Blue Silver: Myriad Manifestations! Blue Silver: Rashomon!

Mu Jin instinctively found it absurd, but the students fleeing in all directions left him no choice but to believe it.

A plant Martial Soul, a white school uniform, a giant cauldron.

Only first-year students wore white uniforms.

Could that giant cauldron be Xiao Xiao's Three-Life Soul-Suppressing Cauldron? Then the one carrying it had to be—

Tang Qi!

Mu Jin's pupils contracted. Without another thought, he shot forward like an arrow loosed from a bow.

"Teacher Mu Jin's gone. What do we do? Go back to class?"

"No idea. But we should be safe here, right? This is Shrek Academy, after all."

For a moment, most of the students agreed.

What kind of place was Shrek? Surely it could handle one Evil Soul Master.

"Hey, do you think—"

A boy suddenly lowered his voice. "Isn't the vice class monitor's Martial Soul the Blue Silver Emperor? And Xiao Xiao, who's always with him—doesn't she have a huge cauldron for a Martial Soul?

"Could that upperclassman have been talking about the vice class monitor?"

Everyone around him froze and turned to stare.

The boy had only meant to ease the tension. Under so many stares, his hair stood on end, and he waved his hands with an awkward laugh. "Ha, haha. I was just talking nonsense. Don't take it seriously."

Ning Tian stood where she was, her pretty face gradually darkening.

"Feng, something's wrong."

"What's wrong?"

Ning Tian shook her head and bit her lip. In the end, she could no longer suppress her inexplicable unease. "No. I have to go see."

With that, she broke into a jog in the direction Mu Jin had gone.

"Hey! Young Master! Wait for me!" Wu Feng stamped her foot hard, then hurried after her.

As the saying went, marry a chicken, follow the chicken; marry a dog, follow the dog.

As Ning Tian's personal guard, Wu Feng had now also been given the unspoken duties of a bridal attendant.

To put their relationship bluntly, if Ning Tian called her into the bridal chamber on her wedding night to lend a hand, Wu Feng could only go in, blushing, and help.

So even though she was scared to death, she could only grit her teeth and follow.

"The class monitor's gone after them too. What do we do?"

The students looked at one another.

After a moment's hesitation, someone took the first step, and the whole group streamed after them.

Elsewhere, on Shrek's central tree-lined avenue.

Of the ten statues that had once stood there, most had now been destroyed.

Chunks of stone and broken limbs littered the ground. Dust filled the air, and the place was a wreck.

Tang Qi leaped down from the head of the ruined "Flender" and skidded across the ground, leaving two long white streaks beneath his feet.

He looked up at the figure wreathed in Evil Fire above him and grinned. "A naturally wicked Evil Soul Master dares damage Lord Sea God's statue? Unforgivable!"

With a sweep of his hand, boundless Blue Silver Wood shot up from the ground, twisting through the air like snakes to keep Ma Xiaotao occupied.

Just then, Mu Jin arrived in a rush.

He recognized Tang Qi at once. Then he saw the blood-red figure overhead, engulfed in flames, her face contorted, and roared, "Where did this Evil Soul Master come from? You dare sneak into Shrek and bully my students?"

Before he had finished speaking, a giant cauldron spun toward his head.

"Catch!"

Tang Qi's shout followed close behind.

Mu Jin caught it on instinct and looked down. Huo Yutong had already fainted inside, while Xiao Xiao clung desperately to the cauldron's wall, her little face deathly pale and her wide eyes darting about.

If Mu Jin, a teacher of the Shrek Outer Court, got involved, whether he could win was another matter. At least Yan Shaozhe would have grounds to handle Shrek's public relations afterward.

With nothing left to worry about, Tang Qi's fighting spirit surged.

He clapped his hands, and the purple Soul Ring beneath his feet lit up. A suffocating force erupted from his body and swept outward like furious waves crashing against the shore.

Even the out-of-control Ma Xiaotao faltered at its force.

"First Soul Skill: Blue Silver: Myriad Manifestations!"

Tang Qi shouted.

In an instant, countless lengths of Blue Silver Wood grew wildly from beneath his feet, shooting outward and skyward until they blotted out the sun.

His first Soul Skill was an amplification skill. When activated, it increased his Soul Power recovery speed, attack power, effective range, and defense by 150%.

At the same time, he unleashed the Blue Silver Domain in full, doubling those boosts.

The entire tree-lined avenue fell within the Blue Silver Domain.

All the decorative greenery along both sides of the road became spears in his hands.

Countless plants twisted and warped, turned to wood, and surged from the earth like ten thousand giant pythons lunging at Ma Xiaotao.

Meanwhile, Ning Tian, Wu Feng, and the others arrived, panting.

But before they could speak, they looked up and froze, even their breath catching.

Overhead, Blue Silver Wood blotted out the sun, bearing down like black clouds over a city.

Layer upon layer, it closed in on the blood-red figure.

"That... that's the Blue Silver Emperor?" Wu Feng's jaw dropped, her voice rising out of pitch.

Ning Tian did not answer. She stared at the pink-and-blue figure at the center of the battlefield, her beautiful eyes gleaming.

The Evil Fire around Ma Xiaotao burned ever more fiercely. She regarded the Blue Silver Wood entangling her with almost human disdain.

Evil Fire surged, as if it meant to burn every last strand of the troublesome wood to ash.

But boundless Blue Silver Wood wrapped around her in layer after layer. Each time the Evil Fire burned away a centimeter, life force poured in, and two centimeters grew back in the blink of an eye.

The cycle repeated, and the enraged Evil Fire burned hotter still.

Boom—!

Ma Xiaotao erupted.

As though she had activated some kind of amplification Soul Skill, she burned through every strand of Blue Silver Wood binding her.

A clear phoenix cry rang out.

In midair, a pitch-black fire phoenix with a one-meter wingspan materialized from nowhere and dove at Tang Qi.

It was Ma Xiaotao's Phoenix Cloud-Piercing Strike.

Tang Qi's eyes flashed. "Second Soul Skill: Blue Silver: Rashomon!"

As the words left his mouth, countless gnarled lengths of Blue Silver Wood burst from the earth and instantly formed three massive shield-gates before him.

Each gate radiated an oppressive weight.

Boom—!

The Phoenix Cloud-Piercing Strike slammed into the first Rashomon.

The entire avenue shook violently.

The force drove the Class Nine students watching from afar back several steps, their faces flushed with heat.

A moment later, the first Rashomon shattered.

The fire phoenix lost some momentum and struck the second gate, but this time it was stopped.

This was his second Soul Skill. Each Rashomon came with fifteen percent damage reduction and a substantial shield value that increased with his level. He also gained one additional gate for each major rank he advanced.

"A high-level Soul Emperor!" Mu Jin set down the Three-Life Soul-Suppressing Cauldron and murmured as he watched from afar.

Then he looked toward the pink-and-blue figure behind the Rashomon, his expression complicated.

"..."

"..."

"Heh heh heh! Zhou Yi will never beat me in this lifetime! Hahaha!"

The Class Nine students could not help casting strange looks at Mu Jin, who seemed to have lost his mind.