While everyone on the plateau radiated the same power as a Nascent Soul, the battle itself showed how much variation existed among those in the same rank. Those with a lesser understanding of laws were equivalent to a lower stage in the Nascent Soul realm and that difference became much more clear when they faced off against Chu Shuai, who was in the later stages of Nascent Soul. Some of the Purple Mist Sect members seemed to be outmatched and were on the losing side of their individual clashes, but for the most part, the advantages of their poison and powerful beast body’s gave them an edge in the battles.

At the center of the plateau, the golden eyed man was giving Chu Shuai a much more difficult fight. The singular Chu Shuai had split into six, and six times the flaming red chains were writhing and flailing rapidly. Opposite him, the man with golden eyes was flawlessly dodging the hundreds of rapid fire attacks, and reaching up to slap away some of them with the thorns wrapped around his arm. With so many attacks raining down upon him there was no way he could possibly dodge them all, as they could attack from every direction at the same time. Instead, he somehow moved into the place where the lowest density of attacks was, then twisted his body so that the movement of his right arm could intercept the rest of the flaming chains with the black vine that was wrapped around him.

The storm of flaming chains created a vicious storm of attacks that smashed against the rocky ground of the plateau, sending a thick cloud of dust into the air. The fiery chains didn’t strike extremely hard, but they burned extremely hot and the sheer number of attacks smacking into the ground was smashing the stones into tiny gravel. The battle had progressed rapidly to this state, Chu Shuai could tell he was outmatched from the start and he’d created another clone. Yet, that wasn’t enough and he’d made another, then another. Now that it was six against one, Chu Shuai was finally pushing the golden eyed man back. Another copy of his appeared and the storm of attacks finally started to batter the field of green energy that sheathed the golden eyed man’s body.

As if reaching a turning point, the black vine suddenly loosened, partially unraveling from the man’s arm and swinging through the air. The claw shaped purple thorns clashed against the flaming chains, whipping out to intercept them closer to Chu Shuai’s body, knocking them off their trajectory and acting like a dam, diverting the flood of fiery chains. The sudden change caught Chu Shuai slightly off guard and the black vine cracked in the air as it suddenly changed directions, curling around one of the fiery chains and catching one of the seven Chu Shuai’s across the cheek with a hooked thorn. The claw shaped thorn drew blood and also infected the clone with venom. Almost immediately, Chu Shuai noticed the change and the seven of him pulled away, backing off from the furious attacks to assess the poisoning he’d suffered.

Across from Chu Shuai the golden eyed man, Sage, had also stopped to watch the results of his attack. The tiny field of stars in the pupil of one of his eyes was peeking at the future and what he saw was surprising. Before using the venom to attack he’d determined which of the Chu Shuai’s was the ‘real’ one. He’d thought this guy was quite bold to bring his real body to fight against him. Sage assumed that others in the same situation would use their real body to fight the weakest of the Purple Mist Sect, or perhaps the strongest of them to better conceal himself. It was quite a bold move to come against him, who was presumably the most powerful enemy. Then Sage found out that he could keep making clones so it made more sense. Even so, Sage used Foresight to see which clone to poison to cause the greatest damage, especially since what he saw was quite confusing.

Chu Shuai’s face twisted as he saw the result of the venom in his clone. Then the six unpoisoned clones merged together into one body before splitting apart into eight people. At the same time, the poisoned clone let out a scream and then suddenly exploded. A red haze spread from the detonated body and was then swept over into the eight other versions of Chu Shuai that were facing off against Sage. With Foresight, Sage couldn’t tell what was going on from just the visuals, but now that he could experience the event in person, he used his Spirit Sense to feel the energy from the exploded clone getting absorbed by the freshly created clones. Sage’s face was stoic, but inwardly he was annoyed as this information was not quite worth giving away the secret of his venom. Then again, it was enough to strike some fear into Chu Shuai and helped to keep the man from spreading his clones out. If Chu Shuai spread his clones out too far, it would be much simpler for the man to attempt an escape, which was exactly what Sage was worried about.

There was a series of Formation Arrays set up around this plateau intended to trap Chu Shuai if he tried to flee, but Sage had no idea exactly how many of these clones the man could make. If clones ran in every direction at once it would become quite difficult to stop them all at the same time. Sage could release the rest of the Purple Mist Sect, but there was a limit to their number. What if Chu Shuai could split into forty as well? What if he could make double or triple that number of clones? If revealing his venom encouraged Chu Shuai to group his clones tightly together then it was worth it.

While Chu Shuai was regrouping, Sage was also preparing. The black vine around his arm suddenly lit up with bright blue spots. Tiny dots climbing down the length of it adding more color than just the sharply curved purple thorns. The blue dots continued to expand into flower buds just slightly smaller than the thorns. Across from him the eight Chu Shuai’s had moved to stand back to back and the fiery chains coming from behind them had started to wrap and weave together. A chain from each of them connected together making each of the fiery strands a rope made of eight strands. The hundreds of chains had now become dozens, but each of them were eight times tougher. Sage was immediately suspicious because the eight clones had now tightly linked themselves together, which would reduce their agility. Why couldn’t each clone just layer their own chains together?

Then, they started to attack again and Sage realized the difference. The chains weren’t just tougher, they carried the strength of all eight clones at the same time. Linking together made them able to share their strength like a few of the formations that Sage had used for his own subordinates. This combination of power was enough to counteract the move that Sage had just used. The blue buds started to grow as they absorbed heat from the fiery chains that Chu Shuai was swinging at him. Hundreds of Winter Lotuses had spread out along the length of the black vine in his hands, leeching heat to reduce the strength of the chains. Even so, he was being pushed back again, having to keep putting distance between them to reduce the pressure from the storm of flailing chains. The methods the two of them used put Sage once again at a disadvantage.