Chapter 119: WITHOUT SENSE

CHAPTER

119

WITHOUT SENSE

JIEYUAN

—∞—

It took Jieyuan a moment to recognize the beast.

The triangular ears, the fox-like head, the long, bushy tail. Green-furred, except for its white underside.

A greenseeker jackal, was it?

The last time he’d seen one had been more than two months ago, back when Meiyao was still around. She’d said it was a scavenger, so that added up. He couldn’t recall her mentioning anything about it being a burrower, but it could be that she hadn’t thought that important enough to mention. Or maybe some other beast had carved out this place, and the jackal had claimed it afterward.

Either way, this is its turf, and we’re intruding.

Jieyuan went over everything else Meiyao had said about it. She hadn’t told him what its beast-skills were, but she had revealed its soulsign. First-sign Orangesoul. Which meant they weren’t outright doomed.

None of them moved. Not Jieyuan, not Daojue, and not the jackal.

The beast might as well have been a statue as it eyed them, glowing green eyes narrow and attentive. No sound came from it. Meiyao might’ve been able to tell what was going on its little head, but Jieyuan didn’t have the slightest clue.

Probably not anything good, though.

The beast’s gaze wasn’t fixed on either him or Daojue specifically, but rather taking them both in at once. It was as silent as the grave. Jieyuan stared right back at it, unmoving, unblinking.

Stare-downs like this happened pretty often—almost always when it came to feline beasts, and more often than not with other types. Even after two months and well over a thousand beasts killed, Jieyuan would only need two hands to count the number of times a beast had gone for the kill right off the bat. Even the more aggressive ones would first spend a little while eyeing them from a distance before approaching.

Best as Jieyuan could tell, these standstills were beasts weighing their odds, deciding whether engaging was worth it. He didn’t know if all chromal beasts acted this way, but the ones in the Gleamstone Valley had been much the same.

Jieyuan kept his breathing even and his body tensed but not tight. He considered the situation.

Normally, he and Daojue would mirror the beast—going still, eyeing it back—in hopes of avoiding a fight, just as they were doing right now. It worked out about one in three times, which wasn’t as much as he’d have liked, but more than he’d have expected.

This time around, though, the odds didn’t seem to favor a peaceful conclusion.

The jackal had found them in its lair. Even if it was willing to overlook that, Jieyuan doubted it’d let them take any of its treasures away.

And he had no intention of giving up on the artifacts here.

The two-headed snake—or at least the white half of it—was the first Orangesoul beast he and Daojue had killed.

It hadn’t been the last.

They’d taken down four more Orangesoul beasts—and each one had left him and Daojue with a new set of scars to remember it by.

Now, Jieyuan didn’t see the point in taking risks if he didn’t stand to gain anything.

But that wasn’t the case here.

There was a haul of Redsoul, Orangesoul, and Yellowsoul artifacts on the line.

And that, Jieyuan decided, was worth a little risk.

His decision made, Jieyuan didn’t hesitate. He let go of the Shifting Feathers, and as the two short-glaives dropped to the ground he swept his arms up, smoothly palming two of his scale blades from his belt purses—one in each hand—and threw the blades at the beast.

The jackal blurred out of the way, and the blades burrowed into the wall of the cave. But Daojue had moved at the same moment Jieyuan did, charging forward, and swept Gleaming End at the moving jackal.

The beast retreated.

Maeva, fetch me a pill.

Daojue shot toward it, while Jieyuan let loose two more blades. The jackal kicked off to the side in a blur of green and white, toward the wall of the cave, and all the attacks hit either wall or empty air.

Maeva, in the meanwhile, used his soulforce to draw an agility augmenter pill—a small, round, yellow thing—from one of his belt purses.

Mid-air, the beast spun around, reorienting its body, before it landed on the wall with all four claws, standing on like it was on the ground, like gravity was coming at it from sideways.

Some manner of aura-lashing? It wasn’t the first time Jieyuan had seen a chromal beast replicate that particular power, despite their lack of aura.

Before the jackal could do anything else, Daojue reached it, stabbing at it with his spear. It dodged again, dashing across the wall. Another volley of blades followed up Daojue’s attack, and Jieyuan was already preparing another.

Maeva brought the agility augmenter to his lips, and Jieyuan swallowed it down just as the jackal dodged again. Immediately he could see its effects. Though the jackal probably moved at the same speed as earlier, this time Jieyuan saw it clearly as it kicked off the wall and jumped—for Heavens’ sake, is it a dog or a rabbit?—toward the opposite side of the cave, where it landed on the wall and stuck to it like a lizard.

It was still fast, though. Too fast. Given Jieyuan’s soulsign and the agility pill he’d just taken, he should have about three-quarters the speed of a first-sign orangesoul. And yet the jackal was at least twice as fast as he was. What it lacked in size, it more than made up for in speed.

Jieyuan gritted his teeth, palming two more scale blades. The larger a beast was, the greater its strength, that much was true. But agility was usually inversely proportional to size—and speed, as Jieyuan saw it, was much more of an advantage than strength. Not to mention that a small beast’s dimensions made it even harder to hit.

Give me big and slow over small and fast, any day, any time.

Daojue attacked again, and so did Jieyuan, sending more blades flying toward the jackal.

Again the beast evaded. But this time was different. Right before the jump, its body shimmered—and when it jumped, it did in two different directions, as two jackals appeared where there used to be one.

Oh, come on. Jieyuan groaned. Not this again.  

One of the jackals went up, toward the ceiling—while the other shot straight toward him.

Two months ago, Jieyuan might’ve jumped back or drawn a pair of scale daggers to meet the charge. But he’d been in enough fights these last two months for his instincts to favor a different course of action. He didn’t move from his place as he whipped his arms down and then up. Two more daggers went flying toward the beast.

When something’s in the air and can’t fly, it might as well be a practice target.

The jackal twisted, jerking its body mid-air, and Jieyuan didn’t get a proper look at the results of his throws as he stepped to the side. The jackal flew past him, crashing into the wall at the back of the cave, falling into the pile of armor.

Jieyuan shot a quick look back to the front of the cave—Daojue was fighting the other jackal, keeping it occupied—before focusing on his target, which was just slowly getting out the pile.

Maeva, keep an eye on Daojue and the other jackal for me. His soulsense was enough to cover the cave, and he felt Maeva’s touch on his mind as she pulled on it. He couldn’t sense the other jackal, but he could sense Daojue just fine. He was sure Daojue had it handled, but he didn’t know what other powers the jackal—or maybe it was jackals, now—had.

The jackal got fully back on its feet, growling at him now as it glared at him, surrounded by gauntlets and greaves. One of the blades Jieyuan had thrown earlier was sticking out of its chest, burrowed almost all the way through. Blood darkened the white fur around it. Of the other blade, there was no sign.

Well, so much for hoping for a quick fight. Jieyuan waved his hands past his belt again. His left one drew another throwing blade, whereas his right one took out a scale dagger—longer, thicker, with a proper handle.

He was about to throw the blade when the jackal’s eyes flashed.

Everything went dark. Dark and silent and formless. Sight, hearing, touch, smell—all gone. Everything except his soulsense.

Jieyuan could sense the ambient chroma around him, Daojue further back, and the artifacts on the cave floor. There were also multiple little voids, where there wasn’t any ambient chroma. The higher-realm artifacts.

But Jieyuan’s biggest concern were the two much bigger voids, one near Daojue, and the other in front of him. The jackals.

And there’s our second beastskill. Maeva, can you restore my senses?

“No,” Maeva said. “But I can take over—”

No. I’ve got it. Just keep an eye on Daojue and the other jackal.

Jieyuan took a slow, tentative step forward. His sense of balance was skewered, what with being unable to feel the floor under him—he felt like he was floating—but he anchored himself in his soulsense. The jackal-shaped void in front of him didn’t move.

He couldn’t feel the touch of the weapons in his hands—nor sense them with his soulsense, as they were Orangesoul. But he still had a feel for the strength of his grip, and his aura provided a general sense of his body. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but it’d have to do.

What will it be? Jieyuan focused on the jackal. A lunge, or a prowling advance? He took another drawn-out step forward, slow and hesitant.

That was when the jackal moved, stepping forward as slowly as he was moving.

There we go. Come on, pup.

Jieyuan pretended not to notice as he took another step. The jackal moved too—but faster than before, advancing cautiously but more confidently.

The jackal had probably only ever used this senses-suppression power on other beasts before, and if they had been Redsoul like he was, they shouldn’t have been able to sense it. Jieyuan wasn’t sure if chromal beasts had their own form of soulsense, but if they did, he didn’t reckon they’d have much luck sensing something at a higher realm based on the lack of presence.

Even with all the training Jieyuan had gotten from Maeva at using his soulsense, it was still no small trick. You needed to have very good chromal depth perception—or whatever it was called—to pinpoint empty spots.

Soon the jackal was within only a few feet of him. A jackal-shaped void of chroma, right in front of him.

Jieyuan still feigned obliviousness. He stepped forward—

The jackal lunged.

Jieyuan whipped his right arm to the front, driving his dagger forward, while swinging his left arm, striking with his throwing blade from the side.

Both his hands stopped just shy of the triangular, head-shaped void.

And then his senses returned. And Jieyuan saw the jackal, the dagger buried right between its eyes and the throwing blade sunken into the side of its neck.

Jieyuan stared at the jackal, watching it warily as it twitched, keeping both blades inside it. It was easy to tell when a cultivator died. Their soul vanished, whisked up by the Heavens, so their body turned mundane again. With chromal beasts, though, their spirit-shadow remained, so you only had the physical, biological signs to go on.

Normally, a dagger to the brain should be plenty to seal the deal, but you never knew, with chromal beasts. Jieyuan kept the blades in for a few moments more, until the jackal went entirely still and he felt the beast slump, the only thing holding it up being the blades piercing it.

Jieyuan pulled the weapons out, and the jackal collapsed. Then he stepped back, turning around. Daojue… was standing behind him, Gleaming End held to the side, and looking unharmed for the most part. There was no sign of the other jackal.

“It was a clone,” Maeva told him. “It disappeared the same moment you regained your senses.”

“Hmmm.”

Jieyuan glanced back down at the jackal. At the Orangesoul beast he’d killed practically on his own, despite being only at sixth-sign Redsoul himself. Granted, it was easily the weakest Orangesoul beast they’d faced so far—scavengers were more about stealth than power, and the jackal had been no exception, given its beastskills—but still.

He grinned, then turned over to Daojue. “Let’s get out of here.”