Finals

Ten o'clock in the morning.

Long Hengxu, the grade one dean, announced that today was the final of the grade one Class Promotion Tournament. This year, grade one students were not permitted to challenge higher grades, though no reason was provided for this decision.

However, many understood in their hearts that the reason grade one was barred from challenging upward was precisely because this year's batch was monstrously talented. Class One possessed three two-ring Spirit Masters—and not the type who had just entered the second ring—while Class Five, which had been winning all the way up, also possessed strength that could not be underestimated.

To put it bluntly, this approach was simply to save face for the second and third years, as many of them had yet to even reach the second ring.

Almost everyone in grade one was present for this match.

Tang Wulin and his two teammates were the first to walk onto the arena, followed shortly by the three from Class One.

Offstage, at the very front of the Class One gathering, stood a woman who looked only seventeen or eighteen. She was gorgeous, with a fine figure, dressed in a sexy red dress.

She was Ye Yingluo, the head teacher of Class One.

Many of the senior students knew her. Back when Wu Zhangkong was a teacher for the higher grades, Ye Yingluo had once confessed her feelings to him. Naturally, the outcome was a cold rejection from Wu Zhangkong.

Originally, this wouldn't have been a big deal, as the number of female teachers Wu Zhangkong had rejected was countless. However, Ye Yingluo believed that with so many suitors in the academy, she had lowered her pride to confess to him, only to be rejected so coldly. She felt Wu Zhangkong looked down on her, and she began to harbor a grudge against him.

When she learned that Wu Zhangkong had been demoted to a teacher for the lower grades, she felt she was finally on the same level as him. She began acting pretentiously in the lower-grade teachers' office, even going so far as to smear Wu Zhangkong's reputation.

Yet, Wu Zhangkong still ignored her, focusing only on teaching his class.

"Wu Zhangkong! Today, I will make you see the gap between your students and mine!" Ye Yingluo stood in front of Class One, looking at the eyes-closed Wu Zhangkong across the way, her teeth grinding together.

"Grade one Class Promotion Tournament final, grade one Class Five Tang Wulin, Xie Xie, and Gu Yue versus grade one Class One Wei Xiaofeng, Zhang Yangzi, and Wang Jinxi. Both sides, retreat fifty meters."

Long Hengxu stood in the center of the arena. Once both sides had retreated fifty meters, he said very seriously, "I will emphasize this again: the Class Promotion Tournament is only an internal academy competition. You are classmates, so stop once you have made your point. Maliciously harming the other party is absolutely forbidden. If such a situation occurs, the offender will be expelled."

The three members of both teams nodded in agreement.

"Good! The match begins!" Long Hengxu shouted, walking directly to the very corner of the arena.

Xie Xie, the agility-type Spirit Master from Tang Wulin's team, was the first to move. He gripped his Light Dragon Dagger backhanded, his figure ghostly, his two yellow spirit rings trailing afterimages.

On the other side, Wei Xiaofeng also moved, engaging Xie Xie directly. He was also an agility-type Spirit Master with a spirit power as high as level 23, but because Xie Xie possessed a dual-wielding martial soul, their actual combat power was quite similar.

Wei Xiaofeng's martial soul was a Green Shadow Snake, and even more surprisingly, his spirit soul was also a Green Shadow Snake; the compatibility between his martial soul and spirit soul was infinitely close to one hundred percent.

Wei Xiaofeng's speed was not as fast as Xie Xie's, and he could only barely keep up, but his movements gave people a ghostly, illusory feeling, making his actions unpredictable.

However, Xie Xie was not stupid. Before the match, the three of them had already discussed it: they only had one two-ring Spirit Master on their side, while the opponents had three. If the match dragged on, they would definitely be at a disadvantage.

Therefore, they had planned from the start to concentrate their attacks on one person as soon as the match began.

That person was Zhang Yangzi.

While moving at high speed, Xie Xie made a nearly right-angle turn, dodging Wei Xiaofeng's pursuit and heading straight for Zhang Yangzi.

On the other side, Tang Wulin and Gu Yue had already moved as well.

Gu Yue's first spirit ring lit up instantly. Her Elemental Tide spirit skill allowed her to enhance her control over the six major elements.

The airflow around Zhang Yangzi began to turn chaotic; her wind element control restricted his movements to a certain extent.

On the other side, Tang Wulin kicked off the ground with all his might, the massive burst of power raising his speed to an impressive level. A large amount of Blue Silver Grass appeared around Zhang Yangzi.

Zhang Yangzi hadn't expected them to try and eliminate him right from the start. Seeing the situation turn dire, his spirit rings immediately lit up.

Then, to the shock of everyone present, a pair of black wings sprouted from his back.

Zhang Yangzi was actually a flight-type Spirit Master.

Just as Zhang Yangzi was about to leave the ground, Gu Yue, who was monitoring the battlefield in real-time, had already thought of a solution the moment his wings unfurled.

That's right, it was the same old trick: a patch of swamp appeared beneath Zhang Yangzi's feet, followed by ice element control, instantly freezing the swamp.

"How is this possible? From the start of the match until now, this girl has already displayed control over wind, earth, and ice elements. What kind of martial soul does she have!" Offstage, Ye Yingluo bit her lip, watching Gu Yue's back. She truly couldn't understand why a Spirit Master with such multi-elemental control would appear in Class Five.

On the stage, Zhang Yangzi broke free from the control in just an instant, but it was precisely in that instant that Xie Xie's Light Dragon Slash arrived before his eyes.

Appearing simultaneously were Tang Wulin's Blue Silver Grass Thrust and a pair of iron hammers bound with Blue Silver Grass that seemed to come from nowhere.

Everything was happening so fast; it was a sure-kill situation.

Yet, Ye Yingluo offstage actually smiled. She knew very well that Zhang Yangzi and his teammates were not just a temporarily assembled group. The three of them had entered the East Sea Spirit Master Academy at the same time, and they had come from the same place. Having grown up together since childhood, how could they have no coordination the moment Zhang Yangzi was targeted?

There was only one answer: this was intentional!

"You're going down!" Xie Xie shouted, his Light Dragon Dagger only inches away from Zhang Yangzi.

A trace of a smile appeared on the corner of Zhang Yangzi's mouth.

"Ridiculous!"

Suddenly, a massive black palm appeared in front of Zhang Yangzi. Xie Xie's attack landed on the palm and was blocked directly, failing to cause any actual effect.

As for Tang Wulin's Blue Silver Grass, it went limp the moment it touched the black mist radiating from that palm, and even his Thousand-Refined Sinking Silver Hammer failed to cause any damage when it struck.

"It's Wang Jinxi!"

The first century-old spirit ring beneath Wang Jinxi's feet had long since lit up; this was his spirit skill.

"A darkness-type martial soul!" Xie Xie identified it immediately. His Light Dragon Dagger belonged to the light-type, but it was currently being suppressed by Wang Jinxi's martial soul. Logically, light should suppress darkness, so there was only one answer: the quality of Wang Jinxi's darkness-type martial soul was superior to Xie Xie's Light Dragon Dagger.

"Xie Xie, come back!" Tang Wulin shouted immediately.

Xie Xie tried to turn back, but it was already too late—or rather, the reason Zhang Yangzi had allowed the three of them to attack was precisely to capture Xie Xie.