The situation had developed too suddenly; San Yongli had exhausted a considerable amount of her strength, and the timing for the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel's attack was impeccable, especially as she led with a spiritual disruption spell, distorting senses and lapsing consciousness all around.
San Yongli had devoted a large portion of her temporarily enhanced spiritual sense to locating Wei Wuyin, causing the well-hidden Spiritual Cultivator to skillfully avoid her gaze. Despite her state of incredible empowerment, she was, in the end, not drawing spiritual strength from the blood, mostly physical strength.
Feeling the sensation of her spirit thrumming violently, her head pounding with pain, San Yongli immediately realized her mistake. She swiftly used the Spirit-type Mystic Rune on her finger, dispelling that effect, yet she could only bear witness to the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel reaching Xiao Yanyue and Wen Mingna. "No! Xiao Yan-"
Her panicked words were cut short as a hole was burrowed into the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel's head, scattering her brain and skull into the air. Her terrifying aura and oppressive power ceased all fluctuations.
Dead.
A thud from a lifeless body overwhelmed everyone's senses.
"..." A distinctly heavy silence descended like a thick, velvet curtain upon a show's conclusion. Yet it was hard to reconcile with what just happened, with those like San Yongli, Yi Yun, Yi Xuehan, and those observing unable to process everything.
The marble-skinned Evil Sentinel met their end.
Crash!
A heavier thud shook everyone's senses awake; the charcoal-skinned Evil Sentinel went splat into a barren region. There was no sign of any life in that area, just a bloody blot of bones, blood, and crushed flesh. After his cultivation had been sucked out of him entirely, even his refined body was like a mere mortal's. Falling from his height at his speed of travel almost turned him into a skid mark on the barren, lifeless region.
They were dead.
Two of the most powerful beings in this competition had, back to back, perished. Moreover, only a few knew how the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel died, the rest simply attributed her abrupt and sudden death to San Yongli's incredibly explosive power.
Heavenly Radiance!
Only those from the World Beyond understood the significance of that burst of almost divine-like radiance. Those from the Ascendants were largely ignorant as to what San Yongli had just unleashed, but they couldn't help but feel a tremor of awe in their hearts. Moreover, to many of them, besides the briefly felt aura that was as oppressive and mighty as an angry heavens, they only saw a black flash, felt a gust of wind, and saw a figure collapse from the sky.
The events were simply too fast!
FAST BEYOND MORTAL IMAGINATION!
"-yue!" San Yongli awkwardly finished her call out as she mobilized the ambient mana, descending before Wen Mingna and gazing at the corpse lying at her feet. Her brows were furrowed deeply as she observed the fatal injury. A grasp of frigid chill clutched tightly at her heart.
What terrifying assassination abilities...
If that arrow was aimed at her...
The thought caused her heart to violently pound. She had swept her spiritual sense and hadn't found that archer who fought Xue Yifei, yet she had the strongest feeling that he was a culprit. She restrained the urge to gulp fearfully as she suppressed those thoughts.
"Is she okay?" San Yongli looked at Wen Mingna, observing Xiao Yanyue's unconscious figure. Her damaged foundation was healing rapidly and she seemed to be digesting the power left within her at an absurdly fast pace with little to no disharmony.
"She'll be fine," Wen Mingna softly said, comforting San Yongli by confirming her thoughts. As if the words of a Heavenly Seer were a decree from the heavens themselves, San Yongli touched her chest and breathed out a visible sigh of relief.
"Big Sis Yongli..." Yi Yun approached, giving the Evil Sentinel's corpse a look, his heart similarly pounding from her slowly, warmth-dissipating body. Wasn't this Earthly Saint supposed to be as strong as the Trueborn's leader? To the Ascendants, the cultivation base of the Trueborn's leader was widely disseminated by the higher-ups as if by order of Wei Wuyin.
This only elevated his reputation given he single-handedly dominated Trueborn into submission. The knowledge only served to set an immediate goal for the Ascendants-to grow beyond that existence!
San Yongli gave Yi Yun a thankful look. Whether she wanted to admit it or not, Yi Yun had greatly helped. Despite her enhanced state, her spiritual sense hadn't discovered the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel despite her proximity, so likely she wouldn't have found the hidden charcoal-skinned Evil Sentinel either. Yi Yun's uniquely abnormal sense of smell was key to allowing her to save Xiao Yanyue.
Receiving an earnest look of thanks from San Yongli, which carried warmth and gratefulness, Yi Yun scratched his chin as he faintly blushed. Yi Xuehan silently observed this from the side, but she didn't dare show any dissatisfaction that she felt. This San Yongli woman...
To think she had consumed a Heavenly Saint's essence blood and survived. That blood must have been refined for the explicit purpose of consumption. This was often a type of talisman that elite Martial Cultivators gave their descendants, disciples, and lovers. It was costly to an extreme, requiring decades to properly make, but...
If so, Yi Xuehan believed that this woman was a beloved descendant of an Original Magistrate, perhaps even a Mystic Overlord.
While she was a Demi-Mortal Lord Chosen, her background wasn't even close to matching up. Her great-grandfather was a Worldly Saint and both of her parents were Earthly Saints, and they were, respectively, patriarch and and elders of the Yi Clan.
Cultivation was difficult; with each stage increase, the number within significantly dwindled, and even in the World Beyond, Earthly Saints contained genuine power and authority, often lauded as terrifyingly illustrious elders of powerful forces.
Who knows how many people of similar talent as her, with similar strength, ultimately fail to become Worldly Saints? Ultimately fail to be Earthly Saint? The greater their goals, the harder each step taken was.
The Sealed Region had quintillions of cultivators, yet there were less than three hundred Earthly Saints as a whole, and the majority were of a standard similar to Zhang Ziyi, the Radiant Jade True Queen, at the 1st Runic Ascendant State. However, to higher levels of cultivation societies, that standard was often refused, and countless tried to ascend higher, leading to greater, stronger Earthly Saints as a whole, but considerably more deaths on the path.
She woefully sighed in her heart. San Yongli was undeniably beautiful with an exceptional background, and as a mere mortal, her cultivation foundation seemed incredibly firm and sturdy. Yi Xuehan had gleaned that much from San Yongli's unfurled Worldly Domain earlier as well as her possessing multiple Heavenly Saint-type Bestowed Runes.
Still, an urge to steal something precious from San Yongli emerged in Yi Xuehan's heart, as if to prove that she wasn't inferior. She looked at Yi Yun, and her eyes surreptitiously brightened with considerable thought.
"Someone already took her Mystic Soul," Wen Mingna stated as she gave Xiao Yanyue a gentle heft to further slide her into her arms and chest, deciding to carry this blessed by the heavens woman. Lin Ziyan gave Xiao Yanyue a focused look, and she was deeply relieved seeing that she wasn't crippled and was slowly recovering. She knew how it felt to be crippled by vile, vicious individuals...
San Yongli and the others also gave the corpse another look and verified that the corpse genuinely had lost its Mystic Soul and Mystic Core. Lin Ziyan was unbothered by this. "Then, I'll take my leave. Please take care of her for me."
While she hadn't done much at all, she had made her choice to ask Wei Wuyin to assist her in saving Xiao Yanyue. She had been saved, so she had to leave.
San Yongli briefly glanced at one of Wei Wuyin's rumored lovers and gave a faint nod of acknowledgment. Wen Mingma gave slightly less enthusiasm in her nod, focusing on shifting Xiao Yanyue to a comfortable position. The latter's body was quite soft and curvy, and any man would likely devolve into their base instincts holding her, especially with her beautiful sleeping expression.
Lin Ziyan didn't wait for anyone else; she left with a silvery flash, disappearing from sight and spiritual sense.
Ba-dum!
Ba-dum!
Wei Wuyin's heart was violently pounding as he held back the urge to vomit. His Existential Framework, everything that constituted his mortal soul, was violently quivering as if shaken by an earthquake of the highest scale. If it wasn't for his four Astral Souls working in tandem, he would have broken out into a heavy sweat.
Tightly closing his eyes, he could feel the faint wetness of sweat trying to develop on his palm. This wasn't out of fear but caused by a level of strenuous exertion that vastly exceeded a certain limit of his mortal soul. When San Yongli unleashed her Heavenly Radiance State, albeit mostly a false state, the strength she conjured was heaven-shaking, and he couldn't react initially!
If it wasn't for feeling the sensation of killing intent directed his way and his Astral Souls reacting as always, he would've been as slow as everyone else in San Yongli's eyes. But since she directed her attention to him, he was forced to summon forth his power. He had to not only draw power from six of his Minor Laws, all four Astral Souls, but also Little Defiant had to send an unimaginable amount of solar energy to elevate his physical senses to an extreme, consuming large loads of solar energy just as swiftly as it came.
Although the percentage consumed was barely enough to be considered a drop of an ocean to the gigantic Defiant-sized Solar Star, the fact that he had to channel so much within an extremely short period had caused that strange, soul-level backlash of stress.
Heavenly Radiance Form!
The power of a Heavenly Saint!
Despite having ample memories of Heavenly Saints, from Heavenly Saints themselves, the sensation of feeling it personally was different by no small degree.
"If she had attacked," Wei Wuyin thought with a heavy, exhausted inhale of mana and air. After one and one-quarter seconds, his spine strengthened, and his body and soul had fully recovered. Not even the slightest sign of sweat was present as if it had never existed. Despite the exhaustion, Wei Wuyin possessed the Stellar Paragon Physique! A physique that had never been seen before in history! It wasn't simple!
"I would have been forced to face the calamity early," Wei Wuyin bitterly smiled at the thought.
First Calamity: Survived - 7/7.Second Calamity: Claimed - 1/1.Third Calamity: Claimed - 3/3.Fourth Calamity: Suppressed - 19 Years.Karmic Luck Value: 195,754.0.
He still had nineteen years left. Who knew if dealing with San Yongli, a Blessed with clearly a significant amount of Karmic Luck Value remaining, would unleash a world of calamities upon him, being the end of his life? The risk was too, too much.
Unfortunately for the Temporal Reincarnator, San Yongli's display of killing intent was enough for Wei Wuyin to slightly change his approach toward her.
It was time for a reassignment.
The trio of Saintesses were observing the situation, each with different expressions, but not a single one of them was gleeful or pleasant. Wu Baozhai's eyes carried a cold glint of gloom intermixed with blazing fighting spirit; Na Xinyi had a frigid indifference and a pair of lightly furrowed brows; Xue Yifei's eyes were misty and in deep thought, but within the depths of her pupils was a demonically enthralling light.
San Yongli brought out her trump card, showcasing her astonishing power, yet none of them thought about her in the slightest.
Yao Huoyi! THE ARCHER!!
"Prime Ascendants are frustrating," Xue Yifei said from her heart. While they were all a part of the Valkyrie, Prime Ascendants were different from Valkyrie. Each of them was an abnormality that exceeded common sense, even by the Ascendants' standards. Further exaggerated by Wei Wuyin's downright disgusting levels of tailored nurturing.
Unlike the Valkyrie who have their own goals, and paths, and oftentimes act independently of Wei Wuyin and his organization, who often determine the direction of their cultivation and ask for their resources, the Prime Ascendants all existed for Wei Wuyin in one way or another.
Shui Fengbao... Zuhei... Yao Huoyi...! And then there was 'her'.
Xue Yifei was left a little helpless when she thought about these individuals. And she was aware of two more Ascendants that Wei Wuyin barely talked about, only mentioning them as his Shadow and his All-Seeing Eye. If she wasn't his fiancée and one that relentlessly wanted to intertwine herself with Wei Wuyin, she knew that she would never have learned of these two existences.
"Not invincible," Wu Baozhai stated strongly, her Imperial Heaven Aura was seething within her blood, raging for the challenge.
Na Xinyi, however, remained silent.
"I just said frustrating, right?" Xue Yifei smirked. The implication caused Wu Baozhai to reply with a grin. The two of them were vastly different in many, many ways, but when it came to facing incredible challenges, they would never back down or waver even if the heavens themselves collapsed.
Moreover, while they might not admit it openly, they subconsciously believed that if the heavens collapsed, Wei Wuyin would hold it up for them, allowing them to continue on their way. It was a belief that was incredibly reinforced by his endlessly astonishing feats and mysterious news, especially when they recalled the Four Extreme Continent incident. There didn't seem to be anything he couldn't do in their eyes and hearts.
After all, they saw him rise from a mere mortal in an ignored starfield to a true Ascendant Emperor of Neo-Dawn, ruler of the Neo-Dawn Starfield! And he was still a mere mortal!
The Ascendants that had gathered with them, agreeing to team against the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel, stared at each other. They then begin to depart without saying a word. They were all competitors, and they had mostly decided to gather together to deal with the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel. Now that that woman was dead, they could act once again on their own and fight for the Evercrown or other opportunities.
The trio of Saintesses didn't stop them. The plan to gather was solely to eventually lure out or limit the areas that the marble-skinned Evil Sentinel could assault so they could deal with her decisively. Their plans, however, were rendered unnecessary by Yao Huoyi's arrow.
The three looked up at the sky. Time continued to tick down, and the Evercrown was nearing its arrival.
26:00!
25:55!
23:41!
21:01!
21:00!
The next alchemical light was born in the sky!
