Reaper of the Martial World

Book 4: Chapter 77: Struggle

The look in Dyon’s eyes had completely changed. A dense black flame still remained, however, there was an intelligent flicker that hadn’t been there just moments before. Dyon’s motives had completely changed from mutual destruction, to seeking victory at all costs.

‘You’ve trampled over my home, killed my family, and then dared to say that everything was rightfully yours to begin with…’ A deep seeded anger sprung from the deepest recesses of Dyon’s being. ‘The loss you’ll suffer today is one I’ll make sure you never forget.’

To anyone else, the idea of a meridian formation expert facing off against two celestials and an entity of unknown power was ridiculous – nothing short of seeking death. However, Dyon’s mind only allowed him to see paths to victory.

One way or another, he’d grasp it.

A moment later, the blinding pillar of light that encased Dyon began to slowly fade, revealing his still kneeling figure.

Elder Daiyu and Patriarch Ragnor still had not dared to move, but the entity’s shadow was clearly still giving off an amused air. He didn’t seem to care about what did or didn’t happen within the sealed world.

“Oh?” The shadow chuckled. “It seems you’ve learned to block your mind using The Seal.”

Dyon stood, not being able to stand the idea of kneeling to anyone. The oppressive energy that had locked down on him thanks to Patriarch Ragnor, was easily ignored by making use of The Seal. Because his soul was already a single step from the celestial level, and The Seal provided an added boost, something like this was well within his power.

The range of abilities of this treasure was something even Dyon’s master hadn’t fully grasped, but if lower level seals from the Sigebryht could do away with even death qi, how could the emperor of all seals not deal with mere celestial energy?

The only down fall of the treasures of the 33 heavens was the amount of stamina they took to use. However, with Dyon’s soul talent and accumulated prowess, he could already passively use The Seal in this fashion with negligible consumption. Quite simply put, the soul type 33 heaven weapons would all dream to have Dyon as their master even more so than normal treasures would!

Patriarch Ragnor immediately noticed the uselessness of his energy. “Kneel! How dare you!?” He couldn’t help but tremble nervously. No matter how amicable the entity seemed, he and Elder Daiyu knew the truth. Dyon’s rebellion wouldn’t only cause punishment for Dyon, but him as well!

Dyon took a deep breath, looking into the sky. Even with The Seal greatly helping him, the pressure of the entity still bore down on him just as heavily as it did before. It was clear his soul wasn’t powerful to negate that level of effect. He could only thank his master… In her final moments, not only had she cleared his mind, she helped him regain his soul stamina.

No one understood just the amount of fatigue Dyon’s soul had been under until this moment. If he wasn’t tired beyond belief, how could he only be capable of attacking a single time with his puppet? Remember, Dyon was someone who had taken control of that very puppet at dead kings valley, with vastly inferior soul strength, for months before collapsing. And yet that same Dyon, with vastly improved soul strength, could only attack once? Even if attacking and simply controlling movement required a large disparity in energy – attacking obviously needing much more – the difference was much too exaggerated.

That is why putting things into perspective is so important.

Even before Dyon had a massive hole blown through his chest by Zabia, he had been making full use of his death will form. The use of a supreme law for an extended period of time, especially by someone who wasn’t yet an essence gathering expert, was taxing to the extreme on not just the soul, but also the body.

And yet, directly after that, Dyon had to struggle in a time locked zone to keep his body alive.

For six whole months, Dyon did nothing but stretch his soul out to the extreme, trying to comprehend higher and higher levels of death intent. All that time, he spent stubbornly avoiding the easy path of cultivation, instead wanting to forge his own.

To make things worse, Dyon’s soul continually improved during those 6 months. He had started off at the peak of the 7^th stage when he entered, but when he exited, his soul had already stretched itself to the peak of the 8^th stage. That was like going from the 6^th saint stage all the way to the 12^th!

This would normally be a great thing, but in a time locked zone where there was no flow of energy, this was devastating. It was like Dyon was continually exercising a muscle, and that muscle wanted to get stronger and grow, and yet it got no rest or nutrients!

Although Dyon stepped out with a peak 8^th stage soul, his true soul battle prowess was likely more accurately around the 2^nd or 3^rd soul stage. At that point, you could imagine his peak 8^th stage soul like a massive body of land you should find a refreshing lake in, and yet all you saw were dried and cracked patches of land with sprinkles of moist soul here and there.

And yet, that body of land kept getting larger and larger, stretching out the few moist patches until they too became dried out beyond repair…

That’s what Dyon’s soul was like when he tried to use his puppet and that wasn’t even mentioning the amount of soul stamina he had to divert to save Zabia’s life and stop his soul from dissipating. No wonder he felt so fatigued. Madeleine had used a supreme level intent for a few moments, and yet that had left her completely incapacitated. The fact Dyon was even standing right now was a testament to his will power and domineering soul talent.

Everyone wanted to talk about how Dyon took a power that didn’t belong to himself… What they should be talking about was what kind of monster would it take to shatter a seal placed by The Seal itself!

They were about to find out.

Dyon stood calmly as though the next moments wouldn’t decide whether or not he lived.

Although the entity could no longer read Dyon’s mind, he had a clear understanding of what would happen next. “Haha, this should be an interesting show.”

With those final words, the shadow disappeared.

In the face of The Seal, in the form the entity was in currently, there was nothing he could do. After all, it was the very thing that had put him in the situation he was in currently. He hadn’t been joking when he said he could only wait when Dyon’s master pulled him into the sealed world.

After seeing that Dyon had grasped the use of the seal so easily, he was fully aware that Dyon’s next step would be to close the alter so that he wouldn’t be able to interfere.

Dyon was fully aware that although the entity was restricted, he could very well tip the battle to levels that made an already slim chance at victory impossible. After all, even while sealed, the entity had shattered the array that was concealed within Dyon’s mind. It was clear that he at least had some battle prowess.

Seeing the massive stone alter close and disappear into the ground, rage filled Patriarch Ragnor’s eyes. As for Elder Daiyu, a complex emotion crossed his eyes before he stood to face Dyon.

“Why do you bother struggling?” Elder Daiyu spoke as though he was pleading with Dyon to give up.

“Your voice is quite soft for someone asking another to accept their death.” Dyon didn’t even look at Patriarch Ragnor or Elder Daiyu. He continued to look into the skies as though he was contemplating something. “However, I have no sympathy for you. Not after what I’ve been through. Today, either you or I will die.”

The array that concealed the dragon king’s form shattered on Dyon’s wrist, erupting into brilliant black flames as a ten-foot scythe appeared in Dyon’s hand.

Tattoos of grey and black swam across his lean torso, his eyes setting into a deep red.

The Mathilde family Asura’s eye bloomed to full effect, reaching its peak with Dyon’s manifestations appearing in the skies, turning the natural greenery and light atmosphere of the Belmont Holy Land into a dreary one – filled with anger and resentment.

Immediately afterwards, hundreds of white lilies bloomed in the skies. With celestial energy no longer being capable of locking down Dyon, he was free to teleport.

With a flash of his weapon’s pagoda, every 10% clone was instantly graced with an identical scythe of domineering proportions.

The amount of soul stamina needed to not only create hundreds of clones, but to also sustain so many weapons, all while utilizing a one with heart supreme law was something few could fathom. And yet Dyon did it as easily as breathing.

If he didn’t go all out… He wouldn’t stand a single chance.

Patriarch Ragnor’s laughter boomed through the beautiful inner world. “You truly are the best of the best. In terms of the younger generation, who could possibly have beaten you? To think that anyone doubted your first place position.”

The praise coming from Patriarch Ragnor seemed completely out of place when compared to the savage light in his eyes, and yet he sounded so completely sincere.

“However…” The dark light in his eyes only grew with each passing second as arcs of lightning danced along his skin. “Even for you, it’s thousands of years too early to challenge me!”

The inner world began to crackle with endless amounts of lightning. A stifling sense of danger caused the hairs on the back of Dyon’s neck to stand, but he couldn’t read what was going to happen!

Arcs of red appeared in an instant, mercilessly crashing into Dyon’s clones and transmitting back a blood curdling pain to him.

It all happened in an instant and yet all Dyon could do was watch, wide-eyed, as every clone he had created – hundreds of clones! – disappeared right before his eyes, leaving only himself!

Patriarch Ragnor looked down on Dyon with contempt. “I can kill you as easily as I can snap my fingers. Did you really think such a petty trick would work?”

Dyon didn’t seem to hear those words, as hundreds of lilies appeared even as Patriarch Ragnor finished his sentence.

Elder Daiyu only stood to the side, shaking his head, but not making a move to interfere. To use two celestial experts against a single meridian formation child was beneath him.

10% clones charged forward without fear, each wielding a wisp of death qi as they raged toward Patriarch Ragnor.

The amused expression on Patriarch Ragnor’s features quickly turned to that of annoyance. He couldn’t lock onto Dyon in the distance because the seal was interfering, and now Dyon was using his clones like he did his army – except the coordination was on a completely other level because they were Dyon!

There were no messages needed, nor was there any confusion.

Thousands of tiny arrays flew from Dyon’s body and appeared in the air every second, teleporting and changing the position of his sprinting clones every moment.

His Asura’s eye almost gave him God-like perspective on the battle field. He could see the slightest twitch of Patriarch Ragnor’s muscles, resulting in him changing the position of his clones just in time to avoid the arcs of lightning.

When the clones reached Patriarch Ragnor, they were almost like mosquitoes, sending stinging death qi through the lightning before they died. Regardless of how weak Dyon was, a supreme law was a supreme law. Although Patriarch Ragnor had master his lightning intent to an astonishing 7^th level, one with law, it was a mere elemental will. How could it block a supreme law at the intent level?

However… That was all it did. Without powerful attacks to match his supreme law, all Dyon could do was irritate Patriarch Ragnor. The damage was so negligible that it could hardly be called damage at all.

Patriarch Ragnor roared in anger. He was a first-grade celestial expert! His talent could look down on nearly every martial artist with complete disregard and disdain, and yet he was being annoyed by a meridian formation expert?

He stomped forward. “Since you want to hide, I’ll come to you.”

His speed was simply blinding. Even Dyon’s 6^th sense boosted with Asura’s Imperial Eye didn’t allow him to see the movements clearly. At most his saw a blur of lightning streaking toward him with unprecedented speed.

In less than a split second, Patriarch Ragnor had already bore down on Dyon, completely ignoring the clones.

“Since I can’t kill you directly, I’ll just cut off your legs and arms.” Patriarch Ragnor’s smile of amusement was back, almost as though he couldn’t believe he allowed himself to be irritated by this child.

Suddenly, Patriarch Ragnor’s smile froze as he noticed Dyon’s look of panic shift into a smirk as he pointed upwards.

Patriarch Ragnor’s eyes rounded out as he felt a shocking pressure suffocate him.

Brilliantly embroidered steps appeared in the air. It was a treasure shaped like a temple, with a set of stairs on all four sides, leading to an alter at the peak. This was none other than the Aurora Steps!

Dyon’s soul pressure directly crushed Patriarch Ragnor to the ground. Even with Dyon’s stamina, his face immediately paled by a shade, but the savage light in his eyes didn’t fade as he watched the mighty Patriarch Ragnor fall to his hands and knees before him.

“Die!” Dyon’s scythe swung, bathed in a dense black light.

However, there was something that Dyon seemed to forget in that moment.

Elder Daiyu had been watching silently all this time, but that didn’t mean that he wasn’t always prepared. Unlike Patriarch Ragnor, he had long since learned to not underestimate Dyon from their very first encounter in the Elvin Kingdom.

He appeared behind Dyon and outside the range of the Aurora Steps, raising his hand with a solemn expression on his features.

“I have no choice… Forgive me.”

Dyon smirked, “No one forgot about you, stupid old man.”

Dyon had little respect for people who gave up all of their morals for the sake of fear or power. Elder Daiyu was clearly remorseful about many things, but what did that have to do with Dyon? Remorseful or not, he still had every intention of killing Dyon.

That meant that this man was willing to not only toss away his own moral code, but he also wanted to cause irreparable pain to Dyon’s friends and family? In fact, he already had! Dyon wouldn’t forgive that.

Even more disgustingly ironic was the fact this man probably found it beneath him to team up against a meridian formation expert just moments ago, but as soon as he saw Patriarch Ragnor is a predicament, he didn’t hesitate to jump in.

Elder Daiyu remained oblivious to Dyon’s reaction. After all, he couldn’t see Dyon’s face from behind him.

A sword of fire qi extended from his hand in an instant. All of his daos had fallen to the will level, but that didn’t mean that his proficiency wasn’t much more impressive than most others.

However, because of the damage to his soul, he often kept his wills to the lowest level possible and refrained from using them for extended periods of time. Since wills heavily relied on the soul for stamina of use, this made sense.

Just like that, Patriarch Ragnor could only watch as a scythe coated in unyielding death qi made way for his head, all while Elder Daiyu aimed to cut Dyon’s scythe wielding arms off with a single swift motion.

One a blazing heat… And the other an eerie cold…

Dyon’s smirk deepened, moments before Elder Daiyu’s blade reached him, his eyes flashed with gold, causing his trump card to appear in an instant.

A 20-meter-tall puppet with domineering aura appeared between Dyon’s back and Elder Daiyu, shocking the old man. He had no idea that Dyon had a second! In fact, he didn’t have any idea of Dyon having even a single one. When would Patriarch Ragnor have had time to tell him something like that? In fact, Patriarch Ragnor wouldn’t have seen a reason to. To him, Dyon had left his puppet behind!

Elder Daiyu was caught completely unawares.

Dyon’s soul immediately connected to the puppet, blooming its power to its peak 4^th celestial stage. Something Elder Daiyu had no chance of matching!

The sword swung out viciously, sending a tempest of winds through toward the old man and shattering his fire blade in an instant.

Blood spewed from Elder Daiyu’s mouth as he flew back kilometers at a time, his arms completely shattered.

The vicious light in Dyon’s eyes didn’t disappear as he tried to slice off Patriarch Ragnor’s head completely in the next moment.

However… What should have been a perfect opportunity collapsed.

Because Dyon had been forced to divert his soul power to controlling the puppet, the pressure on Patriarch Ragnor had dissipated just enough for him to regain his senses and fly backward, panting heavily.

Dyon’s scythe just missed the top of his head, dripping with only the smallest bit of blood after the exchange.

Patriarch Ragnor shook with rage as he raised a hand to the top of his head. He stared in abject shock as his hand came back matted with red blood and sliced blond hair.

Dyon immediately cut off his soul from the aurora steps. After just that brief exchange that should have only lasted a fraction of a second, he already felt like his soul was on the verge of being completely depleted again.

However, he was lucky that he was correct. His soul was strong enough to effect Patriarch Ragnor.

At first, Dyon had been really worried. Even with the height of his 6^th sense, he couldn’t see through Patriarch Ragnor’s soul strength at all!

Usually this meant that the opponent he was facing had vastly higher soul strength as compared to him, and this would have made sense too. After all, as a peak celestial grade expert, Patriarch Ragnor must have spent hundreds of years, if not thousands, in the celestial level. With him having that much time, and being just a step away from dao formation, how could he really only saint or lower stage soul?

But, with how drastically he reacted to being pressured by Dyon’s soul, he had to have a weaker soul. Which meant he was likely using a treasure to hide his true soul strength. Dyon had heard of these from his master’s memories. Since one of the best ways to protect your soul was by protecting its true level from others, it made sense that experts would have something like this.

Blood seeped from Patriarch Ragnor’s lips from the tremendous pressure his soul had just felt. “Ha…” He laughed to himself, “Good… Good… You’ve succeeded in angering me!”

In the distance, Elder Daiyu slowly stood, twisting the odd angles of his arms back into place. His arms were still broken, but he of course needed them to be in place properly so they can heal.

Dyon noticed this but didn’t seem too surprised.

One might be confused. After all, Matriarch Niveus had higher cultivation than Elder Daiyu and had faced off against a weaker puppet, and yet she was only able to survive due to burning her blood essence. So, why was Elder Daiyu standing as though nothing had happened and casually shifting his broken arms?

Dyon laughed, mocking Elder Daiyu, “To think the mighty Black Jade Dragons would be the first of their prideful species to lower their heads to another. How pitiful. It’s too bad my master sealed most of your beast forms.”

Elder Daiyu said nothing as he calmly looked at Dyon from the distance. But, it was clear that despite his usual appearance, a rage was building in his eyes. The sealing of their beast forms was a complete humiliation!

“Since you said most, you should know that there were some beast forms that still exist to this day… And sometimes… It’s best not to provoke those beasts…”

Elder Daiyu’s body began to enlarge as domineering black scales sprung into existence along his body.

His clothes tore away from him as a mighty roar escaped from his lips for the first time in centuries.

Dyon could only chuckle bitterly as he watched a majestic dragon snake through the skies for hundreds of meters, domineering horns protruded from its forehead.

The world around them shook, trembling under the sheer arrogance of the Black Jade Dragon.

“Well…” Dyon looked between the fuming peak celestial with arcs of red lightning dancing along his body and the roaring dragon. “Nothing about this is going to be easy…”