Chapter 456: The End of the Heavenly River Heir

The combined assault of the fortress was actually formidable: it had a Sky Soul at its head, with multiple Earth Souls and hundreds of other cultivators behind him. Qi rushed forward in a magical river, shattering against the stones and annihilating everything in the courtyard.

Kai wasn't there, of course. The three of them had leapt clear of the attack, and though the shockwaves of power might have harmed weaker cultivators, they all had the Physique to endure it.

While he was still in midair, Kai was surprised to see Kan Jin Kung leaving the barrier, flashing at him with surprising speed. Several flying swords lashed out and he only managed to catch the first two, so the third cut across his chest.

Just a shallow cut, though. Kai reached out and nearly grabbed his opponent before he retreated to the qi barrier.

"You see now?" Kan Jin Kung glared at all three of them from his position in the sky. "I've grown far more powerful since we last fought, and I've advanced to Rank 18 among Floodisle City's immortals!"

"Does that matter here?" Zae Zin Nim asked, mildly puzzled. "What rank was he before?"

"He was 16," Omilaena said, "but how much of that was due to his family?"

"Shut up!" Kan Jin Kung practically screamed the words and floated higher. "With a Sky Soul's cultivation base, my presence technique will finish you!"

The sapphire crown over his head began to glow, and the pressure washing over them was stronger than before, but this time it didn't matter. Zae Zin Nim had prepared herself, Omilaena injected herself with a syringe, and Kai just took the force and endured.

Then he activated Banchlain's Aura and struck back.

If he had been able to merge it with other techniques, it might have done more, but the essence had still grown in strength after so much use. His aura of terror swept the Flowing Crown backward and pierced the qi barrier, sending many cultivators collapsing or fleeing. Kan Jin Kung stared at him, barely able to resist, fear beginning to creep into his expression.

He should have been looking at Zae Zin Nim instead. During all the posturing, she had been drawing together her qi and mana. The cultivator formations realized there was a threat and began to hurl techniques at her, but Kai and Omilaena came together to defend, giving her time to complete the technique.

When Zae Zin Nim leapt into the air, she looked tiny and light, like a leaf in the wind. But when her palm swept forward, a Coldfire Palm the size of the fortress rumbled from her.

It collided with the great qi barrier and for several seconds the two ground together, making cultivators collapse on all sides. When the flames died out, the fortress wall was broken and the qi barrier utterly destroyed. Behind it, the cultivators looked on in terror and some began to break out of their formations.

"Stand together!" Kan Jin Kung turned his presence on his own side, forcing them back into formation. "If you don't fight them, I'll kill you myself!"

It was a decent display of leadership, if twisted leadership, but he was too late: Kai, Omilaena, and Zae Zin Nim were already inside the fortress among them.

They were fighting against a small army, one that had fought together as a sect for years... and there was no comparison in their coordination. When one of the enemy formations managed to generate a large qi attack, Zae Zin Nim was already in its path, canceling it with the Coldfire Corona. Every time they attempted to attack at range, Omilaena deflected their projectiles with her own. When Kan Jin Kung tried to attack their flanks, Kai was always waiting in his path.

Their counterattacks were devastating. Kai and Omilaena unleashed swarms of needles and quills that annihilated any cultivator outside of defenses. When he ran alongside Zae Zin Nim, their blows tore through qi barriers like paper. She and Omilaena joined together to unleash assaults of ice and blue fire that overwhelmed all attempts at combined techniques.

As the battle continued, and Kan Jin Kung failed to leverage his Sky Soul effectively, it turned into a rout. A large formation of cultivators fled toward one exit, only for Omilaena to block them with a cloud of poison. Kai saw others fleeing in the opposite direction and leapt past them to breathe a wall of Baleful Breath.

A few of the cultivators, staring back at the yard in horror, actually plunged into the darkness and died instantly.

Some of the others built up a formation of whirling wind that protected them enough to advance into the poison, but a second later their bodies came flying out of the blue cloud, their chests crushed. Zae Zin Nim emerged from it, breathing the poison easily.

Soon the only real threat was Kan Jin Kung, who pushed himself past his limits trying to fight all three of them at once. If he had been a more effective fighter or leader during the main battle, he might have impeded them, but on his own against three opponents of similar strength, he was helpless.

Kai reflected that he actually should have been more of a challenge, given his 1300 Power and other advantages. Despite their mockery, Kan Jin Kung wasn't weak in absolute terms. But the problem was that he had too little experience in actual battles, being too used to defeating opponents with overwhelming power. When he was at a disadvantage and needed to show his real character, strategy, or tenacity... he crumbled.

So what was a desperate fight for his life was, for them, just practice.

They could have ended it sooner, with poison or a dozen other methods, but they kept battering the young master across the devastated fortress. Even though none of them said it, they were all thinking the same thing. This was a chance to test out their techniques against a Sky Soul, because there were enemy cultivators stronger and more experienced than this.

When they fought a real opponent, they would be ready. That, Kai reflected, was the real difference between them. Kan Jin Kung never looked upward, only stared inward in awe of his own power.

Eventually they couldn't drag things out any longer: the heir to one of the largest sects in the Southern Rivers was barely on his feet, bleeding from a dozen wounds. The three of them had him surrounded, no one making the final move.

"You... you could have had perfect lives..." Kan Jin Kung's eyes wandered back to the two women. "You could have any husband you wanted and lived in luxury. Instead, you give in to your lusts and-"

"That's enough out of you." Omilaena closed the distance and raised one of her needles just beneath his throat. While he trembled there, she leaned closer with a malicious smirk. "If just seeing us was enough to offend you, just knowing you exist offends me. Let me tell you what's going to happen. I am going to drive this through your brain, you'll die, and then all three of us are going to fuck on top of your corpse."

Kan Jin Kung started to beg for mercy, but her needle pierced through his jaw so forcefully the tip burst from his skull. He twitched several times and then collapsed, and like that, the heir to the Heavenly River sect was dead.

"We are not going to do any such thing," Zae Zin Nim said. "That's disgusting."

"He doesn't know that." Omilaena turned away from the corpse with a shrug. "I figured that if he couldn't stop thinking about us having sex, he might as well think about it while he died."

"If you really insist, we can be intimate in the vault. At least there would be privacy there."

Omilaena grinned in delight, even though Zae Zin Nim probably wasn't serious, and followed her as they went to search for the vault doors. Meanwhile, Kai roamed through the ruined fortress, killing off any cultivators that had survived the assault. None were in good shape, but some had only lost many mouthfuls of blood instead of dying.

Killing those in pain wasn't solely an act of mercy... Kai also made another attempt to absorb their essence. He could feel his hunger absorbing their qi, on the edge of something he couldn't quite grasp. These cultivators were all his enemies but he felt no personal animosity toward them, they were just parts of the sect system. A shame, because he was so close to advancing Banchlain's Aura further.

No other reinforcements came, because there were none left. Yul Wei Ren hid himself in the sect headquarters, burying his head in the sand while his allies deserted him. The rest of the cultivator army in the region was currently being defeated by the Redtree rebels. There were larger forces who had yet to enter the battle, but the Masterful Crown clan's control of the region was beginning to collapse.

Kai tracked the others by their essences and found them in the center of the fortress, having destroyed a large set of doors. The interior was filled with all manner of treasures... not as wild a collection was he would have expected, after his experience of Rosemount, but still impressive. There were even huge piles of gold and jade, which they might as well take since they were the victors. His spatial ring from the elves was much larger and higher quality than average, but he had to wonder if it would all fit.

Meanwhile, his wives were examining the Physique-related items. Zae Zin Nim looked excited, while Omilaena shook her head slowly.

"These might be the ingredients from the scroll," she said, "but that doesn't mean your Physique can advance. We still need to decide on the exact methods."

"But these are the last," Zae Zin Nim said. "Now, no matter how difficult a path we choose, we won't lack for resources."

"The path could be the hardest part. There are still some issues you need to work out."

"It will be fine." Kai wrapped them both into an embrace and felt them gradually relax. "Whatever we have to face, whatever they throw at us, we'll be ready."

He knew that future battles would be more difficult. The Masterful Crown clan had multiple sects under its control, after all, and more powerful forces would be gathering as it became clear that this was a threat to all of them. Honestly, he was looking forward to it.