Cheng Hao licked his lips and looked at the barren lands surrounding him: not a single corpse could be seen in a radius of a mile from his body, as if they had all disappeared from the face of the world.
He lifted his left hand and a ball of light was revealed, the essence of a few thousand cultivators had actually been amassed in that small spot. The air trembled as electric sparks could be seen dancing on the sphere's surface like snakes made out of lightning.
Beside him, Goldy swallowed the red ball Cheng Hao had thrown him and then burped satisfied "Woah, Cheng Hao! We should go to war more often! A few more of these babies and I will break through the peak Superior stage and enter the Sung Realm! Do you know what that means?"
The boy stretched his arms and waist and then shook his head "You have nagged me ever since you got beside me that you would be able to transform into a human once you surpass the Reverend stage and step into the realm of the Ageless, but you forgot to tell me anything about that... Are you finally going to be useful?"
The golden snake that was floating in midair excitedly sighed "Even better! My, my... It looks like I need to tach you some new stuff, because you see... Once I step into the Sung stage..."
He leaned in "I will be only two stages away from the Ageless Realm!" The snake revealed with glinting eyes "At that time, even those not connected through Karma with me will be able to feast their eyes on my magnificence! Mwhaha, Breaking through feels so good!"
Cheng Hao "..."
Goldy trembled "W-Why do you look so angry, brat?"
The boy coldly spoke "Just absorb those cultivation bases quietly. If you make any noise I will be sure you reincarnate into the body of an old hag!"
The dragon whimpered and then coiled around the youth's feet "Please, don't! If you do that I will be the laughingstock among the other Primordial Beasts for a thousand, no, for a million years!"
Cheng Hao ruthlessly looked down and began counting "One... Two..."
The dragon shivered and then dashed away "Alright, alright, your win, your win! I will just stand here, looking at you from afar! I am a simple bystander, don't care about me!"
The boy almost broke out laughing when he saw his companion's fleeing figure but then his expression turned serious. He stepped forward and suddenly bent his body backwards.
A large sabre appeared out of nowhere and slashed at him. The large body of one of the original ten, now nine, armoured men of the Shadow Legion appeared out of thin air.
The blade passed less than an inch from the boy's nose and the man's shoulders shook once from the shock when he saw his sneak attack had been dodged. Cheng Hao grabbed some sand from the ground and threw it behind him. His expression had long since turned serious and he jumped off the ground.
A thin man smiled beneath his own helmet as he also appeared behind the boy and prepared to attack with his own weapon. Suddenly, his vision was blocked by the sand the child had thrown behind his body before, making him lose his sight temprarily and tumble.
The man fell but regained his lucidity in time: before he hit the ground he slashed horizontally at the boy's legs but the child was already in the air. The jump Cheng Hao had done before had been executed just in time to evade the attack by the man's longsword with three blades aiming at his legs.
Cheng Hao then turned in midair and beautifully dodged an arrow flying towards him. He landed on the ground, his whole figure tensed up as his right ear twitched.
He suddenly turned, his right hand flashed and caught a silvery object out of thin air. He threw the needle back from where it came from and an exclamation of surprise could be heard a few meters away from the boy, the sound of the needle hitting steel rang out.
Cheng Hao breathed once, twice and then lifted himself up, relaxing his tensed body.
He smirked and then yelled in front of him "Sneak attacking a kid? Is that your sense of honour that I hear crying?"
The air trembled again and a woman's figure appeared behind a group of eight other people: her eyes were glowing violet and her orange-reddish hair was fluttering in the air.
Although she wore a mask that hid most of the upper half of her face, it could be seen that she was beauty, although not on the same level as a matured Xiao Wu would be or Sou Rou was, she was still really handsome.
Her extended arms trembled once, making the air shift slightly. She bit her purple lips and glared at the child once with her purple eyes as if she wanted to attack once more, but then the pupils turned back to their usual appearance, the typical Shadow Legion's red glow, and her ginger hair fell back down as the illusion spell branded on the piece of cloth covering them faded away.
She retracted her hands and the semi-transparent sheet of the thin, black cloth wrapped around her body like a cape, also covering her appearance once more.
She wore dark robes that resembled what a priest would wear, except they were completely black. The black cloak helped her hide her face and just in case, she also wore the mask covering the top half of her face. Only the glowing red eyes were shown, everything else below the object was hidden.
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Although the twitching of her eyes and mouth was hidden by the mask and hood, it was clear she was not only a bit upset that her skill had been seen through...
Greatsword waved his left hand at her and comforted her "Don't worry about that, Veil. This kid is not simple. I didn't think that he would go down so fast in the first place... Especially with a sneak attack like that, so don't feel too down..."
"Sure... I won't be able to help you guys too much, from now on it is up to you! Avenge Eight Brother!" A young woman's voice replied. Veil then stepped back and simply glared at Cheng Hao, the eyes beneath her hood glowed red and her gaze was full of killing intent.
"..." Greatsword grabbed his weapon and his killing intent got augmented even more "You do not need to worry, Tenth Sister, we will not let that bastard over there go on unpunished!"
Cheng Hao looked at the nine people in front of him, they were all much stronger than him individually when taking into account cultivation. His expression grew even more serious: this would be his first true fight in this new life. If he lost, he would probably not get another chance and he could not afford to die in this place.
If he had gotten the chance to do this a bit more underhandedly and without too much of a risk he would have done it, but he highly doubted that the god-like being would be impressed by a measly show of his hit-and-run abilities. He had no choice, so... He had to give this his all!
He couldn't use the Golden Aura at the moment. Even a godly ability such as it had its weaknesses:
First, if used in a large scale, once interrupted he would be unable to use it again unless he rested first. It was, after all, an incredibly powerful ability that could rival the rules of this world themselves, even the dragon Blindlight had to sleep for a few millions years after he used it to eradicate a whole plane of existence;
Second, even if it was available, he could still only use it against those on the same level or weaker than his cultivation was, and, if possible, have some kind of gap in their Qi manipulation skill, otherwise it would be impractical to absorb their essence as it would take too much time. For people as weak as those below the Reverend stage, the first condition wouldn't apply too much, as he could make up with his own skills, but as for those with greater power... Fat chance;
Third, the greatest effect of the skill shows itself when there are a lot enemies, as it would strip the weaker ones of their strength first, thus enabling him to absorb those slightly stronger that he may not have been able to absorb, had he not fed on weaker people first to increase the Aura's power. Then, he would be able to feed on those stronger than the ones before and so on. If there were just ten enemies and their cultivation were all way above his own, that would not allow him to slowly take them all on, starting from the weakest link and moving up, thus he would not be able to use that.
As their cultivation bases were just too far above his own (Even if he had lifted the seal imposed on his own cultivation) he could not just rely on his superior ability in manipulating Qi so he had no choice but to fight them with some other method.
And that was also the reason why he had used the Golden Aura in such a large scale before instead of only taking out the same number of enemies with other kinds of skills and saving it up for the last fight.
It was also because of the abovementioned weaknesses, but also because the energy he would have left over, absorbed from all the few thousand cultivators that he had slaughtered, would help him greatly, and very soon as well!
The energy of the body, the energy of the mind, the energy of the soul... Every single type of powerful energy present in the bodies of the thousand cultivator were gathered in his hand! At the moment, the sphere held within itself the power of all these experts, the question was, what would he do with it?
The boy stepped forward once, let go of the powerful object and did a hand seal. Suddenly, his expression grew serious and his demeanour turned solemn as the sphere began to emit rays of silvery light and the small electric currents on its surface began to intensify. Cheng Hao grabbed the sphere of lightning and light hovering in midair.
A complicated seal formed in the air, seven huge beasts were represented on it, each looking imposing.
"Lucky!" As he saw that, Cheng Hao's eyes lit up and he excitedly clenched his fist. The light in his hands churned for a bit and then began to grow longer, until it turned into a long and imposing halberd.
It was four meters long and its head occupied a fourth of its total length. Silvery lightning crackled around the blade while the body glowed with grey light. The design of the halberd was extremely refined, what looked like a monstrous Wale's head was carved into the handle of the weapon and the blade had six dents on the dull side.
Cheng Hao examined the weapon and then slashed the air in front of him satisfied "To actually be so lucky to summon one of the Seven Leviathans..." He lifted the halberd and the halberd began to emit powerful pressure and made everyone looking at it instinctively want to kneel down "Sixth Leviathan! Megalodon! Ruler of earthquakes, storms and of all that ravages the land! The feared sinker of ships and king of the depths!"
The nine members of the Shadow Legion shivered wen they heard those words. They did not know what they meant, but simply hearing them instilled fear and panic in their hearts. Greatsword gritted his teeth and stomped on the ground, dispelling the powerful pressure "Do not be afraid! We cannot afford to lose! Eight brother's vengeance rests on us!"
Dagger trembled once and then slashed the air twice with his two daggers. He looked at Cheng Hao enraged and killing intent surged. One by one, eight people stepped forward, each of them carrying a murderous aura behind them that seemed to cover them like a mantle.
Cheng Hao tightened his grip on the halberd and stepped forward. Nine people began to dash towards their opponent/s, Cheng Hao carried the massive halberd behind him while the eight members of the Shadow Legion each wielded their own weapons and also charged forward.
Cheng Hao disappeared and reappeared behind Greatsword, Megalodon already swinging towards the man's defenceless back. Greatsword shivered and hurriedly dodged to the right, turning his body just in time to see the halberd slam into the ground... "BOOOM"
The sound of an explosion made Greatsword pale as he saw the spot where he stood before being totally annihilated by a single slash of the halberd. The ground had been reduced to rubble and a large crater had been formed into the previously fine terrain. Apparently, this weapon did not only look imposing, it was also really heavy!
Only Cheng Hao knew how much... It was actually not as heavy as it seemed, but he could manipulate its weight as he wanted! It was none other than the manifestation of Megalodon: The Eidolon of Gravity, after all!
Cheng Hao smiled as he bent his body unnaturally, his joints apparently did not seem to exist any longer as he crouched, twisted and bent to evade seven attacks coming from all directions. He waved Megalodon around, using the weapon's weight to change direction while in the air and used the fact that the weapon's body was really long to keep his enemies as distant as possible.
Nine figures danced in a dangerous game of killing and not geting killed, and it looked like doing either would be incredibly difficult. A single strike would spell death, so none of the two sides could afford being careless as the dance became faster and faster until the figures became vague blurs and the weapons simple flashes of light...