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Chu Zhongtian consoled, “I guess Zu An is just lacking in battle experience, so don’t be too harsh on him. His earlier performance is already an unexpected surprise to us.”
Qin Wanru still couldn’t help but remark, “It’s true that I didn’t bear any hopes for him at the start, but I didn’t expect him to have such a formidable movement skill either. If he has such capability, it’s not entirely impossible for him to achieve victory. Yet, he used it just to humiliate Yuan Wendong. He even had the spare effort to play that bee gee em or something. In the time he wasted, Yuan Wendong finally got serious in the duel. How can I possibly not get angry at this?”
In her view, if Zu An had used his movement skill to catch Yuan Wendong off guard and strike his vitals, perhaps, he might have already won by now. Yet, all he did was just to slap the latter twice. While it had indeed undermined the Yuan clan’s prestige, his actions had also riled Yuan Wendong up. Once a fifth rank cultivator got serious, it was impossible to bridge the difference with just a movement skill.
This tournament was of great significance to the Chu clan. If Zu An had admitted defeat right from the start, she wouldn’t have felt so frustrated. Yet, she was shown a ray of hope here before being forced to watch the ray of hope slipping them by. The feeling of being so close yet so far was more than enough to make her go on a frenzy.
Chu Zhongtian sighed deeply and said, “He’s still young. He’ll learn after this incident. Right now, we should be prepared to step in, or else he might just die under Yuan Wendong’s blade.
Chu Huanzhao couldn’t help but speak up, “Father, mother, why do the two of you lack confidence in brother-in-law? I believe that he’ll be able to do it.”
It was then that Hong Xingying finally found the perfect opportunity to make his piece known. “Second miss, every rank of difference represents a huge gap between cultivators. If a fifth rank cultivator could be defeated that easily, Yuan Wendong wouldn’t have been considered as a prodigy and an expert in our Brightmoon City.”
He thought that he was loyal to the Chu clan, but between seeing the Chu clan losing the tournament and Zu An earning the winning point, he would rather see the former happen. He couldn’t stand the idea of Zu An making a name for himself, and to make things worse, he lost the first match too. On top of that, he had even mocked Zu An greatly earlier, putting him down as useless.
In the entire world, there would be no one who could stand such a grave face-slapping.
Chu Huanzhao’s smile stiffened. She might not be fond of cultivating, but how could she possibly not know such basic knowledge? “Hmph! My brother-in-law will definitely be able to do it! Isn’t that right, big sister?”
Her voice sounded less confident, such that she had to turn to her older sister to affirm her belief.
“Maybe,” Chu Chuyan answered casually as she stared intently at the figure on the dueling ring contemplatively.
Currently, on the dueling, Yuan Wendong was surrounded by swords and sabers, and that brought him a huge boost of confidence. “Zu An, I have to admit that your movement skill did surprise me. If you had struck me with all you had right from the start, you might have just stood a chance. However, you didn’t grasp your opportunity well, and this is where it all comes down.”
Now that he had additional reassurance, Yuan Wendong was not that anxious to end the battle anymore. He wanted to play a cat-and-mouse chasing game, hoping to see Zu An’s remorseful and despaired look.
Zu An looked at him in intrigue as he remarked, “I would be going easy on you if I defeat you right away. If I don’t return what you did to Huanzhao earlier on, how can I vent her anger?”
Beneath the dueling ring, Chu Huanzhao was overjoyed. She tugged on her parents’ clothes and said, “See, see! I knew brother-in-law had his own reasons for doing that.”
But Chu Zhongtian and Qin Wanru frowned. They felt that Zu An was taking everything too lightly here. But again, given that he was standing up for their daughter, they weren’t in a position to say anything either.
“Who does he think he is?” Hong Xingying thought that Zu An was going for the second miss too despite already having married the first miss, and it made his envy go out of control. “If he can defeat a fifth rank cultivator, I’ll eat this table over here!”
Chu Huanzhao didn’t even bother reacting to Hong Xingying.
Back to the dueling ring, Yuan Wendong was enraged by what he had just heard. “Hahaha! So, you were going easy on me because you want to exact vengeance for your sister-in-law? Hahaha! This is the funniest joke I have heard in all of these years!”
You have successfully trolled Yuan Wendong for +666 Rage!
“Even a joke of such caliber is already considered as the funniest to you?” remarked Zu An in surprise. “It looks like young master Yuan’s worldly experience is truly shallow.”
“…” Yuan Wendong.
You have successfully trolled Yuan Wendong for +250 Rage!
He really couldn’t understand what was running through Zu An’s mind to be able to joke at a time like this. He was worried that he might just be angered to the point of spurting blood if he were to continue listening to the Zu An’s words, so he got straight to the point. “I can’t be bothered to talk nonsense with you. I’ll show you the prowess of a fifth rank cultivator, as well as the difference between both of us!”
With a wave of his hands, the floating swords and sabers immediately rained down toward Zu An. There was a look of frenzy and hatred in Yuan Wendong’s eyes as he said, “It hurts, doesn’t it? Cry all you want now, for you’re going to die next!”
It was true that Zu An’s movement skill was unexpectedly powerful, being able to catch him off guard. However, the entire dueling ring was filled with swords and sabers right now, allowing Yuan Wendong to launch an omnidirectional attack on Zu An. No matter where Zu An dodged, he would still get struck in the end.
“Brother-in-law, careful!” Shocked, Chu Huanzhao’s body sprung right up, but the pain had her slowly wincing back down onto the stretcher.
Chu Zhongtian and Chu Chuyan also had grave looks on their faces. They were ready to leap in and save Zu An at any time.
Shi Kun, however, frowned at the sight. Isn’t Yuan Wendong hurrying things too much here? It was obvious that Chu Zhongtian would leap in and save Zu An if he were to go this far. If so, they might not be able to hurt Zu An as they had initially planned.
On the dueling ring, Zu An unhurriedly shouted, “Little Pingping~”
Cheng Shouping had been waiting by the side of the dueling ring all this time. He threw a weirdly shaped shield over.
Watching as Zu An planted the shield in front of him, Yuan Wendong sneered. I was still wondering what trump cards you have, but all you have is a shield in front of you? What about your sides and back then?
My ability is to control all metal! I can easily get those flying swords to circumvent your shield to strike you!
However, this was fine as well. With this, the Chu clan would be less inclined to make a move.
With a cold sneer, he diverted his attention amongst the swords and separated them into numerous waves; two to strike from the sides, one to strike from the back, and one to strike from the top.
However, it was then that he noticed Zu An retrieving a piece of metal from the middle of the shield, emptying it out. As a result, the shield took on a U shape.
The hell is that shield?! You’re just making fun of me!
Yuan Wendong thought that Zu An was either fooling around or was reminding the Chu clan to intervene and save him. So, he quickly hastened the speed of his swords.
Ah? What’s going on? Why are my swords not heeding my commands anymore?
Yuan Wendong was shocked. He tried to will the swords and sabers to move, but they were all shuddering in midair as another force attempted to wrestle control over his weapons.
Then, all of a sudden, the swords and sabers all flew in a common direction—toward Zu An’s shield. They stuck tightly toward it, and no matter how Yuan Wendong tried to control them, they wouldn’t move at all.
T-this… How could this be possible?
The crowd was shocked by the turn of events.
Yuan Wendong was horrified. He stared at Zu An, whose head was finally peeking from the shield now, and asked in disbelief, “H-how did you manage to do it?”
Zu An shook his head and sighed deeply. “Milord, the era has changed.”
Ever since he saw Yuan Wendong’s ability to control swords back at the academy, he had been thinking of a way to deal with this move. After all, it wasn’t an easy feat to dodge multiple swords at once, and he didn’t have Pei Mianman’s destructive black flames too.
Besides, even if he could dodge it, he wouldn’t go for it either. Yuan Wendong would be coolly maneuvering the swords against him while he was frantically running around like a rat! He wouldn’t stand for that!
I don’t need my skills to work; I just need them to be cool!
Zu An’s first thought was to use magnets, but the magnetism of natural magnets was too weak. It would be hard for him to outpower the control of a metal element cultivator, or else all metal element cultivators would have been rendered irrelevant by now.
However, it was fortunate that Zu An was standing on the shoulders of a giant. He had inherited the thousands of years of knowledge of mankind, which brought his attention to electromagnets. Electromagnets had the potential to become incredibly powerful, as witnessed by how they were able to raise cars and the sort in industrial usage.
The principles were also quite simple, and it wasn’t hard to put it into practice. All Zu An had to do was to contact one of the runemasters in the Chu clan, and he was able to easily make it out.
What posed a larger problem was the flow of electricity as this world didn’t have generators. But in exchange, there was something else that this world had—lightning element cultivators. Using a special formation, it wasn’t too tough to deposit electricity into something for a short period of time.
Zu An had plenty of money anyway, so he was able to easily get all of these done. The work was quite simple, not requiring much skill at all, so the runemaster was able to complete it easily. In fact, he thought that it was so trivial that he didn’t even bother reporting it to Chu Zhongtian.
He thought that Zu An was simply making a toy to fiddle with. He had no idea what an electromagnet was, as well as the incredible magnetic force field it could create when activated.
It was then that those in the crowd finally recovered from their daze. They tried to take a closer look at the bizarrely shaped shield in Zu An’s shield to figure out what it is.
“Is that a secret weapon the Chu clan came up with?”
“Well, that’s to be expected. The Chu clan has hundreds of years of history in smithing, so how could the Yuan clan possibly compete with them?”
“Chu Zhongtian sure is an old wily fox. He was still acting as if the destruction of the spirit creek would cause the quality of his weapons to fall beneath the Yuan clan, but it looks like he was planning to prove their superiority against the Yuan clan during the Clans Tournament!”
…
Seeing the deep looks Sang Hong and the others directed toward him, Chu Zhongtian was dumbstruck. What’s that in Zu An’s hands? I’ve no idea either!
Back onto the dueling ring, Yuan Wendong really felt like fainting. Everything that had happened today had surpassed his understanding. Looking at the smiling face in front of him, he suddenly felt a chill on his back.
Just how many more trump cards have that fellow prepared to deal with me?!
Sensing the withering of Yuan Wendong’s courage, the patriarchs of the Wu clan and Yuan clan quickly sent him a ki transmission to advise him.
“You fool! That weapon created by the Chu clan might be able to deal with your flying swords, but its bulky size made it impossible to use it in close-quarter combat!”
“Just stop controlling your flying swords and fight with him face-on. Protect yourself with your sword ki. No matter how powerful Zu An’s movement skill is, there’s still a huge disparity between the two of you in terms of strength. He can’t possibly hurt you!”
Having listened to the pointers from the two of them, Yuan Wendong’s fighting spirit swiftly returned to him. Indeed! Zu An might have prepared all sorts of toys here, but the disparity between our cultivation is not something he can bridge that easily. Even if I don’t use my elemental ability, my cultivation itself would be enough to crush him!
Yuan Wendong immediately calmed down after having thought things out. He looked at Zu An and said coldly, “Zu An, your mysterious weapon did catch me off guard. However, that’s the foundation of the Chu clan, not you. Just like I told you the last time, there’s a limit to how far you can go tapping into the strength of others. In the end, what that matters the most is your own strength!”
Having been outdone time and time again on this dueling ring, he was desperate to reverse his crumbling reputation.
He drew a sword from his waist and swung it casually. Its surface was swiftly imbued with a semi-transparent layer of sword ki. This sight amazed the crowd present in the area. As expected of a fifth rank cultivator. His control over sword ki is incredible!
This, in turn, brought credibility to what Yuan Wendong said. It was true that the toy Zu An brought out was eye-catching, but it wasn’t enough to win the battle. Once Yuan Wendong recovered from the initial impact, the battle would still be his to take.