Chapter 5 #3
Then he held back a chuckle, leaping for the air with limbs that hadn’t felt so spry and powerful since before he had woken up in a cave as a basic cultivator, all those weeks ago.
And now he had ascended to Silver once more.
His lips stretched wide in a fierce grin as he took to the skies, racing after what he suspected were his friends so silently that no shadow-cloaked foe, no matter how clever, would feel the vibration of his feet upon the ground.
You have successfully embraced Wind Walking. You are now flying faster than any falcon!
Your foes fail to sense your presence.
“Damn right they do. I’m stalking them from altitude, behind them,” he muttered to himself, for Wind Mastery meant that his words would carry to no ears save his own.
He peered down at the ant-like figures below, diligently trying to make out the distant female shapes he had seen from afar.
His eyes lit up as his interface map pinged with fellow adventurers he had delved with just days ago, before stopping cold, eyes widening with awe and dismay, when he took in just how many armed men were waiting just a mile or so away from captors and captives.
Not just a handful of leather-clad warriors, like the group that had come so close to intercepting his party when they’d dared to fuse cores of Silver and Gold to Qianshi’s basin, ensuring the city centuries of pristine water.
No. Where before there had been a deadly but relatively small cluster of opponents, now he saw countless thousands upon thousands of soldiers making camp in the desert sands.
And in the distance, just a few miles away, he spotted the basin that he knew and loved, his interface map pinging a perfect match.
He was home. Or at least, as close to a home as he might ever claim in this desert world.
Which meant that Nili and her band had been intercepted and captured while leaving Qianshi’s territory…
but hadn’t they set off at least a couple days ago?
Alex shook such extraneous thoughts away.
What mattered was that they had never even had a chance to head home to wherever that was before being intercepted by powerful men radiating deadly Silver intensity and the exact same attire as that worn by the killers who had been so eager to steal Alex’s prizes, just days ago.
Killers from Zuihaoshi, or ‘Ultimate City.’ A presumptuous name fitting for the arrogant tyrant who thought he had the right to claim whatever desert treasures he desired.
Yet as was evidenced by the handful of Silvers who had managed to capture his friends and were now heading towards the thousands of soldiers in the distance, it was painfully clear that this mysterious tyrant could back up his delusions with significant deadly force.
Alex’s jaw tightened with tension he refused to acknowledge, realizing what he was doing as he gazed upon the handful of Silvers soon to meet what he suspected was the main contingent of their forces, all of them so clear from his present altitude, a mile away still, though rapidly closing.
And he was delaying.
As if fearing ultimate peril, recalling all too well what had happened the last time he had taken on an entire army. Even if it had been many times bigger than this one.
“Bullshit! We fucking do this, and we do this now!”
Thought became action as he descended to the sands a good thirty feet behind his prey. Yet even so, even with full control over the air currents around them, one of the Silvers raised a gauntleted fist, seeming to smell the air, before slowly turning around.
Artificer skill check made!
So Alex dashed forward for all he was worth, refusing to hesitate. Knowing he didn’t dare delay and that the only option he had was to spring forward NOW!
He slipped past the furiously glaring men moving with odd slowness for Silver-tier monsters, the crescent axe heads of his weapon whistling through the air as he struck his target.
The air rang with a surprised scream as the white-bearded man who had been holding both a collar box and a wand made of bone collapsed to the ground holding nothing at all, having only a moment to gaze down at his spurting wrist stumps before losing his head as well.
The clean desert sands were showered a brilliant shade of crimson, the air now ripe with the coppery scent of blood and freshly spilled offal.
Spell Cleave successfully ruptures all wards!
Rank 7 Doom Blade enhanced by Tier-2 Silver Strength and Rank 8 Wind Crane Kung Fu pierces all armor and countermeasures!
You have critically struck enemy Wujen.
You have decapitated your foe!
You have claimed Collar Control Box.
You have claimed the body of your foe.
Collars are now safe from retributive blasts. (You are unable to remove collars with Control Box at this time.)
Four Silver-tier cultivators designated as Zui Flunkies are charging you.
“Collars are inert! Strike at will!” Alex roared as he flanked his foes, glad that the four hot-eyed killers were now putting all their focus on him.
Alex flashed the would-be killers a fierce smile.
“Hi, assholes, how’s it going?”
The closet thug’s eyes lit up in surprised fury. “It’s the blond-haired Ruidian! He dares to interfere outside his doomed city? Strike him dead! Prince Xien Tang has offered a five-thousand-silver bounty for his head!”
“We can’t do anything, Alex! The collars bind our abilities!
” sobbed Zichen, earning a glare from both Quing Da and Nili.
Yet it seemed that her reminding their foes just how vulnerable they were wasn’t the death sentence it might have been, all four Silver monsters charging straight for Alex with furious roars and blades covered in poisons identical to the ones their fellows had used, just days ago.
All of which brought a happy smile to Alex’s lips as he backpedaled as if in fear, making sure that his enemies were well and truly separated from his allies.
“Look at him run, the coward! Poison blades out now! We finish this!” roared their obvious leader.
Alex couldn’t help laughing at that. “Seriously? What the fuck, man? Just how slow are you assholes? The shits I cut down just three nights ago moved so much faster than you! I mean, talk about inferior quality Silvers!”
This earned him bulging eyes and outraged snarls.
“That you would dare say such things to Prince Xien Tang’s elite squad?
Death by torment can be your only reward!
” the closest assassin roared before his words choked off in surprise, when a coldly smiling Alex was suddenly in his face.
And before the thug could regain his balance or initiative, or get his weapons back in play after Alex had so smoothly dodged the man’s poisoned throwing knife with the slightest tilt of his neck, the air erupted with the crack and boom of thunder and an explosion of lightning so perfectly dark that the main encampment wouldn’t see a thing.
Or such was Alex’s hope even as he accepted yet another handful of furiously stinging wounds… and system notifications that made his bitter heart glow with sudden warmth.
You have successfully struck your opponent with Doom Blast!
Dark Lightning has ruptured ALL Silver-tier wards.
All major organs have been ruptured.
Fatality!
You have taken 3 Light Wounds.
“No shit,” Alex thought with a snarl, forced to blink away boiling blood and brain while smarting from second-degree burns all over his arms before his prismatic bones greedily drank in the majority of the backlash from what truly was his most perilous skill.
The three remaining thugs blinked at Alex in momentary surprise, caught absolutely flatfooted, and Alex happily took advantage of their sudden confused hesitation, refusing to slow down for even a second as he pivoted and darted at an angle, dodging another pair of poisoned daggers to collide with the largest of the trio who was roaring and chopping at Alex with a pair of obsidian axes glowing with tainted infernal Qi that he recognized all too well.
Yet surprisingly, it was almost effortless for Alex to weave and dart past the tainted axe heads that promised soul sickness and a most agonizing death before responding in the only way he could.
Countering foul embers with the cleansing power of rain.
A rain so heavy and filled with so many metallic salts that it was practically the sea.
Or the sea if it was so violent that it could rip through spirit hide like a water jet through tissue paper.
Just like his fangtian ji cleaved through his foe from hip to armpit, a jagged bisection that was Enhanced Water and Wind Strike with a hell of a lot of razor-sharp Dark-Qi-covered metal thrown in.
Most definitely not Black Swan.
But just for shits and giggles…
Rank 8 Synergized Enhanced Water Strike infused with Dark-Qi-infused metal shrapnel and Rank 9 Enhanced Wind Blade have pierced all defenses! Synergized combo has successfully bisected your foe!
NOTE! This attack is most definitely NOT the metaphoric echo of arts relegated to a life lost long ago.
NOTE! You have chosen to name this synergized attack BLACK SWAN, for no reason whatsoever!
Synergized attack will from now on be referred to as Black Swan.
You have successfully dodged past the remaining pair of desperate Silvers that are somehow slower than you!
You have struck your targets!
Black Swan!
Black Swan!
You have DECAPITATED your foes!
Experience earned!
Enhanced Water Strike is now Rank 9!
Enhanced Water Strike is now at parity with Enhanced Wind Strike!
Do you wish to permanently imprint Wind/Water/Steel/Dark Qi infusion as a separate attack?
You have chosen: YES!
You have successfully learned this four-element attack ideal for cutting through any defense (and almost everything else) below Gold-tier effortlessly!
Congratulations! Black Swan is now Rank 9!