Compared to the intense pace of the quarterfinals and earlier rounds, the semifinal match between Su Zhi and Shao Ya started off unusually calm.

Neither Pet Beast rushed to use a skill. Instead, they paced in place, calmly observing one another.

The last time they met in the battle arena, Xiaoyue had only been playing around. Yu Bao’s victory had a large element of luck to it.

But this time, it was a real, no-holds-barred match.

Neither side would be holding back!

"Arf?"

Sensing an abnormal feedback from the Earth Force Field, Yu Bao tensed its body warily.

The arena began to tremble. Then, countless shrubs and trees burst from the surface, instantly transforming the entire stage into a jungle!

Lu Dongjie gripped the microphone excitedly. "It’s Thousand-Year Forest Prison! Xiaoyue has opened with a Wood Element Middle Elite Skill!"

[Frost Shadow Qtm: Holy crap, what kind of skill is Thousand-Year Forest Prison?]

[Annihilation: You up there, didn’t you pay attention in Introduction to Beast Taming? You don’t even know this?]

[Day after Day: So what is it...]

[Annihilation: I don’t know either.]

[Golden Rare: Then what the hell are you talking about!]

"This is a relatively rare Wood Element Skill that can alter the surrounding environment in a short time, creating a field perfectly suited for a Huajing Cat to battle in."

Lu Dongjie spoke rapidly. "The vegetation created by Thousand-Year Forest Prison has the effect of reinforcing soil and water. The Divine Strategy Alliance even used Pet Beasts with this skill to manage soil erosion in Shanyou Province."

"It’s impossible for an artificially bred Pet Beast to awaken this skill. Only a Pet Beast that grew up in a purely natural environment has a chance of mastering it!"

"Many of Yu Bao’s skills rely on sand and dust, and the jungle environment created by Thousand-Year Forest Prison is extremely disadvantageous for Yu Bao’s ability to freely control the Earth Element!"

"You could say that Yu Bao is already at a disadvantage right from the start!"

[Frost Shadow Qtm: Isn’t that totally broken??]

[Day after Day: Right?! I thought this was the first-year bracket... What is this...]

[Butterfly Fan Bone: Using a Middle Elite Skill as a first-year... Terrifying...]

[Audience38128: It’s over. I used to joke that Su Zhi was definitely going to lose, but this time, he’s really going to lose...]

On the stage, Xiaoyue leveraged the power of the Thousand-Year Forest Prison to unleash Vine Fury on Yu Bao.

Compared to a directly cast Vine Fury, the vines within the Thousand-Year Forest Prison were thicker, longer, more numerous, and more powerful!

Yu Bao struggled to dodge using Desert Concealment.

In such a dense jungle, even transforming into sand and wind to evade became difficult.

The effect of the Thousand-Year Forest Prison on Yu Bao was no less than that of the White Mist.

Xiaoyue controlled the vines, watching from afar as Yu Bao scurried around like a mouse.

This was the advantage of a Wood Element Pet Beast: it could maintain non-contact combat and reduce its own attrition.

Suddenly, the ground beneath Xiaoyue’s feet vibrated faintly. Countless Yellow Earth Walls shot up one after another, thrusting toward Xiaoyue from below!

Xiaoyue had expected this and nimbly dodged by riding a vine.

’I have to admit, that dumb puppy’s tactic of ’capturing the king to capture the bandits’ is the right move.’

’But using it against a magnificent big brother like me is far too simple.’

He had watched Yu Bao grow up. The moment Yu Bao lifted its butt, Xiaoyue knew what it was about to do. A sneak attack? Not a chance.

Faced with the Yellow Earth Walls that resembled a range of continuous mountains and deep valleys, Xiaoyue dodged with ease.

But when he looked back, the slight smirk on his lips instantly froze—

The environment created by the Thousand-Year Forest Prison had been utterly devastated by Yu Bao’s Yellow Earth Walls.

’Damn it! My little forest!’

"It’s... it’s Yellow Earth Wall!"

Lu Dongjie’s eyes went wide. "Faced with Xiaoyue’s Thousand-Year Forest Prison, Yu Bao has used Yellow Earth Wall to plow through the entire forest and tear it to shreds!"

[Golden Rare: LMAO, his true intention was not in the wine.]

[Annihilation: Holy crap, you can use Yellow Earth Wall like that?]

[Day after Day: Well, Yellow Earth Wall is usually summoned directly on the surface, but theoretically, summoning it from underground to burst through the surface is also possible...]

[Butterfly Fan Bone: No, the point is... how is he so proficient at it???]

"Well done!"

Su Zhi clenched his fist, a sudden realization dawning on him.

’No wonder Yu Bao was constantly summoning Yellow Earth Walls for fun around the neighborhood recently. So this is what it was practicing!’

"Use Furious Sand Blade to harass Xiaoyue! Don’t let it establish a continuous rhythm of attack!"

"Woof!"

Yu Bao acknowledged the command.

Three Furious Sand Blades materialized beside it at once and shot toward Xiaoyue without pause.

Yu Bao didn’t fire all its Furious Sand Blades at once. Instead, it allocated its firepower according to the principle of a three-stage volley.

One firing, one on standby, one reloading.

This arrangement guaranteed maximum continuity of fire!

Faced with Yu Bao’s dense assault, Xiaoyue could only keep dodging.

The vines that tried to block the blades were quickly reaped, and the field was soon littered with severed tendrils.

The density of the Furious Sand Blade barrage was just right. Since Xiaoyue lacked a rapid movement skill to escape, it could only tire itself out dodging from a distance.

[Annihilation: God Su is a beast! He’s already taken back the tempo!]

[Frost Shadow Qtm: Who said our society has no great emperors!]

[Day after Day: But Xiaoyue shouldn’t be that easy to deal with...]

Until Lu Dongjie’s exclamation cut everyone off:

"Xiaoyue took the attack on purpose! What is it planning?"

It wasn’t just Lu Dongjie and the live stream viewers; everyone in the arena focused their gazes on the wound on Xiaoyue’s left side.

A drop or two of blood fell, moistening the severed vine branches beneath it.

Faced with that last Furious Sand Blade, Xiaoyue was clearly capable of dodging it. Instead, it moved to meet the attack, not even activating a single defense skill.

Su Zhi met the focused gaze of the white-haired girl.

"I told you I was going all out."

Shao Ya closed her eyes slightly and raised her right hand, the back of it facing outward. A leaf-shaped pattern emerged on her fair skin.

The girl’s body began to emit a faint red glow.

When she opened her eyes again, her azure pupils had turned crimson!

The bullet comments exploded instantly—

[Frost Shadow Qtm: That’s my wife!!!]

[Annihilation: Person above! Draw your sword!!]

[Golden Rare: Who was it before the match that said they were gonna slay the waifu to prove their Dao?!]

[Annihilation: But it’s white hair and red eyes!]

[Frost Shadow Qtm: But it’s white hair and red eyes!]

[Audience38128: But it’s white hair and red eyes!]

+1

+1...

"We can see that contestant Shao Ya has become very... ahem, appealing... no, that’s not right."

"We can see that as contestant Shao Ya’s eyes changed, the broken vines around Xiaoyue have begun turning deep red!"

Unlike the pack of unruly viewers all gawking at the white hair and red eyes, Lu Dongjie remained dedicated to his duty of commentating on the match.

"The red is spreading through the vines, and the reddened vines are rapidly regaining their vitality!"

"No known skill bears a high similarity to this phenomenon. Combined with the change in contestant Shao Ya, we can preliminarily deduce that this is her Beast Taming Talent!"

On the stage, all the reddened vines recovered their vitality at that moment and began to multiply rapidly.

Like the magic beans from a fairy tale that could sprout a beanstalk to the heavens, the broken vines took root in the earth and instantly grew to an immense size.

Countless blood-colored vines writhed across the stage, like the tentacles of a deep-sea leviathan reaching above the surface.

The girl blinked her crimson eyes, her aura growing sharper than before. At the same time, the leaf-shaped mark on the back of her hand began to slowly shrink.

That’s right, this was Shao Ya’s Beast Taming Talent.

Forest Quartet: First Movement - Crimson Prayer

Effect: At the cost of your own or your Pet Beast’s blood, temporarily revive all lifeless vegetation within a certain area, while randomly granting it a new trait.

By choosing to be struck by a Furious Sand Blade it could have avoided, Xiaoyue was signaling its master to use her talent.

Under Xiaoyue’s control, innumerable blood-colored vines twisted and lashed out at Yu Bao, like an enraged squid!

"Yu Bao, watch out!"

"WOOF!"

The situation on the field reversed in an instant.

There were simply too many Blood Vines, and they covered nearly every direction. Yu Bao could no longer maintain its offense and was forced to redirect its Furious Sand Blades to attack the vines instead.

However, something happened that astonished Yu Bao:

A Furious Sand Blade shot out, cleanly severing a vine, but the severed ends of the vine began to rapidly multiply instead.

The Blood Vine, split in two by the blade, multiplied and reconnected, transforming into a secondary Blood Vine with two branching forks!

Xiaoyue watched this scene with perfect calm, a crimson light flowing within its light green pupils.

Random Trait: Sanguine Multiplication.

When the plant’s body is broken, it will rapidly grow and reconnect with the severed branch, becoming even stronger and more numerous than before the break.

Of course, the consumption of its own Energy Value would also increase dramatically!

[Golden Rare: My god, that’s suffocating just to watch...]

[Semi-Pro Novelist: What kind of talent is that? It’s way too broken!]

[Frost Shadow Qtm: What do you expect from the tournament’s #1 seed?]

[Day after Day: This is insane, it feels completely impossible to win...]

"The constantly multiplying Blood Vines have blocked all of Yu Bao’s escape routes! Yu Bao is trying to break through with Furious Sand Blade, but the effect isn’t ideal!"

Lu Dongjie said, clutching the microphone, his face flushed with excitement.

"Xiaoyue has completely seized the rhythm of the match! If this keeps up, Shao Ya’s victory is just a matter of—huh, what the?!"

In that moment, Xiaoyue’s pupils dilated in surprise.

Its power was close to Yu Bao’s. Theoretically, it should have been impossible for Yu Bao to break out of the Blood Vines’ encirclement.

In that split second, the speed at which Yu Bao activated Desert Concealment suddenly increased, forcefully carving a path to survival out of the Blood Vines’ siege!

Su Zhi clenched his fists, a faint blue glow that no one else could see flashing in his eyes—

[Pet Beast: Yu Bao (Yu Dian Dog)

Power: 1.20

Agility: 1.74

Intelligence: 1.78

Constitution: 1.20

Perception: 1.73]

[Assignable Attribute Points: 0.01]

[Real-time Energy Value: 1134]

When Yu Bao stepped onto the stage, it still had 0.13 Assignable Attribute Points, and its Agility stat was 1.62.

These 0.13 points were all the points Su Zhi had accumulated since the start of the tournament. However, because Fang Yuan had put him under such immense pressure, Su Zhi had hesitated for days, unable to decide where to allocate them.

But in this moment, he no longer hesitated—

Days of accumulation transformed into a sudden surge of agility—this was the key that Su Zhi and Yu Bao had forged themselves to turn the tide!

In reality, Xiaoyue was strong in every aspect.

Even with Yu Bao’s agility boosted to 1.74, it wasn’t something Xiaoyue couldn’t handle.

However, just as a single feather drifting down at the wrong moment can cause a strongman to fail a lift of several hundred kilograms, Yu Bao’s sudden burst of speed caused the highly focused Xiaoyue to falter for a brief moment.

"Yu Bao! Now! Break out and counterattack!"

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