An Intermediate-Level Battle!

The man in Tang-style clothing had clearly been at Intermediate Level for some time. His casting flowed far more smoothly than Mo Fan's — and more importantly, he was drawing his Star Chart through pure Control alone, without any aids...

The three men spread out, and an instant later a massive, sky-shaking flaming fist erupted into existence. The small hillside seemed unable to bear the overwhelming force of the flames and began to shudder violently.

The heat surged and rolled outward even more ferociously. The surrounding trees were nearly snapped in two, their canopies bending down almost within arm's reach...

The blazing fist careened forward, sending the Hunter-mages scattering in every direction — all except the cowboy-styled man, who stood his ground without the slightest intention of moving. If anything, a flicker of contempt had settled in his eyes.

"Stone Wall: Jagged Rock!"

The cowboy-styled man bellowed and thrust both palms forcefully forward.

Through the wall of flame, a stone barrier materialized from thin air, forming a massive, craggy curved wall directly in front of him.

The jagged stone rampart stood like a mountainside shield enclosing everyone behind it — immensely thick and seemingly indestructible.

The Blazing Fist — powerful enough to blast a gaping hole through solid rock — struck the wall and left nothing but a shallow dent. Every wave of flame had no choice but to roll along the barrier's curved surface, and not a single person sheltered behind it suffered so much as a scorch.

Mo Fan's jaw dropped.

He knew exactly how powerful Blazing Fist was. The concentrated core of flames could reduce a building's walls to ash, and the shockwave alone could flatten an ordinary house — yet this devastating technique, striking dead-on against the stone barrier, had been stopped cold. The cowboy-styled man standing directly in its path was completely unharmed, and so was everyone behind him.

"Stone Wall — Intermediate-Level Stone Element. The strongest defensive magic at this tier and below." Tang Yue proved herself a capable teacher, quickly explaining things to Mo Fan, who was still unfamiliar with the Intermediate-Level domain.

"You learn something new every day," Mo Fan murmured.

At the Basic Level, with everyone limited to a single spell, magical duels were little more than brawls — a punch for a punch. But at the Intermediate Level, with each mage commanding four skills, battles finally gained real depth: feint and counter, offense and defense, an entire repertoire of tactics.

Pan Xiong's Hunter-mages may not have come from prestigious families, but their team composition was remarkably well-balanced.

With the cowboy-styled man's defense holding firm, the scar-faced man completed his own Intermediate-Level Wind Element spell from behind the safety of the Stone Wall.

"Wind Disk: Tornado!"

For a brief instant, not a whisper of air moved across the entire reservoir hollow ringed by hills. Leaves hung perfectly still; not a mote of dust stirred. A strange oppressive weight settled over everything, as though the oxygen itself had been sucked out of the air.

**Whoooosh——**

The gale erupted. The stifling heat that had blanketed the air was swept away in an instant, and everyone standing in the dry reservoir could feel the currents from hundreds of meters in every direction funneling madly toward a single point. The convergence of wind from all sides slowly built at the air's most compressed node into something that made the skin crawl — a towering tornado.

Wind Disk: Tornado hurled every particle of dust skyward, twisting into a murky yellow serpent-dragon rising from the earth. Even the trees nearby could not withstand the savage spiral force — they were being torn straight from the ground, roots and all.

The wind scoured Mo Fan's face raw. He could barely make out what was happening in the reservoir anymore — only Wind Disk: Tornado raged there like some savage beast, upending everything in its path.

Mo Fan had witnessed Intermediate-Level Wind Element magic before, yet seeing it again still sent ice shooting down his spine. Compared to the Basic-Level Wind Trail, this might as well have been a completely different order of power — its destructive capability was utterly terrifying.

When the tornado finally died, the dry reservoir was unrecognizable. Trees were bent, trees had toppled, and sand and gravel lay scattered everywhere.

At the center of the wreckage stood the four Dongfang Clan mages. They appeared to have used some piece of Enchanted Gear to shield themselves — they hadn't been swept into the sky, which was fortunate, because a fall from that height would have cost them half their lives.

They had held on, but barely. All four looked thoroughly battered, and the Tang-suited man wore barely concealed fury across his face.

At that point, all restraint vanished on both sides. Every mage poured everything into their respective Intermediate-Level skills, and Mo Fan and Tang Yue had to fall back another fifty or sixty meters just to stay clear of the blast zone.

The fighting went on for a full ten minutes, with both sides throwing their Enchanted Gear trump cards into the mix. In the end, it was the Tang-suited man who turned the tide: he deployed a Slash Enchanted Gear in a single devastating strike, shattering the scar-faced man's Stone Wall defense and sending the entire Hunter-mage squad hurtling through the air.

Once the wall came down, the Hunter-mages — a team entirely dependent on coordinated roles — were picked apart one by one by the four Intermediate-Level mages.

"I'm giving the Hunters' Alliance face today — but if you're not gone in the next breath, I'll burn every last one of you to ash. Even the Tribunal won't find a shred of evidence!" The Tang-suited man's roar was matched by a ball of searing golden light coalescing in his palm.

Pan Xiong and the rest had a world of grievances choking them, but the strength to fight back was simply gone.

It wasn't that they had been outclassed in skill — if anything, experience and casting technique had given them the upper hand. But the Dongfang mages were outfitted head to toe in Enchanted Gear, and a single artifact had casually nullified everything they'd built.

In that moment, the divide between noble-clan mages and self-made ones couldn't have been more starkly drawn.

"We're leaving!" Pan Xiong gritted his teeth and moved to prop up the teammate lying unconscious beside him.

Mercifully, no one on their side had died outright. In truth, the Dongfang Clan's mages had every opportunity to finish them off — it was fear of the Tribunal that stayed their hands.

Mages fighting and killing each other over rare treasures in the wilderness was nothing new — those who had climbed to higher realms almost universally had blood on their hands. But weighed against the Fire Element Spirit Seed, Pan Xiong and his crew had decided their lives were worth more.

The entire group withdrew quickly. Spent of any real fighting capacity, they didn't linger a moment longer than necessary.

The four Dongfang Clan members, having finally driven their rivals off, each let out a long breath of relief as they watched the Hunter-mages go.

"Damn — if they'd pushed it to the death, we would've taken serious losses too. My Star Nebula is nearly dry," said the young man whose hair shot upward in wild spikes like some unruly dandy.

"No kidding. Brother Jun really came through — scared them off clean."

In truth, the Tang-suited man's own expression was far from relaxed. Hunter-mages like these — hardened by constant battles against Demon-Beasts — had far superior combat instincts compared to Intermediate-Level mages living comfortable lives in the cities. If he hadn't brought three of the clan's finest today, they might well have come out the worse for it. He had to concede: the Hunters' Alliance was not an enemy to be trifled with.