Chapter 878: Time Crunch
‘Well…crap.’
One of the downsides of having access it real time information from multiple points at once, was an inability to act upon it in a personal manner.
The only thing Zhen Liu could do, for the time being, was to focus on the problems in front of him, i.e., the Blood Mantis and Wraith Mandrill.
That said, he and the rest of his group, Zhen Yan and Jin Fang, had to wait until Rianna could find an opening to fire an arrow. Whether it was jammed into the mandrill or the mantis first, it didn’t matter, since they were going to try and deal with both.
‘Worst case scenario…gonna need to reveal a little something something about myself…and deal with the fallout.’
At the same time Zhen Liu and his group were about to interrupt a duel to the death by turning it into a lose-lose situation, the rest of the clansmen were about to do equally dangerous encounters.
…
Due to being influenced by the presence of so many other watching aether beast primates, Zhen Hai’s group opted to try and win the talisman via boxing against the apes guarding the talisman.
These apes might’ve been tough in the wild, but boxing was the domain of mortals and cultivators!
“Just need to keep my feet loose and posture limber…”
…
Technically speaking the group didn’t need to secure the biggest Eternal Spring Calabash tree, they just needed one.
All they would have to do is sneak up around the group of drunken apes and Drunken Frenzy Orangutan, and then go from there.
Of course, it was probably easier to sneak up on the drunken beasts when they were distracted.
“Drunks tend to like either music or food…wait a minute…”
…
On one side, a legion of Mountain Yetis.
On the other, an army of Metal Capped Macaques.
At this point, most reasonable would avoid wanting to get involved in such a hectic battle field.
Unfortunately, they weren’t most people.
“Wait a minute…yetis tend to hate heat and hot water, so are they attacking the macaques?”
“You think they know about the teapot?”
“That…maybe the case…”
…
“So…what do we do about this cocoon?”
“We could try and destroy it, before it hatches…there’s just one problem. Well, two.”
“Two?”
“From what I’ve read, if we strike it one of three things can occur. For starters, it could explode.”
“Of course…”
“The second thing that can occur is that our attacks could complete the maturation process and we’d have to deal with a fully hybridized dragon and…whatever this beast originally was before [Mutation Inheritance] occurred.”
“I mean…that sounds fun.”
“Princess…”
“The absolute best case scenario is that we hit the sweet spot which causes the cocoon to perish on the spot. All of the energy it accumulates might go with it, but the alternatives ain’t much better.”
“Hmmm…how strong would the emergent beast be in comparison to us?”
“If I had to guess…”
…
Regardless of all of these events though, Zhen Liu had no choice other than to focus on the battle before him and the others.
The quicker they resolved this and secure the fountain, the quicker they can go assist the team going after the pond.
Thankfully, that was going to be happening sooner rather than later.
“On my mark,” Zhen Liu heard Rianna whispered to him and the others with an aether modified voice.
“NOW!”
[Stinging Pyre Blast!,] Rianna declared by letting loose a pair of glowing arrows that turned into stinger shaped javelins made of flames.
Prior to joining Zhen Liu, Rianna had already been a crack shot with a bow and arrow due to her needing a way to survive a jungle infested with giant insects.
But now that she had access to proper aether arts that were focused on the usages of bows, Rianna had become something close to a human railgun.
FWOOSH!
“HISSS!”
“OOOK?!”
The stingers made of flames made direct impact with the Blood Mantis and the Wraith Mandrill, with both shots hitting the torsos of both beasts dead center, and absolutely stunning the pack of watching death aether mandrills.
“Tsk! Missed.”
Rianna had been wanting to aim for the hearts of the respective beasts, but both of them moved a bit more than anticipated.
Not that it really mattered, because this was simply the opening move for the others to make use of!
‘Razorstella, with me!’
[Aye!]
“Jin Fang!”
“Yes, Seventh Elder!”
[Regalia, on!]
Zhen Liu and Zhen Yan simultaneously activated their [Regalia] as they coordinated attacked alongside Razorstella and Jin Fang, respectively, peeling off into pairs in order to deal with both the Blood Mantis and Wraith Mandrill without easing up the pressure on either opponent.
…
The first to arrive to their intended target was Zhen Yan and Jin Fang, as the Blood Mantis was a touch closer to the group when they were hiding.
However, the distance was still great enough that it gave them enough to circulate their aether to unleash their biggest respective moves!
[Roaring Lion’s Fist!]
[Hurricane Seal!]
Zhen Yan punched forward, his aether forming into the shape of a burning lion’s head before flying forward at blazing fast speeds.
On the other side, Jin Fang made a strange looking hand-seal that caused a large aether array to form before her for a couple of seconds before exploding into a miniature hurricane that flew towards the Blood Mantis like a wild buzz saw.
Evidently, their attacks were so loud and bright, that they didn’t notice what Zhen Liu and Razorstella was doing…which was a good thing.
…
‘Razorstella, mind if I borrow a bit of your power?!,’ Zhen Liu asked as he drew the [Veteran’s Bone Club] in preparation to use a long neglected skill of his.
[Of course, Director!]
[Chaos] began to surge around Zhen Liu and Razorstella as they rushed towards the Wraith Mandrill, wanting to end this foul simian in one devastating blow.
Was it overkill?
Maybe.
Was it gonna be cathartic as hell given Zhen Liu’s personal beef with them?
Yes. Yes it was.
That stated, Razorstella proved to be a bit faster than Zhen Liu, so she decided that she was going to create an opening. More specifically, she wanted to test out a different way of using her swordegs.
[And…jump!]
With a bit of aether as a propellent, Razorstella launched herself upward while holding herself like she was a world-class gymnast about to do something incredible.
Once she reached the peak of her ascent, she abruptly opened herself in such a manner that the tip of her legs were pointed directly above the Wraith Mandrill.
[Shooting Star Barrage-Forte!]
Empowering her legs, Razorstella began to rapidly kick her legs in a frenzy, causing star shaped bolts of energy to come flying out of her legs and raining down on the Wraith Mandrill in a domineering manner.
“OOKIE?!”
The beast could barely raise its arms up in time to block the slashing shower of energy before Zhen Liu was upon him.
Bone club in hand and [Regalia] donned, Zhen Liu looked like either the most ruthless of heroes or the most heroic of bandits, depending on who you ask.
Then again, that might’ve been due to the fact that the aformentioned bone club was glowing with an aura that looked a lot like a starry night sky!
[Imperial-]
…
[Wait!,] Blazejudicator quickly interjected before Zhen Liu dropped what felt like a sky’s worth of swords on the Wraith Mandrill’s head.
[Let me just give that attack a little boost!]
‘The fuck?’
BWOOM!
‘THE FUCK?!’
…
[-Crusher!]
Midway through his swing, Zhen Liu’s bone club suddenly took on an entirely different characterstic as the stars in the night sky like aura suddenly became red in color and exude a feeling of pure [Patience].
“EEP?!”
The Wraith Mandrill wasn’t sure why, but the suddenly change in the incoming club’s aura caused it to suddenly become a lot more fearful.
It was like something instinctually told it that getting in contact with that club would be the worst possible outcome.
But it was too late.
By the time the Wraith Mandrill managed to put together that the rain of star shaped energy was merely a distraction, Zhen Liu had slammed his [Imperial Crusher] directly into its abdomen and sent the mandrill flying.
The Wraith Mandrill managed to recover it’s footing by grabbing the jungle flooring and managed to upright itself…but then shit got really fucking weird as the beast started seizing up!
‘Hold up…what the fuck?’
“OOOOOOKKK!”
Normally when Zhen Liu used [Chaos], the power would just nullify the aether defenses and attacks of his opponents, something about the two being opposing forces that cancelled each other out like fire and water.
However, when Blazejudicator infused his club with [Patience], it caused this weird chain reaction that caused the Wraith Mandrill to convulse in pain as black smoke and aether began to pour out of it like blood from a slashed open veins.
“Oooo-BLARGH!”
“Oh, ick!”
The next thing he knew, the Wraith Mandrill had barfed up this weird black and red crystal that wreaked of death aether.
Correction.
The next thing he knew, the completely normal giant mandrill had barfed up an aether beast core!
‘Wait…what the fuck?!’
[Well…that was unexpected. Cool!]
‘Okay, but how though?!’
Once again, Zhen Liu was subjected to the age old truth of his powers: they made no fucking sense.
‘Wait a minute…why is the mandrill glowing?’
