Aaron was pinned to the ground, unable to lift his head.
"You think that taking down mindless creatures from the abyss makes you powerful?" the woman sneered. "It's the same type of self defeating arrogance that cultivators gain from massacring mortals. Today, your recklessness almost cost you your life."
Aaron attempted to speak, but all that was heard was the crushing sound of rocks as he parted his lips.
The woman lessened the pressure pressing down on him.
“Does it feel good? Weren’t you doing the very same thing to a woman not too long ago?”
Aaron raised his head looked at her with a vicious expression but remained quiet, unable to think of a response.
The woman waved her hand dismissively, quickly growing bored of the pathetic sight.
“You want to escape, the only way is to kill Feng Zhiming, the tainted one you seek. If you kill him I will let you return.”
"Why? Why would you release me to kill one you have tainted?” Aaron couldn’t bring himself to believe this woman, it was too strange, far too strange
“Because, you are a whetstone, an initial barrier, if he cannot find a way to slay someone merely two major realms above him, then he deserves to perish.”
Aaron squinted eyes and thought she had lost her mind. As a Heavenly Eye cultivator, downgraded to an Ethereal core, he couldn't fathom how Feng Zhiming, reduced to Qi Condensation, could pose a threat to him.
“Do well, and pray for a merciful death." Your goddess may allow that much I supposed, she looked to her side and smirked. "Hopefully not at the hands of the four of these intruders, that would be disappointing.”
After saying those two things she vanished and so did the pressure weighing down on Aaron
He stood up, rage seething through him, but it wasn’t directed towards the woman. At least not the majority of it, the main object of his hatred was his own weakness.
An unsettling glint of insanity began to develop in his eyes.
Today he had humiliated his Goddess with his weakness, and for that he would forever loathe himself.
“Feng Zhiming, I will kill you! Even if she lied about freeing me, I will destroy that woman’s plan!” He shouted without regard for listeners.
This was the only way he could regain the honour he had lost.
*rustle*
He turned his head quickly as he felt some people enter the range of his spiritual sense.
The four Heavenly Eye cultivators he had greeted before being sucked into this place, had surrounded him from all sides.
“Holy Knight, how nice to see you.” Elder Pyari said as she emerged from the thick forest, speaking in a habitually seductive fashion.
“To hell with you whore.” Aaron was not in the mood for joking around.
All it took was one glance to see Elder Pyari’s murderous intentions, this was no friendly encounter.
…
Only Jura accompanied Liza as the two of them stood before Futian and the twenty two people following him. The rest of her camp hid in the trees, their hopes resting on an ambush and the element of surprise.
She decided that running from Futian would only make them more likely to die, if not at the hands of the orthodoxy than at the hands of the mysterious killer or demon beasts.
At least facing them directly let her dictate the circumstances of the battle, a strategically sound decision.
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“Why have you come here?” she asked, an undertone of trepidation present in her voice.
Futian wasn’t surprised by her question, he had clearly expected denial.
“Don’t ask questions we both know the answer to. Did you think you could feign ignorance and avoid the consequences of your inhuman actions?”
At this point he was merely letting her speak a few words since that had been his promise to Orion.
Arius, who had been standing beside Futian, spoke up.
“We know that you have been killing people from our camp! Demonic scum, mistaking our mercy for weakness.”
Liza looked genuinely stunned by the accusation.
“Speechless now that you’ve been caught, demoness.” Futian added as he saw her starstruck expression.
She shook her head instinctively.
“I’ve done no such thing! I genuinely had no idea that disciples in your camp were dying!””
“LIES! Convenient lies to cover up your sins. Now that we stand before you having seen through your facade you dare to stand here a lie.” Futian could not and would not think of another possibility.
He wanted so badly for her to be the killer, as long as she was responsible, it meant that killing her would free them from this paranoia eating away at their brains. If his group felt safer, they would think clearly and thinking clearly was what they all needed.
Before he could draw his fan, Daiyu caught up to him.
“WAIT!” She exclaimed before continuing.
“I know she may very well be guilty, but let’s take a moment to listen to her.”
Futian would have dismissed her quickly, but Daiyu had a fire in her eyes, a flame that he did not want to contest right now.
The disciples agreed, they would not have peace of mind if a speck of doubt still existed.
“Speak, and then prepare to die.” he complied with Daiyu’s request.
Liza quickly scrambled to explain their situation, from the point they separated, to the demon beast that killed a member of their camp, and even when they discovered the faceless corpse.
Jura used his spatial ring to drop the body of the faceless corpse before Futian.
Liza had assumed that it may come in useful and asked him to retrieve it.
“Everything could be dismissed as a lie but the body is indeed very real.” Futian held a hand to his chin as he thought about the situation, it had just become very complicated.
“If I’m understanding this correctly, your fellow disciple Jura found the corpse, just before we got here?” Arius was the first to ask about the dead body.
The rest of the orthodox disciples were surprised, usually he would whisper something to Futian and he would act on it. It was rare for him to speak up like this.
Liza nodded, confirming his interpretation.
Arius made sure to look directly into Liza’s eyes, causing her to tilt her head in confusion.
"Indeed," he continued, "discovering a corpse that serves as circumstantial evidence to exonerate you, while providing the possibility of an alternate killer, how fortunate for you."
Even Daiyu, the one most against this course of action had to admit, the timing of this corpse appearing was miraculous for Liza, if that body turned up a few hours later, Futian no doubt would have already razed her and her camp.
Krimin noticed this going downhill quickly and chimed in with his opinion.
“Consider this.” He spoke calmly. “In the fight between these two groups no one would profit, no one except a third party.”
Futian and Liza both had to agree with this statement, after this battle Futian would likely survive but for how long?
In a beaten and bruised state, who could survive in this dangerous wilderness?
“So how do we determine the user of the skin mask?” Futian asked, clearly dissatisfied with the current state of things.
He wanted to kill her, more then he could say. But even in the depths of his rage he felt fear. If he killed Liza, and the killings didn’t stop, what would he possibly be able to do?
he had to concede that in this situation thinning both of your enemies at the same time was the best strategy, if he was the mysterious third party he’d want to kill them as well.
A long standing silence after Futian’s question was broken by Arius.
“It's simple senior brother, if it is not Liza, there is only one possible explanation.”
He raised his hand and pointed at Jura.
Jura’s eyes shot wide open, as if he had been thrown into the jaws of a beast.
“What!?” He asked defensively.
“Jura was the one to find the body, the body drove away two powerful assets from the demonic camp, the Heaven fallen knight and the Nether witch.”
Daiyu nodded as she carefully considered his words, they seemed to be logically coherent.
“If the two of them were still here we’d think twice before attacking. But if someone wanted to destroy the two of our camps by emboldening us. This would be the perfect move, the implementation of a masked killer hiding among us.”
He walked up to Jura and grabbed him by the collar.
“He’s the imposter.”