The several local heavyweights on the main viewing stand also sensed that something was wrong.
Zhou Boyuan, president of the Ability User Association, stopped stroking his beard, a sharp light flashing in his cloudy old eyes.
Han Tieshan, deputy commander of the City Defense Army, sat up straight, his right hand instinctively resting on the hilt of the saber at his waist.
Su Zhen’s expression was the most unsightly.
His fingers gripped the armrests of his chair so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
Zhao Lie leaned in and asked in a low voice, “Brother Su, didn't you say that kid was an F-rank?”
Su Zhen did not answer.
Because he didn't know how to answer either.
F-rank? Could an F-rank possess such an aura?
But the records from the Awakening Day couldn't be wrong—the awakening stone had clearly displayed an F-rank lightning system.
Everyone in Donghai City knew about it.
Unless...
A thought occurred to Su Zhen that even he found hard to believe.
Unless this kid had managed to upgrade an F-rank ability to E-rank in just ten days after the Awakening Day.
But ability users capable of evolving their abilities were far too rare!
Impossible. Absolutely impossible.
Increasing the rank of an ability was more than ten times harder than breaking through cultivation realms. Many ability users spent their entire lives unable to raise their ability rank by even a single level.
Ten days? From F to E? What kind of joke was that?
While everyone was lost in their own thoughts, the black-haired youth walked to the center of the arena.
He stopped about twenty meters away from Su Qingyue.
Then, reaching back, he grabbed the shaft of the spear on his back and pulled it down, the butt of the spear striking the ground.
“Thud—”
A dull, heavy sound echoed.
The entire arena fell silent.
The black-haired youth looked up, his gaze sweeping across the arena to land on Su Zhen on the main viewing stand.
His voice wasn't loud, yet it carried clearly to every corner of the arena.
“The ten-day challenge. I have come as promised.”
Every word was like a nail driven into the ground.
“Today, let us settle our past grievances.”
As his voice fell, an invisible aura burst forth from him.
It wasn't the pressure of an ability—his lightning ability was only E-rank, far from reaching the level of spiritual pressure.
It was something much purer: a killing intent tempered through countless life-and-death battles.
The ordinary spectators in the stands felt their breath hitch, as if something was pressing down on their chests.
But the true experts felt it even more clearly.
Qin Ruolan stood up abruptly.
Ye Lin’s pupils contracted slightly.
Lei Meng’s hands unconsciously clenched into fists.
Gu Cheng finally took the cigarette out of his mouth.
The teachers from the four major academies simultaneously abandoned their casual, spectating attitudes.
They had originally thought today’s match would be a stomp—S-rank ice against F-rank lightning, the outcome was a foregone conclusion.
They had only come for Su Qingyue; the F-rank kid was nothing more than a foil.
But now, it seemed this match was about to get interesting.
Su Zhen slowly stood up.
As the head of the Su family and the initiator of this match, he had to say something.
This was a matter of rules and decorum.
“Everyone—” He cleared his throat, his voice sounding exceptionally loud in the quiet arena.
“Today is a promised match between my Su family and the Lin family. Ten days ago, Lin Yuan and Qingyue set a challenge, and the winner—”
“Bang!”
A loud crash interrupted him.
Lin Yuan slammed the butt of his spear into the ground again, this time with more than twice the force as before.
The impact sent stone fragments flying, and a visible shockwave rippled outward from him, kicking up a cloud of dust.
“Stop the nonsense.”
The black-haired youth looked up, his gaze resolute.
“Let's just start.”
Su Zhen’s cheek twitched.
To be interrupted like this by an eighteen-year-old youth in front of the teachers from the four top academies and all the prominent figures of Donghai City...
It was practically a slap to the face.
But as the head of the Su family, he still possessed some self-restraint.
He took a deep breath, suppressing his surging emotions, and put on a proper smile once more.
“Since my nephew is in such a hurry,” he said as he slowly sat back down, a trace of hidden coldness in his voice, “then let us begin.”
As the words left his mouth...
In the center of the arena, two gazes collided in the air.
Su Qingyue looked at the black-haired youth across from her.
He had changed a lot in ten days.
His skin was darker, tanned by the sun of the wilderness.
The lines of his face were harder, tempered by ten days of wind and rain.
The spear on his back was covered in countless new battle marks, each one silently telling the story of what he had endured over the past ten days.
But those eyes hadn't changed.
They were just as they were ten days ago—calm and steady.
“Lin Yuan,” she spoke softly, her voice carrying a trace of complex emotion. “You came.”
Lin Yuan looked at her, the corners of his mouth curving slightly.
“I came.”
Su Qingyue fell silent for a moment, then extended her right hand.
An ice-blue light lit up in her palm.
When the light faded, a longsword appeared in her hand.
The blade was slender and translucent like ice crystal. The crossguard was shaped like an Ice Phoenix with its wings spread to protect the hand holding the sword.
It was a weapon Su Qingyue had created using source energy, possessing the power of a Tier 1, Low Grade weapon.
A faint blue glow flowed along the blade, and with every pulse of light, tiny ice crystals drifted down from the sword.
S-rank ice ability—Ice Phoenix.
Six Rounds of Bone Tempering.
Tier 1, Level 3.
Su Qingyue’s stance was perfect, clearly the result of rigorous swordsmanship training.
The tip of her sword pointed diagonally at the ground, her body slightly bladed, and her left hand’s sword fingers were pressed lightly against her right wrist—the opening stance of the Su family’s ancestral swordplay.
“I won't hold back,” she said.
“Just what I wanted.” Lin Yuan brought his spear across his body, the tip pointing straight ahead.
His opening stance had no flourishes.
There were no inherited family patterns, no traces of expert guidance—only the most comfortable posture he had discovered for himself after ten days of killing monsters in the wilderness.
His feet were shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent, and center of gravity low.
He held the spear with both hands, right hand in front and left hand behind, the shaft pressed against his forearm and the tip level with his line of sight.
Simple. Direct. No wasted movement.
Qin Ruolan’s frown deepened.
She could see it.
The kid’s spear techniques had no lineage—or rather, his “master” was the monsters he had slaughtered in the wilderness.
Every move and every stance had been forged in actual combat; there was nothing for show, everything was designed to strike down the opponent as quickly, fiercely, and effectively as possible.
This kind of spearplay wasn't pretty.
But it was definitely lethal.
The air in the arena seemed to freeze.
Everyone held their breath, waiting for the moment the match would begin.
The morning light poured down from the edge of the arena, shining on the two weapons.
One sword, shimmering with ice crystals, exquisite and magnificent.
One spear, covered in scars, radiating a chilling killing intent.
Su Qingyue was the first to move.
Her toes pushed lightly off the ground, and she surged forward like a white phantom.
The Ice Phoenix sword in her hand drew an ice-blue arc, and wherever the blade passed, the moisture in the air instantly condensed into fine ice crystals.
The first strike: a direct thrust.
It was a simple thrust, but enhanced by the S-rank ice ability, a visible ice spike condensed at the tip of the blade, whistling through the air as it lunged toward Lin Yuan’s chest.
Lin Yuan did not retreat.
The spear spun in his hands, and he flicked the tip upward from below.
Lightning exploded at the tip of the spear.
“Boom—”
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