The match officially began after the commentator finished explaining the origins of the Face-Seeking Owl civilization.
The human spectators had already felt uneasy at the sight of the strange bird with a human face. The commentator’s explanation only made things worse, and they grew even more worried that Shi Jingyi would lose this round.
“Let the competition begin!”
As soon as the commentator’s voice fell, the Face-Seeking Owl immediately beat its wings and flew away from the pillar, hovering high in the air at a distance.
Its glossy black eyes kept darting about, fixed on Shi Jingyi’s face with undisguised malice.
The spectators all knew that, just as the commentator had said and its name suggested, this species was born with a genetic craving to “seek human faces.”
Now, this individual, called “Da Qiang,” undoubtedly wanted to use its pair of sharp talons to tear the skin from Shi Jingyi’s face.
But it made no haste to attack. Instead, it flew away from the pillar Shi Jingyi stood on and simply watched her from the air.
“What’s with this thing? Why is it flying so far away?”
“I get it! It’s waiting for Shi Jingyi to fall on her own!”
“Exactly. The pillar’s surface must be too smooth to stand on for long. It’s waiting for Dean Shi to lose her balance and fall, or for her to drop partway before it attacks. That way, victory will be all but guaranteed!”
“No wonder the commentator said this species was extremely intelligent and had turned on the humans who bred them, driving them to extinction. They really are no pushovers!”
Once the human spectators understood the Face-Seeking Owl’s strategy, they couldn’t help worrying for Shi Jingyi.
Yet Guan Tong, who had been the most worried about her before, was not nearly as tense as the other human spectators.
It was precisely because he knew Shi Jingyi well. After hundreds of sparring matches, they understood each other’s strengths and characteristics.
He knew very well that Shi Jingyi, who had trained in martial arts since childhood, had a sense of balance far beyond that of an ordinary person.
Since the age of the Doomsday Rules began, her body had continued to grow stronger. After becoming an Awakened One, she had gained complete control of her body, and with an Authority that enhanced martial arts, these three layers of improvement had brought her overall physical abilities to a terrifying level.
The Face-Seeking Owl was dreaming if it thought she would simply fall from the high pillar into the lava.
Just as Guan Tong expected, Shi Jingyi stood on the smooth pillar platform inside the arena. She was nowhere near flustered, and didn’t move a muscle.
Even the commentator was astonished.
“We can see that the competitor from Tianshui Star Civilization is able to stand completely still on the pillar platform. It seems she has reached the pinnacle of bodily control.”
“If this stalemate continues, who knows which of them will run out of stamina first? Sigh.”
The commentator sighed as he spoke, sounding rather regretful. “It’s a pity this arena has no time limit. Otherwise, they could keep raising the lava level as time passed, and this stalemate would soon be broken.”
The human spectators grew furious again at the commentator’s words, and countless people cursed in the chat bubbles.
“What the hell is wrong with this commentator? Why does he take the other side’s part every round?!”
“It wouldn’t be fair if the lava kept rising. The Face-Seeking Owl wouldn’t even need to fight. It could just fly to the highest point and wait to win.”
“I wonder what civilization the commentator belongs to. Does he have some grudge against human civilization? Does he just hate seeing humanity do well?”
“A tribute to the most impartial commentator. I’m going to set your dreams on fire!”
Guan Tong was also thoroughly annoyed, and thought the commentator was acting very strangely.
Tianshui Star Civilization was competing in the Meltstar Arena Competition for the first time. It had never offended him, so why did he look down on humanity in every round?
Could it be...
A possibility occurred to him.
Could the commentator have been bitten by another human civilization before, and now resented all human civilizations by association?
But that wasn’t the point. It didn’t matter what the commentator said, as long as it couldn’t manipulate the match.
Guan Tong looked toward the arena. He knew the stalemate wouldn’t last forever. Based on his understanding of Shi Jingyi, she would take the initiative and seize control of the situation.
On the pillar, Shi Jingyi didn’t rush to make a move.
The Face-Seeking Owl was waiting for her to fall, while she was waiting to fully adapt to the smoothness of the pillar’s surface.
The surface was far smoother than she had expected. Though it couldn’t possibly be perfectly smooth, with absolutely no friction, it was still astonishingly slick.
The moment the match began, she felt her shoes start to slip. She had only managed to steady herself by using Mind Power in place of her soles to make contact with the pillar in an instant.
Thanks to her precise control over her body and Mind Power, she could remain perfectly still on the surface. But a large movement might cause trouble.
She couldn’t fly freely like Guan Tong. Even if she could stay airborne for a certain distance, she would still need to find something to push off from along the way.
To make sure she could keep her balance on the pillar while fighting and moving, she was now rapidly bringing her Mind Power into contact with the platform, acclimating herself to it.
After the two sides remained at a standoff for about three minutes, the Face-Seeking Owl seemed to realize something was wrong.
Once it realized Shi Jingyi was unlikely to slip off the pillar, it suddenly opened its beak and let out a cry.
!!!!
Powerful sound waves became visible as they spread with the cry, surging toward Shi Jingyi with tremendous force to knock her off the pillar.
Shi Jingyi remained expressionless. Her hands curled from open palms into fists, and a pale yellow protective shield tinged with gray appeared around her.
The shock wave struck it, raising only a faint ripple. The person inside was completely unaffected.
“Hm?”
A spectator in one of the chat bubbles let out a soft sound of surprise when he saw Shi Jingyi’s protective shield.
What surprised him wasn’t the shield itself, but the faint gray tinge on it.
That was chaotic energy.
This energy had many applications. It could be used as a simple power source or to manufacture engines for interstellar travel, among other things.
But using it in combination with Mind Power to strengthen or protect the body was extremely rare.
The spectator seemed to recall that, a very, very long time ago, there had been a civilization in the universe that excelled at using it in this way.
But if his memory served him, that civilization had already been wiped out by the Demon Race.
The spectator continued watching.
In the arena, after Shi Jingyi deployed her protective shield, the Face-Seeking Owl’s cry-based sonic attack proved completely ineffective. It tried increasing its strength, but that didn’t work either.
Realizing how dangerous its opponent was, it began beating its wings and circling Shi Jingyi from a distance.
It moved like a falcon that had locked onto its prey, circling overhead as it watched and waited for the best moment to strike.
Shi Jingyi suddenly thrust out a palm!
There had been no warning. Not even a few spectators had seen her raise her arm.
A vortex formed from Flowable Mind Power gathered in her palm and shot out, accompanied by a sonic boom!
“Shatter!”
It was the Split-Sky Palm!
Guan Tong immediately recognized the move. Shi Jingyi had developed this ranged attack herself, and had used it while sparring with him. Its power was astonishing.
At that moment, as her palm struck out, the violent spiraling Mind Power slammed precisely into the Face-Seeking Owl dozens of meters away.
The latter seemed not to have expected Shi Jingyi to launch a sudden attack. It took the full brunt of the blow and let out a scream as parts of its body split open and began to bleed.
It looked as if it were about to fall, but after wobbling in the air a few times, it steadied itself. The human face on its head twisted with fury.
It wasn’t dead?
Shi Jingyi was somewhat surprised.
She had spent a long time building up that palm strike and had gathered a great deal of Mind Power into it. She had intended to settle the match in one move, but it seemed the Face-Seeking Owl’s body was much tougher than she had expected.
“Grr...”
At that moment, the human face on the Face-Seeking Owl split down the middle, revealing several narrow, pointed beaks crammed inside. It was a particularly horrifying sight.
The commentator’s voice rang out at just the right moment. “Oh! It seems that attack from the Tianshui Star competitor was extremely powerful. Only a gravely wounded Face-Seeking Owl would go so far as to abandon its face. It’s angry! Everyone, cover your ears!”
As soon as the commentator finished speaking, the dozen or so beaks on the Face-Seeking Owl’s face shrieked all at once. It beat its wings rapidly as it flew.
The shrieks came in wave after wave. Besides the sonic attack itself, they seemed to carry some kind of mental attack. As many spectators watched, they began seeing dozens of Face-Seeking Owls flying wildly around the arena.
“What’s going on? It can make clones too?!”
“No, there’s something strange about its cries. They’re messing with our minds!”
“Shi Jingyi’s in danger now!”
After the Face-Seeking Owl used its ability, Shi Jingyi’s eyes didn’t follow it. In fact, she closed them.
The spectators watching the match from the overhead view were all greatly astonished.
“What’s she doing? Is this a meditation contest, or has she given up?”
“The Face-Seeking Owl just used its ultimate move. Even with a protective shield, she won’t be able to hold out for long!”
“If she can’t tell which one is the real one, she should just fire all her Mind Power in every direction and hope for the best!”
Quite a few spectators thought Shi Jingyi had been forced into a dangerous situation. Even if she could hurt the Face-Seeking Owl, if her mind was affected and she couldn’t tell which one was real, she would be left “looking all around with a sword in hand, not knowing where to go.”
Unlike the other worried spectators, however, Guan Tong grew calmer by the moment.
The instant he saw Shi Jingyi close her eyes, he knew she wasn’t ignoring the enemy. On the contrary, she was taking the fight more seriously than ever.
She didn’t need her sight at a time like this. She could lock onto her opponent by sensing its presence.
That was right. He had actually helped her develop this ability.
During their day-after-day sparring sessions, Guan Tong often used the Shadow Domain to disrupt Shi Jingyi and rob her of her field of vision. After a while, she began looking for a way to counter it.
She gave up her visual senses and instead drew on her strength in precisely controlling Flowable Mind Power. By sensing the flow of energy around her with Mind Power, she could lock onto her enemy. That was the “Qi-Sense Lock-on” ability she had developed.
Later, she tested whether the ability worked by fighting Guan Tong many times. On several occasions, even when trapped inside his Shadow Domain, she had still been able to locate Guan Tong’s real body by quickly locking onto his presence.
Now, seeing her close her eyes, Guan Tong knew she intended to use this ability to pinpoint the Face-Seeking Owl, and then...
His pupils contracted as he saw Shi Jingyi bend her knees slightly, then leap from the pillar platform toward the front right!
“!!!”
The spectators were all horrified, because there was no pillar below her in that direction. If she couldn’t get back, she would fall straight into the scalding lava.
The next moment, an even more astonishing sight appeared.
The Face-Seeking Owl had appeared right in front of Shi Jingyi.
She had used her Qi-Sense Lock-on to predict the Face-Seeking Owl’s path in advance, reaching the best position to attack before it did.
Since a ranged attack couldn’t kill her enemy in one blow, she would use an even more brutal close-range attack to eliminate it completely. That was Shi Jingyi’s decision.
She leaned back like a bow pulled taut, then swung her right fist, faintly tinged with gray. Like an arrow shooting through the air, it pierced straight through the Face-Seeking Owl’s head!
Her left hand was just as busy. She grabbed the Face-Seeking Owl’s wing and twisted hard, using the momentum to flip herself around and plant a foot on its belly.
Using the force of the rebound, her body flew precisely toward the nearest pillar, and then she landed on its surface as lightly as a feather.
At the same time, the Face-Seeking Owl’s corpse plunged into the lava.
The victor was decided.