Chapter 152 An Aura of Success or Failure?
Benton dropped Stealth just before loosing the bowstring simply because it felt more sporting to give the eagle a chance in lieu of having the swift arrow appear literally out of nowhere. Not that it mattered. His Foundation Establishment level archery technique made his arrow faster than a bullet and added a seeking function.
Even if the bird would have had time to dodge the arrow, it wouldn't have been able to.
The tip struck true, aimed at the junction of the right wing and the eagle's body. Wood qi overwhelmed the bird's Wind aspected qi shield, and Void qi destroyed a good chunk of the wing.
The creature was tough, though. Even a hundred qi supercharged with a Concept wasn't enough to kill it. In fact, if Benton hadn't hit a critical location, the beast might not have even been all that injured. As it was, the bird couldn't fly with only a single operatable wing and soon crashed to the rocky ground.
With its five allies still far off, Benton Quickstepped to it and finished it off with his spear. The tough eagle took three more strikes to die.
Rank nine beasts truly were on another tier compared to the last wave. If there had been thousands of them like in the first wave, he might have been in trouble if each of them took four hits or so to kill.
In the end, though, he still had way too many advantages over them to consider them a true challenge. His gravity burst, while not slowing them to barely moving or anything, hindered their movements. Time Manipulation sped his relative velocity so fast that it would have been like the beasts were standing still regardless of the gravity. His attack technique countered each of the beast's qi shields with an opposing element, giving each of his strikes more penetration power and allowing his Void qi to touch skin or fur or feathers or what have you.
Between his extreme effective speed advantage which allowed him to strike the beasts with impunity and the absurd amount of damage each hit with his spear caused, the five didn't last long, and bonus, the extremely valuable carcasses weren't too beat up to sell.
Well, they were kind of missing chunks from the use of Void aspected qi here and there, but still, he'd be able to get some decent money for them. It wasn't like there were a lot of rank nine beast pelts going on the market. Even scraps were worth something, and he had a lot more than just that little amount.
Reflecting on his last couple of fights, though, he did have a worry. The overall toughness and prowess of the beasts steadily improved from rank to rank. Which obviously was to be expected. But the magnitude of the jumps was still a bit disconcerting.
The entire seventh wave had been completely incapacitated by his gravity field, and he'd been able to one shot all of them. For the eighth wave, the beasts were able to still move in an equivalent gravity field, albeit slowly, and three of the creatures had survived his first strike to be taken down by the second. Finally, for that last wave, the beasts were only somewhat slowed by the field, and all had taken multiple hits to kill.
What was really bad about that progression was that all those ranks were jumps in minor realm only. They were still all the equivalent of Golden Core cultivators. Rank ten represented an advancement to the next major realm, the realm above Benton—the equivalent of Nascent Soul.
Such beast would have developed an aura, which he knew about from his knowledge technique. The aura had the ability to suppress him in some way, hindering his attacks and defense, but he didn't know by how much. The knowledge didn't quantify anything.
There was some good news. One, his Time Manipulation worked great no matter the rank of his opponent as far as he could tell, and his attack technique did exactly what he expected it to do—deliver a much harder punch than would be expected for an attack that didn't utilize an opposing element to break a shield and Void to consume flesh. Two, a beast was never as strong as a cultivator of the same realm. He'd put him at Nascent Soul minor realm one versus a half dozen rank twelve beasts any day.
But he wasn't at the first minor realm of Nascent Soul yet. He needed a thousand loyal sect members before he could make that advancement.
From his knowledge, fighting against an opponent that had an aura would put him at a big disadvantage, but it wouldn't completely take him out of the fight. His techniques would still work. They just wouldn't be as strong.
And of course, his opponent being in the next major realm up meant that the beast would be that much stronger and tougher.
Frankly, Benton didn't know if he'd be able to defeat even a rank ten beast, much less multiple rank tens or a rank eleven, or heaven forbit, a rank twelve.
But he didn't have a choice. Beast tides were all or nothing. Either the Big Boss was defeated, or the humans all died.
If he were a normal cultivator stuck at the peak of Golden Core knowing what he was about to face, he'd be quaking in his boots. But he wasn't a normal cultivator. He was a cheating cheater who cheats.
"System," he said, "is there a way to minimize the impact of an aura?"
Benton tensed as he waited for the response. Whether the answer he received was positive or negative wouldn't change his actions. He had to proceed onward regardless, but a technique might just provide him with the advantage he needed to succeed. Many Golden Core cultivators have been forced to fight against those in the Nascent Soul realm. Most die, but experiments have proven that coating one's body in a particular type of layer of qi, similar to a shield but attuned to defend against an aura, reduces the negative effects of an aura. He let out a relieved breath. Perfect.
"System, I'd like to create such a technique and buy it to Mastery."Technique Creation Confirmed
Host has learned the technique, Aura Defense -Mastery•
Host has 852 Sect Points Available. Nice.
Benton still anticipated a difficult fight, especially if he had to face multiple rank tens at once or higher ranked beasts, but he was at least somewhat more prepared.
He Quickstepped down to the valley. Time to find the next wave if there was one or the Big Boss if not.
###
Zou Tian stripped everything from his mind, his thoughts, perceptions, feelings. Everything. From the breeze caressing his skin to his worries about the badger somehow finding its way to Wan Ai, he pushed all of it away.
Two months ago, or even one, he wouldn't have been able to attain such a state of concentration, but hours and hours of daily practice had led to steady improvement. As it had with all the members of the Rising Tide Sect. Being able to instantly drop into a meditative state and clear their mind was something that almost any of them could do in seconds.
Until the situation with the stealthed badger, Zou Tian had never considered that Shadow qi could reveal as well as conceal, but his instincts had led him to the path. He would follow it through to its destination.
His experience earlier had proved that there was a way to use Shadow to reveal. He just needed to figure out how.
With an empty mind, he concentrated on a single idea—letting Shadow speak to him.
In his mind, Shadow swirled around him, light and dark. Empty and full. It was as ethereal as a spirit, as solid as night, and translucent as nothingness all at the same time.
What did any of that even mean? What was it trying to tell him? That it was a contradiction?
No. That wasn't right. It was simply trying to tell him that it was something, not nothing.
Yes. It had properties. It was a substance, not merely the absence of light.
More than that, it was an element. A qi aspect.
It could be used to conceal. That was its most common purpose. But it could do so, so much more than that. One only had to embrace it, to become one with it, and open oneself to the possibilities.
Zou Tian felt Hide Presence advance. He'd reached Mastery.
Never before had he been so connected to Shadow, both as a concept and literally to the shadows around him. To the shadows between the houses that Senior Brother was walking toward.
Zou Tian's eyes popped open.
###
Yang Ru calmly walked toward the shadows with a pile of spirit coins in his hands, determined to draw the badger out of hiding.
Obviously, his actions were dangerous. The beast was at a much higher level than him, the equivalent of the near the peak of Foundation Establishment versus him having barely began his journey in the realm.
Yang Ru had factors on his side, however. His Body Cultivation made him much tougher than other cultivators of the same minor realm, though he had no doubt that the badger could damage him if it got in a good shot. The beast was already injured, having retreated with one of his sister's arrows sticking out of it.
Neither of those was his biggest advantage. That distinction belonged to his allies. As soon as it attacked him, he expected his sister to stick another arrow in it, and Kang Lin was watching him. She'd join the battle as soon as the badger moved out in the open.
As long as he could survive long enough and keep the spirit coins for it, he had no doubt that the two girls would kill the creature.
He was almost to the alley the beast had disappeared into.
"Senior Brother!" Zou Tian yelled. "Stop!"
Chapter 153 - Attack a Creature a Major Realm and a Half
Higher Than Me? Sure.
Yang Ru was a step away from the shadowed alley when he heard the call to stop. Already primed to react to the slightest stimulus, Yang Ru halted. Cupping the shaft of his spear around the pile of spirit coins in his hands, he brought his weapon up into a guard position.
"Why?" he yelled.
"It's right in front of you," Zou Tian called.
Good. That was exactly the result Yang Ru wanted. For the badger to attack him and be drawn out into the open.
But the implications of what the younger boy said immediately hit. Zou Tian could sense the beast.
Yang Ru stepped back, keeping his spear at the ready.
###
The badger snarled. So close. One of the less weak humans had been walking toward the alley, holding a source of consumable qi that, though not nearly as big as the first, might be enough for it to advance.
It was all the beast could do to not rush out into the sun to attack.
But it was injured. One of the sticks the humans used for attacks had impaled it. The wound wasn't deadly, but it hurt. And it couldn't work the stick out of itself without making the injury worse.
Though the humans were all much weaker than it, they were not without teeth. The badger had seen them kill two of its fellows. And it was not nearly at full power. If not for the orders it could not disobey, it would have retreated to try for the qi source at night when it could make better use of its stealthiness.
Instead, it had to make the best of a bad situation and find a way to win even with the humans actively on alert. It had to be careful moving, or the stick would move around, jostling its insides and worsening the wound.
None of that would have mattered if it advanced, though. So much power. So close.
As soon as the human stepped into Shadow, it would have attacked, keeping itself hidden from the stick flinger.
But at the last instant, another human had called out, and the less weak human had stopped.
The badger almost ran out, exposing itself. But it hesitated, and the choice was soon taken from it as the less weak human retreated.
It wished it understood human speech. It wished it knew why the weak human had yelled and why the less weak human had left.
The badger wanted that qi. It wanted to advance and kill every human in the gathering, consuming every bit of qi.
There was so much. It would ascend as high as…
Best not to think about that.
All it could do was to wait and to watch. The humans would make a mistake. It was sure.
###
Zou Tian, Yang Ru, Kang Lin, and Ye Zan huddled below the allure with Yang Xiu above keeping watch with her bow ready.
"You can see it?" Ye Zan said.
"I can sense it," Zou Tian said.
Kang Lin grimaced. "How accurately? Is it like a general direction or something more precise?"
"Very accurate, but it requires concentration. It's a new ability. I'm not sure how long I can keep it active if I'm not meditating."
"If we go into the alley, can you direct our attacks from here?" Yang Ru said.
Both Kang Lin and Ye Zan looked doubtful.
Zou Tian shared their hesitation. "I don't see how, Senior Brother. I'd tell you to attack your left, but you wouldn't know exactly where left. And the beast is fast, hard to hit even when we can see it."
"We need to get it into the sun," Ye Zan said. "That way we can all see it."
Kang Lin looked at him like he was an idiot. "Obviously, but how? If Yang Ru or I could sense it, maybe we could go into the alley, survive its attacks, and push it out."
The implication was that Zou Tian was too weak to do the same. Which stung. Especially since the assessment was accurate. He was at Qi Gathering minor realm five, almost a full major realm and a half less than the badger's equivalent of peak Foundation Establishment. There was no way he'd be able to beat the beast one on one.
But he didn't need to beat the creature. He just needed to push it into the sun.
A plan began to form in his mind.
"Do we have a pike?"
###
No one had wanted Zou Tian to carry through with his plan, but neither could any of them come up with a better idea. He was the only one who could sense the beast. Thus, he had to be the one to go into the alley.
One of the village guards had found a pike with a sixteen-foot-long haft. It was a mortal weapon, and the metal piece on the end combining a half-moon blade with a long spike was rusted.
Zou Tian had never even held such a weapon, much less fought with one. Walking into a fight with a vastly superior foe holding an unfamiliar armament did seem pretty darn stupid. He was very glad that Wan Ai wasn't aware of what he was about to do. She was going to be so very upset with him when she found out.
There was literally no one else for the job, though. Yang Xiu's Qi Gathering level perception skill simply wasn't strong enough to detect the higher ranked beast. The only reason he could do it was because of his high affinity with his Shadow qi aspect. If the beast had been using a different element for concealment, he would have been useless.
The only saving grace for his plan was that he didn't need to defeat the creature. He had only two goals. One, survive. Two, get one good hit on the badger.
That was it. Easy.
He snorted. If only.
The problems with his plan were many, starting with the newness of using his technique in such a manner. Hide Presence wasn't envisioned as a way to detect other beings cloaking in Shadow, and forcing it to perform that function required great focus. He wasn't even sure he could do it while walking, much less fighting.
Almost as worrisome, the badger was both fast and tough. It took both the twins' efforts to injure it, and both had used techniques or experience that far outstripped Zou Tian's just to hit it. Senior Brother had been able to convert his Momentum into speed, making him faster that the beast for a short while. Senior Sister's shot had almost been prescient in anticipating where to aim.
Worst was just how much lower in cultivation level he was than the beast. Senior Sister and Kang Lin had told him about a buffalo and how they'd been hesitant to attack such a high ranked creature. They were both already in the Foundation Establishment realm at that point. He was so far below even them that it wasn't funny.
Zou Tian did have tiny advantage in that he was at the peak of Bronze Body Cultivation, and if he were facing a rank three beast, that fact would have made him feel confident indeed. Against a rank six? The badger could tear him to shreds in an instant.
His vulnerabilities were extreme, but the beast was not without flaws to exploit. For one thing, it had been injured by the twins. From what Zou Tian had sensed, it was not moving nearly as fast as it previously had. Second, he knew what it wanted—spirit coins.
Five of the ten-thousand qi ones that Jin LiJuan guarded were in a pouch tied to his waist. It was a lot easier to predict an opponent's movements when one knew what they would be targeting.
###
The badger watched, amused and eager, as the weak human who had yelled walked toward the alley. The young human was so far beneath it that it could kill the youngster with a single swipe. Even better, the human carried consumable qi. A lot of consumable qi. More than the less weak human had.
It licked its lips.
Advancement was so close and growing closer by the step.
The badger sensed Shadow on the weak human. Even better. A stealth-focused opponent would have no chance against it. Such low ranked prey would not be able to hide from it.
It stared, transfixed, at the pouch swinging from the weak human's clothes.
###
Zou Tian swallowed hard. He felt really, really stupid for suggesting a plan that put him in so much danger. But there was no use going over the reasons again. It had to be him, so it would be him.
He glanced back. Kang Lin, Ye Zan, Huang Yimun, and Senior Brother stood in a semi-circle in the center of the plaza. Further back, Yang Xiu had an arrow nocked.
The sight gave him heart. His sect members had his back. Literally. And he had both a Major Healing Pill and a Minor Healing Pill in easy to reach pockets in his robe.
Anything short of death could be healed, and his Body Cultivation should hopefully be helpful in slowing his demise long enough to consume one of the miraculous drugs.
His nerves somewhat settled, he focused on the plan. The badger would logically go for one of two targets. The coins were the beast's primary goal. Master had said the beasts would fixate on them, and the badger's actions had done nothing to dissuade Zou Tian from believing the statement.
Rank six beasts were smart, though. It might decide to go for his throat as killing him would make taking the coins easier.
Zou Tian realistically only had one shot at accomplishing his goal. As soon as the beast moved, he'd need to react by swinging his pike. But the beast was so fast, that he would have to anticipate where it would be, just like Yang Xiu had.
That meant guessing. Coins or throat. Choosing wrong meant failing and maybe his death. Maybe all of their deaths.
He had to guess correctly.
As he neared the alley, Zou Tian slipped into what he thought of as walking meditation. He cleared his mind and sensed the Shadow.
Ahead of him, waiting just inside the alley, was the beast.
That was good on two fronts. First, his ability worked. He was able to walk and detect it as the same time. Second, he needed for the beast to be eager to take the bait for his plan to work.
That the badger was on the edge of the plaza was an important clue.
Zou Tian tried to put himself in his opponent's head. It was injured and desperate to advance. The human approaching it held the means for that advancement. But so had a previous human, one who had retreated before entering the alley.
It was desperate. The wound combined with the source of qi being so close must be overwhelming its intelligence. In such a situation, instinct prevailed.
He tensed as he drew within what he estimated to be leaping range of the beast.
The badger surged forward, and Zou Tian almost committed, which would have been a huge mistake. The creature moved only an inch, clearly wanting to attack but holding itself back from entering the sun.
Trying to calm his heart hammering against the inside of his chest, Zou Tian kept walking slowly forward.
The badger retreated further into the alley.
That was good. A predictable enemy was a beatable enemy.
Zou Tian was positive that, as soon as he fully entered the Shadow, the beast would attack. He steeled his resolve and took another step.
Chapter 154 - Alright Stop, Meditate and Listen
Zou Tian stepped out of the light and into Shadow. As he anticipated, the badger began moving as soon as he'd fully entered the alley.
It was decision time. Would it go for his throat or the coins? With the creatures extreme speed, especially compared to him, he only had time to defend against one, and the wrong call would mean disaster for him and maybe for the rest of the village. For Wan Ai.
Making the right call, on the other hand, didn't guarantee success. It just gave the defenders a chance.
The badger was hurt, and a hurt animal tended to act according to its instincts. Which meant it would go for the throat, right? That tactic was the fastest way to kill its enemy. A basic swipe with the claws to the neck was simple and reflexive, a move the badger had probably known since soon after being born.
The other logical choice was to go for the coins. It already proved to be focused on them, heading straight for Jin LiJuan earlier. And it had appeared to be ready to attack Senior Brother who held some in his hand.
From what Master had told them about spirit beasts, their existence was brutal. Literally dog eat dog. They had to kill to advance or die to become that path to advancement for others.
Given a creature who'd survived long enough to reach near the peak of the sixth rank, what could drive its motivations more than the desire to get stronger? And Zou Tian was carrying fifty thousand qi in an easy to consume bundle of five coins. The only thing that could possibly be more enticing to the badger would have been if they had been Shadow aspected instead of Earth.
The decision boiled down to what would govern the creature's next action—a reversion to its time as a simple animal or its want and need to advance?
The badger was about to leap. Zou Tian had to make his decision.
He swung the long pole of the pike horizontally at waist level, the flat of the half-moon blade pointed toward where he expected the beast to be.
If the badger went high for the throat, the pike would miss it by a mile. At worst, he had a fifty-fifty chance of being right. Though, hopefully, his intelligence and analytical reasoning moved the needle to being in his favor.
Those traits seemed small to hang the fate of his life on.
If he'd guessed wrong, he was about to be in a world of hurt, and he'd just have to hope that his friends could rescue him in time.
The pike swung. The badger leaped.
The flat of the blade connected with the beast. Zou Tian put all his muscle into the keeping the weapon moving in a long arc, carrying the creature with it.
He shifted his body. Ten degrees. Twenty. Forty-five. Ninety.
Using every ounce of his strength and every bit of control he'd gained over his body through intense physical training, he halted the pike's swing.
The badger continued flying. Out of Shadow. Into the sunlight.
It landed, fully visible, in front of the semi-circle of sect members.
###
Kang Lin did not feel like she'd truly pulled her weight in the defense of the village so far. She'd did what she was obligated to do. Followed orders. Stabbed what she could. Faced danger.
She simply wasn't as powerful as her allies.
Compared to Yang Xiu who could anticipate target's movements and shoot arrow after arrow at the attacking beasts and Yang Ru who could convert his Momentum into an absurdly powerful strike and, after a recent epiphany, even speed his attacks making him that much more likely to land a hit, her abilities were more than a little lackluster.
She could hit beasts with forked lightning. Yay. Sometimes, her hits even singed the beasts' fur.
If, you know, someone like Yang Xiu had already caused enough damage for Kang Lin to get past the creature's qi shield.
Naturally, therefore, she hung back as the badger landed, letting the other, more powerful cultivators take their shots.
Even though the badger had a wood shaft sticking out of its midsection, it was still quick and agile. Yang Xiu's rain of arrows all missed. And Yang Ru did not have any Momentum built up, so he had nothing to convert to either speed or power. He, too, was unable to land a hit on the beast.
Kang Lin's combat strength might have been a little lacking in her estimation, but there was nothing wrong with either her observation skills or her intellect. As the badger flopped around dodging attacks, she noticed something important, something that might just be the key to bringing it down.
With the twins having each taken a turn, it was time for a group effort. Ye Zan nodded to Kang Lin as he flanked the creature. As soon as he got into position, he thrust his spear, which the badger easily dodged. At the same time, though, Yang Ru did the same.
His strike, too, was dodged.
Kang Lin hadn't been completely idle while the badger flew toward them and while the twins took their respective shots.
Besides observing, she'd built up quite a charge of Lightning.
The arrows that were created by the fletchers in the village and the ones Master purchased were made mostly of wood. The only metal part was a tiny tip. And wood was a horrible conductor for Lightning aspected qi.
Yang Xiu, however, was pulling out all the stops in trying to kill the sixth rank beast that had penetrated the wall. She wasn't using locally made arrows or even the ones created by crafters in Sixth Flawless Flowing City.
The arrows she'd chosen to shoot at the badger were her pride and joy, the arrows that Master had gifted her. Each was top heaven grade, perfectly straight and with an arrowhead that was sharper than sharp. And more crucially for Kang Lin's purposes, had a metal tip that sheathed a couple of inches of the wood shaft.
She just happened to notice that the very tip of the sheath of the arrow sticking out of the badger extended just past the skin, just past its qi shield, open to the air.
The thing about Lightning was that, when it decided where it wanted to go, it was quite difficult to dodge, no matter how agile one was, and the badger had a small lightning rod sticking out of its stomach. All Kang Lin had to do was fire off a forked bolt from the tip of her spear, and the rest happened naturally.
No matter how much the badger twisted and tried to evade, it had no chance. Her qi sought that little piece of metal with the dedication of Yang Ru avoiding an awkward conversation.
The Lightning struck true.
Best of all, two facts became very important. One, the metal sheath provided a path for the Lightning to travel. Two, the metal extended from outside the badger's qi shield to inside the qi shield.
Nearly one hundred percent of the qi Kang Lin had used on the strike was transferred inside the beast's already injured body. Even though it neared the equivalent peak of Foundation Establishment, it had no defense against so much destructive energy detonating inside its body.
The creature practically exploded from the inside out.
All of the defenders stopped, stunned. They had expected a long fight of attrition, wearing the beast down over time with multiple small wounds. All anticipated many injuries and having to consume healing pills to stay in the fight.
Instead, it was all over. One strike, one kill as Yang Xiu would say.
The sect members didn't stay stunned for long. Instead, they started cheering.
"Great job, Kang Lin!" Ye Zan said.
"Way to go, sister!" Yang Xiu called.
Yang Ru turned to them, his expression as angry as Kang Lin had ever seen him. "What are you all doing? Stop this at once!"
His objection stunned her. All of the defenders were recognizing her contribution, her one moment of competence, of glory, and he couldn't even give her face. It upset her more than she would have liked.
Kang Lin known many, many young masters who couldn't stomach a cultivator of a lower talent doing anything better than them, but Yang Ru had seemed not to care about the distance between their spiritual roots. She couldn't believe that she'd actually trusted him. How could she be so stupid?
"Meditate now!" he yelled. "Congratulate later!"
Oh.
She blushed. He'd just wanted them to focus on consolidating their gains as quickly as possible. As they should. As expected from one of Master's two genius disciples.
She'd maligned him unfairly, even if just in her mind. That was not okay. Whether they were just friends or they had the possibility of becoming more, it was important to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Trust was important, and slowly over time, he was earning hers.
Kang Lin resolved to remember that in the future, but first, she had to meditate.
Chapter 155 - Unexpected
Revelation
12/10/24 Author's Note: I wasn't really satisfied with the ending of the last chapter. In particular, the reason that Kang Lin attributed to Yang Ru's interruption made no sense whatsoever in the context of the story. I've been stewing over how to fix it for a while, and the obvious solution occurred to me today. I made a small edit to correct. Thanks!
When Benton hadn't received notification of any advancements, he'd feared the worst, that the village and all the defenders had somehow been killed. Thus, he let out a very relieved breath when he got the popup.
""Host's Disciple, Zou Tian, has reached Mastery in Hide Presence.
Host is awarded two Sect Points.
Host has 854 Sect Points Available.""
Zou Tian was alive, which meant that the village hadn't been destroyed. In fact, most if not all of the sect members were probably still alive.
Of course they were. They were all good disciples who followed orders well and worked together and looked out for each other. Benton couldn't have asked for a better group of youngsters.
He had been worried for nothing.
Over the next couple of hours as he cautiously Quickstepped toward the mountain searching for the tenth wave, more notifications rolled in. Kang Lin advanced to Large Success with her lightning spear attack. Many other guards and villagers advanced their techniques as well, twelve in total. Three sect members moved up a minor realm in cultivation.
The twins didn't advance further, but that was okay. He was sure they were doing just fine.
The main thing was that it seemed like the defenders had come through whatever it was that they had faced. The sixteen points were just icing on the cake.
He Quickstepped again and extended his senses. And again. And again.
There it was. Finally.
It. Not them. A single beast, a rank ten.
Since there wasn't a wave, that meant the beast he sense was almost certainly the Big Boss.
That was good. Benton had been worried about taking on multiple foes a major realm above him. Going against one should be much easier.
Of course, easier didn't mean easy. From what he'd studied about beast tides, the Big Boss was tougher, stronger, faster, and more intelligent than other beasts of the same rank, usually significantly so.
For one of the few times since his transmigration, Benton was about to walk into a fight and not be the stronger of the combatants.
He was already using his Stealth technique, and even though he doubted its effectiveness considering recent events, he meticulously erased himself from sight, sound, and smell. His next step was to gain elevation to get a look at his opponent, so he Quickstepped up to the limb of a tall tree.
All the beasts he'd seen so far had been enhanced or mutated forms of animals that he could have seen on Earth. Sure, they were much more powerful and aggressive than their mortal counterparts, but at their base, they were the same type of creature.
Not so for the beast ahead of him.
It was a freaking cyclops.
Benton didn't know why the unexpected revelation surprised him so much. Dragons were definitely a thing here. Real dragons that flew. He wasn't one hundred percent sure about fire breathing, but there were enough cultivators who were feted for having faced one that he believed they were real.
He also didn't know a lot about bloodlines, but some families—clans?—drew power from having beasts in their ancestry. Dragons and basilisks were both mythological creatures that were mentioned as bestowing such bloodlines.
If those two could exist, why not cyclops?
Besides, the proof was right there a couple hundred yards in front of him. It had one red eye in the center of its forehead and was eight feet tall if it was an inch. Gray skin outlined chiseled muscles that would make a Mr. Universe contestant weep. And it wore a skirt. Or kilt, maybe.
Either way, that was definitely a piece of clothing, indicating a level of intelligence and perhaps culture far in excess of any of the beasts Benton had previously faced.
Maybe it could be reasoned with?
He wasn't stupid enough to jump down and try to talk to it, though. First, he wanted to observe it and to try to think of everything he knew about the creatures from stories on Earth.
If he remembered correctly, Percy Jackson fought one of them. Maybe? Benton had read the series to his son, but that was a while back. The details were sketchy. Even if there was a cyclops in one of those books, he didn't remember anything about the battle and definitely not any strengths or weaknesses of the beast.
If only he were a protagonist in one of Greg's stories. He would have perfect knowledge of everything, like he had Google at his fingertips. But he was left with only his imperfect memory.
Honestly, the biggest memory he had of cyclops was from a movie. Was it Krull? Maybe. It was something he watched when he was young, not from watching more recently with his kids or grandkids.
Anyway, in the story he remembered, cyclops were all really sad because they were able to see the future but only the moment of their death. Benton somehow doubted the creature in front of him had that particular malady, though.
So basically, he knew absolutely nothing of use about his potential enemy.
Just great.
As he was thinking about what he knew, the beast was moving. And it moved fast. In seconds it had crossed half the distance.
Oops.
Caught off guard, Benton wanted to retreat, and since he knew the beast to be the equivalent of a Nascent Soul cultivator that probably possessed an aura, he activated his Aura Defense. He Quickstepped, intending to move a half mile back.
Something went wonky with the technique, though. Instead of stepping through air from one place to another, it felt like he moved through molasses, and he ended up only traveling a scant hundred yards, around ten percent of the distance he had intended.
When he looked at his qi expended, the short trip had taken five times more than moving the entire half mile should have.
Crap. What happened? He'd bought the Aura Defense technique to Mastery. Did it not work? Or was there some other problem?
"System," he said internally, not wanting to chance drawing any additional attention to himself, "why didn't the technique work?"
""The technique did work. Host was inside the area covered by the overpowering aura of the beast serving as the Boss of a tide. The aura both increased qi expenditure and reduced technique effectiveness as anticipated. Without the technique, Host would have been unable to use any other techniques.""
Man, that sucked. Even with his cheat skill, he would be at a serious disadvantage. The fight was not going to be easy or simple.
It was definitely best if he could avoid it altogether. Which left him to his favorite tactic—bluffing.
To do that, though, he'd have to engage in a conversation with the beast. Ugh. He wasn't exactly optimistic about such an endeavor going well.
Feeling more nervous than he had in a long while, he found a clearing ahead of the cyclops in its path of travel, dropped his Stealth technique, and waited.
As he hoped, the creature stopped as soon as it saw him. To any cultivator or beast with a spiritual sense, not being able to sense an opponent was a huge, glaring warning sign that said, "This dude might just be able to curb stomp me." Thus, the beast had to have found his presence more than a little disconcerting.
"Hi," Benton said.
"Human!"
"Yes, I'm a human. Should I call you Cyclops?"
"Human!!"
Maybe the beast wasn't quite as sharp as Benton had given it credit for being.
"I was wondering if I could perhaps prevail upon you to abandon your attack on my village?"
"Human!!!"
The thing was working itself up into a lather. Its muscles were tensed, and its body literally shook. Clearly, it wanted to do the "Hulk smash!"routine on him and was only being held back by fear of Benton being a higher level.
"I'd prefer not to have to kill you. So few humans or beasts reach your level. It would be a waste."
The cyclops snorted, which at least wasn't another increasingly loud shout identifying his species, so … progress?
"What do you say? Tell me what you're after, and maybe I can help."
"Human weak!"
"Am I? Am I really?" Talk was only going to get Benton so far with the creature. He needed to back up his bluff and had an idea that might just work. "If that's the case, I'm probably slow, too?"
"Human slow!"
"Then if you try to hit me, there's no way I'll be able to dodge, right?"
"Human slow!"
"Try to hit me, then."
Benton barely had an instant to crank up his Time Manipulation to full dilation, speeding himself to the maximum in comparison to the cyclops. It drained his qi like crazy and still the beast was ridiculously fast. He had to Quickstep out of the way, or he would have been flattened.
"See," he said from behind the creature. "I not only dodged, but I was able to move to your blindspot. I'm not weak or slow."
"No aura. Human tries to trick Cyclops. Human weak!"
Well, shoot. Nothing he could do could simulate an aura, and there would be no bluffing the beast without one. It all was going to have to come down to a fight.
Chapter 156 - high tide
Benton hated that he would have to risk everything in a fight that he wasn't assured of winning. What was the saying? It was something like, if the outcome of a fight is in question before you start, you've already messed up.
Well, he'd definitely messed up.
The cyclops was shaking with barely contained rage. It could burst forward with an attack at any moment.
The beast's aura was screwing up all his techniques, making them cost more and be less effective. Even with Time Manipulation and Quickstep, the cyclops was simply faster than him, and he doubted that a gravity field would make much difference.
He needed another technique, one he hadn't bothered with previously because it had felt superfluous. To buy it, though, he had to find a way to stall the beast.
"Fine," Benton said. "Since you refuse to accept that I have an aura until I reveal it, I guess that's what I'll have to do. You've not going to like it, though."
The beast didn't believe him, obviously, but that was okay. He didn't need to stop it, just make it hesitate. Which was just what the cyclops did as it waited to see the demonstration of Benton's nonexistent aura.
As soon as the words left his mouth, he said internally, "System, I want a movement technique based on my Concept of Speed. Confirm purchase to Mastery for me."
""Technique creation confirmed.
Host has learned technique, Absolute Speed Enhancement - Mastery.
Host has 846 Sect Points available.""
Yes! Every little bit of speed should help.
With his other techniques active, Benton was only a little slower than the cyclops, and hopefully, the new technique would be enough to even out that imbalance or even give him the advantage.
Actually, speed wasn't enough. Every bit of anything and everything should help, and his Body Cultivation was currently still sitting at Gold minor realm one, meaning he had room to improve.
A Body Cultivator at the peak of Diamond, the next major realm up, was no match for the equivalent spiritual cultivator, a Nascent Soul cultivator, but he'd take any increased attributes he could get. Besides, a peak Golden Core cultivator at peak Diamond was a lot different than just a peak Diamond. Maybe it would be enough to give him a physical advantage.
If the System let him buy what he wanted, that was.
"System, please take me to the peak of Diamond Body Cultivation."
""Host has not met the following requirements to ascend to Diamond Body Cultivation:
Has more than fifty percent of sect members living on the sect grounds.
Has more than 1,000 sect members.""
It was as he had feared. There were criteria limiting his advancement just like with Spiritual Cultivation. Still, there was something he could do that might help, however little.
"System, please take me to the peak of Gold Body Cultivation."
""Host advancement to Gold - Minor Realm
Nine confirmed.
Host has 814 Sect Points available.""
Every little bit…
Time to simulate that aura. Though he doubted what he was about to do would fool the beast, there was no harm in trying. If it worked, he might just be able to get through the situation without a fight.
He immediately used his gravity burst to enhance the planet's pull on the cyclops and triggered his Area Temperature Manipulation. Since his spiritual sense registered that the beast used Fire aspected qi, he hoped that removing heat from it would hurt it or, at least, hamper it somehow.
The beast snarled. "An aura? Or not an aura. Aura strange. Human aura weak! Human weak!"
Well, that was about the reaction Benton had expected. He triggered his Time Manipulation, effectively accelerating his movements. Triggering his new Speed Enhancement made himself faster still.
The cyclops roared and charged at him.
At the last instant, Benton twisted to the side, letting the beast move right past him.
Man, that thing was fast. Even being constrained by gravity and with Benton having two separate enhancements making him move faster, there wasn't much difference between their combat speeds. He'd barely been able to dodge in time.
With the beast's back to him, it was the perfect opportunity to attack. He was too close for the bow to be effective, so he threw a metal sphere.
He charged the projectile with ten thousand units of Earth qi to counter the beast's aspect in addition to an equal amount of the Void finisher.
As the sphere struck the cyclops, Benton tensed. Even though he was at the peak of Golden Core and the beast was in the low stage of Nascent Soul, they were still a major realm apart. Combined with the deleterious effect of the aura, it was very possible that the sphere would just bounce off the qi shield.
If his main attack proved ineffective even charged with a comparatively massive amount of qi, he wasn't sure he'd be able to survive the battle, much less win.
Thankfully, the first part of his plan went well. Kind of.
The Earth qi, strong against Fire, penetrated the cyclops' shield, allowing the Void qi to do its job. The problem was that the huge spherical gouge Benton had seen when his attack hit any other living tissue was instead much diminished. A small amount of the beast's mass, maybe an inch or inch and a half in diameter, disappeared from the gray muscled back.
Far from a devastating blow, Benton had given the beast an ouchy.
Even worse, he was burning through qi with so many techniques active. On the plus side, he had done some damage, and a death by a thousand cuts was still death. And he had a lot of qi to burn through, over five and a half million in fact, and a good regeneration rate of over two hundred eighty thousand an hour. That wasn't even mentioning buttload of spirit coins stored in his ring.
He could do this all day.
Well, not all day, but for a while. A few hours? Maybe. After all, ten thousand here and ten thousand there used almost continuously added up fast, but it all depended on exactly how much he used and how quickly.
The beast stumbled, obviously not expecting either to miss or to be injured.
Benton took the opportunity to hit it with another sphere, charging it with twice as much Void qi as the previous one and triggering Chain Lightning to hit it at the same time.
The cyclops roared as it regained its footing. It spun and charged.
For the next several exchanges, Benton didn't even get a hit in. It was all he could do to avoid getting hit. Which was important. Because the cyclops was even stronger than it was fast. If it landed one of its colossal blows on him, the fight would be over.
He'd need to strike the beast dozens if not hundreds of times. The beast would need to strike him once. Seemed fair.
Benton dodged a charge, catching sight of the cyclops' back again, though it turned before he had time to launch another sphere. The wounds were at least not healing. He'd half feared that it would have Wolverine-esq healing factor to go with its incredible strength and speed.
The fight went on for a while with neither making contact and neither growing tired. With high ranked and high realmed individuals, stamina just wasn't much of an issue, so Benton couldn't even count on the beast making a mistake due to fatigue.
If he was going to get an opening to attack, he would have to make it himself.
Partially due to the flow of the fight and partially as a tactic, he'd avoided using Quickstep after that first time. He hoped the cyclops either forgot about it or hadn't quite realized what he'd done. After all, not many people could use such a technique, so the beast might not have ever seen anything like it.
Finally, the two ended up facing each other from several steps away, and the beast charged. Its arms and shoulders were spread wide, clearly ready for him to try to dodge.
Instead, at the last instant, he Quickstepped, passing through the beast and ending up dozens of feet behind it. He spun using every bit of speed his Time Manipulation and Enhanced Speed could give him.
The cyclops was already facing him, but Benton had summoned a handful of spheres midturn. He threw them all.
They exploded with Earth and then Void qi as they slammed into the cyclops. Each did a bit of damage, which was helpful, but that wasn't the interesting thing about the attack. The beast's reaction to one that happened to be aimed toward its eye was quite fascinating.
While it ignored the other spheres, letting them detonate on its body wherever they happened to land, it frantically swiped at the one closing in on its face.
Its eye.
Benton was an idiot. That was the cyclops' big weakness, that oversized, single eye.
Unfortunately, he'd taken just a fraction of a second too long in making that astute deduction. The beast closed on him and swung.
Benton leaped to the side, perpendicular to the cyclops motion, and tried to Quickstep away. A fist connected with his back.
The damage was mitigated by a number of factors. One, Benton was moving in the direction of the blow, so some of the force was transferred to speeding him on his way. Two, his automatic shield flared Earth qi to counter the beasts Fire qi, absorbing a great deal of the energy. Three, peak Gold Body Cultivation wasn't just a line on his status screen. It hardened his skin and muscles and organs, making them much tougher than they otherwise would have been.
Without all three of those factors working together, Benton was positive his back would have been broken. As it was, he suffered an intense, shooting pains throughout the area, and his legs went numb, not responding to his directions nearly as well or as quickly as they should.
The only thing that saved him was that the hit had propelled him forward away from the beast, and he was able to, in desperation, do something he'd never even thought to try—chaining a second Quickstep right after the first.
He even had the presence of mind to remove a trio of FEDs from his ring, activate them, and toss them behind him.
A series of three very satisfying explosions sounded behind him. Not that they'd do much damage to the cyclops, but hopefully, the light and sound would slow the beast down for a moment.
Not knowing how bad the damage to his back was and needing quick regeneration to avoid death by massive hammering fists, Benton popped a Major Healing Pill before performing another Quickstep, unsure of whether the beast was about to crush his skull at any instant.
He couldn't say enough good things about anything supplied by the System, especially pills. They both worked extremely fast and were extraordinarily effective. By the time he turned around to face the beast again, he was fully healed.
Benton was panting, though, well aware that he'd almost lost the fight, and with it, his life. Another mistake like that one might be the end of him and his sect. He couldn't let that happen.
Surprisingly, the cyclops was looking none too good. Several chunks had been blown out of various portions of its body by Void qi, and the explosions had left it charred.
It did not look happy.
"Human! Cyclops kill human!"
If Benton could just gain enough distance, he could shoot arrow after arrow at that eye. It would surely deflect most of them, but one had to hit eventually. But he just couldn't get far enough away to set up a shot.
If only—
He truly was a moron. It occurred to him that there was one sure fire way to gain distance from the beast. Flight.
Since advancing to Golden Core, he hadn't once let himself think about the possibility because flight in his realm required a flying sword. Considering how many Shop Points regular weapons cost, he didn't want to be tempted to spend such a precious resource on what he considered to be a frivolous luxury. Much better to wait until his next visit to Sixth Flawless Flowing City and spend easily attainable spirit coins.
Not trusting himself, he'd literally banished the thought from his mind.
Now, though, he needed height, not flight. And he didn't need a sword to achieve that objective. There was no freaking reason he couldn't use his gravity burst on himself. He'd even experimented with that before learning that using gravity to tug him in the direction he wanted to go just wasn't the same as flying through the air like a superhero in a comic book.
The cyclops charged at him.
Benton activated a gravity burst, propelling himself several dozen yards into the air and hovered there.
The beast roared in fury.
"Cyclops so small down there. Cyclops can't fly. Cyclops weak."
It began uprooting trees and finding rocks to chunk at him, but without qi coating the projectiles, mundane objects, even thrown by a Nascent Soul cultivator equivalent, bounced harmlessly off his shield.
Benton calmly pulled his bow from his ring, nocked an arrow, pulled back the bowstring, and loosed. He wasn't quite the artist with the bow that Yang Xiu was, but he had Mastery of an archery technique. Each arrow went pretty much exactly where he wanted it to.
Which was the cyclops' eye.
The beast blocked it of course, but that was okay. Benton had more arrows. A lot more arrows.
If Yang Xiu had been in the same realm as Benton and had the same techniques available, her talent for the bow would probably have made her rate of fire exceed his, but as things stood in reality, he could fire two to three arrows for every one of hers, and she was fast. Darn fast.
Like the first he'd shot, the beast was able to swat away most of the arrows, almost all of them in fact. Almost all were not all, however. One finally landed.
Earth qi and Void qi exploded. The eye was gone, leaving a gaping hole in the beast's forehead and it blinded. After that, it had a much tougher time blocking the rain of arrows, and soon, one wedged itself deeply enough for the Void burst to take out a portion of the beast's brain.
The cyclops' knees folded, and it collapsed to the ground, dead.
Or presumably dead. He wasn't about to get any closer to the thing without confirmation of it. Too many movies where the bad guy came back to life at the last second had taught him that lesson.
Suddenly, he practically shot up into the air, and it took him a moment to understand that his gravity technique's effectiveness was no longer being suppressed. With that realized, he was able to easily re-gain control and hover.
A box popped up.
""The Quest, Survive, has been completed. Host has a choice of rewards, one based on the System's grading of the completion and another based on the percentage of sect members and villagers that survived.
Would Host like to choose rewards now?""