V4C86: Familiar Blue

“So, what do you want?”

“The strongest thing you’ve got, and some information, if you do that kind of thing. Otherwise, I can leave you alone.”

“I think I’d prefer that. As for the strongest thing… have you cultivated any body cultivation methods to reinforce your liver? It would be a shame to kill a young woman like you with a poorly chosen drink,” the bartender said, taking a small bottle from beneath the counter and placing it onto the surface between them with great care.

From that simple act, and due to the proximity of the counter top to the bottle, everything that came into contact with the glass suddenly froze over and became burnt at once, as if it contained the hottest flame and the coldest wind at the same time. It was certainly strange to look at, and made it very clear why the man previously reached beneath the counter and put on a glove onto the hand with which he brought out the bottle. Had he not done so, he might have lost several of his fingers to the bottle alone, not even the thing inside.

Despite that, Wei Yi had no hesitation in picking up the bottle and inspecting the liquid inside closely, putting her eye in dangerous proximity to the fluid within.

“This looks interesting, at the very least. I’ll take it, so long as it’s not beyond several planar shards in price,” she said, putting it back down in a different spot as to not fully burn and freeze through the counter with the small tap that would occur when the two came into contact with one another.

“Heh, if you’re certain that you’ll survive, then here. Drink it,” the man said, carefully removing the cork from the bottle and then filling a small reinforced shot glass with the fluid from the bottle, being very careful to not spill a single drop as to not be forced to evacuate the bar right there and then, “We’ve got quite a few of these, and they’re all one gold coin. You see, this is failed produce from the Jiang District’s refiners, so it’s cheap to get from them.”

“In that case, I shall try out a few.”

Wei Yi took the shot glass and, after quickly smelling the fumes emanating from the fluid for no particular reason, she drank the contents in one gulp.

Despite her entrance to the bar being quite calm and uninteresting in the eyes of most, now she had the majority of the people in the building staring at her, her throat, and her chest, likely expecting an explosion of some kind to occur in one of the latter two spots. They waited, and waited, but the glass was soon back on the bar and her left arm was steady as it was rested on the wooden surface, completely devoid of the typical responses to the consumption of something that was, quite literally, not meant for human consumption. Frankly, even dragons, who were believed to have the strongest digestive systems out of the three ancient intelligent species of beasts, were expected to struggle to consume something that toxic, and yet the silver-haired woman managed it with ease.

Worse yet for those that had hoped to see some amusing demise, she smiled and spoke in a calm and smooth voice, with no hints of the usual burning that might occur to anyone foolish enough to consume the substance.

“Hm, that was better than expected. I believe that I tasted a slight hint of citrus somewhere in there.”

Nobody knew how to respond to that. To consume one of those drinks and verify it for themselves would be suicidal, and even someone with no attachment to life wouldn’t be able to inform the others about the taste before perishing in a far less pleasant manner than the voice that Wei Yi was able to speak in.

‘Of course, I think that is what I tasted, but with my perception of taste being out of commission for the last twenty years or so, I might have gotten a little rusty when it comes to recognising various flavours. Still, does confirm that this was not supposed to be drunk by people,’ the Ascendant ignored their reactions and summarised in her head, ‘For such a vibrant taste, I must thank my Yin-Yang Ascendant physique, as it had kept me safe while experiencing the slightly sour delight of that alchemical failure.’

“Y-You… Shit, are you sure you are fine?” the bartender asked with genuine concern.

“Yup, totally fine. Can I have some more? It has been some time since I last got to taste anything this strong,” she replied, taking advantage of the situation to be entirely honest in her request, “Here are five gold coins in advance, just in case.”

“Sure… I’ll… get right on that…” he muttered, turning away and heading to the back room where more of the dangerous bottles were stored, “What under the heavens was that…”

While he was away, she leaned back as much as someone reasonably could on a barstool and looked about as she waited. Her spiritual perception was sufficient to observe everything in perfect detail in a far larger area than her vision was currently able to inform her about, but her gaze was far more likely to be noticed and thus had the highest chance of resulting in interesting encounters, regardless of their exact nature. Whether she would find the person interested in some silver-haired woman or someone pleasant to spend some time with, she would have a higher chance of engagement with direct visual contact.

No immediate response came, although a few did notice her and locked eyes with her. After a few more glances around, she turned back as the bartender returned with a few thick crates all containing similar small bottles to the ones that she had just consumed. With each one being placed far apart from any other to prevent their collective power from damaging their bottles, the box held far less than it could, but there were still over a dozen small bottles in each crate.

“How many of these do you dare try?” the bartender asked, his voice demonstrating a little of his previous daring bravado seeping into his words, “They’re all a different kind of torment to the body and mind-”

“Thirty-nine, right? Here you go,” she cut him off, tossing that many coins onto the bar.

“… Coming right up. Would you like the one containing the combined poisons of a thousand failed medicinal pills, or the one holding the failed essence of the Extreme Yin Decomposition Pill first?”

“You know, I’ve had some decent poisons recently, and I think that I would be far better off with the latter. I have not had the fortune of experiencing the full power of the Extreme Yin Decomposition Pill in a poor state, since the last time that I tried to make it, it turned out just fine,” she said just as casually, “How badly had the refinement process gone in that particular instance? Under thirty percent quality?”

“There’s a large seven on the cork.”

“Oh, that’s just wonderful. Come on, hurry up and pour it out, already. Otherwise, give it here and let me drink alone, as you had originally intended me to.”

The bartender gave it a moment of thought, then opened the bottle and poured it for her, replacing his glove the moment that he was done with it. His original glove had already suffered greatly from just two bottles of extreme failed medicinal essence, and if he kept using the same one for too long, all of the conflicting effects would eventually overwhelm it and start destroying his hand instead. Being a cultivator in the third realm, he wouldn’t be able to endure that kind of medicinal effectiveness.

As before, she took the shot glass and consumed the contents in a single gulp, taking some time to contemplate the taste of the substance she consumed while her physique energy was set to process the substance entering her body to dissolve any useful elements from it and obliterating anything that was unnecessary to her.

This couldn’t provide much planar energy to her cultivation foundation, which was to be expected from failed products that couldn’t be processed by the Antithesis energy quite as easily as things that she personally created, but drop by drop, an ocean could still be filled eventually. With enough of the failed medicinal essences that had any useful effects at all, whether in refining her body or improving and gathering her energy, she would benefit regardless of whether she would acquire a breakthrough or not, and might even gain a few insights from the various substances that she observed, particularly in the field of pill refining and her Antithesis energy.

In a way, these bottles contained some of the worst things that could be produced from a certain form of refinement, although they still looked like something that could be consumed by a human, and she had not realised all of the potential ways to fail in creating a pill or elixir, meaning that she could not extract quite as much effectiveness through the Antithesis method as she could with that knowledge being available.

“Ah, a very cool, mint-like flavour. Not a fan of it personally, but if this was actually drinkable by your usual customers, I would recommend it to them right away.”

“At least you’re aware of your own insanity, woman… Here’s the next one.”

“Thank you. Let’s see… Tastes shit. The medicinal essences from a thousand different pills blatantly don’t work together, so if you keep importing these from the Jiang District, I’d suggest that they shove this into their walls, while the previous stuff should be supplied to you and people like you exclusively.”

She noticed that there was one more of these terrible pill essence drinks in the crates that he had brought out, so she removed one of the coins from the bar and put it back into her House of Gold, masking the action by pretending to place it back into one of her many internal pockets, using her other hand to point at that bottle in the crate as to ensure that he understood her actions.

By the looks of things, he did, but he had nothing on hand to mark the bottle without the method instantly disintegrating due to the various medicinal effects, so he just had to keep track of it mentally.

After those two, she was given two more drinks from two more bottles, with the bartender needing to replace the glove once more. Despite this not seeming like a popular, or even consumable, product at the bar, he had a large number of padded low-grade artefact gloves prepared, although many were suitable for other purposes like cleaning and beating away any intruders seeking to get drunk for free or steal the contents of the bar or the various earnings that the bar makes, which were held in a secure box beneath the counter, not far from the initial bottle of medicinal essence.

At first, she had not been sure how many she would be able to drink, as her body did have certain limits in the same way that others would only be able to consume so much alcohol safely, but the medicinal essence was not particularly alcoholic, nor too difficult on her digestive system when most of the harmful elements were burned away. Due to this, she was able to essentially drink as much as she wanted to without any difficulty at all.

With that in mind, she kept going while pretending to get just a little exhausted and drunk as a result of everything she had consumed, in order to be able to lure out anyone who had yet to reach out to her, but failed to attract any obvious attention so far.

Once every failed medicinal essence was consumed and their usefulness extracted, she stayed around for a while longer and decided that she wouldn’t be able to get much of the information that she wanted from the bar now that she had a certain effect on the people currently present, which was to say that the majority of the patrons were looking at her as if she wasn’t human, but rather an ancient beast or some kind of alchemical refinement furnace that had gained a human body and retained the ability to handle anything from that great art. If she wanted honesty and directness, having a slightly less inhuman first impression would have been more effective.

As she stepped out of the bar, she had to ponder whether getting rid of her current silver hair and black robes and switching to something else would allow for a second attempt.

‘I hadn’t exactly been subtle when I had just entered, and for the same reason as I was immediately mistaken for someone else, if I just reverted back to a different hair colour most would not bother to look at me twice, whereas those who already know me… well, the point is the same as before, so I might as well go through with it. Let’s see…’

Leaving some of those who were still looking towards her behind, she ducked into another alleyway, but she quickly noticed that there was something near her position that was being obfuscated from her spiritual perception. As obfuscation was both more obvious than complete obscuration, and significantly more aggressive, it was easier to nullify even her own spiritual perception, so she was unable to see what was happening even though she was really interested to learn what it was that someone chose to suddenly hide in the middle of a populated district busy with all kinds of things.

She took a moment to decide the appearance that she would enter the field with, ultimately deciding that her original state was most likely to work here. Regardless of the nature of the field, and that of the things occurring within it, she could always revert her appearance to something else the moment that she gets out of it and needs to appear before someone else again. It would be a bit of a waste of the Visual Transformation Law if she did come across someone that she wouldn’t want to reveal herself to, but it was a quick technique to use, especially when compared to other transformation methods, and so would only need a moment of attention not being on her to be executed.

With all of that quickly considered and debated, she obscured herself with a stealth method and leapt into the air towards the point of interest. Once she was at the very edge of the field, she probed the field to get an insight into other properties that it possessed.

In one moment, she comprehended that this wasn’t something to be discovered from the outside. Beside the first layer of obfuscation, there were several more that all applied their own effects and distinctions. Without spending a number of years to decode all of that nonsense, it would be nearly impossible to understand exactly what it would do, and that was with her highly capable mind. In a normal case, the sheer complexity might shock the mind into inactivity for a number of minutes.

“Eh, fuck it.”

She leapt in right away, deciding that it was unlikely to be greatly damaging to her. At most, she’d endure a few injuries that could be recovered in an instant, as no field that she was aware of would be able to nullify her every cultivation path and innate physical property acquired as a result of her endless physical refinement through cosmic energy. If that did affect her, all that she’d need would be a quick application of Law to forcefully apply it to any enemies as well, and then she would have the upper hand unless they were dragons in human form.

The moment that her body passed through the dozen layers, she was greeted with a scene that looked far more blue yet bright as a result of the light passing through the field and being generated by it, nullifying the differences in light caused by the lighthouse towers.

A number of figures stood at the far end, their energy clearly radiating from them, indicating that they were unaffected by the properties of the dome surrounding them, and all of them were facing an area to Wei Yi’s left, although their attention did come to her the moment that she landed on the ground. They did not respond right away, likely being occupied with their silent communication over what to do with her, giving her just enough mental time to understand the restrictions and who they opposed.

Her first thought was naturally regarding the restrictions imposed upon the area, and quickly confirmed that it was intended to suppress elemental planar energy – including pure planar energy, interestingly enough – which essentially meant all energy that would have any chance of opposing them. However, in order to strengthen the effect, it had clearly focused on suppressing the six individual forms of planar energy, thus avoiding her four manifestations of it as well as the cosmic state of her planar energy, so long as she exerted it outside of her body. Then, there were some more common effects, like slowing down mental processes and weakening bodily vitality, but those were insignificant against her.

The primary obstacle was the significant weakening of spiritual perception, which was still obfuscated and distorted to a significant degree. If she was careless with any of her perception strands, she might suffer minor mental harm, which could be dangerous if the opponents were able to put up enough of a fight with the advantages that they had.

Since that was the case, she looked at the person who the group responsible for the barrier was opposing.

To say that she didn’t immediately recognise a certain resemblance between this woman and someone that she had encountered previously would be entirely disingenuous, but the slight change also made her very uncertain as to whether this was just some coincidence or not.

To begin with, while the woman she remembered had blue hair, this one had silver, and it happened to be a silver that Wei Yi had closely imitated with her own use of the Visual Transformation Law. It was long and smooth, clearly having been cared for with great effort, and perfectly framed the woman’s red eyes, which looked upon the opponents with such intense concentration that she barely paid attention to Wei Yi’s intrusion.

Just as she was personally able to dye or modify her hair colour via other means, this was by no means conclusive, so the primary reason for the girl from the past and the woman from the present being likely to be different people was that one was no older than fifteen at the time. With a mostly flat chest and no particular womanly characteristics, she was nothing like the busty and seductive-looking tall woman that didn’t stand anywhere near as high as she did, but still had a number of inches over the majority of women and even some of the shorter men. The difference between those two visuals was too great, and without the ability to scan her body and bones, it was nigh impossible to confirm any close resemblance just yet.

What did match was her style of clothing. Back then, the girl only had a simple shirt and some similarly simple trousers on, and while the shirt and trousers were both different, they were still plain and lacking in any symbols or distinctive colours to mark her identity. If they were the same person, then the only reason that her clothes did change might have been the growth of her body.

‘Alright, so I’ve entered a strange conflict between someone that might be related to that Lan Mei Xing girl, and a bunch of weird people in robes. Hm… One head would tell me to rescue the woman, if I even can, but that one is not to be trusted, while the one on my shoulders would rather suggest that I figure out the situation first. Just because that person is female and the group looks to be mainly male does not mean that the former will be in the right and the latter will be in the wrong,’ she thought, turning back to the robed people, ‘Unless it’s the Dao of Lust’s Lesbian Branch acting up again…’

She was just about to open her mouth when one of the robed figures asked, “Do you know what you have intruded upon?”

“Actually, no, no clue. I can leave if you want,” the Ascendant replied readily.

“… You must have infiltrated the barrier on purpose. Take her down, and then we must deal with the silver-haired woman!” the leading robed figure ordered, raising his hand as a great mass of strange blue energy in the form of fluid – an opaque and paint-like blue, nothing akin to water – gathered around it.

With that plainly setting her up as their enemy, she had to do the same as at the coast and turn back to the silver-haired woman, who also looked back upon her as the lapse in her concentration caused the blue restriction of the field to collapse upon her, flooding through her entire body. It did little to her confident stance and general powerful appearance, but as the blue restriction passed through her hair, it caused the silver to be torn away from it, leaving behind a familiar blue.

That alone made the resemblance so painfully clear that Wei Yi had little choice but to question it right there and then.

“Lan Mei Xing?”

“The girl with a sense of direction?”

“How does everyone have such specific recollections of very particular actions… Wait, so you are her… Those people, are they after you specifically?”

Although she had no clue who Lan Mei Xing was, other than the fact that she had all of the features of the Lan family and was likely descended from them in a similar manner to Lan Rongqi, she did know that the woman had no sense of direction- no, that she was highly capable, and seemed reasonably polite and non-aggressive. If this wasn’t a misunderstanding of some kind, then the robed figures would likely have bad intentions, and she would have no reason at all to preserve their lives or to allow them to go through with that they were doing.

“I think so. They’re from some kind of blood-focused group, so they’re probably from that Blood-tinged Church he was constantly bothered by,” Lan Mei Xing replied casually, “I didn’t think they’d still be around.”

“You guys are from the Blood-tinged Church?”

“We are from the Corpse Blood Division of the Church, and the heretics-”

They did not get the chance to finish as Wei Yi instantly spread out her planar energy, a cosmic light criss-crossed by distant chains surging out from her body and breaching the tight confines of the blue restriction, exposing details akin to the blood vessels in the body throughout the many layers of the field around them.

Those patterns could have been innocuous in any other circumstance, but having already been labelled and revealed as the members of the Blood-tinged Church – albeit ones that looked to be far less intelligent than the few she had previously encountered – there was no reason for her to not connect these people with the same organisation that had randomly caused the death of a woman that had been forced into the world and made to serve them while failing to remember her own name. It was a terrible thing, and if they were intending to harm yet another woman that looked to have been rather innocent and pure during their first meeting, she was not going to give them even the slightest chance.

“Fuck you! The more I see you lot, the more you remind me of the Great Families!” Wei Yi exclaimed, her left arm transforming into the killing will state as she reached out with it and shot out a vast quantity of pure energy enhanced with the Absolute Dao.

It burnt through the veins of the restriction and reached out to the group of those in robes, slamming into several of them and forcing them back by a couple of steps. Contained within the blast of energy was her spiritual perception, and in the brief moment that there was a full link between her and the robed group, she collected all of the information on their energy that she required in order to assess their threat level.

Their leader was in the upper fifth realm, while his subordinates were in the lower fifth realm, with none being lower than the second stage. At the moment, they were within their element, in more ways than one, but since their field incorporated a number of blood-type principles, it allowed her to get a greater grasp on her own form of blood planar energy.

It, much like her pure planar form of energy, had been near the Full Success stage for some time, and now that she had the opportunity to see how the blood of the dead compares to her own active blood, she could push it to the same stage as her pure planar energy was now at. With the inclusion of her own bloodline, her grasp over the concepts of bloodlines as a whole, and the general benefits granted by Dao upon the elements that they encompass, her blood-type planar energy was significantly more powerful than the last time she had made full use of it.

“Since you are so fond of blood, let me show you mine!” she exclaimed, pulling back her left hand and creating a sphere of energy within it, letting it build up for a moment before transforming it into the Mysterious Blood state.

The first time that she had used it, the blood shared the characteristics of that which flowed through her veins, including that curious golden shade that she had been unable to guess the origin of. Now, however, it possessed a cosmic light filled with the same intertwining distant chains as her cosmic energy, and the power and luminance that it radiated was as bright as if she had brought out a ball of flame instead, lighting up the entire scene with a crimson and primarily violet shade.

“You… HERETIC!” the leader’s voice suddenly warped, and his figure violently disintegrated.

Despite that, his voice seemed to linger, a dozen echoing voices repeating his last word as the blood poured into the restricting sphere isolating them from the regular people of the Lan District. All of the strength within him settled into the restriction’s veins, and before Wei Yi could throw out the sphere of blood, the spread-out blood vessels were thrust towards the middle of the zone in an instant.

All of the thin strands and veins assembled into a humanoid monstrosity with thick blue blood flowing within its transparent blood vessels, visible with ease through the thin film that formed as its skin. Five misshapen arms reached out into the air, the force of the restriction field gathering there and permitting more and more planar energy to form into large spheres comparable to the ones that Wei Yi had created with her blood-type planar energy. While it gained shape and stability, the subordinates in robes placed barriers around themselves and directed the majority of their energy towards the transformed state of their leader.

“Well, that is one way to reply to you,” Lan Mei Xing commented, releasing her own violet energy to repeal some of the restriction around her, “What realm are you in now?”

“Fifth.”

“Oh, me too! How many marks?”

“Are you sure now is a good time for this? That thing is getting stronger with each moment, I’m almost certain, and we should be killing it right away… Fine, fifty-five marks.”

“I’ve got sixty! We’re quite close, aren’t we? I have to say, you’ve developed incredibly well for how little time we had spent apart. I mean, you looked quite good back in the Kong District, but now it’s like you’ve reached a certain peak-”

“Not now!” Wei Yi repeated, throwing the sphere of blood-type energy at the rapidly manifesting creature, and exploding with more of her own cosmic energy as to provide herself with a field in which her power could be exerted fully. Without her spiritual perception being able to reach out to the robed figures, or the amalgamation of the restriction and the blood of their leader, she was unable to understand much regarding their activities, but she did still have an idea of what their actions were intending to achieve.

Whatever the leader had transformed into couldn’t have been too stable, and so it required the support of the other figures in order to be maintained within the restrictive field. Once outside, it likely wouldn’t endure even without that further contribution, which may have been considered when the field was made to prevent easy exiting from the inside.

As her simple projectile struck the entity, it caused a number of ripples within the membrane that acted as its skin but did little else. At the same time, fully aware that this was likely to be the case, the Ascendant threw out a probing mass of cosmic energy at the figures at the back, aiming for one that had endured her previous cosmic lance. Out of all of them, he was likely to be the weakest, so if she was able to damage them at all, the attack might even take him out in one go.

The mixture of stars, nebulae and galaxies flew more quickly than the corporeal sphere of blood, causing it to hit the figure at the back at nearly the same time as the blood had hit the monstrosity.

Whatever stress the first attack might have caused had no effect on the second, as the barriers around the figures not only managed to endure, but a larger protective shield temporarily formed between all of the figures that protected them all at once, and even that failed to be breached by her attack. She did not make use of a searing mark, nor much of her understanding of techniques to further boost the power of the attack, but this alone was sufficient for her to comprehend the fact that the barrier would not be broken or damaged by her unless she was to go all out and risk damaging not only the two layers of barriers but also the restriction and much of the district.

“Have you kept up with your practise of combat techniques?” she asked the blue-haired woman.

“Of course I have! I may have only made two stages worth of progress since we last met, but that does not mean that I forgot to practise!”

‘Two stages? She was already at the Marked Core realm when we had met at the Kong District? How did she manage to age so rapidly when- no, not important right now,’ Wei Yi dismissed that line of thought and said, “We need to take down the entity, and then we should be able to take out the rest of them. Without their aid, the restriction field should drop, and we can get out!”

“Alright, got it.”

She almost wanted to praise her for being so brief, but since that would just cause the brevity to revert to the very opposite of that concept, the Ascendant instead rushed towards the enormous monstrous entity alongside Lan Mei Xing, with each one running up to one of the legs of the creature.

Judging by her movements, the blue-haired woman had still kept her focus on her legs and feet for combat purposes, so as they got close to the entity, both of them halted and transferred their momentum to one leg, kicking out while infusing their limb with a great deal of their energy, managing to demonstrate brilliant results.

The Ascendant, as usual, was surrounded by a halo of cosmic light that surged out from her leg and was transferred with the aid of her high-heeled boot, the star metal at the tip easily stabbing into the transparent membrane wrapping the creature and giving just enough room for her energy to surge in. It did exactly that, enhanced by the properties of Obliteration and Ire amongst other techniques and principles, instantly cutting and tearing through all of the veins in its path as it travelled up the leg and towards the centre of its chest, where a large amalgamation of veins almost formed something resembling a dead yet beating heart.

Lan Mei Xing performed the same kick, as her move was the original inspiration for the Violet Kick, but whereas her previous uses used little bright and noticeable energy due to the nature of the threats that they opposed, that being that they were too weak, now she was clearly going all out. A vibrant violet that formed into the shapes of distant stars burst out from her body, travelling alongside her leg into the side of the entity, breaching into it with the violent power of the countless phantom celestial bodies falling upon a mere mortal existence, whether or not it could still be called human.

Together, their attacks shredded much of the two legs the entity was standing on. Vast quantities of blue, dead blood gushed out of the countless blood vessels that they had damaged, but it seemed to do little to prevent the enormous entity from using its many arms to strike down upon the two of them.

The blue-haired woman dodged to the side of one of the five arms and delivered another blow to the leg of the entity, opening the gap in the membrane further, while Wei Yi simply vanished from the spot via her fourth realm movement method and appeared with a mass of blackened crimson energy already gathered in her hands.

‘I complained about the Kong family’s tradition, but now I am tempted to do it too…’ she thought, pondering the matter for just a moment before exclaiming, “Obliteration!”

The incredible beam burst out of her hands in an odd harmony with the technique’s name, landing upon one of the outstretched arms of the entity and tearing much of the membrane apart with ease. She controlled it to travel from the shoulder to the hand below, and the moment that the Obliteration energy was nearly exhausted, she burst open the sphere from which she was firing it, causing a vast explosion of energy that, to those that had seen it previously, would have a strange degree of flame-like properties that it did not have previously.

It was this new property that she had acquired from the Ever-Growing Blaze, although it was a very minimal integration at the moment and hardly exhibited the best of any of the three forms that the technique could display. With the adhesive and lasting properties of the flames from that technique, she was able to make the incredible power of the Obliteration energy stick to the exposed blood vessels of the entity, allowing the blackened crimson to continue to burn upon the blood and preventing it from pouring out or regenerating.

As if to match her random exclamation, Lan Mei Xing shouted, “Stellar Kick!”

The technique that she used was clearly distinct from the previous one in two ways. It was brighter and far more eye-catching on first glance, the stars in her energy lighting up as they flew towards a second arm of the monstrosity, readily demonstrating the second difference – effectiveness.

Whereas the first kick opened a large tear in the transparent membrane, the second completely exploded the arm that it targeted, shredding apart everything contained within and scattering the blue blood all over the street on which they fought. The strike also tore through the terrain beneath the entity, countless bricks being sent flying into the air while the entity was forced to recoil, one leg and two arms being destroyed in just a few moments.

As Wei Yi avoided the strike from the third arm while preparing a few more spheres of energy with which to strike at the monstrous creature, she glared in the blue-haired woman’s direction.

“Don’t get into the habit of doing that! We are not doing that!”

“But it’s fun, don’t you think? Especially when you called out your technique and the beam did that satisfying sound!” Lan Mei Xing replied, also stepping back while looking at one of the arms, “I’ll take that one, you can have those two. Deal?”

Although the Ascendant rolled her eyes, she still focused upon the two arms and threw out the masses of energy, all of them condensing into odd amalgamations of the four brands that she had in her collection. They were small and misshapen, but when they locked onto their target and rapidly appeared above the two arms, their combat potential was immediately displayed with a violent burst of force that seemed intent to pull everything into the brand, acting upon the blood within the entity and stopping it from reacting with the same speed as it otherwise could have.

Immediately after, they fell upon various points of the arm, thin arcs of energy reaching out to latch onto parts that weren’t directly affected while a vibrant flame burnt everything within their immediate area. The very moment that they struck the membrane, that pull repeated, sucking in the transparent skin and forcefully stretching many points of it. Many areas of the membrane broke right there and then, but everything that was not torn apart was then sent flying out with a pulse of energy.

At the same time, the thin arcs of the Charging Brand component grew in thickness, absorbing much of the energy that was spat out from the Pulse and Collapsing Brand components, taking just a moment longer to build up before they, too, exploded with great intensity, annihilating the two arms.

‘I think I have just attained some comprehension of a Brand Dao… it is a minor element of the Dao of Law, and even that is only in my case, but they clearly follow a distinct series of laws that I had already explored with my attempts to modify the Destruction Brand, and this is just their natural extension… Yes, a Brand Dao is certainly a thing, although I would need to investigate their true origin in order to figure out more,’ Wei Yi thought, checking the Truth of the Universe display to find that her assumption was indeed correct, as a new Brand Dao appeared at the Initial Accomplishment Stage, ‘All but the Destruction Brand have a metal-type element, so perhaps has something to do with their deeper nature.’

While Wei Yi was experiencing a minor epiphany, Lan Mei Xing jumped into the air and, just as her body was at the optimal level to kick at the shoulder region of the last arm of the entity, she did exactly that. Ceasing her rise and fall with a controlled burst of energy, she narrowed her eyes and sent a series of kicks at the entity, although she moved so quickly that it was difficult to figure out whether she kicked countless times in an instant or if her leg simply moved fast enough to create that illusion.

Either way, when they landed on the entity’s body, they tore through the membrane with the same ease that the rest of their attacks managed to, and the intensity of the kicks was able to prevent any blood from being spilled onto her shoes. Instead, all of that was compressed further and further into the body, creating a visible layer of dead blue where there was previously an open area with countless blood vessels. It hampered the entity’s regeneration, and the moment that she ceased her attacks and used their force to fly back and land at a safe distance, all of the fluids that had been forcefully kept away burst out through every place they could.

Sprays of sickly blue tore through the remains of the arm, through the entity’s chest, and even damaged something that vaguely resembled a head.

“Hey, we did about the same amount of damage with that!”

“Not really. Look.”

There was no need to point at what she meant, as the many brands she had cast down were still in play and were only stronger as a result of her minor breakthrough in the Brand Dao. With their initial target gone, they returned into the air, pulled in energy from the air – which was the function of the Collapsing Brand element activating prior to being in striking distance – and crashed down on the remaining pieces of the entity. The chest and back, the poor attempt at a head, and even certain internal elements where the many veins gathered in greater densities were all targeted.

One moment, the Collapsing Brand component activated once again, pulling in everything that was within range, shredding many of the delicate blood vessels without any difficulty whatsoever. The next, a pulse from the Pulse Brand component shot it all back out and frayed the rest of the feeble bonds in the area, leaving the inside of the entity looking like more of a mess than it was. In the third and final moment that mattered for the monster, all of the links of the Charging Brand component were fully charged and exploded, shattering even the vaguest remains of structure and stability within the enormous thing that had once been, at least in part, the leader of this group of the Blood-tinged Church.

Despite that, it was not the final moment of the entity. That came in the fourth moment.

As soon as it was in no state to act, Wei Yi once more vanished from the spot and appeared right beside it, leaping into the membrane and grabbing onto the mass of veins that looked to be the thing’s heart.

“THE IMPURE BLOOD OF THE HERETIC SHALL FLOW TO THE CRIMSON HIEROPHANT!” a voice that barely resembled the leader suddenly emanated from the restriction field itself, prompting all of the blood vessels that still resembled their original appearance to stretch out and grab onto every part of the Ascendant’s skin and flesh that they could find.

Each one desperately pricked at her skin, clearly intending to enter, but she still grabbed onto the heart and then released all of her energies in one go.

Cosmic light, the silver and dawn light of her physique energy, the silver and crimson of her killing will, and, finally, the bloodied light of a galaxy that emitted from her bloodline power. The first three, if killing intent and spiritual will were to be seen as one, were about as effective as her raw strength, but the moment that the all-consuming and endlessly developing bloodline power came into contact with the myriad veins and blood vessels, it was the one to devour them rather than the other way around.

In moments, all of the veins were consumed inside of the body, and just a few seconds after that, even the restriction around them begun to be devoured, the bloodline power finding sustenance in all of the blood that must have been used to create the field and the entity. Or, perhaps, it was feeding upon the remnant bloodline that had been sent into the field when the leader had merged with it, but whatever the case was, it was incredibly effective, being halted only by the fact that the rest of the robed figures were still supporting the field.

So, in order to end them as quickly as possible, Wei Yi grabbed the brands that were still floating around and threw them at the figures, using the weakening restriction to send another Obliteration beam at the secondary barrier, weakening it just enough for the brands to breach it.

As soon as they were downed, so was the restriction field.