When Chu Zimo rose from Qin Liang’s body, a tiny drop of dark red was congealed on his black short blade. He wiped it against the outside of his pant leg, and the shadow on the arena floor had already swallowed more than half of his body.
Just as Fang Xin’s expression changed on the screen, Chu Zimo vanished once again.
At the other end of the arena, Shen Yun instinctively took half a step back.
He stood at the very back of the four-person team, his left hand resting on his belt. He carried no weapon, nor did he display any eye-catching ability.
However, on the first night Qiu Shubai and Tang Xuan received the tournament bracket, Zhang Xian had specifically circled this name.
“You need to keep an eye on this one, Shen Yun,” Zhang Xian had said, tapping his pen on the name.
“He’s already reached Core Consolidation Level 6. His ability is called Mist Barrier. It’s not high-level; it barely scratches the edge of the Sharp Edge rank. He’s a little monster who climbed the ranks through sheer precision of control.”
Zhang Xian’s tone wasn’t particularly complimentary. “The kid’s skill level surprised even me. Among those with similar abilities, his understanding of his own power is miles ahead.”
Zhang Xian’s words flashed through Tang Xuan’s mind before she pushed them aside.
She didn’t have time to worry about others right now.
Fang Xin’s two short blades were circling Qiu Shubai, every strike attempting to bypass her parries. Jiang Sixue’s flames darted across the stage, the crimson fire walls turning half the arena bright red.
“Playing with fire, are we? Fine, I’ll play along!”
Tang Xuan flipped her left hand, and the Light Flame in her palm condensed into a white longsword. Light Flame was a Peerless-tier ability, naturally far more powerful than Jiang Sixue’s Flame Overspread, which burned his own blood energy. She hurled the longsword into the fire wall, the white light chasing after Jiang Sixue through the dark flames.
Jiang Sixue flicked his finger.
The layer of black substance already spread on the ground suddenly ignited two meters behind Tang Xuan. The fire flanked her from behind, much denser than the frontal wall of flame.
Tang Xuan didn’t even turn around. A burst of white flame erupted behind her, and the fire Jiang Sixue had ignited vanished instantly upon contact with the white light, like ice shards hitting boiling water.
“Is this all you’ve got, kid?”
An explosion suddenly scattered several high fire walls. Tang Xuan’s figure appeared through the flashing light, having already closed the distance to Jiang Sixue. She reached out and grabbed the white flame blade just an arm’s length away. Though a caster, she acted like a warrior, raising the blade high above her head and slashing down toward Jiang Sixue.
At the other end of the arena, Shen Yun pressed his left hand down, and a wisp of thin mist seeped out from under his feet.
The mist was so faint it was barely noticeable unless one looked closely, its color somewhere between gray and transparent. It didn’t dissipate but was held firmly under Shen Yun’s blood energy control, spreading slowly across the ground like liquid mercury toward the shadow where Chu Zimo was hiding.
Chu Zimo’s Shadow Bind covered a five-meter radius around him. He had originally planned to leap out from the shadow to Shen Yun’s back left, but he stopped a moment before surfacing.
The thin mist had already crawled beneath his feet. Chu Zimo glanced down. The mist swirled around the soles of his boots; it hadn’t entered his Shadow Bind domain, merely stopping at the edge of the shadow.
There was no corrosion, no binding—none of the attributes that usually decided a battle.
But he could feel that something was wrong with his Shadow Bind.
The shadow he should have been able to traverse quickly now felt as if it were filled with something viscous. He could still move forward, but every step his shadow took required significantly more effort than before.
“...A boring trick.”
Chu Zimo forced the words through his teeth.
He forcibly activated Shadow Bind, half his body emerging from the darkness. His shadow dagger thrust out first, aiming straight for Shen Yun’s defenseless right flank.
The blade was only two inches from Shen Yun’s belt.
Shen Yun’s left hand suddenly jerked upward. The thin mist that had been spread on the ground abruptly rose, forming a shoulder-high thin wall on his right side. The mist remained faint and almost transparent, but the moment the dagger in Chu Zimo’s hand struck it, the blade felt as if it had plunged into hardening glue, making it impossible to cut further.
It was stuck!
Chu Zimo tried to pull the blade back and leave, but the weapon felt welded to the mist wall. He lunged backward, but the force of the blade’s pull caused him to stumble half a step forward instead.
So, he simply let go, using the momentum of the pull to roll away to the left, landing with one knee on the ground. The shadow dagger dissipated on its own, turning into a shadow that flowed back toward him.
Chu Zimo’s brow furrowed. The strength of that mist shouldn’t have been able to stop a full-powered strike, yet every wisp of mist was being perfectly utilized by Shen Yun. Where it went, how much pressure it applied, when to release, and when to pull—it was all executed with exquisite rhythm.
A Core Consolidation Level 6 blood energy reserve combined with this almost pathological precision made a Sharp Edge-tier ability feel like it was Peerless-tier.
In the center of the arena...
Bloodfall was finally fully entangled with Fang Xin’s two short blades. Fang Xin’s Blade Orbit Synchro was much more proficient than it had been a month ago; he stayed three meters away while the blades acted like two snakes, tightly hounding Qiu Shubai’s flanks.
Thanks to Luo Yang’s pointers and his own hard work, he had reached the point where he could meticulously control the blades without even looking at their trajectories.
Qiu Shubai glanced at him.
“Good progress.”
“I appreciate the compliment.”
“But it’s a pity.”
Bloodfall’s sword-light flashed. The blade, which originally only had a faint golden glow, suddenly flickered with a nearly imperceptible sliver of crimson. The silhouette of the blade slightly distorted within that red light, as if looking at a sword through a layer of mist.
That was the distortion power from Crimson Abyss.
She didn’t truly activate Crimson Abyss; she only allowed a sliver of that power to flow along Bloodfall’s edge.
Fang Xin’s dual blades struck Bloodfall in the next second.
According to his calculations, while this attack wouldn’t break Bloodfall’s parry, it would still pin down Qiu Shubai’s movements, preventing her from launching an effective counterattack.
However, his two blades took a complete turn half an inch away from Bloodfall.
Fang Xin’s pupils shrank violently. Every movement of those blades was an instinctive extension of himself, yet at this moment, he clearly felt them slip from his control, flying straight toward Bloodfall.
The sliver of crimson distortion power on Bloodfall climbed up the length of the two short blades like invisible threads pulling at two loose ends. Fang Xin felt a viscous obstruction forced between his mind and the blades; a silent confrontation of blood energy unfolded between the two.
Qiu Shubai simply stood there with her sword held horizontally, but Fang Xin felt as if a blunt needle were prying at the depths of his consciousness, inch by inch.
“Jiang Sixue!” he turned and shouted, seeking help from his teammate.
But Jiang Sixue had no time for him; he was being hammered by Tang Xuan.
The fuel he condensed from blood energy was depleted with every ignition. This time, before he could spread it across the ground again, Tang Xuan’s slash was already upon him.
He raised his hand to condense one last fire wall.
Tang Xuan stepped right into it.
White Light Flame exploded from around her, burning a large hole through Jiang Sixue’s fire wall. The hem of her tank top was slightly singed, but she didn’t care in the slightest.
“Sorry about this.”
That was all she said.
Her palm tightened, the longsword pressed close, and the white light detonated against Jiang Sixue’s chest.
The referee raised a hand.
“Jiang Sixue, out!”
At the exact same moment the announcement fell, Chu Zimo surfaced from the shadows at the other end of the arena.
This time he didn’t use a shadow dagger, switching instead to his black short blade. Shen Yun’s Mist Barrier had already expanded to a half-meter radius around him. The moment Chu Zimo stepped into that domain, he slowed down.
It wasn’t that his actual speed decreased, but the transition between his movements became disjointed. The concentration of Shen Yun’s mist increased sharply within that half-meter radius; the entire space felt like it had turned into a swamp, requiring more effort for every muscle contraction.
Shen Yun didn’t move. As a Core Consolidation Level 6, his blood energy was much deeper than Chu Zimo’s. Even if he had almost no means of attack, he could hold out for a long time based on blood energy reserves alone.
“I won’t lose to you,” Shen Yun said, speaking for the first time during the match.
Chu Zimo smiled, though there was no hint of relaxation in it.
“Neither will I.”
His shadow suddenly lengthened within the mist domain. Shadow Bind’s energy surged frantically within that darkness. While Shen Yun’s mist restricted Chu Zimo’s physical body, it couldn’t stop pure energy conduction.
He threw the black short blade he had switched to.
But he didn’t throw it at Shen Yun; he threw it into the shadow behind himself.
The blade vanished into the shadow and burst out from another patch of darkness behind Shen Yun.
Shen Yun’s Mist Barrier was unidirectional; the direction of defense depended on where his gaze and mind were focused. The shoulder-high mist wall was still facing Chu Zimo, leaving his back almost completely exposed.
The short blade sliced diagonally into Shen Yun’s right shoulder blade.
It didn’t hit a lethal spot, but it was enough.
Shen Yun hadn’t expected Chu Zimo to have such a move. His left hand went to the wound, and his control over the Mist Barrier wavered for a split second.
Chu Zimo lunged forward in that very instant.
The speed at which the mist domain dissipated could never catch up to his Shadow Bind movement. His shadow dagger had reappeared at some point, its edge pressed against Shen Yun’s throat, just a hair’s breadth from the skin.
“I win.”
Chu Zimo’s voice came from behind Shen Yun’s neck.
Shen Yun froze for a moment, said nothing, and simply raised his hand in a gesture of surrender.
The referee raised a hand.
“Shen Yun, out.”
In the center of the arena...
Fang Xin finally managed to pull his consciousness back from the two short blades, but Qiu Shubai was already in front of him.
Bloodfall’s tip should have pierced his chest, but Qiu Shubai’s wrist flicked at the last second, tilting the blade three inches away. It stopped just below his collarbone, a light touch that sliced his training uniform from the collar all the way to his waist with clean precision. As the fabric fluttered down, Fang Xin froze in place.
“I’ll show you a good show.”
She took a step back.
On Bloodfall’s blade, the sliver of crimson distortion power suddenly intensified. The pale gold sword-light slowly condensed, spreading upward from the tip.
The sword’s form underwent a visible change at that moment. Several deep red markings appeared on both sides of the blade, outlining the shapes of flower petals arranged one after another.
In the instructor seating on both sides of the arena, several veteran teachers sat up straight simultaneously.
One of them muttered under his breath, “What kind of ability is this?”
No one answered him.
Fang Xin’s two short blades were no longer within his control. They remained stuck around Bloodfall, like two funnel-drones guarding the main unit.
He wanted to retreat, but his legs wouldn’t obey.
The arena floor beneath Qiu Shubai’s feet was covered by an extremely faint crimson glow.
Consciousness was slowed, thoughts were obstructed; within this blood-colored screen of light, even time itself seemed distorted.
Bloodfall’s tip pointed toward Fang Xin, and the petal markings on the blade lit up one by one. As each petal glowed, a strand of pale gold sword-light detached from the blade and hovered in the air.
Seven petals, seven sword-lights.
They formed an elliptical ring around Bloodfall. As Qiu Shubai took a step forward, the entire ring advanced slowly toward Fang Xin.
When Fang Xin saw those seven sword-lights, even his breathing hitched for a moment.
He could see that those lights would strike him from seven different angles simultaneously—chest, shoulders, waist, thighs. None would be fatal, but together they were enough to keep him in the infirmary until the league ended.
His left hand went to his waist, but there was no blade there. He tried to mobilize his blood energy again, but it was absorbed by the crimson glow on the ground before it could even circulate halfway.
The final petal on Bloodfall’s blade lit up.
An eighth sword-light detached from the blade.
This sword-light wasn’t part of the elliptical ring. It hovered alone directly in front of Bloodfall’s tip, more solid than the other seven and deeper in color—almost dark red.
Fang Xin stared at that sword-light. In his years at the academy, he had participated in countless training sessions, taken countless beatings, and fought innumerable Punishers, yet he had never seen a technique like this. Eight petals slowly unfolding, with the crimson one at the very center while the other seven surrounded it, willingly serving as its foil, enshrining it as the sole core.
No, it wasn’t the core, Fang Xin corrected his intuition internally.
The center of those eight petals was meant to be himself.
END
Rate on N.U.
