บท 296: Bloody battle.
Lucia's pale pink eyes were narrowed dangerously as she looked at Yao Jun and the sword that was pointed straight at her throat. She was an exalted Heavenly Deity, being unable to defend one of her men from the hands of a mere Yao Jun was the greatest shame she had ever experienced in her long life. But she didn't let her emotions rush to her head and dictate her actions, Yao Jun had already shown strength far above what he should be capable of, he was clearly dangerous and had to be treated with caution.
But Yao Jun had no intention of giving Lucia the chance to observe him, He was pressed for time and had to finish this battle at his fastest speed. His right arm moved and swept out with his sword, all the air gathering around the blade and turning into a massive 500-meter long slash that was sent flying forward.
Lucia stretched out her right arm and opened her hand, grabbing onto the incoming slash and clenching her fist. A shattering sound rang out and the middle section of the slash fell apart, bucket-thick cracks spreading through the surrounding space. The slash made from compressed wind fell apart and turned into a soft breeze that just barely ruffled Lucia's brown hair, her eyes remaining somewhat narrow.
But her eyes suddenly shot open as the wind breezed past her, she could feel the skin on the left side of her face freeze and crystallize while the skin on the right side of her face was drying up, the tiny hairs on it melting and releasing a foul burnt scent. She quickly channeled some Qi into her face, the freezing and scorching feeling vanishing and allowing her to let out a soft breath.
The scene caused her eyes to narrow even further, she had been able to clearly feel that it was just normal wind that blew past her, it hadn't been chilled or heated at all. And yet her skin was nearly frozen and burned by the seemingly normal wind, did Yao Jun have even more cards up his sleeve?
She vigilantly observed Yao Jun as she tried to figure out her best course of action, but to her surprise, Yao Jun had yet to make any more moves after launching the massive slash. But her eyes suddenly shot open again as she inspected Yao Jun closely, her body leaning forward and spinning around, her right hand sweeping out while held completely flat like a blade.
A thin black like cut through space wherever her hand passed, stretching out and neatly separating the world into two halves. The air in front of the black line shimmered slightly as Yao Jun appeared there, the him that had been standing still fading away like a painting being erased. Yao Jun's sword was already swinging out as he appeared, his blade and Lucia's hand only a short moment away from colliding.
But a somewhat strange scene appeared just as the two attacks were about to collide. Lucia's attack suddenly jumped forwards a few paces, teleporting directly past Yao Jun's blade so that it could head directly for Yao Jun's throat. Yao Jun's attack also changed, his sword suddenly dissolving into the wind and appearing out of the air directly in front of Lucia's chest.
Space in front of Lucia's chest hardened and formed a shimmering wall that blocked the tip of Yao Jun's sword, only a few cracks appearing on the wall. She blocked his attack, but Yao Jun actually didn't move to block her attack, tilting his head sideways while punching out with his left hand just as she blocked his attack.
His fist passed through space and appeared directly in front of her abdomen, crashing into it and knocking all the air out of her lungs. Lucia's attack landed on his throat, tearing a deep gash in the side of Yao Jun's throat, nearly cutting straight through his windpipe. Blood shot out from his throat, but Yao Jun acted as if he hadn't even noticed it, his strong body cultivation finally starting to show its usefulness in battle.
The blazing orb that still hung above them suddenly roared to life, turning into a thick pillar of flames that poured down onto Lucia as Yao Jun pressed forward and put even more power into his left arm. Lucia felt part of her lifeforce leave her body and enter Yao Jun's left arm, the chilly sensation of death flowing into her body as his law of death wormed its way into her veins.
Even worse, she found her breathing getting rushed and her thoughts somewhat disturbed as a hot poison entered her body through the fist, causing a slight disturbance both in her mind and her lower body. Space above her, as well as around Yao Jun's left hand, started to shimmer and tremble slightly, hair-thin cracks starting to spread out. Space above her froze into a bowl-like shape to block the descending pillar of azure flames while space around Yao Jun's hand cracked and fell apart, a spatial rift forming where his hand was.
Yao Jun managed to temporarily block the spatial rift by creating several defensive walls around his hand, but the walls actually quickly shattered underneath the spatial rift. From the looks of it, this spatial rift was created using a fusion of Lucia's law of space and her law of shattering. Yao Jun managed to pull his arm back and teleport away, but all the bones within his left hand still ended up shattering, his hand hanging limply at his side.
It was at this time that the pillar of fire hit the bowl-shaped frozen space, Lucia not paying too much attention to it as her gaze remained locked on Yao Jun, her law of space already moving into action again. But then she noticed that her bowl-like frozen space didn't have the desired effect of stopping the fire, the flames actually acted like water once they entered the bowl. They splashed up the side of the walls and spilled over the edge, turning into countless drops of fire that rained down on Lucia.
She quickly moved her Qi and created a wormhole above her to teleport the drops away, an act that took quite a bit more energy than just forming a wall. But it wasn't fast enough to snatch up all the drops, a handful of them landing on her body and once again surprising her. She prepared herself for a scorching sensation, but not a single one of the flaming drops burned her.
Three of them brought with them an icy sensation as they started to spread across her right hand, actually freezing her skin and robe while still looking like flames. Another two of the drops splashed out like mist when they landed on her left shoulder, blowing downwards like wind and leaving several cuts on her skin.
Another three drops landed on her head and actually merged with the shadows that her strands of hair created, rapidly spreading out along the shadows and turning into tiny needles that pierced into her scalp. And the final two drops landed on her and simply ran down the length of her left arm like water, only leaving behind a few strange traces of energy. She quickly teleported away all the drops before too much damage could be done, her gaze practically piercing through Yao Jun.
"I don't remember the fragments of the Supreme Law of Elements granting this ability, just what have you done?"
As a Heavenly Deity who had lived for over 5000 years, Lucia could be considered extremely well-read and knowledgable. She knew about the characteristics of each Supreme Law fragment, and while the earlier scene caused her to guess that Yao Jun had acquired the Supreme Law of Elements fragment that reigned over fire, she had never read anything about the fragment granting the owner powers like these.
But how could she know that Yao Jun didn't have a Supreme Law fragment, but the actual Element God's Gate? And with him already having the Demon God's Gate and the Human God's Gate, a change had actually happened to the God Gate. He wasn't like Yuan Shen, who could only have his elements take on the properties of the other elements reigned over by the Element God's Gate, all his elements could take on the properties of his other elements, even his death and poison elements, or his Human God's Gate.
Yao Jun was not one to spill his own secrets, a red leaf-like pattern flashing on his throat as the massive rose still looming a short distance away pulsated slightly. A vast amount of lifeforce flooded into his body from the flower, aiding his already strong body and rapid healing to swiftly close up his throat wound and repair his shattered hand. He didn't care too much about his wounds, they were something he would have to accept if he wanted to win over Lucia.
Lucia's expression sank slightly when she saw how effortlessly Yao Jun's wounds healed, this was one of the reasons she hated fighting against body cultivators. Her pupils moved slightly, massive cracks suddenly spreading through space around the blooming rose. Space around it collapsed in on itself and turned into a circular spatial rift that shattered everything that entered it or was around it, greedily sucking in everything nearby.
But her expression didn't ease up after summoning the spatial rift, she had sensed that the flower vanished just as she unleashed her attack. Yao Jun had brought the flower directly into his God Gate when Lucia unleashed her attack, not even allowing it to suffer from the aftershock of the attack.
Yama didn't grant Yao Jun the ability to summon flowers with the ability to devour lifeforce, he could at best maybe summon a vine or two from his body. The only thing Yama granted him was the ability to absorb lifeforce and other energy, so the flower that had sprouted was, in fact, Yama's actual body. Had it been forced to suffer the effects or aftershock of that attack, it would have grievously harmed Yama, a scenario Yao Jun was trying hard to avoid.
Lucia moved her gaze back onto Yao Jun and swiped her hand through the air, starting to draw a line in space. But her instincts suddenly warned her of danger just as she was drawing the line, her body flashing and teleporting a few meters higher into the air. But even so, she ended up spitting out blood when she reappeared, her gaze lowering down to her abdomen.
A translucent crack had appeared behind her and torn its way directly through her abdomen, the flesh touched by the crack actually tearing itself apart as if it was trying to push away from itself. She moved her gaze a little behind her and saw that similar cracks had spread throughout the entire area, covering an entire 30 kilometers of airspace, she would have been hit no matter where she went.
She also saw the source of all these cracks, the neat line that still cut the surrounding world in two, the result of the attack that Yao Jun had used to kill her Earthly Deity companion. She placed her hand on the crack that had pierced her, a massive amount of Qi entering it and causing it to collapse in on itself. She then took out a pill from her interspatial ring and swallowed it, her wound actually rapidly healing. She spat out a bit of blood that had remained in her mouth, gazing at Yao Jun with piercing eyes.
"You can actually control that thing even after the attack is finished? Just what sort of monster are you really, all these laws and secret techniques one after another, you are not something that should exist in this universe, it goes against all logic. But no matter how much you defy logic, this is not a battle you can win. Just how long can you keep up that strengthened state? You cannot kill me, but I can kill you, especially now that the Devil Vine is gone."
A bit of time had passed since the start of the battle, and despite the hecticness of it, Lucia had gotten some time to observe Yao Jun. She could thus determine that he hadn't been hiding his cultivation earlier, his sudden increase in strength was due to a secret technique that forced his strength to increase. Such techniques could never last forever, especially not ones as strong as this one, so it should run out sooner rather than later. Yao Jun didn't look too bothered by Lucia's words, his sword appearing in his grasp again as he gave a nod of his head and opened his mouth, speaking to Lucia for the second time since they met.
"You're right, killing an early stage Heavenly Deity is too hard for me. But there are more ways to win a battle than just killing your opponent."
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