Chapter 135: Save the Princess, Get Half the Kingdom

"Night Starfall!" Finally finishing his technique, Old Mo opened his palms and collapsed to the ground from exhaustion, breathing hard, trying to catch his breath.

Bursting free from his hands, a massive orb of energy began rising into the sky, growing before everyone's eyes.

Expanding hundreds of times over, blotting out the entire sky above the battlefield, nearly reaching all the way to where An was, the orb suddenly began breaking apart into tens of thousands of small, brilliant fragments, each one resembling a star.

Forming a starry sky over the field, sparing only the epicenter, where the old man and the defending group stood.

Whoosh!

Like a fierce rain, the newly formed stars, their transformation complete, began falling from the sky.

"Raise your defenses!! Focus fire on the target!! Protocol 2-7B!!" Screaming at the top of her lungs, the scarred woman pulled a handful of black talismans marked with white ink from her inner pocket.

"HA!!" With a lightning-fast motion, she flung the talismans above herself, and they immediately scattered across the sky, coming to a stop at equal distances from one another.

The instant they froze in place, the talismans began burning, and streaks of lightning started stretching down from them toward the ground.

The moment those crackling tendrils touched the earth, the entire surrounding area underwent a massive transformation.

Instantly, all the life, all the moisture in the ground, was drawn up through these lightning tendrils into the burning talismans. Bright beams, like cannon fire, began shooting into the sky, forming dozens of searchlights that lit up everything around, not with ordinary light, but with extremely dense, concentrated Qi.

As they fell, the energy stars were immediately drawn to the beams like magnets and detonated, their Qi collapsing into a chaotic state.

The whole sky filled with the glow of the explosions, the air grew heavy, and the sounds around them started distorting from the sheer volume of chaotic Qi in the air.

….

"I-it can't be! A third-rank talisman - Qi Counterweight! How?!!" Already down on one knee, Old Mo stared up at the sky, unable to believe what his twitching eyes were showing him.

Young Master Su rushed over at once and tried to help the old man to his feet.

Grabbing her sleeve with one hand, Old Mo looked into her eyes. "Y-you have to run! I-I'll open a path for you! You have to, miss-!"

Seeing the look in his eyes, she was about to object, when she suddenly felt an enormous pressure beginning to build from somewhere deep inside the old man.

"N-no!! Servant Mo! Don't do this-! Ah!!" Just as she tried to stop him, she felt a hard shove against her shoulder.

With one sharp push, the old man sent her flying back toward the group. Guilt in his eyes, he struggled to his feet and, turning, began rising into the sky.

….

Seeing this, the scarred woman's attention shifted to the lower part of his chest, where something had begun glowing from within his body. "Hahaha! Old fox! Trying to detonate your own defective dantian?!"

Even as the smirk stayed fixed on her face, panic, even fear, flickered in her eyes. With a light wave of her hand, she signaled her people to intensify their attack.

"You think that weak, worn-out old dantian of yours still has enough energy left to finish us off?! Hahaha!!" Spreading her arms, she started laughing hysterically, trying, in whatever way she could, to disrupt the old man's concentration.

….

"Even if he doesn't have it, I do! And enough for a hundred like you! Great Snow Horizon!" Suddenly, out of nowhere, came a young man's voice, and instantly, from the forest, a massive wave of energy tore toward the attackers, freezing everything it passed through.

"HA! Pinpoint Green Death!" Thrusting her hands forward, the scarred woman's fingertips turned black, then green, and instantly a dense green mist appeared in front of her.

The moment they met, the mist immediately began breaking apart, letting the wave pass through, only shaving off a small fraction of its energy.

Seeing her attack fail, she threw herself sharply to the side, dodging the icy wave.

"Agh-A!!"

"A-AH!!"

"H-AGH!"

The same couldn't be said for her own people. Several cultivators, fully focused on the people in front of them, noticed the incoming wave too late and, reacting too slowly, lost their lives in an instant, leaving nothing behind but screams.

Clenching her trembling hands, the scarred woman looked toward the forest, where a cultivator now stood, his long black hair braided down to his waist. Piercing blue eyes stared straight into her soul. Dressed in white-and-blue robes, he held a strange, rusted sword in one hand.

"Wh-who are you? And what gives you the right to interfere in the Black Guild's business? Do you even understand the consequences of your actions?!" Feeling the strength behind his attack, she realized the only sensible move was to try to frighten this cultivator with the name of her organization.

She knew perfectly well, from the intelligence her spies had gathered, that he was supposed to be nothing more than an ordinary passenger aboard that ship.

The cultivator smiled and tossed his rusted sword into the air, catching it in front of himself. "As for my name, it's no secret... my parents gave me my name, Min, and the name of their ancestors, Feng… Feng Min!"

Feng Min turned toward the defending cultivators, meeting Young Master Su's eyes, and with a faint smile, tilted his head.

Seeing him look at her that way, feeling his aura even from such a distance, she, disguised as a young master, faltered slightly and quickly looked away.

….

"Heh, the Black Guild, you say? Never heard of it... So your threats mean nothing to me." Turning to the scarred woman, he tossed his sword again, but this time, when he caught it, he gripped it tight. "I couldn't care less about you or your guild... But ruining my voyage, one I paid so many spirit stones for! Millennium Frozen Edge!"

His sword, beneath its layers of rust, began shimmering with every color of the rainbow, in hundreds of different shades.

Swinging his sword, an arrow of compressed energy tore loose from its tip, flying straight at the scarred woman.

"Breath of a Thousand Poisons!" Pressing her hands together in front of her chest, green energy appeared between them, and in an instant, a massive cloud of thick, shimmering poisonous vapor formed.

"No!! AGH!!"

"Ah! AgmH!"

"Damn it-! AH!"

The cultivators from her own unit, standing near her, now caught in the poison cloud, dropped to their knees and, clutching their throats, started suffocating. Their skin turned blue, and black blood began pouring from every opening, upper and lower.

In just a few seconds, more than ten of her own people died from her own technique.

BOOM!

Out of the center of the poison cloud, a woman's silhouette shot out and, like a doll, slammed into the ground at tremendous speed, carving out a massive crater.

"Kha! Agh!" With a bloodied chest and a massive hole right through the middle of it, she stared with wide eyes, unable to believe what had just happened to her. "H-how dare you! Th-the Black Guild won't let this go! Ugh..."

"The Black Guild this, the Black Guild that... You villains are all the same." Tossing his sword in his hand, he moved slowly toward her.

"First you're all arrogant, but the moment someone kicks your ass, you tuck your tails and start threatening people with whoever's standing behind you... Typical villains..."

Approaching until he was only a few steps away, he stopped and rested his rusted sword on his shoulder. "My master told me to gain some experience while I'm away from my sect... But every time, I run into villains just like this, weak in both body and spirit."

Raising his rusted sword, he activated his Qi and was about to finish her off when he saw something glowing shoot out of her chest.

"Damn it!" Striking the amulet on his neck with one hand, a membrane began forming around him. But far too slowly compared to whatever was already right in front of his face.

"Agh! Ha-AA!" Now it was his turn to go flying like a doll. Spinning through the air several times, he slammed into the ground with a crash, face down.

Lifting his ringing head out of the mud, he reached a hand toward his rusted sword, which had flown several dozen meters away, toward the defenders. "M-my sword..." His voice grating, he strained with everything he had.

….

Among the defending group, Young Master Su looked at the sword lying not far from her, then at Feng Min.

Clenching her hands into fists, she'd only taken one step forward when she felt a hand on her sleeve.

"Y-Young Master Su, please! T-this is dangerous!" Face pale as snow, Old Mo tried to stop her.

Pulling her sleeve free of his weakened grip, she kept running. "This is our chance! I have to do this!"

Seeing the resolve in her eyes, her people, guarding her with the last of their strength, parted, letting her through the defensive circle.

Halfway there, she tried to draw the sword toward herself with her Qi, but realized it wasn't responding. Understanding her only option now was to run as fast as she could, she kept going toward the rusted sword.

….

"Stop her!! Sting of a Hundred Centuries!" Giving the order, the scarred woman swung her arms, and metal needles with black tips shot out of her sleeves.

….

Finally reaching it, she grabbed the sword with her hand and suddenly felt darkness swallowing her, her vision clouding, her senses dulling.

Biting down on her lower lip, she managed to snap herself back to her senses for a moment and quickly threw the sword toward Feng Min, still lying on the ground.

Having thrown the sword, she spun around sharply and saw a swarm of techniques flying straight at her, led by hundreds of needles glinting in the sunlight.

Realizing she no longer had time even to activate her defenses, she squeezed her eyes shut, bracing for the inevitable.

Swish!

Eyes still closed, she suddenly felt intense cold surrounding her, and instead of the attack she'd braced for, only a wave of energy that stirred her robes.

Opening her eyes, she found a broad back standing in front of her.

Holding the sword in one hand, Feng Min turned his head slightly and, with a smile on his lips, said almost in a whisper. "Don't worry, miss. I'm here now."

Hearing him, hearing how he'd addressed her, her cheeks flushed slightly, and lowering her head, she whispered back. "Thank you-" But immediately pulled two swords from her ring. "But I can handle myself too!" With a faint smile, she lifted her head and, walking with confident steps, took her place shoulder to shoulder with him.

"Haha! Well then! I don't mind at all!" Tossing the rusted sword into the air, he caught it in a firm grip and charged into the attack.

….

"No! No!" Gripping the throat of a cultivator in black robes, An channeled his Qi into the man's body.

"A-AH! P-please! K-kill me! A-aGH!" Kicking his legs, black fluid poured from the man's eyes, ears, and mouth, melting through everything it touched.

The lower half of his head rotted away, turning into black jelly within a few breaths.

Tossing the body aside, An kept walking toward the massive ship. 'I need to be careful… almost everyone here's at Foundation Establishment, and that suicidal old man's probably right on the edge of Golden Core... or was, once.'

Continuing on, he couldn't get the rusted sword out of his head. 'That energy's very similar to the Elemental Sword Mo Fan pulled from the dead grip of that other sect's disciple...'

Remembering how, after losing the sword, that Feng Min had been left utterly drained, weaker than an ordinary mortal. 'Strange… from the sword's Qi flows, I never saw a vampiric drain effect strong enough to leave a host in that kind of state... Most likely I'm just missing something again, or maybe I just can't see it.'

Stepping out of the dense forest, he saw the massive ship, nearly three hundred meters tall and over eight hundred long.

Its entire hull was built from gray metal, faint runes covering nearly every inch of open space along the bottom. The upper part of the ship was made of ordinary wood, decorated with elaborate patterns along the railing. Four massive sails of white cloth, thick as several people standing together, struggled to catch the wind.

Studying the whole ship, he spotted cracks, smoke, and open flames scattered across it.

Right on the ground beneath the ship, two separate battles were underway.

One involved more than two hundred people, most of them in black robes.

In the other, four people, all at the Golden Core realm, fought each other. Afraid of harming their own people, both sides had shifted their battle several kilometers away from the ship.

….

"AH! B-brother! Help!"

"Bastards!! Take this!! FU-!!"

"N-no! Please! D-don't touch me!!"

"Where?! Where's my arm! Ah!"

Walking straight through the middle of the crowd, weaving between cultivators fighting to the death, An made his way through them without hurrying and came out right at the base of the ship.

'Hm, I'm seeing a lot of these runes for the first time...' Pulling his rune book out of his ring, he began copying them from the ship's hull.

.

.

Spending a long time circling the entire ship, he managed to add more than thirty new runes to his collection.

Once he was finished, he tucked the book back into his ring and pushed off the ground, shooting up into the sky.

Landing on the edge of the railing, An first looked down at the deck, where several massive holes still had tongues of flame licking out of them.

Turning his head toward the stern, he spotted a damaged, massive metal tuning fork, its surface torn open in several places.

Taking a few steps along the railing, he found himself standing right in front of the fallen tuning fork. 'Guess I put the book away too soon...' Pulling the rune book back out, he began recording new runes he'd never encountered before.

.

.

Crouching down, he ran his fingers along the tuning fork's surface. 'Oh? This isn't metal... it feels like solid gel to the touch.' Pressing his fingers into it, he felt the surface suddenly turn hard. 'Just like a non-Newtonian fluid... except with a solid material. Fascinating!'

Having studied everything he could, as far as his knowledge allowed, An stood and headed toward the deck, specifically toward the massive doors leading inside the ship.