Gu Yue's Restraint

On the Soul Fighting Platform, Su Chen looked at the grave-faced Gu Yue across from him and released his Martial Soul as well.

Dark golden light gathered in his palm, quickly forming a small pagoda—the Soul Suppressing Pagoda.

Then three purple Soul Rings rose from beneath his feet, slowly revolving around him.

Su Chen wasn't looking down on Gu Yue.

Quite the opposite. He had used only his First Martial Soul so Gu Yue could show the full extent of her strength.

When fighting opponents of a lower rank, Su Chen didn't even need to use his Martial Soul to win with ease.

By using the Soul Suppressing Pagoda, he was showing Gu Yue respect.

"Mm, just as I thought. Three Thousand-Year Soul Rings."

Gu Yue took a deep breath, suppressing her shock. Her gaze grew even more focused.

Su Chen's strength was within her expectations, and she certainly wouldn't lose heart before the fight had even begun.

The next moment, Gu Yue moved.

Her body seemed to become the core of the elements.

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—"

Several scorching fireballs formed in an instant and howled toward Su Chen.

"What? How is she a fire-element Soul Master? She doesn't look like one!"

"That fire attack is so powerful. I'm standing this far away, and my cheeks are burning!"

"That's just your face going red because you're lovesick."

"Damn, you should've said so sooner!"

"..."

"Third Soul Skill: Pagoda Soul Protection."

Facing such a fierce attack, Su Chen didn't dodge. He simply unleashed his Third Soul Skill.

An invisible, transparent barrier rapidly spread outward from the Soul Suppressing Pagoda, enveloping him completely.

"Boom, boom, boom—"

The fireballs slammed into the barrier, and the flames burst open with a series of explosions.

But Su Chen's barrier didn't budge.

"Wind Blade—"

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—"

Next, dozens of sharp Wind Blades formed and tore through the air, flanking Su Chen from the right.

"Wind element? She's a dual-element Soul Master!"

The students burst into another round of cries of astonishment.

But that wasn't the end.

Just as the Wind Blades took shape, a chill swept down from above. One icy spike after another formed, raining down over Su Chen with bone-piercing cold.

"Crack, crack, crack—"

Then,

the hard ground suddenly thrust up several sharp stone spikes without warning, stabbing toward Su Chen's feet.

The entire Soul Fighting Platform seemed to be caught in a raging tide of elements, drawing cries of astonishment from the students watching below.

"Four elements! What kind of monster is this? How can one Soul Master control so many elements? Could she be the legendary wielder of four Martial Souls?"

The students of Class One continued to exclaim, clearly unable to make sense of what they were seeing.

It wasn't just the students—even Wu Zhangkong was dumbfounded.

Everyone knew that most Soul Masters had only one element. Dual-element Soul Masters were extremely rare, and no one had ever seen a triple-element Soul Master, let alone one with four elements.

What was more, some of Gu Yue's elements were mutually repellent. If she failed to control them properly, they could clash and cause her to explode. It was extremely dangerous.

On the Soul Fighting Platform,

facing the overwhelming barrage of elements, Su Chen didn't even shift his feet.

The Wind Blades slashed past with a shrill scraping sound, yet still failed to leave the slightest mark on Su Chen's barrier.

"Swamp!"

Gu Yue used her ability to turn the ground beneath Su Chen into a vast mire.

Unfortunately, Su Chen's "Pagoda Soul Protection" covered him from every direction. The mire couldn't break through his shield.

"Cling, cling, cling, cling—"

At the same time, icy needles fell like rain, shattering against the barrier and dissolving into ice crystals.

The pursuing stone spikes crashed into the barrier as if they had struck the hardest metal. They broke apart piece by piece and crumbled to dust.

Both were Thousand-Year Soul Skills, yet their power was worlds apart.

Su Chen's Soul Power foundation was far deeper than that of anyone at his level. He had tempered it again and again until it was as solid as a physical substance, rivaling that of a Soul Emperor.

Gu Yue's Soul Power cultivation, on the other hand, had mostly been forced upward by her innate power. In both quality and quantity, it was still fundamentally at the Soul Grandmaster level.

Su Chen needed to draw on only about one-thousandth of his Soul Power to easily dispel attacks that had cost Gu Yue one-tenth of hers to unleash.

His barrier stood firm as a rock, without even a ripple.

"You!"

"Is defending all you can do? What kind of skill is that? Are you a turtle?!"

Gu Yue flushed with anger and pointed at Su Chen as she shouted, clearly furious.

She hated this kind of suffocating frustration more than anything.

Especially when reality fell so far short of what she had hoped for.

She had thought that even if she couldn't defeat Su Chen, she could at least force him to use five or six tenths of his strength.

She had never imagined—

that she could give it everything she had and still fail to touch even the hem of his clothes.

Su Chen didn't get angry at her words. Instead, the corner of his mouth lifted into a smile. "All right. Then get ready~"

Before his words had even faded, the Second Soul Ring around him suddenly lit up.

"Second Soul Skill—Soul Lock!"

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—"

In an instant, dozens of illusory chains shot out from every side of the pagoda, weaving together into a giant net that descended over Gu Yue and sealed off every possible route of escape.

"Hmph. A paltry trick."

Gu Yue scoffed, a trace of disdain flashing in her eyes.

The next moment, ripples like waves suddenly spread through the space around her.

Just as several chains were about to touch her, her figure abruptly vanished.

In the next instant, she reappeared about ten meters away.

Spatial Teleportation—one of her proudest life-saving skills.

But Gu Yue's expression was far from relaxed.

Every teleport cost her a great deal.

She had evaded the first wave of chains, but the danger was far from over.

"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—"

Su Chen merely curled his finger as if on a whim.

The Soul Suppressing Pagoda shone even brighter.

This time, it wasn't ten chains or a hundred, but thousands upon thousands.

The densely packed chains surged like a bursting flood, intertwining and wrapping around one another until, in the blink of an eye, they covered every inch of the Soul Fighting Platform.

The entire arena seemed to be swallowed by a thicket of dark golden deathly thorns, leaving no room to dodge or maneuver.

"Impossible! How can you have so much Soul Power?!"

Seeing the chain tide blot out the sky, Gu Yue's pupils contracted.

She felt as if everything she knew had been turned upside down.

To unleash Soul Power Chains on such a scale would, in her estimation, consume enough Soul Power to drain an ordinary Soul King dry in an instant.

And Su Chen was clearly only a three-ring Soul Elder!

How could his Soul Power reserves be so vast?

"Whoosh, whoosh—"

In the moment Gu Yue stood stunned, the chains completely wrapped around her, binding her up like a dumpling. She couldn't move at all, and even her mouth was covered.

"Mmph, mmph, mmph—"

Gu Yue glared at Su Chen angrily.

She strongly suspected that he had done it on purpose.

Who silenced their opponent in the middle of a fight?!

"All right, the battle is over."

Wu Zhangkong waved his hand and announced the result.

Su Chen released the chains as well.

Gu Yue collapsed limply onto the ground, aching all over. It took her a while to recover. When she looked at Su Chen, her gaze was full of resentment.

Wu Zhangkong looked at Gu Yue with admiration in his eyes. "Mm, you did very well, Gu Yue. But I'm curious—what is your Martial Soul? How can you control so many elements?"

"Whew..."

Gu Yue got to her feet and gave Su Chen a long look before turning to Wu Zhangkong and answering, "My Martial Soul is Elementalist. It allows me to control several different elements."

"Oh, I see."

Though Wu Zhangkong had never heard of this Martial Soul before, he understood the gist of it.

Its strength lay in its ability to control and combine various elements. Its Soul Skills could take countless forms.

It had its drawbacks, too: Gu Yue couldn't specialize in any single element. She couldn't attach a Soul Skill to any one element or bring the power of a single element to its fullest.

Still, with proper cultivation, it was very powerful.

"All right. Starting today, you're the vice class monitor of Year One, Class One."

Wu Zhangkong gave a slight nod. Not only had Gu Yue passed the test, he had appointed her vice class monitor on the spot, recognizing both her strength and her talent.

In the distance, Wang Jinxi's face darkened at the news.

He had been the vice class monitor.

Still, he didn't dare say anything.

Gu Yue was a Soul Grandmaster, and she had two Thousand-Year Soul Rings. Only a monster like Su Chen could suppress her.

Judging by the terrifying elemental abilities she had just unleashed, even if they all attacked her together, she would crush them to pulp.

"Thank you, teacher~"

Gu Yue smiled brightly at his words.

She was beginning to think that Wu Zhangkong was a little different from other teachers. He didn't seem to care much for the rules.