Chapter 85: Trust (Part 1) (Patreon)

At Little Guang's command, a sky full of Ether blades poured down toward the Lord-class Ethereal closing in on Wise.

The sword-light was so dense it nearly blotted out the gray sky overhead.

Each blade was wrapped in condensed Ether energy, edges angled downward, the dense light literally slicing the gray sky into fragments.

The Lord-class Ethereal came to a stop.

It tilted its head back. The Miasma Shield across its carapace flared to life all at once, dark red patterns racing wildly as layer after layer of heavy defense stacked up in front of it.

The blades slammed into the Miasma Shield, a series of dull impacts ringing out as sparks and Ether particles sprayed outward. The shield didn't break.

But the Lord-class Ethereal's attention had been completely pulled away.

It no longer had eyes for Wise.

At the same moment, the other two Lord-class Ethereals, which had been holding still, began to move.

The instant the Lord-class Ethereal's attention shifted, Wise's figure vanished, reappearing a moment later in a blind spot. He swept a quick glance across the battlefield.

The one on the left had several distinct raised nodes across its carapace, each pulsing with dark red light — a ranged attacker. The steadily climbing Ether fluctuation from earlier had come from it.

The one on the right was something else entirely.

It was smaller than the other two, but its limbs were slenderer, and the carapace along its back extended outward on both sides, forming a pair of wing-like structures etched with Miasma Shield patterns.

Not wings built for flight — more like stabilizer surfaces meant to assist aerial maneuvering. Off-white type. Bird type. Capable of aerial combat.

Wise's pupils contracted sharply.

The bird-type Lord-class Ethereal kicked off hard with its hind legs, its whole body shooting skyward.

The instant it left the ground, the Miasma Shield across its carapace pulled inward to center on its torso, concentrating its defenses at the most critical point. It was blindingly fast — within seconds it had climbed to nearly Little Guang's altitude.

Then it folded its wing-surfaces flat, its whole body turning into a streak of shadow as it shot straight toward Little Guang.

Wise's foot was already off the ground.

The instinct for Dimensional Detachment surged through his meridians, Ether energy gathering beneath his feet, ready to fire at any moment.

Barely five seconds had passed since Little Guang unleashed her sword formation.

In those five seconds, she'd need to keep suppressing the Lord-class Ethereal on the ground while also handling another of the same class diving down at her from the air.

"Wise." Little Guang's voice came through the comm channel.

Unhurried, unruffled — her tone was no different than any other day on the training ground.

"Trust me."

The foot Wise had lifted froze in midair.

His fingers clenched, then loosened.

Ether energy gathered in his palm, then dissipated. Two seconds passed.

"Protect yourself."

Wise pulled his foot back and retreated behind cover. "See you in a bit."

"Mm."

The comm channel cut off.

Wise leaned back against the wall, his yellow-green eyes fixed on the bird-type Ethereal diving toward Little Guang up ahead.

His fingers dug into the edge of the cover so hard the rough wall surface bit into his palm — though he didn't even notice.

In the air, Little Guang sat atop the Azure Empyrean Sword Casket, her long hair streaming back in the wind.

She raised her right hand, fingers spread wide.

The sky full of Ether blades, drawn by her palm, all turned in unison.

Hundreds of streaks of sword-light tore through the air, stabbing toward the diving bird-type Lord-class Ethereal.

Orange-white trails streaked across the gray sky, line after bright line, filling the space between them densely.

The bird-type Ethereal twisted sideways in midair.

Its wing-surfaces flexed, using the shifting airflow to whip off a sudden lateral shift, just barely dodging the first wave's direct impact.

A few Ether longswords grazed past its carapace, leaving shallow scratches across the Miasma Shield's surface.

It thought it had gotten away clean.

But Little Guang's combat experience now was nothing like the Yunkui Summit junior sister who once could only overwhelm with a frontal sword formation.

Over these past days of training, Miguel had taught her how to deal with a single agile target.

Ju Fufu had taught her how to anticipate an opponent's evasive path.

Ye Shiyuan had taught her how to hide a follow-up strike inside an attack.

The first wave was never meant to be the real killing blow.

Just as the bird-type Ethereal thought it had dodged successfully, the blades that had been bundled together suddenly scattered wide. It wasn't a collapse. It was control.

Guided by Little Guang, hundreds of streaks of Ether sword-light closed in from every direction, wrapping the Ethereal at their center.

Above, below, left, right, front, back — every direction was sealed off by blades.

Then, all at once, they fired.

"Clang-clang-clang-clang-clang-clang—"

A ceaseless string of impacts exploded through the air.

The Miasma Shield was sliced by hundreds of blades at once — each individual cut wasn't especially powerful, but the strikes came so fast the Ethereal's defenses had no time to redistribute their energy.

The dark red patterns across its carapace flickered wildly, the Miasma Shield's glow dimming bit by bit.

Little Guang sat atop the Azure Empyrean Sword Casket as the patterns across its surface all lit up at once.

Pale cyan light surged out from the case's underside, propelling her forward toward the bird-type Ethereal trapped within the sword formation.

The Miasma Shield was about to shatter. She closed her right hand loosely, and an Ether longsword — several times thicker than the others — took shape in her palm.

If she could just drive this blade in the instant the shield broke—

"Little Guang! Below you!"

Belle's voice suddenly burst through the comm channel.

Little Guang's gaze snapped downward.

On the ground, the ranged-type Lord-class Ethereal had, at some point, already finished charging.

The dark red nodes across its carapace were lit to full intensity, its forelimbs raised in the exact same stance as the Elite-class ranged Ethereal that had crouched atop the rooftop earlier.

But what it fired wasn't an ordinary Ether round.

Its forelimb whipped forward, and chunks of rubble tore up from the ground, hurtling toward Little Guang with tremendous force.

Not just one or two pieces — dozens of them, surging up from below in a dense wave, sealing off any path for Little Guang to retreat downward.

Little Guang's right hand swept out. Her physical longsword left its sheath, physical-type Ether energy layered across the blade, each strike precisely splitting one incoming chunk of rubble.

The stone split in half, flying past her sides and dropping into the ruins below.

But the attack from below wasn't over.

Just as Little Guang's blade split the last chunk of rubble, a blinding dark-red beam of light shot out from the ranged Lord-class Ethereal's forelimb.

An Ether beam. With a sonic boom tearing through the air, it streaked toward Little Guang at tremendous speed.

It came too fast — so fast that Belle's warning cry only made it as far as "Lit—" before the beam struck.

And at that moment, Little Guang was caught in the gap between her last strike and her next — old momentum spent, new momentum not yet risen.

Her right hand had just finished the last cut, her Ether energy still configured for physical-type slicing, with no time left to switch to a defensive mode.

The Azure Empyrean Sword Casket's propulsion had also hit a brief gap after her burst of acceleration a moment ago.