Just as Wu Zhangkong fully protected himself, an invisible wave surged into his mind, making him lapse into a brief daze — it was Nan Fusheng, who had quietly transferred himself into the mist at some unknown moment, finally making his move.
Clang! Tang Wulin's Golden Dragon Claw tore into the web of sword threads, instantly shattering a large swath of them. Although the claw strike broke through the front layer of icy threads, the backlash shook him badly, forcing him to take a step back.
And in that single step, his offensive momentum was broken.
Nan Fusheng's control skill had been timed for the most critical instant — but no one had expected Wu Zhangkong to suddenly take a purely defensive stance. And his defense was timed perfectly.
Wu Zhangkong's eyes gleamed coldly as the icy mist reformed around his body. Even with his cultivation suppressed to the two-ring level, it was still far stronger than any ordinary two-ring opponent, because it was a compressed two-ring power, backed by soul power mastery worlds apart from theirs.
Even under Nan Fusheng's control, he would only be restrained for at most two or three seconds. After all, his spiritual power had not been suppressed — only his sensory range.
Two or three seconds of Frost Scar was more than enough for him. The Skyfrost Sword flicked upward again, this time aiming straight for Nan Fusheng.
Since you dared to teleport in here, I'll take you out first! — That was Wu Zhangkong's thought.
Among the five, Nan Fusheng was the most troublesome. His intermittent control skills always seemed to hit at the key moment. And after his second ring, gaining spatial abilities made him even harder to deal with — like a slippery loach, even more of a nuisance than Gu Yue. At least Gu Yue's teleportation had a cooldown.
As the Skyfrost Sword was about to strike Nan Fusheng, Wu Zhangkong suddenly caught sight of the boy's smile — and in that instant, his instincts screamed something's wrong. Frost Scar flared again as he tried to reestablish his defenses.
But this time… he was too late.
Beneath his feet, a golden six-pointed star inscribed with glowing runes appeared, light spiraling upward around his body and transforming into chains of ice that locked him in place.
Xu Xiaoyan? Wasn't she outside the frost mist? Wu Zhangkong's mind raced. Even with his perception suppressed to the two-ring level, there was no way he shouldn't have noticed Xu Xiaoyan slipping inside the mist. And these chains…?
At that moment, a soft hand pressed silently against his back. In the next instant, a violent elemental storm erupted — the frigid bite of ice fused with the scorching blaze of fire.
Wu Zhangkong's body naturally formed a layer of frost armor, but even so, the explosion made him stagger a step. A burst of unrestrained soul power surged from him, sweeping all five of the youths back.
His normally cold, expressionless face now looked… a little grim.
"Victory!" Xu Xiaoyan was the first to cheer.
Yes — they had won.
At the very last moment, Wu Zhangkong had unleashed soul power far beyond the two-ring level just to turn the tide.
Retracting the Skyfrost Sword, Wu Zhangkong — being who he was — would never deny defeat. He asked calmly, "Who planned this?"
Nan Fusheng chuckled. "Teacher, that would be me."
"This spatial swap — it's yours as well?" Wu Zhangkong asked. When Xu Xiaoyan's chains had bound him, he had already noticed that Tang Wulin's position had suddenly switched with Xu Xiaoyan's, while Tang Wulin himself was now standing where she had been. It was a space-exchange ability.
"Yes," Nan Fusheng replied.
Wu Zhangkong nodded. "Good. Tomorrow, we'll continue — but I'll raise my cultivation to the four-ring level, and use four soul skills." Without another word, he turned and left, white robes fluttering, still as icy as ever.
From that last fight, he could tell — Class Zero's five students still had plenty left in reserve. With Nan Fusheng's control and Xu Xiaoyan's Starwheel Ice Staff, there was no practical value in continuing at only the three-ring level.
The five, who had been bubbling with excitement moments ago, froze in place like ice sculptures.
Four rings? They'd just skipped straight past three rings? That was a qualitative leap — like the difference between forging from hundred-refinements to thousand-refinements, or from thousand-refinements to spirit refining.
They had thought this victory might spare them from tomorrow's training, or at least change the format. Never had they imagined that instead of reprieve, they'd…
"This isn't what we wanted…" Xie Xie groaned.
In the battle just now, his role had been pure cannon fodder — deliberately obvious cannon fodder to draw Wu Zhangkong's attention. Wu Zhangkong certainly hadn't considered him the main threat, but the Double Dragon Storm was dangerous enough at the same level to force him to take it seriously.
Nan Fusheng's planning had been meticulous. For example, choosing to invite Wu Zhangkong to a nighttime sparring session — it was a move that would naturally arouse suspicion.
Wu Zhangkong knew the other four's abilities very well, so he would inevitably focus his doubts on Xu Xiaoyan.
The brilliance of the setup lay in following Wu Zhangkong's thought process, leading him to firmly believe that the finishing blow would come from Tang Wulin's Golden Dragon Claw — just like in almost every previous battle. Combined with the frost mist blocking Xu Xiaoyan's line of sight, it was only natural he'd underestimate her.
And indeed, everything in the early stage reinforced that assumption. From Tang Wulin's initial assault, to Xie Xie's aerial strike, to Gu Yue's coordinated attack, and finally Nan Fusheng's control — all of it guided him toward that conclusion.
But when the moment came, everyone's methods had already been revealed. At that point, Gu Yue, aside from her opening salvo, had been secretly preparing Ice and Fire Double Heavens. The aura was masked by Tang Wulin's thousand-year Blue Silver Grass skill, so it went unnoticed.
At the critical instant, Tang Wulin was knocked back, and when Wu Zhangkong broke free of Nan Fusheng's control, he relaxed — everything was going just as he'd predicted.
Xu Xiaoyan, seemingly neutralized by the mist, hadn't played a role.
He instinctively concluded that the five had exhausted their tricks.
In that sliver of complacency, when Nan Fusheng prepared to attack, space transfer became the true killing move — swapping Xu Xiaoyan into Tang Wulin's place so she could bind him, while Gu Yue's prepared Ice and Fire Double Heavens detonated at his back.
With cultivation suppressed to their level and even his spiritual sense restrained, Wu Zhangkong's perception was drastically reduced, allowing the children to succeed. If he hadn't unleashed higher-level soul power at the very last second, he would have lost outright.
The plan wasn't perfect, but it had flexibly used each person's abilities and, more importantly, leveraged human psychology.
That was why Wu Zhangkong had asked who the strategist was. For such a scheme to come from ten-year-olds… "limitless potential" was the only way to describe it.
What the five didn't see, as he walked away, was the faint smile in Wu Zhangkong's eyes.
For a teacher, having such students — what more could he want? And Xu Xiaoyan's Starwheel Ice Chains had impressed him just as much; even at his level, he couldn't break them instantly, proving her skill.
Combined with Nan Fusheng's spatial abilities…
When they went to compete in the Sea God's Alliance Tournament, perhaps they would give both the Academy — and him — a very pleasant surprise.