She had calculated the exact trajectory necessary to intercept him, and so fast was her speed that he doubted his ability to avoid any martial skills that she might send his way in the coming seconds. Not wanting to invest too much energy into defending against such an attack, he steadied his body in midair and then summoned a small hand with which to launch himself in her direction. He intended to meet her head on before she could activate any of her more powerful skills.

They collided a split-second later, both of their right hands enveloped in large sheaths of scarlet energy that carried with them a tremendous amount of heavily condensed inner essence. The strength of their attacks was incredible, both of their clothes shredded into pieces the instant their fists connected as a terrible storm of volatile energies exploded outwards in all directions. It took all of Jason’s might to hold his ground, his body threatening to get swept up in the storm and tossed into the night like a leaf in the face of a furious gust of wind. The woman showed similar indignation, fixing him with a penetrating stare that he met with an unwavering gaze of his own. Red irises the colour of polished ruby gave her an intimidating look, her confident, almost seductive expression daring him to look at her naked body and succumb to a crucial moment of distraction.

While Jason rarely thought such things in the heat of battle, he couldn’t help but acknowledge that the woman in front of him was incredibly sexy, her long, chestnut hair whipping around in the wind as the energies that covered their hands struggled to break the other’s martial skill and thus sway the momentum of the exchange in their direction.

Jason’s hasty relocation, the woman’s unhesitant decision to follow after him, their cataclysmic collision—all of it had taken place in the span of a single breath. Just three seconds after their fists connected and their clothes were destroyed, the initial Crippling Blood Palm that Jason had aimed at the woman suddenly smashed into the ground with enough force to cause a brief but disorienting earthquake. Although they were already a kilometre away from the point of impact, both he and his opponent were swept up in the explosion of chaotic energy that terrorized the countryside as nearly a square kilometre of farmland was flattened into mulched earth in an instant. A spread of giant dust clouds rose up a moment after the attack landed, only to be thinly dispersed by dozens of short-lived tornadoes that appeared in the area under the agitation of the energies that were lingering in the air.

Jason relied on his spiritual sense to perceive his surroundings as he was thrown through the air by the force of the blast, keeping his eyes shut to avoid disorienting himself amidst the endless summersaults he was involuntarily doing. He managed to steady himself about two kilometres away from where he and his opponent had just exchanged attacks, but he didn’t even have enough time to put on a change of clothes before the long-haired, crimson-eyed elder of the Bloodhand Sect appeared above him with an energized fist. His eyes were instinctually drawn to her private areas, which created a crucial second of delay that saw her fist slam into his stomach with breath-stealing force. He was immediately sent rocketing downward in the shape of a sideways ‘V,’ his point of view similar to that of a camera that somebody had dropped from very high up in the air. The impact left him stunned and unable to move for several moments.

Fuck sakes, he thought, pain his only perception. That isn’t fair.

His mind felt as if someone had doused it in cold water as he tried to regain control over his body. Coughing in an effort to pull in just a bit of desperately-needed air, Jason instinctively began to draw out the diagram for a defensive arrayment as he sensed that the woman had immediately summoned a massive Crippling Blood Palm of her own, the hand appearing ominous in the blackness of night as it hovered above him amidst a nearby backdrop of flashing red lights, agonized screams and deadly explosions. Muddled as his reflexes were, he wasn’t sure if he would be able to create and activate it in time.

When did we get so close to the others?

He’d used up too much of his inner essence reserves, his dantian only containing about twenty percent of its usual contents. In order to make sure that he had enough energy to flee in the event that it became necessary, he had no choice but to rely on arrayments from here on out.

“It’s not personal,” came a sound transmission from the woman in question. “Personally, I think it’s a waste to kill such a talented young man.”

He vomited up a mouthful of blood, allowing it to spatter onto the grass at his feet as he continued to draw out his diagram undeterred. His stomach felt both cold and hot and was characterized by a worrisome ache that warned him of the presence of internal injuries. Back hurting and his whole body sore, he cursed at the fact that somebody at the sixth level of Genesis was actually as strong or stronger than someone at the seventh level, noting that all of the knuckles of his right hand were fractured in several places.

“I’ll try to leave you with a whole corpse. Though, don’t blame me if I help myself to your energies after.”

Up above, the colossal hand abruptly tilted downward, all of its fingers tucking inward except for the index. This finger assumed a pointing position, as if it were about to squash a tiny ant beneath its tip.

“Why do people always…” he muttered, hampered by a guttural cough. “Why do they always say pointless things in the middle of a fight?”

Spitting more blood from his mouth, Jason met the woman’s distant red stare with one of determination and fearlessness. Adding the finishing touches to his diagram, he activated it just as the hand began to descend. Ignoring the flash of light that erupted around him, he hurriedly summoned a few medicinal pellets from his spatial bag and swallowed them down in order to stabilize his condition.

A dome-like barrier suddenly appeared overhead, covering a radius of almost a hundred metres with Jason at the epicentre. Grey in colour and mostly transparent, the layer of protective energy was only about a centimetre thick. Still, the powers that composed it were extremely tough, having been woven together on a near-microscopic level like the links of metal on a set of chainmail.

Jason watched on with unblinking focus as the gigantic fingertip collided with the top of the dome, which was only of a slightly wider circumference than the finger itself. Grass and wildflowers were ripped from their roots as dangerous winds blew out from the point of contact between the techniques. A nearby copse of trees was nearly toppled over in its entirety, with only a few of the older, thicker-trunked ones managing to remain upright albeit after losing all of their foliage along with countless branches.

At the heart of the barrier, Jason had to raise himself a couple of metres into the air due to how violently the land was shaking. Tracking his opponent with his spiritual sense, he watched on as the barrier began to crack in several places. Seeing this, he threw his arms upward and poured a vast amount of spiritual energy into the transparent dome, which abruptly shone with a bright golden light before all of the cracks disappeared, seemingly mended.

“It seems I’ve underestimated you. Come, show me what else you can do!”

The woman appeared at the base of the barrier dressed in a fresh set of red-on-black robes, an ornately brocaded style that some of their great elders seemed fond of. She stood about fifty metres or so away from where Jason was currently hovering.

Why bother putting on more clothes? They’re just going to get ruined again.

Floating upward so that she was level with him, her thin eyebrows rose up as she watched excessive amounts of spiritual energy pour out of his body in order to directly repair the barrier.

“You might be stronger than me,” he called over the whistling winds that continued to whiplash all around the gigantic finger’s tip. “But I’m not about to lose!”

The woman responded with loud laughter, a rich, amused voice that was purposefully enhanced by inner essence. Eyes widening in excitement, both of her hands were engulfed by ominous scarlet energy that was so potent in strength that it began to agitate the Origin Energy in the surroundings. This, of course, was by a negligible amount in comparison to the massive martial skill manifestation that was currently bearing down upon them, but a direct hit from one of those hands would doubtlessly prove fatal.

From here on out, Jason was walking on glass.