Chapter 76: The Art of Nothingness

Witnessing her opponent’s immediate offensive, Su Liyue did not hesitate.

“Ice Dragon!”

With an elegant flourish of her magic staff, Su Liyue summoned forth a majestic Ice Dragon, which instantly coalesced into being.

Its biting chill and formidable aura immediately overshadowed Zhao Yan’s serpentine earth dragon, rendering it dim and powerless in comparison.

With a prolonged roar, the Ice Dragon lunged directly forward.

***

Boom!!!

Ice and earth collided with explosive force, causing both elemental behemoths to simultaneously shatter and disperse.

Meanwhile, as six whistling wind blades hurtled towards him, Chixiao swiftly conjured a fire shield.

Though the magical expenditure was minimal, the hurried defense left him looking somewhat discomfited, barely managing to deflect Lin Mo’s assault.

Zhao Yan showed no surprise at the outcome of their initial exchange.

After all, his adversaries were Su Liyue, the third-year’s top student, and Chixiao, a prodigy of fire magic.

Nevertheless, Chixiao’s strained parry suggested that his prior engagement with the demonic beast had significantly depleted his energy.

Otherwise, with his formidable power, he would surely have retaliated with a volley of potent fireballs.

Yet, what truly perplexed Zhao Yan was Mu Wanqing, who remained conspicuously still.

Why did this water magic prodigy delay her intervention?

“Truly a genius with affinity for all elements, Student Su. To match my earth dragon with mere water magic is impressive. However, prepare yourself, for my next technique demands your utmost caution!”

Zhao Yan clapped his hands together, a sinister grin spreading across his face.

“Earth Wall!”

With a furious roar, a colossal three-meter-high earth wall erupted from the ground, advancing upon them with an intimidating, crushing momentum.

“Watch out! Student Su, that’s Zhao Yan’s ultimate technique—the Earth Wall!” Chixiao, witnessing the incoming earth magic assault, urgently cried out in warning.

‘Earth Wall?’

Gazing at the sudden onslaught of earth magic before her, Su Liyue found herself inwardly scoffing. ‘Is this truly the strongest attack from this so-called earth genius?’

She now harbored serious doubts about what these third-year students actually learned.

Beyond a slightly stronger elemental affinity and marginally more powerful spells than average students, she perceived no truly remarkable abilities.

‘So why, then,’ she mused, ‘is this individual hailed as an earth genius? Is there truly no other application for earth magic than simply flinging rocks at people?’

“Earth magic is not meant to be wielded in such a crude manner,” Su Liyue remarked calmly, her gaze fixed on the rapidly hurtling earth chunks.

With a flourish of her staff, she declared, “Flying Sand and Rushing Stones!”

In that instant, a furious whirlwind erupted, violently tearing apart the imposing earth wall.

It disintegrated into countless shards of rock, swirling within the nascent vortex.

“What?! Is that—!” Zhao Yan gasped, utterly stunned as his proud Earth Wall spell was shredded to fragments.

“Impossible! My earth magic is supposed to be the most substantial physical spell among the four elements! How could your wind possibly seize control of my earth and turn it against me?!”

“I told you to broaden your knowledge, but you refused to listen! You haven’t even heard of Flying Sand and Rushing Stones!”

Su Liyue’s magic staff traced an elegant arc through the air.

“Since you don’t pay attention in class, don’t try to act like Sun Shiwan (TL Note: A historical figure known for repeatedly failing at the Battle of Hefei, often leading to heavy losses, which in internet slang means ‘showing off and getting defeated.’) and foolishly rush into battle!”

Before her words even faded, the ferocious sand and stone whirlwind roared to life, surging directly towards Zhao Yan.

Suddenly, the very ground began to tremble.

Sections of earth fractured and crumbled, while countless fragments of stone defied gravity, lifting into the air to form a swirling belt of debris around Su Liyue.

With a forward thrust of her magic staff, the three-meter-diameter sandstorm tornado let out a cyclonic shriek, carving deep furrows into the ground in its wake.

Zhao Yan’s eyes widened in utter disbelief.

He instinctively plunged his magic staff into the earth, and brown earth elements, like living tendrils, snaked up its length to envelop his arm.

“Earth Barrier – Thousand-Layered Rock!”

As his roar ripped through the air, seven massive rock walls, inscribed with intricate magic patterns, burst forth from the soil.

Yet, the sandstorm tore through six of the walls with devastating force, leaving the final barrier riddled with spiderweb cracks.

Splintered rock fragments carved several bleeding gashes across his face, the searing pain causing him to sharply inhale.

“Are you all just standing there like stunned exhibits?!” Zhao Yan roared, whipping his head around to find his six teammates frozen in postures of utter astonishment.

The water mage furthest to the right even stood agape, the tip of the fool’s staff still dripping with water droplets that had coalesced only partially before dissipating.

At last, six frantic beams of magic, each distinct in hue, flared to life.

Ice shards and fireballs erupted into brilliant pyrotechnics within the sandstorm, while wind blades whittled the outermost debris into fine dust.

“As expected of the third-year’s top student…” Zhao Yan wiped a bead of cold sweat from his brow, realizing his magical robe was damp with tension across his back.

Yet, a menacing smirk began to curl his lips.

Earth elements swirled into a visible brown vortex at the tip of his staff, and the ground beneath him began to churn like boiling water.

“Alas,” he sneered, “your combined strength of two and a half individuals… will ultimately prove insufficient against the concerted assault of two full teams!”

Thirty paces away, Lin Mo, upon hearing this declaration, immediately fell back.

The ten wind blades he had deployed moments earlier to suppress Chixiao, still suspended in mid-air, abruptly reversed course, leaving translucent trails streaking through the atmosphere.

“Focus fire directly! Overwhelm with numbers!”

“The Golden Magic Core is within our grasp!” Zhao Yan’s fervent cry ignited his team’s morale like a wildfire.

The earth beneath his feet surged, forming an altar-like dais, as an even more colossal sandstorm began to coalesce.

With Lin Mo’s coordinated efforts, the two of them, mimicking Su Liyue’s technique, conjured a Flying Sand and Rushing Stones tornado even grander than the last.

The remaining team members, as if infused with a powerful stimulant, frantically channeled their magic.

Spells of various elements intertwined in the air, forming a destructive storm poised to unleash a fatal blow!

Seven magical luminosities, like a vibrant rainbow bridge, spanned the heavens: the fire mage summoned a spiraling serpent of flame, the wind mage’s staff tip pulsed with high-frequency vibrating air blades, and even the most ponderous water mage completed the incantation for the Triple Surging Wave technique.

Gazing at the coalescing combined magic, Chixiao’s expression abruptly shifted:

“Not good! They want to use human wave tactics! We might as well…”

The words caught abruptly in his throat.

On their side, they had Ye Xingchen, utterly devoid of elemental affinity, and Mu Wanqing, a water elementalist whose attribute clashed with theirs.

Aside from the all-elemental Su Liyue and himself, whose magical power had yet to fully recover, they truly amounted to only ‘two and a half’ combatants.

Upon hearing the disparaging assessment of “two and a half combatants,” Su Liyue’s lips twitched.

‘These people truly consider Ye Xingchen a mere burden?’ she mused, a cold smirk playing on her lips.

Mu Wanqing tightened her grip on her magic staff, and water magic began to surge within her:

“Yueyue, since evasion is no longer an option, perhaps we should combine our efforts and counterattack.

Given our mastery over elements, we ought to be capable of enduring this assault.

If only we can hold on…”

Su Liyue gently pressed her best friend’s hand, a mysterious curve gracing her lips:

“Do you recall the ‘Magic of Nothingness’ we once discussed?”

“Are you…?” Mu Wanqing’s beautiful eyes widened, reflecting an expression of utter disbelief.

“Watch closely! Today, we shall truly open their eyes to what constitutes genuine magical artistry!”

With a subtle flick of her magic staff, Su Liyue’s form suddenly shimmered with peculiar spatial fluctuations.