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The next morning, at the competition grounds.
"Teacher Mujin seems awfully cheerful," Wu Feng remarked, gazing toward the spectator stands. Indeed, Mujin was beaming—her mood even brighter than it had been in recent days.
Chen Junting, arms crossed and eyes slowly opening, thought to himself: Her longtime rival Zhou Yi has been cast into the abyss, almost literally banished to the Shadow Realm—there's no climbing back from this. Of course she's happy.
His gaze swept across the arena. With only the Top 16 teams remaining, the crowd had thinned considerably. Most faces were now familiar at a glance—but his attention fixed on the two other teams led by Soul Masters.
Soon, the draw for the next round began.
Once the brackets were set, Chen Junting's trio faced their opponents: one young man and two girls. Both girls had long blue hair and near-identical features—clearly twins. The boy, by contrast, was tall and powerfully built, making the sisters seem petite beside him.
"Boss Chen," Qin Lan murmured, stepping close with a grave expression, "those sisters possess a martial soul fusion skill."
"Then I'll deal with them first," Chen Junting said calmly, his eyes locking onto the twin girls. There was no trace of gentleness in his tone—only cold resolve.
Upon seeing Chen Junting's team, the young man's expression turned grim. He quickly whispered something to his teammates, then stepped forward with a respectful fist salute.
"Huang Chutian of Team Huang Chutian—accompanied by Lan Susu and Lan Luoluo. We request your guidance."
Chen Junting returned the gesture.
"Chen Junting of Team Chen Junting—alongside Qin Lan and Gao Ming. Likewise."
As both teams retreated to their positions—
"Begin!"
At the command, martial souls erupted instantly.
Huang Chutian roared, pounding his chest. The moment his Mighty Ape martial soul activated, his body swelled to nearly 1.8 meters. Muscles bulged like granite, tearing through his uniform, while his skin turned iron-black and gleamed with a metallic sheen.
The Lan sisters, meanwhile, tossed their blue hair back. Their long tresses whipped through the air like willow branches in a storm, unfurling into shimmering streams over ten meters long, drifting just above the ground.
Before their soul rings even appeared, the twins embraced each other tightly.
In that instant, a massive surge of soul power exploded from them. A deep blue aura enveloped their entwined forms, obscuring them from view.
"First soul skill—Speed Light Bloom!"
Golden light flared around Gao Ming. The Ruyi Disk before him spun once, launching a streak of light that split in two and shot into Chen Junting and Qin Lan.
Swish—!
A razor-sharp sword aura lanced out—
straight toward the Lan sisters at the rear!
Simultaneously, a shadow darted forward—
leaving trails of afterimages across the arena.
Huang Chutian bellowed again, activating his first soul ring. His fists doubled in size, glowing with intense metallic luster, and he charged headlong at Chen Junting.
Ignoring the crisscrossing sword energy, he swung a devastating punch—
—he couldn't worry about his teammates now.
Clang—!
The sword aura struck his iron fists, unleashing a metallic clang that echoed like clashing steel. It tore through his metallic skin, splitting flesh and spraying blood.
He staggered but didn't collapse—only stumbling back a few steps, spared from being launched skyward by the force.
Still, his face paled.
He'd assumed his Mighty Ape's iron hide and brute strength would give him an edge—but he couldn't even withstand Chen Junting's sword aura… and worse, that cut that shredded his flesh wasn't even a soul skill!
But it didn't matter.
They'd bought enough time.
Now, the Lan sisters' hair lifted in unison, crystallizing into translucent blue strands—still fine, yet radiating an entirely different presence.
"Void Hundred Rends!"
Qin Lan unleashed a flurry of claw strikes, each sharp enough to slice the air. But when they hit the crystalline hair, his expression twisted in shock. The strands were not only resilient but astonishingly supple—his attacks sank into them like a stone into the sea, vanishing without a ripple.
He felt as if he'd plunged into a vast, elastic net. Sensing danger, he tried to retreat—but the blue strands had already coiled from behind, sealing every escape route. The net tightened relentlessly.
In an instant, Qin Lan was trussed up like a dumpling, wrapped head to toe in shimmering blue threads.
Yet the sisters weren't finished. Qin Lan was merely incidental—their true target was Chen Junting. The entire net surged forward, engulfing the space around him.
At the same moment—
"Roooar!"
Huang Chutian unleashed another roar. His second soul ring flared, his arms swelling with explosive power. From his fists, a dense yellow energy sphere blasted toward Chen Junting—aimed to drive him straight into the sisters' trap.
But—
"Swish—!"
Chen Junting reversed his wrist. A single sweep of his sword cleaved the energy sphere in two. The halves whistled past Huang Chutian's ears and slammed into the "Heaven and Earth Net."
Then, the first and second pentagrams on his Seven Kill Sword blazed to life. A terrifying killing intent surged forth, making Huang Chutian's hair stand on end.
With a casual slash through empty air, Chen Junting summoned a colossal, ten-meter-long sword beam—unlike anything seen before.
Just as it was about to strike Huang Chutian—
"Boom—!"
A massive shield crashed down from above, intercepting the blow. The referee had intervened—and to block this single strike, he'd even activated his fourth soul skill.
Even so, a deep gash marred the shield's surface.
The referee's involvement meant Huang Chutian was eliminated.
Now facing only the Lan sisters, Chen Junting took a light step forward. Before the cascading curtain of crystalline hair, he gave his sword a subtle flick.
Instantly, countless threads of sword light erupted from the blade, weaving together into a rippling wave—
—and the entire sea of hair was flung apart in an instant.
As the strands scattered, Chen Junting stood firm, sword held horizontally. Before him, six fierce strokes of crimson light carved a massive, blood-red character into the air:
"Kill."
Each stroke pulsed with the killing aura of his second soul skill.
The once-dominant "Heaven and Earth Net" shattered like coarse burlap.
The overwhelming pressure radiating from that blood-soaked "Kill" character made Lan Susu and Lan Luoluo collapse to their knees, their faces draining of all color—already weakened by the broken fusion skill, now utterly broken in spirit.
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