Chapter 911: [Flames of Vice & Virtue]
‘Ignoring…actually, not ignoring this. Blazejudicator, why is my father wreathed in purple flames like some kind of hell demon? And what’s with the overlapping voice? What did you do?’
[Wait, you’re more curious about that and not pissed about him stealing our fighting thunder? This was our fight, director!]
‘Technically, my aim was to distract the monkey long enough for the rest of my family to abscond with the treasures. Speaking of which, Spring Brawler, you good?’
[The girls and I have met up with the rest of the clan and are now heading for the exit. That said, they’re also looking at me kind of funny.]
‘We’ll address that later. Now then, Blazejudicator, explain.”
[Oh, yeah, turns out your old man is surprisingly compatible with the Flames of Vice and Virtue. I just gave him a crash course on the flight here and he just took to it like kindling in a wildfire. How come your old man never cultivated this stuff before?]
‘Lack of resources, lack of knowledge of it existing, hell, I didn’t even know they were a thing until you showed up in my soul.’
[Fair enough. Either way, executor, leave it to me and your old man. We’ll barbecue this monkey like a questionable dinner.]
‘Why…why did that sound wrong?’
[Meh, I’m running two conversations right now, and your dad is about to use the Flames of Gluttony in tandem with Temperance. Gimme a second.]
‘Say what?’
________________________________________
*Bing-Bong*
We interrupt this chapter to do a very quick explanation of what the [Flames of Vice & Virtue] are exactly.
To put it bluntly, they’re fourteen different colored flames associated with the [Seven Deadly Sins] and the [Seven Heavenly Virtues].
Each of the fourteen flames have an effect and color specific to their vice or virtue, what these effects are will be revealed or placed in a separate side chapter.
We now return to your regularly scheduled chapter.
Thank you.
…
|No snarky comment?|
I’ll give you flak when you use these interruptions for lazy padding, not for useful reminders.
|Fair enough.|
*Bing-Bong*
________________________________________
Sound of an armored burning fist smashing in someone’s jaw.
As soon as he arrived, Zhen Yan had already punched the Dragon Thief Monkey right across it’s face.
A sickening crunch echoed throughout the area, as the Dragon Thief Monkey, for the first time throughout this entire battle was finally sent flying.
As this was happening, the kaijin Hurricroak, Frosttusk and Screamira had managed to dispell the Dragon Thief Monkey’s pseudo[Pentagonal Dragon Buster], giving Jinju Ren an opportunity to catch a breather, and for her own attack to get through.
Much to her very mild annoyance.
“You guys know I technically had that, right?”
[Probably, yeah.]
[But I know for damn sure that the maestro would’ve turned this entire jungle into a glassed dessert if you had gotten hurt.]
“D’awww, that’s sweet.”
[Wait, are we seriously letting the producer’s old man take the show? This was supposed to be our prey!]
…
BOOM!
“OOKIE?! OOK!”
The Dragon Thief Monkey did not appreciate being launched like a ragdoll into the ground by some unknown assailant.
It seemed to be a bit of a running trend to have its battles being constantly interrupted by outside intervention and it was starting to get on his nerves.
This moment was especially annoying because this was the first real bit of damage that had been inflicted upon his person. Those previous attacks from both that sword wielding woman and that crazy spinning boy hadn’t done much due to his constant defensive and evasive measures, so the fact that some random lion man showed up out of nowhere and cold clocked him was infuriating, to say the least.
Granted, it would’ve probably been more appropriate to say he got hot clocked.
“Oookie…”
Using a bit of dragon force, the Dragon Thief Monkey began to repair its shattered jaw. However, as it was in the process of doing so, it couldn’t help but to feel as if the process of doing so was taking longer than anticipated.
Back when he was a full-on Diabolic Onyx Dragon, it had to repair broken bones and torn flesh with dragon force multiple times, so he knew when things felt wrong.
FWOOSH
“We ain’t done yet.”
(Un)fortunately, he did not have the luxury of being able to figure out why this was the case.
Landing just a couple feet away from him, stood a being that looked similar to that old man with the frozen chains and similar to that wooden man with the giant club, but had a completely different aura to them.
The old man with the chains had a serpentine armor and reminded the Dragon Thief Monkey of a frozen lake with hidden depth, while the other old man reminded him of an ancient forest. This new one though felt…strange.
The Dragon Thief Monkey didn’t know the concept of [Heaven] or [Hell], but he was familiar with the feeling of [Judgement].
Back when he had to overcome the power of the dragon’s blood, the Dragon Thief Monkey felt as if an overwhelming source of power of pain was looking down on him and forcing him to either bend a knee, break or survive.
Right now, in this man wearing armor that was modelled after a lion, the Dragon Thief Monkey could feel this feeling of pure [Judgement], mixed with a heat that he only felt during wildfires or when he dared to wander a little too close to the territory of a particular primate.
Regardless, the Dragon Thief Monkey knew that now wasn’t the time to get philosophical or to even think about what was going on. Now, it was time to fight.
“OOKIE!”
Which is why it opted to immediately strike with its tail, before his opponent could even take a step forward.
Adapting the move it has learned from that old man that radiated ice and cold, the Dragon Thief Monkey’s tail became enshrouded by the shadow of a coiling serpent.
…
[Incoming!]
‘I see it! I see it!’
When Zhen Yan had decided to surprise attack the Dragon Thief Monkey, it was a bit of a hot-headed decision.
After he was given a crash course on the [Flames of Vice and Virtue], due to them suddenly appearing in his formula in circular manner, he decided to try and focus on one in an attempt to better understand how each worked on an individual basis.
Unfortunately, he decided to start off this experiment by picking the [Flame of Pride] and turned himself into a giant, purple lion-shaped ball of flames that decided it was a good idea to punch the most dangerous thing in the area for the sake of asserting dominance.
It wasn’t until after he had crunched the jaw of the Dragon Thief Monkey that the voice in his head managed to dial back his [Pride].
But now he was on the receiving end of an attack that looked vaguely similar to something his father would use in battle.
Which is why he knew that this was a moment he needed to defend himself or he’d end up with a literal frozen heart.
Luckily, he wasn’t alone in this endeavor.
[Use the Flames of Gluttony and the Flames of Temperance. Now.]
‘Right…which one were those again?’
[Orange and Dark Blue!]
‘Thank you!’
Focusing inward, Zhen Yan singled out the [Flame of Gluttony] and the [Flame of Temperance], and caused them to conflagrate outwards.
This caused the flaming mane that was coming out of his [Regalia] to go from a rainbow colored flame to a heavy mix of blue and orange.
Activating one flame over the other would’ve overpower Zhen Yan’s senses with one of the two extremes on the [Hunger] scale, but by activating both, he managed to achieve a mental balance.
Moments before the Dragon Thief Monkey’s tail impaled his torso, Zhen Yan created a shield of orange flames that actively “devoured” the aether and dragon force surrounding the tail, until it was completely exposed.
“OOKIE?!”
Sensing the sudden vulnerability, the Dragon Thief Monkey tried to retract its tail but it was too late!
By the time it had noticed the change, Zhen Yan had already begun his retaliation.
Which came in the form of burning dark blue claws coming out of his hands.
[Claws of Temperance]
SWISH!
“OOKIE!”
Recoiling out of instinctive pain, the Dragon Thief Monkey leaped back as fast he could the moment those burning blue claws had made contact with his tail.
As quick as he could, the Dragon Thief Monkey quickly looked over his tail to see if there were any burns or obvious wounds, releasing a sigh of relief when he couldn’t find anything.
However, that sigh of relief suddenly stopped when he realized something was off with his tail.
“Ookie?”
Experimentally, the Dragon Thief Monkey tried to flex and bend the tail with the usual amount of force he would when not in battle, not noticing anything different.
However, the moment he tried to use more force, tried to swing it faster…it wouldn’t go any faster than his default speed.
To put it another way, a restraint had been placed on his tail.
And he had a feeling, thing were only get worse.
