Book 3. The Long Journey. Chapter 132. Opportunity.

“Swap again,” Reian said with a casual smile once he broke Yin’s guard for the fourth time. It hasn’t been long at all since he made his breakthrough, but he had already swapped his targets eight times, and this one would be ninth. “If you can’t keep going anymore, just say a word,” he added with a laugh as he directed his attention towards Laien, thus causing the youth to grow quite annoyed.

“Acting high and mighty now that he became stronger, hmph,” Laien said within his thoughts, though at the same time he couldn’t help smirking. This fight against Reian had already been incredibly helpful to him in evolving his Water Flow Spear Art even further, but if he were to compare the benefits he and Yin reaped, then it definitely was Yin who gained a bigger advantage.

Although he was quite sure that Yin was yet to name it, he had sensed and seen that Yin developed his own Sword Art during this spar. He had first realized the possibility of it earlier, then honed its foundation further through those four clashes against the strengthened version of Reian.

“Aa~h, it’s going to get so much harder to spar with him now,” Laien complained silently alongside a quiet laugh. There was no way he would be anything else but happy for Yin when he grew stronger, but at the same time, seeing Yin get ahead of him naturally made him want to turn the tables as soon as possible. Still...

“Wait, wait,” he called out to Reian, who was just about to attack him. “I’ve had enough. In fact, I’m pretty sure we both have had enough,” he said with a helpless laugh. They might have clashed with Reian a mere four times each, but their consumption of energy was incomparably heavy to the time before Reian gained insights into the Supreme Profound Mystery of wind element and advanced to the fourth Realm of Heroes. Although Reian was going easy on them in terms of wind blades and all other martial techniques of his, the gap in their strength was just too much to easily surmount.

“What, are we done?” Reian asked, lowering his sword and pausing for a little bit. “Are you sure?” he inquired prior to making the final choice to put his Qi away. He could tell that both Laien and Yin still had somewhere between one-fourth to one-fifth of their energies left and he knew full well how competitive those two were. He could hardly imagine them conceding a beneficial fight just because they were a little bit tired and not yet exhausted.

“Kind of done?” To Reian’s surprise, it was Yin who responded to his question. “We both need some time to digest what we learned, so there really isn’t much benefit left to playing punching bags for you anymore,” he added jokingly, then moved over to Laien’s side in a few quick leaps. The two of them exchanged a meaningful look and a smile, then both turned to look at Reian.

“We’re still at eleven, right?” Laien asked rhetorically and raised his spear up into the air, rousing what remained of his Qi and spiritual energy.

“Yup, yup,” Yin said with a chuckle and raised the twin sword in his left hand, meeting Laien’s spear up above their heads. “I wonder if you will be able to tell this time,” he mentioned playfully. Both Reian and Jasmine were fire-element practitioners, but back then, at the Ulme Village, they failed to become enlightened. Or rather, they likely failed to realize that Laien had employed one of the top-three Profound Mysteries of the Elemental Law of Fire, the Profound Mystery of Inferno, in order to enhance his ice mist and freeze the whole village all at once.

“Tell what?” Reian asked curiously. Laien and Yin had noticed it earlier, but it looked like his whole personality changed heavily while he used the Profound Mystery of Heavenly Tempest. If the two of them were to compare his character to someone… then the first thought that came to their minds, especially in Laien’s case, was Master Shire.

“You’ll see,” Laien said with a laugh. Then, he took a deep breath and focused on the little one-ten-thousand portion of the Soul Imprint which he and Yin had partially comprehended. The next second, he released his Qi and spiritual energy, mixing it only with the pure insights into the Profound Mystery of Inferno that he had. Similarly, Yin released his Qi mixed with those very same insights, the two of them jointly creating an unstable ball of pure power above their heads.

If it was a few days ago, Yin wouldn’t have been able to join in. However, with his increase in the cultivation level and with the addition of a half-complete Aspect of Tranquility to his arsenal, he became able to roughly control the power of the Profound Mystery of Inferno. Of course, he was far away from actually implementing it into any of his skills, just like Laien, as controlling this Profound Mystery was simply too much of a hurdle for the current them. However, as long as they were given enough time, they were certainly able to unleash an absolutely frightening singe attack with the aid of the Profound Mystery of Inferno.

“What a frightening energy,” Reian shuddered slightly in spite of how lighthearted his character had temporarily become. That ball of Qi and spiritual energy was about ten meters wide, but it wasn’t its size that was so intimidating. “What powerful fire-element fluctuations! I’ve got a feeling I’ve sensed them somewhere before, but where?” he asked himself in his confusion. After he came to understand a little about the Supreme Profound Mystery of Wind, his sensitivity to all kinds of energies increased significantly. In a large part due to that, he could tell that there was a high chance of him getting injured by this ‘mere’ fluctuating mass of Qi and spiritual energy.

Moreover, he had a feeling that those two brats were holding back for his sake, apparently trying to help him out with gaining some new insights. It made him both happy and annoyed, what in consequence caused a wry smirk emerge on his face. Those two rascals, they were full of surprises!

And in truth, Reian was completely right. Were Laien and Yin to actually implement all of their insights into that mass and make use of the fact that their water and lighting could mix and enhance one another in an absurdly perfect fashion, then even the present Reian would be incapable of taking an attack like that head-on. After all, even though the Profound Mystery of Heavenly Tempest was powerful, wind wasn’t innately all that strong defensively and neither was fire. Compared to the likes of water or earth, wind and fire couldn’t hold a candle as far as defensive prowess went.

“T-that… what is…” Out of the spectators, it was Victoria who was most shaken. As a fire-element martial master of the seventh rank, she could instinctually tell that even though the depth of fire-element insights those two boys were displaying was inferior, their quality far surpassed her understanding! This feeling was intense enough to affect the Qi in her own body, causing an intense suppressive sensation to spread throughout it. Were she to be forced to fight those two boys at this moment, she wouldn’t be able to exert more than sixty to seventy percent of her full strength!

In comparison, the look on Jasmine’s face wasn’t nearly as terrified, but as the aura of the Profound Mystery of Inferno was deliberately being allowed to spread at full-strength by Laien and Yin, the suppressive effect it had on her proved to be even greater. A few drops of sweat emerged from her hair and slowly flowed down her forehead as she realized that more than half of her Qi became stagnant and unwilling to move. Her battle capability had instantly been cut in half due to that.

“They’re even using that,” Raphael said with a smile. He was a little surprised to see that those two were willing to reveal this much to Reian, but more than that, he was surprised they were showing it in front these two Grand Elders and more importantly, in front of Victoria. Just standing to the side was unlikely to be enough to allow anyone to easily comprehend those extremely high-level insights, but given Victoria’s potential and elemental affinity, she could reap many benefits today.

“You know what that is?” Elder Samuel asked and glanced towards Raphael. He thought he had been generous in his estimation of how deep the friendship between those four went, but if Laien and Yin told Raphael and Mikaela even about such things, then perhaps he had still undervalued how much the four of them came to like one another.

“It’s the Profound Mystery of Inferno,” Mikaela replied in Raphael’s stead as soon as his father’s question fell. He appeared quite excited at the moment, just as he had been throughout this whole sparring session, but contrary to what one might have thought, neither he nor Raphael spoke carelessly. They had discussed the matter of knowledge they shared with Laien and Yin long ago and they agreed to two things. They would be free to share the knowledge they obtained from each other further along as long as they wished, but they wouldn’t reveal each other’s secrets under no circumstance.

It was a simple deal, which honestly benefitted Raphael and Mikaela more. However, since the two of them were bright youths, they couldn’t have possibly failed to realize this fact. They didn’t mention anything since Laien and Yin didn’t either, but they both were of the mind that one day, they would try and find a chance to repay this favor to Laien and Yin. As much as Laien insisted that there existed no debts amongst friends, wasn’t it the essence of friendship to help each other out in an honest fashion? In this aspect, Raphael and Mikaela agreed wholeheartedly.

“Inferno…” Victoria repeated after Mikaela, her gaze stuck to the insights-filled mass of fluctuating energy above Laien and Yin. She had always obeyed orders to the letter and never voiced disagreement, but when she heard that Reian and his people would be taking on a bulk of the main forces of the Euleanian Yimarate, an indescribable, weird feeling appeared in her stomach and her throat clenched in an unpleasant way. She didn’t know why those feelings appeared nor why she was so irritated those past days, but now, those feelings were extinguished. Alas, she still didn’t even understand why they disappeared and much less why they originally appeared.

“You ready?” Laien called out to Reian after good twenty seconds of preparation. Although he was smiling, he was sweating profusely and his face was somewhat pale; he was obviously overexerting himself. If one looked at Yin, he would discover that his situation wasn’t much better, if not slightly worse. However, since Yin’s body was far stronger than Laien’s, in his case the effects of approaching his limits weren’t showing as apparently.

“Anytime,” Reian replied with a laugh, but in contrast to his lighthearted attitude, the look in his eyes was completely serious. Since Victoria and Jasmine felt suppressed by the mere presence of the Profound Mystery of Inferno a few hundred meters away from here, how could he not be affected at all when he was many times closer? Thankfully, he was a dual-element practitioner and he had infused a Supreme Profound Mystery into his Qi, so even though he was clearly feeling the restrictive might of the Profound Mystery of Inferno had on his fire-element cultivation, his strength wasn’t affected nearly as bad as Victoria’s or Jasmine’s. At most, he lost about five percent of his fighting potential, what could be considered more or less negligible.

“Here we go then,” Laien said wryly and at the same time as Yin, he swung his weapon down, sending the fluctuating mass of energy straight at Reian.

“Here it comes,” Reian mused impatiently as he braced himself to receive the blow. With his speed, he could have dodged effortlessly if he so desired, but what would be the point of that? He would need to be an utter moron to pass the chance to experience this might fire-element mystery with his own body! As reckless as it sounded, he would have likely made the same choice even if Laien and Yin didn’t hold back for his sake and went all-out in this attack, and it was all because the allure this Profound Mystery held to him was simply too great!

As a dual-element practitioner, his greatest strength laid in using fire and wind together. Yet, to do that his two elements needed to be more or less at the same level. It didn’t matter if he was leading with fire or wind in battle, for them to mix well and enhance each other optimally they needed to be close in strength! Naturally, a great gap had been created between the two once he gained insights into the Profound Mystery of Heavenly Tempest, so although his overall power experienced a large upwards leap, the prowess of his fused elements actually fell down by a level.

However, if he could gain some insights into the Mystery those two were displaying for him, then his power would skyrocket! Given a few weeks to stabilize his cultivation in the fourth Realm of Heroes, he would likely be able to give even Julien or Victoria a run for their money if they fought one on one! He hadn’t been chosen by Mustafa to be nurtured as the next Captain Commander of Makarash for noting, after all. The potential of a dual-element practitioner of two extremely compatible elements like fire and wind was extremely great, great enough to more than make up for the slightly lacking speed of cultivation that came with cultivating two elements at once.

“Hot, hot, hot!” Reian cried out within his heart the moment the mass of energy crashed against him and pressed against his barrier of wind. Feeling the skin all over his body, but mainly on the palms of his hands, screech with pain, he delayed no longer and used his own fire to protect himself. When a layer of fire covered him, he sighed in relief. He would have still been able to defend without it, but he would have gotten burned all over. He wanted to concentrate on that fire-element Mystery though, so wriggling in unnecessary pain wasn’t something he was planning to do if it was avoidable.

“It really is powerful, scarily so,” he judged as the mass of energy pressed against his extended hands and leaked past them, pushing against his body’s protections. “How did those two come to master it? They aren’t fire-element practitioners and even if they were, this thing is clearly beyond what martial practitioners can handle. Did they encounter a stroke of incredible luck somewhere?” he wondered half-consciously, all the while attuning his senses of the insights that surrounded him.

He could sense them well now that they were crashing against him, but as the brief moments passed as the energy of the ball depleted by half, he realized that he actually couldn’t understand even a little bit of the insights this energy contained. It was akin to someone who knew nothing about smithing suddenly being shown how a true Grandmaster worked; even if he was an amazing talent, he wouldn’t be able to understand what was so amazing about the Grandmaster’s skills.

In retrospect, it showed how heaven-defying the fiery-haired woman’s ability to bestow a Soul Imprint upon someone was. It not only skipped the requirements in elemental affinity altogether but allowed one to comprehensively understand something that was leagues above his level. The process of training also became incomparably easy thanks to the Soul Imprint, as one no longer needed to seek the natural wonders of the realms and endanger his life to experience them first-hand. The Soul Imprint that Laien and Yin had was above in value even compared to the likes of the Intent they had obtained from the Ancient Tomes of Patrick’s, what further proved how unique of an existence those two siblings from the Anarchic Lands were.

It was worth to be mentioned, though, that Laien and Yin’s potential as blood-contracted partners far exceeded the fiery-haired woman’s predictions. Their training speed and the degree to which they comprehended the Profound Mystery of Inferno was almost ten times over what she had thought they would be. Alas, since Laien and Yin were yet to truly make those insights their own, their abnormal progress was actually very unfortunate for Reian. Had Reian been exposed to the very rudimentary level of the Profound Mystery of Inferno, he would have had a high chance to understand some of it. In the situation as of now, though, his chances were quite low indeed.

Perhaps the chances Reian had could be improved if he was daring enough to remove all of his Qi and stopped defending. He would have gotten gravely injured, but since he was being assaulted by a mostly formless mass of heat, the extreme pain would be all that he needed to suffer through as no his injuries would be easy enough to heal for any skilled water-element or light-element spiritual master. However, the option of doing something so reckless didn’t even enter Reian’s mind and as such, after three seconds or so, he’d already missed his chance as the ball of energy dissipated completely.

“I think it can count as the twelfth one.” Yet, instead of feeling discouraged, Reian raised his somewhat burned hands up as he called out to Laien and Yin. In his mind, he had already benefited immensely this day and since he wasn’t even aware of the opportunity he missed, he wasn’t dejected or dissatisfied in the least. He could even tell that within his soul, apart from the Desire, Awareness, and Pride, which had respectively a full, a half-complete and incomplete foundations, two new clusters of essence appeared while he was focusing on the Profound Mystery of Heavenly Tempest.

“Humility and envy,” he recognized soon enough. It was slightly disappointing that neither of them had any proper foundations, but his emotions had been one whole mess during most of this spar, so he assumed that it was to be expected. He was happy enough with what he got.

“That makes for the third set,” Laien responded contentedly and looked at the faraway Elder Samuel, who at the moment had a complicated look on his face. He was totally spent, but he could already feel his spiritual energy and Qi recovering. Unlike in the past, he was merely slightly dizzy after overexerting himself and no longer needed to bear the sensation of his head cracking apart like during his early days of spiritual training. As such, he was able to enjoy the peculiar mixture of happiness and pain that painted itself on Elder Samuel’s face.

“Let’s see what we can get,” Yin proposed and only now put his twin swords away into his interspatial rings. Just like Laien, he had given his all in that last attack, so it had taken him a dozen seconds or so to recover enough to use his interspatial rings.

“Sure,” Laien agreed straightforwardly and headed towards the whole group of spectators with Yin. The two of them passed by Reian, who was honestly dumbstruck by their behavior.

How could they not even exchange a few words with him after the kind of fight they had? Shouldn’t they at least give him an opportunity to thank them? To think that those two brushed past what he considered to be a life-changing event so easily! He had almost gotten angry with them, but he quickly calmed down. Yes, if he wanted to thank them, he could find a better opportunity than having a chat in front of all those yes. It would be both more practical and more comfortable. He wondered, was this the reason those two simply walked past him without saying a word?

“At best, it’s half the reason,” he said to himself and laughed helplessly, then followed after the two youths. Given Laien’s self-confident character and Yin’s tendency to brush everyone around him off with a smile on his face, he could be quite sure that that the logical reasoning wasn’t all there was to their choice. On the other hand, he needed to admit that once he had gotten to know Laien and Yin well enough, he came to fell that being around types like theirs was more fun than interacting with polite and agreeable people who would do their best to get along with him in all aspects.

“Great fight.” Elder Simon was the first of the adults to regain his composure. He smiled genuinely at the two approaching boys and started clapping his hands. Whether their Ruishi Federation could obtain any direct advantages from spectating this battle didn’t matter to him that much. He had supported Elder Samuel’s plan to ally themselves with Makarash, so the stronger their allies were, the better it was.

“Truly good job,” Jasmine supported and just like everyone else, began clapping her hands. He had some expectations towards Reian’s change of attitude, but what she had gotten went beyond all of them. To be honest, it was to the point that she came to think that she needed to find something good to give those two scoundrels in reward for their performance in the fight with Reian.

“Indeed, a good job,” Elder Samuel agreed and let out a resigned laugh. He was in pain at the mere thought, but seeing Mikaela fidgeting around impatiently by his side was causing him to feel all the more helpless. “I’m almost sure I counted right, but was it twelve times that you injured your opponent?” he asked, deep inside hoping to heart that he was mistaken and the number was lower.

“Yup,” Laien confirmed with a chuckle. “It’s six items we can choose for that, isn’t it?” he asked playfully and chuckled again when Elder Samuel glared at him.

“Make it quick and painless,” Elder Samuel shook his head and said helplessly, though he also revealed a smile after throwing an interspatial ring to Laien. What was one hundred thousand or even two hundred thousand platinum coins if he could develop a good relationship with future powerhouses? Those items were hard to liquefy into actual money too, so his overall level of wealth wouldn’t suffer that much even if he gave up two dozen of them and not just six…

… but he would still probably end up coughing up blood, no matter how outstanding the geniuses were had he needed to give them two dozen of those treasures.

“Let’s see,” Laien said curiously, anticipation painting itself on his face. Elder Samuel told them that he prepared over one hundred items for them, but he hadn’t mentioned that the approximate value of those items was from ten thousand to forty thousand platinum coins each. Thus, when Laien inspected the interspatial ring, he couldn’t help but reveal a surprised look on his face.

“What an incredible mix,” Laien said out loud after a few seconds, then handed the ring to Yin for him to take a look too.

“Pretty nice,” Yin said with a smile, but he was obviously less excited than Laien. Those things were good, but there weren’t enough to catch his eye.

The two of them looked at each other, after what Yin laughed and shook his head, answering the question that wasn’t asked.

“I’m not really interested in anything here, so pick what you want.”

Those who weren’t aware of what the interspatial ring contained still took Yin’s words calmly, but Elder Samuel and Elder Simon, the latter of which had taken a look at the contents prior to coming over to the spar, were flabbergasted. ‘Pretty nice’? ‘Not really interested in anything’?! Where did this kid come from! They could still understand if he wasn’t overly excited, but his reaction was too dismissive! It made Elder Samuel double-check if he hadn’t tossed the wrong ring to Laien! And he hadn't!

“I will help myself then,” Laien said straightforwardly. He wasn’t one to easily agree to take everything for himself, but it was Yin they were talking about. He wouldn’t hesitate to share anything he had with Yin and he was sure Yin would do the same for him, so since Yin really wasn’t interested in anything here, then he saw no reason not to pick all six items on his own.

After about a minute of consideration, he transferred six items directly into his black gold interspatial ring and threw the one with the rest of the items back to Elder Samuel. Of course, since he took the items this way, no one but him and Elder Samuel would know what he had taken, at least for the moment.

“You won’t even show us?” Mikaela stepped forward, unable to restrain himself any longer. This one minute of waiting for Laien to pick felt so long to him, but Laien didn’t take any of the items out at all! This was too unfair! He also wanted to know what Laien had gotten! “C’mon, show us?” he asked right after voicing his complaint, the tone of his voice instantly changing into a cute, pleading one. Seeing Mikaela like this, there truly would be few people who would be able to refuse his request.

Seeing Mikaela act like this, Elder Samuel let out a quiet, helpless laugh, while most those present simply smiled, all of them thinking about similar and yet different things.

“I guess I’ve got no choice,” Laien said with a laugh. He wasn’t an exception to the rule either; cuteness worked wonders on almost everyone and to begin with, he liked Mikaela a lot. Since he was asked, and in such a cute way too, he wouldn’t mind revealing what he had taken as he wasn’t worried that anyone of those present would harbor any intentions of robbing him.