Chapter 47 - Finals

Author's Note: Today's chapter is longer than usual, so comment if you find any errors.

I had thought of several ways to write this fight, but many times I got stuck in some parts. I tried my best and I think it was something more or less readable. Tell me what you think and what I can improve to bring something even better in the future.

Now let's go to the chapter!

======================================================

In the hotel room.

Mo Xie and the others were seated while Wang Yan reviewed his strategies for fighting the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

"Professor Wang, I won't hold back any longer." Mo Xie said.

Wang Yan looked at him and sighed. "I know you think you couldn't have a favorable fight, but you should hide your abilities for a while longer."

"If you release everything in the team fight, our opponents will be able to think of something to restrict you in the individual fights."

"It's impossible for them to restrict me." Mo Xie said haughtily and continued, "My spiritual abilities are a death sentence for any Soul Engineer, as they would need to lock their spirit tools on me to use them, but with my Illusion ability, they will never be able to hit me unless they use a spirit tool that affects a wide area or a spiritual ability that let them see through my Illusions."

"Also, they're likely to use Class 7 Spirit Tools in team fighting. As the Sun Moon Empire is extremely rich, I wouldn't be surprised if they trapped Sister Xiaotao in an Absolute Defense Barrier."

"I have confidence in defeating the Soul Kings on their team, but if Ma Rulong uses a Class 7 Spirit Tool or better, even I don't think I could fight him head-on. That's why I better do everything from the beginning and hurt them badly so there's no problem in the next segments."

"Fine, but you must understand that your safety comes first." Wang Yan sighed and continued: "Everyone can continue with the strategy we have previously agreed upon. Mo Xie will move freely and assist you if necessary."

"It's time. Let's go to Star Luo Plaza." Wang Yan said and took them away.

When they left the room, they met members of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy who were also on their way to the final venue.

Flames of determination could be seen in each of the participants at both academies, but Mo Xie focused his gaze on a girl with black hair and bright eyes that looked like sapphires.

His eyes narrowed, but she just gave him a small smile in return before continuing down the stairs.

Mo Xie tried to see her cultivation level, but his ability failed. This was the second time he had not been able to see the flow of energy from someone similar in age to his own. The first time was with that pale young man with black hair and eyes and now this girl has also managed to hide her energy flow from Mo Xie.

They should use some kind of profound technique to achieve this feat, or it would be impossible for them to hide their cultivations from Mo Xie since only a person with a spiritual power greater than he could escape his eyes.

"Be careful, Mo Xie. If I'm not mistaken, she should be the bearer of the power of destiny you felt at the beginning of the tournament." Xu Ling's voice warned him in his mind.

Mo Xie nodded and before he knew it, he had arrived at Star Luo Plaza. He was relieved that Xuan Zi had already returned and was now sitting in the designated waiting area for Shrek Academy.

After the Star Luo Emperor gave a short speech, both academies climbed onto the platform to the excited screams of the spectators.

On the Shrek Academy side, Mo Xie, Ma Xiaotao, Dai Yueheng, Bei Bei, Xu Sanshi, He Caitou, and Jiang Nannan took the stage while Ma Rulong, Xiao Hongchen, Meng Hongchen, Lin Xi, Chen Fei, Xiao Xia Feng, and Lin Ling represented the formation of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy.

When the referee announced the start of the match, everyone on the platform released their martial souls and spirit tools at the same time.

Mo Xie's team adopted an arrow-shaped formation with Ma Xiaotao, Dai Yueheng, Bei Bei, and Xu Sanshi in the lead. Jiang Nannan and Ling Luochen and He Caitou were behind them in a line while Mo Xie quietly disappeared before everyone's gaze. His Spiritual Detection Sharing was already active.

Ma Rulong's team adopted a triangular formation with Lin Ling in the center.

Suddenly, 4 rings appeared around Lin Ling, two yellow and two purple. Behind her, a golden wheel covered in runes with nine sections formed, releasing strange energy. Her first spirit ring lit up and several pink-gold halos came out of the first section of the golden wheel and fell under Ma Rulong and the others.

Her second ring also lit up and from the second section of the golden wheel, a mist formed and spread across the platform. This fog not only revealed Mo Xie's location, but also the people he hid in his illusion.

"Damn it!" Mo Xie cursed. He never thought his illusion would be so easily dispelled by Lin Ling. This was a slap on his face, but one thing he could confirm, her spiritual abilities were problematic.

Even though he wasn't fully familiar with the power of destiny, Mo Xie could still feel Ma Rulong and the others' luck increasing. This gave them better chances of hitting their attacks and increased their chances of dodging incoming attacks.

Her second ability should be a way to locate someone's destiny in a certain area and expose it. Although he knew there was a lot more to this skill, Mo Xie didn't have time to start thinking.

Ma Xiaotao and the others had already engaged in combat with Ma Rulong and the others, so Mo Xie decided to eliminate Lin Ling first.

However, Xiao Hongchen and Meng Hongchen had already released their martial souls and were protecting her when they noticed Mo Xie approaching at high speed.

With a wave of his hands, several golden orbs appeared around Xiao Hongchen as he continuously lit his spirit rings, manipulating the metals and forming Class 5 Cannons.

Mo Xie released his martial soul and four black rings rose from his feet as purple patterns appeared under his eyes. Ignoring Xiao Hongchen's look of disbelief, Mo Xie activated his second spirit ring only to be restrained by a red thread in form of a chain and discover that his ability failed to hit Xiao Hongchen.

Realizing it was the result of Lin Ling's third ability, he changed tactics.

Mo Xie unsheathed his sword and broke the chains. With him at the center, a gray domain formed, covering 70 meters in all directions of the platform. A powerful sword intent resounded as a Yin-Yang Diagram could be seen in his domain.

With a wave of his hands, several swords formed by the sword intent of fire and ice were launched towards Xiao Hongchen, Meng Hongchen, and Lin Ling.

Feeling the power in each sword, they used their Absolute Defense Barrier. However, these barriers could only be activated for 3 seconds as they are Class 5 Spirit Tools, unlike the Class 7 Absolute Defense Barrier.

At the same time, several explosions took place on the other side of the platform. Ma Xiaotao and Dai Yueheng used their meteor showers respectively to combat the explosive power of their opponents' spirit tools. He Caitou also used an extremely powerful Class 5 energy cannon to deal with a Soul Engineer who was immobile because of his stationary spirit tools.

Bei Bei and Jiang Nannan tried to take out a Soul King only to find out that he managed to dodge their attacks at the last second before retreating and firing with various spirit tools.

Ling Luochen continually created ice barriers only to be destroyed by the weapons used by the other party. If it hadn't been for Xu Sanshi protecting her, she might have already been hit by sixth-class firearms fire.

The most dangerous was Ma Rulong who wielded several class 6 and class 7 spirit tools. He even had a class 7 disintegrator ray on his gear.

Every time his team was in a dangerous moment, they managed to miraculously escape thanks to Lin Ling's abilities.

Although it took a while to describe, it all happened simultaneously.

Mo Xie had already approached his three opponents and with a wave of his hand, the three Absolute Defense Barriers were destroyed by his Life Gold Knife. He was about to attack Lin Ling when the chains of red threads restrained him again and Meng Hongchen attacked him from the side.

With a snort, his sword intent strengthened, shattering the chain and colliding with Meng Hongchen's sword.

"A sword without sword qi or intent is just a toy in a child's hand." Mo Xie said as he continually cut through Meng Hongchen's vital points, sending shivers down her spine.

Each attack was fatal and left her hand trembling. She tried to use her spiritual abilities only to discover to her horror that they didn't work on Mo Xie. Meng Hongchen was a Soul King and her martial soul was the Vermillion Clear Icetoad. This martial soul could create an extremely potent and deadly poison with the elements of ice and fire, but in front of Mo Xie, they were useless.

Not to mention that Mo Xie was already immune to poison, heat, and cold after his body metamorphosis, his martial soul controlled the extreme elements in addition to being of a much superior lineage. This type of poison was disregarded by Mo Xie.

Slightly shifting his center of gravity, Mo Xie used his Blazing Body Freezing Mind Slash. The force of his blow was so great that Meng Hongchen was sent flying towards the platform barrier. If not for her class 6 armor, she could have suffered serious injuries, but her mind suffered more than her body.

Without having to look because of his spiritual detection, Mo Xie disappeared from the place and arrived in front of Xiao Hongchen who was almost finished loading his class 5 cannon.

Through his spiritual detection, Mo Xie realized how Xiao Hongchen controlled the metal element, so a malicious idea popped into his mind.

However, before he could put it into practice, a ray of pink-gold light fell on his head, as well as that of his companions. Because of this light, a great change took place on the battlefield.

Except for Mo Xie, all of his companions were slightly stunned and their combat power also seemed to be reduced. This effect remained active while several red lines formed chains restricting them for a moment.

As a result, Ma Xiaotao was trapped in a seventh-class Absolute Defense Barrier and hit by several sixth-class cannons.

Dai Yueheng also fared no better and was sent flying by the explosion while coughing up blood. Jiang Nannan was seriously injured while saving Bei Bei from an explosion while Xu Sanshi, He Caitou, and Ling Luochen managed to barely defend themselves by being close to each other.

Mo Xie was the least affected by this ray because of his powerful mental power and his third eye defending itself against the power of destiny.

Seeing Ma Xiaotao trapped in a barrier and coughing up blood made his eyes go cold. With a snort, his Basilisk Wings grew on his back and he rose into the air. Looking at Xiao Hongchen with cold eyes, Mo Xie used his spiritual shock.

A high-pitched scream sounded from Xiao Hongchen's mouth as he lost control of his fifth-class cannons, causing them to fall apart.

Originally, Mo Xie didn't want to use his spiritual shock and just use his sword techniques and have fun, but Lin Ling's spiritual abilities were restricting him, preventing him from getting closer with his sword. When Mo Xie saw that she was just a Soul Ancestor, he thought the restriction wouldn't be too strong, but he was terribly wrong.

Mo Xie had a shallow understanding of the power of destiny, but he was forced to realize that a spiritual master focused on this mysterious power was really hard to fight against. If not for his superior mental and physical power, he might have been at the mercy of Lin Ling.

That didn't mean she was stronger, but her abilities could restrict him long enough that he could be besieged by his opponents.

[Author's Note: It's not that the MC was nerfed, but compared to other types of power, the power of destiny is harder to handle. Imagine someone who can constantly change a person's destiny during combat. A person's attacks would never hit unless they could use brute force to overcome the destiny wielder's power.]

With one step, his body disappeared into thin air and a moment later he appeared in front of Xiao Hongchen. Deciding not to play anymore, he slashed with his sword, releasing a powerful sword intent. The sword hit his armor and sent him flying, but even so, the Ultimate Ice penetrated his defenses, freezing Xiao Hongchen's body.

With a wave of his hand, several condensed swords of fire intent struck his body in midair and caused a massive explosion.

A golden light rose, showing that the referee had intervened and saved Xiao Hongchen.

Mo Xie wasted no time, in the next second he had appeared in front of Lin Ling. However, Lin Xi, who arrested Ma Xiaotao in the Absolute Defense Barrier, had come to her side and started shooting several beams of light at Mo Xie.

Without any fear, Mo Xie dodged all the rays only to see a net of lightning coming towards him.

Suddenly, Mo Xie disappeared from his place and came behind Lin Xi. He had teleported with his space power.

"You are annoying." Mo Xie was increasingly irritated. He just wanted to eliminate this girl, but almost everyone on the opposing team was protecting her at the last moment.

Increasing the intensity of his sword intent, an ice blue flame covered his sword blade as a terrible spiritual coercion appeared. With just a simple cut, Lin Xi felt his mind go blank. The sword's intent passed through his body blasting all the defensive spirit tools and cutting him in half. Half of his body was frozen, while the other half was burned to ashes.

Lin Xi's terrible death caused a huge stir among the spectators. The judge didn't even have time to save him as he had already made his move to save Jiang Nannan and Bei Bei who were under a terrible bombardment.

"You didn't have to kill him." Lin Ling spoke in a calm tone as if she didn't care about Lin Xi's death.

Mo Xie didn't mind and continued to attack her, but the referee had already made his move to save her.

Just then, Mo Xie felt a flurry of attacks targeting him. Lin Xi's team members were furious at his death.

With a flutter of wings, he disappeared from the place once more and soared into the sky.

"Time to test something."

Within his domain, hundreds of swords condensed by his sword intent were created and compressed. He combined them and compressed them again until only 30 swords were left.

Only three brilliant colors could be seen on each sword, grey, scarlet red, and ice blue.

Now that Lin Ling had been eliminated, Mo Xie once again used his illusion ability and created even more swords and mixed them up.

There was no way to discern which was real and which wasn't.

Mo Xie also hid his companions in his illusion, giving them breath to recover. At his command, all swords, whether illusory or not, rushed towards Ma Rulong and the others.

They had their minds clouded by their anger, but when they collided with Mo Xie's swords they paled in fear. Each of his defenses gradually broke down until Chen Fei was the first to suffer serious injuries. His body was pierced and cut by many swords after his Absolute Defense Barrier was destroyed.

The sword's intent, condensed with Ultimate Ice and Fire entered his body causing havoc and damage to his internal organs, and was almost dying when the referee saved him.

Just then, Elder Ma's scream sounded. "We gave up on this round!"

The referee then appeared in front of Ma Rulong and Xiao Xia Feng, the only ones left, and defended the rest of Mo Xie's attacks.

After Mo Xie dissipated his domain, he turned a little pale with the consumption of his spiritual power. Compressing hundreds of condensed swords from his sword intent placed a lot of burden on his spiritual power, but the power he gained was even greater than usual.

"Shrek Academy wins the team fight. Both academies begin to prepare for the individual matches." With the referee's announcement, Mo Xie came down from the platform with Ling Luochen, Dai Yueheng, He Caitou, and Ma Xiaotao after releasing her from the Absolute Defense Barrier.

Except for Mo Xie, all received injuries to varying degrees, with Dai Yueheng suffering the worst.

Xu Sanshi had already been knocked out by Dai Yueheng before he got out of hand after seeing Jiang Nannan injured.

On the side of the Sun Moon Imperial Soul Engineering Academy, a dark atmosphere had formed. Of the original seven, one died, two were seriously injured, two sustained some injuries, one passed out while Lin Ling was unharmed thanks to the referee saving her in time.

Although Shrek had also received serious injuries, it would still be difficult to turn around.

The result of this battle dazzled the spectators, leaving them looking forward to the one-on-one matches.