It was even still-no, it was clearly superior!
Granted, his strength was slightly inferior, but the boy's sword always held an unbroken chain of exquisite designs. Yang Yan had attacked first, advancing relentlessly, but after ten breaths, he took a step back; after twenty, his feet never advanced again.
After thirty breaths, anyone could see that he was struggling.
This was utterly at odds with everyone's impressions. Yang Yan! The second-ranked contestant, now perhaps the only person who could contend with Shang Huaitong, actually could not beat Pei Ye?!
The atmosphere around the arena tightened again. Everyone watched with rapt attention, feeling that these Top Eight and Top Four matches were truly spectacular, with every contestant constantly overturning their expectations.
But atop the platform, although Yang Yan's expression was taut, there was no sign of panic. Deep in his eyes, he even watched Pei Ye with a measure of anticipation.
In fact, his face was flushed, and he was thoroughly enjoying the fight.
Just as Pei Ye had said, it really would have been a shame to concede a match like this after merely discussing it.
Yang Yan had never seen Pei Ye push his swordsmanship to such extremes in their sparring off the platform. In fact, he had never known that he could withstand such an endlessly rolling tide of sword strikes for so long!
Compared with when he faced Zhang Zongyuan, he had definitely risen another level.
And this time, he felt that he really was going to beat Pei Ye.
This was neither an ugly woman aping a beauty's frown nor smug self-satisfaction. Rather, Pei Ye still did not know that he had comprehended the Whale chapter.
"What you know and he doesn't-that's the trump card that leaves an enemy most helpless." Those were Pei Ye's own