Heaven's Laws - Lifestone - Chapter 42

Huifen studied the demoness’s qi as they faced off. She’d called it death qi and there was certainly something corrupt and fading about it. Much like decay. As furious as she might be, Heart of Ice stayed her hand. She was far too familiar now with poisons not to treat this woman like a true threat. Who so easily traded their own lifespan for power.

The masked woman slashed out with one claw after the other. The black and red energy had difficulty mixing like oil in water. Great streaks of death qi surged, expanding as they flew. They looked like they’d cover the entire room.

A wall of Ice Shroud pillars shot up from the floor. Huifen couldn’t chance ending this fight too quickly. She had to at least grasp something about how this woman’s qi worked. Chao would have an easier time fending against it than she would because of his impenetrable space barriers.

As the two martial techniques collided, she felt the impact. It was truly a frightening level of force to come from a Sky Realm cultivator. Her Shroud had only taken one attack, but something was happening. Her will permeated her ice as with every technique. Unlike the resistance she was used to facing in the borrow game where one person’s laws competed with another, she was losing control like it wasn’t ice at all. It was eroding away her ability to control it or changing the ice itself.

She didn’t enhance her Shroud but began to manipulate her technique. The fog of imperfections in the ice started to clear as it went through a substantial change. Soon, she could see through like a window. The wall had become transparent. Much of the death qi remained where it had collided with her ice. It was like a living substance. It was corroding her ice, seeping into every crack.

She remembered Senior Billi’s blood qi. Huifen had only seen it in action a few times, but it also seemed to be like a liquid creature brought to life. Where Billi’s qi was filled with vitality, this death qi was just the opposite. It was near empty, desperate to drain whatever it touched of qi and substance.

How could it exist if it was so close to collapse? To devouring itself? Is that why it needed her blood essence? And how could she possibly know this technique—to practice it—if every time it drained her of her lifespan?

She thought back to the young fairies the woman had mutilated. Did she feed on their essence like some vampire or succubus? And why only females? None of the reports said anything about corrosive qi being used in their attacks.

She remembered her dead friend.

The death cultivator chose that moment to strike out. As she did, the mass of qi attached itself to her Shroud only grew. The erosive nature of the substance strengthened as well.

Huifen took a breath’s length to finalize her observations. It should be enough for her to consider how to combat such qi later. She needed to hurry. Chao was alone.

With a blast of her will, the wall of ice began to glow with glacial light. She had to make full use of her defensive aura as the icy temperature plummeted. Much like the heat that fire produced, Tribulation ice radiated into the surrounding area.

The bestial death cultivator noticed the danger immediately. She howled as she began slashing out in a mad frenzy.

Even under the presence of Tribulation ice, the corrosive nature of this death qi didn’t faulter. Instead, it seemed to grow even more powerful.

There wasn’t much time. This crazed woman would break through her Shroud in a few short moments. Huifen considered changing the ice into water and driving it in the woman’s direction, but she didn’t know how the death qi would react. There was no moving force to her Ice Shroud, so it should work. It was a gamble. If it failed, she could fall back on martial techniques. There was another option, but it was also a gamble. If her theory was right, she could face off with this death qi for the first time and find a counter for it in the same fight. Better now than when facing off against a genuine overlord that cultivated the same qi.

Chao, wait for me.

***

He barely acknowledged the impact his sharpened knuckles left on the man’s chest. It’s like Chao’s mind had segmented. One part of him was asking the questions, trying to get every single detail out of the man. Another was systematically adjusting his semi-affective sharpness laws as he figured out what worked best. But at the heart it, he couldn’t get the maiming of Daiyu and Eu-meh out of his mind.

It wasn’t just them. He was in a waking nightmare, seeing Huifen take on the same injuries. Once again, he hadn't been there when she needed him.

He’d done his best to keep his promise to himself. To never let himself imagine what Prince Jin had done to her. It wasn’t because he feared he’d think less of her. That was impossible. No, he knew doing so it would only fuel his anger, which could become a blinding and all-consuming force. He’d failed.

He hit the man again. Had he even asked a question this time? The image of this Jolon slashing his wife’s face with the sword he’d dropped with his severed hand had caused a surge of fury to move his fist without his permission.

That was just an excuse. He was allowing fury to take over. No, he was commanding it to. His parents had taught him too well to be deceived by his own heart. He wanted this.

When he’d faced Prince Jin, he did what needed to be done, but that wasn’t justice. The man had sexually assaulted his Huifen and abused the power and authority he had—the ultimate authority on the Monolith continent. His death was the only answer, but it had ended too quickly. The pain the prince had experienced compared to the months of anguish his wife had then suffered couldn’t be compared. Killing the man so quickly had been an injustice. It wasn’t fair. How could he get away with so little suffering when his victims were still suffering until now?

His Huifen wasn’t alone in her suffering. The entire joint sect had been under Emperor Sun’s shadow of vengeance for a year before finally being put to an end. Families had their homes and possessions forcibly taken and were thrown out on the street. Outer Sect disciples died. Many cultivators in Emperor Sun’s only army died as well. Not to mention the ten overlords Monolith had lost that day.

Where was justice if death was the end? Was Prince Jin to be reincarnated as a lesser beast as punishment, while not having the intellect to remember his sins or comprehend his punishment? Or was it as the mortal religion taught? That a day of judgement was coming. He didn’t know. All that he knew was that the man before him had unleashed an unknowable amount of suffering on the world and he had the power to return some semblance of it to him before he was gone.

But how could this man’s temporal pain bring back the dead and enliven the spirits of those who remained behind? That’s why he let anger guide him. Something had to be done. It still wasn’t enough. He already knew that he didn’t have the wisdom or strength to do this right, but he was doing his best. To do nothing was the greater evil. To just let such men die. Where was the justice in that?

***

Huifen had backed up as far as she could in the room and even found a doorway to exit through if needed. What she needed was a good medium to test her theory to combat this death qi. Her ice and Ice Phoenix martial techniques wouldn’t work for what she planned. Overwhelming the woman with force was possible, but she would leave that until she’d tried all other options. This space was too small for her most powerful techniques as it was.

She continued to supply qi to her Ice Shroud as it was being corroded while summoning a lotus to float in the air behind it. This wasn’t her Ice Lotus technique, for she used nature’s create law that bring it to life. She’d grown up surrounded by such blossoms. It was the flower most in tune with yin qi, and the one from which the Divine Ice Phoenix herself had fashioned their sect second technique. To Huifen, it reminded her of the dreams of her youth, and the love of her mother and family home. It was the catalyst for changing her from an ice fairy with some talent with water, to one that could manipulate the nature laws themselves.

Her lotus started no larger than the size of a fist. It needed both size and strength to be able to defend against the onslaught of what was coming, so she fed it as much hybrid ice qi as it would take. But ice alone wasn’t enough, so she used her conversion technique to fill it with nature’s vitality. If ice wasn’t enough to fend off death, then she’d test its will and defy it with life itself.

Her lotus’s petals were tightly closed as it grew rapidly. She’d never tried to just make one as large as possible, but with nature feeding it, there seemed to be no end to the size it might take.

The death qi came all at once. With each slash the masked woman made, the amount of corrosive qi multiplied. Breaking through the wall of ice at one point, it poured through as if having a mind of its own.

Like a plant too big for its container, her lotus filled the room, blocking the caustic energy’s path. She felt it immediately. The foremost petal was being drained of health. Her ice qi was bolstering its structure, but nature qi was fighting back. She cut her supply of ice qi entirely and focused on creating as much nature qi as possible. Her theory had been right. She could feel it starting to work.

Her lotus flower turned to face the death cultivator and slowly opened up at her command. As it did, the death qi rushed to get between its petals and as deep into the plant as it could to cause as much damage as possible. But instead of dying, the lotus welcomed the assault. As soon as all of the energy had reached its core, it started to close, leaving it no way out.

The masked woman shrieked but didn’t throw another attack.

The death qi didn’t go quietly, but without more blood to feed on it ate itself up. It was a few long minutes before Huifen’s lotus dissipated and she found the murderous woman crouched against the wall like a corned animal.

With the same animal-like reflexes from before, the woman moved to slash out, but Huifen’s finger flick forward. From it flew a small lotus petal rich in nature qi. It intercepted the woman’s attack, piercing straight through the phantom qi covering her hand. The technique faltered entirely, and a bloody wound was found where Huifen’s petal had shot through her wrist.

She watched as ice began to fill in the wound. “You’re an ice cultivator?” She didn’t expect the woman to respond, nor did she want her to.

In one last desperate attempt, the woman struck out with her remain phantom claw. Another lotus petal pierced through her remaining good wrist, stopping the attack before it had begun.

“You have a lot to answer for.” What remained of Fairy Daiyu flashed through her mind. Heart of Ice was keeping her under control, but she’d seen the woman crouched on top of her friend, cutting streaks in her already unrecognizable flesh.

Heart of Ice started to falter, and she let it. Her aura became wild. The woman was already shivering after facing off with her tribulation ice. She started to shake even more, then called upon her own ice defensive aura to combat it the best she could.

Huifen stood there watching the murderous woman far longer than she should have. She should return to her husband to make sure he was okay. It took every ounce of strength she could muster to stop herself from striking out.

Heart of Ice began to circulate, bringing her tumultuous heart back under control. Taking a step closer, she reacted as the woman lunged at her. With the flick of a finger, a pill she’d become far too familiar with shot down her enemy’s throat.

The woman’s eyes widened, but some part of her finally yielded.

Huifen snatched the mask from her face to reveal an aged woman. She examined the her to confirm the ice poison was working. The meridians around her core were almost all entirely shrouded in ice after a few seconds.

Turning back to the entrance they’d entered through, she hurried to leave. The woman lunged at her, but a wave of qi picked her up and dragged her along.

It had taken her far too long to deal with the woman, but what she’d learned had been worth it. She just hoped her husband was alright.

Coming across the corpse of her friend, Huifen was tempted to place her in her spatial ring to save her some dignity—and so she didn’t have to look. She decided to leave her where she was. This was an active crime scene.

The fluctuations of qi had come to an end. No one had joined the masked woman in he assault, so most likely Chao was just fine.

As she stepped through the door, she saw him. She was too wary at the moment to drop Heart of Ice in fear she’d do something foolish. She found Zhu kneeling over a now waking Diu. They were both alive. Then she saw Eu-meh’s injury.

She was tempted to rush across the room and begin her treatment when she realized something was wrong. They hadn’t noticed her enter the room. They were diverting their gaze on purpose.

She found Chao again and it was like she was seeing him for the first time. His face was barren as if the woman’s death qi had leeched him of his spirit, except in the next moment his countenance became feral, and he launched his fist at the wall.

Looking past him, she saw his spear jutting out of the wall. Then she realized something was there. She sensed a person with her perceptions. “Chao,” she called out.

When he turned, she saw the man pinned there beneath his sword and spear. The man’s head drooped lazily to his chest, only to clumsily lift again as he struggled to understand where he was. There were so many cuts on his torso that it was hard to tell what was red from blood or the opened wounds. But that wasn’t the worst of it. She couldn’t tell where the man’s pants and legs began because they were both so covered in char. Smoke rose from what was left of them.

She quickly examined the man with her perceptions and found his dantian intact, but his meridian pathways were burnt past saving. He was dead and didn’t know it yet.

“Did you capture Nang?” Chao asked without any inflection in his voice. “The woman.”

Huifen stepped deeper into the room and dragged the death cultivator in behind her.

The woman squirmed where to floated. Then her eyes found the man pinned to the wall and she grew perfectly still. In the next instant, she clawed at her own forearms just as she’d done when burning her blood essence, but this time with her own nails.

When the woman gave off a surge of power even with her dantian frozen, Huifen was caught off guard.

The murderous woman darted for Chao. He didn’t care to move.

With a swipe of her qi, Huifen tossed her into the air with her qi, appeared above her, and slammed a palm into the flat of her back. The woman slammed chest first into the Divine Stone floor. She’d stopped moving, for now.

Going to her husband, Huifen knew she should be angry at him for breaking his word. They were supposed to discuss these things, but deep down a part of her cheered. She also felt a seedling of fear. She was the unmerciful one that needed pulling back from madness’s edge. If her husband suffered from the same deficiency, what would stop them from become worse than the monster they’d just apprehended?

He looked at her blankly as he started to explain what he’d learned. “She’s the one that mutilates them.” He nodded in the unconscious woman’s direction. “It’s not necessary for her technique. She burns her blood essence and must replenish it with the essence of her enemies within a short period of time or it could kill her. But she doesn’t stop at taking the blood like a blood cultivator would. She hates them. Her husband doesn’t often disfigure them, but he enjoys it more than she does.”

Huifen didn’t reply to him. She didn’t know what to say. Instead, she grabbed one of his blood-covered hands and created water to wash it off.

Turning to Fairy Zhu, she commanded her, “Contact Pangfua immediately. Core Disciple Shoi-ming as well. Have them come here directly. Tell them the murderers have been apprehended and Fairy Daiyu is dead.”

It seemed they hadn’t been sure of Daiyu’s fate, for all three ice fairies were stricken. Zhu was quick to do as asked, however. Still, she hadn’t even glanced at the tortured man or Chao.

Huifen returned to wash Chao’s other hand then led him over to their three disciples and began healing Eu-meh’s face the best she could. She hadn’t lost an eye, but it was close. And Huifen had no idea how well it would heal. With enough advancements to major realms, most of the damage would be repaired, but she might live the rest of her days with a scar that would never completely fade.

In recent days she’d grown fond of the woman not just because she was her husband’s disciple. Eu-meh was more than just beautiful, but it was still an undeniable tragedy.

***

Shoi-ming trusted his juniors to the Ice Phoenix Elder in the Water Cultivation Chamber before rushing through the third and second floors. Every cultivator he saw on his way he commanded to stay put. As he neared, there were a few male and female cultivators near the location which he commanded to head to the third floor. He saw droplets of blood leading to the room that had been mentioned. He followed them while being careful with his footfalls so as not to step on any. He should’ve brought a few disciples to guard this location. After a second though, he summoned his transmission jade and ordered some to come.

He wasn’t officially an elder, but he was expected to take the same level of responsibility by those that knew him. And after losing four overlords including Sage Fage, his sect needed him more than ever.

Stepping into the room in question, he found Sage Pangfua already there with three fairies, one wounded, and Sages Chao and Huifen filling her in with the details.

Pangfua quickly turned, met his gaze, and ordered, “We need to secure the area.”

“I’ve summoned a group to help,” he replied. “They should be here in less than a minute.”

She gave him a little bow of the head before turning back to the sages.

It was immediately clear from their conversation that Chao and Huifen had subdued the murderers. He wasn’t fond of Sage Chao, but he respected him. Even if he had pushed Fang to abandon the sect, he’d also been the one to save it from the Sun Emperor and his overlords.

He found the aged woman tied up and laying on her side against the far wall near the feet of a man that was pinned there. The man had fallen unconscious and was hanging there broken.

Shoi-ming scanned him. Death was already looming.

He busied himself when his men arrived. He knew better than to distract himself with the conversation. The details would be revealed to him soon enough. His job was to make it easier on Fairy Pangfua. The less distractions she had, the better he was doing his job.

Despite not listening to the whole explanation, much of it he still heard. He hadn’t seen Sage Chao’s sword and spear more than a couple time, but the instruments of war pinning the murderer to the wall were undoubtedly his. And from what he was hearing, this sage that was his junior in years had questioned the man thoroughly.

He began to question his own judgement of the young man. He thought him naively idealistic, but, in this instance, he’d done exactly what needed to be done—despite how hard it was. It was possible there was more to Fang’s situation than he’d dared to believe.

Shoi-ming didn’t like being wrong, but he admitted it when he was. He’d have to apologize to the young man—to the sage.

After checking in with the guards posted at all the odd entrances, he returned to the room where the man was still pinned. He’d finally died.

He made a fist and imaged thrashing the man himself. It was dirty work that put a bad taste in his mouth, but the safety of the sect came first. What this man had done was the work of the asura cults. Who else could produce such perverse, bloodthirsty disciples?

When Pangfua was about to lead them out of the room, Shoi-ming spoke up, “Sage Chao, your weapons.”

The young man turned and looked at him like he just realized he was there. That was all the confirmation he needed. Even if Chao was naïve and idealistic, he was willing to do whatever it took to keep the joint sect safe. His reaction was proof enough that what he’d just done to the murderer was taking its toll.

“Allow me,” Shoi-ming said. Turning, he firmly put his boot on the corpse’s chest, grabbed both weapons and ripped them out of the wall.

As he removed his boot, the body slumped to the floor. They had all the information they needed so integrity of the crime scene no longer mattered. They had four witnesses including Chao, and one hostile witness in the crazed old woman.

Wiping his boot on a bloodless portion of the man’s back, he turned to Chao, flipped the weapons around and offered, “Would you like me to clean them?”

“No,” Chao replied in hushed tones. He then added with a little more strength. “Thank you, Brother Shoi-ming.”

He gave the sage a martial salute.

“Go,” Pangfua said as Chao took his sword and spear. “I’ll catch up with you.”

Sage Huifen took the blade from her husband and began to clean it as she led the group out.

Fairies Zhu and Diu followed while guiding Eu-meh who was now donning a veil of Ice Phoenix blue.

He soon heard sobs and a command to circulate Heart of Ice as the fairy’s saw what was left of Fairy Daiyu. Shoi-ming’s heart bled for them. He’d also lost friends.

Soon it was just him and Pangfua left in the room. She was direct as always. “Junior Brother, I need to ask a favor. There is too much evidence of Sage Chao’s presence if the corpse remains as it is. Can you make it look as if you did it yourself?”

Even if his respect for the young sage hadn’t grown, it was a request he wouldn’t have hesitated to fulfill. Now, he was honored. “To the smallest detail.”

“Thank you.”

“Leave the rest to me. After I’m finished, I’ll have this chamber and the corresponding ones cleaned to look as if nothing had happened.”

A sliver of a smile appeared on the sage’s face. It was something he would never get tired of seeing.

“I haven’t forgotten you,” Pangfua said to the tied-up death cultivator. “Come.” She dragged her into the air with her qi and left.

Shoi-ming turned to the corpse. He thought Sage Chao had done this day’s dirty work, but it seems there was more to be done. He’d lived four decades. Three as a cultivator of the greatest sect on the Monolith continent. This wasn’t the first time he’d been called to gruesome work, and it wouldn’t be the last.

It was necessary to disguise the wounds for the badly hidden sage Elder Harish would insist on seeing the body. If anything was off, then he’d begin to suspect. The Morning Midst Village sage mostly stayed out of the Divine Spire and left it to the younger generations, but this could give him cause him to investigate personally. Shoi-ming would do his work thoroughly.

***

Dvora had returned to her seat in the Fire Cultivation Chamber and didn’t say a word. She’d later report to her elder, but there were Fire Phoenix disciples precent so now was not the time. She didn’t want to give away that she’d followed the massive Core Disciples Shoi-ming when he’d left. Any courage she’d once possessed had been driven out of her by what she saw.

It hadn’t been much, but it was more than enough. The man pinned to the wall. His body was shredded and burned to coal. She’d spied Sage Pangfua, and every person in the room. She’d known without having to hear a word what had transpired. The man Tao and his wife Fen’er had caught the murderer.

She’d never seen a person so mangled and yet still alive. It was the man who was capable of causing such butchery who’d she’d tried to seduce. She felt nauseous but she’d already emptied her stomach in some random room on her return trip to this chamber. There was some part of her that told her that what the man had done was for a good cause. She was no murderer and inwardly rejoiced the danger was gone. But what if this Tao came for her now that his job was done?

Should she just keep her mouth shut and hope that she’d be forgotten, or find this Tao the first chance she got and fall on her face to beg forgiveness? Should she flee? Doing so if the man didn’t come for her would cause her equal trouble with the Night Pearl Sect. And if he did, she knew it was impossible to get away.

She’d seen the spear and sword driven directly into the stone of the Divine Spire. Was that something a sage was even capable of? All that she could do was wait. Either her life was over, or it had been spared.

For the longest time she couldn’t cultivate and just sat there.

She was pulled aside later and repeated exactly what she had seen. It seemed Sage Pangfua had already informed the heads of the sects that the murderers had been caught. Her elder would give her report to Elder Alfori and she was to return to her cultivation. That was all. She couldn’t even talk with the woman and had no guarantee her own sect had any plans to protect her for simply following orders.

Her mind turned to Brother Baros. She’d had little interaction with him since everything had happened, but he’d reassured her that things were still progressing as they should. So she did the only thing she could. She sat there and waited.