After the Qi Condensation Class ended, the girls in the Intermediate Class swarmed around Yan Zhen, bombarding him with curious questions. Some even took advantage of the chaos to cop a few feels.
Mi Xue’er and Yan Ruyu quickly stepped in to block those handsy girls, keeping them away from Yan Zhen before urging him to get out of there fast.
Yan Zhen fled the classroom like the wind, heading toward the beginner class to find Yan Meng’er.
But halfway there, someone blocked his path.
It wasn’t a student, but a mentor dressed in the standard mentor robes. His hair was slicked back in a severe style, and he wore a pair of black round-framed glasses. Tall and skinny with a pale face, he looked to be around forty years old.
Under the blazing sun, the middle-aged mentor adjusted his glasses and fixed Yan Zhen with an indifferent gaze.
“You’re the one who hurt my students yesterday?”
Yan Zhen paused for a moment before recalling the beginner-class Kill Matt punks he’d beaten down. Keeping his expression neutral, he replied, “Wasn’t me.”
“Wasn’t you? They all identified you. You still gonna deny it?”
“Who are ‘they’?”
With a wave of his hand, the middle-aged mentor summoned several beginner-class students from behind the pillars of the nearby colonnade. Leading them was Temasha, who strutted forward smugly.
“Mentor, don’t listen to his nonsense! It was him! He used his higher cultivation to bully us and even ambushed us! He’s a disgrace to the academy. We have to make him pay for breaking the rules!”
The middle-aged mentor nodded slightly and turned back to Yan Zhen.
“As an Intermediate Class student ambushing beginner-class students, you’ve seriously violated the academy rules. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Yan Zhen shook his head.
“I don’t know them. They’re saying I did it, but where’s the proof? Their word against mine. I could say they jumped me—five against one, ambushing me right around the corner. You buying that?”
The middle-aged mentor hadn’t expected Yan Zhen to argue so logically. Growing impatient, he snapped, “If you didn’t do it, why would they say it was you?”
“That’s a question for them, not me.” Yan Zhen’s look screamed idiot. “Maybe they got picked on, got mad but too scared to fight back, so they pinned it on some easy target instead. Real twisted psychology.”
Temasha turned red in the face, neck veins bulging. This punk was so sharp-tongued, twisting the facts right in front of them.
“Mentor, don’t buy his crap. He’s a smooth-talker. Grab him first and interrogate him properly—he’ll crack.”
The middle-aged mentor nervously adjusted his glasses again before speaking coldly.
“I’m Discipline Mentor Zhang Wei. I suspect you of violating academy rules. Come with me to the office for questioning right now.”
With that, he turned and started walking away.
“No thanks,” Yan Zhen said flatly. This wasn’t in the script—he had zero interest in dealing with it. “Mentor, you should question your students first and get the facts straight. Otherwise, you’re just making a fool of yourself.”
“What did you say?”
Zhang Wei whipped back around, his Two-Star Mystic Master cultivation erupting in a powerful aura that sent Temasha and the others scrambling away in terror.
Yan Zhen felt the obvious pressure too, like being stared down by a man-eating beast. His heart pounded faster.
But he’d cultivated the Emperor Flame Technique, which carried an inherent imperial majesty. Plus, he’d refined the higher-ranked Heavenly Extreme Flames. A little realm suppression like this? He just circulated his technique slightly, and it vanished.
Seeing Yan Zhen resist so easily only enraged Zhang Wei further.
“You wanna fight back? Forcing my hand, huh?”
Yan Zhen’s face grew icy. What a pain.
This guy wasn’t even in the script. No point wasting time slapping him down!
He gathered his Mystic Power. Though only a Five-Star Mystic Practitioner, the pressure he released rivaled a Mystic Scholar’s.
“A Two-Star Mystic Master—the bottom rung among mentors. Is that what gives you all this confidence?”
“You dare talk to me like that? Lawless brat! I’ll have to discipline you in your mentor’s place!”
Zhang Wei flew into a rage and pointed his index finger at Yan Zhen from afar.
As a Mystic Master, his Mystic Power could kill from a distance!
He flicked his finger, shooting out a burst of finger force like an arrow from a bowstring.
Yan Zhen didn’t even budge, just tilted his head. The force grazed his ear, leaving a faint stinging pain, and drilled a small hole in the tree behind him.
That strike had aimed to take off his ear—way beyond punishment. It was attempted harm.
“Not bad reflexes? Let’s see how you dodge this!”
Another finger blast came flying. Yan Zhen dodged hastily, but it sliced his pant leg, burning with pain.
Zhang Wei stepped forward, firing more finger strikes from range.
Think I’m just gonna take this?!
Yan Zhen planted his feet in a horse stance and unleashed the Eight Extremes Explosion with a punch that shattered the incoming blast.
Pain shot through his fist. He knew he couldn’t keep this up. Time to pull out the Trump Card (First Order) from his System Backpack.
The Trump Card (First Order) was a card that worked only in the Mystic Initiate Realm, guaranteed to turn danger into safety!
And how? Up to him.
Want to escape? Instant teleport a thousand miles away.
Want to fight? Match the enemy’s power for a limited time!
He had two: one from the newbie quest, one from advancing to Mystic Practitioner.
Might as well burn one now and test its power!
If not, it’d expire once he hit Mystic Scholar.
—System!
Yan Zhen shouted inwardly, and it responded instantly.
【Awaiting your orders, Host.】
—Belt Mode!
【Understood.】
Yan Zhen’s empty left hand grabbed at thin air, and the System materialized as a Card Box in his grip.
He slapped the Card Box against his abdomen. It extended a belt that wrapped tightly around his waist.
Trump Card (First Order), insert card.
“Transform.”
The young man spat out the two words coldly.
Boom! The belt erupted in gold-silver flames, enveloping Yan Zhen completely.
At the same time, the System driver blared an epic BGM:
【Emperor Flame! Extreme Flame! Firepower Burst! Mystic Sky Warrior, Yan—】
In the heat of the moment, the System’s voice cut off abruptly, replaced by a ding.
【Ding! System warm reminder: Host’s crisis is about to be resolved. Continue using Trump Card (First Order)?】
—Huh? What the hell? It stopped?
The interruption doused Yan Zhen’s rising battle spirit, leaving him baffled.
But the next moment, he got it.
“Zhang Wei, you dare lay a hand on him?!”
A woman’s sharp cry echoed across the academy skies. At the same time, a massive feather arrow of Water Mystic Force streaked through the air toward Zhang Wei.
Zhang Wei, who’d been closing in on Yan Zhen, paled and unleashed his Mystic Power to retreat, putting serious distance between them.
The crossbow-like water arrow slammed into the ground—boom!—blasting out a person-sized crater amid flying debris.
As the dust cleared, Mentor Yu Xuan descended from the sky, silver greatbow in hand. She landed in front of Yan Zhen, shielding him, her Five-Star Mystic Master cultivation on full display.
Yan Zhen blinked.
“Mentor Yu Xuan?”
“Yan Zhen, are you okay?”
Mentor Yu Xuan scanned him up and down. Spotting the swollen spot on his ear and the tear in his pant leg, fury ignited in her eyes.
