Liang Chen"s gaze followed the back of the swiftly departing Stone-Soul King, a rare grave light flashing through his pupils. This was his first encounter, and subsequent first battle, with a true Divine Beast. And while he was utterly confident in his chances to deal with a normal beast or cultivator at the middle-stage of the Primordial Immortal realm, that confidence shrank slightly in front of the Stone-Soul King.He restrained the Stone-Soul King when it came to his poison, but he could still feel his body tingle due to the hits he and the beast had exchanged. He had cultivated his body to the early stage of the Primordial Immortal realm using a truly supreme technique, but the Stone-Soul King was able to match that using just the natural strength of his body.
And the worst part was that he didn"t seem to go all out during the quick exchange, wary of the other parties present in the area that might interfere. As such, Liang Chen was fairly confident that he would have to at the very least fully restore his veins if he wanted to stand a chance at killing the Stone-Soul King.
And kill him he would have to, especially after he had seen the untamed desire the Stone-Soul King showed. He didn"t know quite why, it probably had something to do with his bloodline, but the Stone-Soul King"s target was clearly him. And just like he said, he would raze the entire city if he had to.
Was Liang Chen so heartless that he could just leave these people to this calamity he had brought upon them? The answer to that was clearly no, doing so would go against everything he believed in and fought for. So he would have to fight, and he would have to kill the enemy to ensure that he wouldn"t have to carve more innocent lives into his soul, those he racked up in the Sword Dancer"s sect were more than enough for him.
But before he could deal with any of that, he had to deal with the current situation, the voice of Shen Fei coming from his side.
"When?"
Liang Chen spat out an exasperated breath that was somewhat turbid thanks to a fine b.l.o.o.d.y mist, the reverberations of the Stone-Soul King"s last attack had pushed through his blocking hand and rushed into his organs for a second. He turned his head to look at the eager Shen Fei, stretching out his hand to point in the direction that the Stone-Soul King had left.
"Just as promised, when it"s all over. He just said that he"ll be back, so this can"t be considered over. After all, I"m certain that you don"t want the battle to be interrupted by him. So it won"t be now, but I swear an oath that I"ll fight you properly once he"s been dealt with."
Shen Fei seemed to deflate somewhat when Liang Chen postponed their duel to an unknown time, but the fact that he swore an oath to fight at least a.s.sured him that Liang Chen wasn"t going to run away. As such, Shen Fei felt confident enough to swipe his belt, which was an interspatial treasure, and toss a transparent mask to Liang Chen.
"My side of the deal."
Liang Chen caught the Heaven Altering Mask, which was a little bit different from the one he had gotten in the past. He put it on and changed his appearance again, Shen Fei dispelling his illusion. The onlookers had obviously seen the exchange and knew that Liang Chen was hiding something, most likely related to his appearance since he received a mask, but no one present could really ask about it.
The two family leaders definitely wanted to ask about it, especially Tien Bao, but seeing as they were facing the threat of city-wide destruction, this clearly wasn"t the time. The two family leaders exchanged a quick glance, already sharing the same idea.
"Little Brother, I"m sure you"re aware of how dire the situation is so I won"t beat around the bush. We"re going to immediately discuss things with the Head Instructor of the Nine Claws Dojo, we"ll need his strength if we want to resist the Stone-Soul King and his horde. Please, Little Brother Chen, Little Brother Fei, join us there."
Enlai Yuan-Hah left the talking to Tien Bao, who could be considered to be marginally closer to Liang Chen, neither of them were really close to Shen Fei so it didn"t matter who talked to him. The Nine Claws Dojo was one of the four powers in the city, and even though it was one of the two that held no power, the leader of the dojo was still someone with significant might.
There was no point in going to the Heaven"s Secrets Company, not even the Stone-Soul King should be foolish enough to try anything against them even while he razed the city. It would be a good place to hide the weaker civilians, but it was not realistic to hide every single citizen there until the Stone-Soul King grew bored and left. Liang Chen could guess that they wanted to use his and Shen Fei"s strength to bolster their defences, but he had other plans so he shook his head.
"Sorry, but I won"t be joining you. There"s no telling when he"ll be back so I can"t afford to waste my time any further than I already have."
Liang Chen didn"t bother waiting for any counter-argument from the two family leaders and directly stepped past them, kicking off the ground and shooting away like a bolt of lightning. Yumao remained behind at the side of the Zun twins and Tien Huang, who had joined up with everyone else during this brief moment of peace.
The people from the Enlai family thought that Liang Chen might be running off to hide, curious as to why he left his companion behind if that was the case. But a faint guess emerged in the minds of those Tien family members that had mingled a little with Liang Chen, a guess that sent a slight shiver down their spines.
With the strength he had just revealed, they had been mostly confident that his injuries were faked by him and that he had actually been at full strength all along. But what if that wasn"t the case? What if he was actually injured and his strength hampered as a result? If that was the strength he showed while wounded, what would he bring out when he wasn"t wounded?
Their guess was indeed correct, Liang Chen"s injuries had never been faked, and now he was going to heal them as quickly as he could. He hadn"t done so in the past for a single reason, the way he had in mind was certain to draw a lot of attention, which he was trying to avoid. But with the Stone-Soul King throwing out such a threat, he couldn"t really afford to worry about drawing any attention.
But even so, he still used the Heaven Altering Mask to change his appearance once more as he travelled, choosing to turn himself into an orange-haired female to make it even harder to recognize him. Some people would probably be able to realize the truth once he actually started, but that was inevitable so there wasn"t much point in worrying about it.
The place he arrived at after leaving the island floating on Moonset Lake was an exceedingly normal-looking five-room earthen house. The surrounding 10-kilometres of land were barren and without a single other structure, making the house appear somewhat lonely as it stood there alone. But this was The Moon"s Nest, the place where the elemental that practically birthed this city had once lived.
The elemental was gone, but the house still exuded such a pressure that none had been able to enter it since, rendering its contents unknown. And it was exactly this pressure that was Liang Chen"s target today. The pressure was the same as one that would be unleashed by a strong cultivator, it was a result of the surrounding Qi getting denser and more agitated by their mere presence. This was why Tien Huang said that just resisting the pressure was a good way to cultivate, because the pressure would inevitably seep a bit of its dense Qi into the person resisting it.
Liang Chen stood still at the very edge of the pressure for a few minutes, regulating his condition so that the minuscule wounds he suffered in the short exchange wouldn"t hinder him. And once he felt that he reached his peak condition, at least peak for the current him, he stepped forward into the pressure.
The pressure was very weak at the start, but each step practically doubled the intensity of the pressure. By the time he was still 100 steps away from the house, it felt like a mountain of pure steel was bearing down on his shoulders, his feet sinking slightly into the earth. And it was only here that he felt the pressure was good enough for him to set his actual plan into motion.
He used his FiendG.o.d Essence to fight back against the remaining corroding energy, but his stronger Anima Essence surged out from his body and into the surroundings. There were only two laws that Liang Chen had infused into all three of his cultivation systems, and those laws were his newer law of the void and his original law of time. As such, he could use both of those laws with all three of his energies.
Thanks to that, the flow of time around him was quickly affected by his Anima Essence, speeding up dramatically and rapidly draining his Anima Essence. Normally he would only be able to keep up this increased flow of time, 24 times the normal speed, for about six hours. But here he was surrounded by energy so dense it formed a pressure, there was no shortage of energy he could absorb to replenish his drained Anima Essence.
And under this increased flow of time, the last of the corroding energy was quickly pushed out so that Liang Chen could finally start restoring his veins. But a resolute light flashed through his eyes before he actually started to restore his veins, a rampant FiendG.o.d Essence rushing through his body and tearing apart the last few veins that remained intact in his body.
The battle with the Stone-Soul King made it very clear that he still had a long way to go, he still had a lot of strength to gain to achieve his goal. So it was a bit risky, but he still decided to be ruthless to himself and made up his mind, he would use the chance right now to reform all his meridians using his body cultivation technique.
He started to reconstruct his meridians and veins, slowly walking forward to increase the pressure and density of energy whenever he felt that he needed more. This, of course, resulted in him bearing more pressure, to the point that his bones started to creak and tremble under the intense energy that bore down on him.
But Liang Chen acted as if he didn"t even notice it, using the immense pressure to also work on another aspect he could improve on, his laws. His bodily laws had perfectly fused to form his unique body law, the law of the Void Storm. His soul-focused laws were also only a small step away from perfectly fusing into his unique soul law, the law of the Void Abyss.
But he was still a bit away from perfectly fusing all of his laws into a single seamless whole for his Qi cultivation, and now was a good chance to do that. The pressure would help a little by forcing his FiendG.o.d Essence and Anima Essence together when he brought them both out, allowing him to somewhat visualize the perfect fusion.
So he continued to step forward, rebuilding his veins and meridians while constantly bringing out his FiendG.o.d Essence and his Anima Essence. He had already set his mind on it, he was going to complete the fusion here, this would be the place where the law of the Void"s Wrath was born.