Coordinated Counter
The collision unfolded in layers of shattered ice and roaring energy.
Wu Changkong's Heavenly Frost Slash carved through Xu Xiaoyan's ice locks like a hot blade through snow, the crystalline structures bursting into glittering powder that hung frozen in the suddenly frigid air. Yao Xuan watched the girl's determined expression falter for just a moment before she reset her stance, Star Wheel Ice Staff glowing with what daytime power she could muster. 'Her time will come,' he thought, the certainty bone-deep. The system's knowledge included more than formulas—it held glimpses of potentials waiting to be unlocked.
Next came Tang Wulin's Blue Silver Grass barrier. The transformed vines, thicker and more resilient than ordinary plants, wove a living wall that strained against the freezing energy. For a heartbeat, they held, the golden dragon bloodline within them resisting the absolute cold. Then frost patterns spiderwebbed across their surfaces, and they shattered with sounds like breaking glass. Tang Wulin grunted, the feedback through his martial soul making him stagger back a step before Xu Xiaoyan's steadying hand on his shoulder anchored him.
Then Gu Yue's defenses.
Yao Xuan watched with something akin to awe as the rock walls she'd conjured didn't just stand passively. They shifted, angled themselves, each positioned not to stop the slash but to redirect its force, to make it work for every inch of progress. Her elemental control had reached a level where she wasn't just commanding nature—she was conversing with it, understanding its rhythms and using them.
The Heavenly Frost Slash cut through the first wall, then the second, but each conquest cost it momentum. By the tenth, its brilliant blue had dulled. By the twentieth, its forward push had noticeably slowed. When it emerged from the final barrier—over thirty walls later—it carried only seventy percent of its original power, its edge blurred, its cold less absolute.
Yet even diminished, it remained terrifying. The energy radiating from it still held the signature of a Soul Saint's full-force technique.
Yao Xuan met it with his spear and his will.
The Great Desolate Heaven-Destroying Spear's first form—Mountains and Rivers Shatter—wasn't just an attack; it was a statement. As he thrust, the illusions around him weren't mere visual effects. They were echoes of the technique's conceptual weight: the impermanence of mountains, the shifting of rivers, the endless cycle of creation and destruction that the ancestral dragon embodied.
Spear tip met slash center.
For three heartbeats, they held in equilibrium—gold and blue swirling in a vortex of conflicting energies. The arena floor beneath them groaned, the reinforced metal deforming under forces it was designed to withstand but rarely tested against.
Then Yao Xuan felt Gu Yue's support not as external aid, but as an extension of his own will. The wind she guided wrapped around him, not pushing but aligning, making his stance more stable, his spear arm truer. The residual heat from her fireballs, though deflected by Wu Changkong, had warmed the air just enough to keep the worst of the cold from seizing his muscles.
He pushed.
The Heavenly Frost Slash fractured into streams of harmless cold mist that dissipated against his scales. The remaining force—a mere five percent—he dismissed with a twist of his spear, scattering it into nothingness.
Silence held for a moment, broken only by the crackle of dying energy and the heavy breathing of the combatants.
Then, from the sidelines, whispers grew into murmurs of disbelief and admiration. Yao Xuan didn't need to hear the words to feel the shift in perception. This wasn't just blocking an attack; it was dissecting it, understanding its components, and countering with precision that spoke of deeper coordination than simple teamwork.
Wu Changkong observed all this, his expression unreadable but his eyes holding that particular intensity that meant he was fully engaged. As Gu Yue's remaining fireballs arced toward him, he didn't dismiss them with contempt but with efficiency—a flick of Frost Whisper, a conjured ice shield that absorbed the impacts with practiced ease.
But the distraction had served its purpose.
Xie Xie chose that moment to strike, his clones materializing from the interplay of light and shadow created by the elemental displays. The light dragon clone came high, the shadow dragon clone low, angles calculated to force impossible choices.
Wu Changkong's response was teaching in motion. Rather than directly countering, he activated his second soul skill. "Frost Mist."
The temperature in a twenty-meter radius around him plummeted so sharply that the air itself seemed to crystallize. Xie Xie's clones, formed of soul power and intent, wavered, their edges blurring as the extreme cold disrupted their cohesion. The real Xie Xie, positioned for a follow-up strike, hissed as the cold penetrated even his agility-enhanced defenses, forcing him to retreat.
Wu Changkong didn't press the advantage. He stood at the center of his frozen domain, Frost Whisper held loosely but ready. "You understand the principle," he said, his voice carrying clearly. "But execution requires adapting to the opponent's adaptations."
He looked at Yao Xuan, then Gu Yue. "You countered my slash not with greater power, but with greater understanding. That is the Shrek way." His gaze swept over the panting team. "Now show me you can sustain that understanding under continuous pressure."
It wasn't a request.
Yao Xuan felt Gu Yue's hand brush his back briefly—not for support, but for synchronization. They shared a glance, and in that moment, no words were needed. They'd prepared for this. Trained for this.
Around them, their teammates reset formations. Tang Wulin's Blue Silver Grass spread across the floor again, not as barrier but as sensor network. Xu Xiaoyan positioned herself behind him, her ice affinity now working in counterpoint to Wu Changkong's frost rather than against it—using the existing cold to enhance her own control. Xie Xie vanished into the periphery, not to attack but to observe, to find patterns.
The real lesson was beginning.
And as Yao Xuan raised his spear, the ancestral dragon power within him humming in harmony with Gu Yue's silver dragon essence, he understood this wasn't just about passing an assessment. It was about proving that their bond—forged in trust, tempered in shared struggle—could become something greater than the sum of its parts.
The frost mist thickened around Wu Changkong. The arena waited.
And Yao Xuan smiled, not in triumph, but in anticipation of the challenge.