Chapter 396: Break the face
=Yup.=
=It’s actually fairly understandable.=
=This entire thing happened based on a chain of coincidences. Only makes sense for it to end, with a chain of coincidences.=
=I think the term is literary trope.=
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As soon as Zhen Liu and Jin Fang entered the warehouse district, a few realizations came to their minds.
First, the sheer amount of collateral damage left behind by the kaijin was surprisingly contained…sort of.
“Oh no,” Jin Fang commented as she saw the destruction they passed by, namely destroyed crates and barrels with their contents spilled everywhere.
“That’s a lot of dried fish.”
“Hence the abandoned quarry, I’d rather not blow up the house,” Zhen Liu added while jumping over a spilled puddle of lard.
As far as they could tell, most of the damage was limited to a single warehouse and its contents, which was scattered every which way, except for what appeared to be a very unfortunately located drydocks.
Zhen Liu could only hope that whatever vessel inside wasn’t affected by their shenanigans…too much.
There was a surprising amount of smoke coming out of it.
Second, this was the first time Zhen Liu and Jin Fang had witnessed the zakos actually fight other cultivators before.
Zhen Liu had entertained the idea of using the zakos as training partners for his family members to use, but there wasn’t a good way to explain how he could control a literal murder squad worth of puppets all at once, especially ones that looked like they were made of human corpses.
Plus on the off chance that the zakos somehow evolved into a kaijin during a sparring session, he didn’t want to even try explaining that to his family.
“They’re rather…free form, with their fighting,” Jin Fang noted.
“I think it’s because I’m not telling them what to do, that they’re fighting based on pure instinct,” Zhen Liu noted
“That would explain all of the biting…”
And finally, the last the thing they realized, they forgot about Rianna back at the inn.
“Wait, weren’t you and Rianna sharing a room back at the inn? Wouldn’t she want to come along for shenanigans like this?,” Zhen Liu asked.
“Who, Rianna? Nah, she wouldn’t. She likes sleeping too- oh wait, you don’t know this. Yeah, she is incredibly heavy sleeper.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. When she found out about the existences of beds, she warmed up to the idea surprisingly fast. She just straight up passes out like a rock when given the chance,” Jin Fang explained.
“Huh…”
Zhen Liu made a mental note to double check on Rianna’s condition later, remembering the influence of a certain malformed amalgamation of insect flesh. While he was fairly certain any influence the man may have had on this world died with him, it was worth a check to make sure nothing lingered on.
Zhen Liu wasn’t entirely sure if people in this world could resurrect themselves on the fly, but he didn’t want to find out.
With all of the realizations out of the way though, the duo finally made it to the site where the kaijin were actually fighting…which is when disaster struck…sort of.
At the exact moment the two of them arrived to the scene, they heard Lacerage make this declaration: [Tornado Cannon!]
“Uh oh.”
Immediately after this declaration was made, four fully grown men clad in aether armor was sent propelling towards Zhen Liu’s and Jin Fang’s direction, launched by a giant tornado made of aether.
“Look out!”
“What the fuck?!”
Without so much as a second thought, Zhen Liu pushed Jin Fang out of the line of fire and took the full force of the incoming human projectiles, getting launched into the air as a result.
“AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!”
“Milord?!”
“Holy shit, she launched maestro straight into the air!”
“Feels…familiar…”
As Zhen Liu was sent flying he could hear the statements of shock coming from the kaijin below…alongside the messages of concern in his brain.
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[LACERAGE! WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU JUST DO?!]
[I KNOW, I KNOW! BY THE GODS, I AM SO SO SORY MILORD! I DIDN’T MEAN TO ACCIDENTALLY LAUNCH YOU IN THE AIR!,] Lacerage apologized profusely.
[Holy shit, how much aether did you put in that attack of yours? They’re going really, really high up,] Hurricroak noted.
[Nostalgia…]
‘Its fine guys, I am still indestructible…I think. Just screaming out of surprise and velocity. You know, like a roller coaster.’
[Are you sure?]
‘Its what I’m telling myself so I don’t panic more than necessary.’
[Fair enough!]
‘Side note, why am I get that tickling feeling on my back like when someone hovers a finger on your forehead and you anticipate getting poked?’
[Oh, that’s because your on a collision course with a crazy shape shifting operatic diva who’s about to rip off Razorstella’s face,] Hurricroak explained.
‘That was highly specific.’
[Because that’s exactly what is happening in three…two…now!]
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POW!
“AH! BITCH!”
“Director?!”
As Zhen Liu’s head made contact with Alice’s face, a small arc of rainbow and dark energy leaped off from him and into the latter’s face.
“Fuck that stings!,” Alic Venus cursed as she began to nurse her(someone else’s) bloody nose.
“Is why my face itchy?,” she asked (herself?).
The projectile of Zhen Liu and the four Blue Shadow leaders soon fell apart after the hit, the momentum thoroughly removed due to the impact.
Zhen Liu was fine for his part, still retaining his consciousness despite being used as the spearhead for the projectile, but the four people he came along with thoroughly knocked out.
As the four leaders fell to the earth below, their aether armor began to fall apart piece by piece, signifying that all four had been rendered completely unconscious.
“Wait, fuck! I haven’t practiced flying in a combat situation yet!”
“Hold on director, I got ya!”
Zhen Liu was about to plummet to the earth as well, but before that happened, Razorstella recorrect her position in the air and swooped in to grab him.
Spinning him in the air for a bit, it gave Zhen Liu to stabilize his aether and float for himself. From an outside perspective, the moment looked a bit like a dance move.
“You alright, director?”
“Yeah I am, thanks Razorstella. Like the new look.”
“Why thank you, I made it myself…I think.”
“Nice.”
“GAAAAAAAHHHH! WHAT THE FUCK?!”
“Huh? WHOA!”
“What’s wrong with her face?!”
As soon as Razorstella and Zhen Liu recorrect their position floating in the air, the two of them had a front row seat to a body horror show.
Namely, Al Venus’s form writhing like crazy as her face started to, for lack of a better word, petrify.
“My FaCEe! mY faCee!,” A Venus began to cry in two overlaid voices as she clawed at her(the) calcifying face.
Weirdly enough though, Zhen Liu could see that the woman wasn’t trying to pry the mask off of her face, but rather, it looked like she was trying to keep it on.
“NeEEEDDDddd tooO FiixxXx!”
After making that declaration Venus’s hands ignited themselves with a weird pale flame, moments before trying to apply it to her mask-face.
As this happened, Zhen Liu felt waves of weird energy coming off of her.
‘Is that…[Chaos]? Can she also use…no, wait…that’s definitely mine…but what the hell is it fighting?’
Zhen Liu had tested this before, that when his [Chaos] made contact with aether, the latter had a habit of becoming distorted or diffused incredibly quickly, without resisting in the slightest
This new energy also felt like it was getting distorted, but it also felt like it was trying to “stabilize” the [Chaos].
“IiitTTss noootTtt working?!”
Seconds later, the mask on Venus’s face exploded in a surprisingly graphic manner, exposing to the world the face of a middle-aged, yet surprisingly attractive, woman with an unusual scar on her face.
One that belonged to a certain operatic diva that Razorstella saw perform just moments before, granted the scar was news to her since she saw the diva perform with a mask on.
“My…mask!, Where’s my face? Where’s Alice?!” Madam Venus muttered as she touched her face in a frantic manner. As she did, the shards of the mask that just exploded suddenly reconstituted into a distinctive ball of purple colored energy and floated in front of Madam Venus’s face.
“There you are!”
Seeing the purple ball, Madam Venus tried to reach out and grab it, but before she could, it ascended even higher and flew off in some direction.
“No! Wait! Come back! Come back I said!,” Venus cried out in a pained manner before hopelessly dropping her arms as she watched the ball disappear into the night sky.
Zhen Liu had never seen anything like this before, but Logos and Pathos definitely had.
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<=Powerful desire detected. Condensing core now.=>
<=Core condensation complete: [-Prismatic-Core of the Imposter] has been added.=>
