Hidden genius: Black belly snake

Chapter 159: Flame Serpent Spell Part4

After her fight, Tang Yue immediately hurried back to the royal palace. 

Just now while she was witnessing first hand the flame serpent spell, she had achieved a small breakthrough in her fire magic comprehension.

So she dashed straight to the Crown's private quarters and settled into a meditative pose on the outer courtyard surrounding the golden lotus pond.

While she felt herself being engulfed by the flame serpent, for an instance Tang Yue was completely surrounded by a thick surge of flame essence.

Typically, one would be extremely hurt and writhing in agony rather than enjoying this feeling, but Tang Yue had donned on a powerful armor, and she also possessed a higher than normal heat resistance.

So she was able to focus more on the other aspects of the flame serpent spell apart from his skin melting flesh burning intense heat.

This was in fact a perfect example of how the rich get stronger and the strong get richer. The whole thing was a vicious cycle.

Since Tang Yue was able to afford such high-end pieces of equipment, she was able to comprehend something as complex as a mid-grade spell just like that.

While others struggled from the basics and learned everything step by step, practicing fire magic for almost a decade, she had managed to grasp the essence in a mere few days.

That being said, it was still her own tireless efforts and high mental strength that helped her achieve this quick result.

Sometimes, even if you throw buckets and buckets of gold, some people still might not be capable of grasping the concepts as quickly as she did.

Tang Yue inhaled and exhaled steadily and she began pulling the fire essence around her at a much faster rate.

The whole process was so effortless as if she was a magnet attracting the fire essence mana particles around her.

She could even feel her entire body brimming with the similar type of fire essence mana particles, pulsating in rhythm.

She bit her lips and held on to this feeling, as more and more fire essence was drawn to her body, everything oscillating in perfect harmony.

Slowly and steadily she tried to gather these oscillating energy particles to her cultivation core. 

This was an intuitive process that was similar to filling up one's lungs with oxygen.

The fire essence mana particles that were spread out and vibrating in all parts of her body, including her blood, bones, and muscles, now started slowly coalescing near her lower abdomen.

Fire essence mana swirled vibrantly within her like a sea in turmoil.

Soon, this swirling wave of energy started compressing bit by bit.

The sea of energy condensed to a ball of fire essence mana that proudly thrummed in her lower abdomen.

This was a mana core.

Tang Yue had finally condensed a mana core! 

Not just any mana core, but a mana core which entirely consisted of rich fire elemental essence.

..

Ding. Congratulations. Mana constitution has been upgraded to Diamond-tier Mortal Core

Ding. 1000 Experience Points have been rewarded.

..

Ding. Congratulations. Mana constitution has been upgraded to Bronze-tier Martial Core

Ding. 2000 Experience Points have been rewarded.

..

Ding. Congratulations. A fire essence mana core has been stably established.

Ding. 5000 Experience Points have been rewarded.

..

Tang Yue blinked her emerald eyes and smiled weakly as she saw the notifications and the experience points rolling in one after the other.

With her mana constitution upgraded as well, she had finally stepped out of the mortal tier and was a legitimate martial tier expert.

The snake could vividly feel the small ball of energy in her body and smiled contently. Now she was a true spirit beast!

After grinning for a while, she rubbed her eyes sleepily.

Forming a mana core was a rather tedious process and it had drained her completely.

So she flopped onto the marble floor in tiredness and went to sleep right then and there.

Loud snoring sounds echoed in the empty lavish courtyard as the snake peacefully slept through the day.

Unfortunately for her, her jade slip wasn't as inactive as she would have wanted it to be.

Throughout the rest of the day, the small piece of jade slip kept glowing intermittently.

Lotte tried his best to wake her up but the snake was fast asleep in a deep slumber. She didn't even budge a little.

And when she finally did wake up, it was already the next morning.

Lotte hurried over nervously and quickly filled her in on all the details.

Apparently, while she was sleeping, Tang Yue had missed a few matches and her victory to loss count was in a precarious state.

After her first dominating victory, the next three or four opponents had readily conceded, but the fifth opponent was determined to face her.

His pride didn't allow him to concede without even exchanging a few blows with the opponent and he decided to go through with the fight.

And luckily for him, Tang Yue was sleeping like a rock. So he ended up winning by default.

This single loss would have been fine, but how could the others let this chance go?

Tang Yue's next two opponents as well chose to fight and achieved victories by default since she didn't show up, resulting in a total of three losses for the undefeated shameless snake.

To make matters worse, by the end of the day, the five thousand participants had finally shrunk to a small elite total of 100.

At this point, the tournament-style changed suddenly into a quick and brutal round of eliminations.

Anyone who suffered a loss twice would be out of the tournament.

The only exceptions were those who hadn't suffered any loss until now. They had four chances. 

All others including Tang Yue, who had previously suffered a loss had only one chance. She was allowed only one loss.

"Hmm. This is bad, but nothing that can't be salvaged." 

The snake chuckled wickedly and quickly made her way to the fighting arena.