Ivor organized his group without many complications. Edwina was happy to go with him, since he seemed reliable, and Klutz didn’t have anybody he knew too well, so he was happy to join. Silkpants was a little harder to convince. “So why should I join your group? It’s not like it’s very strong or anything, and I know quite a few people.”

Ivor wasn’t exactly sure about that himself. “Um… please give me some face here fellow Daoist… no that’s played out… huh. Why should you join us? Maybe… aha! Cut off your arm and kowtow until your head bleeds and I’ll leave you with an intact corpse - wait no that’s the wrong one and I don't know how to sew an arm back on. Wait, how about this: you know how much willpower I have and that I beat Elder Worst at the glorified blood-sport version of tag, so I’m probably good enough for you to work with. Pretty please?”

Silkpants did acknowledge Ivor’s strangely powerful will, and Ivor DID say please, even though he said a few rude things first, so… “I guess I can’t argue with that logic. Onward, then!”

Our band of heroes progressed through the city merrily… until they reached the barrier. Beyond it was a scene of bloodshed. There was a trench filled with cultivators using some sort of strange projectile weapon that astounded Ivor. “Wait is that gun shooting spirit stones or am I blind? You know what I think that some madman made a gun that shoots spirit stones.”

Groups of weaker cultivators, all service or outer disciples, jumped over the trench, which was only there to give cover, not to block passage. After jumping the trenches, the disciples charged forth to meet the weaker stragglers so they didn’t overwhelm the disciples in the trenches who were shooting down the large ones. An inner sect disciple barked at them. “Alright, over the trenches you go! When we’re not in such dire straits, we’ll send you to go reinforce the other sect.”

Ivor and co. dashed out of the barrier and over the trench into a veritable horde of beasts. Ivor sliced through a few oversized foxes and jackals while twirling through his enemies, Edwina hit a wolf over the head until it died, and Klutz… well Klutz walked into the battle before tripping. The beasts jumped on the weakened target, but ended up falling right into the business end of Klutz’s sword. Silkpants stood in the path of one of the stronger monsters and kicked it so hard its face fell off, and Advon put a wolf in a headlock until it ran out of air. “Hey Advon can’t you do a water cutter thingy? Try and be cool!”

Advon was annoyed at Ivor’s request. “That would waste qi, and it’s short range anyway! I’m saving that for a more dangerous situation, just like you’re saving your power!”

As if on queue, a more dangerous situation started rapidly approaching. An azure tiger at the qi infusion level, the level of inner sect disciples, was charging towards the trench. It wasn’t dead already because the back line was under quite a bit of pressure, and because its path would cross some convenient outer sect disciples who could stall it or maybe even kill it. Ivor reacted first, as he had just cleaned up the beasts he was holding back. He managed to retain his composure due to the knowledge that he had the power of God and magical gas on his side and warned the group. “Yo Silkpants! We’ve got a big one! Can you hold it in place a second? I’ll be able to hit it pretty hard, even if it is… three times as strong as me.”

Silkpants grunted in affirmation, jumping to the tiger and showing why he was considered the strongest service disciple. He followed the Dao of the Martial, of fists, kicks and throws, and he was prepared to hold this tiger all day, mentally at least. His leg flew into the head of the tiger, not leaving a mark but inflicting a far worse penalty. A second later, the side of the tiger’s face started falling apart into small chunks. One of Silkpants’ innate abilities was his ability to run qi through his gallbladder to make it more wild, which made it so that instead of enhancing Silkpants’ body in a fight it would slip into enemies on contact and ravage their insides, causing half the tiger’s face to fall apart. It would heal, but it was a big enough distraction that the tiger didn’t notice Ivor’s concealed dagger until its eye was already pierced.

A roar of agony burst from the beast’s mouth. The dagger was still lodged in its eye, kept from the tiger’s brain by a thick membrane. It turned towards Ivor, but it didn’t see him… instead it saw Klutz with his sword at the ready. “Don’t worry about me. I’ve been meditating on the Dao recently and came up with the first stance of an original sword technique - the metal stance of my Elemental Harmony Kata. I’ve been needing to test it out against a strong enemy with killing intent to see if it works properly, although the technique won’t truly work until I make all five stances.”

Despite his proportions and clumsiness, Klutz had discipline when it counted, along with years of experience and decent aptitude with the Dao. The tiger charged at him, and his response was somewhat simple. He stuck his left foot forward and lifted his sword over his right shoulder, holding the handle above and in front of his shoulder with the blade pointing forwards and diagonally downward. The profound part of the stance came next, with Klutz pulling his left foot back closer to his right, placing more weight on his back foot and messing up his balance even while removing his left leg as an obvious weak-point - something considered a terrible tradeoff by sane people.

The tiger’s claw smashed into Klutz’s sword, which should have knocked him over backwards… but it didn’t. The metal stance persevered in its defense. Klutz slid backward but maintained his footwork before knocking his foe’s claw away before transitioning into a diagonal slice. It left a gash in the tiger’s front leg, but the tiger wasn’t done yet. However, it paused for just enough time to let Klutz run like hell, and that was all the time he needed. The next creature in the tiger’s sight was Advon. Going after him and ignoring the more-threatening opponents would be a terrible move, but the tiger wasn’t thinking properly. It wasn’t too much smarter than a normal tiger to begin with, and Ivor had given it a taste of his neurotoxin, although nobody noticed him under the guise of his ability.

Ivor released his ability next to Silkpants; he may have had a third of his capacity left, but his job was done. “Hey, Advon, your job is simple. All you have to do is use your protective talisman. Just sit there and take a hit, we can kite it until it dies from my neurotoxin. Wait… you do have a protective talisman, right?”

“No, you dumb fuck! No I don’t! What the fuck?!?! What’s your contingency? Do I pray I live, resign myself to death, or maybe there’s some brilliant option I’m not seeing. Asshole. Good thing I do have a plan. You’re going to buy me three protective talismans after this, you utter imbecile!”

Ivor was speechless; he couldn’t defend himself without losing even more face than he already had, and an apology wouldn’t help in this kind of situation. His best option was shutting up and buying the talismans. He wasn’t worried about Advon though; they said they had a plan, and Ivor trusted his… not his friend, but his nominal close acquaintance.

Advon had realized when the tiger began charging at him that this situation definitely qualified as “a more dangerous situation,” so he decided to weaponize pressurized water; not as a water cutter, but it was still attacking with water coming through a qi nozzle, so close enough. As the tiger nearly reached Advon, he pointed his finger at its injured eye and sent a blast of pressurized water towards it. The water hit the handle of Ivor’s dagger, which was attuned with water. It was pushed forward as it drew in the water qi to sharpen itself, exiting through the back of the tigers skull before Ivor hopped into the air and caught it. Silkpants grabbed the legs of the tiger’s corpse to stop it in its tracks.

Then Ivor got a sense of deja-vu; there was still a qi infusion monster coming towards them, but this time it wasn’t just the one. It was a veritable mob this time, with creatures higher than qi infusion too, spelling certain death for Ivor’s group unless help came. Thankfully for them, a cloud of green spores enveloped the horde; when it dissipated, all that was left of it were bones.

Ivor saw the familiar face of Elder Moldvanna, the source of the spores. He got a smile and an explanation before Moldvanna charged back towards the mob. “Sorry, a few of the elders had to group up to fight a strong one. We don’t have enough people to form a proper line, so too many for the gunners to handle slipped through. That’s what the comms said at least. I just arrived and spotted you in trouble while going to the front line. I guess we have a bit of Karma with each other.”