Shifting his gaze, Kiso took a deep breath and stared around the cavern thinking to himself, “Just now I clearly saw the azure lights were heading in that direction, it must be the exit!”
Chapter Twenty Five -
A long sigh echoed through the dimly lit cavern. Kiso knew the general direction of the exit, but it was still too early to leave. After all, that elder of the Apostles of Death was likely to be waiting on the other side.
Turning to Yuni, Kiso smiled, "We finally did it Yuni, we actually got the hidden technique! It's even such a wonderful one!"
Yuni smiled and nodded, "Right! But Kiso, now what?"
"For now, let's go down." Kiso turned towards the three remaining strands of hair, absorbing two of them into his ring.
After absorbing the two strands of hair, he walked down the alter's stairs in Julian's direction with Yuni tagging along.
When they reached Julian, Kiso promptly announced, "Julian, the defensive formation is still active so you'll have to reach the fifth stage of spiritual pressure to retrieve that strand of hair. I'll let it remain there as motivation for you during your cultivation."
Julian cupped his hands and bowed slightly thanking him, "Thank you Kiso, your senior will work hard." Lifting his head with a frown on his face, he continued, "Are you two going to be leaving?"
Kiso let out the air in his lungs, looking off into the distance. After a few seconds, he responded, "Not yet. I'm not confident in my ability to battle against Dean Hanzi just yet. Besides, Yuni can't even use the hidden technique yet. I think I'll need her help to defend against those vile death techniques."
Julian revealed a relieved expression and he nodded, "Well said! If you two go out now, I venture to guess you'd be lucky to avoid being reduced to a couple of withered corpses.."
Kiso and Yuni looked at each other, then laughed.
Lifting his hand, Kiso stared at his DS ring, scanning its contents with his spiritual pressure.
Looking over to Yuni, he asked, "I've got about three months of rations left, you?"
Yuni scanned her own ring then responded, "Hmm, looks like I've got enough for about four months...You eat too much Kiso.." She stuck out her tongue teasing him. Indeed, they had bought the same amount of rations back at the first village they passed through after leaving the Ancient Byuki Forest. They had also received a large amount of food from Elder Sage. Between the two, they should have had enough food to last nearly a year.
Kiso lowered his gaze, slightly embarrassed, "I can't help it, my stomach just never stays full.."
Yuni giggled then took a deep breath before saying, "Alright. Although it's pretty down here, I really don't want to be here another three months. I'm going to work hard to master this hidden technique as soon as possible."
Kiso lifted his head and nodded while adding, "We need to increase our spiritual pressure in our core as well. You might not know because you haven't used the technique yet, but it's extremely taxing."
After getting Yuni's nod of agreement, Kiso turned to Julian and bowed, "Julian, we're going to move closer to the exit and cultivate for a few months, then leave. If you have any other requests or questions, please speak them now."
Julian though for a moment with a hand on his chin, then with a disappointed face he responded, "I've troubled you two enough already, go on ahead, I'll be right behind you."
Kiso chuckled and gestured for Yuni to follow as he walked towards a stone bridge with the breeze at his back.
- - - - -
Two months quickly passed.
During this time, Kiso and Yuni trained extremely hard to raise their cultivation.
Yuni managed to finally grasp the hidden technique after an entire month of failure. Her first execution of the technique left her exhausted and served as a reality check regarding her lack of spiritual pressure.
After experiencing that exhaustion from a single use of the technique, Yuni trained longer and harder then ever before. She barely slept three hours a day.
Today, with a cold breeze signaling the change of seasons in the outside world, Kiso and Yuni once more sat facing each other in the meditative stance. Lightning rapidly coiled around their bodies as they sat absorbing nature energy. Occasionally, their lightning would intercept causing booms of thunder to ring out across the cavern.
When the breeze died down, Kiso opened his eyes. He let out a cool breath of air and stood up, stretching his back with his arms above his head.
"Yuni! Wake up!" Kiso yawned and called out.
Yuni opened a single eye, retracting her spiritual pressure while ending her meditation.
"What is it Kiso?" She asked with a curious tone in her voice.
Kiso smiled at her and asked, "It's been two months. You've mastered the hidden technique and can almost use it as well as me. Let me ask you this... How many times can you manipulate the wind with your current spiritual pressure?"
Yuni smiled, slightly puffing up her chest. She was proud of the progress she had made recently and she happily responded, "I think...Four times!"
Nodded, Kiso said, "Good! I think we will be safe to leave now."
Yuni excitedly bounced to her feet and leaned forward tilting her head, "Kiso, after we take care of that Dean Hanzi, what will we do?"
Kiso blushed slightly as he caught sight of a pleasant thing when she leaned forward.
Shaking his head, he controlled himself and responded, "Well, there's the matter of retrieving rations for Julian and ourselves. I think that's first on the list. After that, well, I'm not too sure. I think we'll head for the northern province and meet with Julian's father. Perhaps he'll have some leads regarding the Apostles of Death."
Towards the end of his response, Kiso frowned and his tone became particularly cold.
He added, "I won't be satisfied killing only Hanzi. My parent's death is a debt that can only be repaid with the blood of their entire sect!"
Yuni straightened her back and frowned as well, slowly nodding her head.
After several tens of seconds of silence, Kiso grunted under his breath and turned his body saying, "Let's go."
The exit to the cavern happened to be a defensive formation as well. A special darkness nature spiritual pressure swallowed all light around the exit, leaving it completely hidden from sight.
Although Kiso could have detected the exit in any number of ways, it had been witnessing the visible wind heading in its direction that led to its discovery.
The two of them stepped into the darkness while holding hands, afraid of being separated. Before they even took a second step, the same force that had seemingly sucked in their spiritual energy before once more occurred.
Instantly, a freezing cold breeze brushed against their faces as their tightly clenched eyes shot open.
Rows of snow covered buildings came into view.
Feeling a large presence behind them, they glanced back. The 'Osian Tower' stretched high into the sky behind them, casting a long shadow over them.
Suddenly, a random voice cried out, "THEY'RE HERE!"
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A series of horns bellowed, echoing throughout the city.
Kiso and Yuni glanced at each other, smiling. This was within their expectations and they had no intention of fleeing.
They folded their arms and spread their legs slightly while raising their chins. A calm look of indifference painted their faces as they stood, waiting.
The footsteps of hundreds of people started coming closer and closer, surrounding the tower. The faces of deathly pale young men and women came into view as they formed a human wall.
Looking closely, the faces of those youngsters were full of fear or even admiration in some cases.
The news that two people had escaped from their Dean into the tower five months ago had long since spread throughout the academy. The teachers all warned the students to keep a look out while around the tower and to immediately report any outsiders. They also warned them those outsiders were extremely dangerous and must be dealt with accordingly.
Following the students, the sounds of hundreds of whispers among them were finally drowned out by a thunderous voice that filled the entire academy.
Echoing into the sky itself, the deathly cold voice was familiar to Kiso.
It was Dean Hanzi, who shouted, "CHILDREN, WATCH THOSE TWO, I'M ON MY WAY!"
Hanzi had been waiting for Kiso and Yuni ever since they escaped. After hearing the horns, although he had been miles away collecting the sacrifices of a surrounding village, he immediately abandoned his work and sped towards his academy. With a belly full of rage, he shouted out, filling his voice with spiritual pressure to increase the volume and distance.
With his voice echoing through the academy, even his own students felt the blood drain from their faces as a cold sweat formed on their backs.
Yet, when they looked up towards those two silhouettes standing in front of that black tower, they opened their mouths in shock.
Kiso and Yuni, after hearing Hanzi's shout, couldn't prevent their lips from curving upwards into a devilish smile. Their prey, as planned, was going to bring himself to them.
A short while later, six hooded figures broke through the student wall, approaching Kiso and Yuni. Stopping twenty meters in front of them, they formed a straight line and slowly took their hoods down.
On the rightmost side, Yan's pale face came into view. Her previous vigor had greatly diminished and her eyes were bloodshot. She had clearly been through hell and back during these past five months.
Kiso took note of Yan's figure, a strange light flashed through his eyes.
He quickly scanned the crowd of students, looking for the teacher's cloaks among them. As he scanned the crowd, he suddenly stopped as his mouth couldn't help but open.
"Ruddy!" He almost cried out, but choked back his voice.
Glancing back and Yan, Kiso secretly decided to let her live, if even to repay just that one simple kindness. He knew she must have left out Ruddy's name in her report, or surely his uncle wouldn't be standing there today.
Among the crowd, a pair of cold evil eyes stared daggers at Kiso and Yuni. Bo's pale face hid behind a hood as he excitedly waited to witness the deaths of the two he hated most in the world.
Making sure not to fix his gaze on his uncle too long, Kiso quickly looked into the sky to avoid suspicion. When he looked up however, his face couldn't help but change as a dark silhouette came into view. As the shadowy silhouette came into view, Dean Hanzi's sinister countenance could be plainly seen.
Floating through the sky, slightly above the buildings in the academy, Hanzi finally stopped in the air above his six most powerful family members.
He coldly looked down at Kiso and Yuni.
Hanzi knew the chance to rope them into the academy had passed. The moment they thought to clear their minds of the deathly aura, that chance had already expired. His false kindness was already exposed.
"So, you two actually had the courage to come back and die today." Hanzi's cold sinister voice rang out as he lowered his body to the ground in front of Yan and the rest.
Kiso and Yuni stared down at Hanzi, the same smug smile on their faces.
Kiso wanted to instantly kill Hanzi, but he wanted to try and get some information from him first. With that in mind, he replied, "Dean Hanzi, I've heard a lot about you from a friend. You should know I'm not the kind of man to senselessly seek my own death. Do you really believe I would show myself before you today if I believed you could kill me?"
Hanzi's face became ugly to behold. The confidence in Kiso's voice truly caused him to second guess himself, if for just a moment. The seed of doubt in his heart quickly dispelled and a cold laughter range out from his aged body,
"Ahhahaha...Brave words child! I commend you! As a special reward for my admiration, I'll let you two die quickly!"
A bony hand rose into the air, lifting a loose sleeve along with it. From the hand, a single finger pointed forward, trembling as it struggled to maintain the extended position. Black smoke began to coil around the finger, threatening to spring forward at any moment.
Seeing Hanzi was about to make his move, Kiso poured spiritual pressure into his eyes and hands as he sent his spiritual pressure zone out.
Yuni mirrored Kiso's actions, preparing to attack alongside Kiso.
Their glowing blue eyes caused Hanzi's eyes to widen and his killing intent grew several times more intense.
The small shred of anxiety in his heart grew alongside his killing intent. He had read in his sect's ancient texts everything about the fight between his death god and the wind god. There had even been a few words mentioning the wind god's eyes.
"With azure glowing eyes, Yuka's laughter faded away, promising my own demise..."
The single line of text repeated itself vividly in Hanzi's mind.
He couldn't help but hesitate and call out, "You two! Don't tell me you actually had the artifact?!"
Kiso and Yuni's faces didn't change.
Kiso replied coolly, "So what if we did. Today, your life will still end regardless of whether you know or not!"
As Kiso was about to attack, a sudden thought crept into his mind. He hesitated, adding, "Answer me one thing Hanzi! If you answer this question I'll let you die a quick death! I've heard my father Han Black was killed on one of your missions while protecting my mother. However, it's unclear whether my mother perished as well. Tell me Dean Hanzi, is my mother alive? If she is where is she?!"
Hanzi's ugly face calmed considerably.
His cold voice contained a hint of laughter, "Of course not! Your mother died alongside your father. She screamed miserably as her body was violated and torn apart! She died without a grave!"
Each and every word hammered themselves into Kiso's heart, breaking it each time.
Pure rage poured into the cracks in his heart as bloody tears fell down his face.
An unfathomable amount of spiritual pressure burst into his hands as his figure flickered and disappeared.
To Be Continued!