Chapter 697: Chapter 697. "Hands Off My Child, System."
The enormous explosion created by [Empyrean Star Collapse] was large enough to blind most spectators for a small timeframe.
The explosion was so devastating that almost everybody in the Treasure Land heard it.
After all, during their fight, they didn't stop in one place, and they had moved a long trail while being pushed by each other's attacks, creating a path of destruction.
Laurina gulped and asked. "Aunt Tatyana, do you think Yasenia won?"
The rest of the people present looked over.
Tatyana looked on calmly. "Not yet."
As if they were answering Tatyana's words, an aura burst blasted all the dust away, showing the battle situation.
On one side, Yasenia stood still, breathing heavily as the aftereffects of her reckless use of energy ran through her body, making her legs and muscles twitch.
On the other side, Sarah stood missing an entire arm and with a large gash that ran from her shoulder to her waist, revealing her ribcage and dropping rivers of blood.
Soraia, the tall, muscular, brown-haired human woman, rushed forward. "Sarah!"
Tatyana squinted, but she didn't intervene. She didn't need to.
Soraia's pupils shrunk as she summoned an enormous two-handed battle ax and swung it toward her right while coating her body in an energy armor.
CLANG!
Her attacker was repelled, but not by much, showing that their strengths were similar.
The one attacking her was Harmony, the white-feathered bird woman. "Where are you going, Soraia?"
Soraia looked solemnly at Harmony. "Is this conflict really deep enough to kill each other?"
The one who answered was Angel as she walked slowly toward Soraia. "I didn't want to intervene if you stayed in your place, but you are leaving me no choice."
BOOM!
Her aura soared, making her calf-length blonde hair wildly flutter in the air. "Hey, why did you rush forward? Are you trying to attack a weakened Yasenia?"
Angel's tone was chilling to the point that it didn't sound like her.
Soraia's expression hardened, looking cautiously at the monster in the skin of a little girl approaching her. "I didn't."
Angel sneered. "Oh? You didn't? [Truth Intent Level Two]."
A pale white ripple spread with Angel in the middle, engulfing her. Soraia spoke before her brain even processed. "I wanted to attack Yasenia to give Sarah time to recover."
Then, her eyes widened. "Y-You, how?"
Angel laughed chillingly and lifted her two arms. In the next second, [Glass Heart Shield] appeared in one of her arms while she grasped the hilt of her longsword with her other hand.
BANG!
Soraia and the others looked sideways as the explosion came from the main battlefield.
Yasenia had shot forward toward the motionless Sarah.
At the same time, Lea, Astarea, Bai Ling, and Su Ling Shi rushed toward Yasenia.
However, as if they were matching them, Dorian, Lana, Harmony, and Paledora rushed to block them.
Each took care of one, which allowed them all to be blocked.
While all of this happened, there was one person who didn't turn to look, and that was Angel.
"Hey, where are you looking?"
Soraia's body erupted in chills as the voice wasn't as far as before, but it came from right beside her. "[Magma Shield]!"
A hasty magma shield was summoned at her side, but it only earned a scoff from her attacker.
"Andrea's defense is ten times stronger. [Light Severing Sword]."
SLASH!
The magma shield split in half, and the woman behind fared only relatively better.
A massive eruption of blood burst from Soraia's center as if she had been slashed in two. But the blood only burst from the front, showing that the vertical wound was not as deep.
The only reason she wasn't instantly bisected was the defense she placed against Harmony moments earlier.
However, even if one attack didn't work, others would. Angel knew Soraia's intentions, so she was ruthless. In these tense fights, a single distraction can cost one's life, and Soraia's intentions, even if well-intentioned, were not a "little" distraction.
"[Eight Brilliant Swords]."
With all the other human girls being stopped by the beast-human girls and Sarah and Yasenia about to clash again, sadly, no one could save her.
SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!
Meanwhile, in front of Sarah's eyes, a message popped.
[Ding! Rewards reduced by 20%.]
'Eh?'
The real Sarah's eyes widened, not comprehending the message.
While the System had fought with her body, she had been like a third-person spectator looking at what was happening.
She was honestly scared. She thought Yasenia was already overwhelming when fighting her, yet it appeared she had gone easy on her until the system emerged.
That was a misunderstanding, as Yasenia was initially gauging Sarah's strength to finish her off efficiently later.
Regardless, Sarah had been communicating with the system during the combat, asking about winning odds and such, but the only answers she received were unknowns.
Counting this time, the system had possessed her four times, and the previous three were all quick and overwhelming victories for it. However, the system had lost an arm this time, and Yasenia's giant sword had almost split it in half.
However, there weren't any messages announcing defeat, which she had asked to tell her if it was more than 60% sure of defeat.
Still, once Yasenia charged at "her" again, Sarah became nervous, but she had confidence in the system. The reason was that Yasenia seemed to be tired, and the aura around her was not as oppressive as a moment before.
Even the speed looked much slower.
However, while looking at Yasenia, she forgot to look at her surroundings, and a message that made her brain freeze appeared before her.
'Rewards reduced by twenty percent?'
Sarah used this "ghost-like" state to look around, ignoring the about-to-restart battle with Yasenia, and spotted Soraia being sliced in chunks by Angel.
She had naturally heard their previous exchange, but Sarah had previously spoken with Angel, and in her mind, that woman was nothing but a cute and pampered girl who acted like a baby with Yasenia.
Yet, what Sarah was looking at was a cold-faced blonde woman who didn't even blink as she slaughtered her lover.
'Ah...'
Her voice was a choking lament, as if her emotions had twisted into a knot and didn't know how to be expressed.
Yasenia arrived in front of them at this point, lifting her sword and swinging it down mercilessly.
The world before Sarah slowed down, and she looked at the giant broadsword descending.
Then, she spoke bleakly. 'System. Kill everyone at any cost as long as I end in a reparable state.'
[Order Accepted.]
Sarah's body then burst with so much pain that Sarah fainted even in her "ghost form."
However, the system didn't care and followed her orders.
[Soul Combustion Activated.]
[Blood Essence Combustion Activated.]
[Potential Combustion Activated.]
[Needed Points to cushion the aftereffects with current strength are 12,500,000.]
[Not enough points.]
[Chances of self-injury 100%, ignored by Host's request.]
[Chances of self-crippling 100%, ignored by Host's request.]
[Chances of Death 85%, reduced to 0.01% after system intervention. Danger risk acceptable.]
[Unlocking Quasi-Transcendent state: Elemental Lord. Time remaining before burning kills host, 17 seconds.]
BOOOOOOM!
A few instants earlier, Yasenia was swinging down her sword with the intent to kill Sarah, yet, a moment later, her vision blurred as the entire world appeared to spin around her at extremely high speed.
'Huh?'
Then, her brain shrieked in pain as the bones in her entire body were filled with cracks. The feeling of having been hit by a metal wall spread around her whole self, and her organs were all ruptured, making her cough blood while she flew across the entire Treasure Land without control, smashing through dozens of large boulders and cratering into the side of a distant mountain.
All the air was forcefully expelled from her lungs because of the impact, and her skull fractured, making her so dizzy that she couldn't tell north from south. Her ears rang, her vision was gone from the shock, and her sense of smell and taste was filled with the taste and scent of her own blood.
If she were a mortal, her current injuries would be enough to kill her ten times over. The injuries were as bad as the ones she had received during her Heavenly Tribulations.
"W-What, COUGH, happened? BLREGH! COUGH, COUGH, COUGH!"
Yasenia was vomiting blood and pieces of organs as if her insides wanted to be expelled from her mouth.
She spread her spiritual sense, but she could see nothing inside her range, meaning she had been thrown flying for many kilometers. After the small moments of dizziness where she couldn't even think, she knew she couldn't remain in this state, so she immediately used her Celestial Energy with her Dragon Body techniques.
"[Celestial Dragon Body]!"
BOOOM!
Her heavily damaged meridians poured half of the Celestial energy left in the Celestial Energy Star into Yasenia's body and enveloped everything with its presence.
The dragoness's entire body began healing at nonsensical speeds, and while she continued to vomit blood and organ chunks, they were just the ones her body expelled in order to heal itself quicker.
Let's return a few moments earlier.
After the system released [Elemental Lord], Tatyana's and Mirrory's expressions sank, and they moved while bursting out without holding back a single bit. Their level nine intents exploded, and they instantly attacked "Sarah" with the intention to kill.
Sarah, or better put, the System, in its [Elemental Lord] state, gained the strength of a half-step Dantian Spiritualization Realm cultivator that was about to break through into the Transcendence Realm by burning the potential, soul, and Sarah's life-span.
This kind of technique was not known in the lower realms or middle realms, Sky Continent included, because if anybody used even one of those three, it would mean certain death.
So, if, by chance, someone discovered them and used them to test their effects, they would die, making it impossible to spread.
Worse, even in the places that it was known, it was only used by people who gave up everything and were desperate to the point of being consumed by heart demons. The reason was that, while burning even one of those, the very existence of the person would be crippled, which meant that their subsequent reincarnations would also feel that potential, lifespan, or soul burning.
Of course, as a system made by the heaven itself, it had a way of cushioning 99% of the effects. And still, if Sarah managed to escape alive, her existence would become miserable, to say the least, until she could gather enough system points to buy a panacea that could cure these symptoms.
After entering the Elemental Lord state, Yasenia's movements, which had been extremely quick, appeared so laughably slow that she might as well be still.
As an emotionless system, it was merciless.
It didn't think; it didn't ponder whether to kill Yasenia; it just did it.
"Die. [Elemental Lord's Punishment]."
The system's remaining arm moved forward, violently twisting the very fabric of space while five-colored light engulfed hundreds of kilometers around it.
Everyone in the entire Treasure Land saw the massive five-colored light engulfing everything in a presence that made those below the middle level of the Ethereal Soul realm slam against the ground, helpless and afraid.
However, to the system's surprise, two women appeared between Yasenia and itself with violent Death and Truth energies surging around them.
The system was confused.
[Nine Level Nine Intents detected. Extra calculations start. Result: Yasenia Dravory's Death is inevitable unless a Holy-rank skill is used. The probability of them owning one is infinitely close to zero, proceeding with the initial plan.]
Seeing the fist continuing its path, Tatyana and Mirrory acted.
One had an indifferent expression, her green eyes looking at the system with disdain as her long red hair gently swayed with her movements.
Meanwhile, the other had ruby-colored eyes oozing enough killing intent to kill mortals with a glance, her expression was bone-chilling to the point of giving nightmares and create heart demons, while her voice had a phantasmal undertone.
"Hands off my child, system. [Divine Lich Empress's Abyssal Aegis]."
"[Divine Truth: Block]."
[Miscalculation. Two unknown rank skills have been used.]
Meanwhile, Angel felt enormous amounts of energy flowing out of her body, making her lose balance.
Still, even before she could fall or properly think about it, an explosion that shook the entire Treasure Land blasted her and every other person there, flying like a leaf in a hurricane.
BOOOOOOM!
After the tsunami of multicolored light, an earthquake swallowed the entire treasure land.
Even when Tatyana and Mirrory protected 99.9% of the attack, the remaining 0.1% struck Yasenia as they were a fraction of a second too slow.
And that zero point one percent was what sent Yasenia flying like a shooting star across the Treasure Land and smashed her against a distant mountain, almost killing her.
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