But some people quickly realized that Li Zhiping had probably realized that he couldn’t beat Lan Yu, so he had decided to give up on a victory and seek self-preservation. After exchanging a few rounds and showing that he had tried, he would leave the stage and concede.

This was the best plan. The Thousand Passions Sect couldn’t just allow one of their outstanding students to die, so they had probably given their tacit approval. In any case, at least they would keep their dignity.

Lan Yu also realized this, but he wasn’t going to just let Li Zhiping leave.

He could have accepted it if Li Zhiping had conceded the moment he entered the ring, but to let him leave alive now that he had started fighting would be a failure on his part.

Lan Yu could not accept such a failure, so he thrust out his left hand, and there was a ringing explosion in the air.

This was the Airblast spell, a method of sending shockwaves through the air to impede an opponent’s casting. Li Zhiping was covered in defensive spell arts at this time, so the effects of the Airblast were almost negligible. Lan Yu had not used this spell art to stop him from casting. The Airblast, by sending vibrations through the air, also disrupted sound waves. While it was normally used to prevent sonic spells, it was being used here to prevent Li Zhiping from saying that he conceded.

After using Airblast, Lan Yu waved at the air, and the wind walls froze and stopped converging on Li Zhiping. Instead, they formed a cage that completely locked down the stage, thus stopping Li Zhiping from escaping.

It was only after cutting off the paths of escape that Lan Yu raised his hand and formed a Wind Needle.

Yet this was no ordinary Wind Needle, but hundreds to thousands of Wind Needles compressed together. As these azure needles gathered together in front of him, Lan Yu glared at Li Zhiping and said, “You will die in this battle. Go, Thousand Blade Gale!”

The concentrated Wind Needle shot at Li Zhiping, and Li Zhiping yelped and flung out his hand, raising a shield of light. At the same time, he shouted, “I concede!”

Sure enough, after showing some effort on the stage, he had yelled out his concession.

But the Airblast’s effects were still present, preventing his voice from being heard.

Li Zhiping grimaced and quickly fell back, but he ran into a wind wall, upon which he paled.

Lan Yu savagely laughed, “You’re only leaving here a dead man!”

He sent out another blade of wind, and this blade was so fierce that it both shattered Li Zhiping’s shield of light and obliterated his transparent barrier.

Li Zhiping hastily cast more barriers while punching at the Windwall. It seemed like he didn’t want to fight at all and was thinking only of escaping.

Lan Yu coldly snorted. “You can’t escape.”

He began to form hand signs, his hands quickly working, and the air began to rumble with thunder.

It appeared that Lan Yu was preparing a truly powerful spell art that would kill Li Zhiping in one blow.

At this moment, Li Zhiping’s panicked face turned cold.

He suddenly turned to Lan Yu and instantly accelerated toward him.

Lan Yu hadn’t expected him to suddenly charge at him. After a moment of shock, he realized that he had fallen into a trap.

Li Zhiping had been acting precisely for a chance like this.

He was in the crucial moment of casting an art. He either had to complete the casting and kill his foe, or immediately stop it and suffer a backlash. While this would hurt him a little, it wouldn’t be too serious.

He was a rather decisive person, and he knew that Li Zhiping could only have acted at this moment if he felt that he had a chance. He was determined to not give Li Zhiping this opportunity, so he forced a stop to the casting, taking the backlash. As he threw up blood, he thrust out his hand, creating a barrier of spiritual light.

This barrier was a minor spell that Lan Yu could cast instantly, but the split second of time this bought him was precious indeed.

As the spiritual light barrier emerged, Li Zhiping sighed, knowing that the chance of victory that he had so desperately sought had been cut in half. Even so, he still charged at full speed, thrusting his finger at Lan Yu.

Celestial Rhino Finger!

As this finger struck Lan Yu, there was a crack. Lan Yu’s barrier shattered, and the fingertip struck him in the chest, instantly drawing blood.

But while this finger was sharp, it had been greatly weakened by the barrier. What should have been a certain kill now only injured Lan Yu, and Lan Yu quickly punched back, striking Li Zhiping in the face. “Die!”

He lashed out in anger, and his iron fist erupted with light, imbued with all of his strength.

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But Li Zhiping’s body flashed, and he surprisingly blocked the attack. It turned out that the barrier he had cast for himself earlier was still present.

Lan Yu knew that this wasn’t a good sign. It seemed like he had been frantically casting protective spells not to fend him off, but to buy an opportunity at a moment like this.

As Lan Yu’s punch was blocked, Li Zhiping thrust out his finger again. But rather than the Celestial Rhino Finger, he used the weaker Yang Fire Finger, a spark of flame appearing on his fingertip as it jabbed at Lan Yu’s face.

Lan Yu thrust his own finger in return, but this was to neutralize the attack rather than to counterstrike. He growled, “Even with these lowly methods, you still can’t win!”

He was now showing off the true power of Horizon Ocean Pavilion’s number one student. When facing down Li Zhiping’s formidable offensive, he managed to neutralize it with his own attack, and this was while he was suffering from the backlash of stopping his art. The audience was roaring with excitement.

At this moment, Li Zhiping’s eyes flashed with a cunning light as he said, “That’s not for certain.”

A talisman appeared in his hand, and he slapped it onto Lan Yu’s chest.

Lan Yu had managed to catch his breath after blocking Li Zhiping’s vicious assault. When he saw Li Zhiping take out a talisman, he did not dare to act carelessly and quickly formed another barrier.

A moment later, the talisman exploded, and the barrier flickered for a moment before shattering. Lan Yu went flying through the air!

Oh, no! It was an Explosion talisman!

Lan Yu was aghast, as he knew that he had fallen for the bait again.

The Explosion Talisman was a very deceptive talisman. It sounded very impressive and created a big bang, but its actual lethality was extremely low. But this talisman was particularly outstanding when it came to pushing power. Anyone struck by the talisman’s explosion could easily fly several dozen meters.

When Li Zhiping used this Explosion Talisman, Lan Yu knew what his plan was. For him, killing Lan Yu was naturally the best, but if that wasn’t possible, he would use the Explosion Talisman to send Lan Yu out of the arena, which was also a victory.

For number four of the Thousand Passions Sect to defeat Horizon Ocean Pavilion’s number one was still a glorious feat, even if he didn’t kill him, and it was enough to satisfy the teachers of the Thousand Passions Sect.

This was the advantage of the weak. They didn’t always seek the best outcomes, because for them, even making a little progress came with immense profits.

Li Zhiping sighed in relief as he watched Lan Yu get blasted off the stage.

This had been a hard-fought and dangerous victory.

But at this moment, the flying Lan Yu suddenly disappeared.

Li Zhiping froze, unable to react. Meanwhile, all of the Thousand Passions Sect students shouted in unison, “Senior Brother, watch out!”

What?

Li Zhiping was still trying to understand when he felt a sharp pain at his chest.

He looked down and saw that a hand had penetrated through his body.

Li Zhiping opened his mouth, and blood began to flow out. “Ocean… Oceanflash… Zephyr…”

“So long as you know,” Lan Yu callously said from behind him, his expression dark.

He had been on the verge of defeat just now, and so he found it impossible to feel proud.

“A pity…” Li Zhiping sighed as he collapsed onto the stage.

Lan Yu slowly extracted his hand. “If you hadn’t played so many tricks, you might not have died. Even the most cunning plan is meaningless before absolute strength.”

He proudly raised his head and looked at the crowd as if he was saying, “If you have any tricks, bring it on!”

Sitting on Tang Jie’s shoulder, Yiyi seemed to be affected by Lan Yu’s words, muttering, “Even the most cunning plan is meaningless before absolute strength…”

Tang Jie chuckled, “Yiyi, let me tell you this: never trust in such foolish words. While these words sound reasonable, they’re actually utterly devoid of meaning…”

“You’re saying that he’s wrong?”

“Mm, nonsense piled on error,” Tang Jie replied. “Schemes naturally can’t beat absolute strength, but what does it mean to be ‘absolute’? This in itself is a very shameless term. Back at Thunderbird Cliff, there were nearly one hundred Thunderbirds, with an upper grade among them, and so compared to me who was at Spirit Lake Tier, was their strength absolute? But they still lost to me, and I slaughtered them all. You’ll say that they didn’t have absolute strength, so does that render tactics completely irrelevant? If that’s the case, doesn’t that mean you have to have the strength to dominate the heavens and earth to call it ‘absolute’? So these are extremely shameless words. So long as they lose, you can just say that it was because those people didn’t possess absolute strength… Isn’t that just nonsense? Besides that, who doesn’t want absolute strength, but who can possess it? There are more than ten thousand cultivators here at this Immortal Fortune Conference, but who here would dare say that they had absolute strength? Nothing but empty words, a fart in the wind. Thus, it’s a whole load of nonsense!”

He spoke in a particularly loud voice, and many people heard him, including Lan Yu, who turned and glared at him.

Tang Jie continued to speak loudly. “That said, schemes exist not to put up a stiff resistance, but to avoid fighting against those people who have absolute strength. If you do it right, you can even have those people who possess absolute strength serve you. Thus, these words are also wrong.”

Finally, Tang Jie shouted, “Clearly almost having the tables turned on himself and just eking out a win, and then speaking such arrogant nonsense after luckily winning, thinking highly of himself—in my view, a person like this will ultimately end up as an idiot who is used by others!”

Lan Yu’s face turned white with rage.