“Willpower doesn’t matter! All that matters is your strength!”

“If just gritting your teeth is enough to ensure victory, then what’s the point of being strong?”

“Focus your attention and then unleash it! The Arcana Race is invincible!”

Astin felt like he was hearing his past voice speak to his current self.

How interesting. Before this, he had only believed in strength and not in the explosive power of potential, but now he was beginning to unleash his hidden potential.

It was exceptionally difficult for Arcana Masters to unleash their potential.

But if successful, the results would be extremely frightening.

Astin gathered all of his power, emanating a threatening aura. Even Su Chen could sense the immense threat gathering before his eyes.

Astin was about to use another Sixth-Ring Arcana Technique.

Astin was a Fifth-Ring Arcana Master. Under normal circumstances, he would only be able to use Fifth-Ring Arcana Techniques. But like how strong people could bypass Origin Energy restrictions, Arcana Masters also possessed their own ways of getting around their limitations. Long ago, during the Arcana Kingdom’s rule, the Arcana Race had developed more than ten methods to overcome these restrictions. This was why Su Chen wasn’t that surprised by the fact that Astin was able to use Sixth-Ring Arcana Techniques.

But because he was jumping tiers, Astin could only really use the Fire Halo. Even though the Fire Halo was a Sixth-Ring Arcana Technique, it was meant to be used against multiple targets, so its general power wasn’t actually that much higher than the Black Wave of Death. Astin had chosen this technique all those years ago because he had believed that he was more likely to be attacked by a group of people than a single assailant.

For the first time since then, he was beginning to regret that decision.

The Flame Halo wasn’t nearly enough to finish off his opponent, but at the very least he knew that Sixth-Ring Arcana Techniques posed a threat to Su Chen.

A powerful single-target Sixth-Ring Arcana Technique could absolutely kill his opponent.

As such, at this moment, he made the decision to cut off his paths of retreat.

A venomous green light interlaced with flowing streaks of black light began to gather in front of him. It was obvious that the Arcana Technique Astin was about to use was extremely poisonous. However, he didn’t stop just there.

At the same time that the deathly green miasma appeared, a translucent figure of a charming woman also appeared. She tilted her head back and began wailing out a high-pitched, sorrowful song.

𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

Her voice was extremely bewitching, and anyone who heard it would want to serve her.

As the technique was activated, Astin’s body began to rapidly decline — this abnormal method of jumping Arcana Technique tiers was rapidly draining his lifeforce.

“Go, Ghost Maiden. Kill that bastard!”

The woman with the bewitching voice giggled charmingly at Su Chen as the dense wave of miasma floated towards him.

“So that’s your ultimate technique? It uses a consciousness technique and poison in tandem to amplify their individual effects. As the consciousness technique erodes the target’s will, the target’s ability to resist the poison will decrease, and the increased damage inflicted by the poison will then make it harder for the opponent to resist the consciousness technique. However, this also means that these two techniques on their own aren’t actually that special; their effectiveness comes from their combined usage...... Oh, I get it! This technique must be the result of synthesizing two Four-Ring Arcana Techniques into one. No wonder you were able to jump tiers to use a skill like this; you already had a foundation set beforehand.”

Su Chen indifferently vocalized his analysis. Not only was he able to defend himself against the Ghost Maiden’s ambush, but he even had the mental capacity to calmly evaluate this Arcana Technique.

“This- how is this possible?” Astin stared at Su Chen in complete shock.

How could he so easily defend himself against the attack of my Ghost Maiden?

Su Chen glanced at Astin somewhat pityingly. “Your intelligence is far below your strength. Did you never investigate what kind of person I am? I am half a foot in the Master Alchemist rank, so how could a measly Fourth-Ring poison affect me? As for the Ghost Maiden’s ambush on my consciousness, did you forget how your other consciousness control Arcana Techniques all failed on me?”

Astin stared at Su Chen, completely tongue-tied.

The Ghost Maiden clawed viciously but had no way of penetrating Su Chen’s consciousness.

The mighty walls that Su Chen had erected around his heart were impossible for her to break.

Six-Ring Arcana Techniques were indeed very powerful, and combining consciousness attacks with poison was more than sufficient to deal with most opponents. Even Li Chongshan wouldn’t have been willing to face such a combination head-on.

However, even the most powerful technique was weak if used against the wrong opponent.

Su Chen was basically completely resistant to any poison-type or consciousness-type Arcana Techniques. If either of these were used against him, they would almost certainly fail.

“So now it’s my turn, right?” Su Chen smiled savagely at his opponent.

Astin’s hair was already completely white.

No matter the end result of the Sixth-Ring Arcana Technique, the cost of using one was quite high.

“Die!” Su Chen yelled as he stabbed out with his blade.

Clang!

The clear, resounding hum of vibrating steel seemed to howl like a dragon breaking through the clouds, and waves of boundless energy rolled off of the blade.

In that instant, Su Chen infused this blade strike with all of his thunder and fire energy as well as his consciousness power.

The end result was a boundless destructive power that threatened to swallow up everything nearby.

How frightening! How could this youth who was only in the Yang Opening Realm unleash an attack that clearly could have only been unleashed by a Light Shaking Realm cultivator?

Astin was stunned, but he had no time to think too deeply on this.

Nearly a hundred years of combat experience helped him almost instinctively put up numerous defensive barriers. At the same time, his figure faded into nothingness.

He was going to retreat.

He wanted to delay for time until the Ferocious Race reinforcements arrived before working with them to kill Su Chen.

Blade light pierced through barrier after barrier like butter. It continued to press on towards Astin, who was floating away like a cloud. This was the Void Transformation Technique, Astin’s specialty. It granted him temporary invincibility, but it also prevented him from attacking. At this point in time, his only goal was to delay for time.

However, the more he delayed, the more he felt like something was wrong.

Why wasn’t the Ferocious Race here yet?

Those guys were too slow, weren’t they?

“You’re wondering why they haven’t arrived yet, right?” Su Chen suddenly said.

Astin’s heart beat madly. He could sense that Su Chen was about to say the last thing he wanted to hear.

Su Chen said, “Laymen wonder about results, while wise men wonder about the process. If I were you, I wouldn’t have only become suspicious at this point in time. Actually, I would have become suspicious as soon as my opponent let me send out a signal..... Why would he have let me do that?”

“You......” Astin stared at Su Chen, a look of confusion on his face.

Su Chen sighed and continued, saying, “Laymen sit waiting for answers to come to them, while wise men actively seek out answers. If I were you, I would have realized that my opponent’s consciousness was far more powerful than my own as soon as I failed to influence his consciousness twice. And people who have powerful consciousnesses often have a few consciousness techniques up their sleeves as well. And there are only so many different kinds of consciousness techniques: either offensive, or controlling. You haven’t been attacked at all, so the only logical conclusion is......”

“Illusion! You put me under an illusion earlier!” Astin yelled loudly as he reached into his clothes.

He pulled out an item.

The signal arrow!

So he had never even sent a signal in the first place. That fire arrow had all been an illusion.

Completely instinctively, Astin tossed the signal arrow into the sky. With a whoosh, a fiery glow lit up the sky.

‘It’s definitely not an illusion this time. I was actually able to send out the signal,’ Astin thought excitedly to himself.

Whoosh!

Blade light whizzed past him.

Astin’s figure trembled. He lowered his head and found that his body had been cleaved in two.

It was impossible for him to throw the fire arrow in the sky while he was still in his intangible form, so he had momentarily returned to his physical body in the instant that he had tossed the arrow into the air.

Even though it had been just a moment of weakness, Su Chen had managed to firmly grasp it.

Bisecting the opponent in a single blade strike.

“You......” Astin stared at Su Chen in disbelief as bloody froth appeared at the corners of his mouth.

Su Chen said expressionlessly, “Laymen follow others’ movements, while wise men control the situation. It’s still the same hypothetical situation; if I had heard my opponent talk to me that much, I would have realized that my opponent was waiting for me to do something.”

“Bayan...... will...... kill you.”

“Quite the opposite. I’ll also toy him to death just like you,” Su Chen replied coolly.

He raised his arm, and the blade descended a final time.