Huang Liyue was more than professional when it came to being a bodyguard and the idea of leaving Cao Yun down in the cave while she went to fight some 9-core demonic beast did not feel right. But on the other hand, whoever was fighting that creature probably required her help. And if the creature won, it would ultimately find the humans below. Then, Huang Liyue would find herself having to protect Cao Yun from the demonic beast alone. Besides, as much as she felt responsible for protecting Cao Yun, she also felt extremely responsible for the well-being of her entire family.
If an expert from the Huang family was badly hurt or even killed, this would be bad for all of them. After balancing her priorities for an instant or two, Huang Liyue sent a surge of Qi around Cao Yun, Can Mouye and the egg. All of them were now in a ball of translucent flames. Contrary to the flames Huang Liyue used during a fight, those flames were warm and nice. Cao Yun felt as though he was in a comfortable blanket.
"Stay there! I'll help them deal with the beast. Then we'll think about our next move."
After saying that, Huang Liyue took out an iron fan from her spatial ring. All her spiritual senses condensed into a column encompassing herself and the two fighters high in the sky. Until now she had not been able to get a very clear picture of them. But now that her senses were more focused she was able to see them as though they were right before her naked eyes.
The 9-core demonic beast was a gigantic monster. It was as big as the Bone Kings she had battled in the Yellow Death World, except that it had flesh and skin over its bones. With the shape of a bird, the creature also had dark red feathers all over its body. At the end of its legs, it had impressive claws still slick with blood. As a tail, it had three thick feathers almost as long as its entire body. In a sense, it looked like a peacock wheel that had lost all of its feathers but three.
Aside from the giant stature of the beast, what really set it apart from other birds was its head, or rather, its heads. Indeed, the creature had nine heads. All of them were attached to its own rather long neck. Then, all nine of those necks fused into one thick neck just over its wings.
Huang Liyue recognized that bird very easily thanks to this feature. It was the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu. According to the texts, this creature was able to devour someone's soul. In fact, it was very fond of humans' Hun. Huang Liyue remembered a story in which a 7th-grade Spirit Warrior had encountered such a demonic beast. He had survived but his Soul Embryo had been sucked out of his body and devoured whole.
After fighting creatures who were quite literally born from Po, she would be faced with one who devoured Hun. Thankfully, her Soul Embryo was now way more powerful. In fact, it was probably even more resilient than the matriarch's Soul Embryo, albeit not as powerful. With the Yellow Sorrows Water absorbed in her Soul Embryo under the advice of Cleansed Asura, Huang Liyue had full confidence in its ability to resist powerful attacks. It didn't mean that she wanted to test it out though.
However, now that she had identified the demonic beast, she felt a bit more at ease. She was fairly confident in her ability to kill that giant bird with a bit of help from an expert of her family, thanks to her improved Soul Embryo. Thankfully, the demonic beast did not seem to have noticed her probing. She had been very careful with her spiritual senses, even adding a bit of 'Ashen Feather Seal' with her soul. Besides, it was in the middle of a fight. Thus, its attention was almost entirely focused on its enemy who was rather powerful.
That was when Huang Liyue was finally able to identify the expert from the Huang family.
The person fighting the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu was none other than Matriarch Huang Yufeng. As she had not been able to see her fight for a very long time, she had not recognized her technique at first. Although every member of the Huang family was well versed in 'Ten Thousands Fiery Wheel', each one had a unique touch. Indeed, they all had different other martial arts with them. So even though they were often trained by only a handful of different trainers, in the end they all developed their own signature. And in the middle of the fight, from a distant position, Huang Liyue had not even recognized her Qi, maybe because of her recent breakthrough as well. She was not used to seeing her as a 9th-grade Spirit Warrior.
As soon as she had identified her though, Huang Liyue blasted through the ceiling of the cave and emerged in the outside world. Now that Cao Yun was protected by her surge of Qi, she wasn't worried at all. Even a 6th-grade demonic beast would have a hard time breaking through it in less than a day or two.
The moment she tore apart the ground to get back to the surface, both fresh air and natural light flooded the cave Cao Yun was in. For the first time in a bit less than a year, he was feeling really alive. Being trapped in a world without any vivid color, without Qi in the air and full of the stench of death had not been the most pleasant thing in his life...
Sensing the turmoil on the surface, Huang Yufeng did not even turn her gaze toward it. Just like the demonic beast, she had not first noticed Huang Liyue down below. But just as she broke through the ground, she heard her voice in her head.
"Matriarch, let me assist you."
"Liyue?! What are you doing here...?! Never mind that! This thing attacked our residence. All the other beasts are already dead. Although I'm confident, I have to admit that my soul did not fully recover from the tribulation... Apparently, I'm even older than I was feeling myself..."
Even after a year, and with the help of various pills and means, Huang Yufeng had not entirely soothed her Soul Embryo. Attempting the breakthrough to become a Sage had really taken a toll on her. And fighting a demonic beast that was specialized in attacking the soul was a real mismatch.
Looking at the matriarch in the sky, Huang Liyue could imagine what had happened. The old woman seemed extremely tired. She had some blood stains here and there, but it wasn't human blood. Even her hair was disheveled. The poor woman had probably fought against a stampede to protect Baziyun City. As the only 9th-grade Spirit Warrior, she had most likely lead the charge, especially if there had been more than one 9-core demonic beasts. Apart from her, there were not that many experts who could fight off against such powerful monsters.
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Huang Liyue and Huang Yufeng had both lived through an exhausting situation. Arguably, Huang Liyue had had it worse, but now was not the time to compare their ordeals.
Although Huang Yufeng did not directly look at Huang Liyue, she was able to immediately feel that she had broken through to the 8th-grade Spirit Warrior stage. Such an increase in her cultivation was absolutely unheard of. As such, the matriarch could not stop from being amazed, and proud.
With them fighting alongside each other, the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu had absolutely no chance at all.
Just like its human opponent, the giant bird was surprised by the explosion down below. Thanks to its many heads, it was able to look at both Huang Yufeng and the situation on the ground at the same time. Fortunately, Huang Liyue was way faster than the demonic beast. Before it could fully register what was going on, an iron fan had literally pierced it through and through. Just after that, flames poured into the wound. The moment they entered the wound though, they got extinguished.
Moreover, the wound was not as wide as what Huang Liyue had been hoping for. A 9-core demonic beast could not be underestimated. Although the giant bird was specialized in souls and had not a body as sturdy as a Star Mole Dragon, it was still very resilient. In less than a second, the wound was already closed. Only some oozing black blood was left around the former wound to show that it had ever existed.
Letting out a deafening shriek, the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu activated its pseudo-Qi Manifestation. From the cave that had had its ceiling annihilated, Cao Yun was watching with a lot of attention. Not only was this fight extraordinary for a Mortal to watch, but the demonic beast was dealing with souls. This could be a great opportunity to broaden his horizons even more.
All around the demonic beast, the image of chains binding thousands and thousands of skulls to its body slowly appeared. Witnessing all that, Cao Yun had an epiphany. This kind of technique was similar to the Qi Manifestation he had performed. Not through Qi, but through blood, one could summon such phenomena without fully controlling their Qi yet. Since Cao Yun would soon cross over to the Mortal Warrior realm, this wasn't as mind blowing that it should have been. But it gave him many ideas. By using both kinds of Qi Manifestation, he would become even stronger than a regular Mortal Warrior. The day he would finally break through, he would have to try it out.
Seeing all those skulls around the demonic beast, Huang Liyue let out a sigh of exasperation. Usually, she never let out her emotions, but she was mentally exhausted. And more than that...
"I am tired of bones!"
From her spatial ring, all the iron fans she had left appeared. The same happened from Huang Yufeng's spatial ring. Before long, the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu was surrounded by iron fans. Immediately, it tried to flee. Against a single human being, it was too proud to escape, especially if the human was a wounded old lady. But against two of them, it was not suicidal. However, as soon as it tried to move out of the encirclement, it realized that there was a thin layer of flames all around the iron fans. Up in the sky, there was an invisible bubble keeping it trapped.
Of course, it could have easily broken it, but it was just meant as a means to buy some time. And it had worked perfectly.
Huang Liyue and Huang Yufeng both launched themselves toward the creature. With iron fans fully opened and covered in flames in hands, they danced around the beast. While flying around all the chains and the skulls trying to bite them, they lacerated the bird all over its massive body.
From down below, the show was incredible. The two women were synchronized beyond belief. This was even beyond the level of what martial artists could attain after decades or even centuries of training together. The way they were able to move around their enemy with such grace, elegance and harmony felt as though they were one and the same.
Another painful shriek echoed throughout the sky. This time, both Huang Yufeng and Huang Liyue felt a great pressure over their Soul Embryo. However, only Huang Yufeng was disturbed by it. Because she had been fighting for several weeks now and that her Soul Embryo had not even fully recovered yet, she was affected by this soul attack. Ironically, because Huang Liyue was not, it completely threw off their attack. Since they were not in harmony anymore, the momentum of their attack was broken and the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu was able to get out of the encirclement, ready to fly away.
Without any hesitation, Huang Liyue used one of her ultimate attacks.
'Fenghuang Soars From Kunlun'!
A True Fiery Fenghuang materialized through her Qi. The fiery bird took the giant creature in its claws, trying to pin it down.
"Matriarch! Now!"
Following Huang Liyue's actions, Huang Yufeng knew exactly what she was waiting for. In the matriarch's eyes, eight balls of fire shined.
'Feng and Huang Dominate All Under the Sky'.
Behind her, the vague silhouette of a prodigious mountain appeared. And immediately, two broad wings erupted from it as it blinked out of existence. As a giant wave, the two wings spread forward toward the Nine-Headed Bird of Chu.
Unlike most demonic beasts, its cores were not in its center. In fact, after becoming a 9-demonic beast, this particular creature had its demonic cores relocated toward its heads. And with one swift move, the two wings cut off all of the nine heads as though they were only one.
The two most powerful techniques of 'Ten Thousands Fiery Wheel' had been largely enough to kill the enemy.
Suddenly, its pseudo-Qi Manifestation dissipated and the giant body of the now headless Bird of Chu fell down. Because it was dead, its Wei Qi had also began to dissipate. As such, Huang Yufeng was able to spread the influence of her spatial ring through her spiritual senses all around the demonic beast. In an instant, the giant corpse disappeared into the separate space inside her ring.
Since that 9-core demonic beast was fond of devouring souls, its parts were used in a number of pills that could help souls and Soul Embryos. It just happened to be that Huang Yufeng was in need of pills to help her recover faster. The sooner she could recover, the sooner she could attempt another breakthrough. Besides, she would also have a clearer mind to analyze her previous failure. In one word, this corpse would be extremely useful and beneficial to her.
Now that the fight was over, everything went back to an eerie calm. All the usual sounds of nature were gone. Compared with the dead world they had just fled from though, it felt extremely lively to both Cao Yun and Huang Liyue.
Speaking of the young man, Huang Yufeng finally noticed him through the hole in the ground. For an instant, the old lady and the young man's eyes crossed. Despite the distance, their senses were good enough to almost see each other as though they were up-close. And Cao Yun saw something in Huang Yufeng's eyes. He wasn't sure what it was though.