Immortal Connections - Chapter 34 preview

Chapter 34 - Yang Mu

“Move!” Yang Mu roared, raising her fan before her. The damaged enchanted item took the attack by the Nascent Soul cultivator directly, additional cracks spiraling outwards from the handle and across the face of the accessory. She grunted as part of the dao and fire chi of the attack leaked through the spatial enchantment, blistering the skin of her hand and face.

A flick of her hand that held the other fan opened the linked portal, the energy that was being swallowed by the attack emerging from the portal and slamming into a cluster of enemies, wiping out three of them completely and injuring the Core Formation cultivator who had covered the entirety of his body in glowing copper.

All around her, chaos reigned as the caravan was attacked. Strung out across a li in the winding hills, the attackers who had emerged had caught them out by surprise, trapping the front of the caravan in a beguilement formation. It isolated the middle where Yang Mu was currently under attack and the rear where the Midnight Spear was doing battle with a trio of Core Formation cultivators.

Here, in the middle, the Nascent Soul cultivator and his team of Energy Storage and Body Formation cultivators had targeted her and the group. It was only fate and luck that had given Yang Mu sufficient time to trigger an escape talisman as she threw herself off her steed. The attacks had – surprisingly – missed the creature for the most part, instead tracking her as she reappeared even as her steed fell over snorting in pain before it expired.

Now, here she was, dealing with the attackers as the remaining members who had been recruited boiled out of carriages or took to the fight. Already, she could see one of the Red Spider cult members on the ground, gurgling to death around a punctured throat wound. 

The attack finally relented, leaving her a moment to rush to the side. She swept into the middle of the leading edge of the attack, demon sect members in unnatural forms attempting to pull her down. She wove between them, using the drunken fairy martial arts, stumbling onto and around the attackers, going so far as to lean on their bodies as she dodged attacks and placed herself in a position that made it difficult for her to attacker to target her.

Not without actually attacking their own people, and thankfully, this cultivator had not devolved that far. 

Moments of hesitation and thought, long enough for the Daoist master to exit his carriage. He casually blocked a sweeping attack with one hand, tossing his opponent into the trees with a surge of strength and power as he reviewed the battle.

Then, a small motion had the pair of flying swords that hovered over his shoulder shooting forward, crossing the space between him and the Nascent Soul demon, forcing his opponent on the defensive. He launched himself after his swords, a handbell loosing a single, discordant peal.

The noise pushed all the demonic cultivators to their feet, clutching their ears. It grated on the nerves of other cultivators, a few wincing as various cultivation techniques that revolved around extending or supplementing their hearing were assaulted by the sound attack. However, the bell itself was set to ring and harm the supernatural and demons, and as such; it was their enemies who suffered most.

Many were on the ground, clutching bleeding ears or swiping at leaking eyes. A few, the weakest or most unlucky, clutched at their hearts whose very beating had been disrupted. Yet, the Red Spider Cult members were all martial cultivators, trained and experienced enough that none took the brief distraction for granted.

Blood spurted, heads and limbs were cleaved, a trio of cultivators flying into the air as silk ribbons wrapped around necks and heaved, lifting and strangling in the same motion. Cracks and thuds echoed through the clearing, as the surprise attack was suddenly turned by the addition of a single Nascent Soul cultivator.

No surprise there. A peak cultivator – just a step beneath immortality – could take on entire regiments by themselves. That she had managed to not only locate, but hire, two such cultivators must have been a true surprise for her enemies.

Sufficient enough that they had launched an attack with insufficient force. 

Yang Mu twisted her arm and body, her fan in its closed form helping to leverage her opponent’s neck sideways and in the opposite direction till her it snapped with a sharp retort. The massive feline-like demon slumped to the ground, unable to control their body any longer.

A quick look around and sudden intuition had her leaning sideways, the arrow that had been loosed cutting through the air and glancing off the enchanted silk robes she wore. It left behind a greenish, poisonous haze in its wake, impacting the caravan door nearby and shattering the caravan itself.

“’Ware! Archers.” She shouted the warning and then leapt, throwing an open fan at the tree line where the attack had arrived. A sweep with her other fan sent a gust of wind to speed her attack as well as disrupt additional arrows that targeted her as she created a target of herself.

Arrows flew into the gale that she had suddenly created, swerving away or dropping aside. One caught a member of the Red Spider cult in the arm, though most fell without harming others. At the same time, the fan that she had thrown grew in size as it flew, opening larger and larger till it struck the trees and sliced through the foliage. The majority of the cultivators had either fled above the attack or ducked beneath the fan, leaving but a single cultivator who found a foot, dangling too low – sliced off.

It did, however, manage to tear down the cover of their ranged attackers, leaving them exposed. Moments later, caravan guards and the few ranged attackers from the cult released their own attacks, everything from crossbow bolts to blade slashes.

Meanwhile, the battle between the Nascent Soul cultivators had progressed, the pair flying off into the sky as the Daoist cultivator rode a staircase of reforming yellow talisman papers, his swords – one metal, the other made of peach wood – chased after the demon. Surprisingly, Yang Mu noted how the demon cared more for the peach wood sword, always fleeing from it rather than blocking the attack with his claws.

It surprised her, a little, that there were no shock waves or effects of the clash amongst the caravan. Trees and even portions of a hill in the background were tearing apart as the pair fought, but where the caravan stood, beyond the loud and reverberating noise of battle, it was quiet. 

Acting on instinct again as she landed, Yang Mu turned to the fluctuations in environmental chi that she sensed, picking out the presence of Guardian Mai. His massive mace had been slammed into the ground, the mace head expanded. It shook with every moment, growing brighter as it absorbed the effects of the clash. Standing beside the Guardian was Patriarch Ruo, the demure and matronly woman warding off any attacks.

A lousy use of her skills, Yang Mu could not help but think. Still, the battle itself was nearly over in this portion. She could only hope that the Midnight Spear was as good as his own reputation. Even if the fight here was nearly over, it still required her presence.