Infinite Potential System

"Nihlo, Bethany, Jonathan, and Odessa, you stick with William. Your role is defense and support for this Boss fight." Mikaela ordered. "Everyone else, with me. You'll be offense."

Nihlo and the Irisa siblings were picked out for defense exclusively because of their Elemental Affinities. Nihlo's only Affinity was the Earth Element, but because of this, he had a lot of time to focus on the single type of Magic.

Among the class, Nihlo was confident that his mastery of the Earth Element outperformed everyone else. At least, that was true before he met William.

Bethany Irisa had the Light, Sound, and Plant Affinities, which didn't place her in an offensive role, nor was it very defensive. Her greatest advantage wasn't actually Magic, but he noticed that she was much more perceptive than the rest of her classmates; likely something to do with her eyes.

She fell into the support category, so William planned to have her enhance her classmates' speed with Light Magic, while using Plant and Sound Magic to deal with the Boss' underground attacks.

Jonathan was just like Bethany, also possessing the Light, Sound, and Plant Affinities. His visual prowess was slightly weaker than hers, but he shared that he also had the Earth and Wind Affinities, totaling five Elements at his disposal. He would have the same role as Bethany, though the range of Spells he could use would be more variable.@@novelbin@@

Lastly was Odessa, who declined to share her abilities with William, nor could he discern them with his Mana Mode. It was obvious that she had a very powerful Concealment Technique, which didn't surprise him at all, nor did he plan to pry further.

After all, it was her business whether she wanted to share her abilities. It was hard to trust others in the Cultivation World.

Concealment Techniques were extremely common in the Celestial Planes, though William's current abilities could see through most of them at a glance. If they were Concealing their Cultivation, or suppressing it to a certain point, William's Cultivation Talent would hint at what their true Cultivation was.

If it exceeded the Ascension Realm, obviously the Cultivation Talent wouldn't show him anything, but if it was below that, he would know exactly what Realm they were in. It was mostly foolproof and would help him avoid the dangerous enemies.

I thought I had checked everyone out with the Cultivation Talent, but apparently, I missed her... William gave Odessa a second glance, realizing it was very difficult to keep his attention on her. Even his thoughts were trailing away, as if trying to convince him that she wasn't important.

Powerful Magic was clearly at play here, and possibly even the Fate or Karma Elements. It reminded William of when he was in the Wild Clover Restaurant down in the Five Elements Sect. A girl named Su Yanyu also had special Affinities which she used to completely hide her identity.

Revealing this fact to himself allowed William to store a suggestion within his own memory, reminding himself to pay more attention to this girl. He looked over and scanned her with the Cultivation Talent, surprised to see that she was in the Upper Stages of the Ascension Realm!

When he thought back to their first meeting, it wasn't the same way. It had clearly not revealed her Cultivation before, meaning she was either in the Initial Deity Realm or his Talent was simply ineffective.

There was only one explanation as to why he could see her Cultivation now. Either his previous Cultivation Talent wasn't strong enough to see through her Concealment Technique, or her Cultivation had regressed from the Initial Deity Realm.

Either option was terrifying, since to regress a Cultivation Realm meant her Technique was absurdly powerful compared to before. Did she also have a Mythic Cultivation Technique? It would explain why she was near the peak of the Ascension Realm at her age.

If the Ascension Realm had nine levels like the Tribulation Transcendence Realm or otherwise, it could be said that Odessa was already level eight! Compared to the rest of the students, this was a massive gap!

"What are you looking at?" Odessa frowned.

Her expression wasn't hostile, but William felt a slight pressure on his shoulders, as if he was staring face to face with a Magical Beast. When she locked eyes with him, Odessa's dark eyeshadow left a deep impression on him, as if she was also analyzing him.

The odd feeling combined with the awkward situation made William feel slightly embarrassed, leading him to turn away.

"I was just trying to figure out what you should do during the Boss fight. I don't know any of your Elements." William told a half-truth. He decided not to worry about Odessa, instead returning his attention to the battle plan.

"Ice Element." Odessa said simply, not bothering to elaborate further.

"Just Ice? Nothing else?" William asked with a raised eyebrow. He found it hard to believe that this girl only had a single Affinity. He scanned his memories for any additional information but realized that he hadn't paid any attention to her battles in the entrance exam.

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

"..." William didn't know what to say. He made a mental note that she had the Ice Element, and probably also a Mythic Element like Fate or Karma.

Mikaela had already organized her team and was looking at William, so he nodded and walked forward to open the doors of the Boss Room. He was already aware of the Boss' attack patterns, so he preferred not to put his classmates in danger right from the start.

The moment the doors opened, several long branches shot forward from the tree trunk in the center, stabbing at William with great precision. Everything happened incredibly quickly, but with the Accelerated Reflexes Talent and his Mana Control, William had plenty of time to react.

Using an advanced Spell that he created earlier, William conjured a samurai-style set of Ascended Granite armor that looked ceramic in nature, layering them perfectly with his Forcefield Talent so that it looked like the armor alone was protecting him.

William purposefully dodged the first two branches with his absurd movement speed, then allowed the remaining four to hit him squarely on the chest and at his right shoulder. As if he were facing a Tribulation Transcendence Beast, William's Ascended Plate Armor Spell only received a few scratches before the onslaught of attacks ended.

William timed the last strike to forcefully destroy his Ascended Plate Armor, absorbing the damaged earth and recovering several thousand Mana. He didn't need to do this, but William hoped that his classmates wouldn't think light of the Boss and take unnecessary losses.

He issued several orders at once. "Nihlo and Jonathan! Reinforce the ground under the Boss room! Bethany, keep an eye on any underground movements and report anything unusual to Odessa! Odessa, find a way to freeze as many incoming attacks as possible, I'll deal with the rest!"

Mikaela used this opportunity to issue her own commands, arranging her larger force in a way that would make it easy for William and the others to protect them. If everything went as planned, there should be no need for the offensive group to cast a defensive Spell.

Seeing that its first wave of attacks failed to damage William, the Morphing Devil Tree did the opposite of what a normal Magical Beast would do and chose to directly ignore him. It opened up its gnarly mouth and fired a spray of poison-coated needles that Odessa blocked with a timely Ice Wall.

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While the Bosses didn't seem to learn or grow from their previous fights, their intelligence was higher than the average creature in the Quake Dungeon. Their tactics would shift and change depending on what kind of Cultivators they were facing.

Against a large group of enemies like this, the Morphing Devil Tree seemed focused on identifying the weak links and targeting them instead. It tried to sneak several branches under the Boss Room to reach at the group, but their movements were slowed by the stronger than usual ground and easily detected by Bethany.

"Four branches! Twenty meters underground, heading towards Mikaela!" Bethany shouted, to which Odessa responded by sending several dozen ice needles at the identified area.

While she was focused on the underground, William stepped up and blocked a follow-on wave of needles with a tungsten wall, countering the Morphing Devil Tree's every move.

When Bethany gave her confirmation that the movements had stopped, Felmus conjured several javelins made from the Fire Element and sent them hurtling into the mouth of the Boss. He had just developed this Spell based on William's Starmetal Javelins from earlier.

The Morphing Devil Tree shook in anger as it suffered injuries in mere minutes, but it continued attacking with several methods that tried to breach William's team's absurd defense. Unfortunately for it, five Cultivators entirely focused on defense was too much for the singular Boss, turning what was supposed to be a difficult fight into a smackdown.

After an hour of battle, the Morphing Devil Tree's regeneration couldn't keep up with the amount of incoming damage, and its body dissolved into Quake Gems and a Morphing Devil Stick.