead retreated. He raised his hands and the golden light around him faded away. He retracted his martial soul and soul power as he stood there in the arena.

Zheng Zhan, the referee, was stunned.

While Bei Bei had landed four direct hits on his opponent, his opponent should have been able to endure those four strikes with his defensive prowess! While these four palm- strikes had appeared intimidating, causing Ji Li’s body to shake with each strike, and a vast amount of electric light was released, he could not have lost just like that. After all, he was an evil soul master!

However, Bei Bei’s actions proved that the match was indeed over. This was because he had already taken out a Milk Bottle, and was silently replenishing his soul power. His eyes were closed as he stood in the center of the arena.

---

In the audience, a tall ﬁgure standing silently close to the arena slowly said, “Perfect.”

“Perfect?” Next to him, a stunningly beautiful young woman asked in surprise, “Aotian, in your eyes, is this perfect?”

That was right. The tall ﬁgure was the most powerful soul master among the younger generation of disciples in the Body Sect, Long Aotian. The woman next to him was naturally Princess Wei Na. Long Aotian nodded with a dark expression. “It’s no shame to lose to the Tang Sect. Bei Bei concealed his power well. His ﬁfth soul skill is truly powerful indeed.”

Wei Na was confused. “It doesn’t seem to be much?!...”

Long Aotian looked at her from the corner of his eyes, sighed, and said, “That’s because you are not yet at that level. Hence, you think it’s ordinary. Just now, his spiritual power, soul power, soul skill, and strategy all combined into one perfectly. That is why such a perfect attack formed. While it seemed to have just been four palm-strikes, each of his palms shook me to the core. That day, when we were competing, if he had used this attack, even I would not expect to win. I would have had to use my Martial Soul True Body to win, and even so, I would have been severely injured. Furthermore, I still do not know what his sixth soul skill is. Shrek Academy lives up to its name indeed! Shrek’s Seven Monsters have all concealed their power well. Bei Bei is even more terrifying than Xu Sanshi!”

A look of shock appeared on Wei Na’s face. She trusted Long Aotian completely, and she also knew that he was incredibly proud. When even he respected Bei Bei this much… Wei Na chuckled bitterly and said, “I feel that we’ve underestimated the Tang Sect. Before we leave Radiant City, we must ﬁnd a chance to better our ties with them.”

Long Aotian nodded and grunted in agreement.

---

In the arena, Ji Li trembled violently, swaying around as if he were drunk. Finally, his legs went soft as he fell to his knees.

Following that, his entire body started to tremble. The scales on his body started to drop off piece-by-piece. He mumbled, “Whew, whew,” but he could not string a sentence together.

Rays of golden light started to seep out from his body. Gradually, the golden light solidiﬁed, and then started to spread in all directions. The odorous smell from his body faded away, and was replaced by a clear scent of something that had just been bathed by powerful sunlight.

Boom!

Ji Li’s body exploded into countless tiny pieces. Weirdly, no blood spurted out from his body, and no ﬂesh ﬂew from it. His body burst open, and then turned into ashes underneath the golden light.

The intense golden light remained where it was and then, turned into a miniature version of the Golden Holy Dragon. It lasted only a few seconds before disappearing.

The audience was stunned into silence by this!

The scene was way too shocking. No one could have imagined it. What soul skill is this? Why is it so powerful!?

The battle did not last very long. At ﬁrst, Bei Bei had appeared to be at a disadvantage. The evil soul master, Ji Li, was unpredictable and powerful. In particular, his tongue and his powerful defenses seemed to have forced Bei Bei into a corner.

However, the end of this battle came so quickly. The four thunderous booms seemed capable of blowing everyone’s hearts up. A Soul Emperor-level evil soul master died in battle, just like that!

---

The Tang Sect’s waiting zone...

Huo Yuhao sat there as he looked dumbly at Bei Bei. He mumbled to himself, “This, this is teacher’s Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture! Elder brother is able to use this soul skill. No wonder he did not want to use his ﬁfth soul skill when he sparred against us. It’s actually the Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture! With Sovereign’s Descent as its foundation, and with the Golden Holy Dragon martial soul as its source, it’s able to destroy everything! Furthermore, it will evolve as one’s cultivation improves. It’s a powerful soul skill representative of a true Titled Douluo, or even a Transcendent Douluo, or even an Ultimate Douluo!”

Even though Huo Yuhao was a direct disciple of Mu En, he’d only inherited Sovereign’s Descent, the Dragon God Douluo’s many experiences, and his research into martial souls. After all, his martial soul was unlike his teacher’s. There was no way for him to emulate his teacher’s power.

However, Bei Bei could do so! Bei Bei was able to evolve his Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul into a Radiant Holy Dragon. Mu En’s newly-researched ability tapped into the power of the Radiant Holy Dragon as its blueprint and so Bei Bei could emulate it. As Mu En’s disciple, Bei Bei had trained with him since he was a child. While Huo Yuhao had inherited his experience, knowledge, and ﬁghting style, which had helped him expand his knowledge, make more discoveries of his own, and ultimately ﬁnd his own path, Bei Bei followed Mu En’s path, and had inherited the Dragon God Douluo’s essence!

Was the Golden Dragon Girl, Wang Qiu’er, the most powerful soul master with a Dragon martial soul in this tournament?

This thought was suddenly in the minds of everyone spectating this match.

The Tang Sect versus the Holy Ghost Sect, individual elimination round one. Tang Sect, victory! Ji Li, a member of the Holy Ghost Sect, dead!

Chapter 331: Dragon Emperor Realm Quake

In the resting zone, the Tiger Scorpion Douluo Zhang Peng, who sat at the back of the Holy Ghost Sect, stood up with a dark expression on his face. He mouthed something to those in the waiting zone. No one knew what he was saying.

In the waiting zone, Tang Ya, who stood at the front, turned to look at the Tiger Scorpion Douluo. Then, she nodded in his direction.

Huo Yuhao had been observing the two of them. His gaze likewise fell onto the familiar woman next to him. Is she my sister? No matter what, he had to ﬁnd out the truth after this tournament ended.

Bei Bei stood in the arena. He continued to absorb soul power from the Milk Bottle. He was not perturbed at all by what was going on around him.

Over on the Holy Ghost Sect’s side, under Tang Ya’s beckoning, another team member leapt onto the arena.

This person was extremely tall, at least two meters, but at the same time, he was extremely skinny. He looked as if he were a twig. His long black robes hung on his frame like an old sack.

His movements were evidently very stiff, and he was not very fast, either. He walked slowly and rigidly toward the center of the arena, as if his knees could not bend.

“State your names.”

“Tang Sect, Bei Bei.”

“Holy Ghost Sect, Wang Xiaolei.” Wang Xiaolei’s voice was raspy and cold. It seemed to reverberate slightly in the air. It was vastly different from that of a normal person.

When he saw Wang Xiaolei walk onto the arena, a change happened in Huo Yuhao’s eyes. His lips moved as he said something to Bei Bei up in the arena. Only then did Bei Bei open his eyes again. He put his Milk Bottle away.

“Will both participants please move back and prepare for the match to begin?”

Bei Bei slowly walked to the end of the arena. Wang Xiaolei of the Holy Ghost Sect did the same as he ambled stifﬂy over. His stiff, slow movements made him appear wizened.

The crowd quieted down. One match did not mean everything. While many people thought that Bei Bei’s power rivaled Wang Qiu’er’s, he had appeared less often than she had. Many wanted to see if he had gotten by so far by luck or by skill.

Before this round had started, not many people thought that the Tang Sect had a chance. After all, among ordinary folks and normal soul masters, evil soul masters were mysterious, powerful, and bloodthirsty.

No one would have imagined that an ordinary soul master could beat an evil soul master under equal conditions.

However, their mindset now started to change. Bei Bei was able to prove through his actions that these evil soul masters were not invincible. While they were scary, they could still be killed by ordinary soul masters of the same level.

Of course, everyone could see that Ji Li of the Holy Ghost Sect had been careless. Before he could even use his most powerful soul skills, he had been slain. Evidently, he had underestimated his opponent. Now that the Tang Sect had killed one of their opponents, they had gained an advantage in both the individual elimination round and the group round. However, this was not an absolute advantage. The second round was just as important.

The protective soul barriers started to rise. The Unbreakable Douluo stood at the center of the arena as he looked at Bei Bei, who had walked to the edge of the arena and was wearing a slight, elegant smile on his face.

As the referee, in his eyes the Holy Ghost Sect was not the only mysterious sect anymore. While he had refereed many rounds with the Tang Sect, they now appeared to be shrouded in another veil of mystery, too... The Tang Sect was able to conceal their abilities so well. In the previous round, facing the powerful soul masters from the Body Sect, they did not even use their full strength. Only now had Bei Bei unleashed his powerful ﬁfth soul skill.

While Zheng Zhan was a Class 9 soul engineer, and his martial soul could not compare to a real Titled Douluo, he was much more perceptive than normal people thanks to his cultivation. He could not only sense the perfection that Long Aotian had detected, but he also could sense the essence as well!

Why were Bei Bei’s four palm-strikes able to deliver such terrifying destructive power? Furthermore, it came from the inside-out. This was not just his power alone, Ji Li’s power may have been involved in some way too. In other words, his attack was able to affect Ji Li’s internal soul power and cause it to explode. This move was no ordinary soul skill. A truly powerful soul master actually had such a powerful tactic at his disposal!

“Begin!” While thoughts surfaced in his mind non-stop, they did not affect the way Zheng Zhan refereed this battle. As his right hand came down, Bei Bei, who had looked relaxed, warm, and happy just moments ago, suddenly moved forward rapidly. His charge this time was even more relentless. Even though it was weaker than Wang Qiu’er’s terrifyingly explosive power, he was able to cross the arena in a breath’s time.

The only reason he charged forward so ferociously was because Huo Yuhao had said one sentence to Bei Bei. Your opponent specializes in long-distance attacks. Force him into close-combat. The impact of Spiritual Detection was unparalleled at this moment.

On the other side, Wang Xiao Lei stood where he was without moving. He then lifted his slender right arm, and soul rings started to rise from underneath his feet.

He was indeed a disciple of a powerful evil soul master sect. He also had six soul rings, which were in the perfect combination. They slowly rose together; two yellow, two purple, and two black!

At this moment, a white, bony claw reached out from his right sleeve, pointing toward Bei Bei. Wang Xiaolei’s ﬁrst soul ring started to shine.

An odd scene appeared once more. A cluster of white, bony claws suddenly appeared from the metal ground of the arena, trying to grab Bei Bei’s legs. Two of them found purchase, and held him fast.

Even though it was daytime, the sky was already overcast. Coupled with the pile of claw bones that appeared on the ground, everyone was shocked.

A low voice rumbled from Wang Xiaolei’s cloak. Five phalanx bones spun on his outstretched claw. His second, third, fourth, ﬁfth, and sixth soul rings started to shine with light in a mysterious fashion. His soul rings ﬂashed in order. The light from his soul rings ﬂashed like a wave churning in the sea. No one could tell what soul skills Wang Xiaolei was using.

With his legs trapped, Bei Bei’s charge was naturally stopped. As he had charged too ferociously, his body instantly tumbled forward. Bei Bei pushed himself up from the ground in front of him and stood upright once more. At the same time, a huge swathe of electricity emerged from his feet. This was his second soul skill, Vigorous Thunderbolt!

Bei Bei’s control over his second soul skill was amazing. In the previous round, by compressing Vigorous Thunderbolt between his palms into a dense forest of electricity, he was able to stop Ji Li’s tongue. At this moment, Vigorous Thunderbolt was concentrated on his legs. Instantly, with a crackle and a hiss, the claws that were grabbing his legs were reduced to dust.

One had to know that lightning itself was a coagulation of the natural qi of heaven and earth, and hence it was able to suppress the power of all evil beings.

Earlier, the ﬁfth soul skill Bei Bei had used was called Dragon Emperor Demonic Rapture by Elder Mu because the thunderous natural qi and the power of light were able to form an extraordinary force that could stop all things demonic. Hence, it was able to suppress all types of evil soul masters. This was why the mysterious Imperial Tutor was so agitated when he saw it. However, his short delay allowed his opponent to complete his soul skill.

Wang Xiaolei pressed forward toward Bei Bei, and a ball of mysterious, ice-blue light shone on his claw bones. Instantly, a pale-white halo of light appeared underneath Bei Bei’s feet.

Bei Bei felt a powerful, ghastly cold energy assaulting him.

Then, everything around him turned white.

Second soul skill, Evil Frost!

Wang Xiaolei’s freezing power was different from Huo Yuhao’s Ultimate Ice. His attack was not pure ice-type. Instead, it was reﬁned from the evil power of avenging spirits. The freezing sensation came from condensed evil and a desire for vengeance. His soul skill required him to continually replenish a supply of avenging spirits for use. Every avenging spirit came from a life. Like many evil soul masters, his abilities came from murder!

Wang Xiaolei’s mind was clear. He wanted to use this soul skill to pollute Bei Bei. As long as he was able to corrupt Bei Bei’s martial soul and prevent him from using his light power, he would be at an advantage!

The moment he used Evil Frost, Wang Xiaolei took a step forward and raised his right hand high into the air. As his right hand rose, a collective gasp could be heard from the crowd. His sleeve slid down all the way to his shoulder to reveal his right arm, which was nothing but white bones!

Could this mean that Wang Xiaolei, underneath his black robe, was just a skeleton?

The eerie and mysterious nature of evil soul masters made everyone’s hair stand up, and their blood run cold.

Purplish-black light started to gather around Wang Xiaolei’s upraised right hand. His Evil Frost was not only able to pollute his opponent, but it also allowed his Avenging Spirit to devour his opponent in a frenzy, and even turn his opponent into another one. At the same time, it had powerful immobilizing effects. As for how long he could immobilize his opponent, that depended on his opponent’s power. At this moment, the ﬁfth soul ring on his body started to shine.

He had learned from Ji Li’s mistake of being careless and underestimating his opponent. This time, Wang Xiaolei decided to show no mercy!

The purplish-black light on his right hand became extremely eye-catching. The wails of avenging spirits could be heard everywhere.

Even the Unbreakable Douluo’s face turned dark. Naturally, he did not fear Wang Xiaolei’s attack. However, he could clearly sense that the highly-concentrated nature of Wang Xiaolei’s attack was extracted from hundreds of lives! This guy was a true executioner!

While Zheng Zhan came from the Sun Moon Empire and had a close relationship with the imperial family, he did not like the evil soul masters. In his heart, he resolved that if this Bei Bei from the Tang Sect were to kill this guy, he would deﬁnitely not intervene.

A scream could be heard. Wang Xiaolei’s right arm suddenly came down. Instantly, a long purplish-black whip swung out from his right hand. The whip cracked straight toward Bei Bei, who had been immobilized by his Evil Frost. This was his powerful ﬁfth soul skill, Death Whip! Once someone was struck by the Death Whip, he would be eaten away by an aura of death. At the same time, he would be ferociously attacked by the avenging spirits in the Death Whip until he became an avenging spirit too!

The Death Whip was forged from avenging spirits. Wang Xiaolei’s Death Whip already had more than two hundred avenging spirits in it. As it was formed from so many avenging spirits, this ﬁfth soul skill’s strength could easily overpower many seven-ringed Soul Sages!

One had to know that it was not easy to make avenging spirits. It was not just a simple matter of killing someone. Only those with an intense hatred in their hearts at the moment of death, or those who had been terriﬁed prior to their demise, could be turned into powerful avenging spirits. Because of this, no one knew how many people Wang Xiaolei had killed to achieve his current powers. Zheng Zhan realized that he did not know evil soul masters well enough. The number of people Wang Xiaolei had killed should be in the thousands by now...

The purplish-black whip swished through the air, and one could hear countless deafening wails. This sound alone spread far from the tournament’s arena. Some members of the audience who were close to the arena felt an intense giddiness, as if their souls were about to leave their bodies. After this tournament, many of them would be struck by severe illnesses.

Bei Bei stood there without moving. It was as if he had already been polluted by the Evil Frost. Faced with the Death Whip now, there appeared to be nothing he could do.

Just as the horrifying whip was about to land on him, a sudden, intense golden light suddenly shone from the center of Bei Bei’s body outward. The evil icy-blue layer around his body was blown off. A clear golden palm reached out and grabbed the whip.

Wails could be heard from the long whip. One could clearly see a huge amount of mist seeping out from the area around Bei Bei’s hand. In the mist, one could many twisted human faces dissipating in the air, as well as streams of black gases ﬂoating around them.

Wang Xiaolei was infuriated as he roared. He had spent a lot of time and effort crafting his Death Whip, to the point where he himself was no longer fully human. At this moment, the light, lightning, and demon-destroying abilities of Bei Bei were wrecking his whip! Even if just a bit of it was wrecked, it was not something Wang Xiaolei would let go!

However, Wang Xiaolei remained calm. Under these circumstances, he did not think about withdrawing his Death Whip. Instead, he ﬂicked his wrist upward, causing the Death Whip to coil around Bei Bei’s neck like a snake!

At this moment, Wang Xiaolei was extremely careful, because he could clearly see Bei Bei’s ﬁfth soul ring ﬂashing around his body. This meant that he was readying his Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture.

However, Wang Xiaolei had tricks up his sleeves too. His sixth soul ring started to shine, and a ball of purplish-black light coated his body. At this moment, his robe ﬁnally burst open.

Just as many had guessed, without his robe, Wang Xiaolei was nothing more than a white skeleton.

Two dark red ﬁres jumped in his eye sockets. One could see countless purplish-black patterns all over his bones.

At this moment, he lifted his left hand and pressed it down onto his right hand. Balls of purplish-black light were sent over from his left hand to the Death Whip, which he was wielding in his right hand.

The avenging spirits appeared to be calmed by this, and a terrifying aura of death surged toward Bei Bei like a tidal wave.

The expression on Bei Bei’s face changed. He could clearly feel that the aura of death that was rushing toward him would allow the Death Whip to break free from his grasp.

He took a step back and let go. He thrust out with his palms and landed four palm-strikes on the purplish-black aura of death that was surging toward him.

Thunder boomed around him. Golden bolts of lightning a meter wide exploded in mid-air. Every single explosion of lightning would destroy huge swathes of the purplish-black aura. However, it continued to crash toward him. Some of it landed on the ground. Instantly, the metal on the ground dissolved silently! Furthermore, the purplish-black aura would not just eat through the metal on the ground, but also bored holes in the stone below after they were done with the metal. Many tiny holes whose depth could not be seen started to appear. Their densely-packed nature made everyone uncomfortable.

Death Withering, Wang Xiaolei’s sixth soul skill. This was also his most powerful one!

However, before the Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture, neither Death Withering nor the Death Whip stood a chance, and they were both shattered by its powerful demon- destroying abilities.

After the last Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture was unleashed, an explosion boomed in the air. One-third of the Death Whip was completely shattered, and the remainder of the Death Withering was utterly obliterated.

---

On the main podium, the mysterious Imperial Tutor said, “If this guy doesn’t die, he’ll become another Mu En in a few decades.”

Xu Tianran said nothing. Instead, he ﬁxed his gaze on the arena. Bei Bei’s powerful palms could force even evil soul masters into retreat with each strike. They were powerful indeed!

---

The audience spectating the match cheered Bei Bei on relentlessly. In their eyes, the skeletal Wang Xiaolei was too horrifying. They wanted Bei Bei to kill him quickly, just like he did Ji Li!

The energy from their clash reverberated in the air. The ﬁre that danced in Wang Xiaolei’s eye sockets dimmed a bit. However, Bei Bei also took a few steps back. Both sides were evidently shaken from the clash.

The Radiant Holy Dragon’s image appeared behind Bei Bei. He lifted his head and let out a draconic roar. Then, he charged toward Wang Xiaolei once more. Claws appeared on the ground once again. However, they were unable to stop Bei Bei, who was currently in his Radiant Holy Dragon state.

Everywhere Bei Bei passed, the bones would disintegrate.

There was no way they could stop him.

The spirit ﬁre that danced in Wang Xiaolei’s eyes looked shocked. While they had appeared to be evenly-matched just now, he was unable to widen the distance between Bei Bei and himself. He was also unable to defeat Bei Bei with his two main soul skills. He knew that he was now at a disadvantage. His only hope was that Bei Bei could not maintain his explosive state for long.

Wang Xiaolei specialized in long-range attacks. However, speed was a major problem for him. It was impossible for him to widen the distance via speed. The only thing he could do was assault his opponent non-stop to block him.

He grabbed at the air with his right hand, and his third soul ring ﬂashed. A dark-purple bubble appeared in mid-air and enveloped his body. Following that, his extended his skeletal left and right arms. The purplish-black patterns on his body lit up.

The moment he reached out with his arms, his fourth soul ring started to shine. The purplish-black light started to seep out from his feet.

This was his third soul skill, Death Protection, and his fourth soul skill, Deadspirit Sea!

This was Wang Xiaolei’s most powerful attack. Strengthened by Deadspirit Sea, he would normally then release his ﬁfth and sixth soul skills. However, as Bei Bei’s attack was too fast, there was no way he could have released his Deadspirit Sea in time before.

Deadspirit Sea was like a domain-type ability, but not quite.

It only had a radius of ﬁve meters. Once it was released, Deadspirit Sea would not move with Wang Xiaolei. All attacks he released afterward would increase in strength. Furthermore, it nourished the avenging spirits, giving them new strength.

How could one who was chosen to represent the Holy Ghost Church not have astounding abilities?

When Bei Bei was less than twenty meters from him, he raised his right hand and slashed it toward Wang Xiaolei with his Thunderous Dragon Claw.

However, the moment the golden Thunderous Dragon Claw entered the zone of the Deadspirit Sea, it started to change. Purplish-black light ﬂashed and pulsated. The golden Thunderous Dragon Claw was cloaked with a layer of purplish- black light. While its demon-destroying abilities were able to resist the purplish-black light, it dissipated completely when it reached Death Protection. All that was left were a few strands of purplish-black light that landed uselessly on Wang Xiaolei’s Death Protection.

Wang Xiaolei moved his hands up and down. At this moment, he no longer cared about the depletion of his soul power.

Layers of Evil Frost surged from his Deadspirit Sea. Like a tsunami, they crashed toward Bei Bei.

Bei Bei snorted coldly, and his third soul ring started to ﬂash.

It was Thunderous Fury!

A huge golden tendril of electricity wrapped itself around his body. At the same time, the toes of his left foot touched the ground. He then charged like an arrow into the Deadspirit Sea without any hesitation!

Even though the Deadspirit Sea only had a radius of about ﬁve meters, Wang Xiaolei had already retreated to its other end. The moment Bei Bei entered it, he could feel his body going cold. Avenging spirits wailed, which made his soul feel unstable, as if it were about to leave his body.

The Evil Frost continued to assault his body, trying tofreeze both his body and his soul. Bei Bei’s speed slowed visibly. The thunder and lightning around his body fought against the Evil Frost, but now, every step he took became arduous.

“Kakaka!” Wang Xiaolei laughed. His laughter was as chilling as the caw of a crow. “Fool, your biggest mistake was entering my Deadspirit Sea. Time to enjoy Death Withering in the Deadspirit Sea.”

As he said that, he lifted his hands, and a purplish-black fountain centered around his body started to seep into every corner of the Deadspirit Sea. The terrifying death aura rushed toward Bei Bei frantically. Once, Wang Xiaolei had used this move to simultaneously kill two Soul Sages. Then, he’d turned them into the main Avenging Spirits for his Death Whip. He anticipated the moment when he could do the same to Bei Bei. How would his light and demon-destroying soul affect his Death Whip after he subdued Bei Bei? What would his Death Whip become? Maybe it wouldn’t even fear light-type attacks anymore!

The overcast sky today was a great advantage for the evil soul masters, particularly for Wang Xiaolei. Had it been sunny, the strength of his attacks would have been greatly reduced. He might not even have been able to compete, and his team would’ve had to activate their reserves.

At this moment, he brimmed with conﬁdence. He could almost see the very moment when Bei Bei became part of his Death Whip.

As a powerful evil soul master, Wang Xiaolei was very perceptive. He could clearly analyze that the Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture attack Bei Bei had used earlier could not be used consecutively. How could a soul skill which fused with spiritual power be simple? He had already used it twice in two battles. If he wanted to continue using it, he would need to take a rest. Without needing to fear the terrifying power of Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture, his sixth soul skill, Death Withering, which was further strengthened by his fourth soul skill, Deadspirit Sea, could not be easily resisted!

Wang Xiaolei thought he almost saw terror in Bei Bei’s eyes.

The spirit ﬁre in his eye sockets danced rapidly.

However, he quickly saw Bei Bei laugh. His laughter was cold and arrogant. Bei Bei, who usually had a warm demeanor, now treated his opponent arrogantly. In his heart, he always viewed himself as above everything else. This was the true nature of Sovereign’s Descent!

If fear appeared in his heart, how could he control the Sovereign’s Descent?

Bei Bei bent over. Looking at him, it was as if his entire body had curled up. At the same time, a black halo rose, and an intense golden light shone from his body.

With a clear and mighty dragon roar, the huge image of the Radiant Holy Dragon crashed into Bei Bei and entered his body. Now, Bei Bei was covered with a thick layer of golden armor. He shot out like a thunderbolt.

Even though the Radiant Holy Dragon had taken Bei Bei’s humanoid form, at this moment, he resembled a true Radiant Holy Dragon!

As this Radiant Holy Dragon charged forward, it started to swirl quickly. Then, in mid-air, it took the shape of a huge dragon head.

There was only a dragon head. This meant that Bei Bei had yet to enter the level of a seven-ringed soul master who could use his Martial Soul True Body. However, the appearance of just this dragon head alone was enough to make the mysterious Imperial Tutor stand up.

The golden dragon head brimmed with a powerful, regal ﬂavor. The powerful Radiant Holy Dragon burst forth!

“Dragon Emperor’s Realm Quake,” the Imperial Tutor said word-by-word as he named Bei Bei’s soul skill. A golden halo with a ﬁfteen-meter radius appeared. The halo completely encircled the Deadspirit Sea. In the center of the halo, one could see that humongous, arrogant dragon head. Inside the halo were numerous Golden Holy Dragons. As they appeared, the Deadspirit Sea started to slow. Death Withering, which was gaining momentum, also stopped in place.

Compared to Wang Xiaolei and his horrifying soul skills, Bei Bei’s soul skills appeared extremely dazzling.

At least ten Golden Holy Dragons appeared in the halo. At this moment, Wang Xiaolei suddenly discovered that there was nothing he could do. An indescribable terror now appeared in his mind.

His Death Withering and Deadspirit Sea both broke free from his control. All he could feel was that his soul was slowly rising. Everything around him became cloaked in gold.

After the realistic-looking Radiant Holy Dragons appeared, they did not move.

They were like statues suspended in mid-air.

The dragon head in the center roared once more.

It was as if it had given an order to attack. All of the Radiant Holy Dragons unleashed their devastating attacks together.

They turned into rays of golden lightning that ﬂashed and dashed around within the golden halo. The Deadspirit Sea and Death Withering were instantly ripped apart by the dragon- shaped thunder and lightning. At the same time, they all charged toward Wang Xiaolei.

Boom, boom, boom, boom!

Four explosions sounded in the arena. Three blows, and Wang Xiaolei’s Death Protection was shattered.

Zheng Zhan, the Unbreakable Douluo, reacted and wanted to go and save him. However, the golden halo on the ground started to shine intensely. A golden thirty meter-tall pillar of light started to rise into the sky. Even Zheng Zhan could not enter at this moment. When he touched the golden pillar, golden lightning circled his entire body. Even though he tried to resist it with his defensive soul tools, it was impossible to take even a single step.

This lasted for less than two seconds. Soon, slowly faded and disappeared.

In the sky, the shadow of the Radiant Holy Dragon ﬂickered in and out of sight. The dozen Radiant Holy Dragons ﬂew up into the sky.

Dragon Emperor’s Realm Quake!

This was a powerful soul skill the Dragon God Douluo, Mu En, had created. It specialized in destroying demons and stopping evil soul masters.

Dragon Emperor Realm Quake and Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture were the two signature killer moves of Elder Mu many years ago. No one knew how many evil soul masters he’d killed with them. Evil soul masters were all terriﬁed of them.

At this moment, it was clear that Bei Bei had used the same methods, and inherited his master’s skills.

Wang Xiaolei’s body had disappeared completely. Compared to Ji Li, his disappearance was even more traceless. No one saw how he had really disappeared.

The giant gold pillar of light was gone, which meant that he’d disappeared naturally as well. Not even a single trace of him was left.

The entire arena fell silent once more. Bei Bei had just killed two Soul Emperor-level evil soul masters!

At this moment, no one dared to say that Wang Qiu’er was the most powerful Dragon martial soul soul master of this tournament. Until she could beat him, no one would say that.

Yu Tianlong was completely still. As a fellow Dragon martial soul soul master, and as someone with the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon martial soul, he now truly understood how powerful Bei Bei’s attack was. This was a soul skill that surpassed even that of an ordinary Soul Sage.

He knew that he was deﬁnitely not Bei Bei’s opponent. It was hard to even speak for Wang Qiu’er. Very hard to say, indeed. Where did the Tang Sect come from? Why are they so powerful?

Bei Bei reappeared where the golden light pillar once was.

His face looked pale, but he stood upright.

Regardless of whether it was his quick breaths or his unhealthy complexion, neither could diminish the determined look in his eyes.

He’d won. Indeed, he’d won once more. Twice! And he had killed two people! Everyone in the audience was cheering for him.

Demon-destroying. This was his light-type demon- destroying ability! Even though every Soul Emperor could use their ﬁfth and sixth soul skills, very few could use up as much power as he had. Bei Bei stood there quietly. It took some time for his breathing to normalize once more. He lifted his right hand slowly and pointed in the direction of the Holy Ghost Sect’s waiting zone. He extended his index ﬁnger and pointed straight at Tang Ya, who sat at the front of the resting zone.

She appeared agitated. She stood up and looked coldly at Bei Bei. While she wore a hood over her head, her sharp gaze bored into Bei Bei, who was separated from her by the descending protective soul barrier.

“Individual elimination round, round two, Victory, the Tang Sect.” When he said these words, even Zheng Zhan was dumbfounded.

Two to zero, who would have thought that the Tang Sect would take the lead?

Bei Bei inhaled and lowered his arm. He turned and walked expressionlessly to the center of the arena. Slowly, he walked in front of the Unbreakable Douluo and took out his Milk Bottle once more as he stood there, slowly replenishing his soul power.

Tang Ya turned around and looked at the waiting zone.

The shock from the Scorpion Tiger Douluo Zhang Peng’s eyes had disappeared. It was slowly being replaced by fear.

The moment Bei Bei unleashed his Dragon Emperor Realm Quake, it was as if he had returned to the moment when the Dragon God Douluo Mu En had unleashed the same powerful move to suppress him. This was where his terror came from. The skills of the Dragon God Douluo had indeed been passed down! Fortunately, this bastard is still young...

At this moment, a cold light ﬂashed in Zhang Peng’s eyes. He nodded meaningfully at Tang Ya.

Tang Ya nodded. On the balls of her feet, she stood up with her back facing the arena. Then, her slender body somersaulted in mid-air and she ascended comfortably into the arena. At the same time, she removed her hood. The cheering crowd quieted down instantly. They were all taken aback by what they saw.

Tang Ya walked onto the arena. In the eyes of the crowd, they were expecting some hideous guy from the Holy Ghost Sect. However, the person who now stood before them was a stunningly beautiful girl with dark-blue eyes and jade-white skin.

Compared to a few years ago, Tang Ya was much more mature. She had grown taller, and become more womanly. She looked like a young adult now. Her beautiful face was icy-cold as she walked towards Bei Bei!

Chapter 332: Xiao Ya, I'm Feeling A Little Cold

Classy and cold, with an indescribably charming, yet evil demeanor. Her captivating splendor didn’t seem to be much inferior to Wang Dong’er and Wang Qiu’er.

Bei Bei’s pupils shrank slightly, and a tormented look ﬂashed across his eyes. However, he still seemed very determined. He faced Tang Ya directly and didn’t avoid her.

She was also staring back at him, and her gaze seemed ghastly. A dim dark-blue streak of gas started revolving around her body. It seemed like she could erupt at any time.

She only stopped when she was three meters away from Bei Bei. She looked at him coldly and didn’t utter a word. However, there was very solemn aura on the stage.

Zheng Zhan’s emotions hadn’t subsided yet. Bei Bei’s ﬁfth and sixth soul skills had destroyed two evil soul masters. Regarding this reﬁned-looking young man in front of him, Zheng Zhan felt that he was very pleasant. He hoped that Bei Bei wouldn’t be destroyed under the hands of the Holy Ghost Sect. However, he was the referee, and even a member of the Sun Moon Empire. How could he express his thoughts?

As he looked at both parties, Zheng Zhan said, “Both parties, please report your names.” His voice was evidently slower than the previous two times. He was thinking to himself. Kid, this is the most that I can do to help you. I hope that you can take this short period of time to restore yourself a little.

From Bei Bei’s soul power undulations, he could tell that Bei Bei couldn’t last a third round. In addition, the aura from Tang Ya was markedly stronger than the two previous evil soul masters. From where she was seated in the waiting area, she should be one of the best in this evil soul master sect.

“Tang Sect, Bei Bei.” Bei Bei said these four simple words, and emphasized the words ‘Tang Sect’.

Tang Ya seemed to be dazed for a moment, and a lost look ﬂashed across her eyes. However, she soon regained her cold attitude and said, “Holy Ghost Church, Tang Ya.” Bei Bei took in a deep breath and nodded at her. There was a tormented look on his face. Before the Unbreakable Douluo could speak, he immediately turned around and walked towards his half of the stage. He was very determined.

Tang Ya didn’t seem to sense anything, and also turned around before walking towards her own half of the stage. She seemed very graceful as she walked. It was as if she were drifting along. Her body didn’t move much.

Humans were always inclined towards beauty. Tang Ya’s appearance quieted down the spectators who were fearful and disgusted by the Holy Ghost Sect. There were even some who were doubtful. Can such a pretty lady be an evil soul master?

Of course, beauty didn’t decide a soul master’s abilities. Tang Ya slowly walked towards her side of the stage before turning around. On the other side, Bei Bei was already prepared. He had also put his Milk Bottle away.

This was already the third individual elimination round. The third round was very important, especially for the team that had won the ﬁrst two rounds. As long as they won the third round, Bei Bei had the right to request that they immediately move on to the team round. The Tang Sect outnumbered the Holy Ghost Sect by two people. If Bei Bei could win this round, the Tang Sect’s advantage would be quite great.

However, could the Tang Sect really win? After ﬁghting two consecutive rounds, Bei Bei’s depletion could be seen in his expression. It was quite unlikely that he could defeat Tang Ya right now, who was also likely the team leader of the Holy Ghost Sect.

The Unbreakable Douluo looked at both parties. He knew that he couldn’t delay any further. He sighed in his heart and lifted his right hand up high.

“Begin!”

After his voice sounded, Bei Bei was the one who made the ﬁrst move. He exerted his strength and instantly burst forward. He didn’t seem slower than when he had faced Wang Xiaolei earlier.

In the waiting area, the rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters were witnessing the ﬁght nervously. Xu Sanshi couldn’t help but hold Jiang Nannan’s hand tightly, and Jiang Nannan didn’t blame him for exploiting this opportunity to hold onto her hand right now.

They were the earliest two of Shrek’s Seven Monsters to know Bei Bei and Tang Ya. They had watched how Bei Bei and Tang Ya grew up as a couple. They had witnessed how tormented Bei Bei was after Tang Ya disappeared.

At this moment, these two lovers had been reunited.

However, they were reunited as opponents!

“Xiao Ya, do you not remember anything? Do you know how much Bei Bei has sacriﬁced for you all these years?” Jiang Nannan muttered to herself. Her eyes started to turn red.

Xu Sanshi was as uninhibited as usual, and said, “We must believe Bei Bei. He’ll be able to wake her up.”

“He will deﬁnitely be able to.” Wang Dong’er and Xiao Xiao said at almost the same time. He Caitou also clenched his ﬁsts as he watched them anxiously. Only Huo Yuhao seemed calmer. His breathing was very regular, and he placed his hands on the handles of his wheelchair. He seemed to be pondering something.

Tang Ya didn’t rush forward even though Bei Bei had burst straight towards her. Her expression was very cold. She moved step by step toward Bei Bei. She wasn’t quick. However, the dark blue light that shone from her body became stronger and stronger with every step she took.

The dark blue light accentuated her ravishing looks. She had the aura of an inﬂuential queen!

The two of them were getting closer and closer to each other.

Beneath Tang Ya’s feet, her soul rings also ﬁnally shone.

Two yellow, two purple and three black soul rings.

In the waiting area, Jiang Nannan couldn’t help but exclaim, “Seven!” A few others who were familiar with Tang Ya were also stunned. Huo Yuhao also revealed a shocked look in his eyes. Seven soul rings, a seven-ringed Soul Sage?

Initially, Tang Ya’s cultivation was inferior to Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi and even Jiang Nannan. This was also why she had left Shrek Academy; she knew that she couldn’t enter the inner courtyard.

However, seven soul rings lit up on her body right now. In a few years, she had already become a seven-ringed Soul Sage. Were all evil soul masters so scary?

Her third soul ring lit up ﬁrst. Tang Ya lifted up her right hand and mimicked a gentle smacking action towards Bei Bei. A ball of dark blue light ball shot out and ﬂew towards Bei Bei.

The ball quickly expanded as it ﬂew out, turning into a dark blue net.

Bei Bei recognized this soul skill. Huo Yuhao also knew it very clearly. This was the third soul skill that Bei Bei had helped Tang Ya obtain when Huo Yuhao ﬁrst met them, Spiderweb Binding! It was obtained from a thousand year Man- faced Devilspider!

However, the Spiderweb Binding that Tang Ya used now was more than ten meters in diameter. It covered a huge surface area, and Bei Bei felt that he couldn’t dodge it as it moved towards him.

Not only this, but Tang Ya’s ﬁrst soul ring also lit up. Countless vines surged out from her back. The dark blue vines were very shiny and transparent, exuding a deep sapphire glow. As the glow spread, it was about to cover Bei Bei entirely.

Even though Tang Ya had become an evil soul master, she didn’t change her cultivation direction. She was still a control- type soul master!

Bei Bei stopped running forward. Following this, bluish- purple lightning surfaced around him. A huge bluish-purple lightning web opened up towards Tang Ya’s Spiderweb Binding. It was as big as the Spiderweb Binding.

Two huge webs clashed in the air. The spiderweb suddenly stopped, and the lightning surrounded it. ---

“Xiao Ya, you must try to open up your spiderweb when you use it. After that, you must judge beforehand. It’s best to unleash it when your opponent is coming close to you at high speed, or if he’s already in the air and can’t change directions easily.

“You see, your spiderweb is very sticky. Also, the vines converted from your Bluesilver Grass will become tougher as your abilities improve. When that happens, your enemy will ﬁnd it very difﬁcult to cut the Bluesilver Grass. He might even cause the spiderweb to close up as he attacks it, and be instantly restrained.”

“Will my opponent be able to resist my Spiderweb Binding?”

“Of course. Use it on me.”

“Eh, I see what you are doing! It sounds fun. One is a lightning web and one is a spiderweb. It’s quite interesting when we combine them together! Should we give it a name?” “Hehe, let’s call it the Loveweb. There are no holes in the Loveweb. I can trap you!”

“Hehe, let’s call it the Loveweb then!

---

“Loveweb…” Tang Ya seemed to be in a daze. There was a confused look in her eyes. Bei Bei exploited this opportunity to detour around the Loveweb and continue towards her.

Tang Ya’s confusion only lasted for a second. She quickly regained her cold mindset, and several vines formed by the Bluesilver Grass quickly reached out towards Bei Bei.

Not only this, but she also lifted her right hand, and her fourth soul ring shone.

Bei Bei was too familiar with Tang Ya. When he saw her lifting her right hand, he leapt up quickly. As he leaped away, Bluesilver Grass that resembled a patch of long spears poked out. It was like there was a forest of spears beneath him. They released a dense, cold glow.

If Bei Bei had been one step slower, he would have clashed with this patch of Bluesilver Grass.

This was Tang Ya’s fourth soul skill, Bluesilver Prison!

Bei Bei leapt towards Tang Ya. In the air, he extended his hands and swiped towards Tang Ya with his Lightning Dragon’s Claws!

Two dark blue vines appeared and whipped at the Lightning Dragon’s Claws. They managed to crush the claws just like that. A huge patch of vines instantly rose and blocked Bei Bei’s path.

Bei Bei unleashed his third soul skill, Thunderous Fury, and the lightning around him grew stronger and stronger. He clasped his palms in front of his chest, and released a sonorous dragon roar.

Suddenly, the lightning gathered to form a huge dragon head that charged towards the patch of Bluesilver Grass.

A huge boom echoed in the air. The vines of Bluesilver Grass scattered as they were struck by Bei Bei’s fourth soul skill, Thunderous Dragon Head. However, they weren’t completely crushed from the explosion even though the Thunderous Dragon Head was very powerful. They were only scattered. At this point, Bei Bei didn’t seem to care anymore. As he landed, he smacked his palm down and continued to burst forward in the air. He opened his arms wide, as if he were trying to embrace Tang Ya.

There was a cold look on Tang Ya’s face. She raised her right hand to her side, palm facing inwards, ﬁngers together and pointing at him A long spear exuding a bright blue light appeared on her ﬁngertips.

When this spear appeared, the scattered vines changed into shadows and fused with it. Tang Ya also turned a transparent, dark blue at this moment.

This was…

Zheng Zhan felt his hair stand on end. It was as if his soul had been penetrated.

This was Tang Ya’s ﬁfth soul skill. It brought about a sense of oppression, and wasn’t inferior to Bei Bei’s Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture. However, Bei Bei seemed to have already expended his soul power. He wasn’t able to unleash the powers of his Radiant Holy Dragon. His ﬁfth and sixth soul rings were also inactive.

There was a determined look on Bei Bei’s face. As he faced Tang Ya’s spear, there was a sense of desolation as he smiled.

“Xiao Ya, I miss you so much,” he said softly. At this moment, he seemed to be completely immersed in his own feelings. The lightning above his claws had disappeared. His eyes were only ﬁlled with a gentle look.

These seven simple words were like seven huge hammers pounding on Tang Ya’s soul. She didn’t throw her spear out immediately after it formed.

Bei Bei was extremely fast. He was about to reach her.

There was a puff of impact, and a bloody light surfaced.

Bei Bei didn’t dodge, and didn’t try to attack either. He let the spear stab through his chest and come out his back.

Everyone from the Tang Sect was shocked by this. Even Huo Yuhao was unable to maintain his cool anymore. Something seemed to be stuck in his throat as he grabbed onto his wheelchair with his right hand.

The other ﬁve Shrek’s Seven Monsters even stood up.

“Eldest senior, you lied to me.” Huo Yuhao’s voice was trembling. He couldn't believe what he was seeing.

---

Before today’s match, Bei Bei had quietly come to ﬁnd Huo Yuhao. He didn’t even let Wang Dong’er listen to his private conversation.

“Little junior, we’ll arrange our strategy in this way. Do you have any objections?”

“Eldest senior, I have no objections. What do we do with Teacher Xiao Ya? If she appears in the ﬁrst few rounds, will we really make a move against her?”

“Little junior, don’t worry. I know what to do. Even if the evil soul masters abducted her, no one understands her better than me. Remember when she attacked me that day? It was just for show. She did it as a show for the rest of the evil soul masters.”

“In fact, she had already recognized me then. She told me about her condition using a sign that only the two of us knew. She was threatened by those evil soul masters, and thus was unable to return then. But we’ll coordinate with each other in the tournament. Don’t worry.”

“That’s great. But how did the Holy Ghost Church threaten Teacher Xiao Ya? We must ensure that she returns safely!”

“You don’t have to worry about that. I have a plan in mind. Don’t forget, I’m able to turn into the Radiant Holy Dragon! When have you ever seen me doing something I’m not conﬁdent in? Xiao Ya is my greatest love. No matter what, I must help her recover. This is also something that only I can do. Don’t worry, and focus on competing.” “That’s great! It’ll be great if Teacher Xiao Ya can return!”

---

Everything that he had said was completely in contrast with what was happening.

Huo Yuhao could keep his cool earlier because Bei Bei had informed him of his plan. In addition, he had always been a composed person.

After he saw Bei Bei defeating two strong opponents, his conﬁdence grew even further.

However, he knew that he had been lied to when Bei Bei smiled and allowed himself to be stabbed by the long spear. Eldest senior was lying!

He didn’t communicate with Teacher Xiao Ya at all. The attack that he suffered that day was also not a message that Teacher Xiao Ya left for him. He doesn’t have the ability to bring her back!

Eldest Senior!

The long spear had stabbed through Bei Bei’s chest and exited out his back. However, he continued to move forward toward Tang Ya. He closed his opened arms and tightly embraced her.

Fresh blood spurted out from his chest and scattered on Tang Ya. Her cold aura seemed to have suffered a blow, and she seemed to warm up a little.

She was stunned. When her Bluesilver Tyrant Spear stabbed Bei Bei, she felt as if her own chest had been stabbed. An indescribable pain appeared in her chest.

She didn’t unleash the life-devouring ability of her Bluesilver Tyrant Spear. She stood there in a daze without moving. It was as if she had been immobilized. The lost look in her eyes also turned into a tremendous struggle.

“Xiao Ya, it’s so good to hug you again. It feels really good.” Bei Bei didn’t even seem to feel the pain in his chest. He hugged Tang Ya tightly, and his face was ﬁlled with bliss. It was just that it was also extremely pale right now.

“Xiao Ya, do you know? I’ve really missed you. After I lost you, I realized how important you were to me. You have become an indispensable part of my life.

“When I saw you that day, my soul was ﬁnally awoken. I’ve waited for today for too long.

“I don’t know if you can remember me, or whether you’ll recover.

“However, it’s enough that I can hug you. Wake up, Xiao Ya. Let me summon you with my life. I’ve already established the Tang Sect for you. Wake up, will you?”

Golden light surfaced on Bei Bei’s body once again. However, it appeared as a dim golden fog this time.

In the resting area, the Scorpion Tiger Douluo Zhang Peng had already rushed to the arena. His expression was changing wildly as he stared at the stage.

Evidently, he didn’t know about Bei Bei and Tang Ya’s relationship. After Tang Ya joined the Holy Ghost Church, her talent was highly regarded. Over these past few years, she had been cultivating in secret. Her improvement was the greatest of all the younger soul masters. It was why she was able to represent the Holy Ghost Church as their team leader for this tournament.

It seemed like Tang Ya should have had the upper hand. However, why didn’t she destroy Bei Bei with her Bluesilver Tyrant Spear and swallow his life energy? Her cultivation was bound to increase greatly if she swallowed the life energy of a Soul Emperor. Not only would her soul power not be depleted, but she might even become stronger than she was at her peak!

Why was she standing there without moving?

Fresh blood was already ﬂowing from the edges of Bei Bei’s lips. His right chest and lung had been stabbed. The cold aura that the Bluesilver Tyrant Spear let out was also ﬁlled with evil. As he sensed that Tang Ya was in a daze, Bei Bei slowly shut his eyes and muttered, “Is it still… not working…?

“Don’t worry, Xiao Ya. Let it be like this then. To die in your arms is also happiness for me. It’s better than suffering from the torment of missing you every day.”

As he spoke, he leaned his head on Tang Ya’s shoulder. His signature, reﬁned smile returned to his face.

In the resting area, Zhang Lexuan clenched her ﬁsts when she saw this. Her ﬁngernails were already piercing through her palm.

Bei Bei, why are you so foolish? Is she so good that it’s worth doing this? Fool, you are really a fool!

Wang Qiu’er was also stunned when she saw this. At this moment, the scene of Huo Yuhao standing by the lakeside of the Iceﬁre Yin Yang Well and swallowing the water of the Blazing Sunspring to melt the origin energy of Ultimate Ice in his body surfaced in her mind. Is this love? Sacriﬁcing your life for someone you love?

“Xiao Ya, I’m a little cold. Make your move.” Bei Bei used his remaining energy to hug Tang Ya tightly. At this moment, the rest of Shrek’s Seven Monsters were completely shocked. There were protective barriers in front of them. They couldn’t charge up. They didn’t even have a chance to stop Bei Bei. But they all saw the smile on Bei Bei’s face.

“Teacher Xiao Ya, wake up!” Although Huo Yuhao knew Tang Ya couldn’t hear his call, he still couldn’t help but shout. Tears were already streaming down his face.

“Bei… Bei Bei…” Tang Ya muttered these few words.

Bei Bei’s body shuddered. He suddenly opened his eyes and revealed a surprised look on his face.

“Bei Bei… Bei Bei…” Tang Ya lowered her head as she reminisced. She looked at Bei Bei, who was lying on her shoulder now.

“Xiao Ya. My Xiao Ya. Are you back?” Bei Bei’s voice had become weak. Although it hadn’t been long, the huge injury on his chest had caused him to lose too much blood.

Although he couldn’t hear them, Huo Yuhao could see Bei Bei’s expression and Tang Ya’s movement. His vertical eye opened, and a streak of purplish-gold light shot out. It struck the protective barriers and caused a slit to open. “We concede defeat! Quickly, save him!” he screamed at Zheng Zhan.

Zheng Zhan only woke up at this point. He quickly rushed towards Tang Ya and Bei Bei. He lifted his hands and announced the end of the ﬁght.

The protective barriers were deactivated, and everyone from the Tang Sect rushed up to the stage towards Bei Bei and Tang Ya.

Tang Ya was looking at Bei Bei with expressionless eyes, but she was suddenly ﬁlled with torment. The Bluesilver Tyrant Spear disappeared. Just as the spear disappeared, Wang Dong’er was the ﬁrst to leap towards Bei Bei. As she mimicked a pressing action, bright golden ﬂames adhered to his huge wounds and forcefully sealed them.

He Caitou also stuffed a cigarette into Bei Bei’s mouth and shouted, “Quickly, suck!” As he spoke, his sixth soul ring disappeared. It was He Caitou’s sixth soul skill, the Resurrection Silver Cigar. His sixth soul skill had great healing powers.

His Resurrection Silver Cigar was mainly used on external injuries, and its effect was very strong. However, it didn’t have any effect on internal injuries.

Bei Bei sucked with force, and instantly felt a warm ﬂow down his throat. His body suddenly felt very warm. The blood that was spurting from his chest also stopped temporarily.

Tang Ya squatted there and looked at Bei Bei. Suddenly, she stood up and grabbed her head with her hands. She looked into the sky and screamed in anguish.

Her piercing scream was very penetrating. An intense dark- blue light surged out towards her surroundings.

Xu Sanshi’s body ﬂashed, and he blocked Tang Ya’s light, using his shield to protect everyone from the Tang Sect. When everyone from the Tang Sect climbed onto the stage, the Scorpion Tiger Douluo from the Holy Ghost Sect leaped onto the stage too. Tang Ya’s importance to the Holy Ghost Church wasn’t inferior to Bei Bei and Xu Sanshi’s importance to Shrek Academy. He could tell that something was wrong with Tang Ya, and thus had hurried up to the stage immediately.

“Holy Lady, what’s wrong?” Zhang Peng asked as he grabbed Tang Ya’s shoulders.

Tang Ya suddenly turned around, and her eyes turned dark- blue. Countless vines surged out and slapped Zhang Peng.

Zhang Peng was also shocked when he saw her tormented look. However, he couldn’t be controlled by Tang Ya, given his cultivation.

What were evil soul masters most afraid of? They weren’t afraid of their opponents’ abilities, but instead of going berserk during their own cultivation. An ordinary soul master could still be saved even if he went berserk. However, evil soul masters were too domineering. Once there were problems, they were bound to die.

Throughout the course of history, many soul masters had gone berserk as they tried to break through a difﬁcult barrier, leading to their deaths. Some of them even blew apart.

Seeing that things weren’t going too well, Zhang Peng immediately unleashed his strong aura and forced the Bluesilver Grass away from him. He took a step forward, made a grabbing action, and his immense soul power trapped Tang Ya. At the same time, he smacked Tang Ya’s forehead with his palm.

Tang Ya stopped screaming, and collapsed softly to the ground.

The mysterious lady from the Holy Ghost Sect suddenly appeared onstage and grabbed Tang Ya as she collapsed. She whispered something to Zhang Peng. Zhang Peng looked grim, but the mysterious lady jumped off the stage with Tang Ya. She didn’t bring Tang Ya into the waiting area either, but immediately brought her out to the resting area.

Huo Yuhao held onto Xiao Xiao, who wanted to save Tang Ya. Xu Sanshi also grabbed hold of Jiang Nannan and didn’t let her rush over.

Zhang Peng was an evil soul master, and a Transcendent Douluo. He was able to match up to Shrek Academy’s Soul Engineering Department’s Dean, the Martial God Douluo Xian Lin’er. How were the two of them going to deal with him?

Bei Bei sucked in a few breaths of the cigar He Caitou gave him, and the wound on his chest started to heal.

Although his body had been pierced by the Bluesilver Tyrant Spear, this external injury was the greatest injury he had sustained. After all, Tang Ya didn’t fully unleash the power of the Bluesilver Tyrant Spear and invade his body with her evil energy.

At this point, Bei Bei was already unconscious. His breathing was also a little weak. However, he had still managed to preserve his life. With the protection of Wang Dong’er’s power of light and He Caitou’s cigar, his life wasn’t in danger. Zheng Zhan stepped in front of Zhang Peng and asked, “Who are you? Don’t you know that the elders of the competing teams aren’t allowed onto the stage?”

Zhang Peng glared at him coldly. Suddenly, Zheng Zhan felt nauseous, and retreated two steps subconsciously.

This person is very strong. Just the aura from the look in his eyes makes me feel he is irresistible. Titled Douluo, he must be a Titled Douluo! He might even be a Transcendent Douluo!

Just as Zheng Zhan was horriﬁed, Zhang Peng said, “Something seems to have happened to my competing member. She can’t compete anymore. We’ll concede defeat in the fourth round. Continue.” As he spoke, he turned around and seemed to teleport off the stage.

Everyone from the Tang Sect also carried Bei Bei off the stage. Only Huo Yuhao was left behind.

Huo Yuhao looked at the remaining four members of the Holy Ghost Sect with a cold look in his eyes. He lifted his right hand and hooked his ﬁnger at them. “Referee, we’ve already won three individual elimination rounds. We’ve decided to forfeit the rest of the individual elimination round and request to enter the team round immediately.”

Zheng Zhan nodded and walked to the Holy Ghost Sect’s side. He said a few sentences to them in the waiting area.

The four remaining members of the Holy Ghost Sect stood up at the same time. A cold intent spread towards the stage and Huo Yuhao.

Huo Yuhao ignored them and said, “Referee, we should be able to start after a short rest?”

Zheng Zhan nodded. As the remaining competing members from both teams had yet to compete, he immediately announced that the team round would commence after ﬁfteen minutes, and would decide the outcome of this semiﬁnal match.

Huo Yuhao pushed his wheelchair back to his team’s waiting area. Xu Sanshi jumped up onto the stage to help him off. Wang Dong’er was still helping Bei Bei with his injury. His cigar was quite effective. The wound on Bei Bei’s chest was healing very quickly.

Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but give He Caitou a thumbs up. “Second senior, it’s all to your credit.”

He Caitou smiled widely and said, “It’s only right. My cigar can only heal external injuries, and so is very suitable for eldest senior. He’s lost too much blood, but should recover if he nourishes his body. When we return, I’ll give him two more cigars.”

Xu Sanshi laughed bitterly. “Bei Bei has suffered a lot in this tournament! It’s his second time being so seriously hurt. He was even hurt by Xiao Ya both times. Don’t tell me she has really forgotten him?”

Huo Yuhao shook his head and gently said, “No. Teacher Xiao Ya must have had been woken up by eldest senior. At least a part of her memories should have been jolted. Otherwise, he would have been dead by now. Second senior, quickly restore your soul power. We’ll go up later and ﬁnish them off.” “Even though Bei Bei was seriously injured now, the Tang Sect is still at an advantage. Bei Bei got rid of two people by sacriﬁcing himself. He even caused Tang Ya to lose her ability to compete further. In the team round, we’ll be outnumbering them six to four. We have a very obvious advantage.”

Jiang Nannan came to Huo Yuhao’s side, and she was very anxious. “Are you saying that Xiao Ya has been jolted awake? If that’s the case, we should save her!”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly. “It’s no use. Fourth senior, don’t be rash. The Scorpion Tiger Douluo is an evil soul master, and also a Transcendent Douluo. Furthermore, this is the Sun Moon Empire’s territory. There are many Holy Ghost Sect members around. We’ve no ability to save her now. We must wait for the opportunity.”

Jiang Nannan wanted to say something, but she was dragged away by Xu Sanshi.

Xu Sanshi grabbed onto Jiang Nannan’s shoulder and said, “Nannan, calm down. We still have the team round later. Can you compete if you remain like this? Let’s defeat our opponents ﬁrst. We are doing our best to get Xiao Ya back.”

Jiang Nannan nodded as she saw his bright eyes.

Xu Sanshi hugged her and said sincerely, “I’ve always been very envious of Bei Bei and Tang Ya. However, I feel that we are more blissful than them. No matter what your feelings are for me, you’ve always been by my side, and you can still recognize me. Nannan, I’ll treasure you.”

“Okay.” Xu Sanshi hugged her, but she didn’t struggle after the sad encounter between Bei Bei and Tang Ya. She hugged him at the waist, and her tears ﬂowed again. She muttered, “If I become like Xiao Ya one day, I want you to personally kill me. I’d rather die in your arms than wake up seeing you collapsed beside me.”

Chapter 333: Four Great Evil Soul Masters

Xu Sanshi’s body jerked. He had been together with Jiang Nannan for quite some time. However, he had always been the one taking the initiative. Jiang Nannan rarely responded to his confessions. Now that she said such words, how could he not feel surprised and shocked at the same time?

“Alright. If something like that happens, I’ll kill you ﬁrst before I die with you. At least you won’t be alone.”

“Pui, pui, pui. Can the two of you not sound so inauspicious?” Xiao Xiao couldn’t help but butt in.

He Caitou touched Xiao Xiao’s head and said, “Alright, everyone calm down. Let’s prepare for the team round. Yuhao, you’ll still command the team round.”

“Alright.” Huo Yuhao was a little unsteady right now. He looked at the pale and unconscious Bei Bei as he bit his lips. Everything was caused by the Holy Ghost Church. They made Teacher Xiao Ya like that. It’s because of them that eldest senior and Teacher Xiao Ya are in so much pain. They must pay the price!

Huo Yuhao wasn’t just a junior to Bei Bei and Tang Ya. The two of them had changed his life. Through being a member of the Tang Sect and entering Shrek Academy, he had managed to experience what a family was. He had felt warmth, he had found teachers, and gained everything that belonged to him now.

Although Huo Yuhao was one of the youngest in the Tang Sect, he was still the third person to join the sect. He was only behind Bei Bei and Tang Ya. In his heart, Bei Bei and Tang Ya were like his real siblings.

He didn’t feel any less tormented than Bei Bei after Tang Ya and Ma Xiaotao disappeared. He felt the same as Bei Bei every time he saw the loneliness in Bei Bei’s eyes.

He had developed a calm heart after going through the training of the Ultimate Soldier Plan. However, this sense of calm had merely repressed his emotional side. This repression wasn’t effective all the time, however. Once the repression was overcome, the emotions he felt became even more intense. After all, humans weren’t machines!

It was just like how he risked everything for Wang Dong’er; he didn’t care as he proceeded to the Iceﬁre Yin Yang Well and practically exchanged his life for the medicinal herb. As he saw how sorrowful and tormented Bei Bei was, and how Tang Ya was taken away by the Scorpion Tiger Douluo, the pain that he felt slowly turned into a burning furnace of pure fury.

He had not felt such a deep hatred in a long time. He swore to himself that he would completely destroy the Holy Ghost Church one day!

His anxious expression turned cold. The training he had gone through in the Ultimate Soldier Plan was no longer able to repress his emotions. However, he was able to tolerate the fury he felt just as he was experiencing an emotional outburst.

Wang Dong’er was a little worried as she looked at Huo Yuhao. She pressed her hands against his shoulders and gently massaged them. She spent the most time with him, and was the clearest about his emotional ups and downs. She could clearly sense the cold intent that Huo Yuhao was letting out. It was obvious to her that he was infuriated!

Huo Yuhao lifted his right hand to tap Wang Dong’er’s hand. He signaled to her that he hadn’t lost control of his emotions. He slowly shut his eyes and waited for the match to begin.

Xu Sanshi carried Bei Bei away and sent him to the resting area. He passed him over to Na Na, Ji Juechen, and Jing Ziyan before returning to the waiting area.

“Despicable Holy Ghost Sect. My hatred won’t be sated unless I destroy them. Yuhao, let’s use that move!” A vicious look ﬂashed across Xu Sanshi’s eyes.

The expressions of everyone from the Tang Sect turned cold. Bei Bei’s injury had not just angered Huo Yuhao, but all of them.

At this point, Wang Qiu’er stood up. No one from the Tang Sect expected this. She walked towards them. This wasn’t allowed by the rules. However, no one had expected this to happen. When the staff members realized what was happening, Wang Qiu’er was already in the waiting area. She lowered her head and said a few words to Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao as she stood in between them.

Wang Dong’er was stunned, and twisted her head to look at her.

Huo Yuhao hesitated for a moment before looking at Wang Dong’er. Eventually, he nodded.

Wang Qiu’er revealed a persistent look. “I’m only repaying you a personal favor.”

“Okay.” Huo Yuhao didn’t feel like speaking too much at the moment.

The staff members ran over at this point.

Wang Qiu’er straightened, and glared at them coldly. Who was this Golden Dragon Lady? She had the most supporters in this tournament, even though she came from Shrek Academy!

All the staff members stopped when she glared coldly at them. After that, they just watched as she walked back to her resting area.

However, no one noticed that there was something different about Wang Qiu’er before and after she talked to Huo Yuhao…

---

Fifteen minutes passed in a ﬂash. On the stage, the ﬁve members from the Tang Sect stood up at the same time when Zheng Zhan asked the competing members from both teams to enter the stage. Wang Dong’er pushed Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair up on the stage ﬁrst, and the other four followed behind. There was an austere aura subtly rising from them.

On the other side, the remaining four members of the Holy Ghost Sect also ascended the stage. The four of them had different ﬁgures. However, they were all young men. The person in the lead had been seated at the last position earlier in the waiting area. This person was also the largest of all the Holy Ghost Sect’s team members.

He was even bigger than He Caitou, with extremely broad shoulders. As he walked in front of them, the other three were completely blocked behind him.

The four of them came to the center of the stage and faced the six from the Tang Sect. Even though they were outnumbered, the aura that they exuded didn’t seem to be inferior. They released a cold and eerie power from their bodies, and the temperature seemed to be dropping.

“Both parties, please report your names.” Zheng Zhan said. He knew that this might be the most difﬁcult ﬁght he was going to referee, even though there neither team was at full strength. If the ten of them fought against him, he knew that it wouldn’t be easy to defeat them, especially the four mysterious evil soul masters.

Zheng Zhan could tell that Bei Bei was able to defeat two of his opponents earlier because he had a natural element that could suppress evil soul masters. However, did the rest of the Tang Sect possess such abilities? Evil soul masters couldn’t be measured using logic.

There was once an evil soul master that had killed ten soul masters at the same cultivation level as him. There were four such evil soul masters right now. No one knew what they were capable of, because they had never appeared in the earlier rounds.

The evil soul masters that had competed in the earlier rounds were all in the resting area now. They were undoubtedly the substitutes for these last few evil soul masters onstage right now.

“Tang Sect, Huo Yuhao.” As the acting team leader, Huo Yuhao reported his name ﬁrst.

“Tang Sect, He Caitou.”

“Tang Sect, Xu Sanshi.” “Tang Sect, Jiang Nannan.”

“Tang Sect, Xiao Xiao.”

“Tang Sect, Wang Dong’er.”

The six of them used the simplest method of reporting their names. They had no intention of concealing the killing intent that came from their bodies.

The largest person from the Holy Ghost Sect said, “Holy Ghost Sect, Lu Genggeng.”

“Holy Ghost Sect, Yan Feng.”

“Holy Ghost Sect, Tang Dai.”

“Holy Ghost Sect, Gu Yu.” Four people, four different voices. Lu Genggeng’s voice was loud and clear. This was rare among evil soul masters. Not only did he not sound eerie, he even seemed quite vibrant.

Of the three behind him, Yan Feng had the most ordinary ﬁgure. However, the aura that he exuded was the coldest and creepiest. He felt like a creepy venomous snake.

Tang Dai hid his aura the best. Just from his aura, it felt like he was an ordinary person. Huo Yuhao couldn’t even sense any soul power undulations from his body. He was quite tall, only half a head shorter than Lu Genggeng, but quite scrawny.

Gu Yu was very stocky. His shoulders were almost as broad as Lu Genggeng’s, but his height reached just past Lu Genggeng’s waist.

As the four of them stood there, the ﬁrst feeling that they gave off was... unevenly matched.

“Both parties, please withdraw and prepare for the start of the ﬁght,” Zheng Zhan instructed them. The ten of them turned around at almost the same time and walked towards their respective sides of the stage.

As they moved, Huo Yuhao activated his Spiritual Detection.

He also used his Imitation to conceal his soul rings.

With his Spiritual Detection, Huo Yuhao naturally didn’t need to use words to communicate with his teammates.

On the other side, the four evil soul masters didn’t seem to interact with one another at all. They weren’t rushing, either. They also walked slowly over to their side of the stage.

Zheng Zhan lifted his right hand as both parties reached their respective sides of the stage. It was a sign to everyone that they should prepare for the match to begin.

The Tang Sect quickly set up their formation. They did it differently from the previous rounds. This time, Xu Sanshi wasn’t in front, He Caitou was. Xiao Xiao was on the left in the second row, while Jiang Nannan was on the right. Xu Sanshi was standing behind Wang Dong’er. Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao were in the back row. The six of them formed a very weird cross shape with everyone standing in front of Xu Sanshi!

Zheng Zhan was a little stunned when he saw their formation. What’s this formation? The strategy of the Tang Sect is indeed very weird. They use different formations every round. Don’t tell me they’re still capable of more tricks like Bei Bei?

On the other side, the Holy Ghost Sect’s formation was much simpler. Lu Genggeng and Tang Dai stood in front, while Yan Feng and Gu Yu stood behind them. The four of them formed a simple square.

Seeing that both parties were already in position and had no intention of changing, Zheng Zhan took in a deep breath before shouting, “Fight, start!”

The members of both teams unleashed their martial souls immediately.

He Caitou’s six soul rings shone. Following this, a Binding Light surfaced on his chest. The rest of them also unleashed their own martial souls.

Dazzling soul rings started to rise.

Zheng Zhan was a Class 9 soul engineer. Among the ten competitors on the stage right now, only He Caitou was a soul engineer. Thus, he naturally paid close attention to He Caitou’s performance. As the tournament reached this stage, all the soul engineering sects had been kicked out. He Caitou was the sole remaining soul engineer. It was very difﬁcult to tell if Huo Yuhao was a soul master, or a soul engineer!

Seeing that He Caitou was immediately using his Class 7 Binding Light, Zheng Zhan furrowed his brow.

This idiot. Why is he using his Binding Light right now? Doesn’t he know that its effective range is only six meters? This is a mistake he shouldn’t be making.

He’s only a Class 6 soul engineer. The Binding Light will greatly deplete his soul power. Furthermore, the Binding Light will start to consume his soul power the moment he opens the barrel. How can he move under such circumstances? Don’t tell me that an opponent will sacriﬁce himself by charging towards the Binding Light?

Zheng Zhan felt that he would admonish He Caitou after this ﬁght was over, if he were the young man’s teacher.

The four evil soul masters also unleashed their martial souls.

Lu Genggeng was the ﬁrst to make a move. He exerted force through his legs and leapt up. He didn’t jump too high, only leaping two meters into the air, and only charging forward for four or ﬁve meters.

However, he ballooned the moment he jumped up.

By the time he landed, his black robe had already burst open.

He had become an extremely huge and terrifying monster!

After unleashing his martial soul, Lu Genggeng grew to more than ﬁve meters in height. He was extremely plump, making him look like a giant meatball. His thick legs were extremely short. When he landed on the ground, everyone from the Tang Sect felt it quake beneath their feet. A loud crunching also resonated from the stage. What kind of monster is this?

All the spectators were stunned when they witnessed this.

Lu Genggeng was like an obese man. His body was exuding waves of dark-green soul power. The strange thing was that these undulations were like an arrhythmic fog as they rose around his body. His head puffed up into a ball, and his blood- red eyes looked very ﬁerce. His six soul rings seemed extremely large because of his huge body

The scary thing was that the pieces of fat on his arms and shoulders seemed to have been stitched together. His skin appeared as patches. He opened his mouth wide and saliva ﬂowed from it continuously. As it landed on the steel plates on the ground, gusts of smoke rose.

When they saw him, everyone from the Tang Sect couldn’t help but recall Feng Ling. However, Feng Ling was terrifying because of his stinky breath. The saliva of this obese guy in front of them now was much more terrifying. After he ballooned in size, Lu Genggeng charged towards the Tang Sect with a swaying motion.

Everyone from the Tang Sect was shocked when they saw him. What is his martial soul?

Only Huo Yuhao’s eyes ﬂashed coldly. “Abomination. It’s a terrifying specter. It feeds on corpses to enhance its strength. Once it’s hurt, it can devour corpses to recover. Its abilities should include speed, control, and assault. It’s a very strong, comprehensive and evil martial soul. Take extreme caution against it. The dark-green aura around it should be poison.”

“It’s actually an Abomination.” Huo Yuhao was inwardly horriﬁed. Although he could point out the characteristics of this Abomination, it was actually his ﬁrst time seeing one. He had learned everything about this Abomination from Electrolux. Even in the world of specters, abominations were ranked among the top.

Next to Lu Genggeng, Tang Dai also took big steps forward. He wasn’t as forceful as Lu Genggeng as he leapt forward. However, the transformations to his body weren’t any less terrifying.

His body grew in size with every step he took. When he arrived beside Lu Genggeng, he was actually half a meter taller than him. However, he wasn’t as fat as the Abomination. He had turned into a huge skeleton made of dark gold bones.

The transformations to both of their bodies were too weird.

The spectators couldn’t help but exclaim things in revulsion.

---

Up on the main stage, Xu Tianran furrowed his brow. He suddenly felt that it was a mistake to let the Holy Ghost Sect compete in this tournament. Their existence was too much for ordinary people and soul masters to take. The Sun Moon Empire’s ofﬁcials revealed astonished looks on their faces, and they couldn’t conceal their disgust.

The disgust towards specters had been like this since time immemorial. This time wasn’t an exception.

Xu Tianran sighed in his heart. It seemed like he couldn’t let the Holy Ghost Sect win in the end! Otherwise, he would be under great pressure within his own empire regardless of what happened to the other empires on the continent. These evil soul masters were better kept in the dark.

As he thought of this, he made a decision. It was ﬁne if the Holy Ghost Sect lost this semiﬁnal match. Even if they won, he would make them forfeit the ﬁnal and give the championship to Shrek Academy. Compared to his position in the empire, losing the championship to Shrek Academy wouldn’t affect the empire’s reputation.

---

“Skeleton King. Its physical and energy defenses are very strong. It’s adept at physical assault, but its ﬂaw lies in its inability to attack at range.” Huo Yuhao immediately warned his teammates as he saw Tang Dai’s transformations.

At the same time, he was also doubtful. It seems like many of these evil soul masters are related to specters! The Zhong Li brothers that I met earlier were very adept at controlling souls. Wang Xiaolei was also a witch demon, that was similar to a specter. These two’s martial souls also seem like an Abomination and a Skeleton King. They are some of the strongest martial souls among specters. No wonder they’re able to represent the Holy Ghost Sect to compete.

Yan Feng and Gu Yu were both blocked by the Skeleton King and Abomination.

However, it was a pity that their opponent was the Tang Sect. With Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, there was no way they could conceal themselves.

An icy-blue halo lit up beneath Yan Feng’s feet. This halo appeared along with his soul rings. The halo spread outward as his body became stronger. Dragon scales started to surface on his skin, tearing away his black cloak.

Yan Feng was the only other evil soul master who had seemed like a human, apart from Tang Ya. He was extremely handsome. As the dragon scales surfaced on his body, he grew in size. His gaze also became sharper, and his cold aura soared. His soul rings rose quickly.

Two yellow, two purple and three black soul rings. Seven- ringed Soul Sage.

He was actually a Soul Sage.

He was an evil Soul Sage, just like Tang Ya!

When everyone from the Tang Sect saw Yan Feng’s seven soul rings, they became very serious. If not for the fact that Bei Bei had gotten rid of two six-ringed evil soul masters and caused the seven-ringed Tang Ya to lose control, they might have been completely suppressed in a seven versus seven ﬁght, since the Holy Ghost Sect had two evil Soul Sages!

Even now, they were in a dire situation.

Yan Feng was a Soul Sage, while the rest were all Soul Emperors. Gu Yu’s martial soul was a long bone staff.

The bone staff was made of white bones, and three meters long. There was a silver-grey skull at the tip of the staff, whose eyes burned with a dim purple ﬂame.

He was a very strong evil soul master!

Gu Yu lifted his bone staff, and Yan Feng bent his body slightly before two huge wings opened on his back.

The wings were icy-blue and made of bones, connected by bluish-grey light. When the wings opened up, they spanned close to six meters across. They beat once, and he rose into the air, drifting over in front of Lu Genggeng and Tang Dai.

Ground-based, air-based, and long-distance. The four of them were adept in different areas. Along with Tang Ya, who was adept at control; Wang Xiaolei, who was adept at long- range attacks and control; and Ji Li, who was adept at both attacking and defending, they formed an extremely terrifying team!

In the history of the Continental Elite Youth Soul Master Tournament, they were one of the strongest teams ever in terms of ﬁghting strength. It wasn’t even too far-fetched to say that they were the strongest team to ever compete!

It was obvious that Bei Bei’s contribution in the individual elimination round had been very important!

The Abomination and Skeleton King charged forward at the same time, both appearing very clumsy as they lumbered over. Up in the air, Yan Feng’s icy-blue light became stronger and stronger. He also advanced with the other two.

Gu Yu lifted his bone staff, and a ball of purple light took form at the tip of the staff. A purplish halo surfaced on each of the other three evil soul masters’ bodies in front of him.

“Let’s begin!” Xu Sanshi shouted.

He lifted his Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle, and an intense black light suddenly shone. His fourth soul ring also lit up as his actions were obscured by He Caitou’s burly ﬁgure.

He Caitou also instantly turned around and faced Xu Sanshi. Xiao Xiao unleashed her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron and surrounded Xu Sanshi in the middle of them.

What were they doing?

The answer was revealed immediately.

As black lights ﬂashed, Xu Sanshi disappeared. Someone else immediately replaced him, appearing in the center of the other ﬁve Tang Sect members.

Shrek’s Seven Monsters had once used this strategy in the previous tournament. In this tournament, Xu Sanshi had used the Mysterious Underworld Displacement before. However, he had kept this strategy a secret until now to deal with their strongest opponent.

Huo Yuhao didn’t choose Tang Dai, Lu Genggeng or Yan Feng. He chose Gu Yu instead, who was there to support the other three.

It was very easy for him to make this decision.

Lu Genggeng and Tang Dai were too big. The Tang Sect’s formation would likely be forced out of shape if either of them were displaced. At the same time, both of their martial souls were defensively sound, while Yan Feng was a Soul Sage. Huo Yuhao wasn’t conﬁdent in getting rid of them quickly. So he shifted his target to Gu Yu, who was only a Soul Emperor, but whose abilities were long-range, controlling, and auxiliary in nature.

With the guidance of Spiritual Detection, Xu Sanshi’s Mysterious Underworld Displacement still took effect even though he couldn’t see or be seen by his opponents!

Instantly, both of them shifted positions. Gu Yu was astonished to discover that he was in enemy territory. He was even encircled!

The Tang Sect was prepared.

Wang Dong’er pulled Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair and leapt backward, along with the other four members of the team. Xiao Xiao’s three cauldrons were unleashed at this moment. With a loud boom, the Cauldron’s Quaking Tremble sounded. Gu Yu had only just appeared, but the immense impact force of the cauldrons struck him immediately.

Gu Yu was still a little confused, but he was already completely trapped!

They weren’t completely defenseless against Xu Sanshi’s Mysterious Underworld Displacement. After all, the Tang Sect did use it a couple of times earlier in the tournament.

While they found out that this skill could be considered a divine skill for a defense-type soul master, the soul master had to ﬁrst be able to lock onto his opponent’s position.

The remaining four evil soul masters were all extremely strong. Except for Gu Yu, the other three would be very resistant even if they were encircled, and could still unleash their great ﬁghting strength. As such, they weren’t afraid of being displaced. They were also prepared for it. Gu Yu was shielded by the Skeleton King and Abomination. He was an auxiliary-type and control-type soul master. As long as he wasn’t locked onto by Xu Sanshi, he naturally didn’t have to be afraid. When he unleashed his abilities, he might even be scarier than the other three.

However, who would have expected Xu Sanshi to displace him without knowing his position? This sudden change in events caused Gu Yu to panic.

While the Holy Ghost Church was an evil soul master sect, they were even more persistent than the Body Sect in their belief in a soul master’s abilities, and despised soul tools. This was also why none of the evil soul masters were equipped with Invincible Barriers. Otherwise, Bei Bei wouldn’t have found it so easy to kill them earlier.

Gu Yu was indeed a strong evil soul master. When he discovered that he was trapped, his sixth soul ring shone without any hesitation.

As the black soul ring ﬂashed, his body started to contort. Xiao Xiao’s Cauldron Quaking Tremble brushed past him, but didn’t have any effect on him.

Void! It was an extremely strong soul skill. This soul skill enabled one’s body to become like air, and made one resistant to physical and soul power attacks. More accurately speaking, these two types of attacks were ineffective against him after his Void took effect.

In the Holy Ghost Church, only the outstanding disciples had the opportunity to obtain such a soul skill with the help of the higher-ups. In critical moments, it might even be more effective than an Invincible Barrier.

However, Void didn’t protect one against everything.

Huo Yuhao was also put in a difﬁcult spot right now. Golden light ﬂashed from his forehead, and his vertical eye lit up. Gu Yu couldn’t attack, as he was in his Void state. When his three teammates realized something was amiss, Xu Sanshi was already behind them.

Patches of black light surged. It was Xuanwu’s Domain! In order to delay the three of them, Xu Sanshi used the strength of his domain. The three of them seemed to have fallen into a deep quagmire, and couldn’t free themselves.

Not only this, but his ﬁrst soul ring also lit up. The Mysterious Underworld Quake was unleashed.

The black light in Xuanwu’s Domain started to shake, causing the three evil soul masters to fall under Xu Sanshi’s control in this domain.

Xu Sanshi was already bleeding profusely right now. This was a sacriﬁce he was making to win the team round. His sixth soul skill wasn’t easy to control. Along with the fact that his old injury had yet to recover, he was under great pressure as he unleashed all his strength, even though he had managed to trap his opponents.

Purplish-gold lights shone. Gu Yu let out a pathetic scream. His black bamboo hat and veil were struck off his head, revealing his pale white face and bald head.

However, his head seemed to be in a very disastrous condition right now. There was blood oozing out everywhere, and his body seemed to be very unstable. His Void was indeed capable of keeping out most physical and soul power attacks. However, it couldn’t keep out spiritual power!

Huo Yuhao hated the Holy Ghost Sect immensely, and thus he immediately used his strongest tactic against them the moment he made a move. He used his Eye of Destiny and Spiritual Shock!

The purplish-gold light was like a sharp sword stabbing deep into his opponent’s soul. Gu Yu was instantly wrenched out of his Void state!

A golden Hexagram Array was unleashed at this point. As it rose, it landed on Gu Yu’s body at the same time as the Binding Light, which appeared behind his back.

Without his Void, how could he resist being bound? Moreover, Gu Yu’s mind was completely blank at this point, as his soul had been greatly damaged.

Wang Dong’er’s wings opened, and she drifted up into the air at the same time as she used her Hexagram Array. As her body ﬂashed, she arrived in front of Gu Yu. She lifted her right hand and pointed her index ﬁnger one inch away from Gu Yu’s forehead. Her right hand turned golden. Although she only pointed one ﬁnger, her ﬁngertip seemed to shine like a small sun.

An oxhair-like golden light ﬂashed before disappearing. Gu Yu leaned his head back, and golden light penetrated through the back of his head before disappearing in the air. His body went completely stiff.

At that instant, the other three evil soul masters knew that Gu Yu was dead

When they saw Gu Yu being forced out of his Void state by Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Shock, they knew he was a dead man.

They were indeed vicious. They didn’t try to break free from Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu’s domain. Rather, they turned around at the same time and charged towards him.

Since one of them had already died, they had to drag at least one person from the Tang Sect down with him. Xu Sanshi was extremely important to the Tang Sect. Without their defense- type soul master, the Tang Sect would ﬁnd it difﬁcult to resist the three of them!

The three of them were indeed very strong.

Tang Dai lifted his arms, and his black, bony arms turned into two pitch-black bone blades that slashed out at the same time. He managed to carve a path through the domain.

Lu Genggeng exuded a crimson-red glow, increasing his speed in the domain. He charged towards Xu Sanshi maniacally and opened his mouth. It seemed like he wanted to swallow the other whole.

Yan Feng was still the scariest one. He exuded a strong, icy- blue glow, and his body expanded even further as he ﬂew. As his wings ﬂapped forward, two streaks of fog-like, icy-blue light shot towards Xu Sanshi. Wherever the two streaks of lights passed, Xu Sanshi’s Xuanwu’s Domain seemed like it was frozen in place. No matter how strong Xu Sanshi was, he was still immediately placed in a precarious position against three evil soul masters whose cultivations weren’t inferior to his.

On the other side of the stage, Huo Yuhao and the rest immediately acted after getting rid of Gu Yu.

Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao increased their speed as they burst forward towards their opponents. He Caitou released his Class 7 Eye of Fear into the air. It was simply too important in this team round. With it, their opponents would be very unsettled and cautious.

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er were the strangest.

After Wang Dong’er’s Broken Devil of Light blew apart Gu Yu’s brain, she revolved in the air and landed in Huo Yuhao’s chair. She bent her knees and landed in Huo Yuhao’s lap. At the same time, she opened her arms wide and grabbed his neck.

Chapter 334: The Tang Sect's Hidden Fighting Strategy

Due to the height difference, Huo Yuhao only sensed a gentle fragrance in front of him. However, he couldn’t bother to enjoy this fragrance right now!

The dazzling wings closed up and engulfed Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er. Suddenly, an intense white light was released from their bodies.

At the same time, Xu Sanshi revealed a smile on his face even though he was encircled by three strong evil soul masters.

His smile was a little cheeky. If Bei Bei were awake, he would have commented on how cheap Xu Sanshi’s smile was.

Dense black light rose from his body once again. In the next instant, black and white intersected. The deep black and his Xuanwu’s Domain disappeared at almost the same time. What replaced them was a ball of blinding white light. Of the attacks from the three evil soul masters going after Xu Sanshi, the two streaks of icy-blue light that came from Yan Feng reached Xu Sanshi ﬁrst. However, the chilling icy blue lights ﬁlled with an evil aura immediately dissipated as they struck the ball of white light. They didn’t have any effects.

Following that, the ball of white light turned golden. Tang Dai, Lu Genggeng, and Yan Feng looked at the countless, small golden hammer projections surfacing from the ball of golden light. The three of them were then covered by these hammers.

Their souls shook with unprecedented force horrifying them. They couldn’t be bothered to attack their opponents anymore, and frantically bolstered their defenses.

Mantra Amidst the Void, Spiritual Tempest!

This was one of Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s fusion skills. They had once used this skill to save Ju Zi in a war, causing many heads to blow apart. To this very day, Ju Zi could still clearly recall this. That was why Ju Zi’s gaze sharpened when she saw the small golden hammers, as she recalled what had happened in the past. There was an indescribable look of struggle in her eyes.

There wasn’t any way of avoiding it. The three evil soul masters were struck at the same time, but their reactions were all different. Tang Dai was stunned, while Lu Genggeng peered into the sky and roared. His fat started to jiggle.

Yan Feng released a strong icy-blue halo that protected him.

In his eyes, an icy-blue spiritual ﬁre surged and resisted the attack of the fusion skill. However, he still fell from the sky.

Since Huo Yuhao had allowed Xu Sanshi to sneak into their opponent’s territory to earn his side a victory, he naturally took his safety into account!

In the previous tournament, he had once asked Xu Sanshi if it was possible for him to switch positions with Wang Dong’er as she unleashed their fusion skill. At that point in time, Xu Sanshi said it wasn’t possible. Indeed, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er were one entity when they unleashed their fusion skill. When they unleashed their fusion skill, their soul power undulations were too strong and unstable. With Xu Sanshi’s control of his soul skill, it wasn’t possible for him to displace them.

However, it was completely different now, ﬁve years later. Before they left Shrek Academy, he was already able to complete this displacement. This was also one of the strongest killer moves of the Tang Sect. They had waited until today to use it.

This was their foundation, the Tang Sect’s foundation and Shrek’s Seven Monsters’ foundation!

They kicked out all their opponents and advanced to the semiﬁnal before unleashing their greatest strength. If the other teams that had been eliminated by them were present right now, they would most likely be won over by the strength that the Tang Sect was showing now.

The Tang Sect had used a different ﬁghting method in every team round. There weren’t any clues for their next opponents to use to determine their next set of tactics. This displacement and return allowed the Tang Sect to deliver a fusion skill attack towards their opponents without any warning. It was very impressive.

An elder who wore a bamboo hat among the spectators swore in admiration, “Shrek, it’s always Shrek!” A dim green light ﬂashed across his eyes.

The three evil soul masters were controlled at the same time. Even the strongest Yan Feng had entered a temporary state of mental blankness.

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er revealed themselves again.

However, they didn’t pursue immediately.

The Tang Sect had unleashed a fusion skill and used it on the Holy Ghost Sect. Something like this wasn’t achieved just by Xu Sanshi alone. When Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er unleashed their fusion skill, they had to try their best to repress and seal it ﬁrst to prevent any accidents from happening as Xu Sanshi delivered the fusion skill. After such control, the two of them needed an opportunity for some recovery time.

On the other side, Xiao Xiao and Jiang Nannan had already charged over. He Caitou also lifted a heavy cannon to his shoulder after he unleashed his Eye of Fear.

The cannon was entirely blood-red, with a cone-shaped tip.

Is that a Class 7 piercing cannon?

At this moment, Zheng Zhan could ﬁnally conﬁrm that He Caitou wasn’t a Class 6 soul engineer. It was evident that he was a six-ringed soul master that had successfully been promoted to a Class 7 soul engineer!

Class 7 soul engineer. There’s actually a Class 7 soul engineer in the Tang Sect? He’s not even twenty years old yet! Even in the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, he’d be one of a rare few. Moreover, he’s still a food-type soul master. How outstanding is he? There was a simple reason why Zheng Zhan had judged He Caitou to be a Class 7 soul engineer… he had used three Class 7 soul tools consecutively! If not for the fact that his ability was already at a comparable level, how could he manage all of them? An ordinary Class 6 soul engineer could go beyond his

class occasionally to use a Class 7 soul tool.

However, He Caitou had used three of them, one right after another. This would be truly abnormal if he were a Class 6 soul engineer. He had revealed his Class 7 Binding Light in the previous round, while his piercing cannon made its appearance for the ﬁrst time in this round. This bunch from the Tang Sect can really hide themselves well. They continuously hid their abilities until the last moment!

He Caitou went down on one knee as he brought up his heavy cannon. He aimed, but still had to control the Eye of Fear in the air. Right now, He Caitou was deﬁnitely demonstrating the standards of a Class 7 soul engineer. He wasn’t an ordinary Class 7 soul engineer, either!

Of course, Zheng Zhan didn’t know that the Eye of Fear and the piercing cannon were both equipped with a Class 6 Sealed Milk Bottle. Otherwise, it would have been very difﬁcult for He Caitou to handle the depletion from three Class 7 soul tools at the same time, since his soul power was still at the six-ringed level.

Huo Yuhao, Wang Dong’er, and the three evil soul masters were stuck in a temporary stalemate. Xiao Xiao was the ﬁrst to attack.

After Jiang Nannan and Xiao Xiao crossed the halfway line, Xiao Xiao suddenly leapt up. Jiang Nannan quickly ﬂashed below her and grabbed her slender waist with both hands. After that, she made three quick turns before ﬂinging Xiao Xiao out.

In this team round, Jiang Nannan wasn’t going to very effective against her opponents because of their special martial souls. She was most adept at close-combat, but it wouldn’t be very effective against her opponents, since they were too huge.

That was why Huo Yuhao arranged for her to use her abilities as support for the others.

Xiao Xiao was ﬂung out by the force of Jiang Nannan’s spin. The speed at which Xiao Xiao was moving could compare to Wang Qiu’er if she burst forward with all her strength.

Very quickly, Xiao Xiao was above the three evil soul masters. She clearly knew what her strengths and weaknesses were. She didn’t attack her opponents over-ambitiously. She unleashed her Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron in the air, and her ﬁrst and second soul rings shone. She immediately used her National Treasure, Cauldron’s Quaking Tremble!

Her huge cauldron crashed against the Skeleton King.

Huo Yuhao gave her very simple information through his Spiritual Detection. The Skeleton King is roughly as strong as the Abomination. However, the defensive strength of the Abomination’s fat will be able to resist the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron’s attack. The cauldron will be able to curb the Skeleton King, however.

There was a rumbling bang, and the Skeleton King ﬂew backward, at least seven of its ribs fractured.

The Mantra Amidst the Void, Spiritual Tempest wasn’t so easily resisted. There was one common point between these three evil soul masters; their martial souls were only strong because they relied on their spiritual power to control them.

This detail was very important. After their souls were affected by the Spiritual Tempest, their control over their own bodies weakened considerably. Xiao Xiao’s attack was unleashed on the defenseless Skeleton King, and achieved a miraculous effect.

Xiao Xiao didn’t intend to let the Skeleton King off even though it had already been thrown backward. Her ﬁfth soul ring lit up for the ﬁrst time in this tournament.

Her cauldron split into three. Each of the cauldrons shot out a beam of intense black light. After this black light rose into the sky, a mighty aura instantly appeared. Xiao Xiao seemed to have teleported herself above the three cauldrons.

The three cauldrons descended. As a low-pitched buzzing sound built up, they cornered the Skeleton King.

The three beams of light intersected in the air, forming a huge light barrier. The Skeleton King was trapped!

Skeleton King Tang Dai woke up as he struggled against the instability of his own soul. He immediately felt as if a mountain were pressing down on his soul. He couldn’t even control his own body to stand up. He was pressed ﬁrmly to the ground after he collapsed.

This was the ﬁfth soul skill of the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron, the Threelives Soulcrush!

It was a strong soul skill that suppressed a soul. Huo Yuhao had once let Xiao Xiao use this soul skill against him. Even with his immense spiritual power, it took him three minutes to overcome the suppression.

It was important to know that his spiritual power was comparable to a Soul Douluo. His control might even be better!

The Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron was very rare among tool souls, but it was a top-ranked martial soul that wasn’t inferior to the Clear Sky Hammer. The greatest characteristic of this martial soul was that it became stronger as the number of soul rings and the soul master’s abilities increased.

When Xiao Xiao gained this soul skill, Elder Xuan told her that she could protect herself against any evil soul master as long as he wasn’t a Soul Sage yet. It showed how strong this soul skill was.

Of course, it wasn’t without ﬂaws. Once it was initiated, Xiao Xiao couldn’t move anymore. She could only control her soul skill with all her strength. Unless she ended it of her own accord or her soul power was depleted, her Threelives Soulcrush would remain active.

However, her soul skill might be destroyed if she suffered external attacks.

As a result, she had to ensure that she wasn’t externally susceptible once she used this soul skill.

Xiao Xiao even thought of suppressing all three evil soul masters at the same time, but this proposition was denied by Huo Yuhao. The more people she suppressed, the greater the depletion of her soul power. She didn’t need to do so considering the situation they were in.

Once the Threelives Soulcrush was initiated, anyone who tried to save or attack the person being suppressed would suffer from a backlash against his soul power due to the connection between his soul and body.

There was a simple reason why Xiao Xiao was allowed to use the Threelives Soulcrush – she was supposed to restrain a six- ringed evil soul master with her ﬁve-ringed cultivation! This allowed her own team to concentrate more of their strength to deal with the other two evil soul masters. Once they got rid of the two others, it wouldn’t be difﬁcult to get rid of the Skeleton King anymore.

Furthermore, Xiao Xiao’s Threelives Soulcrush didn’t have any effect on soul tools. In other words, He Caitou was the only one who wouldn’t suffer any backlash from the Threelives Soulcrush if he attacked the Skeleton King right now. Even if the Eye of Fear wasn’t suitable to be used against Lu Genggeng and Yan Feng, the Skeleton King was still a target.

This was called strategizing!

Under the circumstance that his team didn’t have an absolute advantage and might even be at a slight disadvantage, Huo Yuhao tapped into the analysis he obtained through his Spiritual Detection and deep understanding of his teammates’ abilities to create such a situation.

However, Yan Feng had already woken up just as the Skeleton King was being suppressed.

He seemed to be able to tell the effects and ﬂaws of the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron immediately. He ﬂapped his right wing forcefully, and a streak of icy-blue light shot towards Xiao Xiao.

They were two against six right now. It was getting increasingly disadvantageous for the Holy Ghost team. While Yan Feng was a very composed person, he couldn’t help but become anxious at this point. No matter how conﬁdent he was, he didn’t think that he could defeat the entire Tang Sect team by himself.

However, his judgment was very accurate. Among the Tang Sect, those who could pose a threat to him included Xu Sanshi, He Caitou, Huo Yuhao, and Wang Dong’er. Among the four of them, Xu Sanshi’s old injury had relapsed even though he had managed to achieve his goal, and his abilities had fallen. As for the other three, he felt that the greatest threat wasn’t He Caitou even though he had two Class 7 soul tools with him now. Rather, it was Huo Yuhao!

It was a feeling that came from his soul. When the two streaks of icy, fog-like light were dissipated earlier, Yan Feng had already sensed that there was danger. This danger had come from Huo Yuhao!

Ultimate Ice. Even my power of evil ice can’t invade his Ultimate Ice? This is how strong an Ultimate element is! If I devour his abilities, can I increase my power of evil ice to an Ultimate level? When that happens, I’ll become the Holy Son of the Church, and I might even become the next founder!

As he thought of this, Yan Feng’s eyes revealed a look of greed. Although his attack was targeted at Xiao Xiao, his attention was all on Huo Yuhao.

A streak of icy azure light surged out from Huo Yuhao’s chest and intercepted the power of evil ice that Yan Feng unleashed. Its success proved that Yan Feng’s power of evil ice was inferior to his Ultimate Ice!

Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er had also recovered from their earlier displacement. Wang Dong’er lifted her hands, and a Hexagram Array appeared in front of Lu Genggeng.

Lu Genggeng had woken up just after Yan Feng. He didn’t move a single inch, waiting for his chance to attack. It was a pity that the changes to his spiritual self couldn’t be concealed from Huo Yuhao. Wang Dong’er’s Hexagram Array immediately stopped him from advancing any further.

At the same time, a thin streak of dark red light the width of an index ﬁnger also shot out from afar. The target of this streak of light was Lu Genggeng!

He Caitou’s fully-charged piercing cannon had been ﬁred!

Even though it was a hundred meters away, Lu Genggeng shuddered when the cannon was ﬁred. While he was fat, he wasn’t slow at all. He pointed his left foot toward the ground and made a hundred and eighty degree turn on the spot.

It looked like… an old sow was dancing ballet. It was too amusing, but it was effective!

He immediately turned to face He Caitou. Of Lu Genggeng’s six soul rings, his third purple soul ring shone. Suddenly, he grew even larger in size. He was like a mountain of meat right now!

He was too huge. Although Lu Genggeng was also quick, he couldn’t avoid the red light. As it ﬂashed, a hole appeared in his body with a meaty sound, like a spear being driven into a hanging carcass.

While the dark red light seemed very thin, it penetrated his two-meter thick body and exited from his back. The entry and exit wounds were charred.

Lu Genggeng screamed in pain, and his eyes turned blood- red. He shook his fat and the charred wound disappeared. Big patches of disgusting, yellow fat squeezed out to seal the wound shut. It seemed as if nothing had happened to him. He glared at He Caitou with his small eyes and leapt up suddenly.

Imagine a mountain of meat jumping up, that was what Lu Genggeng appeared like right now. He wasn’t jumping towards He Caitou, but ﬂipped his body backward instead. He was plummeting towards Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er, trying to crush them.

Not only this, but his ﬁrst soul ring also lit up. Gusts of greenish, poisonous fog were released around him.

While Huo Yuhao was much smaller than Lu Genggeng, he was much less ﬂexible right now compared to him. Even Wang Dong’er’s expression changed when she saw the meat mountain plummeting down at them.

However, her wings opened up at this moment. She let go of Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair and ﬂipped around. She left Huo Yuhao alone as he faced Lu Genggeng.

Wang Dong’er lifted her wings up high in the air, and unleashed the Hexagram Array again. This time, it shot towards Yan Feng.

Yan Feng exploited this opportunity to gain altitude as he beat his wings.

Yan Feng was very conﬁdent in Lu Genggeng’s abilities. Among the younger generation, Lu Genggeng wasn’t the most outstanding in the Holy Ghost Church. Whether it was Yan Feng or the Sacred Lady Tang Ya, their cultivations were above him.

However, Lu Genggeng’s defenses were deﬁnitely the best. Even when he was struck by the Class 7 piercing cannon, he acted as if nothing had happened.

It was a Class 7 soul tool! Even though the light pierced through his fat, his fat was like his armor. As long as the core of his body wasn’t struck, he could still recover even if thousands of holes were made on his body.

As for attacks that covered a huge area, his ten-centimeter thick skin wouldn’t even be penetrated. Yan Feng was ﬁlled with killing intent now. He didn’t care about Wang Dong’er’s attack. To him, it wasn’t much of a threat even though it was light-type.

Besides Wang Dong’er and Huo Yuhao who were ﬁghting the two evil soul masters, Xiao Xiao continued to restrain the Skeleton King, while He Caitou charged his cannon once again. Xu Sanshi and Jiang Nannan were rushing over, Xu Sanshi sticking close to Jiang Nannan now. She could use the same method as she had with Xiao Xiao to help him join the ﬁght quickly.

While there were only three evil soul masters left, they were all individually very strong. From the looks of it, the Tang Sect was still far from victory.

Huo Yuhao’s eyes ﬂashed with a cold look as he saw the huge ﬁgure descending from the sky. He lifted his right hand slowly, and the Snow Lady drifted out of his forehead.

A golden projection emerged from his back. It was the ﬁghting technique that he had created, the Goddess of Light! Something strange occurred. The Snow Lady suddenly turned illusory, and she also grew in size at the same time. The arrogant face of the Snow Empress re-appeared once again. The golden projection behind Huo Yuhao than fused with his body. One golden and one white projection fused into his body at the same time!

Wang Dong’er drifted close to his back and watched worriedly. Although she was conﬁdent in Huo Yuhao, evil soul masters were too weird! If not for the fact that Huo Yuhao had urged her to back away, she wouldn’t have left his side.

However, she wasn’t slow even though she was half- panicked. A huge volley of the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess ﬂew out to intercept Yan Feng.

Yan Feng was stunned. The seemingly-harmless Wang Dong’er had given him a huge shock!

The seemingly chaotic Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess was ﬁlled with a dense aura of light. Although it couldn’t curb his power of evil ice, every ball of light exploded with the power of light as it blew apart. It had a great resistance to his power!

Furthermore, the Hexagram Array also rose from the ground as the Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess was unleashed. Yan Feng couldn’t be struck by the Hexagram Array beneath him, avoiding it easily. However, every ball of light from Wang Dong’er’s Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess passed through the Hexagram Array. In the process of passing through it, the strength of the balls soared, increasing to at least double their original strength. Yan Feng’s charging speed decreased signiﬁcantly, and he couldn’t attack Huo Yuhao at the same time as Lu Genggeng crashed towards him.

Could her Hexagram Array be used as a strengthening skill?

For some reason, Yan Feng felt very uneasy.

However, he suddenly changed his target when he saw that he was unable to immediately attack Huo Yuhao.

His ﬁrst and third soul rings shone at the same time, and his body doubled in size. He opened his huge wings and turned around in the air. As he did, his second soul ring lit up.

His enlarged body turned illusory. He was also facing Xu Sanshi, who was ﬂung forward just then by Jiang Nannan. Xu Sanshi was alarmed. Huo Yuhao immediately shouted for him to be careful through his Spiritual Detection.

As he blocked with the Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle, his third soul skill, the Mysterious Underworld Force, was also unleashed at the same time.

His ﬁfth soul skill, the Turtle God’s Strike, was also activated.

Xu Sanshi was very aware of the state that he was in. His old injury had relapsed, and his soul power had been depleted greatly after he used his Mysterious Underworld Displacement twice. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have used the Turtle God’s Strike right after using the Mysterious Underworld Force, considering how conceited he was.

However, he suddenly felt very lucky that he had done so.

A huge skull suddenly appeared in front of the illusory Yan Feng. This skull was very weird, two meters long, a meter tall, and more than one and a half meters wide. When it opened its jaws, it was obvious that it looked like a huge dragon skull. At this moment, everyone from the Tang Sect ﬁnally knew what Yan Feng’s martial soul was. Bone Dragon! Among evil soul masters, it was considered one of the top-ranked martial souls!

A ball of icy-blue gas surged towards Xu Sanshi like a tidal wave.

Yan Feng’s ﬁrst soul skill was Dragon Transformation, and his third soul skill was Dragoniﬁcation. His ﬁrst soul skill enabled his body to transform into the Bone Dragon, while his third soul enabled him to use soul power to form parts of the Bone Dragon’s body. With both these strengthening skills, his second soul skill, Dragonbreath, appeared.

The loud boom didn’t cause Xu Sanshi to be ﬂung away. Instead, his entire body was covered with a layer of intense icy- blue light.

He was instantly converted into a huge ice sculpture and frozen in place. The Bone Dragon disappeared, but Yan Feng’s expanded body didn’t shrink in size. At this point, there was a loud groan beside him.

The groan came not far away from him. It was from Lu Genggeng, who had crashed down on Huo Yuhao with his back facing the wheelchair-bound Tang Sect member.

Huo Yuhao’s right hand reached out for Lu Genggeng, the only hand he could use.

The projections of the Snow Empress and Goddess of Light reformed above Huo Yuhao. His aura started to change tremendously.

It was an elegant and icy, yet dominating aura.

It was a simple palm. The snowy-white palm pressed against Lu Genggeng’s butt.

Lu Genggeng’s body weighed at least a few thousand kilos.

However, Huo Yuhao managed to stop him with just his palm!

After he did, Huo Yuhao’s wheelchair slid backward by exploiting the rebound force, and he instantly moved out of Lu Genggeng’s way.

The groaning sound came from Lu Genggeng as he fell to the ground. The entire stage seemed to experience an earthquake.

Although he only glanced at him, Yan Feng clearly saw that the poisonous gas approaching Huo Yuhao was converted into green powder before scattering harmlessly.

It was a strong Ultimate Ice aura. However, it was a pity his cultivation was too weak!

A disdainful look ﬂashed across Yan Feng’s face. He had never taken the Tang Sect seriously before. Even without Tang Ya, he was absolutely conﬁdent that he could turn the situation around on his own.

In his opinion, Huo Yuhao was only a ﬁve-ringed soul master, no matter how talented he was. On the other hand, Yan Feng was a seven-ringed evil Soul Sage! Even some eight-ringed Soul Douluos wouldn’t have an advantage over him!

The Tang Sect was nothing to him!

His Dragonbreath had immobilized Xu Sanshi. He turned around and roared into the sky like a dragon. His second soul ring shone again, and his Bone Dragon appeared once again. His target this time was Wang Dong’er!

A terrifying icy-blue glow caused the surroundings to turn pale blue, and it quickly moved towards Wang Dong’er.

A golden light ﬂashed, and Wang Dong’er disappeared. When she appeared again, she was already behind Huo Yuhao.

Instant Teleportation – the soul skill that came with her left leg bone!

The Dragonbreath blew apart as it struck the protective barriers nearby, turning a huge patch of the protective barriers icy-blue. Rings of ice started to spread out from them. It seemed like even the protective barriers couldn’t last much longer.

It was a very powerful attack!

When the spectators saw such a terrifying strike, they couldn’t help but think that it wasn’t the ﬁrst time today.

Who was the strongest dragon-type soul master in this tournament?

They were already surprised by Bei Bei’s performance, but right now, this seven-ringed evil soul master with a Bone Dragon martial soul seemed even more astonishing.

Right now, everyone from the Snowdemon Sect looked very dismal, including Long Aotian. They had just realized that they wouldn’t have stood a chance against the Holy Ghost Sect! Disregarding the rest, Yan Feng’s abilities weren’t below Long Aotian’s. Moreover, there was still Tang Ya!

The Holy Ghost Sect was too strong!

Although the Dragonbreath didn’t hit Wang Dong’er, Huo Yuhao was still in trouble.

A huge hook formed by a pale-white glow suddenly appeared in front of him. Huo Yuhao felt a weird force transmitting through it. Following this, he was ﬂung back, along with his wheelchair.

Lu Genggeng’s fourth soul ring had lit up. This huge hook was his fourth soul skill!

Huo Yuhao was caught off-guard, as he was surprised by Yan Feng’s attack.

The huge hook was connected to pale-white bone chains. They seemed to have been formed using soul power, but they were extremely tough. Huo Yuhao struggled, but he couldn’t break free. He was even more astonished that he couldn’t use his Instant Teleportation. It was as if the hook had hooked into his soul! The Abomination opened its mouth wide and released an infuriated roar at Huo Yuhao as he drew closer.

His butt had just been smacked by Huo Yuhao, and it felt very cold. More than half of his butt felt very numb, and had lost all feeling. Even though his butt wasn’t the core of his body, Lu Genggeng felt as if his body had become more inﬂexible. He couldn’t exert any strength with his entire right leg. He naturally hated Huo Yuhao!

Wang Dong’er had used her Instant Teleportation to appear behind Huo Yuhao. As Huo Yuhao was dragged away, she was also naturally revealed.

A ﬁerce look ﬂashed across Yan Feng’s face. He wouldn’t show mercy just because Wang Dong’er was beautiful!

He let out a cold groan, and his fourth soul ring shone again.

Wang Dong’er felt a chill. In the next moment, a huge formation with a diameter greater than ﬁve meters and created using all types of bones appeared. An indescribable restraint seemed to engulf her body.

Wang Dong’er only felt waves and waves of intense suction force coming from the weird formation that seemed to be devouring her life power. She even felt as if her ﬂesh was going to be torn apart.

This was Yan Feng’s fourth soul skill, the Graveyard! It was very effective for controlling and hurting one’s opponent. It could absorb an opponent’s ﬂesh to nourish the wielder’s life force. At the same time, the opponent would eventually turn into a bag of bones, and these bones could strengthen Yan Feng’s Bone Dragon. It was extremely vicious. It was also his best way of increasing his own cultivation. Ever since he had obtained his fourth soul skill, there had been a signiﬁcant increase in his cultivation speed.

Wang Dong’er pressed down without any hesitation, and a Hexagram Array was unleashed from beneath her feet. Golden light ﬂashed and protected her. However, the Hexagram Array could only protect her life power from being devoured. She couldn’t escape the suction force exerted by the Graveyard.

Jiang Nannan ﬁnally rushed over at this time...

Chapter 335: Purple Golden Transformation

Seeing that Wang Dong’er was trapped, Jiang Nannan didn’t attack Yan Feng. Before this ﬁght had started, she already knew her role – she was playing an auxiliary role.

Her abilities were indeed unsuitable against these evil soul masters. That was why Jiang Nannan immediately activated her Instant Teleportation.

Her third and fourth soul rings shone.

Jiang Nannan immediately appeared within the Graveyard and hugged Wang Dong’er’s slender waist. She had activated her Invincible Golden Body as well, and thus the Hexagram Array and the Graveyard couldn’t harm her.

Jiang Nannan ﬂung Wang Dong’er out. She also used her Invincible Golden Body to jump backward out of the Graveyard. Wang Dong’er was furious. Her eyes looked very cold as her sixth soul ring lit up for the ﬁrst time.

A weird buzzing sound came from her body. Following this, a huge projection of the Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess appeared behind her back.

Wang Dong’er looked even more ravishing with this projection behind her. Layers of golden light started to spread from her wings.

Following this, she opened her wings. Her wings changed into countless streaks of ﬂowing light and fused with her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess projection. In the next instant, the huge projection rose into the sky and instantly changed into a dazzling bluish-gold light that ﬂowed towards Yan Feng.

Wang Dong’er’s sixth soul skill, the Butterﬂy Goddess’ Dance!

Yan Feng was stunned when he saw the Butterﬂy Goddess’ Dance. The Bone Dragon’s skull disappeared, replaced by a huge dragon tail. This tail whipped towards Wang Dong’er’s Butterﬂy Goddess’ Dance.

Not only this, but his ﬁfth soul ring also shone. He mimicked a grabbing action towards Jiang Nannan.

A huge bony claw appeared above Jiang Nannan without any warning.

At this moment, Jiang Nannan had just leaped out from the Graveyard. Even though she was warned by Huo Yuhao’s Spiritual Detection, Jiang Nannan couldn’t dodge, as she had just used her Instant Teleportation.

“Schlikt!” The claws slashed down and trapped Jiang Nannan. A terrifying sense of suppression restrained her.

This was Yan Feng’s ﬁfth soul skill, Bony Claw Prison!

This was his ﬁrst ten thousand year soul skill, and thus it wasn’t so simple. The Bony Claw Prison and the Graveyard could counter auxiliary-type soul skills. For example, Wang Dong’er wasn’t able to use Instant Teleportation in the Graveyard earlier. From inside to outside, all skills were unable to be used. To defeat the Bony Claw Prison, Yan Feng had to be defeated ﬁrst.

The most frightening thing about his Bony Claw Prison was that it had a special effect called Absolute Defense.

This Absolute Defense was mainly applicable to Yan Feng. The connotation of the word ‘absolute’ was that Yan Feng had to be defeated ﬁrst before he would lose his connection to his bony claws. Otherwise, there was no way of overcoming them.

Of course, there was another way, but the person trapped inside had to be stronger than Yan Feng.

The ﬂaw of the Bony Claw Prison was that it couldn’t lock onto its opponent. It could only be unleashed based on his prediction of his opponent’s movements. That was why the best way to deal with it was avoiding it. If Jiang Nannan hadn’t used two soul skills consecutively, and wasn’t able to use another skill temporarily, she wouldn’t be in such a dire state. But right now, she was trapped, and there was nothing she could do about it. Huo Yuhao was already in front of the Abomination.

Lu Genggeng’s ﬁfth soul skill also lit up. Evidently, he hated Huo Yuhao. Something strange occurred. He opened his mouth wide in a very abnormal way. The edges of his lips were already at his ears.

In front of him, a three-meter wide and two-meter tall bloody mouth formed from soul power bit towards Huo Yuhao.

The fangs in the mouth exuded a thick, poisonous gas. Although Huo Yuhao didn’t know the effect of this bite, he knew that it wasn’t going to be pleasant!

The advantage that the Tang Sect had had earlier had completely diminished by now. They outnumbered their opponents ﬁve to two, but they were still curbed. The abilities of evil soul masters were evidently very strong.

However, He Caitou suddenly demonstrated his strength at this moment. A beam of strong light descended from the sky. It was targeted towards Lu Genggeng.

The light was aimed at the huge head that seemed to have been formed using rotten ﬂesh. The Eye of Fear was ﬁnally showing its strength.

Not only this, but He Caitou also ﬁred his piercing cannon again. It was also targeted at Lu Genggeng, speciﬁcally, at the center of his body.

Huo Yuhao wasn’t able to tell much about Lu Genggeng’s body, even with his Spiritual Detection. However, the core of the Abomination’s body should be within a speciﬁc region no matter how well Lu Genggeng managed to conceal it. Attacking this core would enable Huo Yuhao to hurt Lu Genggeng.

Indeed, the attacks from the air and the ground struck at the same time. Lu Genggeng knew things were going badly.

He couldn’t be bothered with Huo Yuhao now, and quickly retreated. He lifted his right arm to block his head. He Caitou’s double attack came from two Class 7 soul tools. No matter how defensively strong Lu Genggeng thought he was, he didn’t dare to resist the attacks forcefully with his vitals.

A layer of icy armor suddenly appeared on Huo Yuhao’s body. It was the Ice Empress’ Armor. At the same time, a streak of icy azure light shone from his backbone. It was another skill of the Ice Empress, the Ice Empress’ Wrath.

The bloody mouth and the pale-white hook were frozen in midair. Huo Yuhao took this opportunity to free himself.

As Lu Genggeng was avoiding He Caitou’s attacks, he rolled and covered his vital spot.

The piercing cannon’s strike only brushed against his body and left a huge wound, while the Eye of Fear penetrated his right arm. Lu Genggeng’s body started to twitch as the wounds appeared. His fat started to scatter everywhere, but no blood ﬂowed out. It was as if his body were only made of fat. Huo Yuhao was temporarily relieved of his crisis. However, Wang Dong’er had also started to clash against Yan Feng on the other side.

Butterﬂy Goddess’ Dance. This was the strongest soul skill that Wang Dong’er could unleash right now on her own. Against the Bone Dragon’s tail, the Butterﬂy Goddess opened her wings deftly in the air. After that, she seemed to freeze in the air, and allowed the Bone Dragon’s tail to whip her.

As the Bone Dragon’s tail whipped her, the image of the Butterﬂy Goddess scattered to form many tiny Butterﬂy Goddesses that stuck to the tail. A bluish-gold light immediately spread to every corner of Yan Feng’s body, and he was turned into that same color.

Following this, the Butterﬂy Goddess appeared once again.

This time, she surfaced behind Yan Feng.

Yan Feng was frightened. He was so horriﬁed that his expression changed. He stopped conserving his powers; his seventh soul ring shone. “Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!” Seven consecutive booms instantly rang out. Every time a boom was heard, the bluish-gold light on his body would form a butterﬂy. Seven butterﬂy projections were formed in the air, each with a different form. It was as if a huge golden butterﬂy had started dancing in the air.

Yan Feng’s tragic screams sounded amidst the booms. Wang Dong’er had already landed at this point. As she unleashed her Butterﬂy Goddess Dance, she was unable to use her Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess.

However, a low-pitched and infuriated dragon roar sounded at this moment.

At the core of the explosions, the Goddess of Light that was dancing in the air was crushed. A huge ﬁgure seemed to crawl out from another world.

It was a huge Bone Dragon, a complete Bone Dragon. It was more than ﬁfteen meters long, and its wings were around ten meters across. Its huge ﬁgure was formed entirely out of pale- white bones. However, it exuded a strong icy-blue glow from its body. The light on its skull was the strongest. There were deep-blue ﬂames in its eyes that carried the fury of this Bone Dragon.

Yan Feng was still too careless. He hadn’t expected Wang Dong’er’s sixth soul skill to be so destructive.

When he was possessed by the Butterﬂy Goddess Dance, he felt an indescribable force seeping into his body. After that, the explosions occurred. Even his own martial soul was on the verge of being torn apart by the terrifying explosive force.

Under such a circumstance, he didn’t dare to hesitate. He immediately unleashed his strongest soul skill. It was his Martial Soul True Body.

His Martial Soul True Body appeared. It was a Bone Dragon True Body.

Yan Feng’s Bone Dragon naturally couldn’t compare to a real Bone Dragon. Whether it was in terms of size or strength, there were still great differences. However, he only had just come into the ability to activate his Martial Soul True Body. As his cultivation increased, the abilities of his Bone Dragon would also grow.

However, even this basic Bone Dragon was still very mighty.

Wang Dong’er’s Light of the Butterﬂy Goddess and Butterﬂy Goddess Slash dissipated when they landed on the Bone Dragon.

This was one ability that the Bone Dragon possessed – dissipating soul power.

Its huge ﬁgure moved in the air, and it unleashed its Dragon’s Breath towards Wang Dong’er.

Wang Dong’er quickly used her Instant Teleportation and returned to Huo Yuhao’s side.

The Bone Dragon didn’t pursue her, but instead suddenly retracted its wings. In the next moment, it charged forward in the air. “Second senior, be careful!” Huo Yuhao couldn’t help but shout even though he could use his Spiritual Detection to warn He Caitou.

At this moment, Xu Sanshi broke out of the ice and blocked the Bone Dragon’s charge with his shield.

“Bang⼀” It was a forceful clash.

His shield broke, and he was thrown back.

Just like Yan Feng had thought, his Bone Dragon was so strong that he could challenge an ordinary Soul Douluo with his seven-ringed Soul Sage cultivation. He couldn’t be so easily blocked by Xu Sanshi.

The Shield of the Xuanwu Turtle was instantly crushed. Xu Sanshi was also ﬂung back, spitting blood as he ﬂew through the air.

“Sanshi!” Jiang Nannan was screaming in pain as she was stuck in the Bony Claw Prison. She attacked the prison with all her might, but she still couldn’t escape!

However, Xu Sanshi’s block also caused the Bone Dragon to stall a little. This gave He Caitou enough time to react.

He unleashed his protective barrier and Invincible Barrier without any hesitation. At the same time, he also lifted two Class 6 soul cannons on his shoulders. He attacked with everything he had.

But Yan Feng was too strong. In fact, his individual abilities were even superior to Tang Ya’s. It was just Tang Ya was very special to the Holy Ghost Church. That was why his status was slightly lower than hers.

He Caitou’s attacks didn’t have any effect on him. Although he was stalled momentarily, he crashed ferociously into He Caitou’s protective barrier in the next moment.

“Bang!” He Caitou also ﬂew back. However, he was quite fortunate compared to Xu Sanshi.

His Invincible Barrier was crushed, but managed to resist the charge of the Bone Dragon. His protective barrier was on the verge of breaking as he was also ﬂung backward. It was important to know that his protective soul barrier was Class 7! If it were Class 6, he might even be in a worse state compared to Xu Sanshi.

“Boom!” At this moment, a thunderous boom sounded in the sky, and the suppressed gloomy clouds seemed to be on the verge of erupting.

“You’re all dead!” The panting Lu Genggeng shouted in a furious and violent manner. He rose again, and charged towards Huo Yuhao.

Yan Feng shot out his Dragon’s Breath towards He Caitou and froze him into a brick of ice even though he was protected by his protective barrier. Yan Feng didn’t pursue Xu Sanshi, but instead unleashed his Dragon’s Breath towards the Eye of Fear in the sky.

This threat in the sky had to be removed.

“Boom——” The Eye of Fear was destroyed.

The Tang Sect, which had perfect coordination every time, lost their advantage at this moment.

Xiao Xiao gritted her teeth and did her best to restrain the Skeleton King. This was the most she could do. The Abomination and Bone Dragon were too strong. If she let the Skeleton King out, they were bound to lose! Jiang Nannan was trapped by the Bony Claw Prison and couldn’t move. On the other side, Xu Sanshi was critically hurt, and couldn’t get up after being thrown back. He Caitou was also frozen.

The only ones who could still ﬁght were Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er. Their opponents were Lu Genggeng, who was like an injured wild beast, and Yan Feng, who was still in his Bone Dragon state.

The Tang Sect has lost!

All the spectators had this same thought in their mind.

Lu Genggeng roared into the sky. As he roared, fat started to ooze from his body.

Although this fat wasn’t his own soul power, it was still energy that he had accumulated. It appeared very disgusting, but it was very important to him. He had obtained it through devouring corpses. Today’s setback was quite great for Lu Genggeng. Huo Yuhao’s chest ﬂashed with light. He slid backward. It was the effect of a soul thruster on his chest. With the propulsion from his soul thruster, he advanced towards Wang Dong’er behind him.

Yan Feng ﬂuttered his wings after getting rid of the Eye of Fear. The entire stage was in chaos. Yan Feng ﬂew towards Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

The stage was only one hundred meters in diameter, and Yan Feng’s body was ﬁfteen meters long. As he ﬂuttered his wings, he quickly bore down on Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er in a suppressive manner. He also didn’t forget to unleash his Dragon’s Breath at Xiao Xiao.

As long as Xiao Xiao’s three cauldrons were overcome, Tang Dai could be released. The combination of the three evil soul masters would ensure their victory. Even though they were winning, Yan Feng still remained very calm. The mysterious Imperial Tutor nodded his head in approval as he saw this.

They couldn’t be in a more dire situation. However, Huo Yuhao still remained very calm. His eyes had turned completely golden at this moment. Even his body was covered by a layer of golden light.

From the looks of it, he almost seemed to have been sculpted from gold right now. His wheelchair was also shining with the same golden glow. An awe-inspiring ﬁgure suddenly surfaced behind Huo Yuhao.

It was a tall man. As it was only a projection, the looks of this man couldn’t be clearly seen. He mimicked a smacking action, and an aura that resembled that of the Sovereign’s Descent was released, along with a streak of golden light. The Dragon’s Breath was intercepted by the streak of golden light, and both entities disappeared.

Huo Yuhao’s vertical eye opened as he exploited this opportunity. Following this, the illusory ﬁgure behind him turned into a huge eye. It also had a vertical pupil, but it was silver.

“Whitesilver level of a body soul’s Second Awakening.” In the spectators’ stand, there were a few exclamations from different areas. The sudden appearance of this Whitesilver vertical pupil shook all the soul masters who understood Body Souls.

Yes, it was a Second Awakening of the Whitesilver level. This was one of Huo Yuhao’s trump cards. In the previous few rounds of the tournament, he had not used it no matter how tough he found things. It was only at this moment that he used it as they were on the verge of being eliminated. His teammates were in life-and-death situations, and he had no choice but to reveal his greatest trump card.

All of Huo Yuhao’s soul rings disappeared as a silvery-white light ﬂashed. His body also slowly drifted up. He drifted into mid-air.

He couldn’t walk, so only drifted there. But since he hung in midair, he currently didn’t appear any different from a normal person.

The huge silver eye drifted forward and engulfed his body. At that instant, the golden light released by his Eye of Destiny fused with the silver eye. As gold and silver intersected, a distorted glow started to spread with his body at the center. When Yan Feng saw the silver eye behind Huo Yuhao, he was shocked. One thought arose in his mind. Is this the Second Awakening of his body soul? However, isn’t this something that only members of the Body Sect can do? Don’t tell me Huo Yuhao is a spy from the Body Sect in Shrek Academy?

As he thought of all this, the light rays in front of him distorted. Yan Feng ﬂuttered his wings and wanted to annihilate Huo Yuhao. However, his surroundings only rippled with distorted waves.

Wang Dong’er had already stuck close to Huo Yuhao’s back, and now she wrapped her arms under his. She clasped her hands together in front of his chest. Her wings opened wide behind her back. Even she entered a miraculous state at this moment.

The Bone Dragon jerked and opened its wings. A thick icy- blue glow started to expand with his body at the center. He was trying to disperse the distorted lights.

However, the distorted rays instead became clearer and clearer. Following this, Yan Feng heard a deafening explosion.

“Boom.”

“Ah!”

As the explosion rang out, Lu Genggeng screamed tragically.

How is this possible? What did he do to Lu Genggeng? Yan Feng was shocked. He was very conﬁdent in Lu Genggeng’s defensive prowess. Lu Genggeng was only hurt even after being hit three times by two Class 7 soul tools. Could Huo Yuhao even hurt Lu Genggeng? It was unbelievable!

However, the truth was that Huo Yuhao had managed to so.

The spectators could certainly tell that Huo Yuhao had hurt Lu Genggeng.

Huo Yuhao’s body shifted instantly as he was hugged by Wang Dong’er. Following this, Huo Yuhao’s body shone with bright white light. After this, he raised his left arm. His left hand opened wide, then mimicked a closing action.

Following this, a loud boom sounded behind Lu Genggeng’s back. The back half of his body was blown apart. Suddenly, his fat scattered. At least a third of Lu Genggeng’s body had been blown away. His disgusting fat was scattered all over the arena. He was also ﬂung into the air as he screamed, and he crashed down towards Yan Feng.

Huo Yuhao’s vertical eye ﬂashed once again. The air on the stage distorted even more. This time, even the spectators couldn’t see things clearly.

He can use his left arm? Has he been tricking us all this while? In the resting area, the Scorpion Tiger Douluo looked very pale as he watched everything.

Yes, Huo Yuhao could use his left arm. However, he hadn’t tricked anyone. It was because his left arm had just recovered a few days ago. He had relied on the pure distillate to cultivate as he absorbed the origin energy of Ultimate Ice at a faster speed than before. He absorbed a little every day. In this way, his cultivation increased at a signiﬁcant speed, and the origin energy of Ultimate Ice in his left arm greatly decreased.

After the origin energy had been completely neutralized in his left arm, his left arm had naturally recovered!

Earlier in the battle, Lu Genggeng had crashed down on Huo Yuhao and was smacked aside by Huo Yuhao’s palm. Huo Yuhao had also exploited the impact force to slide backwards.

To all the spectators, that was the only time the two of them had clashed.

However, no one had noticed Huo Yuhao’s transformations, as they were distracted by Lu Genggeng.

Huo Yuhao’s palm was a fusion between his ﬁghting technique, the Goddess of Light, and the strength of the Snow Empress’ spirit. After he unleashed that palm, his attacks evidently slowed down. That was because he needed some time to adjust after the heavy exertion.

The Snow Empress’ Three Ultimate Techniques: Empress’ Palm, Snowless Glacier! It was a Snowless Glacier fused with the Goddess of Light! The palm had seemed very simple, but it had compressed the Ultimate Ice within it.

The origin energy of Ultimate Ice brought a lot of trouble to Huo Yuhao. However, there were beneﬁts alongside the problems. The temperature of his Ultimate Ice was even lower now than it had been in the past.

Only the core of the Abomination belonged to Lu Genggeng. When he was struck by Huo Yuhao’s palm earlier, he felt his hip and back turning numb. However, his defense was very strong. The chill from the Snowless Glacier couldn’t penetrate the many layers of his fat to freeze his heart.

However, the Snowless Glacier could freeze his fat!

The Ultimate chill spread at a frightening speed, and gradually froze huge lumps of fat on Lu Genggeng’s body. Just as Huo Yuhao unleashed the Second Awakening of his body soul, he also lifted his left hand.

Ice Explosion Technique!

Within a set region, all frozen matter would be affected by the Ice Explosion Technique. Even though Huo Yuhao didn’t infuse the Ice Explosion Technique into the Abomination’s soul power, it was enough that he blew the frozen fat apart.

This attack immediately hurt Lu Genggeng critically.

Yan Feng could ﬁnally see that the surrounding, distorted lights had turned clearer amidst this deafening explosion. He saw with his own eyes that lumps and lumps of fat were scattered everywhere. Lu Genggeng was screaming tragically as he was ﬂung away, while Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er were charging at him from the sides. An intense dark gold light turned into a huge light blade, and this blade slashed towards Lu Genggeng’s battered body.

Yan Feng’s Bone Dragon let out a hoarse draconic roar. His eyes were ﬁlled with spirit ﬁre that burned very strongly. Icy- blue lights surrounded his body and instantly converted into a huge current that attacked Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er.

This icy-blue current was more than ﬁve meters in diameter. From the looks of it, it was like a huge ice beam. The entire stage was covered by a layer of frost at this point.

Thunder rumbled in the skies and storms raged. Torrential rain descended.

There was a massive boom as a huge ice sculpture suddenly appeared on the stage. Yan Feng’s attack wasn’t a joke. In his Martial Soul True Body state as the Bone Dragon, his ﬁghting strength was immense. He was deﬁnitely the most terrifying person in this tournament!

When the huge ice sculpture was frozen, it turned into ice powder that scattered. The evil power of ice was ﬁlled with the hatred and destructive intent of an avenging spirit. After being struck, the target was instantly destroyed.

It was over!

Yan Feng’s Bone Dragon revealed an arrogant look. However, the arrogance turned into shock in the next instant. The surrounding lights dispersed, and a ﬁgure drifted in the air not far away from him.

How is this possible? They should’ve been killed by my Breath of Extermination! Why are they still here?

Yan Feng only saw Wang Dong’er helping Huo Yuhao remain aloft.

Following this, he discovered that the Abomination that Lu Genggeng had changed into had disappeared. The disgusting fat was also gone. The rest of the stage was normal, but his teammate was no longer around.

Sadness and disbelief…

Huo Yuhao smiled and said to Yan Feng, “You were very strong when you killed your own teammate.”

Yan Feng’s heart sank. He ﬁnally realized what had happened. “How did you do it? When I was in my Martial Soul True Body, my spiritual power was burning as the spirit ﬁre. It causes many people’s spiritual control to lose effect.

“Your cultivation is so far away from mine. How is it possible…?”

Yan Feng ﬁnally understood. Just earlier, he had been affected somehow by Huo Yuhao, and thought Lu Genggeng was Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er. However, he was still shocked by how Huo Yuhao managed to trick him.

Huo Yuhao said, “Do you think I’ll tell you?”

Yan Feng’s Bone Dragon’s head lifted, and he said coldly, “You killed another of my teammates. I’ll cultivate your soul for forty-nine days, and let you suffer the most painful torture in this world before I let you die!”

Huo Yuhao smiled, “If you can.” Yan Feng snorted, “The gap in our abilities can’t be made up so easily. If I’m not wrong, your spiritual power must have been depleted quite a lot after my misjudgment earlier. With the defensive prowess of my Martial Soul True Body, your attacks can’t possibly overcome my defenses. That’s why you didn’t continue to use your spiritual power to interfere with me. You are bound to lose this ﬁght.”

“Is that so? Let’s try then.” Huo Yuhao’s eyes ﬂashed with a cold look. His vertical eye shone again, and a streak of golden light suddenly descended from the sky, landing accurately on Yan Feng.

Suddenly, Yan Feng felt his heart skip a beat, and an extremely weird feeling engulfed his body. It was like everything around him had turned dark.

What skill is this? It clearly hasn’t affected me, but why do I feel so discomforted?

Kill him, kill him! A wild thought arose in Yan Feng’s head. The icy-blue lights around him became stronger, and even his pale-white bones turned icy-blue. There was only one thought in his head. He wanted to kill Huo Yuhao!

Around Huo Yuhao’s body, the silver lights emitted by his silver vertical pupil became stronger. Not only this, but Wang Dong’er also started to experience weird changes.

The stage suddenly lit up without any warning. A halo ﬂashing with a whitish-gold glow had spread from Huo Yuhao’s body.

Following this, the entire stage lit up with a beam of golden- silver light.

This beam of light appeared too suddenly, and it was also very strong and blinding. Along with the sudden storms and rain, the spectators were getting very excited. However, no one could tell what was happening onstage right now.

The beam of light only lasted for an instant before it disappeared. However, something shocking appeared on the stage.

The Bone Dragon, who was drifting in mid-air earlier and was ready to kill Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er as it unleashed all its soul power, crashed forcefully to the ground. A deafening boom reverberated out at the impact.

Following this, the light from Huo Yuhao’s vertical eye disappeared. Wang Dong’er’s wings closed up and engulfed him.

A bright-golden light rose. A low-pitched dragon roar and pleasant singing voice sounded at almost the same time.

Golden lights suddenly separated from the front and back of Huo Yuhao’s body. In mid-air, he turned into three ﬁgures. In front of his actual body was the golden Goddess of Light. Behind him, there was also another golden Goddess of Light. The two ravishing, golden ﬁgures surfaced in front of and behind Huo Yuhao just like that. They formed a weird image in the air.

It was a pity that no one could clearly see the looks in the eyes of these two ﬁgures. They wore very complex looks, but they weren’t identical. Two streaks of golden light shot towards the central ﬁgure. From the central ﬁgure, a white glow and an azure-green glow surfaced at the same time.

Golden, white, azure-green, blue, and purple. These dazzling glows started to rise from the central ﬁgure at the same time.

A purplish-gold halo also surfaced beneath that ﬁgure. It wasn’t a soul ring, but a halo with elegant ﬂoral patterns. This halo included patterns of a dragon’s totem, patterns of the Radiant Butterﬂy Goddess’ totem, a ravishing lady, a mysterious pupil, and a fat worm, as well as a scorpion that ﬂashed with an azure light.

When these light patterns came together, they formed the complex and mysterious halo.

Under the illumination of this halo, a ﬁgure re-surfaced in the air.

It was a slender man covered with purplish-gold armor. The armor wasn’t made of metal, but some sort of shiny and transparent gemstone. The purplish-gold light was shining forth from the armor. He had a pair of special wings behind him. They weren’t made of feathers, and didn’t resemble butterﬂy wings either. They had adopted the structure of wings that seemed to belong to some kind of ancient, sacred dragon.

While the man wore armor, he didn’t have a helmet. His black hair ﬂowed down behind his shoulders. On his forehead, there was a bright purplish-gold vertical eye. Upon closer inspection, the reﬂection of the principles of heaven and earth could be seen in his eye.

The man didn’t resemble anyone, he didn’t look like Wang Dong’er or Huo Yuhao. His handsomeness was ﬁlled with a sense of holiness.

The armor’s scales were rhombic, and they refracted purplish-gold rays under the illumination of the purplish-gold glow. Along with the purplish-gold halo beneath the man’s feet, he looked magniﬁcent!

He wasn’t holding any weapons, but there was a huge dragon revolving around his body. He shut his eyes, but the vertical eye on his forehead remained open.

What exactly was this...?

Chapter 336: Pride of the Ice and Snow Empress

Up on the main stage, the mysterious Imperial Tutor, Ju Zi, Jing Hongchen, and all the other Sun Moon Empire ofﬁcials all stood up.

There was no lack of strong soul masters among them.

However, it was their ﬁrst time seeing something like this.

Fusion skill? No, it can’t be. This doesn’t look like a fusion skill! How can there be so many changes in a fusion skill? Furthermore, the Sun Moon Empire had done a thorough investigation of Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er. There weren’t any records of such a transformation being used by them.

When the purplish-gold ﬁgure appeared, the weather changed. The raging storms and rain seemed to stop. The entire stage was illuminated by the purplish-gold light.

What exactly was this? The Bone Dragon ﬁnally lifted his head again.

When everyone else saw the stage shining with golden and silver lights earlier, he had seen the silver eye shining brightly when Huo Yuhao’s body soul underwent its Second Awakening. Huo Yuhao’s golden vertical eye turned into a silver one. The golden and silver lights had turned into an unprecedentedly powerful Spiritual Shock that had struck him.

A strong sense of crisis forced Yan Feng to gather his soul power around his head. Even so, he still experienced a throbbing dizziness after being struck. Even his spiritual sea started to crack, and he lost control of his body temporarily. Eventually, he collapsed onto the stage.

Just as he was struggling and managed to stay clear-headed for a moment, he saw something very strange, or rather, miraculous.

Is this… another illusion?

Yan Feng struggled to stand up. As he roared, he tried to bear the intense pain that followed the Spiritual Shock. His wings opened, and he started to ﬂy again.

The purplish-gold ﬁgure also moved at this moment. He was extremely quick; he reached an unbelievable speed in just a second.

However, the ﬁgure didn’t charge towards Yan Feng, but towards the side.

Xiao Xiao dismantled her cauldron formation at the same time and somersaulted backward in the air.

The purplish-gold ﬁgure was like a bolt of purplish-gold lightning that suddenly ﬂashed in the air. It swept past the Skeleton King.

A purplish-gold palm was pressed against the Skeleton King, who was completely clueless about what was going on. A purplish-gold projection ﬂashed before disappearing.

The Skeleton King’s head exploded with a quiet boom. A white light also shot into his crushed head. Just as it was rising, the spirit ﬁre that attempted to escape was dissipated by the purifying white light.

A tragic scream resonated across the entire stage. The Skeleton King collapsed to the ground. His black bones couldn’t handle it anymore, and were completely crushed.

Yan Feng ﬁnally panicked. By the time he saw the purplish- gold ﬁgure again, the Skeleton King was already dead.

Even though the Skeleton King was restrained by the Threelives Soulcrush Cauldron earlier, this sudden destructiveness was too frightening. Even his spirit ﬁre didn’t escape, and he was killed so easily!

The eyes of the purplish-gold ﬁgure were still shut, and he remained in mid-air. His dragon wings were open, and the purplish-gold glow, as well as the halo beneath his feet, were still ﬂashing gently.

The sound of the wind stopped, while the rain changed. The torrential rain seemed to be guided by an invisible force, and gathered towards the center of the stage. The rainwater followed the circular opening at the top of the barriers and ﬂowed down. It was like a waterfall had appeared above the stage.

As the rainwater reached less than two hundred meters from the ground, it began falling at a considerably slower rate. The rainwater turned into falling snow, and started to engulf the entire stage.

He can manipulate the weather? Isn’t this something only a Titled Douluo can do?

After being astonished several times, Yan Feng felt as if there were a mountain on his chest. He knew he couldn’t wait anymore.

The purplish-gold ﬁgure was like an immortal that had descended upon the mortal world. He used one palm strike to kill the Skeleton King, casting a huge shadow over the back of his mind. As the weather changed, Yan Feng also knew that his time was almost up. The Bone Dragon lifted his head to the sky and roared. The icy-blue light around its body rose once again. The falling snowﬂakes actually helped to strengthen him. The Bone Dragon was a creature of evil and ice. At this moment, Yan Feng’s body shone brightly with icy-blue light that burned like ﬁre. His Bone Dragon body expanded once again, growing by several meters. After that, he charged towards the purplish- gold ﬁgure with an unstoppable momentum.

It was do or die. He exploited the opportunity before his opponent unleashed all his strength to push for victory!

The purplish-gold ﬁgure seemed as if he didn’t care. He lifted his right hand and pointed his index ﬁnger towards the sky.

Suddenly, the falling snowﬂakes danced and converted into a huge icy whirlpool descending from the sky. The temperature on the stage fell signiﬁcantly, and even the yellowish barriers started to turn white.

The soul masters maintaining the barriers were under great pressure. It felt like the extreme chill could seep into their bodies through the barriers. What kind of force is this? Is he a Titled Douluo? Zheng Zhan was already at a loss for words. The falling temperature caused him to feel cold, even with his cultivation.

Even if someone allowed him to end the ﬁght right now, he would be very unwilling to do so. He knew that he could be hurt if he just ended it like this.

Is this really achievable by someone who’s not even twenty years old?

The Bone Dragon took only a second to arrive in front of the purplish-gold ﬁgure.

The purplish-gold ﬁgure lifted his left arm and mimicked a pushing action.

The wings behind his back suddenly changed color. One side turned white, while the other became shiny and transparent.

There was a captivating light projection above each of the wings. They looked like two elegant ladies.

Rings of light started to rise from the purplish-gold ﬁgure’s feet. The ﬁrst halo was blood-red, and carried four streaks of gold. The second to ﬁfth halos were all orange-gold.

The ﬁfth halo ﬂashed.

The Bone Dragon stopped in front of the pushing left palm and couldn’t advance any further. The icy-blue ﬂames that were burning on his body seemed to meet with an obstacle, too. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t advance.

The stage suddenly lit up with a patch of blinding light. However, it wasn’t gold and silver this time. Rather, it was white and jade-green.

Those who were prepared this time saw everything clearly. The white and azure-green light came from the purplish-gold ﬁgure’s wings. They appeared as two captivating projections that merged together. Instantly, they spread from the head of the Bone Dragon all the way to his tail. The two lights seemed to ﬂash across his entire body in an instant. The patch of blinding light disappeared. The spinning snowﬂakes above the stage also stopped, and slowly stopped descending altogether. Then they started rising instead. They changed into ice blades shooting into the sky.

The falling rain was slashed apart by these blades and turned into snow. Eventually, it changed into a huge icy tornado that whirled its way into the sky.

Zheng Zhan was in daze as he watched all this. His pupils shrank. Just as the white and azure-green lights ﬂashed, he felt goosebumps all across his body. Even he wasn’t sure what he would do if he faced such an attack.

What kind of strength is that?

Eight rings! The attack must at least be at the level of an eight-ringed Soul Douluo! No wonder he was afraid, even though he was a Class 9 soul engineer! After all, he didn’t possess the ﬁghting strength of a true Titled Douluo...

How is this possible? Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er have ﬁve and six rings respectively. Their combined strength is actually able to reach an eight-ringed level?

The Bone Dragon opened its mouth and continued to drift in front of the purplish-gold left palm. His voice was becoming more and more coarse.

“Can you tell me the name of this soul skill?”

Huo Yuhao’s indifferent and cold voice sounded out, “It’s called the Pride of the Ice and Snow Empresses.”

“Thanks.” Yan Feng’s voice suddenly sounded huskier. In the next instant, his body seemed to turn brighter. Following this, his bones started to crack. After a series of piercing cracks, his bones were crushed.

When his crushed bones fell to the ground, they turned to powder. A ball of icy-blue light shone for a short while around the Bone Dragon’s head before it disappeared.

The Pride of the Ice and Snow Empress didn’t just destroy his body; it destroyed his soul, too. Yan Feng was completely obliterated.

The Tang Sect versus the Holy Ghost Sect. Of the four disciples from the Holy Ghost Sect that had competed, all four were killed. They were annihilated!

----

On the main stage, the mysterious Imperial Tutor suddenly clenched his ﬁst extremely tightly. A very unstable and dangerous aura was exuded from his body. He was like a volcano that could erupt at any time.

Jing Hongchen took a step forward and blocked Xu Tianran, protecting both him and Ju Zi. A ﬁery-red glow shone on his chest.

Although Jing Hongchen hadn’t fought this Imperial Tutor before, he knew how scary he was. Once he erupted, the entire main stage would turn into hell! Jing Hongchen wasn’t the only one who sensed the dangerous aura. There were seven or eight people who quickly rushed in front of Xu Tianran and protected him as well!

There was also another person beside the Imperial Tutor. It was a lady completely decked out in black robes.

“Founder, please calm down.”

The Imperial Tutor slowly retracted his dangerous aura, and his cold and creepy voice resonated from underneath his veil.

“Bloody Tang Sect. How dare they kill my disciples? I’ll let them have a taste of what it’s like to have their souls burned and be skinned to the bones.”

How could his heart not ache?

These disciples who represented the Holy Ghost Church weren’t even twenty years old yet, but they were all elites. Yan Feng was even his inheriting disciple! He had high hopes for Yan Feng, but now had he died just like that under Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er’s hands. No matter how cold he was, he was still heartbroken right now. He almost lost his cool!

“Imperial Tutor, please calm down. I promise you that I’ll hand them over to you and you can do whatever you want with them,” Xu Tianran recovered after a momentary shock. He promised the Imperial Tutor from safely behind his subjects.

“Your Highness, you don’t have to go to so much trouble. I’ll deal with these small fries myself; I’ll send people to catch them.” After he ﬁnished speaking, he turned around and walked away. As he walked off the stage, he blurred and turned into a streak of black light before disappearing.

The lady in black said to Xu Tianran, “Your Highness, please understand how the Imperial Tutor feels. If he was being disrespectful, I’d like to apologize on his behalf.”

“No worries,” Xu Tianran smiled in reply, as if he wasn’t bothered at all.

The lady in black nodded at Xu Tianran. After that, she also jumped up and turned into a streak of black light, chasing after the Imperial Tutor.

Jing Hongchen looked a little dismal as he said, “Your Highness, the Holy Ghost Church is too arrogant. How dare they act like this in front of you…”

Xu Tianran maintained his composure and said, “Hallmaster Hongchen, watch your words.”

Jing Hongchen was slightly stunned, and he grunted in anger. However, he didn’t continue. He understood a little about the Holy Ghost Church. He knew that there was someone so strong in the church that even the Illustrious Virtue Hall couldn’t afford to offend them.

The purplish-gold ﬁgure ﬁnally landed at this point. His icy- white and azure-green wings regained their purplish-gold color. They slowly closed up behind him.

A strong purplish-gold light suddenly separated from his body, and two golden ﬁgures appeared in front of and behind him. The light dispersed and changed into a strong glow that engulfed all three ﬁgures.

As the glow distorted, Huo Yuhao and Wang Dong’er re- appeared on the stage.

Wang Dong’er’s ﬁgure ﬂashed, and she moved to grab Huo Yuhao. She prevented him from falling, as he couldn’t stand straight with his legs.

Huo Yuhao was a little pale, but he was in good spirits. There was a steady look in his eyes, and he seemed resilient. He clenched both of his ﬁsts tightly. He couldn’t hide his excitement.

“Dong’er, we’ve won!” Huo Yuhao said with real emotion.

Unrivaled Tang Sect Volume 27

Chapter 265: Tough Dong'er

Chapter 266: Waking Up in Comfort

Chapter 267: Working Hard For the Sake of Recovering

Chapter 268: One Hand

Chapter 269: Powerful Spiritual Power

Chapter 270: The Competition in Radiant City!

Chapter 271: Sword Fanatic's Sword

Chapter 272: Tang Ya

Chapter 273: Shadows of the Holy Ghost Church

Chapter 274: A Big Customer

Chapter 275: The Art of Negotiating

Chapter 276: Child Bride...

Chapter 277: Regent Concubine

Chapter 278: First Battle

Chapter 279: A Competing Cripple?

Chapter 280: The Cute Yet Powerful Snow Lady

Chapter 281: I'll Marry Whoever Kills Him!

Chapter 282: Nan Qiuqiu and Nan Shuishui

Chapter 283: Team Holy Spirit

Chapter 284: Seven-Man Fusion Skill

Chapter 285: Team Shrek's Improvement

Chapter 286: The Other Tournament

Chapter 287: The Newbies Compete

Chapter 288: The Fierce Genius Soul Engineer

Chapter 289: Tactical Surrender?

Chapter 290: Team Sun Moon

Chapter 291: Wang Dong'er's Fifth Soul Skill

Chapter 292: An Astonishing Rainbow Crossing A Hundred Meters

Chapter 293: The Even-more Terrifying Xiao Hongchen

Chapter 294: Awaken! Wang Dong'er

Chapter 295: Ranked Carving Knife

Chapter 296: The Clearjade Sect

Chapter 297: The Vampire Bat

Chapter 298: A Fake Martial Soul True Body!

Chapter 299: Eye of Fear

Chapter 300: Defeating Clearjade!

Chapter 301: A Confrontation Of Soul Tools

Chapter 302:The Lofty Blood-Coagulating Carving Knife

Chapter 303: Liquor, Medium, Icebreaker

Chapter 304: Wang Qiu'er Makes A Powerful Entrance

Chapter 305: Intimidating One's Enemies, Entering the Team Fight

Chapter 306: An Armor Made of Beautiful Ice Crystals

Chapter 307: The Last Clash

Chapter 308: The Soul Engineering Tournament's Round-Of-Six

Chapter 309: Betting Against the Darkness Green Dragon

Chapter 310: The Adjudication Shield

Chapter 311: Huo Yuhao's Third Martial Soul

Chapter 312: The World of Specters

Chapter 313: Qiu'er and Dong'er's Duel

Chapter 314: Lot Drawing for The Round of Eight

Chapter 315: The Round of Eight Starts!

Chapter 316: One-man Team

Chapter 317: Baptism of the Sun, the Golden Dragon Lady

Chapter 319: Tang Sect vs Body Sect!

Chapter 320: The Ever-Transforming Huo Yuhao!

Chapter 321: The Strongest Member of The Body Sect

Chapter 322: Yama's Invitation

Chapter 323: Xuanwu's Domain

Chapter 324: The Team Fight--The Tang Sect VS The Snowdemon Sect

Chapter 326: Dark Clouds Hanging

Chapter 327: Semiﬁnals!

Chapter 328: Duel of the Two Dragons!

Chapter 329: An Earlier Final Round!

Chapter 330: Dragon Emperor Demonic Rupture

Chapter 331: Dragon Emperor Realm Quake

Chapter 332: Xiao Ya, I'm Feeling A Little Cold

Chapter 333: Four Great Evil Soul Masters

Chapter 334: The Tang Sect's Hidden Fighting Strategy

Chapter 335: Purple Golden Transformation

Chapter 336: Pride of the Ice and Snow Empress

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