Chapter 166 - Festival’s Eve (Part V) (Patreon)

When the colossal fangs descended from the black heavens toward the emerald sea, an overwhelming suction force erupted, giving birth to whirlwinds and typhoons that swept across the Spiritual Sea.

Feeling part of her split soul being pulled away, Resonant Sea Ancestor's eyes widened. She felt the situation was getting out of control, and she had to take matters seriously!

"Pseudo Battlefield Killer Technique: Sea of Ten Thousand Echoes!"

The moment she spoke, a vast portion of Lucian's soul was depleted. Then, the two fangs were forced to siphon the countless echoes of her shout, missing their target. Originally, they would consume the Resonant Sea Ancestor's knowledge, traits, and Qi!

Not only that, but every sound produced in the Spiritual Sea now generated echoes. For example, the night creatures became a source of countless sounds, hurting their own bodies. Be it a beating of their wings, their shrieks, the collisions between them, everything turned into soundwave attacks.

Following that, heartbeats and breaths echoed too. Next, even the blink of an eye produced an echo and hurt the blinking eye.

The echoes multiplied without end, colliding with one another until the night creatures began to shriek and explode because of their simple actions.

Lucian watched in silence, feeling his own heartbeat reverberate through his body, each pulse tearing at his chest.

"Incredible," he muttered, his voice tearing at his lips.

He slowly raised an arm and felt his muscles rip apart. Every slight movement generated new echoes that strained his flesh and ruptured his blood vessels.

Watching the colossal fangs lose their momentum while the crimson storm of creatures was rapidly exterminated, he strained his senses as much as he could.

"There has to be a price for a technique like this," he shouted across the Spiritual Sea, hurting his throat. "I can feel my soul foundation weakening, but if that were the only cost, you would have used it from the very beginning."

Curiously enough, he noticed that his shout only harmed himself. The echoes did not affect the other creatures, and the ones they generated didn't affect each other.

Meanwhile, hidden deep within the Spiritual Sea inside an invisible current, the Resonant Sea Ancestor observed Lucian with an icy expression. Maintaining her Domain while wielding multiple Authorities and casting the Sea of Ten Thousand Echoes came at a price far greater than a soul foundation.

It consumed her very existence!

Had this been her true body and complete soul, forget this pseudo-battlefield technique. With her Nascent Soul cultivation, she could have unfolded a true Domain, one vastly superior to anything a Core Formation cultivator could produce, and erased every one of those night creatures with a single thought. She wouldn't need a technique at all!

Unfortunately, she was just a split soul. Every Authority and major technique she invoked was borrowed power, not something she could sustain.

Suddenly, she frowned and muttered, "I feel tired."

The words had barely left her mouth before thousands of thoughts echoed through her mind.

Her instincts screamed, and she shouted, “Impossible!”

A split soul could not be tired, especially when drawing on another's soul foundation.

Immediately, she scanned her surroundings, searching for the source of the anomaly, inward and outward. She used her Authorities and simple investigative techniques, and then she found it.

A mark shaped like a half-closed eye.

It had been hidden inside one of her memories, embedded within a crimson scene.

"I don't remember this."

Alarmed, she immediately activated her techniques to erase the altered memory. After she did so, a chuckle echoed across the Spiritual Sea.

Turning toward Lucian, the Resonant Sea Ancestor heard him speak.

"This game of cat and mouse is becoming tiresome. You should rest."

Without exposing her location, she answered through the battlefield technique itself, her voice resonating throughout the Spiritual Sea and triggering another wave of destruction.

"Time is on my side. The longer you resist, the weaker you become. Killing me is impossible!"

Lucian smiled coldly and waved his hand in response. Next, an enormous crimson eye, formed from the blood of the fallen night creatures, slowly opened above him.

"I don't want to kill you," he said as the eye formed. "I intend to take everything you have."

A sense of danger washed over the Resonant Sea Ancestor. She observed the eye sinking into the emerald sea, the water's surface rapidly corroded by crimson once more.

Refusing to underestimate Lucian, she abandoned her position. Then, rather than moving normally, she divided herself into flowing branches of water within the Spiritual Sea, adjusting every current so precisely that not even the slightest disturbance was created.

Here in the Spiritual Sea, this water was more of a concept than a physical element, and in her case, she could blend into it through a delicate combination of her Authorities of Resonance and Flow.

As for ordinary Qi techniques, she no longer dared rely on them for concealment.

To her surprise, as the seconds passed, the giant crimson eyeball continued sinking into the emerald sea until it became so small that she could no longer sense it. Even the crimson corrosion it generated diminished.

Her eyes widened, guessing it was a feint, and she immediately turned her attention back to Lucian.

"I knew it!" she said.

While she was distracted, four fingers formed from Blood Essence, pressing against the necks of the night creatures and leaving crimson shackles. After a crimson monster was marked, it would immediately stop producing echoes and scatter throughout the Spiritual Sea in search of her.

"You may be wondering how I did that," Lucian said without pausing his search. "I should thank you. You mentioned earlier that you couldn't use a true Battlefield Killer Technique, hinting that your technique should have a mistake. After analyzing it, I forged a connection between those night creatures and myself, diverting all their echoes into my own body."

Resonant Sea Ancestor's eyes widened in shock. That was too ridiculous!

And indeed, beneath the armor, Lucian's body was constantly splitting apart and rebuilding itself in an endless cycle of destruction and regeneration.

Such ruthlessness toward himself made her grit her teeth. Seeing his resolve, she felt it was time to stake everything. While she was certain that the longer the battle lasted, the greater her advantage became, Lucian was adapting far too quickly, seemingly indifferent to the gradual erosion of his soul foundation.

Resonant Sea Ancestor would never voice it, but she was starting to doubt her odds.

Nonetheless, she still possessed the memories of a Nascent Soul expert. She was anything but a helpless woman. She was a split soul of one of the nine most powerful living beings in this world!

Possessing Lucian, overwriting his identity with her own, and claiming his body had always been her primary objective. However, should that fail, she still had two hidden goals.

The first was to ensure she would never be captured. Even being a split soul, she still carried countless secrets and at least half of her original techniques.

Her second goal was mutual destruction.

Anything else could fail, but Lucian had to die!

If he survived, he would either become an enemy beyond measure or eventually be devoured by another Ancestor, strengthening one of her rivals.

Having reached her decision to throw caution to the wind, she refined more of Lucian's soul foundation into Qi and drew forth the true power of her Authorities.

First, a sphere composed of sweet melodies appeared above her, endlessly echoing through the Spiritual Sea before dividing into countless smaller spheres.

Then, shimmering lines spread outward, connecting her to the heavens, the sea, and everything around her, embodying the resonance shared by all existence. They trembled constantly, quivering as though vibrating to an inaudible melody.

Finally, an invisible current flowed through the countless spheres of echoes and the web of resonance, weaving them into a single form. It was the very same instrument Lucian had seen her playing after he dealt with Xu Hua's regret.

A golden zither, the manifestation of her combined Authorities!