Martial Virtue in Abundance

Gao De pushed open the brown-black door once more.

"You're here." Mage Seda sat at the desk as usual, looking at Gao De without emotion.

"I'm here." Gao De nodded, giving Mage Seda a once-over. He actually felt that, compared to ten-odd days ago, the man had visibly aged several more years.

While Gao De was studying Mage Seda, Mage Seda was observing Gao De as well, seemingly quite satisfied with his obedience.

He pushed the potion bottle on the table forward. "Drink it."

"You have some talent in Herbology. If all goes well, I will truly take you on as my apprentice."

Perhaps because success was so close at hand, and he wanted an auspicious sign, Mage Seda unexpectedly set aside his previous threats and voluntarily promised Gao De a reward.

Looking at the unknown fluorescent-blue liquid in the conical potion bottle before him, Gao De found that he was surprisingly calm.

He smiled and said to Mage Seda in a very "sincere" tone, "Thank you, Mage Lord."

Perhaps he had prepared for this day for too long, and been tense for too long. Now that the moment had truly arrived, he had instead calmed down, without much emotional turmoil.

And now that it had truly come to this, Gao De even felt as though he had seen through life and death.

He did not belong here to begin with. This life had been picked up for nothing.

If the one who walked out of here today was him, then he would have made an outrageous profit.

If it was not him, then he had at least lived an extra month. That was no loss either.

Since I can't lose either way, why should I be afraid of you?

Having completely thought it through, Gao De cast all his tension and worries aside.

With a thought, the potion bottle on the table rose into the air and flew straight into his hand.

Mage Hand.

Mage Seda was somewhat surprised by Gao De's action, but all his attention was on whether the potion would succeed, so he temporarily overlooked this seemingly "presumptuous" act.

Gao De pulled out the stopper. Then, under Mage Seda's watchful gaze, he raised the bottle to his lips, assuming a posture as if he were about to drink.

Gao De, who had been watching Mage Seda from the corner of his eye, saw that the mage had been staring at the bottle in his hand with an obsessed expression. Mockery could not help appearing in his eyes.

The next moment, Gao De struck without warning!

Rather than gulping down the potion as Mage Seda expected, he clenched the bottle in his right hand and flung it hard with a heart set on the end.

The potion that Mage Seda had concocted at enormous cost, with immense effort and energy, and on which he had placed such high hopes, became an arc that sliced through the air and smashed onto the floor in front of Mage Seda.

With a crisp yet heavy crash, shards of glass scattered in every direction.

The fluorescent-blue liquid burst free from its shattered container and splashed across the cold, hard floor, forming an irregular mottled stain that silently told of an irreversible decision.

The smell of potion spread through the air.

For an instant, everything seemed frozen.

Then it was swiftly shattered.

"What are you doing?! I want you dead! I want you dead!!" A supremely violent roar rang through the room and echoed within it.

The always-indifferent Mage Seda was like an erupting lion. Staring at the puddle on the floor, he could no longer suppress his emotions.

Gao De watched coldly. Mage Seda's reaction was exactly what he wanted to see.

To destroy someone, first drive them mad.

Gao De knew better than anyone how much Mage Seda valued that potion.

That was precisely why he had to use it to enrage Mage Seda, make him lose his reason, and give himself that tiny sliver more of a chance at victory.

Pfft!

While Mage Seda was still roaring, a handful of flour suddenly scattered straight into his face.

How could the old mage have ever seen such a martial-virtue-less style of fighting? Caught off guard, he was hit and blinded.

And Gao De's next move was already upon him.

He took several more steps back, widening the distance between himself and Mage Seda, while pulling a potion bottle from his waist and hurling it at the mage while his eyes were still shut from the flour.

It was the homemade throwable acid bottle Gao De had prepared in advance.

Scatter Ash plus splashing acid—a classic two-hit combo from Hall Master Wei.

Gao De had not watched all those wuxia films as a child for nothing.

But while Mage Seda had carelessly fallen for Gao De's dirty trick, he was naturally not so easy to deal with.

The instant he was struck, Mage Seda responded in time.

Without any visible movement from him, a distinct magical ripple spread through the sealed room.

The acid bottle Gao De had thrown could no longer move forward when it was less than a foot from Mage Seda, as though it had struck a transparent but solid glass dome.

The glass bottle instantly shattered into pieces, and the liquid inside splashed out with a pungent sulfurous smell.

Acid sprayed everywhere, with a large portion splashing toward Mage Seda.

Given the acid's corrosive power, if it truly landed on Mage Seda, even if it could not defeat him in a single blow, it would still be enough to make him suffer.

But just like the acid bottle, every droplet of acid was blocked off. They fell onto the floor, unable to get anywhere near Mage Seda's body.

"Is this what you were relying on?" Mage Seda finally managed to force his eyes open. So enraged that he laughed, he said, "Using a few lowly tricks, plus a bottle of acid from who knows where, and you think you can turn things around?"

The moment he smelled that pungent sulfurous odor, Mage Seda had already understood the nature of the liquid.

"You dare flaunt such tricks before me?" His face had darkened to the extreme.

"You will regret this. Today, I'll make you kneel here and beg me to kill you!"

Faced with Mage Seda's naked threat, faced with the reality that Mage Seda had effortlessly and imperceptibly blocked his opening attack—

"Today, only one of us will walk out of this room alive." Gao De's voice was incomparably cold, incomparably calm.

He did not lose his courage because of Mage Seda's methods.

For the first time before Mage Seda, he bared his fangs without the slightest concealment.

But Mage Seda did not take Gao De seriously at all, merely thinking he had gone mad. "Though I don't know where you got that bottle of acid, do you truly think that with these external things and a few rogue tricks, you can be my match?"

"A mage is a mage because a mage can do anything."

"Only a mage can kill a mage."

"You are a Mage Apprentice. So am I." Gao De looked coldly at Mage Seda.

Mage Seda seemed somewhat surprised by Gao De's audacity, and somewhat amused. He said disdainfully:

"It seems I truly taught you far too little, for you to have such an absurd notion."

"You should know that even among Mage Apprentices, there are differences."

Gao De did not pay attention to Mage Seda's verbal blows.

Activating a Spell Model required time.

Mana had to flow through the Spell Model once before it could transform into all manner of incredible magical effects.

This was called casting time.

And the more powerful a spell was, the larger its Spell Model would be, and the longer it would take for mana to flow through it once.

Gao De spoke with Mage Seda for one reason: to vent the frustration that had been bottled up in his chest for a month.

The other was to buy himself a brief window to cast.

At that moment, Gao De sharply flicked his right hand.

A subtle ripple of energy had already gathered in his hand, solidifying into a ball of acid that glowed with a faint green light.

The acid sphere flew from his hand with the motion of his wrist, leaving behind a slightly warped streak of light as it crossed the short distance between him and Mage Seda and shot toward the mage's face.

Acid Splash+!