Ruanfu screeched at the old man and a strange symbol appeared on her forehead. She suddenly became something else, her tiny body replaced by a huge feathery white wyvern. She had the beak of an eagle and feathers instead of scales, but the huge tail and long sinuous neck made it obvious she was no bird. Huge feathers shot from her wings like spears towards the man, bursting through the aura of majesty he emitted and grazing across his cheek and thigh. The snow swirled around him, making his blood seem thicker. The blue tinted crystal talon on his single armored finger lit up with violet light again, stabbing towards Ruanfu’s tail. A second wave of violent energy rippled down her body and culminated in her tail tip instead of her toes.

The huge boom blew back some of those fighting nearby. Ruanfu and the old man were both knocked backward, one digging tracks into the ground beneath his feet and the other flipping through the air. Ruanfu flapped her wings to stabilize and their laws collided against each other before they rushed forward to collide against each other again.

While the two Nascent Souls were locked in combat, the other seven of the group were facing uneven odds. The majority of the twenty four enemies were Core Formation Cultivators. They had thousands of Dragoons behind them, but the majority of them were only in the third rank. Lei and the five other Tiankong Siblings were facing off against two rank fives each, while Sage was facing off against six of them on his own. The other six were mostly rank fours, with a pair of rank fives facing the waves of Dragoons. They advanced with spear and shield, firing hundreds of crossbow bolts and diving down from the air with spears extended.

The other enemies weren’t sitting on their laurels either. When the orange barrier disappeared, the most non-uniform group that came with Hei Bai started to rush towards Sage and the Tiankong Siblings, but Hei Bai yelled at them. Sage couldn’t hear her from where he was, but the others with her turned and started advancing on Lionheart Town. The Fu Clan seemed exceptionally disciplined, moving almost instantly towards the town while Whitestaff’s followers looked to her lead, following her obediently towards the town.

As for Sage himself, he was covered in clouded ice armor with a metallic blue tint. Using the Blue Icesilver and his physical strength to defend against a half dozen Core Formation Cultivators. He seemed to be getting a bit overwhelmed, the six of them smashing against his armor again and again, shattering pieces off it. He’d wanted to make it seem like their numbers were too much for him to handle, but he kept choosing the wrong path. His Foresight showed him the potential futures, and for some reason even when he committed heavily to his choices he still saw a half dozen futures with the same possibility of happening. Again and again he chose wrong and he’d get smashed by another attack.

He was losing energy at a rapid pace to restore his armor and couldn’t hold back any longer. A hulking figure leapt up behind him and caught one of the enemies in its grasp. The ten foot behemoth had the same metallic ice armor that he was wearing, with the gaps of its armor showing viscous black liquid. The Blacksilver Knight caught one of the enemies in a bearhug, pinning him in place just long enough for Sage to turn around and spit out a huge black globule. It landed right between the man’s eyes and there was a loud sizzling sound. That man screamed with pain, his arms still pinned to his sides while the black poison, Third Eye’s End, burrowed through his forehead and melted his brain.

Sage took a hit from each of the five others, but the enemy he was facing was reduced by one.

He wasn’t the only one making sacrifices, the other seven were all pulling similar maneuvers, trading wounds with their foes. They were all in an advantageous position, but Sage was not feeling optimistic. Even if they were on track to win this battle, wasn’t this only a quarter of the enemies they faced?

For their part, the other three groups of enemies were dashing towards Lionheart Town after smashing through the Dragoon formations, likely wanting to destroy his base and devastate his reputation. They had crossed the ten and a half miles in just a few minutes, and began to gather their energy to attack the green barrier outside the City Wall. It was at that moment that Sage triggered the Seven Layer Barrier again. Violet, indigo, blue, green, and orange. Only five of the layers were active. A yellow dome appeared behind Sage’s team. The orange layer was set at ten and a half miles while the yellow was set at ten. The three attacking teams were blocked from the city proper by two barriers, and now another layer appeared around them to stop them from interfering with the current fight.

Jiyao, always the cocky one, couldn’t help himself. He let out a crow and a laugh, “HeHaa! Even if we die trying, you bastards will pay for what you’ve done to our Father!”

Hei Bai and the others were no fools, with the appearance of another barrier layer they realized their mistake and started rushing back. They thought that the Violet Light Sect could hold Lang Sheng in place long enough for them to break the two barriers and take Lionheart Town, but now they did a quick count and realized there was still another barrier missing. They rushed back to the yellow barrier and started attacking it, just in time for the final wall to power up. At the twenty mile mark from Lionheart Town the largest and also weakest red layer of the barrier lit up. The full Seven Layer Barrier consumed a huge amount of energy, but it also trapped the Violet Light Sect in with Sage and his companions.

The only problem was that the others weren’t holding back any longer. Their initial assault on the barrier had been meant to conserve energy for a long siege, but now they were going all out to rescue the Violet Light Sect. A huge group of seventy five cultivators, most in the fifth rank, combined their power and focused it on a single spot of the barrier. While a formation of this scale was meant to protect a whole city from attackers, it was mainly used to protect against large numbers of weaker enemies. The concentrated attack of so many high ranking enemies was beyond its capability. Especially for a formation with so many layers that covered such a huge area.

Sage killed another of the two he was up against and the Tiankong Siblings had all severely wounded their opponents, with the exception of Ruanfu who was fighting the old man equally. Their point of breakthrough was Sage himself. The more of them he killed the greater their advantage would be. The others were only supposed to occupy their enemies while he killed them as fast as he could. They were just too angry to hold themselves back. These guys were wearing their Father’s talon as a weapon and their leader was stomping on their dad’s severed head. They fought like caged tigers and the blood flowed freely.

Behind them, the yellow barrier layer was shaking ferociously, already on the verge of destruction.

“We’re running out of time!”