Chu Yao VS Oscar

The commentator's voice still carried the tremor of the previous life-and-death battle.

"Second individual match—Chu Yao of Sky Abyss Academy versus Oscar of Shrek Academy!"

The boiling atmosphere across the arena abruptly turned cold.

A support-type soul master against another support-type soul master.

An astonishingly unanimous thought arose in the minds of ninety percent of the spectators—time for a trip to the latrine.

One made sausages, while the other refined gu poison. Were they going to feed each other onstage and see who got poisoned to death first?

Before the discussions had even died down, Chu Yao had already stepped onto the arena.

The entire venue fell silent.

Her ice-blue gown brushed over the broken stones with a faint rustling sound, like cracking ice.

She walked slowly, yet every step carried an aura that seemed to crush everything beneath it. She neither hurried nor slowed, and she would never make way for anyone.

She stopped at the center of the arena.

The male spectators in the first three rows nearly forgot how to breathe at the same time. Someone in the fourth row dropped a teacup, which rolled across the ground and shattered into pieces.

It was not her beauty that had stunned them.

Rather, a faintly sweet fragrance silently spread outward from the center of the arena.

The scent was not overpowering, but it carried an irresistible warmth, luring people into sinking deeper and falling asleep.

In the seventh row, a middle-aged merchant's eyelids grew as heavy as lead, and his head uncontrollably drooped.

In the fifth row, a female soul master desperately covered her nose and mouth, but a trace of sweetness still slipped through her fingers. Her pupils began to lose focus.

The chief referee's expression changed drastically. He slammed his palm against the bronze pillar beside the stage and roared!

"Activate the Isolation Formation!"

Six barriers of light rose from the ground, enclosing the entire arena within a transparent soul power barrier.

The faint fragrance was completely sealed off.

The spectators in the front rows suddenly snapped awake, their backs already drenched in cold sweat.

The chief referee looked at Chu Yao with deep wariness.

She had not even released her martial soul yet.

This was merely the scent naturally emitted by her physique.

Oscar stepped onto the final stair and abruptly paused.

Inside the Isolation Formation, an extremely thin layer of pale purple mist still clung to the ground, not yet fully dispersed.

He looked once more at the face across from him.

Her ice-blue eyes contained nothing. Beneath her high nose, the natural downward curve of her lips seemed to declare her utter lack of interest in the world.

Oscar's Adam's apple bobbed.

He turned toward the contestants' seats. Tang San was watching him with a calm gaze, while Ma Hongjun beside him raised a fist—good luck!

Oscar steadied himself, turned back, and forced what he considered a dashing smile onto his face.

"Um... can I ask you something before we start? Do you have a boyfriend?"

The entire arena burst into laughter.

Chu Yao's expression did not ripple in the slightest.

"That's your last words?"

The laughter stopped abruptly.

Oscar's smile froze, but he reacted quickly. He clapped his hands together, and his martial soul was released!

"I might not be able to beat you, but I can—stay alive!"

Before his words had even faded, his hands blurred as six golden sausages formed in rapid succession.

He stuffed three Recovery Sausages into his pouch, bit two Speed Sausages directly into his mouth, and tightly gripped the final Detox Sausage in his hand!

"Do you know how my teacher evaluated me? He said I'm the hardest man in Shrek Academy to kill!"

Oscar swallowed the Speed Sausages in one bite. A pale golden glow spread across his body as both legs suddenly exerted force!

His entire body turned into a blurry streak of light, racing at high speed along the edge of the arena!

"If you can't catch me—you can't hit me—my sausages—can keep me going forever—!"

His voice was torn into fragments by the rushing wind.

Chu Yao remained where she stood, unmoving.

She lowered her eyes and looked at her long, fair fingers. Her nails shimmered with a faint purple luster, and she looked somewhat bored.

"Boring."

First Soul Skill: Gu Poison Diffusion.

There was no soul power fluctuation and no dazzling visual effect.

From the cracks between the broken stone slabs beneath her feet, strands of nearly invisible pale purple smoke silently seeped out.

The smoke spread along the ground, so quiet that it seemed to possess no presence at all.

Within three seconds, the entire arena floor had been covered.

Oscar glanced down, but his speed did not decrease.

He broke open the Detox Sausage in his hand and viciously took a large bite. Warm soul power turned into a protective membrane within his body.

"Useless! My Detox Sausage can resist toxins at the ten-thousand-year level!"

His voice was full of confidence. Grandmaster had specifically studied poison-type soul masters, and the formula for his Detox Sausage had undergone three improvements. It was remarkably effective against forty-seven known ten-thousand-year poisons.

Chu Yao tilted her head slightly.

The movement was small, carrying the indifference of someone observing a prey's final struggle.

"Who told you I was using poison?"

When Oscar's right foot touched the ground, he sensed that something was wrong.

The enhancement effect of the Speed Sausage was weakening.

It had not suddenly vanished. Rather, something was corroding it away, causing it to drain bit by bit. His speed declined from its peak, and every step became slightly slower than the last.

"My gu is not poison."

Chu Yao walked slowly through the purple mist. Her long skirt swept past, and the fog automatically parted to form a path for her.

"It is Erosion."

"What it erodes is not your body, but the enhancement effects produced by your soul skills."

Oscar's pupils abruptly constricted.

"Your sausages can last ten minutes?" Chu Yao's voice remained flat and emotionless, as though she were simply stating a fact. "Within the range of the Erosion Gu, five minutes."

Oscar felt as though his feet had been filled with lead. The Speed Sausage's bonus had already dropped by forty percent. He had no time to think and pulled out a second Speed Sausage, stuffing it into his mouth!

"Three minutes."

The enhancement from the second sausage had barely surged up before it began to decay at an accelerated rate.

"One minute."

Oscar was starting to be unable to run.

He panted heavily, creating Recovery Sausages, Speed Sausages, and Detox Sausages one after another, swallowing them one after another.

Crumbs covered the corners of his mouth, his cheeks bulged, and he looked utterly miserable.

Fifteen seconds later, his speed bonus fell to zero.

His sprint turned into a jog, and his jog turned into a brisk walk.

Thirty seconds later, his recovery bonus fell to zero.

The warm protective membrane inside his body completely vanished. Nothing he ate could provide even the slightest bit of soul power anymore.

Forty-five seconds—

Oscar's face suddenly flushed the color of pig liver.

He bent over sharply, bracing both hands against his knees as his entire body began to retch violently.

"Blegh—!"

The sixth sausage he had just eaten not only failed to have any effect, but instead exploded within him with a surge of reversed soul power!

That force wildly battered his meridians, and the pain was ten times worse than the cramps from spoiled food!

The entire venue was silent.

Everyone witnessed a scene they would never forget in their lives: a food-type soul master being devoured by the backlash of his own food.

"The final stage of the Erosion Gu."

Chu Yao walked up to him and stopped. Pale purple mist curled obediently around her feet.

"Your enhancement-type soul skills will reverse into weakening effects."

She lowered her head and looked down at the figure curled into a ball on the ground.

"In other words—the more you eat, the faster you die."

Oscar lay sprawled on the cold broken stone slabs, his stomach churning violently. He used the last of his strength to raise his head, meeting those ice-blue eyes.

His lips trembled.

"You... you devil..."

Chu Yao crouched down.

Her ice-blue skirt spread over the ruined arena as she leaned close to Oscar's ear.

That faintly sweet lilac fragrance washed over him again, now close enough to touch.

The entire arena held its breath.

"Thank you for the compliment."

She stood, turned around, and walked off the stage without looking back.

The chief referee remained silent for a full two seconds before raising his right hand.

"Second match—Chu Yao of Sky Abyss Academy wins."

He paused, then added.

"Time taken—one minute and twelve seconds."

In the contestants' seats, Ning Rongrong felt a chill shoot from her tailbone straight to the top of her head. Her hands and feet went ice-cold.

Her Seven Treasure Glazed Tower was the strongest enhancement-type martial soul on the Douluo Continent.

Speed, strength, defense, soul power—she could stack seven terrifying enhancements onto her teammates.

This was her pride, the foundation of her identity as the heir to the world's number one support sect.

Yet that woman just now, along with her gu—

Specialized in eroding enhancements.

The more enhancements there were, the fiercer the backlash became.

This was not suppression.

This was a complete—fundamental denial of the very rules.

Ning Rongrong tightly clenched the hem of her skirt, her knuckles already turning white.

Tang San took it all in without saying a word.

He raised his head and looked toward the contestants' seats opposite them.

Su Chen was still leaning against his chair, looking relaxed. His gaze happened to pass over the entire arena and lightly meet Tang San's in midair.

Su Chen smiled, then slowly raised three fingers at Tang San.

Tang San understood.

The third match.

Two to zero. Abyss remained in the lead.

And their true trump card had yet to appear.