If Heaven hadn't given birth to me, I would be arrogant.

In fact, not only Fox, but everyone else was also a little confused. How could a thorn seed appear in this duel arena?

Speaking of these thorn seeds, they are considered one of the most unsuccessful magical creations researched by mages on the Holy Word Continent. As everyone knows, mages' weapons are wooden staffs, and the harder the wood, the stronger its magical properties. As one of the hardest woods on the continent, the wood of the thorn tree has been favored by many mages.

However, even the hardest wood cannot withstand the continuous infusion of high-intensity magic. Therefore, many magicians' followers carry a bundle of thick thornwood so that the magician can change and make a staff at any time.

So, some wood-elemental mages came up with a solution: they would use wood-elemental magic to wrap thorn seeds and plant them in the ground whenever needed, instantly obtaining a new thorn tree. This saved their followers from carrying heavy loads and effectively increased their followers' combat power!

All plant seeds on the continent will immediately grow once planted after being wrapped in a layer of wood-attribute magic. The growth rate is directly related to the level of the magician who wrapped the magic; the stronger the wood-attribute magic, the faster the growth rate!

It is said that a wood-elemental mage once infused a wisteria seed with his magic and released it during battle. The wisteria instantly matured and strangled his opponent to death.

Strangely, however, the thorn seed, regardless of whether it was infused with magic by a powerful mage or the weakest magic apprentice, always produced the same result: it not only failed to grow into a thorn tree, but instead corroded the ground, creating a small pit.

Thus, after being ridiculed by many non-wood attribute mages, this magical research gradually became the best tool for clearing farmland.

Magical research is very expensive. To make money, some young wood magic apprentices would infuse large quantities of thornwood seeds with weak magic and then sell them to farmers. Farmers would simply scatter the seeds when clearing land, and the next day the ground would be covered with small pits, completely softened, and incredibly easy to turn over!

The result of this research was that farmers gained another powerful tool for clearing land, and wood-attribute mages were jokingly referred to by mages of other attributes as "land pioneers!"

At this moment, thorn seeds, the kind that only grow on farms, appeared in the arena and coincidentally overturned Little Fox's warhorse, which surprised everyone!

“Think back to what just happened!” Old Flot continued patiently, “After Xiao Zong greeted Xiao Fox face to face, when he returned to his duel location, wasn’t he walking very slowly?”

"I understand!" Zong said loudly, "That little brat scattered thorn seeds as he walked. The seeds were so small that we didn't notice them at all. By the time Little Fox urged his warhorse forward, there were already small pits all in front of him!"

"That little brat! He's got so many bad ideas!" Zong Kuang finally understood and couldn't help but mutter a curse under his breath.

But Lan Qizhan, standing nearby, was thinking more deeply: "Teacher, what you just mentioned about Xiao Zong's heavy armor units..."

Before the old prime minister could answer, Zong Xiaozhang interjected, "Need I say more? If this little brat uses this thing, he could really wipe out the entire heavy cavalry legion of the Bright Empire with just an infantry battalion. Those knights are covered in heavy armor, and if they just fall to the ground like that, how can they get up? The infantry battalion can just slowly cut off their heads!"

When Zong arrogantly uttered those words, Old Fox suddenly snapped out of his daze. He immediately shouted, "Oh no! My son is wearing heavy armor too!"

"Ah!" Everyone then realized that it was still duel time and quickly turned their attention back to the duel arena. What they saw there left them all dumbfounded!

It turns out that little Fox was quite young, and in order to sit more steadily on the horse, he actually tied his legs to the saddle with his body.

To be honest, many people have used this method, even Zong Kuang used it when he was young. But right now, Little Fox's warhorse has fallen over.

Little Fox's warhorse was already incredibly heavy with its armor, and the fall had broken its front leg, so it couldn't get up at all. It just lay on its side on the ground.

This was tough on Little Fox, whose leg was pinned under the horse's leg. Fortunately, Little Fox was wearing heavy armor, except for the fact that he wasn't wearing a helmet to look cool. If it weren't for the leg guards in that armor, Little Fox's leg would probably have been crushed by the warhorse!

At this moment, Zong Ze was standing in front of Little Fox, still holding the fire poker in his hand, not saying a word, just looking at Little Fox lying at his feet with a "savage" smile!

"What are you laughing at? Aren't you going to pull me out?" Little Fox couldn't hold back any longer and shrieked!

"Pull you out?" Zong Ze looked completely innocent. "Why should I pull you out? Aren't we in a duel? You haven't admitted defeat, and the referee hasn't called a stop. Why should I pull you out, my little treasurer!"

At this point, the referee could have easily called a halt to the duel. Why even bother? One of them had been overpowered by his own horse from the start! However, the referee, like everyone in the stands, was stunned by the scene and hadn't quite recovered yet!

"What financial assistant?" Although Fox was pinned down from his horse, he was not injured and was not in much pain. Hearing Zong Ze call him a financial assistant, he did not react for a moment!

"Isn't your dad the Minister of Finance? Then I'll call you Little Minister of Finance!" Zong Ze said with a teasing look.

"Ignorant!" Hearing that Zong Ze seemed to have little knowledge of official positions, Fox's face was full of arrogance: "Who told you that if your father holds a certain position, your son must hold the same position? Does that mean that just because your father is a general, I can call you a little general?"

"Uh... well!" Zong Ze thought for a moment, then said seriously, "If you really want to call me that, I can reluctantly accept it! But, whether you can accept it or not, from now on I'll call you Finance Assistant!"

"I'm not going to argue with an ignorant fool like you!" Fox said arrogantly. "Hurry up and pull me out, this horse is so heavy!"

"Pull you out?" Zong Ze suddenly looked thoughtful, and after a moment he slowly said, "Pulling you out is not impossible, but it seems that we are currently dueling, so I, Zong Ze, as the duelist, formally ask you to admit defeat to me!"