A Tactical Counter

At the referee's signal, all six contestants summoned their martial souls.

A Thousand-Year Soul Ring appeared on each side of the arena.

This time, Lu Yi finally revealed all his soul rings.

When a second Thousand-Year Soul Ring rose beneath his feet, Zhu Lu and Cui Yajie were briefly startled. But they quickly suppressed their thoughts and refocused on Zhou Sichen.

After observing Zhou Sichen's team in battle, Dai Huabin's team had already settled on a counterstrategy.

Zhou Sichen's team had a bizarre lineup: all three had tool martial souls, and all three fought at range.

Zhou Sichen's book could summon two Beast Spirits, each capable of fighting at the level of a Soul Grandmaster. He was clearly the team's linchpin.

No matter who faced them, he had to be the first target.

But Cao Jinxuan's presence made reaching Zhou Sichen far more difficult.

His reliable control could also create openings for Lu Yi, whose accuracy left much to be desired. And Lu Yi certainly had the power to finish a fight.

They had to admit it was a finely tuned combination.

But that precision also meant a failure at any point could bring the whole formation crashing down.

They had also realized that Zhu Lu's speed was the perfect counter to Lu Yi. Cao Jinxuan, however, could hamper her mobility. That meant Cui Yajie had to break the deadlock with her mental charm. Whoever she charmed, the tide of battle would turn in an instant.

Dai Huabin moved. Rather than charging head-on as expected, he swept in from the flank, straight toward Lu Yi.

Zhu Lu and Cui Yajie approached from the other side, aiming for Cao Jinxuan.

At the same moment, Lu Yi's team adjusted its formation.

Just as Cui Yajie had predicted, Zhou Sichen's two Beast Spirits appeared again. Without hesitation, he sent them charging at Dai Huabin.

Lu Yi and Cao Jinxuan faced Zhu Lu and Cui Yajie together.

An instant later, Dai Huabin collided with the two Beast Spirits.

With his formidable level-thirty-four strength, he could gain a slight edge against either Beast Spirit head-on once he activated the White Tiger Protection Barrier.

But when his third, Thousand-Year Soul Ring lit up, the tremendous boosts from White Tiger Vajra Transformation tipped even a two-on-one fight in his favor.

Zhou Sichen had no time to think. He activated the Three-Aperture Heart Control, which he had yet to master, and controlled both Beast Spirits while darting forward to harass Dai Huabin from time to time. At last, he steadied the situation.

On the other side, Cao Jinxuan's slowing effect had already fallen on Zhu Lu and Cui Yajie. But even slowed, Zhu Lu was terrifyingly fast.

Seeing this, Cao Jinxuan immediately followed up with his second Soul Skill, Time Lock, targeting Zhu Lu.

But just as he activated it, a razor-sharp Fox Tail Needle shot toward him.

Cao Jinxuan had no time to dodge. Lu Yi leaped forward into the needle's path.

"Protego!"

A colorless, invisible shield wrapped around him. The sharp Fox Tail Needle struck it like a polished iron sphere with a metallic clang and bounced away.

[Perfect defensive timing and awareness]

[Protego Lv. 3 (3/4)]

The notification flashed across Lu Yi's panel, and Cao Jinxuan's Time Lock froze Zhu Lu.

Cui Yajie saw Lu Yi block her attack and raise his hand, pointing his martial soul at Zhu Lu. Horror seized her.

The red lightning Lu Yi had unleashed that morning was still vivid in her mind, and Luo Tianba's agonized cries still rang in her ears.

It felt as though Zhu Lu would be the one screaming in pain next. The whole point of attacking alongside her had been to keep Lu Yi from using that Soul Skill.

What Cui Yajie did not know was that the referee had privately banned that so-called red lightning.

Besides, the Disarming Charm would do nothing to the three of them apart from knocking them back. Lu Yi had no reason to cast it on them.

In that hair's-breadth moment, Cui Yajie pushed through the slight sluggishness in her Soul Power and movements. She crossed several steps to block Lu Yi's view of Zhu Lu, and her entire bearing changed.

The urgency of battle vanished. In its place came a bewitching allure, as though Cui Yajie glowed pink from head to toe.

The first Soul Ring beneath her feet lit up. A teasing voice emerged from her luscious lips, and her spring-bright eyes drew Lu Yi's gaze.

"First Soul Skill: Charm."

As the words left her mouth, her normally invisible mental power seemed to become countless pink hearts flying from her eyes toward Lu Yi. Even the air around them seemed filled with an enticing, dreamy haze.

Cui Yajie's Charm activated almost instantly. By the time Lu Yi realized what she intended, their eyes had already met.

He had no choice but to stop the Full Body-Bind Curse gathering in his hand.

Lu Yi instantly realized the charm had affected him and forced his eyes shut.

"Occlumency!"

The images that made his blood surge and tempted him to lose himself in them forever were flushed clean from his mind like water down a toilet.

His mind cleared. Though his eyes remained shut, another scene appeared distinctly before him: a torrent of mental power made of countless hearts hammered against a mental barrier.

Just as the Fox Tail Needle had struck his shield moments earlier, the torrent of hearts scattered against the barrier and swiftly dissolved into the air.

When Lu Yi opened his eyes again, only half a second had passed. But Cui Yajie had already closed in the moment she interrupted his spell.

Then she drove off the ground with her powerful long legs and launched a kick straight at Lu Yi's face.

Her attack was almost upon him. Lu Yi hurriedly raised both arms to block, but the tremendous force drove him back several steps.

Before he could regain his footing, Cui Yajie pressed her assault.

Cui Yajie clearly had not expected Lu Yi to break free of her charm so easily. Astonishment flashed through her, and she put even more force behind her attacks.

The next instant, Cao Jinxuan's Time Lock expired.

Zhu Lu emerged from the darkness, relieved that she had not been attacked while trapped.

It seemed Cui Yajie had successfully tied Lu Yi down, just as planned.

She ignored Cao Jinxuan, whose Soul Skill was still on cooldown, and fixed her sights on Lu Yi as he fought Cui Yajie.

Without hesitation, she activated her first Soul Skill and shot toward Lu Yi like an arrow loosed from the bow.

Cao Jinxuan had anticipated this the moment Lu Yi's spell was interrupted. He had no intention of letting Lu Yi face two opponents alone.

The instant his Soul Skill ended, he sprang into motion.

"Your opponent is me!"

Quick-eyed and quick-handed, Cao Jinxuan cut off Zhu Lu's attack route and engaged her.

But he was a control-type Soul Master whose tool martial soul offered little physical enhancement. His inferior speed soon left him at a disadvantage.

His cultivation was level twenty-four, not much different from Zhu Lu's, but all he could do now was pour more Soul Power into protecting himself and weather her storm of claw strikes.

For a time, the arena fell into the one-on-one matchups Zhou Sichen had feared. This was precisely the situation Dai Huabin's team had wanted.

With his two Beast Spirits and his own harassment, Zhou Sichen could just barely fight Dai Huabin to a standstill. But that was only how it looked.

Controlling two Beast Spirits drained his Soul Power far faster than Dai Huabin's. If they kept going like this, Zhou Sichen would be the one to lose.

Just as the situation began to feel hopeless, he glanced over and saw Lu Yi had put away his martial soul and was fighting Cui Yajie hand-to-hand.

He had never seen Lu Yi fight at close quarters before and had assumed it was his greatest weakness.

Yet Lu Yi was already gaining the upper hand, while Cui Yajie was the one being pressed so hard she could barely breathe.

"What's going on?"