Wizard: Starts with Advanced Meditation

The gauntlet was covered in dark purple magic patterns. As soon as it appeared, tiny electric currents jumped across its surface. As the crystals on its surface shimmered, a purple circular shield made of electric currents condensed in front of it.

At the same moment, the ice crystal staff had already reached Sotadia and pressed against the surface of the shield. Only then did Sotadia realize that the staff was actually made up of segments of ice crystals.

Suddenly, the ice crystal at the very front lit up with a blinding blue light. The next moment, the ice crystal exploded, and piercing ice elemental energy surged out.

"Bang—Sizzle!!"

The burst of ice elemental energy collided violently with the round shield. With a loud "bang," the purple current on the surface of the round shield suddenly exploded, clashing wildly with the sweeping blue energy.

Before the energy from the first section could completely dissipate, the staff surged forward again, and the ice crystals from the second section erupted, releasing another wave of surging icy energy.

"Bang—Sizzle! Bang—Sizzle!..."

And so, the ice crystal staff advanced section by section. As soon as one section exploded into ice mist, the next section immediately surged forward. Before the lightning on the round shield could recover, a new section would explode with a bang.

This was Hughes's impromptu combination method; he divided the compressed energy stream into several parts and attached them to sections of ice crystal rods.

The explosions then occurred section by section, with each subsequent section protected by surface compression energy, thus preventing damage from the explosions of the preceding sections.

Under the series of explosions from the long staff, Sotadia was pinned to the spot, unable to move.

After exploding four or five times, with a "sizzle," a large hole was blasted into the round shield, its elemental structure became unstable, and the shield suddenly collapsed.

With only two sections of the staff remaining, Sotadia gritted his teeth and used the dense lightning around him to defend himself, but after the two explosions, before the lightning could subside, another ice crystal staff came flying at him.

This long staff was meticulously constructed by Hughes while Sotadia was defending, and not only was its power greater than before, but it also had an astonishing ten sections.

A hint of impatience flashed in Sotadia's eyes. Without the slightest hesitation, he actually withstood an explosion. Before the energy had dissipated, a pair of gauntlet-clad hands emerged and gripped the long staff in front of him tightly.

The moment the gauntlet touched the ice crystal, the dark purple magic runes suddenly lit up, and extremely fine electric currents spread wildly along the patterns on the surface of the ice crystal.

Suddenly, Sotadia's fingertips snapped shut at the seam of the long staff, precisely wedging into the weak point where the two ice crystal sections were joined.

Immediately, the crystal in his palm emitted a bright light again. This was not to release lightning outwards, but to condense the current into fine "probes" and drill into the ice crystal along the nodes.

Hughes sensed something was wrong and was about to detonate the ice crystals when he heard a crisp "crack." He looked up sharply and saw that the first section of the ice crystals in Sotadia, which was flashing blue light, had suddenly fallen off the stick.

"Puff—Buzz"

The ice crystal fell to the ground. Because it had broken free from the long staff controlled by Hughes, it lost Hughes's guidance, and the blue light that was about to burst forth on its surface suddenly dimmed and then dissipated into the air.

Immediately afterwards, countless ice crystals fell and scattered on the spot.

Hughes was shocked. He was able to control so many scattered compressed streams of light at the same time by using the ice crystal rod as a medium and his mental power to regulate the timing of the bursts of these compressed ice elements one by one.

Now that each section of the ice crystal rod is falling off one after another, Hughes has naturally lost his medium, and he is currently unable to control so many compressed ice element streams at the same time.

Without Hughes's stability, this compressed, icy-blue energy will soon dissipate.

But at that moment, Hughes's eyes narrowed, and he poured out his mental energy, each strand precisely locking onto the ice crystals closest to Sotadia.

The next second, their surfaces flashed blue light again, and the compressed energy on them was about to be detonated.

Just then, Sotadia smiled slightly, and the next second, a small electric field burst out from his body, covering the ice crystals.

The crystal on the gauntlet lit up again, and the few strands of current in the electric field condensed into a "probe" once more. However, this time it was no longer separating the ice crystals, but directly destroying the structure of the ice crystal surface that compressed energy.

In an instant, the elemental energy that was about to erupt above suddenly stopped, and then turned into specks of ice-blue fluorescence and dissipated in the air.

The electric field did not stop; instead, it expanded, enveloping Hughes.

"Sizzle—sizzle sizzle—"

This lightning was noticeably different; the dark elements on various parts of Hughes's jet-black armor fluctuated violently.

Immediately afterwards, with a few muffled hissing sounds, the armor exploded, and large and small pieces of dark elemental armor scattered, but they did not turn back into black spheres, but dissipated in the air.

"Tsk!"

Hughes frowned. He manually deactivated "Tidal Protection" and once again cast the deflection field to resist the erosion of the electric current.

But this time the current was extremely strong, and he had to expend a lot of energy to maintain the operation of the deflection field.

Sotadia smiled slightly, raised his hand and pressed down, and the current increased to another level. This time, several currents actually drilled into the force field and struck Hughes.

In an instant, a numbing sensation swept over Hughes' entire body, and some scorch marks appeared on his skin.

Hughes took out a bottle of blood-replenishing potion from his storage bag, drank it, and then raised his hands forward, strengthening the effect of the deflecting force field. The energy field expanded instantly, and the incoming electric current was completely expelled.

"Hehe, your method of compressing ice elements is ingenious, a method I've never seen before. It's a pity it's not fully formed yet, otherwise... even I would be quite wary of it."

As he spoke, Sotadia looked at his body. He had just withstood a burst of compressed ice element, and the electric current that automatically protected his body was completely blasted away. Fortunately, he was protected by his magical artifact and was not injured.

But the explosion also completely shattered his black robe, and even the magic runes on his sorcery tools became slightly blurred.

"Before you die, I'll teach you something."

Sotadia looked at Hughes, who was struggling to resist, and a hint of mockery flashed in his eyes—he was going to torture this murderer who had killed his own family.

"No matter what method you use to compress the elements, at least during the apprenticeship, the ultimate goal is to make the elements you release different from others."

"So, all elemental attacks released by compression should be compressed, you stupid commoner apprentice."

As he spoke, Sotadia bent down and picked up a piece of ice crystal that had fallen from the ground.

"But your ice crystals? They were only strengthened using elemental layering, merely having some compressed elements attached to the outside?"

Sotadia shook his head, mocking Hughes's little trick.