Chapter 128 – Selenic Ironbark Seal
The moment Flaring Light was knocked away, the demon swung his fist again, and like a bee attracted to the scent of a blooming flower he closed in on Ye Wei regardless of the attempts to dodge him.
“You are just a human Warrior, learn your place!” The demon chuckled.
‘Driftwind Steps!’ Ye Wei’s pupils dilated, and strands of runes quickly appeared under his feet. He turned into a blur and flashed three times with each step he took leaving the demon farther behind.
The ordinary Driftwind Steps would never have helped Ye Wei out of this sticky situation, but the Star Shifter form allowed him to use the incoming force of the demon’s fist like his own Qi which boosted the stance’s effectiveness. This was what enabled him to slip away from the cold fist one time after another.
“Your clan sent a demon General here?” Ye Wei’s fighting spirit was ignited by the demon in front of him, who was the equivalent of a condensed prime Warrior.
“Haha! What is this? You want to kill me?” Ye Wei’s expanding presence didn’t go unnoticed. “Hahaha! Although I have only just evolved into a General, but with the Black Mist clan’s gifts, I wouldn’t even have a problem destroying a condensed prime Warrior; I suggest that you don’t get any funny ideas. It will be painful if you make me angry!” The demon said while laughing disdainfully as he looked at Ye Wei.
His laughter intensified and became a clap of thunder which shook the ground and split the courtyard into small islands releasing a storm of dust into the air.
A strange blanket of black mist then spread throughout the courtyard from where the demon stood.
“Be careful what you wish for sometimes you will get really disappointed when you dream too big.” Ye Wei welcomed the black mist as he stepped forward and the golden runes covering his bones began to flow.
‘First Supernova evolution!’
Ye Wei’s Qi expanded and burst out of his body which sent a rippling energy wave through the courtyard, stopping the wind caused by the demon’s stomp.
“Humm, that’s what you beat Qi Xiu with? It is an interesting amplifying stance!” The demon’s face changed when he felt Ye Wei’s energy surging upwards. In response, his dark figure became blurry again as he prepared to answer the amplifying stance.
The power Ye Wei possessed at this point greatly exceeded what a normal Warrior’s body could handle.
“You think you can get away?” Ye Wei launched himself forward, and his speed was greatly boosted by the runes under his feet. Within the blink of an eye, he was in front of the demon, and his fist sped up to a blur.
“There is a special presence on your body!” The demon’s gaze fell onto Ye Wei then he chuckled and quickly flashed away from the course of Ye Wei’s fist.
‘Triple Selenic Punch!’ Ye Wei jumped up in the air and opened his left hand. Then he stretched his fingers, raining down runes from each of his fingertips. Soon after, a beast shaped crest appeared on the back of his hand. Under the effect of Supernova stance, the power of Triple Selenic Punch was also amplified.
“Bang! Bang! Bang!”
Ye Wei’s punches fell from above leaving gigantic potholes on the ground and splashing up debris when he pulled his fist back up.
The demon knew better than to take on Ye Wei right now, so he kept evading the vicious attacks with strange movements of his body.
“So young yet so powerful. I can’t find a reason not to eat you! Your flesh must be really tasty,” The demon said as his bloodshot eyes became cold. Ye Wei could feel a terrifying killing intent intensifying in the demonic Qi.
Another punch was thrown, but this time, the demon did not bother dodging; instead, he lunged forward and grabbed Ye Wei’s wrist. Suddenly, his arm thickened, and the dark hair on his skin stood up like needles. His grip on Ye Wei kept tightening as his arm transformed to its original demon form.
“Let go!”
Feeling the pressure of the demon’s piercing grip, Ye Wei’s pupils dilated as he was overwhelmed by pain. He quickly swung his sword at the demon’s arm forcing his transforming opponent to let go of his wrist and back off.
Although wielding a sword while punching, Ye Wei’s strikes did not get any weaker and he was not slowed at all.
The two quickly exchanged fifty rounds of blows.
“Humph!” The demon grunted and made a fist with his other hand as it finished transforming. He then swung it towards Ye Wei’s rune empowered punch.
A thundering rumble marked the moment the two fists met.
Ye Wei rode the explosive energy as he pulled his fist back and did a backflip returning safely to Cao Ning’s side. He landed heavily in a half-kneeling position and stabilized himself placing his hand on the ground which left cracks in the ground where his finger.
After using a few more stances one after the other to fight the demon, Ye Wei’s face had turned pale. Having to keep up his speed drained of him more Qi and will-force than he anticipated. Even though he had three to four times more Qi and will-force than other cultivators with at his level, the situation was turning desperate.
But the demon wasn’t faring any better; his robe had long since been shred to pieces, body been worn and now he was leaning against the courtyard’s wall; his casual attitude had long since vanished.
The demon General was more terrifying than Ye Wei had expected. Although under the effect of the Supernova stance, Ye Wei was not able to gain any advantage over his opponent.
“A peak ten-star Warrior with powers comparable to a two-star condensed prime Warrior and someone who knows an amplification stance, you are full of surprises!” The demon said while shaking his fist trying to get rid of the numbness; his pupils slowly changed into a triangular shape, and his glare became much more sinister.
“I admit it, I have underestimated you, but now you have left me no choice but to show you my true from,” The demon panted heavily. “Let me show you how you will meet your demise!”
Surrounding himself with a red mist the demon’s body quickly underwent a drastic transformation.
“Thump!”
“Thump!”
“Thump!”
The thundering demonic heartbeat echoed in the courtyard, and an utterly terrifying pressure caused the atmosphere to thicken to the point where the air felt almost sticky suffocating Cao Ning.
From this Ye Wei could safely assume what he was facing was not just an ordinary demon General, but a very talented one.
“Wei! Careful!” A burst of energy swept the courtyard knocking Cao Ning into the air. He then landed heavily more than ten meters back.
“I know!” Although Ye Wei was tired after the violent exchange, his dantian was actually getting stronger from the heavy Qi usage and was showing signs growing.
‘Second evolution!’
The energy level within Ye Wei’s body soared once again, and as he didn’t want to waste the limited time of the amplifying effect, he quickly drew a sequence of runes.
‘Selenic Ironbark Seal!’
Staring at the red mist coming out of the transforming demon’s pores Ye Wei did not hesitate to use his best-kept secret, the fifth stance of the Selenic Seven Stances.
The Selenic Ironbark Seal was a low-level Myst stance, and all one hundred and thirty-six runes forming the stance were specialized runes. These specialized runes were the reason why despite Ye Wei having used only enough Qi to activate a low-level Myst stance, it had the power of its mid-level counterpart.
In order to learn this Myst stance, Ye Wei had to use the second evolution of the Supernova stance to meet the Qi, will-force, and body strength requirement that otherwise couldn’t be met by anyone below the condensed prime level. With the help of the Supernova stance, it took Ye Wei more than a year to master this stance. The Glacial Emperor created the Selenic Seven and all seven of them were unrefinable stances. Despite this Ye Wei had mastered five of them!
Even under the effect of Supernova’s second evolution, it was proving hard for him to use this Myst stance composed exclusively of specialized runes.
“Zoom! Zoom!”
A sequence of complex runes appeared as Ye Wei slowly dragged his finger across the air, and his face turned paler after each stroke.
While the specialized runes were being drawn, strands of the lingering red mist were getting thicker and spun around the demon like flying serpents.
“Roar!”
The demon roared into the sky and let out a painful sounding grunt then his body inflated at a terrifying speed.
“Crack! Crack!”
The sound of tearing cloth could be heard as the demon’s black body expanded and his black robe burst into pieces.
A three-meter tall monstrous figure emerged from within the red mist. His triangular pupils dilated as he glared at Ye Wei with red bloodthirsty eyes. His needle-like black hair stood up as his seemingly rock hard muscles were bulging.
This was the true form of a Blackmist Demon, one of the seven biggest demon clans.
Under normal circumstances, a demon’s body was the same as a human’s apart from their hearts. Their heart was the main source of a demon’s power. When stimulated by bloodlust a demon’s hearts releases its energy which transforms demons into their true form. The stronger a demon is, the better they can control their powers.
“Time to die you, petty human!” The demon roared and lunged toward Ye Wei. This happened so quickly that his body disappeared into the dark night, and the next moment, he reappeared in front of Ye Wei. He rose his hairy hand high and swung it right at the human’s head.
The violent strike created a fearsome pressure wave that shook the whole courtyard and created a web of fissures on the ground. If it weren’t for the Black Scale Array, the whole palace would have been shaken.
‘This is it!’ Ye Wei ground his teeth and finished the last three specialized runes with both of his hands dancing through the air.
Just half a second before the demon’s strike was about to land on Ye Wei’s head a large, wood-textured palm appeared from the specialized rune sequence with a brown glow shining through the grains.
“Boom!”
The courtyard was reduced to flat ground from just the pressure wave of the wooden palm.
Ye Wei’s stance then crashed onto the demon’s large hairy hand. The recoil sunk Ye Wei’s body into the ground and simultaneously sent the demon flying like a kite with its string cut.