Chapter 538: Intervening Powers
‘Wait, no, not the time,’ Zhen Ren Fa shook her head as she realized that the identity of this warrior woman could be addressed later.
Right now, two of her subordinates were about to get absolutely bodied because it turned out these brackborn Aether Masters had not-so simple backgrounds.
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Unfortunately, Zhen Ren Fa’s warning came a little late.
At the exact moment she told the two warriors that they were dealing with a World Class aether art, their attacks had already collided with it.
All Zhen Ren Fa could do now was to pray…that and get involved herself…
‘Uncle won’t be pleased if I cut loose in the city…but then again, I’m sure he’d be more than okay with it once I present to him the World class aether art these brackborns are using…of course…I’m going to have to get a little…violent…’
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[Wow, going for the double wrist grab before they can act I see, very dramatic,] Hurricroak praised, [granted I’m more of a fan of punching them in the face before they can do anything myself.]
[Agreed,] Spring Brawler added, [cracking someone’s jaw is much more satisfying.]
[Grab…the…neck…,] Frosttusk stated, [can’t…react…if…they…can’t…breath…]
[Yeesh, y’all are so…brutish. It’s much easier to sever a nerve or five,] Razorstella chided while clicking her knife-like claws for emphasis.
Nepherage couldn’t help but roll her eyes as soon as she heard this banter, a part of her wanting to retort about their comments right there and then, but she had a cover to maintain and asses to kick, so she left this is sort of thing to her cousins.
That didn’t stop him from riffing on all of his cousins though.
[Enough of the bantering please, I am busy trying to hold a pair of rambunctious youths back so that our lord’s cousins can perform their aether arts in peace…speaking of our lord…]
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“Alright, how do I look?”
“Like a surly old man who could definitely qualify as being called an ‘old monster’,” Rianna plainly stated.
“Excellent, thank you Jin Fang.”
“My finest work so far,” Jin Fang praised herself as she put away her make-up kit, “although, I thought you were going to go for that masked look again.”
“I would’ve, but then my cousins lied about their names, so I had to change it up…again.”
“Ah.”
[Milord?]
‘Ah, Nepherage,’ Zhen Liu replied mentally while physically signaling to Rianna and Jin Fang that one of the kaijn were currently talking inside his head, ‘excellent timing, how goes the battle? Are my cousins still alive?’
The two girls quietly signaled they understood his message and went off to do their own thing, namely establish their own disguises for Zhen Liu’s absurd plan.
[They are milord, but uh…there is a slight issue.]
‘Slight issue? Slight issue, how?’
[Zhen Yue and Zhen Hai are…you know what? You’re about to hear it.]
‘Uh oh.’
As if on cue, Zhen Liu suddenly heard a familiar, echoing roar in stereo that was accompanied by a sound that could only be described as an avalanche crashing into a landslide and a thunderstorm, simultaneously.
A sour look formed on Zhen Liu’s disguised face, a surprising feat given the stiffness he was feeling in parts of it.
It appears that whatever situation his cousins got involved in, it warranted the deployment of their family’s secret ace in the hole.
‘Man, this better not start a war…hang on Nepherage, I’m on my way right now.’
[Of course, milord.]
“Jin Fang, Rianna. Sorry to cut your disguise time short, but it appears we gotta go over there, now.”
“Go on ahead, we’ll catch up shortly.”
“Alright.”
Not wanting to disturb his parents, aunts, uncles and his grandfather, Zhen Liu opted to leave the room the only way that wouldn’t be noticed by them and would give him immediate access to the situation, he opted to jump out of the window.
‘And…yeet!’
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‘What the fuck?!,’ Lei Zhong cursed as his eyes went wide.
Moments before his [Judgement Bolt] could exact the judgement of the heavens on this brackborn bitch named Shen Yue, she pulled an ace out of her sleeve.
[Ecoing…]
Not just any ace though, it was one that was at least several stages stronger than his own.
[…Frost!]
The woman let loose a powerful roar, one that was laced with several different types of aether, that threatened to turn Lei Zhong’s entire existence into that akin to an ice statue.
As the roar traveled to his location, Lei Zhong could see the places it passed by becoming colder and coated in a thin layer of frost, as if winter had decided that it should be snow white all years round.
When his attack was suddenly stopped dead in its tracks by the roar, he came to realize that this attack was anything but simple.
‘Fuck! I need to empower my attack further!,’ Lei Zhong thought to himself as he tried his best to reinforce his [Judgement Bolt], a task easier said than done given how he had yet to fully master the art anyways.
Whether or not his efforts to do so would work though was an another question entirely.
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‘Shit!,’ Gou Huang cursed as he felt his hands suddenly become a lot colder.
He had heard Lady Zhen Ren Fa’s warning about how the attack his opponent was using was a World class aether art and had decided to try and double down on his [Punishing Mountain Seal], in an effort to overpower it.
Gou Huang could sense that despite its power, Shen Hai had not fully mastered this aether art to its fullest potential, meaning that, technically speaking, it could be easily overpowered by an aether that might be a stage weaker than it, but was also fully mastered.
Evidently, Gou Huang was incredibly wrong about this assumption.
Despite his best efforts and his aether reinforcement, Gou Huang could not push his mountain seal attack through Shen Hai’s icy roar and smash it into the howling man.
Instead, this singular roar, something that sounded more at home to an aether beast than a human, had locked Gou Huang into place and was now slowly freezing him from the fingertips.
‘I…need…to…do….something!,’ Gou Huang could barely think as he kept holding the mountain seal in place against a howling force of nature.
Gou Huang needed a miracle, an intervention or a sudden power boost if he wanted to win against Shen Hai.
(Un)luckily for him, one of those things were going to happen but not in the way he expected it to…
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Meanwhile in another part of the city…
A man dressed in a uniform similar to the city guard, except fancier, was sitting at a desk, reading over several reports of public incidents that had occurred throughout the day.
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Each of these incidents were related to the Sapling Festival and linked to people partying a bit too hard in celebration of the event, as such, the man decided to be lenient about their punishments.
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Now, who was this man and why did he have the right to determine the punishment for all of these ne’er-do-wells?
The short answer was that he was the captain of the guard for Willow Scale City and was simply the local enforcement.
The longer answer was that he was Captain Zhen Ba Yin, the Honorable Sixth Captain of the Guard, Master of the Peach Blossom slashing whip and a direct descendant of the current patriarch of the Zhen Clan.
Who was also just about to wrap up his day on a high note of no further incidents.
‘Just one last case and I can go enjoy the festival myself, finally,’ Zhen Ba Yin thought to himself as he picked up one last report scroll.
However, the moment he picked up the scroll, unfurled it to read what was in it, and determine the offender’s punishment, he suddenly heard a strange echoing roar originating from his office’s window.
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Captain Zhen Ba Yin took a deep breath once he heard that his family got involved with something…again.
He might be in charge of the law enforcement, but that didn’t mean his nieces, nephews and cousins had free reign to do whatever they wanted…mostly.
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Depending on his subordinate’s answer, he was either going to do nothing or actually get involved for once…he hoped it was the former.
‘Might actually do them some good to get humbled for once…’
