Shuxue rolled the stone out of his Immortal’s cave, just as he heard an anguished cry.
“NOOOOOOOOO!” A Mathivator with a long gray beard that touched his toes fell to his knees, aghast. The headless corpse of a young man who couldn’t be older than thirty lay on the ground in front of him.
“My son! My one and only son, who was actually a good person unlike all the other young masters, died!” The man scratched his face in despair until blood came out of the gashes he had ripped into his own face.
“I just wanted him to go out and gain some experience beating up weaklings, and I never expected he died! But he did!”
“I’m Zhujiao! Your son was a bad man!” Zhujiao laughed as he squeezed the head of another disciple into mush.
“You!” The old man wheeled around, staring with bloodshot eyes at Zhujiao. “You killed my concubine over a dinner table, and now you killed my sole son! Only one of us will be walking away tonight, Zhujiao!”
Zhujiao smiled. “That’s just what I, Zhujiao, wanted to hear! If I beat you, you have to give me 100,000 Arithmetic pearls!”
The old man’s eyes bugged. “You aren’t getting anything from me either way! Take this!”
Mathforce blasted out of the old man, coalescing into a circle with a triangle inscribed inside it. The triangle had one edge affixed to the circumference of the circle, and rotated around the circle like a clock hand, changing size as it did so. It seemed to contain many profound mysteries inside it. More Mathforce erupted out of the circle, forming into the illusory image of a hulking giant with one golden eye. Its arms swung down towards Zhujiao with the might of a falling boulder.
“The Circle Cyclops technique, the signature technique of Trigonometry stage experts of the Greenhill Sector!” Shuxue breathed out a sigh of incredulity.
No matter how many rules Zhujiao broke, there was no way he could stand up to such a blow. Geometry mathforce was slightly over 3 times more powerful than Arithmetic mathforce, and Trigonometry mathforce was 10 times as powerful as geometry mathforce! There was simply no way Zhujiao could overcome that. No way.
An illusory grid shimmered into existence above Zhujiao. A tremendous boom rippled out as the fist smashed into the grid, destroying nearby rocks and trees.
Zhujiao…
was absolutely unscathed! He smirked at the old man, whose face had completely drained of blood. Shuxue’s eyes bugged with shock, just like they had the last ten times Zhujiao had broken the rules.
“Impossible!”
“This Zhujiao actually took on an attack from a Trigonometry-stage practitioner, and lived!”
“He must have some profound treasure on him!”
The Mathivators of the several hundred Sectors that had arrived had been wearing expressions of righteous fury, but now there was also a trace of greed.
Zhujiao just sneered. “It’s my turn!” He lifted up a single finger at the old man.
The old man gritted his teeth, sweeping his hand out. A circular shield, inscribed with countless triangles, shimmered into existence.
An illusory finger shot out of Zhujiao, smashing straight into the shield.
1!
The old man, who had been covering his eyes, lifted them up just to see the 1 spelled out by the mathforce from the attack dissipate into smoke.
Shuxue watched, perplexed. “What the fuck?”
Another finger smashed into the shield.
2!
“How dare you trick me!” The old man roared. Waving his hand, the shield disappeared. The old man executed another circle cyclops attack, which once again was blocked by the illusory grid that formed right when the attack descended.
Another finger flew into the old man, and another.
6! 24!
The thousands of enemies present at the scene watched, completely confused. They were so mystified by the sheer weakness of the attack that they didn’t even think about joining the fight.
Shuxue began edging away. “This is the perfect time to make my getaway! I have to thank brother Zhujiao when he reincarnates! This favor is too large for me to ever be bothered to repay. Though it’s his fault all these people are here to begin with.”
Zhujiao punched out, sending a 120 into the old man. It made a small rip in his clothes, but otherwise did nothing.
“Fool! You think you can injure me, someone with 79 years of Mathivation who has meditated into the early trigonometry stage, with a trifling attack like that?” The old man roared. Giant fists smashed down repeatedly upon Zhujiao, all of them completely ineffective. “Let’s just wait for the moment this grid shield runs out! I know it can’t last too long!”
“I’m Zhujiao! My Plot Armor will never expire to the likes of you!” Zhujiao palmed with his hand.
720! A small cut appeared on the old man’s arm, which he completely ignored.
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“Friends, help me destroy this grid! This little boy must die today, or the heavens will weep from injustice!”
Another palm rocketed into the old man. 5,760!
“Eh? What the hell?” Shuxue stared in shock at the 5,760 attack value. “There’s no way an Arithmetic practitioner could channel so much mathforce! That makes no sense!”
The old man coughed out some blood. His eyes were venomous, but when he saw Zhujiao palming towards him again, he couldn’t help but feel a sense of apprehension in his heart. The shield rematerialized in front of him to block the incoming blow. At the same time, a cloud of illusory mathforce dragons, lotus flowers, light swords, thorny vines, and numbers flew past him, slamming straight towards Zhujiao.
A sphere of annihilation swept out from the impact zone, destroying everything it touched. Numbers ranging from the low thousands to the tens of thousands shot into the air. Buildings were reduced to rubble. Boulders flew through the air. One of them hurtled through the air towards a little toddler.
“Whorton! No!” Another boy ran forward, tackling the toddler just in time for the both of them to be smashed into a puddle of blood.
Shuxue couldn’t help but snicker to himself when he saw this. “This is why you never help other people!”
A single number flew out of the cloud of mathforce, blasting straight through the circular shield and turning the old man into a lump of meat patty.
40,320!
All the other Mathivators were in disbelief.
“This is impossible!”
“Zhujiao’s only an Arithmetic stage Mathivator! How could he perform such a move!”
“We must escape!” One man said, his face ashen. But before he could flee, a giant, illusory boulder descended down, smashing him and four other Mathivators into liquid.
362,880!
“I’m Zhujiao!” Zhujiao shouted, walking out of the crater made by the mass attack of the surrounding Mathivators. “I killed six of you, so you all owe me 100,000+100,000+100,000+100,000+100,000+100,000=... 600,000 pearls!”
“Do your math faster!” Shuxue blanched. Unknowingly, he had stopped to watch.
“Can’t you multiply, you little shit?” Despite themselves, some of the Mathivators could not refrain from shouting. They just couldn’t help but cringe at this method of mathematics. Shuxue even felt he could vomit.
“Of course I can multiply! I’m Zhujiao! Who do you think I am?” Zhujiao was indignant, and folded his arms.
“Oh, right! We have to flee!” Another Mathivator immediately turned tail and began to run for his life.
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
“Flee!”
Every single remaining Mathivator shouted “Flee!” at the top of their lungs, as if doing so would teleport them far, far away.
Zhujiao bent down to his knees, vaulting high into the air. A small hill smashed down onto another twenty Mathivators.
3,628,800!
“Taste the power of the ultimate technique of I, Zhujiao!” Zhujiao shouted. His hands had been brought up above his head. As if he was throwing something with all his might, the hands flew forward, and Zhujiao blasted back.
A gargantuan shadow, several kilometers wide and long, descended upon the thousands of fleeing Mathivators. A cloud of dust enveloped them as the ground caved inward, causing easily noticeable earthquakes that would ripple through this plane for several days.
39,916,800!
When the dust cleared, Shuxue could see a giant canyon carved into the section of the Brownwater Sector entrance. Every few hundred meters, there would be a bloodstain on the ground. It was as if an invisible mountain had fallen upon the earth! Only, all Shuxue had seen was a shadow descending over the heads of the invading Mathivators. This attack… was truly mysterious!