But there were more shocking things to come. When the violet light came into contact with Jiang Chen’s breath, it dissipated on the spot without an explosion.

A fake?

The recognition of what they had just seen was late in coming.

There were two amazing things they’d witnessed: that the Violet Thunderbolt had been a decoy, and that Jiang Chen had seen through and instantly disposed of it with disdain.

It was almost like he’d played a parlor trick.

Was Jiang Chen really not scared of Hu Lei whatsoever?

Everyone knew how strong the Violet Thunderbolt was. It deserved every bit of its fame. The thunderbolt had a mind of its own and a nearly imperceptible trajectory. Just because one dodged the first strike didn’t guarantee safety from the subsequent ones. Before the lightning made contact with its mark, it pursued with a relentless spirit.

Unless a more powerful method was used to destroy the thunderbolt, it would detonate on its intended target without fail.

A robust piece of protective armor might be able to guard against the explosion, but the same wasn’t true for the coursing lightning that the thunderbolt contained.

The Violet Thunderbolt attacked its enemies via two discrete angles.

Hu Lei was even more bewildered than the audience. It didn’t look like Jiang Chen cared at all about his Violet Thunderbolt. Defending against it with a single breath was the most humiliating insult that could be delivered.

He seethed with fury, but calmed down thanks to the gravity of the situation. His prior battle experience told him that reason was necessary if he wanted to win here.

He flicked his fingers continually, sending out a seemingly endless stream of violet.

The entire sky was lit up with luminance. It was impossible to distinguish which was the real one. A meteoric shower of magenta turned the night as bright as day.

“You’re really despicable, Hu Lei!” Gan Ning cursed. “You agreed to only launch one Violet Thunderbolt. What is this??”

Hu Lei sneered. I did only launch one Violet Thunderbolt. The others are totally harmless, just a light show.

The storm of violet darted toward Jiang Chen like a cloud of hornets.

A strange smile curled at the corner of the young man’s mouth. In the next instant, he moved to intercept it.

“Huff, huff, huff, huff...” Jiang Chen blew out countless times, as easily as breathing upon candles. The purple before him dimmed one by one.

But a single light among the crowd refused to halt and headed for his face.

His God’s Eye locked onto it. His right hand opened suddenly, fingers clutching at empty space. Incredibly, the thunderbolt landed happily upon his palm.

Boom!

It exploded in a cloud of dust and smoke.

Hu Lei beamed, then cackled with pleasure. This Jiang Chen had been overconfident after all. It was utterly stupid to try to grasp his Violet Thunderbolt with bare hands!

Even if he wasn’t dead, he would be severely crippled by now.

After a moment, the dust cleared. Jiang Chen stood right where he was, in the same pose he had been in – palm outstretched toward the sky.

A ball of violet electricity danced in the center of his hand, almost like it was cavorting with joy.

Jiang Chen was completely unscathed, right down to the details of his clothes and hair. Though the Violet Thunderbolt had apparently exploded, it had done absolutely nothing to him.

Hu Lei was blindsided by this development. Had his thunderbolt detonated at all?

The disastrous state the surroundings were in told him that, yes, it had.

But then why was Jiang Chen completely alright? Were he and the thunderbolt relatives or what?

Even a gust of wind would have messed up his hair, wouldn’t it?

He felt common sense leave his mind. In fact, he was on the verge of going crazy.

Watching from nearby, Gan Ning felt his heart settle back down. He had looked on with considerable consternation, in fear that something might’ve gone wrong.

He had tried to guess many versions of what would happen, but what had actually transpired hadn’t been one of them.

The expression on Hu Lei’s face was a frozen grin, but he looked like he very much wanted to cry.

The other geniuses who observed from a distance furrowed their brows tightly when they saw the Violet Thunderbolt’s ineffectiveness as well. Some of them were just like Hu Lei: unconvinced that Jiang Chen was worthy of his present fame, desirous of trampling him underfoot.

Seeing Hu Lei’s powerlessness before their goal filled them with self-doubt. Could they really do any better?

“My turn, then?” Jiang Chen’s smile was as smooth and easy as it had been when all this began.

Hu Lei had thought the Eternal genius was just feigning it before to mask his dread, but he believed this no longer. The more he looked at it, the more it seemed to hide the limitless unknown.

𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

He became rather anxious. Given how capable Jiang Chen had been on the defense, if he was just as good on the offense, then...

And this from someone who was usually foreign to fear!

Jiang Chen flipped his hand over, materializing and expanding a great bell.

He couldn’t control his other methods of attack very well. Using excessive force was a real possibility, and Hu Lei might not be able to survive.

If he only used his golden bell to suppress his opponent rather than activating its more powerful attacks, Hu Lei would probably be able to endure.

This was a trial, so killing was out of the question. Even accidentally killing his opponents was against the rules. Such was Jiang Chen’s plan: to restrict Hu Lei’s movements only.

“If you can escape from my golden bell’s influence, then we’ll call it a tie. If you can’t, then you lose.”

Hu Lei was surprised to see Jiang Chen use a great bell rather than a more lethal attack.

This was probably a restrictive treasure of some sort. As long as the attack wasn’t too life-threatening, he was confident he could withstand it.

His tenseness relaxed somewhat.

“Alright. Let’s see what this bell of yours can do.” Hu Lei’s tone had more bark than bite to it.

Jiang Chen nodded, then pushed the bell forward. It hummed loudly, shimmering with aureate light that enveloped where Hu Lei stood.

Hu Lei grinned, leering provocatively toward his opponent. Clearly, he considered Jiang Chen’s use of the bell to be a gross underestimation of what the Polylore genius could do.

“Has it started yet?” Cackling, he made to jump out of the light’s area of effect.