Now that Long is gone again, I can return to trashing his courtyard in peace.
First dig a post hole, then grow a spatial storage ball overfilled with my…super-heated death chi acid? Grow a canister for it, grow a circle with a pin, trigger mechanism ready. Place in hole. Back away.
Back further away.
Aden tosses a pebble on the homegrown pressure sensitive mine.
In slow motion capture, he watches as the ground begins to expand, then turns glass-like before it can get blown apart, causing the air to fill with millions of transparent microspheres and the following shower of vitrifying payload. Droplets meet air and begin to eat away the atmosphere, creating a shimmer of gas within the cloud and further expanding it.
The pebble is gone. Might as well have been dirt, cause its dust now too. The acid doesn't go far, but the cloud creates a more inert atmosphere to contain droplets of it within, if I just add more acid. Good thing I made the container and trigger assembly to not be a part of me, otherwise it could have interfered.
The microspheres got blown into the surrounding areas but they were too fragile and simply broke up in the air before hitting anything, turning to mere dust in the wind instead of claymore balls…cluster bombs…
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Aden tosses the next pebble towards a smaller mine. The ensuing explosion behaves the same, up until even smaller balls are blown out through the vitrified ground with more waves following behind. One wave after another, detonating down the chain of command until the final explosions take out the pillars pretending to support the surrounding veranda.
Good thing those weren’t critical to the infrastructure.
Excellent test results. Despite the same input, it reached farther, and appears not to care what it touches. Everything is pretty now.
While some custom soulless homunculus drones are beyond my skill right now, a living armor should work. No need to program or remote control.
I’ll just grow a false surface layer thin enough to extend my hairs through, then increase the space within it as much as I can…about 30 feet. I need to eat more. That should be good though. Who would expect to cut me but not reach me like this? Then I just add pockets of highly pressurized molten acid, and it becomes reactive armor.
Guess I’ll stock up on a variety of cluster bombs and just hold them within me. Black flame, hot acid….uuuuh…I guess I don’t have a lot of options. Oh well, they’re strong. I’ll make sure they have proper shrapnel now too.
Oh, I can create what looks like a heavy cloth but is really just another bomb due to spatial distortion. Good idea, me. People would try to cut through and just blow themselves up.
…
Aden sighs and looks up to the sky.
Closing his eyes and feeling the wind. No need to rush. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. If I stand in the right place at the right time, the world will come to me.
Opening to gaze once more at the red sky.
Serene.
I should appreciate the world more often.
Returning his eyes to the mess he created. It’s time I go. Fate calls me to the lake.
Aden drifts through the pavilion, making his way out without a mark or sound.
Perhaps I can free myself of fate.
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“Welcome, Aden. My deepest gratitude for your aid, I am not only healed, but also about to break through. Please, come in.”
“Is there such a need to enter when we already see each other? I’m sure Long spoke of my distaste for the fatuous. Tell me of the one who injured you. Will they be a problem if you break through now?”
“Yes, Long did mention you preferred to get to the point. The nascent soul cultivator practiced what I believe to be similar to the Serene Sky Rage technique. If not similar, it may be a higher stage in it that I have yet seen. A possibility as I have seen merely peak foundation building with such a practice. He wields wind and yang. His movements are fast while appearing slow, with a preference for the blade. If he senses me breaking through to the 9th stage and then to nascent soul, he may perceive me as a potential threat.”
“How long until advancement.”
“I can withhold a day at most. The efficacy of your pill was astounding.”
“I will make my way to our side of the lake. Begin your advancement when I arrive. You can sense that far, right?”
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
“Yes, if I focus then there will be no problem. Godspeed, Aden.”
Was that a joke? “I would wish you the same, but have I not already done so? Enjoy your advancement.”
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I wished for flight, and yet here I am. Still on the ground, slinking around.
Let’s see how close I can get without the nascent soul noticing me. He shouldn’t be able to detect any energy, just the displacement of space that anything would have.
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How underwhelming. There you are, and yet you can’t see me.
Floating above the lake, slowly scanning it, a youthful looking middle aged man hovers without sound nor tussle of wind. Long white hair and beard still and serene. Gold-trimmed white robes unmoving.
From the distance, far behind, where Aden had come from, the sky darkens. Storm clouds gather in preparation, lightning arcing in anticipation.
The nascent soul eyes the new clouds on his horizon, bringing his head about slowly, then quickly, like the illusion of speed and distance a tornado or tsunami give off. Then with the same fluid grace, he accelerates towards the ascending ancestor.
Fate’s hold on you is great. Your actions are just a response to the past. How underwhelming.
Aden crosses his arms at full length, then whips them out towards the path of the nascent soul. Four solid beige spheres hurtle towards him on coure for interception.
The man immediately turns his gaze to Aden and the incoming spheres in his unique manner, then changes course for his new target. Meeting the four spheres half way, he attempts to cut through them, and a familiar white explosion occurs, growing in size to consume the area.
Anticipating that they would not be enough, four fire bombs were already sent. Just before they are to enter the cloud, an immense weight descends upon the area,
Aden attempts to detonate the fire bombs before his target is no longer in their blast radius by throwing pebbles, but just before they reach, a wind blows it all away. The white cloud, the fire bombs, the pebbles, and the surrounding tree tops are ripped up and sent far into the distance, unheard from.
Oh fuck.
The man hovers, still as always. His robes now tattered and whitened. His skin untouched.
Not good.
“Standing under my pressure, how impressive. I was beginning to think the treasure was gone, but now I see what I have been searching for.”
His hand extends and formless pressure surrounds Aden, pressing tightly around him and bringing him up towards the nascent soul. Now face to face.
“You will make an excellent pill”
Not now that you are in range, dumbass.
Aden detonates his entire front side along with his collection of cluster bombs and shrapnel. The man expecting this attempts to shield like before, but the shrapnel cuts through his chi barrier, adorning the nascent soul’s widening eyes with fear, and allowing everything to get through. Now without hold over Aden, the force of the explosion sends them both rocketing backwards to the ground.
Aden stands, fully healed. Mind ready for combat, only to see him on the ground.
Anticlimactic. He had no defense once I got inside his chi barrier. I don’t believe I saw his blade anymore after he cut my initial bombing, either. Are all nascent soul as inexperienced as this man was? I don’t even know his name.
Hmmmmmmm…
Adens walks closer, eying the powder-like exterior of the body, then fixing his gaze towards the abdomen. Reaching in, he pulls out a golden pill.
Don’t worry, I don’t let my hunts go to waste. Down the hatch.
Aden breathes in, as if a child with his first peppermint patty.
[Core Assimilated]
Exhilarating.
Hm? It wants to be where my phylactery is. Fighting for its place, but finding no ground. I can mobilize it.
I just gained a peak core formation, early nascent soul core. No tribulation. No tireless pursuit of cultivation through centuries of meditation.
Watching chi circulate through his fist as he flexes it. “Marvelous”, speaks a stranger from above.
Aden instantly looks to the newcomer, body tensed with fear.
Just as he meets his gaze, Aden feels a force travel through his body, severing his legs and arms. In the half second that they begin to split from him, his regenerating tissue finds purchase on the parts and recovers them as if new.
“What are you?” The man hums to himself, seemingly uncaring of a response.
I can’t fight him.
“Ever fought a god?”
“Wha-”
A force ripples through the ground, growing out to cover the surroundings.
“You seek to fight me in that condition?!” The man gazes through the ground beneath Aden, towards the cult.
Looks like unplanned backup has arrived.
“Enough to kill”
That's not the ancestor…
The imposing man pauses for a moment before responding.
Narrowing his eyes. “Very well… for now…”
He pivots in the air and accelerates away almost faster than Aden can see.
“To what do I owe the pleasure of your acquaintance?”
“Twin Serpents”
Hm? Like from the cult origins? Beneath the cult? Condition…Injured? Struck during a time of weakness…starts a religion…
“You are maintaining your self with the power of belief.”
“Perceptive”
Can’t see you though
“And I helped you or your people in a way that made me worth it”
“Come”
Ah, thanks for the hint. I see the way now.