Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 190. Spiritual Link.
“We will help if we can,” Laien replied after a moment of thought. He wanted to say something else too, but he stopped himself. Everyone here was about to fight a battle for their sake and they were all resolved to fight with their lives on the line, so telling Reian not to overdo it would be extremely disrespectful, or so Laien felt deep inside. “Instead of worrying over those things, let’s do our best to win this battle. Yimar Maar must understand what we are aiming for, so he will order his troops to attack with all their strength from the very beginning… if we screw up once, there might not be a chance to regroup,” he reminded himself and took a deep breath, then let the air out slowly. The old marble mine was already in sight, so the last clash of this prolonged battle was about to begin.
“Thank you,” Reian said in a quiet voice, using his Qi to allow Laien, Yin, and Julien to hear him properly. He could see that once Laien had agreed, the two boys no longer paid attention to him and started focusing on preparing for the incoming clash. Thus, he didn’t say anything else and instead, followed the boys’ example and started calming his thoughts. If he wanted them to have a chance of killing Abdain, even if the man took quite some risk, then he couldn’t afford to be distracted.
With moments, while Laien, Yin, and basically everyone else in their group were mentally preparing themselves for battle, Casimir led them into a wide, slowly tightening cone-like path that went good two hundred meters below the level of the grounds surrounding the marble mine. They then started splitting up, with Arslan and the weaker of their members moving furthest to the back and stopping only three hundred meters away from the cliff-like wall of the marble mine. Naturally, all of their horses were moved to this open space in order to prevent needless loses. As for their main fighting force, which counted roughly two hundred and fifty men by this point, they started reorganizing their ranks further to the front all the while paying attention to the movements of Yimar Maar’s army.
From the perspective of Arslan’s group, as they had all turned around to face the incoming enemies, the first line of defense looked as such. Julien and Reian took to the right flank and occupied roughly two hundred meters of the pathway’s width. The three hundred meters of the middle was blocked by the seventy-plus men of the White Sword Unit, while the remaining three hundred meters to the left was guarded by Casimir, Anna, and Casimir’s eighty-plus Royal Guards.
As for the secondary line of defense, Julien’s remaining thirty-plus elites stood behind and in-between Reian and Julien’s right wing area and the White Sword’s central area. Similarly, behind and in-between Casimir and Anna’s left wing and the central White Sword’s area, Anna’s fifty-three Royal Guards took their positions.
Finally, the roughly thirty men of the Black Sword Unit were spread out fairly thin as the furthest, third line of defense. Laien and Yin’s seven guards and Rakar, whose main goal was to help guard Sarah and Johan, were part of this last defensive line, too. Behind their backs were Sirius and Kasha, and alongside Arslan was the bunch from their group that had little to no combat ability.
Thanks to the advantage in speed, their group had had enough buffer time to get ready before Yimar Maar’s army caught up. By the time all of them were standing still and waiting, Yimar Maar, Abdain, and all of their men were around three kilometers away. This meant they had at least twenty seconds before they were in the range of any enemy attacks and likely around thirty seconds, maybe even longer if Yimar Maar wanted to reorganize his ranks before the actual clash began.
“Where to?” Laien wondered while he and Yin stood at the forefront, between Casimir’s left wing and the White Sword’s center. They weren’t going to get involved in the fight against Abdain early on, so they didn’t need to take Julien and Reian’s side into consideration. The question was, would it be better if they stayed in the middle for a bit or should they join Casimir immediately? “I guess it depends on how Yimar Maar and Abdain spread their last two thousand ruby-golden-robed elites,” he mused, a corner of his lips quirking upwards slightly. Be it him or Yin, they were both very used to life-or-death battles by now, so it had taken them only a brief moment to enter a battle-ready state.
“I was a bit worried,” Laien thought while watching how Yimar Maar’s army was approaching. “I thought we’d feel a bit restless since we finished our cultivation only a few minutes before this important battle, but I feel strangely calm. Yin’s the same too… hah. Actually, aren’t we both a bit excited to see how far our new insights and strengths can bring us?” he wondered, unaware that the originally slight smirk on his face grew into a splendid, wry smile. That being said, it wasn’t like the two of them were oblivious to the changes the constant bloody battles had brought to their characters, but it was only now that they felt no shame about feeling excited in such situations.
“Surprisingly comfortable feeling, no?” Yin thought in half-reply and chuckled quietly. He wondered, why were they feeling so comfortable now all of a sudden? Was it because the two of them had experienced a mental breakthrough of a kind before their cultivation breakthroughs back in the great forest? Or was it because they had experienced so much that they got used to dangerous fights? Maybe because they had no regrets about what they had chosen to do? Or was it because their souls had just grown much stronger, probably about twice as strong as before? If someone were to ask him, he would say that it was because of all those things combined.
“It is,” Laien agreed with a quiet laugh and exchanged a glance with Yin. “Oh, look. They are matching us,” he pointed out once they returned their gazes to the front. To match their forces, Abdain with roughly two hundred of his ruby-golden-robed elites were going to the right, to Julien and Reian. Yimar Maar and one thousand of his personal elites were positioning themselves to attack Casimir and Anna, while the remaining three hundred and five hundred elites of respectively Abdain and Yimar Maar placed themselves in the middle. In addition to that, the four and a half thousand of the regular experts in the Realm of Heroes that Yimar Maar still had left after the costly battle in the great forest appeared to have split up into more or less two halves. Two thousand of them were going alongside Yimar Maar, while the remaining two and a half thousand were going to the center.
However, what did come as a surprise not just to Laien and Yin but also to many others, was what, or rather who came into their sights the next moment.
“Martial practitioners?” Laien and Yin frowned when they saw three thousand riders charging in three one-thousand-man groups. Even though those people were too far away for them to sense their auras, the ‘presence’ of theirs was so weak that he and everyone else was sure that they were merely martial practitioners. There could only be one reason to have three columns of such weak people gallop straight at the enemy ranks, but even then, it would be almost pointless. With numbers as low as three thousand, those riders would have a negligible influence on the battle as a whole. Rather, they would only be wasting the precious time. Was Yimar Maar truly now aware of it?
“They’re sending them to their deaths,” Laien thought and let out a sigh. “I don’t know if it’s beneficial or detrimental to us as far as the time goes, but it’s good there’s only three thousands of them. Had they managed to bring ten or fifteen thousand, we would have been in trouble in more ways than one,” he mused calmly. Then, wanting to confirm something, he glanced in Casimir’s direction and ended up revealing an appreciating smile. Unlike him, Casimir looked unsurprised by both the appearance and the numbers of those cannon-fodder practitioners.
“He doesn’t seem to be faking it,” Yin’s thought reached him the next moment. The two of them had been worried about the same thing, but it looked like it was needless of them to do so. Was it thanks to Flora and her allies helping them from the backlines or was it purely due to the relatively high speed of the chase? Either way, Casimir appeared to have been expecting this development. In terms of him accurately gauging how long this battle should take, it was something to be relieved about.
“Hey,” Yin brought up, a slight frown appearing on his face. “Are they going to all charge at once? It does look like they will, doesn’t it?” he asked in his thoughts. Those three columns of mortal realm riders did slow down, but not that much, while Yimar Maar and Abdain’s core army made three paths for them to pass through. One right through the middle, and two between the two wings and the middle. “They want to break our ranks all at once and are using them as literal meat shields,” he pointed out silently and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Laien nodding in grim agreement.
“Casimir!” Laien called out, knowing that he and Yin were thinking the same thing. “You guys stay where you are! We will be fine!” he informed and without waiting for Casimir to reply, he moved to the front with Yin, stopping only sixty meters in front of the first lines of the White Sword Unit. In this way, he and Yin ended up standing in front of the entire line of defense of their group and inevitably, they attracted full attention of their allies and enemies alike, though for two very opposite reasons.
“Do as you like,” Casimir replied in a confident, almost merry tone and gestured the White Sword Unit to do as Laien and Yin wanted. From the left side, Julien also gestured his own elites to follow this course of actions, thus calming them down. Once this was taken care of, the two men suppressed a laugh at the same time. Truly, those guys had come to value Laien and Yin a bit too much if they were about to disregard orders and move to the forefront to fight alongside these two.
“Don’t let them through!” Casimir shouted in an unrestrained manner now that Yimar Maar, Abdain, and the core of their army started moving in unison with the three thousand riders. “If we can hold them off for long enough, it will be our victory! Fight and survive!” he yelled openly, using his Qi to spread his voice far and wide. He cared little that his words would reach the ears of their enemies and in fact, his goal was to both boost the morale of his allies and to cause their enemies to feel the pressure of time. The more crazily those people attacked them, the more dangerous it would be, but at the same time, the higher the chances of their plan succeeding fully would become.
“Ho-oh!” The elites on their side, and even the likes of Laien, Yin, Reian, and Julien all raised their weapons and responded in unison. Then, all of the experts in their group roused their auras to the maximum, causing many of their charging enemies to start having second thoughts about this battle.
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Ten thousand against two hundred and fifty wasn’t exactly the fairest of odds, and it wasn’t like on Yimar Maar’s side they were falling behind in the numbers of elites either. Yet, almost every clash they had gone through during this war ended with their side getting the short-end of the deal. The overall casualties their armies had sustained were quite horrifying if taken a look at, too. With that in mind, it would be more surprising if only a few of them were having dark thoughts.
“Bring me Arslan!” In response to Casimir, Yimar Maar called out to his men on his own. “Slaughter everyone else!” he urged furiously. His personal one thousand and a half of elites responded immediately with an ear-deafening battle cry, having just experienced a one-sided victory. Out of the ten thousand men Yimar Maar had at hand, those people definitely had the highest morale. As for the five hundred elites of Abdain’s, they raised their voices only half a second after Abdain did. The regular Realm of Heroes experts followed suit, allowing the bloodthirsty atmosphere to sweep them. As for those mortal realm cannon fodder, they cried out too, though their voices appeared to be filled with more despair since all of them were fighting against great fear, aware they were going to their own deaths. If one in a hundred of their numbers survived, it would already be quite lucky.
Still, regardless of the plethora of emotions that the combined yells of Yimar Maar’s army contained, they were filled with Qi and thus so loud that the walls of the marble mine shook. Because of them, while the sun was approaching the faraway horizon to the west, beyond the sight of those gathered, countless small pebbles started falling from the three high cliff-like walls that surrounded the cone-shaped battlefield. As they fell, they almost seemed to disappear the moment they left the rays of the sun and entered the somewhat dark area towards the bottom of the cone. However, there was no one amongst the thousands of people gathered at this place who took notice of this curious phenomenon of nature as everyone thought only about one thing. They had to kill their enemies, they had to kill everyone who tried to attack them in order to survive themselves!
“Interesting,” Laien murmured. The next instant, a series of vague thoughts passed through his mind. “They aren’t even considering to exchange martial techniques with us. It is because Reian can potentially nullify all of those attacks on his own thanks to his Heavenly Tempest? They aren’t taking their time to send some experts around on top of the cliffs to encircle us either. Truthfully, while this charge is very threatening, them taking this simplistic and head-on approach is very beneficial to us.”
“Let’s stop them,” Yin thought with a slight smile. “We can’t afford our allies to take the brunt of this charge just because our Shadow Trials will work out better this way. So, how about we use up some energy and see if we can silence those annoying roars of theirs?” he suggested eagerly. If the two of them as they were currently held nothing back and cooperated in creating one huge area-of-effect technique, then just how strong would they be able to make it? He couldn’t wait to find out.
“Fine,” Laien agreed with a laugh, for once actually saying the word aloud. Subsequently, as the letters were still ringing out in the air, he and Yin both roused their Qi and kicked at the ground. They dashed straight at Yimar Maar’s central army, which by this point was merely six hundred meters away from them. Naturally, the two of them accelerated at a very high rate thanks to their powerful bodies, but there was something else in those seemingly simple steps of theirs which amazed many of their allies and a few of those enemies who managed to notice the subtle sensation.
In Yin’s case, his first ‘kick’ couldn’t truly be described as a kick and neither could his subsequent steps be described as normal steps. They were all too light, almost weightless in impression and yet, they allowed him to accelerate all the same. Moreover, those who had seen Yin’s movement-technique-like steps back in the great forest were even more amazed. This was because now, Yin’s simple steps were giving them a weird feeling and it was only after half a second that some of them figured out what it was. They were having trouble predicting Yin’s moves even though Yin wasn’t faking them out in any noticeable way. This feeling was… almost as if Yin’s movements weren’t only unnaturally smooth and fast, but also like a tide of water which could turn in any direction at any time. Unbelievably enough, it was as if his movements weren’t just lightning-like, but also water-like.
As for Laien, the difference was a more subtle one compared to Yin’s eye-catching display. Unlike Yin, Laien wasn’t using any movement arts, but even then his steps came to contain a trace of sharpness in them. They appeared to be touching the ground less than before too, but unless one was very familiar with Laien’s usual tendencies and with his fighting style honed through the Water Flow Spear Art, it would be hard to catch this difference. Still, for this new trace of sharpness to be visible in Laien’s normal movements proved how great of a change he had gone through.
“What are those two bastards...?”
“Oho, they grew even stronger.”
Seeing Laien and Yin’s dash, Yimar Maar and Abdain displayed very different reactions. Yimar Maar was both anxious and furious, while Abdain was expectant and rather curious. Be it as it may, Laien and Yin had left a very strong impression on Abdain during their three encounters. The first time, those kids had somehow escaped the chase of multiple martial masters of the fifth rank and even got all those chasing them killed. The second time those boys arrived with the northerners and were able to stop him for long enough that capturing Arslan became impossible. And, last but not the least, those two were just around half of the reason for him losing hundreds of his personal elites in the encounter from before this entire six-hour-long chase began. There was also the indirect impression they left on him from the great forest battlefield as naturally, he had received the reports of his subordinates and had learned of their spectacular performance and new strengths and abilities.
To the contrary, as far as Abdain knew, Yimar Maar had shooed away the men who were ‘trying to make excuses’ for the western part of the great forest battle. As such, apart from learning the number of casualties, Yimar Maar knew nothing about the true strength of those two boys. In Yimar Maar’s assumption, it went more or less like that - no matter how monstrously strong those two were, no matter if they had some weird unique abilities, they weren’t strong enough to affect the battlefield as a whole. ‘Thus, since I’m already furious, it’s fine to ignore them’, or so he thought.
That being said, be it Yimar Maar or even Abdain, they were about to learn that they were grossly underestimating the danger those two small approaching figures signified. Had they been warier, had they tried to predict this development and taken some countermeasures, perhaps the following catastrophe wouldn’t have been such a devastating one. Alas, with not even a dozen of the ruby-golden-robed elites preparing to launch martial techniques at the two incoming boys, they were bound to experience doom like no other and they would have to pay the price in their own blood.
“Come forth!” Laien called out silently the moment the distance of six hundred meters between them and their enemies shrunk to a little over two hundred meters. While running, he and Yin had widened the space between the two of them to about six meters very much on purpose, so he had more than enough room to act freely. As his powerful soul stirred his insights and as his Phantasmal World of Water and Lightning rumbled with appearing Phantasmal Essence, he turned his chest to the right and raised his spear high, the spearhead pointing at the sky behind his right shoulder.
At this moment, the first bits of Qi and spiritual energy started forming over the white spear and simultaneously, he took another step and twisted his body to the left, thus throwing the full-circle swipe of his spear into motion. The instant this energy started growing in size, the surge of all his insights merged into it, causing the seemingly weightless spear in his hands to suddenly feel heavy. He was prepared for this change though, so he didn’t cease adding more and more Qi and spiritual energy, causing the mass of water to grow into a wave as he rotated his body. At the same time, he pushed his soul to the limits and added more and more essence of his insights into the technique.
Before his Phantasmal World evolved, his limit had been using three streaks of Phantasmal Essence of Inferno and one river-like wave of all of the other insights. Since using those powerful Phantasmal Essences which went too far beyond the reasonable limits of his cultivation strained him greatly, he had been rather limited in their use. It would have been impossible for him to pull onto enough of Phantasmal Essences to spread them evenly throughout a large amount of Qi and spiritual energy, so his large-scale attacks back then were quite lacking compared to his smaller-scale abilities.
Yet, now he was attempting to use a great area-of-effect technique with Yin, so he naturally had to make the best use of every little bit of his unlocked potential! With such a thought in mind, Laien didn’t hesitate to push his limits dangerously close to wounding his soul. As the wave of water formed, he created three complete river-like waves of insights, each of them containing not only his Water and Lightning Phantasmal Essences but also the Phantasmal Essence of Inferno! He merged all of those insights into his attack and just as his body completed the full turn and his heavy swipe went through the open space between him and Yin, the power of this attack reached its pinnace.
Meanwhile, to Laien’s right, Yin repeated the exact same process as if reflected in a mirror, be it the movements of his body or the way he pulled onto his insights. Prompted by Laien, and perhaps wanting to outdo him, he also went all-out. He not only strained himself to create three river-like waves of insights to boost his technique, but he pulled onto his Heavenly Lightning and increased the might of the attack even further beyond! His emerald lightning, once merged with all those insights, with all three Phantasmal Essences, released might like never before, one that overshadowed even Laien’s all-out water-element technique by a little bit despite the fact that Laien’s spiritual energy and Qi were connected and slightly merged on the most rudimentary level.
However, it was at this instant that Yin felt a rush of cold spread across his back alongside a shiver. “Shit! I overdid it!” The alarming thought instantly passed through his mind. Just before he could release the enhanced ‘Wing of the Storm’, he felt his soul reach its limits. He could already see that his soul was going to crack and he knew that the instant it did, he would lose control of his technique and suffer a tremendous backlash from his insights and from the Heavenly Lightning. He would not only need months for his soul to recover, but the wounds he would sustain would make him unable to continue the current battle! The attack he and Laien were trying to unleash would be thoroughly wasted too, they would be lucky if it didn’t explode in front of them and wound them instead!
Yet, just as Yin was truly about to panic, he suddenly ‘heard’ the sound of something akin to glass breaking into countless little shards. His heart skipped a beat at first as he thought it was his soul cracking, but the very next split-second he felt a surge of warmth touch upon his very existence. Then, this warmth spread all throughout his soul and relieved a little bit of strain it had to endure, making him extremely comfortable. Thanks to this warmth, he was able to just barely pull through with his technique and just as he completed the swing of his word, he was able to release it.
Like that, with Yin having overcome his moment of crisis, the surge of water and the wing of lightning merged into one technique. The two separate attacks, once joined together, exploded forth and started growing from just the size of a few meters to first dozens, then hundreds of meters. Furthermore, the overall might of the attack jumped again as the insights Laien and Yin had poured into this joint technique started resonating with each other. This development surprised even the two youths who were responsible for the technique’s creation. Their attack had been ridiculously strong to begin with, so just how monstrous was it going to become now that it grew even more?
Needless to be said, the two of them were about to get their confirmation as the huge, crescent-shaped mass of azure water and emerald lightning was about to crash into the incoming hundreds, if not thousands of enemies that were in its path.