Three Slaps!!
Blazing Fist — Nine Palaces!
When nine pillars of raging flame erupted skyward, Xu Mingcong and his teammates were scorched to within an inch of their lives.
Under the Thunderbolt barrage, they had already burned through their Shield Enchanted Gear and Armor Enchanted Gear alike. When Nine Palaces descended again, every last defense they had was reduced to rubble.
The sheer destructive force cracked the arena floor across a wide swath; the Barrier shuddered with violent convulsions as tongues of fire danced aimlessly between the towering pillars...
In the stands, Gu Jian stood with his jaw slack. He was a dual Lightning Element and Fire Element practitioner himself — a pure offense-type Mage — yet the same two skills, in Mo Fan's hands, carried an entirely different magnitude. Mo Fan's Thunderbolt: Frenzied Dance and Blazing Fist — Nine Palaces hit with such staggering force that Gu Jian could scarcely believe what he was seeing.
*Spirit Seeds!!*
The realization struck him all at once — it was the difference in Spirit Seeds that explained the gap in power.
Mo Fan's Rose Flame was the blunt, straightforward type: Fire Element power boosted by 2.5 times. A skill like Blazing Fist — Nine Palaces was perfectly built for that kind of raw amplification, and that extra 0.5 times above other Spirit Seeds expressed itself across all nine flame pillars, multiplying the total devastation far beyond what a simpler Spirit Seed could achieve.
As for Lightning Element — Mo Fan's Qianjun made Thunderbolt: Frenzied Dance roughly comparable to what Gu Jian himself could manage. But the spatial shockwave effect left anyone relying on Enchanted Gear for defense utterly overwhelmed.
A small difference between Spirit Seeds. A result that was anything but small.
Once the lightning and fire had finished their work, the outcome felt like a foregone conclusion.
The opposing team had exhausted every defensive Enchanted Gear item they owned, while Mo Fan's side was just as well-equipped. There was no reason for them to lose now — not after the other team had been pounded to the point where their very bones felt like they might scatter.
As the situation grew clearer by the moment, the look on Gu Jian's face grew darker and darker.
"We won — we actually won?" Ah Li Jie and Liu Xin stared at Mo Fan, barely daring to believe it.
"Ha! We won! Mo Fan, you're amazing!" Ai Tutu leapt into the air with joy and, right there in front of everyone, planted a kiss square on Mo Fan's cheek.
Ai Tutu was very much the baby-faced, impressively-endowed type, and when she threw herself at him with that kind of enthusiasm, the soft weight pressing against his chest — remarkable in its resilience — very nearly sent blood shooting from Mo Fan's nose.
*Holy shit, this woman is going to be the death of me!!*
Ai Tutu must have realized she'd gotten a little carried away. Her face went red — but she maintained her composure and declared, perfectly straight-faced, "That was purely from excitement. Nothing else to read into it. Don't get any ideas."
Mo Fan gave a wicked grin and said nothing more.
Shortly after, the three referee-teachers announced the official match result. Following Mo Fan's back-to-back volleys with two Intermediate-Level spells, Xu Mingcong's team had clearly been pushed past their limits, and the fight that followed fell apart quickly.
In truth, none of Liu Xin, Ah Li Jie, or Ai Tutu were weak fighters. Once Mo Fan's explosive output had seized an overwhelming advantage, there was simply no coming back for Xu Mingcong's side — especially with Ai Tutu's Slash Enchanted Gear in play, whose damage output rivaled a single full-force Intermediate-Level spell from Mo Fan himself.
"Xu Mingcong, what the hell was that?! You actually *lost*?!" Gu Jian completely lost it, rounding on Xu Mingcong.
"Hmph. Think you could've done better?" Xu Mingcong was already in a foul mood from the defeat; having Gu Jian shout at him on top of it did nothing for his temper.
What was Xu Mingcong supposed to do?
He was a Wind Element and Shadow Element Mage. The most he could realistically contribute was disruption and harassment.
When the opponent had dual Lightning and Fire cultivation with explosive output — plus a summoned Swift Star Wolf on top of it all — there was no disrupting anything.
This Mo Fan. His strength really was extraordinary. He was top ten on the Fire Rankings, after all.
"One match proves nothing. Just you wait," Xu Mingcong said, resentment still plain on his face as he leveled a finger at Mo Fan.
Compared to how he'd walked in, Xu Mingcong was now a picture of ruin: clothes shredded, his blue-green hair hanging in disarray like a beggar's, every trace of the effortless cool he'd always projected stripped away. The girls who'd screamed his name earlier could barely reconcile this sorry figure with the Xu Mingcong they knew — the one who always strolled in with his hands tucked in his pockets, looking every inch the magnetic, villainous lead.
He had no intention of prolonging the humiliation. He turned and left.
The moment he was gone, Gu Jian looked utterly at a loss.
Ai Tutu wasted no time — she hurried straight back to her seat, gave her round little backside a pointed wiggle, and planted herself in a prim, upright posture.
They'd won. Which meant the earlier losses hadn't been entirely her fault. Gu Jian was capable enough in a solo fight, but in a team setting he acted purely on his own whims — a stark contrast to Mo Fan, who actually knew how to leverage each member's different element type.
From where Ai Tutu stood, Mo Fan was already frightening in his own right. Yet throughout this fight, beyond the single devastating lightning-and-fire barrage that had secured the decisive advantage, he had spent most of his time coordinating with the team — reading how to respond, figuring out how to crack the opponent's approach, knowing when to pull back and when to press. In terms of real combat ability, Mo Fan was in a completely different world from Gu Jian, who only knew how to bark.
Ai Tutu finally broke into a smile, eyes narrowing as she looked at Gu Jian.
She had no intention of sparing him any face. He'd brought it entirely on himself.
"What are you standing around for? Start crawling," Mo Fan said — his personal dictionary evidently containing no entry for mercy — addressing Gu Jian without a shred of sympathy.
Gu Jian's teeth were practically grinding to powder.
How — wasn't Xu Mingcong supposed to be stronger than Bai Yulang? How had they lost? How the hell had they *lost*?!
With this many eyes on him, he couldn't go back on his word. His face darkened like a storm cloud as he dropped to his hands and knees...
He crawled one step forward, and immediately felt humiliation crash over him like waves battering a sea wall. It took everything he had not to lunge back to his feet and settle things with Mo Fan right then and there.
But he kept going, his eyes blazing with a dark, venomous fury.
The distance wasn't great, but that crawl felt more agonizing than walking the road to the underworld. He finally reached the front of that infuriating woman — only to find her wearing the most smug, gleeful smile imaginable, dripping with petty satisfaction.
**Crack!!**
Ai Tutu wasn't about to be gentle. She brought a sharp, ringing slap square across his face.
Gu Jian's cheek blazed. When he'd spat out that string of insults, it hadn't even crossed his mind that before the day was out, this woman would be slapping every word right back into his face.
**Crack!!**
"And that one's for running your filthy mouth, you piece of trash — I am still a virgin, for your information!"
A backhand to match the first. Ai Tutu's demon-queen streak came out in full force, and even the onlookers couldn't suppress a sharp, involuntary intake of breath.
Never provoke a woman. *Never* provoke a woman. That handsome face of his was already swelling from two slaps alone, and this was Gu Jian — a man who had always prided himself on his standing. When had he ever been made to swallow something like this?
"And as for this last one..."
Ai Tutu raised her hand high, putting every ounce of strength into what was clearly meant to be the final, definitive blow.
But at the peak of her swing, her wrist was suddenly caught — seized by a slightly sun-bronzed hand that closed around it like an iron clamp, stopping her cold.
Gu Jian had already screwed his eyes shut and was grimly plotting his future revenge when he registered that someone had intervened. Through the wreckage of his wounded pride, a flicker of relief sparked to life.