Volume 2: Shenzhou Academy & The Battle of Venice
Chapter 187
Battle of the Century at the Shenzhou Arena
The thousand-year ancient bell atop the Heavenly Demon Tower fell silent, yet its nine deep, resonant chimes still reverberated through the rolling sea of clouds enveloping the Shenzhou Magic Academy.
Atop the Floating Island suspended three thousand meters above the ground, the Heavenly Demon Arena stood majestically like an ancient Roman colosseum forged from monolithic basalt stone. The fierce northern wind whipped across rows of colossal stone pillars, carrying dust and the heavy, charged scent of an epoch-making clash.
All fifty thousand seats across the tiered semicircular stands were packed to absolute capacity. From every student of the seven major departments—Fire, Lightning, Ice, Wind, Earth, Shadow, and Summoning—to thousands of senior lecturers and elite mages, everyone had assembled. The roaring cheers of the human sea surged like tidal waves crashing against a rocky shore, making the entire island suspended in mid-air seem to tremble slightly with each collective heartbeat of the crowd.
This was the battle that would decide the new sovereign of the Shenzhou Magic Academy—an encounter eagerly anticipated for a whole decade!
In the VIP honor gallery on the highest tier, the atmosphere was suffocatingly solemn. The academy’s most powerful heavyweights were already seated. Dean Xiao Yan of the Fire Department, with his grey-flecked hair and deep crimson cloak, sat at the center; beside him were Dean Lei Yan of the Lightning Department, Dean Han Shuang of the Ice Department, and senior elders of the academy council.
Not far away, a high-ranking military delegation representing the Eastern Theater Command—led personally by Lieutenant General Lu Haojun and Major Chen Tao—gathered solemnly in crisp uniforms, their hawk-like eyes gazing down into the arena. Even elder representatives from the supreme noble families of the Magic Capital, such as the Ye, Zhao, and Bai clans, were fully present. The fierce clash between Ye Lingtian—who had reigned supreme over the Battle Rankings for the past three years—and Lin Feng, the dark horse who had achieved monumental merits at Heavenly Harbor Island, carried enough weight to reshape the young power hierarchy of the entire East for years to come.
In the elite competitor seating rows, Ye Qingwan sat straight in a pale-blue snow-silk evening gown. Her slender hands were tightly intertwined, her knuckles pressed white. On one side was her own flesh and blood, an undefeated icon since childhood; on the other was the young man who had shared life and death with her, shattering countless dangerous cultist dens. She bit her lower lip slightly, her chest rising and falling with turbulent anxieties.
Beside her, Gu Xiaowei leaned close and whispered, “Big Sister Qingwan, don’t be too tense. Big Brother Lin Feng has never fought a battle without absolute confidence!”
Xie Zhaoyuan clutched his heavy shield tightly before his knees, shaking his head with a deep voice, “Xiaowei, don’t be too optimistic. This time, our opponent is Ye Lingtian. He has reigned at the peak of the academy for three years not by luck. The magic he commands is the Space Element—a rule-based ability far beyond the comprehension of ordinary elemental magic.”
A few steps away, Han Yue crossed her arms, her ice-blue eyes as clear as winter lake water locked tightly onto the two figures below the stage. Once a defeated opponent under Lin Feng’s hands, she understood the unfathomably terrifying depth of Ye Lingtian better than anyone else.
In the center of the granite arena, spanning hundreds of zhang, Dean Xiao Yan slowly stepped out into the open. His aged yet vigorous figure radiated the majestic pressure of a peak Archmage.
He raised his hand slightly, his voice resounding like thunder straight into the minds of all fifty thousand spectators:
“Today, at the Heavenly Demon Arena, we witness the pinnacle duel between Battle Rankings Number One Ye Lingtian and Number Two Lin Feng! I shall personally serve as the supreme referee for this match. To ensure absolute safety for all honored guests, spatial containment barriers and Super-tier magic will be operated at full capacity!”
With that, Dean Xiao Yan and the four deans in the stands simultaneously raised their hands!
RUMBLE ——!
The nine ancient monolithic pillars surrounding the arena simultaneously blazed with light. Colossal beams of elemental light shot into the azure sky, intertwining with the Chaos and Spatial mana manipulated by the Archmages, forming a transparent barrier screen up to three zhang thick that completely isolated the arena from the outside world. The quasi-Super-tier defensive magic, “Four Directions Chaos Realm,” was officially activated!
“Match rules: The use of Super-tier life-saving magical artifacts from families is prohibited, forbidden drugs that damage vital energy are prohibited, and victory must be determined by one’s own strength! Going all out is permitted!”
Xiao Yan retreated to the edge of the arena, waving his fiery-red robe sleeves sharply: “Both competitors... Prepare!”
In the vast expanse of the arena, the two figures stood facing each other thirty paces apart.
Ye Lingtian stood with one hand behind his back. He wore a deep-blue cloak embroidered with ornate golden lightning dragons belonging to the Ye clan, his long silver hair fluttering gently in the chilling wind. His sharp, jade-carved handsome face bore the silent arrogance of an absolute monarch. Wherever his footsteps fell, the space there seemed to ripple and distort. He stood there, as calm and profound as the boundless cosmos, revealing not a shred of murderous intent yet exuding a pressure that made his opponent feel as small as a grain of sand between heaven and earth.
Opposite him, Lin Feng stood upright like a spear thrust straight into mountain rock. He wore a sleek black combat uniform trimmed with gold, his tall, athletic frame brimming with explosive vitality. After three days of recuperation, absorbing the essence of the Spirit Grass and the cleansing energy of the Archaic Dragon Talisman, his spirit and physical vigor had reached their absolute peak.
If Ye Lingtian was the silent cosmos, then Lin Feng was a divine sword just unsheathed, its razor-sharp edge fully exposed!
The bloody, slaughtering aura tempered through hundreds of life-or-death battles along the coast, severing the heads of Commander-class behemoths and wiping out the cultists of Heavenly Harbor Island, now rolled around his body like an invisible vortex. Lin Feng’s pitch-black eyes were as sharp as a stalking hawk, showing not the slightest hint of fear before his opponent’s three-year undefeated reputation.
Their eyes locked across the empty space. The air pressure between them plummeted instantly, crushing the surrounding floating dust into fine powder.
“Lin Feng, you are the first person in three years to make the blood in my body heat up.” Ye Lingtian spoke, his voice deep and warm yet resonant: “The Heavenly Harbor Island campaign proved that you deserve to stand here. Do not hold back; unleash your full strength!”
“Senior Ye, your throne at the peak of Shenzhou has been occupied for far too long.” The corners of Lin Feng’s mouth curled into an arrogant smile: “Today, I am here to change that!”
Dean Xiao Yan looked at the two, his gaze condensing as he decisively swung his hand down through the void!
“THE MATCH... BEGINS!!”
SWISH-ZZZ ——!
The magical whistle shrieked piercingly, tearing open the thick atmosphere!
The very first instant the sound touched their eardrums, the battle erupted without any probing maneuvers!
BANG!
The granite floor beneath Ye Lingtian’s feet shook violently!
There was no waving of hands or ordinary Star Path tracing!
There was no sparkling light of Stars or Star Constellations familiar to elemental mages!
That was the sheer terror of Dimension Magic—the Space Element! Spatial magic took powerful mental will as its core. The moment a thought arose, the magic instantly took shape in the void, completely bypassing the startup time of Star Paths!
Ye Lingtian’s eyes suddenly flared with a brilliant blue-silver halo. He simply raised his right hand, spreading his five fingers straight toward Lin Feng, his thin lips coldly uttering two words:
“Gravity!”
BOOM ——!
An invisible, heaven-shaking pressure resembling a ten-thousand-zhang Mount Tai suddenly descended straight down upon the top of Lin Feng’s head!
CREAK! CRACK! SNAP!
The high-strength magical granite floor beneath Lin Feng’s feet instantly emitted horrifying, groaning screeches. In the blink of an eye, the stone surface depressed over a yard deep, thousands of spiderweb-like cracks expanding wildly in all directions as stone dust blasted into the sky!
The gravitational pressure within a radius of ten zhang around Lin Feng was abnormally warped, skyrocketing to five times, then eight times normal! The surrounding air was compressed so tightly it produced sharp, crackling explosions. Lin Feng’s entire body weight, the blood flowing through his meridians, and even every muscle fiber seemed to be dragged down to the earth by a giant invisible hand, wanting to snap his knees and force him to his knees!
“The Spatial Element’s Gravity Suppression!”
“Instant casting! No time needed to trace Star Paths!”
Across the stands, thousands of students cried out in terror. They had never witnessed magic so insidious and overwhelming firsthand. There was no fire, no lightning, yet it could crush sturdy arena flooring in the blink of an eye!
Yet, right at the epicenter of the thousand-jin gravity storm, Lin Feng did not buckle!
CRACK-SNAP!
Lin Feng’s entire skeletal frame emitted crisp frictional sounds. His physique had already been tempered by the ancient dragon blood from the Archaic Dragon Talisman, and further refined through countless iterations of pushing Tyrannical Dragon Might beyond bodily limits. Under the overwhelming pressure, his legs were like iron piles driven deep into the cracked stone, his spine remaining as straight as a steel spear!
“Not bad!” A flash of astonishment rippled through Ye Lingtian’s eyes, but his right hand immediately slashed horizontally across the void: “Then how about this?”
WHOOSH-WHOOSH ——!
The space in front of Ye Lingtian suddenly split into three transparent fissure tracks. The vacuum ripples, thin as cicada wings and sharp enough to bend sunlight, frantically coalesced into three half-moon blade arcs more than two zhang long!
“Spatial Blade!”
SWISH ——!
The transparent vacuum blades tore through the air, emitting hair-raising, piercing shrieks! They charged forward at terrifying speed, far surpassing ordinary wind blades or fireballs, slashing straight at Lin Feng from upper, middle, and lower trajectories!
Because it was pure Spatial magic, these blades were entirely transparent and colorless. The fifty thousand spectators in the stands could only see the layer of air being cleaved apart, creating vague, hurtling wave traces! Before the blades even arrived, the razor-sharp pressure had already severed several strands of hair fluttering before Lin Feng’s forehead.
An invisible slash capable of slicing magical armor into tiny fragments!
“Lin Feng, dodge!!” Ye Qingwan in the stands couldn’t help crying out in alarm.
Yet, the exact moment the three Spatial Blades were less than half a foot from Lin Feng’s chest, a dense dark mana suddenly erupted from beneath his heels!
The space surrounding Lin Feng’s body instantly darkened as if ink had been poured over it.
“Intermediate Shadow Element...”
Lin Feng’s low voice echoed through the silent darkness:
“Shadow Escape —— PHANTOM ILLUSION!”
SWISH!
The three Spatial Blade arcs sheared straight through Lin Feng’s body without the slightest obstruction!
BANG! BANG! BANG!
The stone floor behind Lin Feng was cleaved in two by the three strikes, creating three deep, yawning fissures more than twenty zhang long, with cuts as smooth and flat as a mirror, plunging so deep their bottoms couldn’t be seen! Stone dust billowed thickly!
“Did it hit?!”
Shocked shouts echoed from all directions.
Yet the body of Lin Feng that had just been slashed through did not drop a single drop of blood. It quivered slightly before dissolving into a wisp of dim, shadowy smoke in mid-air!
It was merely an afterimage!
“What?!” Ye Lingtian’s pupils contracted.
WHOOSH! WHOOSH! WHOOSH!
Immediately afterward, a breath-taking, wondrous spectacle erupted across the entire Heavenly Demon Arena!
From the dark shadow spreading across the cracked ground, not one, but dozens of identical dark figures rose simultaneously!
One... five... ten... twelve figures of Lin Feng!
Every single figure carried identical, razor-sharp murderous intent, their movement fluid like ghostly phantoms, gliding across the ground at extreme speed. The twelve afterimages scattered in twelve directions, weaving tangled black trails across the granite floor to form an illusionary matrix that tightly surrounded Ye Lingtian at the center!
Extreme speed combat style!
The Shadow Element combined with agile footwork had completely neutralized the Spatial Element’s Gravity Suppression! Because Ye Lingtian could not determine which was the true body to lock his mental will onto!
“Illusions?”
Ye Lingtian let out a cold laugh, waving both hands simultaneously. The blue light in his eyes blazed brilliantly, Spatial mental will erupting frantically:
“Then shatter all of them for me!”
SWISH! SWISH! SWISH! SWISH!
The Spatial Blades no longer fired individually. Within a radius of thirty zhang around Ye Lingtian, dozens and hundreds of transparent vacuum blades shot out like a storm!
The air was torn to shreds into tiny fragments! Piercing wind shrieks sounded incessantly like the roars of an invisible pack of monsters. Large swaths of granite flooring were plowed to pieces, flying rocks crashing against the Chaos barrier to create flickering five-colored ripples!
SMACK! SMACK! SMACK!
Each of Lin Feng’s dark afterimages was slashed into scattered wisps of black smoke by the Spatial Blades. Ye Lingtian’s casting speed was fast enough to suffocate anyone watching. Without needing to accumulate magic, without spell cooldowns, wave after wave of spatial wind blades swept the earth like a giant crushing machine!
Yet, twelve afterimages were destroyed, and another twelve were born from the shadows!
Lin Feng was like a true phantom dancing amidst the Grimscythe’s blade. He flicked in and out, weaving through impossibly narrow gaps between the vacuum blades, step by step closing the distance to Ye Lingtian!
Thirty zhang... twenty zhang... fifteen zhang!
The distance grew closer and closer!
“Such monstrous speed! Can an elemental mage really evade spatial attacks at such close range?!” In the VIP stands, Dean Lei Yan of the Lightning Department couldn’t help slamming his hand onto the armrest, his eyes widening in astonishment.
Spatial force was inherently invisible and blindingly fast. Ordinary people would find their heads severed the moment they saw the air ripple. But Lin Feng didn’t just use his eyes to see. He used his life-or-death intuition tempered among coastal behemoths to sense the tiniest fluctuations in the atmosphere, dodging attacks before they even took physical shape!
And the exact moment Ye Lingtian unleashed his fourth wave of Spatial Blades, the defensive blind spot behind his back was exposed for a tenth of a second!
WHOOSH!
A dark shadow rose from the ground behind Ye Lingtian’s back with wind-tearing speed!
This time, it was no afterimage!
Lin Feng’s true body descended!
The air surrounding Lin Feng suddenly surged with thousands of degrees of scorching heat. On his right arm, muscles bulged, crimson Scarlet Flame Flowing Fire roaring and blazing fiercely, intertwining with crackling purplish-black Yaksha Divine Lightning bolts swirling wildly around his fist!
Lightning and Fire dual-element fusion!
Tyrannical Dragon Might ready to fire!
“Senior, my turn!”
Lin Feng roared in a deep, resonant voice, his fist carrying power capable of smashing an aggressive Commander-class behemoth directly slamming toward the back of Ye Lingtian’s neck!
The fist frantically broke the sound barrier, producing a deafening explosion!
Fifty thousand spectators simultaneously sprang up in breathless shock! Could the three-year undefeated wall of Shenzhou Academy be shattered by a freshman’s single punch right in the opening round?!
Yet, the exact moment the blazing, thunderous fist was a mere inch from the back of Ye Lingtian’s neck, the corners of the dark-blue-robed young man’s mouth curled into a profound smile.
Ye Lingtian did not turn his head, but his left hand, hidden within his wide sleeve, reversed slightly.
“Did you really think I hadn’t seen through your true body?”
BOOM ——!
A bizarre and terrifying spatial fluctuation never seen before suddenly erupted from behind Ye Lingtian, completely distorting the space surrounding Lin Feng’s fist...