Chapter 322: Elemental Fire

The grand spiritual bells of the Abyssal Lotus Pavilion boomed a third time, the deep, resonant echoes vibrating across the volcanic stone pillars of the main colosseum. The final, definitive phase of the recruitment trial—Stage 3: The Innate Fire Selection—had officially arrived.

The atmosphere inside the stadium was tightly coiled, thick with a toxic mix of anticipation and noble arrogance. High above the arena floor, behind a massive, semi-translucent array glass window, Lady Vivienne Vane sat in her private box. Her elegant, breathtakingly beautiful face was perfectly calm, but her violet eyes were locked entirely onto Tony Clark's lazy, unbothered figure down below.

On the arena floor, a long row of high-grade, black iron testing pillars had been raised from the white marble floor. Each pillar was anchored to an ancient, subterranean spirit-sensing array. To pass this final hurdle, the examinees had to manually channel their internal fire-attribute elements, unleashing their innate flames directly into the core of the black iron. The pillar would then glow, projecting the precise color, heat density, and classification rank of the fire directly into the sky for the entire city to witness.

"Stage 3, begin!" the head proctor roared, violently waving a crimson flag.

Almost instantly, the young noble masters of the capital district stepped forward, desperate to wash away the intense humiliation of Tony's back-to-back perfect scores from the earlier rounds. They pushed their internal energies to their absolute, desperate limits, eager to prove that a country-bumpkin archer could never match the raw, biological heritage of the capital's elite.

BOOM!

A bright, crackling surge of dark-red elemental fire violently erupted from the station on the far left. Gerald Vance had thrust both his palms forward, channeling his 10th-Class Grand Disciple base into the iron. The testing pillar glowed intensely, projecting a solid, heavy scarlet pillar of light forty feet into the sky.

"Gerald Vance! Earth-Core Flame! High-Tier Mortal Rank!" the announcer shouted, earning a loud wave of cheers from the Vance clan lackeys in the stands.

But the cheers were instantly swallowed by a far more terrifying, world-suppressing wave of heat that exploded from the absolute center of the front row. Lady Scarlet stepped forward, her beautiful face twisted into a mask of pure, psychotic pride. She gritted her teeth and manually unleashed the true, deep-seated heritage of her royal support faction from her physical meridians.

ROAR!

A colossal, blazing inferno of deep, violet-crimson fire violently erupted from her palms, twisting in the air like a literal, roaring beast before slamming directly into the black iron column. The testing pillar hummed beautifully under the intense thermal compression, and a magnificent, hundred-foot pillar of blinding, fiery light shot straight through the clouds, causing the ambient temperature inside the colosseum to spike so drastically that the clothes of several nearby applicants began to faintly scorch.

"Lady Scarlet! The Vermilion Beast Fire Body! Low-Tier Earth Rank!" the head proctor announced in absolute, trembling awe.

The entire stadium erupted into a massive, unprecedented wave of frantic cheering and proud roars from the popular elder-rank masters on the sidelines. Lady Scarlet tilted her chin upward with an agonizing amount of royal pride, her fiery eyes locking onto Tony with a sharp, predatory intensity as she wiped a drop of sweat from her brow.

"Look at that, you talentless country bumpkin!" Scarlet sneered coldly, her silky voice carrying a sharp edge that echoed across the stone platform. "You can memorize a textbook or calculate the weight of an herb through a temporary fluke of luck, but you can never forge a supreme, innate beast fire out of thin air! A primitive archer who plays with wooden sticks will always remain an insect beneath the absolute weight of a true royal fire prodigy!"

"Haha! Lady Scarlet speaks the absolute truth!" Gerald Vance jeered loudly from his station, his gold silks rustling as he laughed. "Let the country bumpkin show us his pathetic little sparks! He probably doesn't even have enough fire energy to heat a common kettle!"

Tony Clark stood perfectly still at the absolute edge of the front line, his hands casually tucked back into the pockets of his dark hunting cloak. He didn't flinch, he didn't panic, and he didn't show even a single fraction of internal distress under their burning, mocking glares. A slow, deeply villainous grin curled the corners of his lips as his Truth Eye effortlessly scanned the trembling golden fire pillars in the sky. To a true supreme villain whose system spirit was fully awake and whose internal meridians possessed a 9th-Class peak solar foundation, their proud beast fires and their arrogant biological heritages were nothing more than common dust.

Tony took a slow, deliberate step forward, his heavy leather boots making a clear, resonant clicking sound on the white marble floor as he approached his assigned black iron testing pillar. He casually pulled his right hand out of his cloak pocket, his posture perfectly lazy and unhurried as he lightly laid his bare palm against the cold, unyielding surface of the stone column.

I am Tony Clark, his strategic mind roared internally, his dark eyes flashing with an unnatural, terrifyingly sharp brilliance as his consciousness connected directly with the interface of the Fated Villain System.

The four great powerhouses believe their low-tier earth fires are the absolute pinnacle of this city, but on my grand chessboard, their pride is nothing more than the perfect fuel to launch my final ascension toward the World Alchemy Summit. Let us show this entire city who truly owns the absolute laws of fire in this universe.

With a sudden, silent mental command, Tony violently unleashed the full, explosive depth of his 9th Class Elder Disciple solar foundation directly through the runic pathways of his arm, activating a forbidden, higher-realm cosmic flame that the system had perfectly synchronized into his flesh.

BOOM!

An absolute, incomprehensible explosion of pure, blinding white-gold solar fire violently erupted from Tony's bare palm, instantly slamming straight into the core of the black iron testing pillar. The impact was so immensely thick, so filled with a dense, primordial law energy that the massive black iron column didn't just glow—it violently cracked down the absolute middle within a fraction of a single millisecond, unable to safely contain the terrifying thermal density of the flame.

A colossal, reality-shattering pillar of blinding, white-gold cosmic fire shot straight through the heavens, tearing a massive, three-mile-wide physical hole directly through the thick storm clouds above the city.

The sheer, world-suppressing heat wave radiating from his palm caused the entire colosseum floor to instantly begin to turn into liquid, bubbling lava. The hundred-foot fire pillars of Lady Scarlet and Gerald Vance were completely, systematically swallowed and vaporized into absolute nothingness by the white-gold light, looking like nothing more than dim candles before a rising sun.

The ancient Mighty Dragon Cry violently boomed from the core of the cracked pillar, a sound wave so immense and full of pure, divine authority that thousands of weak-hearted young nobles in the stands instantly let out screams of biological terror, dropping onto their knees as they covered their ears in absolute panic.

The entire colosseum fell into a state of shocked, paralyzed stillness so absolute that the frantic, hyper-ventilating breathing of Lady Scarlet became completely audible to everyone. Her face turned an incredibly beautiful shade of pale, her wide violet eyes staring at the white-gold column of light in utter, unadulterated horror as her proud Vermilion Beast Fire was completely crushed into ash.

High above the arena floor, Lady Vivienne Vane violently stood up from her plush chair inside her private box, her breathtakingly beautiful face twisting into a mask of total, dizzying awe as she stared through the array glass.

Her alchemical sea was violently humming in response to the white-gold light, her heart pounding furiously against her ribs as she recognized the forbidden signature of a Sovereign Sun Core Flame—a legendary, higher-realm cosmic fire that hadn't been seen on this continent for over five centuries.

"A Sovereign Sun Flame..." Lady Vivienne whispered softly, her silky voice trembling with an intense wave of fanatical excitement and absolute certainty as she pushed open her balcony doors. "He didn't just pass the test... he completely mocked the entire medical registry of our empire! This boy is the absolute master I have been waiting for!"

The head proctor stood paralyzed before his altar, his crimson flag dropping from his trembling fingers onto the melting floor as he looked up at the broken ledger screen, his voice shaking violently as he made the official announcement to the stunned city.

"Winner of Stage 3: Tony Clark! Perfect Score—100%! Absolute, Unprecedented Divine Prodigy Rank!"

Tony Clark casually pulled his hand back from the cracked iron pillar, his standard lazy smirk perfectly returning to his face as he tucked his fingers back into his dark hunting cloak. He turned his dark eyes toward the pale, trembling figures of the four great powerhouses, a slow, villainous grin curling his lips as he prepared to step into Lady Vivienne's inner sanctum to claim his absolute summit recommendation token, leaving the entire city of shattered nobles weeping in the dust behind his boots.

-Tq guys