“Patriarch, you aren’t thinking of joining the fight too, are you?” asked one of the elders standing behind Youjin Liu. “If you were to be injured here today, think of what would happen to the clan.”
“Worry not. I might be missing a good workout, but I am not suicidal,” Liu said. He hid the excited tremble in his hands within his long sleeves, but the Youjin Elder knew him too well.
How long has it been since I was able to truly go all out? The thrill of chasing a fiend down and ending its life. Youjin Liu shook his head despondently. I cannot say I miss that life, although it was undoubtedly romantic. But with the way the fight is going, we may not have a choice…
He noticed the grim atmosphere amongst his entourage, and even among the sects and the Free Sparrow Gang members who had set their base nearby.
“My brother has joined the fray. This one figures that by the time the tea is hot, the fight would have already been over,” Youjin Liu said with a slight smile.
He was joking, of course.
They were standing on the precipice of a cliff, about a mile away from where the powerhouses were fighting the Unfolding Heaven 1st Order Wretched Emissary. The fight was still contained in the valley, and around the trenches and within the caves, the Voidfiends still warred with the Chaosfiends.
If any dared to get too close to the cultivators’ camp, they would be swiftly dealt with. For these smaller fiends were of no worry.
They would have no effect on the future of those present here, let alone on the Dim Gold City and the various clans and sects.
The Wretched Emissary was different. It was an apocalypse personified.
Even as they were speaking, loud roars rang out that seemed akin to the dying screams of slaughtered elephants. The space around where the mountain-shattering battle was taking place had warped into a void qi-infested wasteland. The earth, grass, and trees had turned pale white, as though made of solidified ash.
And within that white landscape, the Flareful Empress fought the voidfiend powerhouse head-on, in her demi-human-like half-dragon form. Purple scales covered her robed form as toxic miasma followed every one of her punches and kicks. Her Amaranthine Torch Dragon Physique was fully in use as the powerful body cultivator took the brunt of the emissary’s attacks.
Beside her, Youjin Gengxin from the Selenosilver Valley wielded his Dim Silver Sword to act as a protective bastion, deflecting the attacks that came the Flareful Empress’s way with expert precision. There was also Han Xinglou; the scholarly elder from the Malignant Moon Sword Sect cleaved the fiend’s left shoulder apart with his own powerful artefact. The Elder from Twilight Blood Palace also kept up his assault, he too letting his bloodline run free in the form of a massive hominid hunting hound. This was all possible because of the continuous efforts of the Elder from the Victorious Tide Island and her entrapping spiritual art.
But if it were only her, then she would not have been able to restrict the movements of the voidfiend and its creepy attacks for so long. She was joined by the leader of the Dark Star Mercenaries, the elusive Princess An Ping of the Xiyue Royal Family. The mercenary leader-slash-princess displayed the royal arts of her clan in full view, adding many folded layers of qi-infused crescent blades to clear the battlefield of ‘other’ pests.
Finally, there was the enigmatic Dark Star, An Xing himself. He had rushed back after capturing the now completely deformed void cultist. He joined the fight, attacking with his abnormally long hands to dish out perfectly timed punches, interrupting the Wretched Emissary every time it tried to cast its harrowing scream at his allies.
But still, the Wretched Emissary refused to fall. It was cleaved apart, burnt to ashes. But it would keep appearing from the other side of the void, screaming out attacks laden with corrupting void qi despite An Xing’s efforts to shut its mouth forever. It had many, many heads after all.
It kept crying and screaming, as if its reserves were infinite. Because perhaps, they were.
The Wretched Emissary held up its chalice once more and sobbed. Along with its bloodstained tears, it dropped the ominous liquid on the ground. The heads on its many accessories laughed in glee.
The liquid spread on the ground like oil on water. From it, strange shapes began to rise.
At first, they looked like barely discernible statues of goo. But within mere breaths, their forms solidified, turning into the cruel visages of various voidfiends.
Wretched Hornbeasts, Bloodhounds, Chiropteras, and more.
All beings in the Imperfect Heaven 2nd and 3rd Order. They growled and roared, then pounced on the cultivators, especially An Ping and the Victorious Tide Island Elder, with manic bloodlust. An Ping clicked her tongue, her crescent blades scouring the battlefield once more to combat these pests that kept appearing.
Han Xinglou and An Xing separated from the vanguard and came in between the newly birthed fiends and the two at the rear.
A new fight ensued. The 3rd Realm Imperfect Heaven Rens would win, of course, as they had thrice before, but now the Wretched Emissary was once more able to buy some leeway.
It rampaged, the white hellscape spread, the Flareful Empress blasted it apart with a flurry of draconic punches, and the Elephantine fiend appeared once more from the void.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
Youjin Liu could feel the stress radiating off the seven cultivators a mile away.
This exact scene was repeated many times. That seemed to be the theme with this head-obsessed emissary.
The cultivators were approaching their limits.
If push came to shove, they could probably run away if their qi really was about to run out.
All other than Youjin Gengxin, and perhaps the Xiyue princess and her husband because of their ties to the Xiyue royals. For if the Wretched Emissary got free, no one doubted its next target would be Dim Gold City.
In which case, Youjin Liu and all other native cultivators would have no choice but to lay their lives on the line to stop it.
Would insects like them in the Imperfect Heaven 1st and 2nd realms even make a difference?
The good patriarch didn’t know.
He could only hope that his daughter was having better luck inside the network of caves. Fairy Su was with her. She would be safe.
“Patriarch, do you see that?” An Elder suddenly said. There was a murmur that spread throughout the camp, one filled with positive emotions, as finally, a change had appeared in the Wretched Emissary’s countenance.
“So that’s it! That’s your tether, foul beast of the voidrealm!” The Flareful Empress’s victorious roar rang out.
Whether it was intentional or dumb luck, Youjin Liu could not fathom a guess. But when the Flareful Empress, Youjin Gengxin, and the Elder from the Twilight Blood Palace attacked in such a way that all the ren heads on the Emissary’s body were destroyed at the exact same moment, the fiend took far longer to re-appear, giving the cultivators just enough time to clear up the spawned voidfiend minions.
The Wretched Emissary reappeared, this time with one less number of heads on its ominous accessories. It raised its chalice again, summoning more fiends.
But its trunk was cracked. So was its body, pale white hide cracking off like ceramic flakes. And deep within, Youjin Liu saw something shocking.
It was a ren cultivator, someone he recognized! One of Youjin Fuqiang, the previous patriarch’s retainers. He was curled up in a fetal pose inside the stomach of the elephantine voidfiend, snarling at the opposing seven cultivators with mad insanity.
The Flareful Empress snarled back, her draconic fangs spread into a grin.
“Wait not too long, void cultist. For I will rip you apart and tear you limb from limb. What a troublesome foe you are.” Her voice echoed the miles, carried by the enraged winds.
The Wretched Emissary had healed completely in the meantime, the ceramic cracks gone. But the cat was out of the bag.
The fight began anew.
***
Back in the cave, Youjin Chun barely dodged a bone spear thrown her way from her left, and deflected a rusty axe coming at her head from the right.
“P-Pa…” She was protecting Ziyou Ling. The madlander girl had been skewered by multiple spears, and her guts were spilling out like soup. No doubt the weapons wielded by the mad cultists were corrosive and poisonous. Or perhaps it was just the nature of the corrupting qi from the void, annihilating any matter that was from the material planes.
Youjin Chun was terrified. She failed to dodge a sword, which left a large gash on her back. The heiress rolled forward, then in her crouching pose, she lifted Ziyou Ling onto her shoulder and rushed towards the surviving Youjin cultivators.
“P-Pa… why… F-fairy S-Su—Chao… where are yo–” Ziyou Ling coughed up more blood.
“Shut up, wench!” Youjin Chun cried, her face mired by blood, grime, and sweat. Most from Ling, but some from herself. She had lost vision in one eye, an arrow having barely missed piercing her head but left its shocking mark.
“It is useless, moving head soon to be delivered. Give up thy life!” Another cultist roared. This being, humanoid like the native ren of the plane, was too alien to be called that. Even most yao only had animal features such as furry ears or scaly tails unless they were in their battle mode, shapeshifting into a primordial form. Sometimes full beast-like when Fairy Su was a giant vixen, and sometimes half-beast as the Su Princess was right now, fighting Youjin Fuqiang head-on with that infuriating, elegant smile on her face.
But these cultists, these creatures, they had transparent skin the shade of the deep blue sea and covered in suckers. Their hair was tentacles of squid or octopi, their mouths the mandibles of lobsters and shrimp. Eyes beady, gills on their scaled throats.
Crustacean features, yet clearly discernable as ren faces. Yao? Ren? Strange bloodlines? Perhaps only the princess could say for sure.
But would she even care?
She left us to die! Youjin Chun felt despair like no other. Of course, she would not heed Ziyou Ling's command. The madlander boy was nought but her slave, and to even think that their banter was that of lovers? She must have been crazy!
The body on her shoulder gradually stopped moving.
“Heh, that’s what you get. That’s what you get for stealing my Elder Brother Chao, dirty wench. Why, why, it wasn’t supposed to end like thi–” Youjin Chun cried. She saw the blade of the sword arcing at her neck. She was too tired to dodge.
This was it.
The rusty features of the bone sword appeared more like claws. The fingers holding them were covered in that transparent skin, the disgusting blood vessels clearly discernable by the naked eye.
Youjin Chun did not close her eyes.
And when the sword edge was merely an inch away from her, a rush of qi blasted it away, followed by a giant, pained yet familiar grunt.
“E-Elder Gangkai!” Youjin Chun cried out.
“Mistress. We leave. Now!” The burly man said. “Leave the corpse.”
“B-But—”
“Elder Yetu’s orders. They shall hold the rear. Come,” The Burly Elder did not listen to her. He hoisted her up effortlessly on his injured shoulder, using his good hand to wield his blade. Then burnt the last of his True Qi. He had spotted Ziyou Yung with one of his secret spiritual arts, and there was an exit there. Now was the time to escape.
Ziyou Ling’s corpse was dropped on the ground like a ragdoll.
Beside it, another round object fell. It bounced a few times like one of those strange footballs, Ziyou Yung’s creation.
It was a head.
“Mistress?” Youjin Gangkai was shocked.
“She is in a better place now. Be delivered next, big guy.” The invisible cultist from before, at the peak of Imperfect Heaven 2nd Realm, cackled madly.
As a shower of blood rose from the now bare stump that was Youjin Chun’s neck, bathing the stunned Youjin Gangkai in red and black, three more daggers closed around his own neck like the serrated fangs of hungry hyenas.
Yung saw all this from afar, near the hidden exit.
“Kiy!”
“Arf.”
He did not have the heart to reply to his two little companions. His legs were weak. He was having trouble breathing, his lips tasting the salty snot and tears dripping down his face.
“What is happening?” he asked no one.
But Nanya still heard him.
She was now fighting right in the middle of the legion of squid-headed cultists, the same elegant yet cruel smile on her pretty face.
She looked up at Yung as if to say, “Won’t you trust me?”
Still, her Empathic Link read true. She was confident in victory.
“Why did it turn out like this?” Yung had to ask. What victory? With so many deaths?
Youjin Fuqiang’s clawed palms ripped Nanya’s racy shawls apart and cleaved five large gashes across her shapely breasts and tight abdomen. Despite this, she seemed to feel nothing. And with a bloody smile, she mouthed, “Figure it out yourself, fool.”