The frost blade lunged toward Qin Qingyu's front.
When those twelve ice blades were still about three zhang away from Qin Qingyu, the hem of the girl's skirt moved as if stirred by no wind.
Then the frost blades trembled slightly in midair and immediately shattered.
Only countless tiny ice crystals remained in the air, slowly drifting down toward the ground.
Hua Mingyang's pupils contracted, the corner of his mouth trembling.
Because Qin Qingyu had not even made a move.
Merely the protective true qi around her body had effortlessly shattered Hua Mingyang's frost blades.
This was an absolute, irreconcilable difference in strength.
From the beginning, Hua Mingyang had known he stood no chance against Qin Qingyu, the widely recognized strongest Martial Spring Realm cultivator of his generation on the Chenping Continent.
But Hua Mingyang did not want to give up just like that.
He did not intend to defeat her, he only wanted to treasure this hard-earned opportunity to duel with Qin Qingyu.
One must understand, even geniuses have gaps between them.
Every move and every form exchanged with Qin Qingyu would surely benefit him greatly.
A vast, icy true qi surged from Hua Mingyang's Martial Spring, freezing the platform completely, and the temperature of the entire Daoyan Arena dropped several degrees in that instant.
He charged forward with quick steps, then leapt, striking the air consecutively; with each step Hua Mingyang took, a transparent ice lotus formed in the air.
Qin Qingyu tilted her head to look at Hua Mingyang as he charged through the air toward her.
Between the veil covering her face and the ice crystals slowly falling through the air, it was impossible to read her expression.
The ice crystals floated down in front of her and paused for a moment before her eyes, which were as deep as an autumn pool at night.
Her eyes seemed to be...
smiling.
Hua Mingyang raised his right hand high, and the numerous ice crystals in the air began pouring toward his palm, quickly coalescing into a pale-blue, semi-transparent long sword.
Around the blade, the shadow of a cold chi coiled, accompanied by dragonlike wails and the sound of glaciers cracking.
"Cold Chi Shatters Jade Technique!"
On the viewing stand where representatives of Wind Ravine Valley sat, an elder from Wind Ravine Valley couldn't help standing up and exclaiming,
"Mingyang actually cultivated this technique while still at Martial Spring Realm, truly..."
The elder meant to say "a prodigious talent," but when he remembered that Mingyang's opponent was Qin Qingyu from Star Heaven Sect, he swallowed those words back down.
Among this generation of disciples, as long as Qin Qingyu was present, no one could be called a prodigious talent!
The cold chi coiling around Hua Mingyang's ice sword kept devouring the ice crystals drifting down from the sky, and eventually the phantom had grown to about ten zhang in size.
If the Frost Blossom Thousand Blades was the widely known strongest technique Hua Mingyang practiced, then the Cold Chi Shatters Jade Technique was his true trump card, a move scarcely known even within Wind Ravine Valley and especially within Bai Shang Ravine.
"Slash!"
At the instant Hua Mingyang swung his sword, the ten-zhang cold chi suddenly collapsed into a speck of ghostly blue cold light.
This displayed the compression of his extreme cold true qi to the utmost; where the sword tip passed, even the air froze into spiderweb-like fissures.
This was the meaning of "shattering jade."
Many Qi Sea Realm cultivators on the viewing stand quietly broke into cold sweats, wondering whether they themselves could walk away unscathed if faced with the Cold Chi Shatters Jade Technique unleashed by a late Martial Spring cultivator.
Elder Zhang Zhuang of Beiyuan Sect was naturally among those Qi Sea Realm cultivators.
Standing beside him, Ye Xiu's expression was very solemn.
Ye Xiu believed that even he would need to avoid the brunt of that Cold Chi Shatters Jade Technique.
Finally, faced with such an overwhelmingly powerful Cold Chi Shatters Jade, Qin Qingyu moved.
She lifted her fair wrist.
The ice crystals floating above the platform suddenly developed moonlike halos in an instant.
Then her fingertip flicked lightly.
Pop!
Pop! Pop!
The ice crystals suspended in the air burst one after another into clouds of cold mist.
Pop! Pop! Pop!
That speck of ghostly blue cold light, which had condensed into a single point and charged toward Qin Qingyu's face, halted midair and began to tremble violently with a dragonlike, mournful cry.
Then the ghostly blue cold light exploded, reverting into a sky full of ice crystals.
Cracks began to crawl up from the tip of the sword Hua Mingyang had formed from the ice crystals.
His complexion turned pale and weak; he forced a wry smile toward Qin Qingyu.
"First Seat Qin, I admit defeat."
"Thank you for the match."
In stark contrast to the weakened Hua Mingyang, Qin Qingyu's breathing did not falter; her voice remained calm.
After all, from start to finish she had only raised her wrist and flicked a finger—just those two motions.
"What was that?"
At that moment, Elder Mo's voice suddenly sounded inside Ye Xiu's mind.
"What technique did Qin Qingyu just use?" Ye Xiu asked Mo in his thoughts.
"Star Heaven Sect's and Moon Void Sect's exclusive heart method, the Taoyin Star-Scales Scripture," Elder Mo answered.
"Its cultivation conditions are extremely harsh. When I wandered across the Chenping Continent, if you count everyone in Star Heaven Sect practicing this heart method, including the Grand Elders, there were only four in total."
"......"
Ye Xiu fell silent.
"To reach Martial Spring and use the Taoyin Star-Scales Scripture to that degree, she truly lives up to the title of the strongest Martial Spring cultivator of her generation. If she grows safely under Star Heaven Sect's protection, achieving Divine Ability or even Dao Union should present no great obstacle."
Elder Mo said,
"Tell me, Ye Xiu, if you came across Qin Qingyu, would you have confidence?"
"Maybe I could win."
"And if you don't use the technique I taught you?" Elder Mo asked again.
"...I'm not her match," Ye Xiu replied frankly.
In front of Elder Mo, there was nothing Ye Xiu kept from saying.
"Platform Seven, Group Thirteen!"
At that moment, the Daoyan Arena announced another pairing.
"Which group are you in?" Elder Mo asked.
"Group Seventeen on Platform Seven."
Ye Xiu answered.
"Mm, good."
Elder Mo said,
"If everything goes smoothly, you'll be called to the platform in about half an hour. After that, among the disciples on Platform Seven will be the Five Great Sects...and Chen Yan."
Ye Xiu's gaze hardened.
He despised the Five Great Sects.
Ye Xiu often wondered why disciples of the Five Great Sects could monopolize the vast majority of cultivation resources, while second-rate sects like Beiyuan Sect were forced to a corner.
You do not really hate that the Five Great Sects' disciples possess so many cultivation resources; you only hate that it is not you who possesses them, and nothing more.
Elder Mo had once said this.
A hypocrite.
That was Elder Mo's verdict of Ye Xiu.