As serious as the battle was, it had suddenly turned into an opportunity to show off. Or at least that’s what Ruanfu and King wanted it to be. Sage wanted to yell at them, but it actually wasn’t the worst idea. They might fight harder with an audience and that audience wasn’t useless. Sage brought out the characters that were named and a teenage boy as well as five women appeared. The boy was the most eye-catching, having blond hair and blue eyes. More amazingly, his facial features and skin tone were very european. Compared to the majority of people in this world so far seeming quite asian, it was very eye catching.

“Brother Lei, watch me!”

Ruanfu called out to the blond boy and then flipped through the air. She threw her upper body forwards, ducking underneath the blade of a glaive and then carrying her momentum around and spinning like a top. Her leg flashed out and smashed into the man with the Glaive, seeming to separate his upper body into two distinct portions. That same foot touched onto the ground and then launched her into the air. Her body stayed horizontal and spun like a corkscrew, her other leg came down from above and fell onto another one of the Slavers like a splitting axe, cleaving the man from shoulder to stern. She was hopping on one leg, pulling her foot out of the remainder of a person, but also looking back at the blond boy to gauge his reaction.

The blond teenager was Wanqian Lei, and the human form of the Golden Thundereagle. A golden feathered hawk covered in lightning, he was a mutation. Normally, a Thundereagle would reach maturity at rank 3, and they were silver in color. On the other hand, there was the Thunderhawk that could rise to rank 5 at maturity, and they had golden feathers. Wanqian Lei was a Thundereagle, yet he had golden feathers like the Thunderhawk. Ruanfu didn’t know any of this when she first made Sage capture him, but when she found out about it later it made her even more excited. She had said, “My eyes are good. I even picked out a truly exceptional First Husband instantly.”

Over on the other side, King wasn’t quite as flashy and violent as Ruanfu, but he was focusing on looking elegant while killing the Slavers. Between each kill, he’d stop and pose while staring down his next target. The Slavers were actually quite scared as not a single one of them had been able to evade his attacks or survive more than a few moments against King. His precise wind blades made him seem like a butcher, carefully dissecting them bit by bit.

From time to time, he would glance over at the five women. He reached up and slicked back his hair, putting on his best cool guy act and striking a pose for the ladies. They were some of the many birds that Sage had worked with them to catch a while back and the five that King was currently trying to woo into becoming more of his wives. They didn’t really seem all that impressed with his antics, instead getting annoyed and rushing into battle themselves. They used their hands like beaks and hammered them down like picks against the Slavers throats and eyes, showing King that beating these foes was easy!

Sage shook his head at this nonsense and instead ran towards the corner where the greatest concentration of cages still was. It was also the biggest group of Slavers still on the floor. He swung out his left hand and with Spirit Strings caught hold of a few hands and arms, dashing forward to tighten the cable around them while also swinging his right hand forward and stabbing out the speartip to punch through a throat. He rapidly took out half of the lower level Slavers before the three rank 4s finally pushed them aside and formed a rough triangular formation around him.

At that moment, the women also ran into trouble. One of the patrol teams led by a rank 4 Slaver moved into quickly to surround the five women. King and Ruanfu were too busy showing off to notice the approaching danger and the women found themselves backed up against a wall. Another one of the rank 4 patrol leaders joined into the mess and blocked King from intercepting. The last of the rank 4s also took this opportunity to rush towards Ruanfu. Her own cultivation was actually equal to the man, both of them being level 41, the initial stage of rank 4. Wanqian Lei even rushed to back her up to help her fight off the lackeys the rank 4 had with him. The Golden Thundereagle was only level 35, but it was enough to equal the other Slavers.

The woman with bright green eyes, the Green Eyed Kingfisher, was pulled away from the other women and singled out by the rank 4 Slaver. With Ruanfu and King both occupied by the other two, they had no way to go to her rescue. Or at least that’s how it seemed. King released an ear piercing screech and charged towards the man across from him. The man was somewhat feminine, very thin and with swaying hips, and wielded a pair of butterfly swords. The short, but thick pair of swords, flashed out again and again, swiping at King. King was not deterred. To avoid the storm of cuts he would have to retreat, and he couldn’t do that.

King dashed past the man with the butterfly swords. He stumbled, but his speed was great and he arrived behind the man cornering the Green Eyed Kingfisher. Her bright green eyes widened as she watched King pounce onto the back of the Slaver and sink his fingers into the sides of the man’s neck. It was like his fingernails were talons, they plunged into the rank 4 Slaver’s throat and the man gurgled with pain. At almost the same time, the man with the butterfly swords as well as King himself both sprouted dozens of red marks. Blood erupted from their bodies, spilling from many cuts and slices.

The man with the butterfly swords fell to the ground, more than one of the wounds on his body were fatal. King on the other hand had accepted the strikes of the butterfly swords on more superficial areas of the body. The skin on his forearms, shoulders, shins, and chest getting torn into ribbons. He chose to take the hits in order to kill the man as quickly as possible in order to rescue the green eyed woman. Worse yet, as he thrust his fingers into the throat of another rank 4 Slaver, that man’s friends turned away from the other women and struck King’s back. The green eyed woman already had tears in her eyes, but the other four women screamed with anger. Each of them lashing out at the now distracted Slavers.

King tore off the head of the rank 4 Slaver and then helped the other four women, finishing off the two high level enemies and all their henchmen. The Green Eyed Kingfisher ran to King and started trying to nurse his wounds. King was bleeding everywhere, having taken cuts and stabs seemingly everywhere but the vital ones. His face and organs safe, but his flesh looking quite well minced.

Things were equally dire on Ruanfu’s end, fighting with an enemy with the same level of strength as herself. Even so, that wouldn’t be too dangerous for her, given her status as a Demonic Beast. The problem was that the guy had six subordinates while Ruanfu only had Wanqian Lei as backup. The blond haired boy had erupted with a terrifying amount of golden lightning and attracted the attention of four of the slavers, but that still meant Ruanfu had to face the rank 4 leader as well as two others. They didn’t dare to face her directly, but the two wielded spears and stabbed towards her back while she fought.

She was thrown into a purely defensive battle, having to give her all to block the rank 4’s attacks and then immediately dodge away to avoid the spears coming for her back. They had her on the ropes, but unfortunately for them it wouldn’t last long. Getting annoyed, she released a screeching roar of her own and leaped high into the air. She flipped over the rank 4’s head and blocked a palm strike he threw at her. She rolled in mid-air, kicking her feet against the empty air, but somehow swooping straight down from the motion. Her motion became oddly… aquatic. Swimming through the air, she of course also had Cosmic Traction, and used it to approach the Slaver. She swung her leg through the air with astonishing flexibility, her leg looking like it had grown more joints or even turned to rubber as it bent around the Slaver’s outstretched arm and smashed into his chest. He had tried to block, but her attack bent around his defense and struck him anyway. He heard a crack and felt a sharp pain in his chest. His breathing became labored and he coughed up blood.

King saw that Ruanfu was about to triumph in her battle and smiled through his pain. He thought they were about to succeed, at least until he heard the commotion coming from the stairway and saw dozens of men start to file out.