Born in Blood



As the Rank 4 beasts cleared away, Liam headed straight for where they were kept a moment earlier.

The "Slaving Chains", as they were called, were extremely valuable.

Liam wanted to store them.

To study them.

And, perhaps, replicate their effect.

Chains weren't useful just for binding beasts, after all.

Liam arrived at the now empty Beast Rooms and stored the chains in specially designed rings, made just for the occasion.

'It should be time for the crane to—'

BOOOOOOOOM!

'There it is,' Liam thought, as a massive explosion lit up a patch of the night. 

'That should make them confused about what to take care of first.'

The crane was made pretty well, in Liam's opinion.

Without the Maneuverability Formation, it wouldn't really function, hence the massive, flat carriage that it came with.

With that thing on their side, Liam was pretty sure the remaining six Elders couldn't do much unless their Rank 5 Patriarch showed up.

'Time to move deeper in.'

Liam decided to push his limits to the brim.

He hadn't used his Ashura Form after becoming a Rank 3 Magus.

He still wouldn't use it.

But it was there as a backup.

Liam wanted to attempt taking down as many powerful disciples as he could in one fell swoop.

Silently, he could kill an entire room of Rank 3 cultivators without them really knowing.

But directly?

That was a different matter.

It was this line of reasoning that brought Liam face-to-face with four Rank 3 cultivators. 

And he was surrounded by them and their beasts.

He was in a secluded part of the landscape, covered by natural hills and dense trees.

With this, Liam didn't need to hide his full strength if the situation called for it.

Liam unsheathed his Dusk Blades, then coated them with his Shadow.

The Leashes' beast companions hissed in hostility.

Curses flew at him from the disciples.

The battle had already started.

But no one had made a move.

A few mental attacks reached out to Liam's mental sphere, but he activated Thicken and Corrosive Mind.

That wasn't enough to bear the pressure exuded by a Rank 3 Magus.

But Liam simply gritted his teeth and honed his focus nevertheless.

Just then, something attacked.

A horned brown toad used its spear-like tongue to stab at him, followed by a massive fireball with the strength of a Rank 3 core.

To his left, right and back, a tiger, a snake, a panther lunged at him.

All the while, their human companions threw their strongest spells.

Liam's eye repeatedly flickered left and right.

Instantly, Liam threw a Shadow Bomb on the ground.

A dense cloud of dark smoke covered more than 20 meters of land.

Sensing the danger, the disciples made a wide jump backwards.

Despite it, the beasts continued their lunges, and the spells converged towards the center where Liam was.

Most of the cloud was blown away with the force of the fireball and the condensed spears of wind.

But none of them hit their mark.

WHOOSH!

Three different figures exited the cloud.

One was entirely made out of mist, and the others were identical copies of the original.

The disciples grew shocked, but that was fatal.

As a Wraith, Liam turned into mist and severed the head of the snake closest to him. 

The Dusk Blade went through it like butter.

A crimson and golden light turned into swirling lines.

Black streaks of light flew out of the remaining clusters of smoke.

SHING!

SPURT!

RIIIIIP!

BOOF!

Flesh and bone were being ripped and torn apart.

Both human and beast.

Liam pivoted and sidestepped the lunges, while dual swinging his Dusk Blades.

The Leash closest to Liam had his arm cleaved in half before he dodged backwards, attempting to dodge the Umbral Needle Liam had hurled at him a moment earlier.

Liam's Shadow Clones covered his back and took care of defense.

Liam's speed was just unnaturally fast.

Still, it wasn't like Liam was invincible.

A wide gash drew his blood from deltoid to chest, revealing bone underneath through the wrappings.

The entire right side of his arm turned to a black crisp.

Most of his hair had been cut off by the gales of wind.

VMMMMM.

Chaos churned inside the Dusk Blades.

By then, all the smoke had been blown away by a fierce wind, which formed countless deep cuts on Liam's skin and flash.

Right as Liam arrived in front of a leash disciple, a dense wall of water gushed in front of him.

Liam hurled his blades anyways.

Obviously, in any normal case, they wouldn't go through.

But just then—

BOOOM!

The blades exploded, tearing an opening through the water-wall and piercing right through the disciple behind it.

With one out of four down, it was an even battle.

Three versus three.

As a collective, Liam and his Shadow Clones used perfect coordination to fight against the disciples.

But clones couldn't compare to a human.

BOOOM!

One of the clones was instantly decimated by a mass of flames.

However, that created an opening that allowed Liam to kill another disciple, using Focused Havoc straight into the man's heart.

By then, there were only two disciples remaining.

But even before the battle raged on, Liam had been spreading his Sanguine Strings everywhere.

Finally, it was ready to use.

The two disciples didn't notice until it was too late.

A giant, crimson cocoon had formed around them.

Shortly after, the cocoon began to rapidly shrink, essentially becoming a multi-directional slicing machine.

Liam had already left the cocoon by merging with his shadows and leaving its circumference.

The disciples desperately threw every spell and attack they could, but that did little to stop the crystalized blood.

SHLIGH!

The disciples had been turned to meat paste, sliced into a million different sides that peeled off on their own.

Liam heaved a long, tired sigh.

He was drained of his strength.

He was stripped bare of layers of skin and was riddled with bruises, holes and burn marks.

But a victorious smile appeared on his pale face anyway.

'I can probably fight one or two more Rank 3 cultivators.'

Liam's battle prowess was not normal.

With the King's Eye, he could predict a spell's trajectory before it even arrived.

He could also read the disciples' intention before they attacked him.

Even monsters would do well to shudder in his presence.