Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 183. Rudimentary Dao Domain.
The two martial masters of the fifth rank were startled once again. Just a second ago, the two of them had stopped attacking and retreated a couple steps back since the Ice Devil had released some kind of overbearing energy which made even them fearful of receiving it head-on. Now, however, this chaotically surging energy suddenly disappeared, almost as if all of it was sucked back into the Ice Devil’s body. The two of them might have even suspected if this monster hadn’t failed to control an all-out desperate attack of his, thus suffering a backlash as the price for trying, had it not been for the slight smile present on the monster’s lips and the calm yet excited look which suddenly appeared in his eyes. They wouldn’t be able to explain why if someone asked, but at this moment just seeing the look in the Ice Devil’s eyes caused both of them to have clear premonitions of their own deaths.
As experienced and battle-hardened experts, the two of them instantly understood that their instincts were trying to warn them. They had experienced similar sensations a few times when death was knocking on their doors on the battlefields, either when a supremely strong expert was about to launch an attack in their direction or when a heavily superior unit of enemies was about to act. They were shocked to discover that something must have changed within that Ice Devil for them to suddenly be overcome by the premonitions of death, but they didn’t make the instantaneous decision to run. They had been, after all, pressuring this monster heavily for the last minutes!
Seeing how the two men were neither running away or attacking him, Laien rejoiced secretly. He would have had to give up on killing both of them had they fled immediately, but since they stayed for just a little bit longer, it gave him enough time to use his magic and attack them on his own. His body was still moving backwards since he had been retreating the entire time, but with a laugh, he stomped at the ground and changed directions. He leaped forward and twisted his chest to the right, sending his left shoulder ahead as he brandished his white spear in preparation for a powerful thrust. At the same time, he released the four pure strands of spiritual energy that contained massive amounts of the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno and sent two of them to either of his sides.
The two martial masters sensed the four streaks of formless, yet frighteningly powerful spiritual energy. They also saw that the Ice Devil was aiming at one of them with his own attack, but comparatively speaking, they judged that the thrust wasn’t nearly as dangerous. They assumed it was a bait the Ice Devil wanted to use in order to assure that one of them would die to this forbidden spell of his. So, they weren’t surprised when four ice spikes, each of which gave them an extremely dangerous feeling, formed in the air and shoot towards them at different angles. Up until this point they had easily dodged all similar attacks of the Ice Devil’s, but just as they started adjusting their positions in response to the forming magic, the ice spikes adjusted their targets slightly and shot out at a speed that caused both of their hearts to palpitate.
If they were skewered by even one of those things, then their lives would be over! This was what their instincts were screaming at them as they acted desperately in order to avoid a direct hit. The one of them who hadn’t been targeted by Laien’s thrust thanked his lucky stars as he gathered his Qi on his sword and while maneuvering to dodge one of the spikes, he struck at the second one. His companion, however, was under a far greater dilemma. The telegraphed thrust of Laien’s would have never hit him under normal circumstances, but with those two terrifying ice spikes coming at him from the side, he was forced to make a choice and accept one of those three attacks!
With the shadow of death looming over him, he recalled all the battles he had gone through with the good brother he had to his side and with all the brothers who had fallen to the Ice Devil moments ago. He could more or less tell that if he used up all of his Qi in a desperate attempt to defend, he would still have a decent chance to preserve his life and escape with heavy injuries. However, he would have no guarantee that the next attack of the Ice Devil’s wouldn’t end up taking his life anyway. Thus, he made up his mind and made a decisive choice. He twisted his body in order to dodge one of the ice spikes and slashed at the second one with his sword, but at the same time, he didn’t take his eyes off the Ice Devil at all.
The next instant, two loud crashing and breaking sounds reverberated throughout the forest as the swords of the two wind-element martial masters met with the ice spikes. The two of them were honestly shocked by how much power this simple and pretty much instantaneous spell contained as their hands shook and the Qi around their swords scattered under pressure. However, they were ultimately able to shatter the ice spikes and prevent them from damaging their bodies in any way.
Yet, the price one of them paid for doing so was to have his stomach pierced through by Laien’s spear. While Laien’s killing potential wasn’t nowhere near Yin’s, it wasn’t that he lacked the power necessary to kill someone once he scored a perfect blow. Thus, the Qi this martial master of the fifth rank had attempted to cover himself with had been easily pierced by him and right afterwards, he started freezing the innards of the man and reached out to destroy his Qi Origin. It was right at this time, however, that a murderous intent flashed past the dying man’s eyes as he roused all the Qi he had left without regard for the internal damage he was going to suffer because of it. The man then slowed down the frost spreading throughout his body and used his left hand to grab at the spear!
“Now!” The man shouted to his friend, who in turn showed a pained expression once he realized what his old companion had done. He didn’t hesitate though as to not waste the opportunity his brother was buying him with his life and he jumped at the Ice Devil. He was about five meters away from the two of them, so as long as his brother bought him a split-second, it would be enough! His slash would be able to reach the Ice Devil and with a clean hit, this defensive technique of the monster’s that turned his skin jade-white wouldn’t be enough to save him, for sure!
Yet, as the two men aimed to take his life, Laien remained completely cool-headed. The corner of his lips quirked upward as only now, he pulled onto the river-like wave of insights he had left behind and poured all of it into his spear. This caused the power of the frost around it to increase many times over and to the utter shock of the man who was trying to hold him in place, it allowed the ice to spread at an astonishing rate. In the blink of an eye, not only was the man’s Qi Origin shattered, but his entire arm and the majority of his chest turned into ice, too. The second of the two men both saw and sensed this change, but by this point, he could do nothing to change the inevitable outcome which was about to follow.
With a wry smile on his face, Laien twisted his body again and pushed the spear to the side, shattering the rest of the dead man’s body. The swipe of his still carried the power of the river-like wave of insights, so once it met with the hastily put up guard of the second man, it pushed it aside and allowed the spearhead to slash through the man’s neck. The blow almost beheaded the man, but even without this physical wound, the frost alone which used this brief opportunity to invade his body was more than enough to kill him. The wind-element martial masters were very fast and agile, but after all, they weren’t known for having sturdy defenses against direct attacks.
“And the last one,” Laien mused and raised his hand slightly, making it a bit easier and faster to send out another surge of spiritual energy. Considering that he was still sustaining the mixture of spiritual energy and Qi around his spear, he had just enough Phantasmal Essence of Inferno to spare for two other small-scale spells or techniques. Sustaining one part that was integrated with all of the insights available to him in addition to two parts of the leftover essence of Inferno was his current limit.
“Still,” he murmured as the dozens of small ice needles caught up to the fleeing martial master of the third rank, who had almost wet his pants once his two senior brothers died one after another within the span of one second. The multiple ice needles pierced through the man’s protective Qi and slid into his flesh, then effectively turned his torso into a mass of solid ice. From over a hundred meters away, he, an elite-martial master of the third rank, was killed as easily as one strangled a chicken.
“It’s more than enough,” Laien finished his thought and laughed quietly. Before this breakthrough, he had had no choice but to flee from these two wind-element martial masters of the fifth rank, but now he had killed them. Admittedly, the surprise factor played a role in how easily he was able to do it, but just like he had assumed during his breakthrough, he now had a fair chance of killing an elite martial master of the fifth rank as long as he didn’t make any mistakes. To him, who had been annoyed with his lack of single-target killing abilities and techniques, this was a very satisfying development.
“That being said, uuh,” he said with a helpless laugh and without a second of hesitation, turned around and started running away at full speed. He didn’t forget, though, to quickly collect the two interspatial rings off the hands of those two experts by his feet with a quick wave of his hand. “I’ve fallen a few kilometers behind the frontlines because of this chase, damn!” he complained while fleeing. Now that the auras of those two men had disappeared, he could vaguely sense that a huge amount of people started closing onto him from both left, right, and behind him. If he delayed even for a little bit, then even with all the improvements he had made, he would be surrounded and killed in a matter of seconds. Dying without being able to put up a fight was the last on his list of the things he wanted to do, so it went without saying that he ran as if his life depended on it! Because it did!
Seconds quickly passed one after another as he ran past the many the trunks of huge, ancient trees. However, the more time passed as he ran at full speed, the more bewildered he became. He had been exerting his body quite a bit not only during the three battles in the forest, but he had also used up quite some stamina in the clash with Abdain’s men early on. He had fully expected his body to start feeling heavier now that his levels of adrenaline subsided a little, but forget feeling tired, his body seemed to be growing lighter and more energetic by the moment! To top it off, although it wasn’t a very noticeable difference, he could tell that he had actually recovered a little bit of his Qi even though he had used it in both of his spear strikes half a minute ago.
“What is going on?” he asked himself. It wasn’t that he was about to complain about this ridiculous recovery ability of his physical body, but he at least wanted to… “Right, the Forbidden Lands! I thought that blessing was amazing to have increased our martial talent by a degree and we could tell that our bodies were strengthened, too. However, it looks like we underestimated the benefits the greater purity of our flesh was going to bring, huh. This abnormal recovery speed must be because all the impurities were forced out of my body, nothing else makes sense. Though I guess the difference is more apparent to me since Yin’s body was already quite superior to mine in this area,” he mused with a smile on his face. He felt a bit guilty about feeling happy and thinking that this day was getting better and better, but he told himself that as long as he respected the help he received from others, which made all of this possible, then it would be fine for him to feel happy.
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Just as he was feeling content, though, the figures of dozens upon dozens of enemy experts started appearing within his sight both to his left and right. And, more dangerously, quite a few of those incoming enemies were ahead of him in the forest. At this rate, even though he had been able to run faster than he had predicted, he would need to fight his way out of this area first. He would also need to do it quickly and without getting entangled here, else the best he could hope for would be to be captured and then exchanged for a ransom. However, he couldn’t quite decide which of the many bad possibilities would be the worst one, considering that options such as death, getting crippled, and getting tortured for a long time all were very much viable given the circumstances.
“I wish I could use only my insights to attack,” he thought wishfully while releasing his Qi and spiritual energy. He was able to use minuscule amounts of the two of them in addition to his insights to create many fairly powerful attacks out of the thin air, but with so many enemies here and with him running low on resources, even such a small expenditure was painful. The only good thing here was that he could fill two strands of energy with the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno and he could shift the complete river-like wave of insights somewhere else too if needed. But, when it came to cultivating and growing stronger, he never seemed to be satisfied and always wanted more.
“The problem is that if I leave the essence of my insights alone, then they will passively hang there. I need my spiritual energy to make it act since they lack the will on thei-… huh?”
The sudden realization hit Laien like a ton of bricks. In fact, he almost tripped since he needed to hold back his laughter. It would be impossible with the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno since he needed to guide it personally for it to obey him willingly, but the four Phantasmal Essences of water were connected to him on the very fundamental level! He didn’t need a connection of spiritual energy to move them as he could communicate directly with their wills at any time he wanted!
Thrilled, he dissolved the insights from around his spear with the exception of the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno and sent them into the air. This caused a wave of ‘threatening air’ to appear to the senses of all those martial masters that were rushing towards him, but since the wave of insights alone indicated no danger and carried no killing intent, most of them ignored it and only some of them chose to be wary of it just in case. This seemingly inconsequential decision of theirs, however, was about to shift the entire course of their incoming encounter with the ‘Ice Devil’.
“About thirty on each side?” Laien gauged quickly. To get out of this forming encirclement, he would need to fend off sixty people all in all, preferably without stopping or slowing down. Those sixty people, thankfully, contained only two martial masters of the fifth rank and eight martial masters of the fourth rank. As for the rest of those sixty, they were either the ruby-golden-robed martial masters of the third rank or the regular experts under the command of Abdain’s elites. This extremely even spread of fighting strength which their enemies employed in this western part of the forest was a good idea for stalling, but to him, it was a godsend. If he needed to deal with an entire group of elite martial masters of the fifth rank here, then he feared that no enlightenment would be able to preserve his life. Falling behind the frontline was simply too dangerous!
“Freeze,” the one word appeared in his mind the moment the two waves of enemies entered the range of thirty meters from him. He felt that if he forced himself, he would be able to extend the effective range of his Phantasmal Essence to around sixty, maybe seventy meters, but the delayed reaction time and the loss of strength weren’t worth it. Still, this kind of long-range instantaneous manipulation was far beyond his usual effective limit of about ten meters of his Guardian Magic.
Regardless, the surge of Phantasmal Essence responded to Laien’s command and thus, it both transformed its nature and revealed it at full strength at the same time. As it did, the changes that occurred were so fast and so powerful that even the natural spiritual energy in the air was forcefully pulled into the mix and was instantly refined into usable water-element spiritual energy. This further increased the threat this already beyond-common-sense magic carried, presenting Laien with a pleasant surprise.
On the other hand, the bunch of regular experts and a few ruby-golden-robed martial masters of the third rank to Laien’s right were anything but pleased with what started happening out of nowhere. The strange wave of mysterious air which they hadn’t paid much attention to had suddenly transformed into a blast of white, icy mist and swept past them at great speed. As it had appeared pretty much either atop of their bodies or mere meters away from them, the majority of their numbers hadn’t been able to as much as rouse more Qi to defend themselves from the freezing-cold mist. This, in addition to them not being strong enough to resist the mixture of the four water-element Phantasmal Essences of Laien’s, resulted in sixteen bodies falling down to the ground.
Only once a large number of their companions died did the remaining ten or so of the weaker experts manage to split up and prevent the mist from targeting them in large batches. However, to the further shock of all those who were watching these ridiculous developments, the surge of ice mist didn’t chase after them and instead converged into a dozen ice spikes before speeding towards the nearest two ruby-golden-robed martial masters of the fourth rank!
These two elites, however, weren’t about to do nothing and allow this strange spell to kill them. One of the two roared angrily and slashed out with his sword, releasing a wave of flames which collided with the dozen ice spikes the very next instant. The two energies struggled with one another for the briefest of times, but in the end, the man’s marital technique scattered the ice spikes and even purged the remnant water-element spiritual energy in the air around it. In the end, as useful and powerful as Laien’s new way of using magic was, it couldn’t hold a candle to a martial technique of an elite martial mater of the fourth rank. In fact, in a direct clash, an elite martial master of the third rank would also be able to accomplish the same feat as long as he reacted in time. However!
Laien smirked and turned rightwards, intending to force his way through the heavily weakened group of enemies. The martial master who was leading them and those four martial masters of the fourth rank would be the main obstacle in his way, but he wasn’t worried. Rather than that, he was having trouble stopping his lips from twitching in amusement. He was still ten meters away from those five guys and the one who had ‘vanquished’ his new spell was turning towards him at this moment.
Having been waiting for this exact opportunity, Laien willed the Phantasmal Essence to converge once again, and so it did, right behind the backs of those five people! Feeling that targeting all five of them would be a bit greedy, he sent eight spikes towards the back of their leader, two at the back of the man who had just finished turning around, and two more at one of the other three as a coin toss.
Taken thoroughly off-guard, the two of his main targets were skewered through, the spikes gouging themselves so deep that some of them managed to go right through their bodies. As for the lucky shot at the third person, it turned out very well too as the man reacted too late and despite being targeted with only two ice spikes, he allowed one of them to go right through his stomach. Since he was a wind-element practitioner, trying to prevent frost from spreading inside his body was a helpless endeavor for him, so he lost his cultivation base half a second later and died once a full second passed. Needless to say, the leader of theirs, having been pierced by six of the eight spikes, was similarly killed on the spot, his fire-element affinity failing to save his life.
When a smile that could be described as a truly devilish appeared on Laien’s face, the remaining three martial masters became unable to keep their cool. They didn’t even think about attacking him anymore while their brains started going crazy trying to resist the fear and figure out what in the world had happened. They could still have believed it if the Ice Devil had released another of those gusts of weird air, but they had been attacked from their blind spot after one of them destroyed this magic! This made no sense! They seriously started doubting, was Laien really a Djinn spawn and not just a monstrously talented practitioner who ended up with such a nickname? As they saw it, no other explanation would make sense given what they had just witnessed and gone through.
“Foolish,” Laien murmured silently. “But it can’t be helped. Even I wouldn’t believe it if someone told me that normal Qi, spiritual energy and even essence of insights are all incapable of wiping out the Phantasmal Essence in a short period of time. They can at most weaken it a bit,” the few thoughts passed through his mind alongside somewhat sympathetic feelings towards these soon-to-be-dead three experts. If they understood how his Phantasmal Essence worked, they would have been able to put up a much better fight. However, he himself had never heard of the concept of Phantasmal Essence even though he had interacted with so many top-tier-powers of the entire continent.
So, how could those subordinates of Abdain’s be aware of what Phantasmal Essence was, much less how to effectively fight against it? With the exception of other Phantasmal Essence or perhaps some top-tier abilities and insights, nothing else could stand up to it. When facing him, the most optimal tactic would be to remain on guard against the constantly reforming Phantasmal Essence while trying to bring him down as fast as possible. However, it wasn’t like he was going to tell them that.
Instead, he willed it once again, causing the spikes in the three corpses alongside those which had struck the ground to dissolve. He then kicked at the ground and dashed towards the path those three martial masters of the fourth rank had opened for him and simultaneously, he sent out two streaks of his spiritual energy which he had infused with the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno.
This time, the water-element Phantasmal Essence formed a small cloud of icy mist just like in the beginning. It engulfed the two fire-element practitioners who had jumped to one side in itself, forcing them to expend quite a bit of strength to resist the frost while at the same time clouding their senses. Half a second later, as those two men were trying to leap out of the freezing mist, they were met with one thick ice spike each. Those two spikes were, of course, the ones enhanced by the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno, so the two men soon proved incapable of blocking them in any way and had their bodies skewered. Objectively speaking, with their suppressed senses and with Laien’s superior aura-manipulating skills, they were doomed the moment they went on the defensive and got too close without the intent to risk their lives in order to take Laien out.
With the two dead, Laien sent the surge of icy mist formed from the Phantasmal Essence to the other side, after the escaping wind-element martial master. However, since the man was quite fast, he had no choice but to transform the mist into a dozen ice spikes and send them at the man’s back. Thankfully, the man hadn’t gotten far beyond the range of thirty meters from him just yet, so he was able to adjust the course of those spikes and assure that they landed and took his life, what they did.
“Now then,” Laien said with a chuckle. He naturally continued to run away and towards the frontline, but as he looked over his shoulder, the look in his eyes was no longer that of a hunted prey, but of the hunter. He couldn’t help but wonder, if he played his cards right, just how many of those bastards would he be able to take down before they figured out how to deal with his new abilities?