Number One Dungeon Supplier

"What kind of cultivator is she?" Shang Xia deflected the umbrella swipe once more with her dagger, while at the same time activating its effects causing Ryuli to be knocked to the side. Her daggers as indicated with an up or down arrow had the ability to force the opponent to move as per the direction of the arrow on the dagger.

This allowed a distinct advantage against most of her enemies, especially those in her melee range. However, it did not seem to work rather well with the girl with her combat umbrella. Ever since she learnt how the dagger had worked, it did not seem to matter much for her. The first hit was particularly painful as the dagger which she parried, caused her to suddenly lose her footing and sent Ryuli flying to the ceiling.

And to make things even more complicated, Shang Xia's daggers could change the direction of Ryuli's counter attacks too during her attempt to block the next set of attacks from the Banned Emperor terrorist. Still, seeing it once was enough for her to change her pattern of attack. From a straight forceful blast of chi to scattered collateral damage.

The Dragon Girl also used her chi umbrella to send out solid beams of chi to assault Shang Xia and they were proven effective mainly because of Ryuli's ability to manipulate the chi beams. Each time the assassin deflected the beam, Ryuli would simply break the beam into multiple smaller lasers and bend them to attack the assassin. It annoyed Shang Xia but she could not deny that only a competent monster was able to make beams converge towards her and she had to up her game if she were to fight toe to toe with the State Agent.

Even though the damage might not be significantly high, it's the sustained damage that would subsequently bring the assassin down to her knees. Thus, Shang Xia knew the consequences of Ryuli's slow way of killing her and decided to not reserve any skills. One would have thought that her skills would be more towards directional manipulation but Shang Xia was actually a cultivator who was able to control gravity (to a certain extent.)

This was equally as unique as Ryuli's extensive chi manipulation mainly because when cultivators usually use their chi to create an attack, it was usually an extension of themselves. It's like a bow and arrow situation where the archer dictates where the arrow would go with his/her bow.

The strength, direction and intent had been set right from the start and everything lies on how the arrow would fly to. But in Ryuli and Shang Xia's case, chi to them was like controlling a puppet on strings where the puppeteer was able to still move the puppet at the very last minute. The only difference was how much control both of the cultivators were able to exert.

With Shang Xia's ability, her powers were leaning more towards the basic manipulation since gravity was not an easy 'object' to control. Unlike Ryuli who could control each and every minor chi blast going towards the Queen, Shang Xia only had partial control with the usage of her daggers as well as her surroundings.

Still, that was sufficient to affect the delicate control of Ryuli's chi blast and caused them to deviate from their pattern allowing them to miss. Initially, the Dragon Girl thought that the terrorist's skills were something related to directional arrows but she now understood that it was a façade to hide her true powers.

"A Western based Cultivator. Able to manipulate the space around her. Could just be gravity but I do not have time to test, neither do I have enough space to exert more extensive chi techniques against her." Ryuli thought and then she suddenly realised something was amiss.

The two guards.

When Shang Xia saw how Ryuli had moved her glance towards the side of the room, she immediately laughed. "You thought that I was the only Banned Emperor in that whole group? You should have selected your people even more extensively Ms State Agent!" Shang Xia laughed as her plan was two fold. Half of the bodyguards that were employed were under the Banned Emperor's control and the group leader just so happened to call on the bodyguards that were affiliated with the Banned Emperor.

The only problem was that the bodyguards were seeded by another team and the only way to know who was who during the action was when they dispersed their chi in battle. However, at that moment when the two guards were escorting Shang Xia and Ryuli to the toilet, their identities had not been revealed until Shang Xia knocked them on the back.

Only upon contact, she could sense the chi which embedded in them and start to pour some chi in the battle towards them to kickstart their consciousness back. That was also one of the reasons why she was more on the defensive than attacking. Ryuli could only connect the dots as to how Shang Xia could have done it with the use of the gravity powers to move the bodies away from the fight and they quietly sneaked off.

Even though she did not know the number of bodyguards that could have been corrupted by the Banned Emperor's ideology, her main concern now was to catch those guys. If the relic were to fall into their hands, it would be a pending disaster. (Not to mention, it was naturally bad for her resume and a dent in her achievement, especially when it was near the end of the fiscal year and the annual appraisal was near. If Kong Rong was here in her head, he could only sigh how money minded she was.)

"Do not even think you can catch them without defeating me." Shang Xia said but Ryuli was already too mad to have proper thoughts in her mind. The fight had reignited her generation of Maqi within her dantian core and if the bodyguards were a threat, she had to settle this quickly.