Chapter 794: Lavender Infused Fury
When an Ignarii aether warrior showed up out of nowhere, the Zhen Clan scions were surprised. Aetherii would normally be only able to operate in regions of incredibly dense elemental aether.
When they vaguely understood the weird foreign language the aetherii had used when they introduced themselves as Olstenna, they were shocked. The language the man had used didn’t sound like any of the seven tongues that the seven continents used.
When a second warrior that appeared to be connected to Olstenna showed up out of nowhere again and challenged Olstenna, the Zhen Clan scions were finally just…numb. A lot of crazy things had happened in the span of a few minutes, and the scions had barely any idea on how to handle it.
“Do…do we still go down there and fight, or…”
“Yeah, no. I can sense the energy those two freaky ass warriors are using and I’d rather not get caught up in the crossfire if I can help it.”
“This has technically evolved into a problem that we can’t handle by ourselves…”
Technically speaking, when Olstenna showed up and started attacking the mystery fighters, the Zhen Clan scions should’ve been one of the first wave of warriors to fight this guy off. After all, this arena was technically their territory after all and they would be remissed not being able to handle such problems by themselves.
But before they could have a chance to organize anything at all, a warrior in black [Regalia] showed up and stole their thunder.
But as they continued to watch the warrior in black [Regalia] fight, they couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of deja vu.
“Hey… this is gonna sound weird…but does that guy’s moves look…familiar or am I going crazy?”
“No, no…you’re not the only one…but…I don’t think that’s him…”
“Why?”
“Well…for starters, that guy down there is using an ax as a weapon, while Xiao Liu only has a pair of blunt objects as weapons.”
“I guess…”
“Also, bigger factor, we’ve all seen what Zhen Liu’s [Regalia] looks like, and it is nowhere near as ominous looking as that guy’s [Regalia].”
“Fair.”
Some time during the long trip from Roaring Tide to Stampeding Bison, Zhen Liu had eventually showed his family what his [Regalia] looked like in a more personal setting.
There was a small touch of confusion as to why his [Regalia] didn’t have the same animalistic flair as the elders, but they didn’t really care. They were just happy to add another Grandmaster to the ranks.
That said, it was because of this moment that the Zhen Clan scions watching the battle at this time were mostly confident that the guy fighting down there wasn’t their cousin. After all, it was impossible for someone to have more than [Regalia]…right?
“Besides, Xiao Liu uses those weird aether puppets to fight and prefers to fight with his fists like that Olstenna guy. There’s no way that warrior in black is him.”
“I guess, but…didn’t we see Xiao Liu once use one of his weird aether phllets to enhance his [Regalia] in battle once? Back when the Fallen Clan had attacked?”
“That…huh.”
As the memory of seeing Zhen Liu absorb his black and red puppet into his [Regalia] played through their respective heads, the Zhen Clan scions ended up independently reaching a singular, similar thought.
‘If that is Zhen Liu down there, could he explain what the fuck a kaijin was?’
(Un)fortunately, the scions wouldn’t be getting the answer to that question just yet.
________________________________________
*Bing-Bong*
As a periodic reminder, Zhen Liu’s identity is being obscured by his Maoh [Regalia].
As such, he will be referred to on an alternating basis between his actual name and as “the warrior in black”.
Thank you.
*Bing-Bong*
________________________________________
[Damned Execution!]
*FWOOM!*
Zhen Liu swung down his bone ax as hard as he could, releasing a wave of green [Ghost Flame] in the form of an earth splitting slash.
Outside observers at this time could see that as the blade traveled onwards, the very ground that it passed through began to take on a gnarly, necrotic look to it. It was if this attack from this warrior in black was literally sapping the life force of anything and everything that came in contact with it.
Most people, seeing such an attack come their way, would either start panicking or try to come up with several different ways to avoid coming into contact with such an attack.
Olstenna, however, was not most people.
‘Oh-ho! This attack feels a bit more vicious than the one before it! It even has a little something extra mixed into it!,’ Olstenna noticed with battle-hungry glee as he stared at the incoming wave of fire. ‘It would be rude for me to not respond in kind.’
Olstenna began to circulate his internal aether at a faster rate than before, causing literal sparks of purple flames to form off of his body.
‘Do I go for another punch? Nah, let’s try something a bit…bigger.’
Olstenna proceeded to form a strange looking hand-seal that caused the flames in and around his body to condense in front of him into the shape of a strange looking seal with a demonic visage.
As Zhen Liu saw this demonic seal of flames beginning to form, he began to grimace under his [Regalia].
‘Oh joy…a seal of flames. Great…’
Zhen Liu had read enough comics and novels at this point to know that any attacks that came in the form of a giant weird seal had a tendency to be unusually powerful. That and they usually belonged to either the protagonists or warriors associated with some unnecessarily large and powerful authority figure.
‘Wait…shit, that does make me the antagonist?,’ Zhen Liu mused for a moment.
Before he could think about this train of thought any further though, Olstenna released his counterattack.
[Asura’s Flame Seal!]
*BOOM!*
Olstenna had condensed his flames into the shape of giant circular seal with the visage of a demon, and fired it directly towards Zhen Liu’s wave of green flames.
“Oh boy…”
“Here it comes…”
Many of the onlookers assumed that the two different types of fire aether would cancel each other out again, just like last time. However, something weird occurred that threw that line of thinking straight out of a window and into a fiery pit of doom.
‘Think of it like a giant cookie, think of it like a giant cookie…now!’
“What the fuck?!”
“Does he have a death wish?”
[Wait a damn minute…]
Moments before the two fiery attacks collided with one another, Zhen Liu had cancelled out his own attack in order to let Olstenna’s attack to fly at him in an unimpeded manner. As he did so, the mouth piece on his [Regalia] had suddenly opened up like the maw of a demon. Of course, nobody noticed this little action occuring.
“Oht hat guy is-”
*BOOM!*
“-OH SHIT!”
Everyone watching at this time assumed that Olstenna’s fire seal would’ve simply scorched the warrior in black into ashes before continuing on, or that would the warrior would use his ax to counter attack in a different way.
Instead, they were given front row seats to the sight of this mysterious warrior attempting to swallow the giant mass of purple flames that threatened to kill him.
Needless to say, everyone was a bit flabbergasted at the sight.
________________________________________
‘Sweet mother ducker, it feels like I’m swallowing a bottle of lavender infused melted butter. Is lavender even edible? Wait…why aren’t I swearing like I usually do?’
∆Lavendar is indeed edible, milord. On a side note, Jasper and Janice are a big fan of our flower-infused mochi cakes. Jasper likes the rose scented ones while Janice loves honeysuckle.∆
‘Adorable, but seriously, what the fuck am I swallowing right now?’
=Analyzing unknown aether fire treasure now…okay, good news. We have identified the fire that Olstenna is using as the [Violet Berserker Spring Flame]. As such, we advise you to capture this guy, not kill him.=
‘Cool and what’s the bad news?’
∆The sheer amount of heat and power in his flames are so well-honed, that if you continue to swallow it at your current pace, your body will end up burning inside out like a pig at a luau!∆
‘What the fuck?!’
=Not to worry, we just need to reroute the heat attacking your soul and formula to one of the other kaijin. Thankfully, we have just the candidate for that.=
‘Oh thank the gods for my paranoid ass preparing for every contingency.’
∆You still don’t have a dedicated spy master kaijin though.∆
‘I AM WORKING ON IT!’
_______Meanwhile, outside the arena______
[Frosttusk, why did you suddenly stop in the middle of the street like a statue?]
[I am…not entirely sure…why. But I feel like…I am becoming faster and faster…by the second.]
[Oh. Uh oh.]
[Our jarl appears to be in deeper amount of trouble than we had anticipated. We need to get to him now.]
