The Dragon's Reveal
The coordinated assault was a masterpiece of predatory efficiency. Zhang Yangzi, a specter within his self-made twilight, and Wang Jinxi, a juggernaut of calcified malice, moved with the silent understanding of partners who had trained this moment a hundred times. Their strategy was brutally simple: overwhelm the cornerstone, and the arch crumbles. With Wei Xiaofeng occupying Xie Xie, eliminating Yao Xuan would leave Gu Yue isolated. It was a cold, logical plan, born from analysis and a deep-seated belief in their inherent superiority.
Yet, facing the closing pincers of shadow and bone, Yao Xuan felt not panic, but a profound, clarifying focus. The chaotic noise of the crowd, the sun on his skin, the gritty texture of the arena stone beneath his feet—it all sharpened into a single, crystalline point of action. These were not street thugs or overconfident fliers. These were genuine prodigies, wielding top-tier martial souls with the support of powerful soul spirits. To dismiss them would be arrogance. To defeat them required respect… and appropriate force.
"Good," Yao Xuan murmured, the word lost in the roar of approaching energy. A fierce, exhilarating seriousness settled in his eyes. This was the crucible he needed.
Soul power, a torrent of dense, vibrant energy, surged through his meridians at his mental command. Then, the air around him shimmered. Not with a flash of light, but with a distortion of reality, as if the space itself was making way. From that shimmer, the Ancestral Dragon Martial Soul manifested.
It was not the massive, sky-blotting form of legend, but a concentrated, meter-long apparition of breathtaking complexity. It hovered before him, a serpentine form woven from luminous, ever-shifting hues of nine colors that seemed to contain all elements and none. Its presence was not loud, but heavy. A silent, profound pressure radiated outward, a gravitational pull on the spirit. The air grew thick, charged with a primordial dignity.
A gasp, then a wave of stunned silence, then a tumult of excitement rolled through the stands. "What is that?!" "I've never seen such colors!" "It feels… ancient. Older than the academy, older than the city…"
On the stage, the effect was more direct. Wang Jinxi, mid-charge, faltered for a split second. A deep, instinctual tremor ran through his Bone Dragon King martial soul—a mouse sensing a prowling tiger, a lesser dragon feeling the gaze of its progenitor. His soul power flow hitched. 'An illusion!' he screamed inwardly, forcing the fear down, pouring anger into the dark-purple energy wreathing his claw. His charge regained momentum, now fueled by furious denial.
"Ancestral Dragon, Possess Me!"
Yao Xuan's voice was a low, resonant chant. The magnificent spirit above him dove, not as an attack, but as a homecoming. It streamed into the crown of his head. The transformation was swift and awe-inspiring.
A faint, nine-colored luminescence bloomed under his skin, then solidified. Pale, beautifully articulated scales, each shimmering with a subtle, different hue, emerged across his arms, torso, and legs, forming a natural, otherworldly armor. His height increased slightly, his posture aligning with an innate, draconic majesty. His hands and feet elongated, fingers tapering into elegant, razor-sharp claws that gleamed with a latent, world-cleaving light. Before him, his soul spirit—a miniature, twenty-centimeter version of the Ancestral Dragon—materialized, coiling in the air with intelligent eyes. Finally, two brilliant yellow spirit rings rose from his feet, their light deepening the hues of his scales.
The Ancestral Dragon stood revealed. Not in full, world-ending glory, but in a first-year student, a glimpse of genesis given form.
He didn't wait. His first spirit ring ignited.
"First Soul Skill: Ancestral Dragon Sky-Splitting Strike!"
His right claw drew back, the nine-colored light condensing around it until it became a focal point of dazzling, impossible radiance. He didn't leap; he uncoiled, his body a released spring. He met Wang Jinxi's descending Bone Dragon Claw not with a block, but with a decisive, upward slash.
Yet, half his awareness was a panoramic radar. In the periphery of his soul sense, the patch of unnatural shadow behind him moved. Zhang Yangzi, having used the cover of his own dark aura and the distraction of the frontal assault, emerged from the gloom like a viper. A smug, triumphant smirk was etched on his face visible within the fading shadow. His second spirit ring flashed—"Eagle Soars Through the Sky"—granting him a burst of supernatural agility. His own talons, sheathed in cutting wind pressure, aimed for the unprotected space between Yao Xuan's scaled shoulder blades. A perfect, merciless pincer attack.
"Yao Xuan, your back!"
Gu Yue's voice, usually so composed, carried a sharp edge of urgency. She hadn't been idle. While monitoring the entire field, her focus had been split, ready to support. The moment Zhang Yangzi's shadow solidified, she acted. A yellow spirit ring glowed at her feet. The earth in front of the emerging shadow heaved. A wall of solid clay and packed stone, two meters wide and a meter thick, erupted vertically, interposing itself between Zhang Yangzi's claws and Yao Xuan's back. It was a barrier of last resort, buying a fraction of a second.
"Understood! Hold your position!" Yao Xuan's response was a shouted acknowledgment, his trust in her support absolute. His focus never wavered from the clash before him.
CRACK-BOOM!
The sound of the collision was not metallic, but organic and catastrophic, like an ancient tree splitting under lightning. Yao Xuan's Sky-Splitting Strike met Wang Jinxi's Bone Dragon Claw. For an instant, a miniature sun of conflicting energies—decaying purple against primordial nine-color light—flared at the point of impact.
Then, the force told. Wang Jinxi's eyes bulged. A sensation not of impact, but of annulment traveled up his arm. His fortified claws, hard enough to scratch steel, met a power that spoke of separating heavens from earth. A spiderweb of fine cracks erupted across the dark, bony surface with a sound like shattering porcelain. The kinetic energy, vast and unconsumed, lifted him bodily off his feet. He flew backward as if yanked by a giant's hand, crashing to the stone ten meters away with a heavy thud that drove the air from his lungs. He lay stunned, staring at the fissures in his claw, a cold, primal fear seeping through the pain. 'It… it shattered my soul skill's manifestation…'
The crowd erupted. "He sent him flying! With one hit!" "Did you see the light?!" "The Bone Dragon King was overpowered!"
But the danger wasn't over. Behind Yao Xuan, Zhang Yangzi's wind-enhanced talons struck Gu Yue's earthen wall. It held for a heroic moment, then disintegrated under the concentrated assault, exploding into a cloud of dust and fragments. Through the debris, Zhang Yangzi shot, his talons aimed true, the wind blades around them screaming. He was a phantom made real, vengeance given wings.
Yao Xuan, still in the follow-through of his strike against Wang Jinxi, seemed wide open.
"Good angle," Yao Xuan thought, his inner voice calm amidst the storm. "But you telegraphed your emergence from the curtain by half a heartbeat."
He didn't turn. He didn't even look. Instead, deep within his body, a different kind of power awoke—not soul power from the spirit rings, but the vital, universe-creating energy of his Qi and Blood. The first cycle, linked to his very life force, spun into furious activity.
First Qi and Blood Ability: Ancestral Dragon Shattering Void Step.
The air around his feet warped. It wasn't a blur of speed. It was as if the space beneath him recoiled, propelling him not with muscle, but with a conceptual rejection of confinement. He vanished from the spot just as Zhang Yangzi's claws raked through the space he had occupied, slicing nothing but afterimages and displaced air.
Zhang Yangzi's triumphant sneer froze, then twisted into bewildered shock. His target was simply… gone.
Yao Xuan reappeared three meters to the left, his scaled body settled in a low, ready stance, his nine-colored claws still gleaming with residual energy from the first strike. He turned his head, his gaze—now holding a subtle, dragon-like vertical slit in the iris—meeting Zhang Yangzi's. The message was clear: The siege has failed. The hunter is now the hunted.
The battle had reached its fever pitch. Xie Xie and Wei Xiaofeng were a storm of clashing lights in the background. Wang Jinxi was struggling to rise, his right arm hanging useless. And now, Yao Xuan stood, having shattered one attacker and evaded another with preternatural grace, his draconic form a silent challenge to the remaining shadow eagle. The outcome still hung in the balance, but the momentum, in that breathless moment, had decisively shifted.