[Dance of a Thousand Swords]

Yu Chenguang started the battle off without holding back. He threw his sword up, then clapped his hands. One sword became a hundred and a hundred became ten hundred. Each sword looked identical to one he had thrown, but they were all made with chi.

“Go!”

With a gesture of his hand, the one thousand swords flew forward faster than the eye could track and struck Xao Wen, but the man they hit merely grinned as he let the swords bounce off him. His skin was harder than steel and no chi sword would break through unless the cultivator had more chi than him.

While Yu Chenguang was keeping him distracted, Mei Xilan took in a deep breath.

[Ice Phoenix Domain]

The air shifted. A cold wind picked up and spread out in a bubble that expanded to encompass Yu Chenguang and Xao Wen with Mei Xilan in its center. The ice blue bubble was proceeded by an intense chill that caused Xao Wen’s body to turn blue. Yu Chenguang remained unaffected.

“So… you have a domain. I’d heard… the rumors… but did not believe them,” Xao Wen said through chattering teeth. “But this won’t be enough to stop me!!!”

Xao Wen raced forward to attack Mei Xilan, but his movements were sluggish, like he was wading through mud. Yu Chenguang intercepted him. His sword glowed with a sword intent as he thrust it forward, and though it glanced off the man’s skin, a shallow cut was drawn along his chest. Blood trickled down.

Gritting his teeth, Xao Wen was forced to engage in martial combat with Yu Chenguang. They exchanged fists and sword at a pace so rapid nobody below the Human Limit Realm would be able to follow their movements. Sparks flew every time sword met fist. Xao Wen’s movements might have been sluggish, but he was still much stronger than either Yu Chenguang or Mei Xilan. The domain could only affect someone this powerful so much.

Yu Chenguang realized he wasn’t making any headway and backed off. He tucked his sword in toward his torso, channeled chi along the blade, then thrust it forward.

[Peircing Swallow]

A thin beam of condensed sword intent raced forward. Xao Wen’s eyes widened, but he didn’t back down, and instead channeled chi into his left hand. He took a deep breath and puched the air.

[Solid Knuckles]

Bright orange chi shaped like a fist erupted from his punch, struck the beam, and exploded. The two attacks negated each other, but the shockwave that spread out forced those within its radious to move backward. Even Mei Xilan was caught within the attack. She coughed out blood as the shockwave struck her.

“You okay?” asked Yu Chenguang.

“I am fine,” said Mei Xilan, wiping the blood from her lips.

“Hmph. You two are quite impressive. I did not expect you to fight me to a standstill… but it’s not like this changes anything,” said Xao Wen. “Or have you not noticed how poorly your forces are doing?”

“What?”

Yu Chenguang was confused at first, but then he glanced at the battle taking place below and went pale. He had already lost more than half his men. Even though they were outnumbered, his forces were still superior to most of the people present. In an ordinary battle, he would have had the upper hand since all of his men were at the Asura Realm.

But that meant nothing to someone like Duo Long. The Wind-Lightning Pavilion sect master created several massive boars made of lightning and sent them into Yu Chenguang’s forces, decimating their ranks. Dozens died in a single attack. Their corpses were charred from the inside out and they dropped to the ground, bodies twitching.

He wondered where Hua Xue was, but he found his answer soon enough when a howling blizzard erupted several dozen lî away. Hua Xue had taken her battle against Fēng Yi far away from the battlefield so their own forces wouldn’t be caught by her friendly fire. Fēng Yi was struggling to put up a solid fight as he constantly retreated from her barrage of ice techniques. His hands were coated in wind sharpened into blades as he cut through them, but there were so many that he couldn’t avoid them all, and blood ran down fresh wounds that appeared every few seconds.

However, while the battle between Hua Xue and Fēng Yi was going in their favor, the rest of the battle was not.

I understand now. They had Fēng Yi engage Hua Xue in combat to keep her occupied. Meanwhile, Xao Wen is keeping us occupied, allowing Duo Long to attack our forces while Lì Liàng protects their own forces. Our strategy has been bested. If only we’d had more time to mobilize our troops.

The mobilization of their forces had been rushed because they did not know how much time they had before the enemy arrived on their doorstep. One thousand men was the most he could muster under such short notice. He had picked up garrisons of men along the way to bolster his ranks, but this was all he’d been able to acquire.

There was little Yu Chenguang could about his losses do except fight the man in front of him. He could not afford to do any less.

[Dance of a Thousand Swords]

Yu Chenguang once more created a thousand swords filled with sword intent and sent them at Xao Wen, who merely laughed as he began punching each sword with blows so powerful the blades shattered under impact. But Yu Chenguang already knew this would happen. He wasn’t attempting to injure his opponent.

[Crystal Sword Coffin]

Yu Chenguang clapped his hands together and created a seal. The shattered fragments of his sword quickly surrounded Xao Wen and encased him in a clear coffin. It was not enough to contain the man for long, and, with a burst of chi, Xao Wen broke free of the coffin, but the time it took was long enough for Mei Xilan to get into place.

[Ice Phoenix Breath]

Swirling motes of ice gathered together and created a phoenix several times larger the Mei Xilan herself. The majest creature glared at Xao Wen as it opened its mouth. A powerful blast of ice erupted and overtook the man, who had left his back completely exposed. Ice fragments impaled his back, thousands of microscopic shards cut into his flesh, and ice began creeping over his skin, slowly covering him.

He’s running out of chi. He might be half a step into the Deva Realm, but he’s not so powerful that he can fight two Human Limit Realm experts at once. The Martial God fighting style is meant for one-on-one combat anyway. It was never designed for fighting multiple opponents so close in strength. If we can just keep this up, we should be able to--

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Yu Chenguang began moving before he saw the danger. Duo Long appeared behind Mei Xilan seconds after she had unleashed her attack. Her body was slouched over, she was breathing heavily, and her domain flickered like it was about to break at any second. She didn’t even notice Duo Long’s appearance.

“It’s time for you to die!” the man said as he coated his knife-shaped hand in lightning and thrust it at her heart.

Mei Xilan turned around, but she was unable to defend against it. The attack drew closer. Yet just when it looked like she would be struck, Yu Chenguang appeared before her, sword raised to block the attack. A loud snapping sound echoed around them as his sword was broken in half. Duo Long’s fist pierced through his left shoulder.

***

Hua Xue frowned as she fought Fēng Yi. Her opponent was constantly retreating, never allowing himself to confront her head on, which was what allowed him to survive up to this point. All of her attacks thus far had only caused shallow injuries because he refused to take them. This was, of course, expected during battle. Only an idiot would take attacks they couldn’t handle. However, Hua Xue was also having trouble trapping him. He was wiley enough to avoid her attempts to trap him, and she currently couldn’t bring enough power to bear to simply plow through his tactics with overwhelming strength.

[Ice Briars]

Cold air coalesced and became ice, which took the shape of a briar, which then expanded to ensare Fēng Yi within its grip.

[Lightning Blade]

The ancestor flew backward and swung his arm. Lightning erupted from his hand in a crescent that cut through the briar, though that didn’t stop her technique. A second briar formed from the cut off segment and attacked in tandem with the first. While it seemed like this might succeed at first, Fēng Yi clapped his hands together and unleashed a shockwave that shattered her two briars.

[Wind-Lightning Oscillation]

He weakened my first briar by cutting it in two, then attacked them both. His tactical knowledge is impressive. I’m just a little stronger than him as I am now, too, so I can’t simply overpower him. Killing him is not going to be easy.

[Ice Lotus: Bloom]

Hua Xue created an ice lotus between her palms. She threw it at Fēng Yi. The single lotus bloomed in midair, then began duplicating. One became two. Two became four. Four became eight. It wasn’t long before there were over a hundred ice lotus heading Fēng Yi’s way.

The man flew up to avoid her attack, but she directed her ice lotus to follow him. She moved to intercept him at the same time. Fēng Yi was forced to stop short as he found himself trapped between her and the ice lotus. She narrowed her eyes, circulated her chi, and activated her domain.

[Domain of Frost]

Hua Xue’s domain was not as powerful as Mei Xilan’s, but they were of a similar type, and she was much stronger than the young woman blessed by the Ice Phoenix Mountain’s guardian diety. A barrier formed of cold air quickly filled the battlefield. Fēng Yi’s movements slowed to a crawl.

It had taken her a long time to gather the necessary chi to activate her domain. Since she was a lot more powerful than Mei Xilan, her domain required more chi to use, and thus took more time to activate. She had been trying to trap Fēng Yi without her domain because she didn’t want to spend so much time on him, but he was simply too wily to trap using normal means.

[Icy Prison]

Now that her domain was active, she quickly began covering him with a layer of ice. Sweat ran down her brow as the ice slowly formed over his legs, then his torso, before extending to his arms. Her breathing grew heavier. With the seal keeping her from using the full extent of her powers, she could barely use her domain. Doing so was already exhausting her more quickly than she thought it would.

Now that her opponent was trapped, Hua Xue intended to end this man before he could think to escape.

“Are you sure you should be so focused on me?” asked Fēng Yi. Although he was trapped in ice, he seemed relatively fine. She furrowed her brow. Even his expression remained placid like he wasn’t frozen solid.

“What do you mean?” Although she knew it was a trap, she asked anyway.

Fēng Yi chuckled. “I mean, you were so focused on me that you haven’t been paying attention to the rest of the battle.”

Hua Xue’s eyes widened as she glanced at the rest of the battlefield and realized more than half their forces had been killed. To make matters worse, Mei Xilan and Yu Chenguang were now being forced to fight Xao Wen and Duo Long. The man titled the Shang Kingdom’s Strongest Cultivator had a gaping hole in his shoulder as he was forced to protect Mei Xilan, who was doing everything she could to maintain her domain.

[Domain: Raging Tempest]

Her attention was forced away from the battlefield when Fēng Yi activated his own domain. He wasn’t strong enough to overpower hers, but the Icy Prison he was trapped in shattered, and the man quickly flew out of her reach. Should she go after him? No, she wouldn’t be able to kill him quickly enough. Mei Xilan and Yu Chenguang would die before then.

Decision made, Hua Xue rushed toward the battlefield between her two allies and their enemies. She activated several of her techniques along the way to decimate the enemies ranks. Lì Liàng tried to protect his forces from her, but she targeted only the people too far away from his protection. He attempted to attack her directly instead. A massive stone slab appeared before him, morphed into a drill-like shape, and shot forward. It froze in midair, then Hua Xue sent it back, forcing him to retreat. The now frozen drill slammed into the ground, and ice biars with blooming flowers expanded across the battlefield, freezing even more people.

Hua Xue reached Mei Xilan and Yu Chenguang just as the young woman’s domain vanished.

[Spinning Lotus Shield]

Hua Xue created an ice lotus that spun around at incredible speed. Xao Wen, who’d been mere moments away from punching Mei Xilan, was thrown back when he hit the shield instead. His chi disrupted, the ice from her shield caked the surface of his knuckles, turning them a deep blue.

[Ice Lotus Shield: Split]

The shield suddenly split into two, blocking Duo Long’s attack, a lightning boar.

[Reflect]

The boar bounced back and forth between the two shields before it was reflected back at Dup Long. He canceled his technique with a swipe of his hand. Hua Xue interposed herself between the battle during that time.

“Yu Chenguang, sound the retreat. We’re leaving now.”

“… You’re right. There’s little more we can do here.” He sucked in a deep breath. “All forces! Withdraw!”

His words carried to the far ends of the battlefield, and the forces under his command began withdrawing.

“Do you think I’ll let you ants retreat?!” asked Xao Wen. He roared and rushed forward to attack the retreating forces directly. He could not afford to use his techniques lest he hit his own forces with friendly fire.

“It is not a matter of what you’ll allow,” said Hua Xue coldly.

[Great Blooming Lotus]

While it burned through a lot of her chi, Hua Xue gathered all the moisture in the air and caused a massive ice lotus to bloom on the battlefield. Xao Wen’s feet quickly became stuck as ice spread across the ground. He broke through the ice, but leapt backward as the lotus’ area of influence began expanding. Even Dup Long, Lì Liàng, and Fēng Yi had no choice but to withdraw.

Hua Xue, Mei Xilan, and Yu Chenguang took that opportunity to retreat. They flew back and regrouped with their diminished forces. Barely a third of their forces remained and many of them were wounded.

“This is awful,” Mei Xilan said.

“We lost this battle, and we lost a great many soldiers, but we did accomplish what we set out to do.”

Yu Chenguang directed their attention to the land beyond--a land ablaze. The many farmlands that lay between Biānjiè and Shang Imperial City were on fire. While the Four Great Pavilions had their own supply lines to support their troops, depriving them of the land’s bounty like this would weaken them considerably. Once their forces reached the capital, their supply line would be spread so thin that breaking it would be easy.

That was the hope at least.

“I know this was our purpose, but it does not please me to see people’s livelihood being destroyed like this,” said Hua Xue. It was a sentiment they all shared, though they also knew it was a necessity. Harsh decisions sometimes had to be made in war.

“Let us return quickly to the capital. We need to let Her Highness know about what’s happening,” Yu Chenguang said.

The other two quickly agreed.