Yuanchen's body crashed on the ground with a thud.
Again!
Again!
He thought to himself — he was on the verge of dying again, he could hear the footsteps of Yakeen approaching Lia and Damon but they were growing faint. He tried to move, to scream; his body neither responded.
Yuanchen felt the cold embrace cover him, his fears starting to waver and peace settle. He closed his eyes and relaxed his face.
Guess this is death.
Can't say I'm disappointed.
"Not quite yet."
Yuanchen snapped his eyes open — Shengyuan's voice reached him when he was in the darkness and when he did snap his eyes open, he was in another field — in this field he lay on the lush grass, in the distance were mountains and a lake divided the mountains into two. Above him sat a large tree with a bark wide as the eye could see; the leaves were golden and the tree bore golden apples. It felt peaceful to Yuanchen, who sat up and looked at Shengyuan standing there.
His expression soured when he saw the man. What do you want?
Shengyuan's cold eyes stared at Yuanchen, making him flinch. "Stop resisting, accept me and together we can stand above this world... No... Above fate itself."
Yuanchen scoffed. To hell with your world bullshit, do you think everyone wants to be all-powerful? No! Not everyone wants to be all-powerful, hell I can't even cultivate on my own.
For the first time in over a millennium — Shengyuan showed expression. His eyes widened briefly as the words of Yuanchen reached his ear, and for a split second Yuanchen changed from how he looked to someone old — the sentiment disappeared as soon as it arrived and behind remained a stoic man, with eyes that could make heaven tremble itself.
"Your destiny is incomplete. Fate wants to kill you before you reach your goal. It wasn't by chance that you met me. We were destined to meet, you are the path everyone has to follow and you need not fight me."
Yuanchen's brow ticked and he rushed to his feet; he let out a desperate cry and threw a punch at Shengyuan only to be shot back by an invisible force. Landing unceremoniously on the ground, Yuanchen lost the will to keep fighting and stared at his feet. What's the point, you are turning me into something I am not, it scares me at what I am becoming... He mused and looked at his hands. I have no talent, and I am almost dead so do what you want. Just promise that you don't change me.
"You have my word."
---
Yakeen approached Lia with a smile, his sword resting at his side — he stopped in front of the woman who stared at him with trembling eyes. Yakeen licked his lips, the fear in her eyes was tasty, he could almost grab it and it brought him to laughter. "I like the fear in your eyes... Such pure fear!" He raised his sword and was about to strike.
When something no one expected happened.
A monstrous wave of Qi merged with Neuro-Qi exploded from the open wound on Yuanchen's body. The Qi did multiple things which shook Yakeen to the core. First, it covered Yuanchen's body and healed the wound Yakeen had delivered — secondly, the Qi shook everything. The entirety of the world shook; from Sunderfall to the heavenly cities — the overwhelming Qi surging through Yuanchen's body destabilized the gravitational forces around the world, causing massive earthquakes and floods.
Yuanchen slowly rose from the ground like a dead man rising from the grave — he turned around and stared at Yakeen with blood-red eyes. Something was different about him. On Yuanchen's forehead was a marking written in text that Yakeen couldn't decipher; his hair was longer.
Yakeen could feel the emanating presence from the Qi itself — he took a step back, his hands trembling as he did. "What are you?"
Yuanchen pointed at himself in response to the question. "I'm the law, I am the universe itself!" Yuanchen said in the voice of Shengyuan.
Master! I've long waited for your awakening.
A voice flooded Yuanchen's mind and he grinned. "Null World." With that declaration, the world changed. Space tore apart and the Sunderfall atmosphere got covered in a white veil. The trash and machines mining the trash vanished and in their stead a vast white void remained. The void shook as a massive sphere of Qi descended from the heavens and settled in the center.
The orb changed shape — shrinking until it was no bigger than a human palm. The orb took the form of a bipedal creature with daunting blue eyes, humanoid features and blue hair. The creature wore a flowing dress and it hovered to Yuanchen's shoulder.
Master, you are here. It chirped and sat down on his shoulder.
Lia stared at the world. It was simply magnificent. She couldn't comprehend what she was seeing. Her eyes landed on Yuanchen and a glint of hope appeared in them.
Yakeen chuckled. "You are the law, you say? WELL... PROVE THIS THEN! Six Sword Technique Second Form: Eight Silvers of Light." He drew his sword and Neuro-Qi burst from his body, he flickered out of existence, moving so fast his body got shrouded by a wave of Qi. Behind him, air folded onto itself multiple times while the ground gave up and a crater formed — he appeared on Yuanchen's blind side and swung his sword in an arc, the sword mirrored through the planes becoming twelve in one strike.
"Prostrate yourself." Yuanchen said.
Yakeen gawked — not believing his eyes. With just a single sentence, his sword technique struck nothing but thin air. His eyes could see the spatial curvature where his blade touched but the man behind it was unscathed, not even a strand of hair was touched.
He removed his sword and gained some distance between them. How! That move should've reached him, Yakeen thought as he assessed Yuanchen.
Yuanchen turned to look at Yakeen. "You must be wondering how you couldn't reach me. Simple, your sword can't reach me, it has nothing that can reach me, you are..."
"Weak." Yakeen turned to his side as he heard that and his eyes widened — Yuanchen moved so fast, he could not even tell until the latter was by his side and Yakeen felt the air leave his lungs, saliva leave his mouth — in that moment of realization, Yuanchen delivered more than one blow to Yakeen, starting his assault with a gut punch which sent Yakeen flying through the white void. He followed behind by appearing above Yakeen with his hand raised and struck the man in the stomach, sending him plummeting to the ground where he left a sizeable dent.
Yuanchen steadied his body in the air and gazed down at the man kneeling. "Is that all, Yakeen?"
Yakeen gritted his teeth at the condescending tone the man was using — he tightened his grip around his sword and got up, spitting out blood from the attacks. "You just got lucky," he said and pointed his weapon at Yuanchen.
"Lucky? Why not attack me then."
Yakeen's eyebrow dangerously narrowed and he took the invitation — he settled into his earlier stance, his weapon sheathed, and he breathed in. "50% output..." he whispered, opening 50% of the Qi within his core to travel through the implants to amplify his performance. "Six Sword Technique Third Form: Whispering Death." Yakeen's body simmered as his cultivation scripture triggered, causing him to multiply in number. In a blink, all the Yakeen present, which was seventy, charged at Yuanchen and attacked him from all directions.
Clang!
The melody of steel meeting steel.
Yuanchen looked at Yakeen. "Is this it?" he asked as his fingers held onto the real weapon, much to Yakeen's surprise at what had happened.
His third form, considered one of the most powerful forms of assassination — was seen through and brought to ineffectiveness.
Just what was this man?
He was not human.
Yakeen thought as he jumped back along with his replications — he grabbed the sword from one of the replications and dispelled them. "Not bad, you saw through my technique," he said, trying to mask his shock.
Master, this is getting boring. Need I kill him? The bipedal creature asked, its bright eyes staring Yuanchen in the eye.
Yakeen laughed maniacally and held his sword with both hands — the man before him was nothing like the one he'd slain, the one he'd slain could barely react to his attack, yet for some reason this one could react to him and even outspeed him. Were these two sharing the same body? The idea of that being true was laughable, yet when faced with such overwhelming evidence, Yakeen couldn't help but think maybe it was true, maybe the man he considered a wimp was actually two souls in one body.
"I'll show you my ultimate technique then, prepare." Yakeen took a breather and pointed at his chest, a pulse rocked his body as the heart Conduit opened, unleashing 100% of his Neuro-Qi from his core. He closed his eyes and held his blade again, firmly this time. He couldn't believe it, someone this trivial was forcing him to use his last resort technique.
"Six Sword Technique Combination Form: Dauntless Pursuit."
Yakeen's eyes glowed with Neuro-Qi as the world unfolded far clearer than he'd ever seen — his hands emitted smoke which also rose from the soles of his feet. The smoke showed a clear sign of Conduit overclocking. He gritted his teeth, withstanding the pain shooting through his body in waves — his eyes scanned Yuanchen for any sign of weakness, his eyes landed on his target and he grinned.
He pushed off on his right foot, shooting forward at rapid speeds, temporarily outpacing his shadow — mid-run, his body phased a bit and separated, creating more replicas than the first time he did. Each replica swung their swords and the second form appeared between all of them, making a myriad of swords appear, covering Yuanchen's entire point of view.
Yuanchen dodged attack after attack with minimal effort — but that was what Yakeen was counting on, the man focusing on his clones. With Yuanchen preoccupied with his replications, Yakeen slipped past him and dashed toward Lia with his weapon poised to stab her through the heart.
"DIEEE!!"