Chapter 35: Instant Kill

“He disappeared? Where did that student vanish to?”

At this time, everyone watching the battle on the ring focused their attention on Li Jiye’s whereabouts. As the first battle of the Grand Four-City Contest, it was naturally the most eye-catching one.

“It’s a Wind Element skill. This student is the qualifying champion of Polar Star Academy. I heard that at the young age of sixteen, his strength is already extraordinary. This skill is Shadow Wind Steps, an extremely useful B-level skill.”

Those who already knew the competitors’ information had already guessed Li Jiye’s move.

But this was a completely different case for Cang Jie, who was stunned by Li Jiye’s Shadow Wind Steps.

“That’s fast…” Frowning, Cang Jie subconsciously summoned his Shadow Element skill to hide himself in the shadows. He reacted in an instant and also summoned Ghostly Footwork. He shuttled across the big ring like a puff of black smoke.

The fusion of the Shadow Element skill and his B-level movement technique Ghostly Footwork was an excellent combination. However, Li Jiye seemed to hold the upper hand by using his best movement technique.

Cang Jie wanted to deal with Li Jiye with his speed.

But Li Jiye didn’t give him a chance to attack.

A few seconds later, the constantly pulsating dark mist in the field suddenly subsided. The audience cast curious and bewildered glances on the ring. In the next second, they realized that Cang Jie and Li Jiye had appeared on the same spot.

“You—you predicted my position?” Cold sweat had already broken out on Cang Jie’s forehead because Li Jiye was pressing his long knife on his neck.

It had only been a little more than ten seconds since the start of the battle.

“I guess you could say that… Don’t forget, I control the Wind Element. As long as you’re moving through the air, you can’t escape from my ‘sight’. Your time is up. You should give up.” Li Jiye sounded very calm, but in actual fact, even he didn’t expect his Tier 2 advanced-level strength to reach such heights.

This must be because of his physical strength that had already reached Tier 3. Relying on his physical body, he could now take the B-level Shadow Wind Steps to the extreme.

“No! I won’t admit defeat! You just hit me while I was caught off guard! If I had been prepared, you wouldn’t have beaten me!”

At this moment, Cang Jie suddenly escaped from the knife in Li Jiye’s hand. His eyes looked extremely determined and unwilling to admit defeat as he drew his dagger out.

“Take this!”

Several spectators frowned upon seeing this situation. Cang Jie’s refusal to admit defeat was simply laughable. If Li Jiye hadn’t held back just now, he would already have been lying down.

However, Cang Jie was too engrossed by the anger in his heart at the moment, so how could he care about this? This was the first battle of the Grand Four-City Contest. Having always thought he was the strongest in North Sea Academy, being defeated in an instant in the first battle was too big an insult for him.

Li Jiye must die under his dagger today!

But in the face of absolute power, any struggle seemed redundant.

Raising his long knife high up in the air, Li Jiye summoned his skills. In the next second, a four-foot knife shone with waves of blue and whistled towards the opponent with the sound of the wind.

It was the B-level martial art, Wave Decapitation!

Cang Jie’s anger had already blinded his wits. Upon seeing Li Jiye’s Wave Decapitation knife heading directly towards him, he didn’t try to evade it and only tried to fight it with his martial art.

However, the Shadow Element wasn’t cut out for attacks. Although his Lightning Dodge was a B-level martial art like Wave Decapitation, it was used for assassination, while the other was used for head-on confrontation.

Cang Jie naturally wound up on the losing end.

He was pushed back by the continuous waves and flew 10 steps back in succession. After barely stopping at the edge of the ring, he spat out a mouthful of blood.

In the fight with martial arts, Li Jiye had won yet again!

It was also an instant kill!

When the referee saw Cang Jie’s flailing legs and heaving chest, he immediately understood that he was almost done for the battle.

“The first battle of the Grand Four-City Contest. Li Jiye from Polar Star Academy wins!” the referee spoke immediately.

After a short silence, the spectators stood up and immediately burst into thunderous applause. Li Jiye’s amazing methods had given the audience a new perspective on Polar Star Academy’s strength.

Li Jiye was in no hurry to get off the ring at this moment. He put his long knife into its sheath and then slowly took a few steps towards Cang Jie.

“Ten seconds. Take care…” Li Jiye then patted Cang Jie’s shoulder. At the same time, a dark light that was invisible to everyone else flashed across his palm.

“Ding! Congratulations on your successful replication of the B-level skill, Shadow Element.”

The next few battles weren’t as exciting as the battle between Li Jiye and Cang Jie. After the first round of battles for the four groups was finished, Li Jiye, the winner of Group D, once again competed, this time with a student from Vegas Academy.

Vegas Academy pursued the Doctrine of the Mean[1] and usually had good relationships with the other academies. Although Li Jiye’s opponents were also Tier 2 martial artists, their speed and strength weren’t on par with his. For the sake of Vegas Academy’s reputation, Li Jiye didn’t finish him off instantly as he did with Cang Jie.

His opponents felt extremely grateful to him for this after each of their defeats.

The first day of the Grand Four-City Contest ended smoothly. The first battles had already separated the top 16 among the Tier 2 students, and the next day’s competition would be a duel between the top 8.

On the way back, Li Jiye felt a little awkward under Jovic and Selmore’s stares.

“Hey! What evil did you two commit? Why do you keep staring at me?”

Besides them, every other Tier 2 student from Polar Star Academy was also looking at him a little strangely.

After a long pause, Selmore finally plucked up the courage. “Big brother. From now on, you’re my big brother! You defeated the top student of North Sea Academy with one move. I suddenly feel like this year, Polar Star Academy has a high chance of winning the Tier 2 competition!”

Upon hearing this, Jovic frowned. “Don’t underestimate our enemies. Li Jiye’s strength might be surprising, but the student named Mike from Mante Academy is also very capable…”

“Oh?”

Li Jiye’s interest was piqued at the sound of this. In his spare time, he had watched the other competitions but had missed Mike’s battles.

[1] Doctrine of the Mean – a Confucian doctrine advocating Self-watchfulness, Leniency, and Sincerity.