บท 236: The void storm and the abyss.
Liang Chen stood within the ruins of the city, the light of the sun that snuck through the openings in the torn-up clouds shining down on him as he stretched out his right hand. The lotus that was quietly descending alongside the last few drops of rain landed in his palm, the law of death contained within it no longer acting as violent as it had earlier. Liang Chen let out a drawn out breath as he looked at the three-coloured lotus, weighing it in his hand.
"I wish I could find a water element bloodline, it would suck if I have to fight like this every time I want to cultivate my body without Ling'er around."
Liang Chen didn't regret his choice of incorporating water into his body cultivation, it was a way for him to show the depths of his emotions and also a way for him to feel like Yan Ling was always there, even when they were apart. Even if he did end up finding a water-element bloodline, given the option and chance he would still choose to use Yan Ling's water Qi over his own.
Of course, actually finding a water-element bloodline was far easier said than done, especially in Liang Chen's case. He couldn't just pick any water-element Demonic beast and absorb its blood, his body would just use it as a cultivation resource as it always did when he used blood from Demonic beasts. If he could absorb just any bloodline then he would have long acquired a lightning bloodline and a poison bloodline.
But he didn't have those bloodlines despite the veritable sea of blood he had bathed in up to this point in his cultivation. The only bloodlines he had was the Heaven Devouring Dragon, the Star God, the Void Born, the Rot Dragon, and the mutated Nethersky Wyrm Emperor. Other than the Nethersky Wyrm Emperor bloodline, the rest of the bloodlines contained blood that was either of the Divine Beast realm or higher, they were bloodlines that could stand somewhat equal with the bloodline Liang Chen had at the time of absorbing them.
Thanks to this, Liang Chen guessed that if he tried to absorb a bloodline that was weaker than his own then it would just end up getting devoured and turned into energy rather than properly merged. The Nethersky Wyrm Emperor bloodline was probably an exception as it was a mutated bloodline and thus belonged to a more unique rank than a normal Nethersky Wyrm Emperor.
And it was in this guess that Liang Chen found his problem, his current bloodline could be said to be at the peak of all bloodlines. His bloodline had merged with the Voidborn bloodline and now stood at the same rank as a Ruler Voidborn, a peak being born of true nothingness. His bloodline embodied nothingness and non-existence, where was he supposed to find a water-element bloodline that could merge with something like that? What sort of bloodline had reached such a level that even the rulers of the Void itself accepted it as an equal?
A slightly subdued hissing sound reached Liang Chen's ears and brought him out of his silent musings, his gaze landing on the descending Yumao. His scales had lost their lustre and his feathers were so wet with sweat that they stuck to his body, the final attack that tore open the massive abomination and laid bare its core had clearly taken a large toll on him. Yumao was still young after all so he wasn't used to controlling such a large amount of shadows and darkness, much less when he also had to use them to launch a powerful attack. Yumao landed on Liang Chen's head, Liang Chen giving his head a few soft strokes.
"You did really good, your help really made things easier. How about you rest up and get some food for now and then we'll take care of you first?"
Yumao hissed weakly in response, rolling onto his back and hanging his head in front of Liang Chen's face while keeping his mouth open. Liang Chen gave Yumao's nose a light flick and brought out some of the corpses from his interspatial ring, quickly siphoning out the poison that he had used to kill them. He tossed the corpses to the side, ignoring Yumao's hissing complaints and forcing him to leave Liang Chen's head to feed.
Liang Chen stretched out his left arm as Yumao flew to the side, a grey light rushing down from the sky. His spear crashed into the earth next to him, his hand wrapping around the handle and absorbing the weapon back into his body. He glanced at the blue sky and the dissipating clouds, drawing in a short breath as he once again activated the Rain-Caller's Dance.
The vanishing storm picked up again, rain and lightning once again pelting the ruined city and drowning out most other sounds. The lightning, rain, and fierce winds of the storm would be very helpful when he started his body cultivation, which was why he started the storm up again. It cost a bit of energy, but most of that energy could be recovered by just absorbing some of the elements within the storm.
Yumao finished eating the corpses and got a few hours of rest, Liang Chen taking this time to quietly regulate his own condition back to its peak. He divided the Elemental Lotus into three, keeping the water portion for himself, chucking the earth portion into a jade box for safekeeping, and the death portion was kept for Yumao. The budding leaves that were growing at the top of the lotus showed faint black traces now that he looked at them from up close, they also radiated a very faint aura of the law of darkness so Liang Chen kept them alongside the death portion.
Yumao finished resting and restored himself to his peak condition, his scales and feathers gleaming with a beautiful lustre that radiated a faint sense of power. Liang Chen stopped his silent meditation and locked eyes with Yumao, a pair of golden pupils locking with a pair of grey pupils. Liang Chen swept his interspatial ring and tossed Yumao his portion of the Elemental Lotus while nodding at him.
"Here. I'll guard you so don't worry about getting interrupted."
Yumao snatched the upper layer of the lotus, but rather than swallow the leaves one by one as Liang Chen expected, he swallowed the entire thing whole in one gulp, a task that was easy since he had stretched to his actual size. Liang Chen's eyebrow twitched slightly at the scene, momentarily worried that Yumao wouldn't be able to handle the immense amount of energy contained in the lotus. But seeing as Yumao had decided to do it, Liang Chen felt that he could only trust Yumao and believe that he knew his own limits.
Yumao closed his eyes and coiled up after swallowing his part of the lotus, his flesh wriggling slightly as wispy tendrils of black energy started to seep out from between his scales. The energy moved around his body for a bit before it was sucked back into his body, Yumao not willing to waste an ounce of the energy.
The sound of creaking started to sound out from within Yumao's body, his bones twisting and bending, cracking as his body slowly grew larger and sturdier. His wings received the same treatment, the bones in them jutting through the skin as they started to slowly grow larger. His scales and feathers however, received a more gruesome treatment, falling out in droves and revealing his tender red flesh.
His flesh wriggled and seemingly boiled, the energy of the Elemental Lotus tearing through Yumao's body. Black tendrils of energy started to rise up from the ground and into Yumao's body, the remaining deathly energy coursing through the ground resonating with the Elemental Lotus and instinctively heading for it. And Liang Chen didn't know if it was because of Yumao's law of darkness or the budding leaves that had been on the Elemental Lotus, but the shadows and darkness around them started to exude fog-like energy that also sank into Yumao's body.
And this sudden influx of extra energy seemed to be what pushed the already struggling Yumao over the breaking point. A portion of the boiling flesh on his tail exploded, splashing Liang Chen and the surrounding area with blood and minced flesh as Yumao let out a subdued and pained hiss. The creaking of his bones got even more intense, another section of his flesh exploding as bone fragments shot out.
Liang Chen's pupils instantly shrank until they were barely visible, his entire body tensing as he sprung up and shot over to Yumao. He placed his hand on Yumao's boiling flesh and forced his own Qi into Yumao's body, but the massive amount of energy had already turned completely rampant. Normally it wouldn't turn this rampant just because there was so much of it, only a single possibility popping up in Liang Chen's mind.
Whatever sort of race Yumao belonged to, it was of a level that wasn't strong enough to contain such vast energy. So rather than him controlling and absorbing the energy, the energy was trying to absorb and control his own energy, forcing him to struggle to resist, resulting in the current situation. Liang Chen quickly surrounded Yumao's organs with his Qi to protect them as best he could, urging him on with a faint sliver of panic in his voice.
"Spit it out! Spit it out and focus on forcing the remaining energy out of your body!"
The Elemental Lotus had already been ruined by him swallowing it so spitting it out would cause the remaining energy in it to leak out, but a bit of waste was far better than the other option, death. But Yumao did not listen to Liang Chen's urging, all his muscles tensing up as his body twisted, jagged red lines extending across his grey pupils. He didn't relent even as his flesh was exploding, his gaze remained unyielding as he refused to abandon this energy, only furthering Liang Chen's slight panic.
"I said spit it out! We can find a different one, it'll just be another detour, there's no point in risking things like this!"
Liang Chen tried to convince him, but it didn't help. Yumao had been at Liang Chen's side for quite a while now, he had seen almost all of Liang Chen's struggles and fights. Yan Ling had seen things he would never see, but so too had he seen things that Yan Ling would never see. He had seen the things Liang Chen had risked, the way he put his own body and life on the line time and time again.
His master, his father, was willing to go through such things for what he believed in, for those he wanted to protect. So how could he not do the same for the chance to acquire the strength to be of help to his father? So he did his best to reign in the rampant energy, he did his best to emulate the actions of the person closest to him.
But some things simply couldn't be achieved with mere bravado and determination. His body and bloodline were too weak to contain the vast energy, his attempts at reigning it in only increased the pain he felt, only hastened his death. But his blood-filled eyes remained unyielding even as more of his flesh and bones exploded, some of his organs already laid bare. But even so, he refused to abandon this energy, this chance.
Liang Chen grit his teeth, the desire to shout and curse at Yumao practically boiling over in his chest. But he couldn't do it, he knew that Yumao was only emulating what he had seen Liang Chen do time and time again, he was doing his best to be like Liang Chen. But the two of them were fundamentally different, they were beings of different rank, they were never meant to be able to achieve the same things. Liang Chen's teeth started to crack from how hard he grit them, his expression suddenly sinking as he made up his mind.
"No, I forbid it. You are not allowed to die, you are still going to fly with me to a sky higher than high, to an abyss darker than black."
Liang Chen flipped Yumao onto his back and revealed his stomach, his gaze landing directly on Yumao's frantically beating heart. He then held out his left arm with his palm facing the sky, placing the fingers of his right hand on his exposed wrist. His fingers pierced into his arm and pulled out his veins, his own blood splattering everywhere and hissing violently as it touched the ground.
He split off part of his mind to subdue the worst of the lightning and the other violent energy in his blood, stabbing the veins directly into Yumao's heart and pumping his own blood into him. If Yumao's race wasn't strong enough to handle the amount of energy then the answer was simple, Liang Chen just had to drag him up to his own level by force.
Yumao immediately started to toss and turn, thrashing violently as Liang Chen's blood flowed into his heart and started to spread through his body. Liang Chen had purposefully inserted his blood directly into Yumao's heart to make it easier to spread through the rest of his body, hopefully increasing the speed at which he adapted to the blood.
Yumao thrashed around due to the pain, but he didn't allow any pained hisses to escape him, focusing entirely on resisting the pain while absorbing the blood. His father was doing his best to give him this chance, he could not allow himself to show any weakness at this point.
But Liang Chen quickly discovered a problem as he poured more blood into Yumao, he himself was getting weaker too quickly, he was losing too much energy and blood. If things kept going like this, he would collapse before Yumao stabilized, and that would be catastrophic for both of them. His gaze sharpened further, since things had reached this point then there was no reason to not take it farther.
"Fine, I'll join you in your madness. But once you survive this you'd best be ready for me to smack you around."
Liang Chen moved his right hand away from his veins and swept his interspatial ring, taking out his section of the Elemental Lotus and swallowing it whole. He then started to wantonly draw in the surrounding lightning, wind, and rain, his spear appearing in his grasp. He gathered all his energy as well as his law of the void at the tip and instantly unleashed his strongest technique, Fourth Step Pierces the Sparrow.
A grey hole as thick as a thumb was opened in the air next to Liang Chen, an immense amount of the law of the void spilling forth as a few grains of light grey sand fell out of the hole. He had once again torn open a small portal to the void, greedily sucking in the energy that burst forth and using it to temper his own body. He wanted to wait with his own body cultivation until Yumao was safely done with his own cultivation, but with things having reached this point he would just have to give it all.
Since his energy and blood were vanishing too quickly then he just had to restore them faster than they vanished. Just drawing in the surrounding elements was possible, but it would be far more effective and far faster to use the massive energy that came about when he cultivated his body, it would also restore his lost blood far faster.
So he started to cultivate his own body while pouring more and more of his own blood into Yumao's heart, seemingly all-encompassing darkness welling forth from beneath Yumao and spreading out to blot out the entire area. Hidden away at the centre of the darkness was the small gate to the void, continuously pouring forth sand and energy, the land all around Liang Chen and Yumao turning white and bone-like in appearance as the void corrupted it. And at the centre of the spreading corruption was Liang Chen and Yumao, one birthing the void storm while the other strove towards his own abyss.
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