Refining the Rose Flame!
The curse was gradually lifting. Mo Fan's verbal sparring with Chao He had not been entirely without purpose — at the very least, it had spared Tang Yue from sharing the same fate as the four Dongfang Clan members.
"Teacher Tang Yue, are you all right?" Mo Fan walked toward her where she leaned, slumped, against a rock.
Her collar had come undone. She pressed both hands against her chest, and it was honestly impossible to tell whether she was trying to protect her dignity or fighting the urge to tear her clothes off entirely.
"Don't — don't come any closer..." Tang Yue gritted her teeth and forced herself to stay seated, struggling to keep the thoughts flooding her mind from taking over.
Within several kilometers, Mo Fan was almost certainly the only male around. The kind of catastrophically awkward situation she'd only ever seen in soap operas had somehow managed to fall on her head. *If he were at least a dashing, gorgeous prince — I might just be able to stomach it!*
No. In a situation like this, any normal man would take advantage of the opportunity. She had to find a way to drive him off. If she could have ten minutes of quiet to sit still, her willpower alone might see her through it; a Mage's Mental Intent was far stronger than an ordinary person's.
Right — the Rose Flame!
She'd originally intended to hand it over to the Tribunal, but now it seemed there was no choice but to let this nuisance have it.
"You... go refine the Rose Flame," Tang Yue said, drawing a slow, steadying breath.
"The Rose Flame can be refined any time. Your safety comes first," Mo Fan said with perfect sincerity.
Tang Yue didn't dare look up at him. She cursed his name a hundred times in silence: *Mo Fan, you insufferable wretch, go collect your windfall and get out of my face. Don't you dare tell me you can't see what state I'm in right now — take one more step toward me and I will chop you up and feed you to the dogs!!*
Truthfully, Tang Yue was genuinely worried — worried that he might do something to her, or, worse, that she might do something to him. She set her jaw and said, "Spirit-grade fire seeds dissipate quickly."
"Oh. Oh! You're really giving it to me?" Mo Fan asked with complete earnestness.
"YES!!!" Tang Yue nearly ground her teeth to powder.
"Then take care of yourself. I'll go refine the Rose Flame. If you need anything from me—"
"GET. LOST!!!" She was on the verge of losing her mind entirely.
Mo Fan went, reluctantly, muttering under his breath as he walked.
He was, at this particular moment, the spitting image of a certain Xiao Ming — the boy who had once gone to his female teacher's classroom with a perfectly sincere question, been screamed out the door for his trouble, and shuffled off lamenting the total lack of decorum among female teachers these days... only to realize he'd just been escorted out of the women's restroom.
But the moment his thoughts turned to the Fire Element Spirit Seed he was about to receive — something worth an absolute fortune — everything else evaporated.
A truly charming man, they say, is himself an aphrodisiac; any woman who draws near him falls helplessly under his spell, as though she's taken a drug she can never quit. As one of the rare few who possessed such magnetism, Mo Fan was of course far too dignified to stoop to —
All right. Mo Fan admitted it: he'd seen Teacher Tang Yue condense a ball of flame in her palm.
The Rose Flame's pull on him was every bit as lethal.
He was flat broke right now. How could he possibly not want something this rare?
The Dongfang Clan, Pan Xiong's Hunter-mage squad, and even that fugitive killer — they had all bled for this Rose Flame. Mo Fan had wanted it from the very beginning. He really did owe Tang Yue a debt of gratitude for her timely intervention; without her, a treasure like this could never have landed in his hands under any circumstances.
Now Tang Yue was waging war against her own inner demons to preserve her dignity, and the prize had fallen into his lap exactly as he'd hoped. His hands were practically trembling.
*Get it refined and get Tang Yue out of here. If more Mages show up, things are going to get very messy — I'll lose the treasure and the girl in one go.* The thought flashed through his mind.
He wasted no more time. He plunged his palms into the unearthly Rose Flame.
A wave of scorching heat flooded from his hands through his entire body. The initial burn was almost unbearable — but almost immediately, he sensed that this sentient flame carried not the slightest intention of harming a human being.
Gradually, it felt as though rivers of scalding blood were flowing into him. Mo Fan closed his eyes and focused, letting himself sink into this extraordinary element.
The Rose Flame was, in truth, remarkably gentle. It was like a newborn infant — toward the first person to approach it, to come close to it, it felt something close to a child's instinctive recognition of a parent. After its first moment of wariness, it shed every layer of its defenses all at once. It spread its tiny, tender arms wide and embraced him, merging into Mo Fan's body, flowing into his Fire Element Star Nebula.
Throughout the process, Mo Fan felt as though he were being baptized by fire itself. The impurities in his existing flames burned away and shed continuously under the Rose Flame's touch.
The first change appeared in his skin. It had always carried a faint sun-darkened hue — not quite bronze, but close. As the Rose Flame seeped in, his complexion began to take on its coloring: luminous, radiant, with a faint silken sheen he'd never had before.
His blood changed next, deepening to a richer, more vibrant crimson.
Then his bones. They had once been no different from any ordinary person's — but under the Rose Flame's baptism, they hardened and refined like steel worked through a thousand hammer strokes. Mo Fan couldn't see it, but he could feel the profound difference from what they had been.
The most dramatic transformation, naturally, was in the Fire Element Star Nebula within his Inner World.
The scarlet nebula had still carried traces of impurity — a mere splash of vivid color in the vast inner cosmos, nothing more. The arrival of the Rose Flame elevated the Star Nebula's very nature by an entire tier—
The nebula already turned in a great spiral. As the raw scarlet was washed clean into a deep, luminous crimson-rose, something bloomed within the black expanse of that inner cosmos: noble, mysterious, proud, and solitary.
A rose.
The refinement was complete — and the results were instant.
Even without casting a single skill, Mo Fan could feel the power coiled inside the Rose Flame — far greater, far more potent than the raw fire he'd commanded before.
It was not restless. It did not rage. It bloomed alone in silence. But Mo Fan knew — it was every bit as dangerous as a rose's thorns.
Before, a direct hit from Fire Burst: Blast would leave most Demon-Beasts badly wounded, at best.
Now, with the Rose Flame amplifying his power by more than twofold, a single Fire Burst: Blast landing cleanly would cripple an ordinary Demon-Beast outright — or drop it on the spot.
The complication, of course, was that most Demon-Beasts moved fast. They wouldn't stand there like targets waiting to be hit. Even another Mage wielding the Rose Flame would likely just enjoy a straightforward power increase and nothing more.
But Mo Fan was a man born with Dual Elements.
First: a Lightning Seal — force-locking the Demon-Beast in place. Then: chain immediately into a Rose Flame — Fire Burst: Blast. An absolute, guaranteed kill.
His Lightning Seal Release now took one and a half seconds at most. Fire Burst likewise no more than one and a half.
Give him three seconds — just three — and creatures like One-Eyed Demon Wolves and Giant-Eyed Ape-Rats were dead. No exceptions. No argument.
Basic-tier spells didn't drain much Magical Energy. As long as he wasn't completely surrounded, Mo Fan could cut his own way out. And if he was unlucky enough to get surrounded anyway? Then let them taste what it meant to have Fire Fist Ace himself possessing his fist.