Huo Yuqing finally did what she had fantasized about ever since she was seven years old.
She charged at her half-blood relative, the one who had killed her mother — her knuckles cracked as she clenched her fist and swung it straight at Dai Huabin's face.
In the instant she raised her hand, a pale, lifeless face flashed before her eyes — her mother's cracked, dry lips weakly opening and closing, her last words and dying breaths echoing in Huo Yuqing's ears. She felt again the hunger and cold of those early years, the pain of beatings from the servants of the Duke's mansion.
The cold, hardened face of the thirteen-year-old Dai Huabin overlapped with the baby-fat-softened, childish features of his eight-year-old self.
All that pain, in that moment, transformed into raw power. It pushed her, drove her, turned whispers into a roar. In this instant, Huo Yuqing felt something almost intoxicating — almost a sweetness.
Look!I finally have the strength to throw a punch at Dai Huabin openly, proudly, with my own power!
But Dai Huabin merely let out a short, cold laugh and casually raised his hand to block.
A level-twenty spiritual attribute control-type Soul Grandmaster challenging a top-tier beast-type Battle Soul Master, with a soul power advantage of nearly ten levels, in raw strength?
Wasn't that just pure comedy?
Dai Huabin was, of course, wary of the opponent before him.
He wasn't stupid. During the annual assessments, Huo Yuqing had only been a one-ring Soul Master, yet with a glance she'd knocked his teammate Cui Yajie off the field, and just now had directly eliminated Xie Huanyue.
Spiritual-type martial souls were far too rare, their powers too bizarre.
Dai Huabin didn't believe that such a powerful skill could be used twice in quick succession, but he had indeed considered how to deal with that silent, formless spiritual attack. Maybe avoiding eye contact would work — he wasn't sure. Huo Yuqing had been excellent at keeping the details of her ability hidden. But it was worth a try.
No matter what, a spiritual-type Soul Master using physical strength to trade blows with him was pure folly, abandoning her strengths for weakness, overestimating herself…
And then Dai Huabin got smashed into the ground by that punch, rolling several times before the force finally dissipated.
Elder Xuan, who had been watching the remaining contestants while taking a swig from his gourd, choked on his liquor and started coughing violently.
How was that possible? Even if that brat from the Dai clan had underestimated him, it shouldn't have been like this!
Did I misread the kid? Had his primary martial soul undergone a second awakening?Impossible! Absolutely impossible!
Unless… Could it be a high-level soul bone? If he had a few top-grade soul bones providing stat boosts, then that might make sense.
"Huabin!" Zhu Lu cried out in alarm, lunging forward to help her fiancé up — only to be shoved aside.
Dai Huabin climbed to his feet, spat the blood from his mouth onto the floor, and glared at Huo Yuqing with savage hatred flooding his eyes, red veins spreading across the whites.
He raised his head and let out an earth-shaking tiger's roar. His first three soul rings lit up in rapid succession. A layer of platinum-gold light spread across his body, golden claws extended from his fingertips, and his muscles swelled a second time. Fierce white light burst forth, condensing into a coat of snowy fur striped with black tiger markings, exuding the feral dominance of the king of beasts.
He stomped down hard, shattering tiles beneath his feet, and charged straight at Huo Yuqing, leaving behind broken floor slabs — and Zhu Lu, who hesitated, unwilling to advance.
Zhu Lu knew Dai Huabin too well. Her fiancé had lost face and would fight to regain it. If she interfered before being allowed, she would surely bear his wrath. All she could do was guard the battlefield from outside interference.
As for Huo Yuqing, staring down Dai Huabin's furious charge, her eyes only burned with double the hatred.
Facing this beast-like enemy, the aura around Huo Yuqing shifted.
The white soul ring behind her vanished, leaving only a deep violet one. The pure, pale-golden glow faded from her eyes, replaced by a chilling emerald radiance.
Dai Huabin didn't even have time to process why one of Huo Yuqing's soul rings had disappeared — all he felt was that he was charging into a blizzard, a cutting, blade-sharp cold wind slashing into his face.
Crack.
With the augmentation of two soul skills, Dai Huabin's strength had already been raised to a terrifying level — yet even so, when his golden, savage tiger claws came crashing down at Huo Yuqing's head, they were caught firmly by a pair of hands gleaming with dazzling diamond-like light.
At that moment, Huo Yuqing's hands were covered in perfectly formed hexagonal ice crystals. The fingertips were smooth, mirror-like silver, that silvery sheen extending to nails half an inch longer and sharpened to points.
Now, her four fingers pressed together, thumb spread wide, those silvered, sharpened claws joined at a single deadly point, like the pincers of a true scorpion. Bone-chilling cold radiated freely from her hands, condensing the water in the air into curling white mist.
It was one of the four great abilities granted by the Ice Empress soul ring —The Ice Empress' Pincers!
Huo Yuqing's soul power hadn't yet reached level thirty, but with the combined amplification of Tianmeng's original power, the Life Gold, the Ice Empress soul ring, and her soul bone — even without using any extreme-attribute strength, with sheer physical power alone, she was in no way weaker than Dai Huabin!
And the Ice Empress' Pincers were vastly superior to the pure enhancement-based skills of White Tiger Vajra Transformation combined with White Tiger Barrier.
Seeing his first attack fail, Dai Huabin immediately released his strength and shifted tactics, his tiger claw swiping toward Huo Yuqing's waist — but his intentions were fully exposed under her Spiritual Detection. Huo Yuqing stepped back with one hand to block while her other hand pulled Dai Huabin's arm aside, diverting his power.
The two of them engaged in close combat, relying purely on their martial souls.
Tiger claws and scorpion pincers clashed violently, detonating with thunderous booms, platinum and emerald light flashing — every strike aimed to kill.
The ferocity of their battle even outshone the thunder and explosions from the three-way four-ring melee happening elsewhere.
Dai Huabin's combat style was open and explosive, carrying the distinct shadow of the White Tiger Regiment's training. Huo Yuqing's movements, however, didn't belong to any clear system.
She had sparred in close combat with Yan Wen, Wang Rui, and similarly ranked friends in Jadeite City, but no one had formally taught her. Her spiritual-type martial soul was special enough — combined with Spiritual Detection and the computational precision granted by her powerful spiritual power, she could calculate the most efficient evasions and deadliest strikes, ultimately forming her own style.
But she still bore the influence of her sparring partners — her techniques had a nimbleness to them, yet carried a kind of wild, domineering savagery.
Especially since her Ice Empress martial soul was that of a true apex predator — the king of the Extreme North — in the state of martial soul possession, the primal, savage aura of an ancient soul beast exuded fully from her.
That feral, brutal aura placed enormous pressure on Dai Huabin.
A faint, unnoticed instinct to retreat flickered in his heart. Dai Huabin was already realizing that his opponent was likely a once-in-a-century twin martial soul prodigy — her primary martial soul being a top-tier body-type martial soul, while the second was clearly an elite-level ice-element beast martial soul — likely of far higher quality than even the White Tiger.
But he could not retreat.
If he took even one step back — if he lost to a Soul Grandmaster with soul power ten levels below his own — how could he still claim to be worthy of the White Tiger Duke's son?
This battle, no matter what, he had to win.Absolutely had to.
Dai Huabin discreetly gestured toward Zhu Lu. Zhu Lu understood immediately, nodding, her shadowy figure vanishing in an instant.
At point-blank range, Dai Huabin unleashed a White Tiger Light Wave, willingly taking damage to grab hold of Huo Yuqing's forearm, preventing her from dodging — while Zhu Lu closed in from behind, Nether Claws stabbing toward Huo Yuqing's back.
Huo Yuqing let out a cold laugh.
With one hand restrained by Dai Huabin, she intercepted the incoming attack with the other, clenching her five fingers together — the burst of cold shattered the glowing white light into scattered motes.
And as Huo Yuqing handled Dai Huabin, Zhu Lu silently slipped into Huo Yuqing's rear blind spot. Just as she thought she had her, a jade-green scorpion tail shot out from beneath Huo Yuqing's waist.
That scorpion tail lashed out like a whip, tearing through the air with a terrifying crack.
But the tail was even thicker than Zhu Lu's leg, segmented into eight parts, its form somewhere between the Ice Jade Scorpion and the Pink Queen Scorpion. From its base near the body, it was a deep, rich emerald green, growing more translucent toward the tip — by the final segment, the stinger was fully crystalline.
Zhu Lu felt as if she'd been struck by a massive hammer, her lightweight agility-type body sent flying through the air, crashing heavily to the ground.
Elder Xuan, having just swallowed his meat, was about to scoop her out — only to see her already struggling back to her feet, so he stayed his hand, a glimmer of interest in his eyes.
The black-haired girl spat out the strands that had fallen into her mouth, wiped the blood from her lips with the back of her hand, tapped her toes to the ground, and lunged once more at Dai Huabin.
And Dai Huabin, paying the price of having his left arm shattered by Huo Yuqing's Ice Jade Scorpion Pincers, also lunged toward Zhu Lu.
A flash of black and white light — and the enormous purple-eyed White Tiger appeared on the battlefield.
That white tiger stood nearly three meters tall, its body nearly ten meters long, dwarfing the figure of Huo Yuqing standing before it.
"He's not even falling back to defend her teammate?" Elder Xuan muttered, his eyes flicking toward the four-ring melee.
At that moment, around Beibei, thunder-light formed a massive net, caging Wang Rui in the sky — yet on Wang Rui's dragon wings flashed a terrifying crimson glow. He reached out and grabbed the lightning net, fire bursting forth along the thunder, igniting the blue-violet web entirely.
The burning fire-net reversed like a living thing, surging toward Beibei, while Wang Rui switched targets, diving toward Xu Sanshi. A crystalline, ruby-like fire-element shield appeared in his hands, slamming straight into Xu Sanshi's Xuanming Turtle Shield.
As though he hadn't even noticed the massive Netherworld White Tiger now looming on the battlefield, preparing to bite off Huo Yuqing's head.
Now Elder Xuan was confused.
Was this faith in their teammate…? But that kid couldn't possibly handle the Netherworld White Tiger alone. Or was it trust in Shrek Academy's referee?
And then — the terrifying white tiger raised its massive forepaw and slammed it down toward Huo Yuqing.
Huo Yuqing took a deep breath, lifted her hands slightly. A deep, ghostly emerald glow radiated from her upper body, faintly outlining the shape of a torso's bones.
A massive, yet ethereal, Ice Jade Emperor Scorpion phantom appeared above Huo Yuqing, its six long scorpion legs folding protectively around her.
Her slightly raised hands touched before her chest, then stretched upward until they were over her head — such a simple motion, yet sweat beaded at her temples, her face instantly pale.
It was as if a whirlpool had opened within her body, draining her soul power.
Unlike the real Ice Empress's wild, beastly amber eyes, this Ice Jade Scorpion bore more humanized, ghost-green eyes — and in those eyes was the same cold indifference, and beneath it, the same deep-seated hatred that burned in Huo Yuqing's own.
As she pushed through the motion, the colossal Ice Jade Scorpion phantom also slowly raised its pincers — and at the instant its mirror-like silver claw tips met the Netherworld White Tiger's massive paw, the phantom's claws turned solid, catching the deadly strike.
Each inch the giant Ice Jade Scorpion phantom moved devoured a terrifying amount of soul power, and the Netherworld White Tiger's massive claw pressed down with brutal, crushing force.
Huo Yuqing forced her body beyond its limits — her raised arms began to tremble, her clothes soaked through with sweat and clinging to her back, veins bulged at her temples, silvered teeth nearly cracked under the force of her own bite. Blood vessels burst in the whites of her eyes, crimson tears streaking down her cheeks.
By this point, her soul power was utterly exhausted.
But she would not yield.
She would never yield.
With her soul power depleted, she drove her spirit beyond its limits.
In Huo Yuqing's spiritual sea, that massive, vertical turquoise-gold eye formed from the Life Gold — the seven rotating light points within its pupil all erupted in blinding brilliance at once.
The purest life force, Huo Yuqing's own spiritual power, and the faint seed of divinity in her consciousness merged — a newborn power surged forth like spring water from a newly opened well, coursing through her meridians, sustaining her.
She thrust her hands upward, flipped them, clenched tight as if grabbing hold of something in the void — and with a savage swing —
The massive Ice Jade Scorpion phantom's now-solid pincers heaved the colossal Netherworld White Tiger, clamped its tail, and — in the midst of the deafening blast from Wang Rui's Molten Fire Shield colliding with Xu Sanshi's Xuanming Turtle Shield — flung it away.
(End of Chapter)